“Even if that were true, it’s too late.” She inched her way forwards towards Matthew and smiled at him, holding out her fingertips in an effort to narrow the abhorrent distance between them. “You don’t have the documents anymore.”
“What?”
“I took them. They are destroyed. They were all on your desk, and I destroyed them.”
“That’s a lie.” He tried to think back to his office, full of smoke and hard to negotiate. Were the files still there? Had she really taken them? He couldn’t be sure.
“It’s the truth. I’m sorry, Ben,” she said as she looked for forgiveness. “I’m so sorry about everything.”
As the man lying on the floor listened to the conversation above him, he waited patiently for Ben’s move.
“Mark, give me Matthew,” Ben said ignoring Hannah’s apologies. “You can’t use him like this. Let him come to me. Let him come now.”
“Didn’t you hear what I said? There is only one way this is playing out. My way. My way!” He gripped onto Matthew harder whilst pressing down on his shoulder for support, as more blood began to ooze from his shoulder. Matthew’s cries grew louder, Hannah’s too.
“Mark, don’t...” Ben said.
“Move away from the boat, Ben,” Mark screamed in a guttural and threatening call to listen.
“Mark, please...”
“Get off the boat,” he screamed again as Matthew shook beneath him. It was time to end it. He was tired of Ben’s pathetic defiance. Couldn’t he see it was useless? Couldn’t he see who was in control? He took the gun and thrust it towards Matthew’s chest. Matthew screamed out as he felt the barrel push between his tiny ribs like a doctor’s exploratory finger.
“Ben!” Hannah screamed, as she pulled her own gun and pointed it at Mark. Time for thought was over. There was no space for anything but action. She had left it too late. There was a gun trained on Matthew. I’m too late! It’s too late!
Immediately Ben abandoned his guns, holding them up in the air.
“Alright. Alright, Mark, you win. We’ll trade. Me for Matthew. Just let him go.”
“That’s what it took, huh? That’s the only thing I had to do. Finally you have come to your senses.” Mark’s voice was calm, like a flat line of death. “But you have more fight in you than I thought you would. More stupidity, too, for such a fucking genius.” Ben threw the guns on the floor of the boat and took a grip of the small ladder. Pulling himself out of the boat and standing on the edge of the dock, he held his arms outstretched releasing a series of perpetual pleas, begging Mark to forsake his weapon and free Matthew. “Get over here.”
Ben stepped past the boatman as Mark instructed. When Ben was within reach Mark relinquished the gun from Matthew’s chest, raising it at Ben’s temple. Matthew ran to Hannah. She scooped him up and fell to the rough ground, cradling him like a small baby. He gripped her body with his tiny fingers. The smell of urine coming from his trousers took her straight back to the cupboard where she had sat for days as a child after the execution of her mother. She rocked him back and forth as he lay paralysed in her arms, and she told him over and over that nobody would ever hurt him again.
“Finally, it’s over,” Mark said, as he smirked at Ben standing before him, dropping the gun and enjoying a moment of triumph. “Get in the car.”
“You’re not going to kill me?” Ben knew it was a risk, but he figured if he wanted to shoot him he could have already done so ten times over. He had to push him. He had to know.
“And give up the chance to drag you in, take the glory? I’m not gonna miss that. Now walk.”
“Give me a chance to say goodbye. Please.”
“I said walk,” Mark shouted, pushing Ben forwards with the nose of the gun. Mark waited for him to take the first steps forwards towards the car. Hannah watched helplessly as he marched Ben forwards and away from her forever. She wanted to react, but she couldn’t stop herself from thinking about the boatman who was alive just metres away. They must have a plan. They must, she pleaded to herself. Do something!
“Mark, you know you are taking Matthew’s father away from him. You realise that don’t you?” Ben said.
“Oh, just shut up, Ben.” Mark didn’t want to listen to his ramblings. He had done it. He had got him. “It’s over now.”
“You know I could never let you do that.” For all he had done, and all that he had become, Ben wanted to hate Mark. He saw remnants of the friend who had been there through his darkest moments, the one he had loved and never thought he would live without. Part of him, the old Ben, wanted to sit him down, help him get to hospital and protect him. He wanted to believe that the boy who had put his arm around his shoulders as he wept for a lost father was still there. But he wasn’t. He was so sorry for what he was about to do, but even sorrier that the Mark he loved was already gone. Finally he realised. There was nothing left to grieve for.
“You don’t have much choice,” Mark sneered.
“Yes I do.” Ben’s comments were cool and collected, and had Mark not have been so intoxicated on his own glory he would have been more alert as Ben shouted, “now!”
The boatman rolled over. His perfectly trained eye found the sight of the gun and with only a split second between turning and firing, he pulled the trigger, releasing two rounds which fired through the air towards Mark. Mark swung round just in time for the first of the bullets to plant itself in his side, and the second in the right side of his chest. Ben jumped forwards and dropped to the floor, turning as he did so kicking up a small dust cloud from the dry ground. He saw Mark land next to him, his eyes wide and vacant, and his body limp and heavy. A split second of sadness gripped Ben, followed by an immediate sense of relief as if somebody had reached inside of him and pulled out the fear. As he staggered back to his feet he raced towards Matthew and Hannah where he fell to the ground and into her arms. He held them, and for the second time today he cherished the sense that Matthew’s life had been saved. First from disease, and secondly from Mark. He promised himself that in whatever life it was that they now had, there would never be anything of greater importance than his family again.
The boatman was also quick to his feet and raced over to them. “Come on Hannah, there is no time to waste.” He pulled Hannah to her feet and Ben took Matthew from her. He kissed his face repeatedly and made the same promises to him that Hannah had made only moments before.
“Get him to the boat,” said Hannah, pushing them forwards. “Do you have the passports?”
“They’re in the boat already.” She nodded and smiled at him, and grabbing his face in her hands she kissed him passionately on the lips. As their lips met and she felt the wet warmth of his skin, all she wanted to do was get on the boat and leave. But she had one more thing to do. She had to try to make up for the hurt. She had to try to destroy the plans of the Agency. She hadn’t stolen the files for nothing. She ran back towards the car. She looked back briefly and saw Ben carrying Matthew to the boat, lowering him in. The boatman was reaching up and took Matthew from him before Ben also stepped into the boat. She smiled to herself as she reached in and collected the files. She held them tightly to her chest and took her first steps past Mark into a future that seemed so full of promise. She could see Ben talking to Matthew standing in the boat looking as perfect as he ever had. She had done it. She had saved him and in the process somehow managed to save herself.
As Ben stood upright and looked back towards Hannah he saw Mark pushing himself up, disabled but not stopped by the two bullets and with a gun gripped in his hand. He was turning to face Hannah.
“Hannah!” screamed Ben. He reached down to grab a gun from the floor of the boat, but he heard the shot ring out above him. He snatched the gun up from the deck of the boat and raised it up and over the dockside. He fired two shots which struck Mark in the chest. The gun dropped from Mark’s hand and his head fell to the dirt. As he clambered over the ladder for a second time, he saw her lying face down and motionless on the ground.
He fell to his knees as he reached Hannah, without a second thought for Mark. He could see the wound in her back, just to the side and around where he knew her liver to be. He turned her over, hoping to see weakness and pain rather than the silence of death. Her breathing was brusque and staccato, but she was alive. She was still clutching the files, hanging on not for the research but for a chance of forgiveness and a second chance at unity with the man that she had almost killed.
“Hannah,” he whimpered as he hovered above her, stroking her face and brushing her blond hair away from her eyes. He pulled the files from her arms, a bloodstained bullet hole scarring the folders. He realised that suddenly they were not as important as he had imagined them to be. They had stopped him living his life in the present, and every day had served as a reminder of his painful past. He wished that he had realised before this moment. He bent back down towards Hannah, and after sliding both arms underneath her, he scooped her up. Her head flopped into his chest and he felt the warmth of her breath against his skin.
“I got your files, Ben. I did it. I got you, and Matthew.” Only now did he recognise that nothing held greater importance to him than his wife and child. Not even NEMREC. He ran with her in his arms back to the boat and lowered her in with the help of the boatman, the same way he had Matthew only moments before.
“Get us out of here,” he shouted as he pulled off his jacket and tore at his shirt for something to press against the wound. She couldn’t die. He couldn’t lose anything else. As the boat sped away, nobody looked back. Matthew crouched on the floor, holding his mother’s head, whilst Ben shouted faster, faster to the boatman. He applied all of his weight and all of his strength to the wound on his wife’s body, screaming at her to stay alive.
As they sped across the waves, the boat tipping up and down as it crashed against the billowing swell of the open water, Ben knew he had only so much time. Hannah had saved his life, she had saved Matthew, and NEMREC too. He had no intention of failing her now.
TWENTY FOUR
Sitting in the unembellished corridor listening to the blinking of the overhead strip lighting, he realised that he was third in line. He had discarded his shirt just like everyone else as he waited his turn, naked from the waist up. His muscles were tight and tattooed. But the banter between the five soldiers stopped as soon as their Captain walked in. When he stood before you, there was no place for stupidity. It led only to punishment.
The five soldiers stood to attention in front of the imposing figure as he inspected their muscles and prosperity of youth. He walked towards the door and beckoned for them to follow as he led the way into the five bedded room. They each took a space, and after being instructed to do so removed their shiny black boots. They tucked them neatly under the bed as they each had thousands of times before.
He regarded his captain and his fellow soldiers as they readied themselves, half naked standing proudly at the side of their beds. He wondered what they thought of him, if they thought that he deserved it. He knew why he had been chosen, but what about them? Perhaps he would trust some of them. But he also knew that others would remain loyal to their Captain and sell him out if they found out his plans.
They sat down in unison swinging their feet up on to the beds, organised in a round, their feet all facing inwards to a central point like a clock face. They eyed each other in silence as their Captain stood to the side of the door, keeping watch over his flock.
The nurse joined them, pushing her trolley in front of her, arriving at the bed space of the first soldier. They all watched him wince as the large gauge needle was inserted into the crease of his arm. The soldier flexed his arm back into a tight bend as the nurse pulled the needle from his arm. The pain was visible as he writhed about. One of the other soldiers began to snigger, but it was short lived, remembering that he was also waiting his turn for the same treatment. She stuck a couple of gauze swaps over the hole left by the needle and taped them down. She told the soldier to hold it in place, to press down. She pushed the silver trolley towards the next bed space. There were four more prepared syringes. The first batch. The only batch. It was the first NEMREC injection in history.
As she was finishing with the second soldier the door opened. From the shadows stepped an aged man, sporting a grand looking white moustache and a well kept head of silver hair. He wore a green hat which donned a red band and impressive insignia. He wasn’t unsteady on his feet but he was slow, and the seventieth birthday that he was rumoured to have celebrated last month was no surprise to most. He nodded his head briskly to the nurse, who now appeared nervous for the first time, and she stood politely aside to allow him time to pass.
For a moment he stood at the side of the third bed and looked upon the soldier propped up against the headrest, much like a father would a son during a moment of pride and satisfaction. “Finally,” he said, and he rested his hand onto his shoulder and patted his skin.
“Yes, General White. Finally.” The old man smiled at the soldier’s formal response, and looked upon the well defined body with delight, as if was his own work that had achieved such near perfection. “If you don’t mind my saying, Sir, it’s not before time.”
The old man gestured the nurse to come forward and she brought her trolley to the side of the bed. The General watched her work. She took the soldiers arm and cleaned the crease of his elbow, wiping the small alcohol-laced cotton ball repeatedly over the injection site. “You are right, you have waited patiently. But as of today, the wait is over.”
She inserted the needle, piercing a large hole in the surface of his skin. The soldier was brave and said nothing, eliciting no reaction. He didn’t wince, flinch, or complain. None of his company would have known that he felt anything. Those still to receive the injection looked disparagingly upon the first two soldiers, unfairly judging their outward display of discomfort.
The serum burnt as it travelled through his system, each muscle tingling as it skirted through his body like a microbe taking swift control of its host. He clenched his jaw, eager not to demonstrate how much it hurt. The general eyed the nurse’s work closely, and as she removed the needle General White smiled softly at the soldier. “Two weeks, and this will all seem like a distant memory, and all of the years of waiting will be worth it.”
The nurse taped the gauze swabs to his arm and placed the fingers of his other hand on top of them, politely instructing him to press down on the wound.
“When can I start physical training again?” the soldier asked. “I don’t want to miss much.”
“We’ll have you up and moving soon enough, Matthew. Don’t worry. In two weeks time, once this has done its job,” he said as he pointed to the empty syringe that had just been inserted into Matthew’s arm, “it’ll be like you never stopped training.” General White held up the syringe and turned it in his fingers, glancing over the word NEMREC-1. Matthew rubbed his arm as the serum burnt its way into the cells, travelling first over his shoulder and then across his chest and towards his heart. The General turned to walk away, stopping only as he heard Matthew speak.
“General White, Sir.” A genuine and heartfelt smile graced Matthew’s lips. In contrast to the contempt he felt for the rest of his company, a simple and easy hatred, with White it was different. It wasn’t so simple. “Thank you for recommending me. Without you I wouldn’t be here today. I wouldn’t have this opportunity.”
The General smiled. “Matthew, without your parents’ efforts to preserve your father’s research all those years ago, it would never have been possible. They paid the ultimate price, God rest their souls. You too. The Agency owes them, and you, a great debt.”
As he turned to walk away Matthew rested his head back on his pillow and decided to stop fighting. He succumbed to the burning sensation as it took over the muscles in his other arm and delved painfully into his hips. He closed his eyes and bit his lip, acceding to the discomfort as the old man left the room. In two weeks time it would all be worth it. By that time the serum would ha
ve done its job. He would become exactly what they intended. He would be stronger than anybody else, including the four others lying beside him, the last of which was moaning as the nurse forced the painful serum into his arm. He would prove to them what NEMREC was. He would show them what his father created. He would become exactly what they intended.
He promised himself that he would make each and every one of them pay their debt.
The End
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Thank you for purchasing this novel. If you would like more information regarding future work, or wish to contact Michelle, you can visit her website.
www.michellemuckley.com
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