Trapped

by Isla Whitcroft

  Cate paused for a minute, regaining her breath. With adrenalin coursing through her veins she had turned into a fighting machine, aggressive, powerful, ruthless even, almost as if it was someone else rather than her. But she had no time to analyse her feelings now, there was work to do.

  She pulled out her gun from the rucksack and rested it against her left hand, her right hand on the trigger, and moved silently back to the bridge.

  ‘What the hell—’ It was the last words the guard said for a good few hours. Cate hit him hard over the head with the gun, and his body slumped onto the desk behind him. She grabbed a clump of his dark, curly hair, lifted it up and checked his eyes. Definitely unconscious.

  She got to work, with no idea when the next guard would appear. She searched frantically for something indicating the radar and sonar computer system, checking above and below the desk and on the shelving which ran around the room. Cate cursed aloud. Of course, she remembered now. What José had said as she had walked past the bank of screens downstairs on the bottom deck. ‘The sonar system,’ he had told her proudly, ‘is here.’

  Cate groaned. Now she had to do what she could to retrieve the situation but it was taking a lot longer than she had imagined.

  She grabbed her phone and texted Marcus. Pull back until I say so.

  Immediately he was back to her. We are getting you off now.

  No can do. Sonar and radar still not down. Will call you. Trust me. She turned to leave the bridge, moving silently in the darkness of the deck. As she left the confines of the small room she breathed deeply, taking in the sharp night air. Then she felt something cold and hard pressing into the small of her back.

  ‘Welcome aboard, Cate Carlisle,’ said Bill.

  Down in a corner of the bottom deck, Cate sat on a chair, staring angrily at Bill, Mikey and Ahmed who were standing in a semi-circle around her. Bill was going through her rucksack, pulling out objects and throwing them onto a table next to him.

  ‘A gun! Jesus, Cate, what the hell are you doing with a gun? And a knife. And what’s this?’ Bill had found the survival tin and was picking through the contents, trying to work them out. ‘OK, Cate, talk to me. I’m hoping you can give me a really good reason why you were on this ship at night, trying to sabotage our bridge and at the same time carrying a gun, because it looks really bad.’

  ‘I could say the same about you, Bill,’ said Cate.

  For a few seconds Bill was shocked into silence. He swallowed hard and tried again. ‘Who are you working for, Cate?’

  ‘You first, Bill.’ She knew she was winding him up but she couldn’t help herself. She desperately wanted to know why Bill was involved, wanted to hear what he had to say, but there was only more silence.

  Ahmed walked up to Cate and slapped her hard around the face, so hard that she nearly fell off the chair. She turned back to face him and was taken aback by the hatred she saw blazing in his pale eyes. ‘I thought she was trouble from the first time I saw her.’ He turned to Mikey who was standing expressionless, not taking his eyes from Cate’s face. ‘There was something not right about her. Too sharp, too nosy, always watching and listening and being in places she shouldn’t be. I told you, Bill.’

  ‘You’ve been a really stupid girl.’ Mikey spoke at last. ‘How’re we going to sort fings out now?’

  ‘We could kill her,’ Ahmed suggested helpfully. ‘Chuck her over the side.’

  ‘Hang on a minute, Ahmed.’ Mikey was alarmed. ‘She’s only a kid. We can get her to talk easily and then just dump her somewhere when all this mess is over.’

  Bill was silent, considering the options. ‘No need to panic,’ he said finally. ‘She’ll be our insurance, our ticket out of here. She’s got a gun and high tech equipment. She’s not working alone. I’ll ask you again, Cate. Who are you working for?’

  ‘No one.’ Cate was playing for time, frantically working through the possibilities for escape. Cate knew that if she stayed the likelihood was that she would be killed, if not now then very soon. She had nothing left to lose, she had to try to escape.

  ‘I came out here because I saw the animals yesterday and I wanted to rescue them.’

  Ahmed hit her again and this time Cate did fall off her chair. She landed painfully on her ribs, her face throbbing, and stayed there until Mikey picked her up and stuck her roughly back on the chair.

  ‘If you came on your own, where did the helicopters come from?’ Ahmed demanded.

  ‘Don’t know.’ Cate was spitting out blood. ‘Nothing to do with me. I thought it was some of Tass’s flash mates playing tricks.’

  The three men were looking at each other, none of them willing to make the final decision. Cate saw her chance. She darted between Mikey and Bill and, before they could put out a hand to stop her, she was running for the rear of the boat and the stairwell. Halfway up the stairs she felt a hand grabbing at her foot and, turning sharply, kicked out hard at Ahmed’s forehead. He groaned and fell backwards into Mikey who shoved him roughly aside before following Cate up the stairs.

  She was heading for the sea-level deck and the safety of the water. She reached the top of the stairs, running out towards the mini harbour and up ahead of her she could see the outline of the power boat, and next to it the jetskis floating free in the water.

  She felt hope rise in her. Just a few metres to go, and as long as the jetski started first time she would be away. She could hear the shouts of her captors behind, they were gaining on her. Heart pounding with the effort, she raced out from the tunnel, the fresh air hitting her like a wall. She was just about to take a huge leap onto the jetski when she heard a noise behind her. Instinctively she turned and felt something shoved hard over her bruised face. Then everything went black.

  CHAPTER 17

  ‘Well, well,’ said Tass. ‘And just what new and amazing species do we have here?’

  From her position sprawled at the bottom of the cage, Cate stared blearily upwards taking in the expensive shoes, the tanned legs and finally the faces of Tass and Lulu.

  She feigned surprise. ‘What’s going on? What I am doing in this cage?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, Cate, nice try.’ Tass sounded calm and relaxed, amused even. ‘Well, who’d have thought that a kid like you would end up causing us all this trouble? Don’t worry, Cate, we’ll soon have you out of there. But not just yet.’

  ‘I would enjoy being in that cage if I were you, Cate Carlisle,’ Lulu hissed happily at her. ‘Where you’re going, this will seem like the lap of luxury.’

  ‘Hang on, wait – please.’ Cate dragged herself upright to face them, swaying as she hung onto the bars for support. She forced herself to meet Tass’s eyes. ‘People will be looking for me – my friends, my family. If I don’t call them soon then they will know something bad has happened.’

  ‘Oh?’ Tass sneered, his handsome face contorted with hatred. ‘How scared am I?’ He looked down at his clunky gold watch. ‘Two hours ago, when you were enjoying a nice sleep, The Good Times left Antibes harbour. In roughly ten minutes she will be out in international waters and then it doesn’t matter who your friends are. If they try to mount any misguided rescue attempt we will be completely within our rights to use maximum force against them. We will send them to the bottom of the sea.’

  For the first time since she had come to, Cate was aware of the deep throbbing sound of the engines vibrating along the floor of her cage. Her heart sank. It was all too late.

  ‘Where are you taking me?’ she asked.

  This time Lulu answered her. ‘Well, we were going to have a press conference somewhere nice and civilised like Venice or Monaco. But now, thanks to the trouble you have caused us, we are having to relocate to Sibya. As it happens, Tass is very friendly with the head of the Sibyan army. They don’t like spies there any more than we do.’

  Now Cate was really beginning to panic. She knew about Sibya, she had heard her father discussing with colleagues about how the small East African country was one of the most danger
ous places in the world. Once people crossed the borders, they often disappeared without trace.

  ‘My father will never stop searching for me.’ Cate was trying to sound confident, keep calm. ‘He knows so many people around the world, you’d never get a minute’s peace.’

  ‘He can’t prove anything.’ Lulu smiled at her benignly. ‘Not really. No one can. The thing is, Cate, you’ve been far too good at covering your tracks. We’ll just deny everything. We’ll say that the last time we saw you was on Catwalk II and no one will be able to prove otherwise. Will they, darling?’ She looked brightly at Tass, who nodded his head approvingly.

  ‘And,’ she continued, her smile becoming more menacing by the second, ‘they’ll never know that we’ve been thinking about extending our research to humans. And you’d be the perfect specimen to start with.’

  Cate went cold. These two had clearly lost all semblance of humanity and rationality. They were scary, very scary.

  Tass smiled at Lulu lovingly.

  Cate looked from one to the other, the shock registering in her face. ‘You two?’ she said incredulously. ‘You two are – you two are together? An item?’ She was laughing now through her fear – she couldn’t help herself.

  Lulu turned back to her crossly. ‘We’re married – husband and wife. We’ve been together for years. We met at school.’ Her face softened. ‘I wasn’t rich enough so we had to keep it secret from Tass’s vile father. Tass couldn’t risk being cut off from the money, you see.’

  Tass looked sadly at his wife. ‘I’m sorry, darling. I still feel really bad about that.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ Lulu said brightly. ‘I understand. I wanted the money too.’

  ‘But now,’ Tass said gleefully, ‘now, I’m going to prove myself once and for all with this amazing, genius breakthough. Presidents, scientists, businessmen. The whole world will be begging me to work with them.’

  ‘It wasn’t your breakthrough!’ Cate was outraged, her sense of justice getting the better of her. ‘I think you’ll find that the professor came up with the knowledge.’

  It was a mistake. Immediately Tass’s mood changed, his face darkened as one strong hand came through the bars grabbing at Cate’s arm and pulling her closer. She stared at him, half terrified, half fascinated, wondering how she could have ever thought him handsome.

  ‘You – know – far – too – much.’ He spat it out, his spittle landing on Cate’s face. ‘In ten hours we reach Sibya. Then you are . . .’ He ran his finger across her throat. ‘I will take personal pleasure in telling the good Colonel there to make your life one long, lingering hell.’

  As the doors closed behind them and the overhead lights faded to a dull gleam, a shaken Cate took stock of her situation. It was grim, she knew that. Any hope she had of persuading her captors that she was just a silly teenager caught up in something beyond her comprehension was long gone. She had seen what had happened to the professor when he became a problem. She shuddered. Part of her was angry at herself for being so stupid as to think that she, Cate Carlisle, could possibly have succeeded in taking on, and winning against, such determined thugs. Undeniably too, she was terrified of dying, of the actual process of being killed, of never seeing her friends and family again.

  But still, she wasn’t ready to give up. She looked around at her surroundings. The bars of the cage were spaced at ten centimetre intervals, far too close for her to squeeze through. She couldn’t see where the lock was but, looking at the other cages around her, she spotted a digital box situated right at the top of the doors. But even if Cate knew which code to punch in – which she didn’t – a quick attempt convinced her she wouldn’t be able to reach the box anyway.

  There was a rustle in the cage next to her and, turning to look, she saw a pair of eyes staring back at her. As her vision adjusted to the gloom she saw a tiny panda, no more than thirty centimetres high, big black circles surrounding his frightened eyes.

  Opposite her, in a large cage, she could just make out the outline of a white tiger cub, its yellowy eyes watching her carefully. In the next cage, a small black mass had crammed itself into the far corner of the cage, its long arms wrapped protectively around its chest. A gorilla, thought Cate. A beautiful mountain gorilla.

  She counted around twenty cages, all full of animals who should by rights, she thought, no longer be babies and should be roaming safely in protected reserves. She pictured their parents, imagined the heartbreak they must have suffered as their babies were torn away from them and she felt tears prick at her eyes.

  Now they were trapped here, manipulated and experimented on by monsters, and would never be allowed to mature. No doubt they would become some sort of freak show, objects not of beauty and strength but of curiosity, to be sold to the highest bidder as if they were sacks of grain.

  Cate was furious now, her anger energising her. She patted her clothes and her pockets. She had been thoroughly searched and everything removed from her. Even the laces on her trainers had gone. But her trainers hadn’t. Remembering the CCTV camera clicking overhead, Cate crept to the back of her cage and looked at the bottom of her trainers. Relief washed over her. The studs were still there.

  Just then there was the sound of footsteps in the antechamber. The doors opened, the lights came up and a ginger-haired man walked in holding buckets of food and a heavy, pointed stick.

  ‘Feeding time at the zoo.’ The accent, the voice was familiar. Suddenly Cate was aware of a thin face peering at her through the bars.

  ‘Oh. I thought it was you.’ It was the guard who had found Stripy for her the day before. Was it really just a day ago? She could hardly believe it.

  ‘You got me into a lot of trouble, kid. Well, you stuck your nose in where it shouldn’t be and look what happened to ya.’ He whistled cheerfully as he stood up. ‘Now it’s your turn to be in a whole heap of trouble.’

  Cate watched as he began to feed the animals. They were clearly waiting for their food, but even so they didn’t rush to the door. She soon understood why.

  The guard opened the door of the panda cage next to her and without any preamble gave the baby a sharp thwack across the back of its neck with his stick. The panda shuddered but didn’t howl, just lay cowed and subdued, crouched as far away from the guard as possible.

  ‘Hey!’ shouted Cate, horrified by what she was witnessing. ‘Leave him alone, you coward.’

  ‘You want some too?’ The guard was back at her cage, his stupid face peering through the bars at her. ‘A hiding would do you the world of good, I reckon. It’s like these animals. They may be precious but they still need to know who’s boss and I think you do too.’ Before Cate could move, the door was open and she felt a sharp pain across the back of her calves.

  ‘Next time it’s your feet.’ The guard grinned. ‘Hurts more there.’

  Cate groaned, rubbing her already swollen legs. She couldn’t believe that someone so young could be so vicious. But she had learnt her lesson. No more mouthiness, she thought. Action next time.

  From the back of her cage she watched carefully as her tormentor went about his work. As the guard clicked the code on each of the cages, Cate quickly realised that it was the same one. And one she could easily remember. 181542 – the battle of Waterloo plus the number of the bus she got to school. Thanks, Ginger.

  Just as the guard was about to leave the room, Cate called out to him. ‘Please.’ She forced herself to sound weak and close to tears. ‘Please can I have some water, something to eat. I’m so hungry, so sick.’

  He came back to her, delighted at her pleading. ‘I might do, I might not.’ His grinning face was tantalisingly close. ‘It’s not like you’re precious like these animals, is it, darlin’?’

  Cate felt like grabbing his head and smashing it against the bars. Not yet, she thought.

  ‘OK, kid. Here’s the deal. I think you need just a little bit more time to think about all the trouble you’ve caused. I’ll bring you something to eat when I’m ready.’

/>   I’ll be waiting, thought Cate.

  As soon as the door closed she went to work. She moved away as far as she could from the overhead cameras and felt down to the bottom of her right trainer. She unscrewed the first stud she came to and poked her fingers into the hole. First time lucky. She pulled out the tiny vial and slid it under the palm of her hand. As smoothly as possible she rolled onto her stomach, her head facing the bars where they met the back wall.

  She took a deep breath, unscrewed the vial and poured a few drops of liquid onto the bottom of each of the three bars that lay in the shadows, hoping against hope that it would be too dark for the camera to see what she was up to. There was a slight smell of burning, a soft crackle and, before her eyes, Cate could see the metal dissolving as if it was a stick of sugar rock.

  Cate gave it a few seconds then pulled hard at the bars. They moved inwards into the cage. She looked at the hole, checking it out for size. Easily large enough for her to slither through.

  Now she needed a weapon. She poured what was left of the acid over one of the loosened bars and cheered inwardly as a section fell onto the straw with a dull thud. Now all Cate had to do was wait.

  The guard was clearly in no hurry to feed her. Hours ticked by and Cate fought to stay awake. The animals around her were still, but she saw by the glimmer of their eyes that they were awake and watchful, unnerved no doubt by her unfamiliar presence.

  Then she heard footsteps and sprang into action. She slipped quietly through the hole, picked up the heavy bar and was by the side of the door just as the guard came through it. She swung hard and hit down with a ferocious anger she didn’t know she possessed. The man slid silently to the floor, the electronic door swooshing shut behind him.