The Rescue

by Sophie McKenzie

  With a whoosh, I was transported. But where? Was I actually inside Ketty’s head? My focus flickered on and off, like a dying light bulb. I sensed a backdrop of stubborn determination . . . a focus on a word . . . a colour . . .

  Yellow? I thought-spoke.

  Ed? As Ketty thought-spoke back, the connection slid away.

  I frowned, trying to bring it back, but it was no good.

  ‘Hey, you did it,’ Ketty exclaimed.

  ‘Yeah, for about two seconds,’ I said with a sigh.

  ‘Never mind, that was an amazing start,’ Ketty said, her voice filled with awe.

  I grinned. She was right, it was a start. Something to build on, at least.

  ‘Can you try and reach Nico now?’ Ketty said, all excited.

  Nico. As she said his name, my sense of triumph evaporated. It didn’t matter how powerful I became at reading people’s minds, Ketty’s first thought would always be for him.

  ‘Sure,’ I said, trying to hide the hurt in my voice. I brought Nico’s face to mind – the dark eyes, full of mischief, the high cheekbones and smooth skin . . . it struck me as I focused on a mental picture of his face, that I’d never seen Nico with so much as a single spot. How unfair was that?

  I slowed my breathing, as I had before, and concentrated on Nico’s face in my mind’s eye. It was harder to imagine looking into his eyes. Maybe because I’d done it less. Or maybe because, after the scornful way he’d spoken to me earlier, the inside of Nico’s head was the last place I wanted to be.

  I kept going but it didn’t feel right. I was exhausted, I realised, from connecting with Ketty and forcing this attempt to reach Nico. After a couple of minutes I gave up.

  ‘It’s not working,’ I said. ‘I’ll try again in a minute.’

  ‘Okay.’ Ketty sounded disappointed. ‘At least you know it’s poss—’

  A banging sound, metal on metal, broke across her words. Light flooded the van, blinding me. Heavy footsteps pounded across the inside of the van.

  I blinked, my eyes adjusting to the light. One of Carson’s men was standing over us, peering in through the bars of the cage. He raised his hand. Another tranquilliser gun.

  I opened my mouth to say ‘No’, but before I could speak I felt the prick of the dart in my arm and was out cold.

  Sometime later I awoke, my head pounding, my mouth dry. It took a few moments for me to remember everything that had happened. As I did, my eyes sprang open. I was in a bare, sunlit room. Light poured in through the only window, high overhead. A single light bulb hung from the centre of the room. Nothing on the walls. No furniture.

  It was a cell.

  Stomach twisting with fear, I eased myself off the low camp bed I’d been placed on. My right arm was numb from the way I’d lain on it. I rubbed it, swallowing to create some moisture in my mouth. I had never felt so thirsty in my life.

  Where was everyone else?

  I was about to stand up when the door opened. Carson walked in, carrying a chair.

  ‘Good, you’re awake,’ he said.

  I glanced up at the window and the bright sunlight. The room was swelteringly hot – an even fiercer, drier heat than the desert in Spain.

  ‘Where am I?’ I said.

  ‘North Africa.’ Carson waved his hand as if to suggest the detail of our exact location wasn’t important. ‘And, before you ask, your friends are safe . . . all of them. Would you like some water?’

  I nodded, rubbing my forehead. My neck was stiff and sore and my brain felt like it was operating through a fog, but I had to pull myself together. I had to find out what Carson was planning to do with us.

  As I was thinking all this, Carson rose from his chair and disappeared outside. A second later he was back, a full litre bottle of water in his hand. He passed it to me and I took a couple of huge gulps.

  ‘Careful.’ His thin lips twisted into a smile. ‘You’ll make yourself sick drinking that fast.’

  I shrugged.

  Carson put on a pair of mirrored sunglasses. ‘These are just a precaution, kiddo.’ He tapped his temple. ‘Access denied and all that.’

  My heart beat faster as I remembered how I’d managed that brief connection with Ketty – and without eye contact – earlier. Maybe I should try and get inside Carson’s head now?

  No. Better to wait until my own head was clearer . . . until he wasn’t sitting right in front of me . . .

  ‘I expect you’re wondering what I’m going to do with you.’ Carson leaned back in his chair.

  ‘Actually, I was wondering how long I’d been unconscious,’ I said. ‘And why you’re not still in prison.’

  Carson sat up. ‘It’s been about twelve hours since the injection in the boat. Twenty-four or so since the first tranquilliser in Spain.’

  My mouth fell open. I’d lost a whole day? I took another sip of water.

  ‘As for prison,’ Carson went on, ‘all the charges against me were dropped. I’d have thought Geri Paterson would have told you that.’

  I looked away. Geri had a habit of not telling us important things. I couldn’t imagine why she hadn’t let us know Carson was on the loose, but at least it explained why she was so keen to fake our deaths and create new identities for us.

  ‘I’ve been looking for you since I was released,’ Carson went on. ‘And I have to say I was getting nowhere fast until I picked up some blog about a kid in a bar in San Juan who did a mean mind-reading trick.’

  I shook my head, inwardly cursing Jorge’s greed. ‘So what are you going to do with me . . . with us?’ I said.

  ‘Glad you asked, kiddo.’ Carson stood up. ‘I’ve got a job for you – and you’d better not let me down.’

  16: The interrogation

  I stared up at Carson, my head still throbbing.

  ‘You’ve got a job for me?’ I said. ‘Doing what?’

  Carson crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. ‘There’s a man next door who has resisted all my attempts to get him to tell me a piece of information that I badly need,’ he said. ‘You, kiddo, are my passport to that information. And before you even think about saying “no”, I suggest you remember which one of us has the gun.’ He smiled and patted his jacket, outlining the holster underneath.

  I stood up, feeling shaky on my legs. I’d have to go along with this for now – there was no choice. I stumbled after Carson into a concrete corridor. Other doors led off down both sides. I just had time to wonder if the others were locked in any of those rooms, before Carson was pushing me into another bleak, concrete cell. This one had no windows and was even more stifling than the room I’d been kept in. A mirror ran the length of one wall and a single rickety table stood in the middle of the room, a chair on either side.

  ‘Sit,’ Carson ordered.

  I sat down in one of the chairs, my heart beating fast. Carson was clearly going to make me mind-read someone. But who? And why?

  The door opened again and two black men walked in. The first was dressed in a torn, bloodstained shirt. He limped to the chair on the opposite side of the table from me then stood, head bowed. The other man, smartly dressed in a crisp cotton suit, with large, damp sweat patches under the arms, prodded him into the chair, then stood back. A gun rested inside the holster strapped to his belt.

  The first man looked up. I gasped. His face was swollen and bruised – one eye almost completely obscured behind a blood-encrusted gash. He frowned, the glassy expression on his face coming momentarily into focus as he registered I was sitting in front of him. He hung his head again and I turned to Carson, feeling sick.

  ‘This man knows the location of some property that was stolen from a friend of mine,’ he said, speaking before I had a chance to say anything. ‘I want you to find out where that property is. Go on, mind-read him – his name is Charles Tsonga.’

  At the mention of his name, Tsonga looked up. I glanced past him, to the mirror at the end of the room. I could see the whole scene reflected in front of me – the back of Tsonga’s head
, where another sizable gash made a dark red line across his closely-shaved scalp, the rickety table, the guard standing impassively to one side, Carson, tall and thin in his mirrored shades, leaning over me, and, in the middle of the scene, me – all anxious eyes and tousled hair. I stared at myself in the mirror and remembered the remote telepathy I’d managed yesterday.

  If I could do that, then maybe I didn’t need to do this. Confidence surged through me. Maybe I could look straight into Tsonga’s eyes and not mind-read him.

  ‘Ed.’ Carson’s voice sounded a warning note. ‘Get on with it.’

  Tsonga was staring defiantly, at me. I took a deep breath and looked up, into his bloodshot brown eyes. I held his gaze, feeling and fighting the impulse to dive into his mind. It actually wasn’t that hard, I realised with a jolt. All that time I’d believed I had no choice but to mind-read on eye contact. God, maybe Ketty had been right and it had all been one great big unconscious excuse to justify my own shyness.

  ‘Ed?’ Carson said, a trace of impatience in his voice. ‘What can you see?’

  I hesitated a second. ‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘It’s not working.’

  Carson’s hand thumped down on the table. Both Tsonga and I jumped. The guard stepped smartly forward, yanking the gun out of his holster. He held it straight out in front of him, pointing from me, to Tsonga, then back to me.

  I sucked in my breath, fighting a sudden, panicky urge to pee. Carson held up his hand and the guard stepped back.

  ‘Okay, Ed, let’s try again,’ he said softly.

  I took a gulp from the water bottle that was still in my hand. Tsonga’s eyes fixed on the clear liquid. His thirst was unmistakable. I glanced at Carson for permission to share the drink. He nodded.

  I held the bottle out and Tsonga took it.

  ‘Thank you.’ His heavily-accented voice cracked as he spoke.

  ‘You’re welcome,’ I said.

  Tsonga took a couple of large gulps, then put the bottle down on the table between us. ‘I will not speak,’ he said.

  ‘Ed, go on,’ Carson prompted.

  ‘But it’s not working,’ I said, as emphatically as I could.

  ‘I don’t believe you.’ Carson’s voice was laced with menace. I could feel the tip of a gun against the back of my head. ‘Hurry up, or I’ll send this guard to shoot your friends. One by one, until you do what I say.’

  Tsonga was staring at us; his eyes looked clearer now he’d drunk some water, but his forehead was creased with a frown.

  I swallowed. There was no choice.

  ‘Now, Ed,’ Carson said.

  I looked into Tsonga’s eyes. This time I let the old impulse to dive in take over. With a whoosh, I was there, inside his mind – an angry, scared place, a low, steady energy underneath.

  Instinctively I knew Tsonga was a good man. Whatever he was hiding from Carson, he was hiding it for a good reason.

  And I was about to expose his secret.

  Hi, I thought-spoke.

  What? Who? How? Tsonga’s thought-speech exploded in panic-stricken fury.

  I held back, like I always do when I’m inside someone’s mind for the first time. It seems to help to give people a little time to adjust to me. I counted to ten, waiting, but fragments of Tsonga’s thoughts and feelings were still whirling round his head. Maybe he was too stressed by being held and beaten to be able to settle at all.

  ‘Find out where the weapons are held,’ Carson hissed in my ear.

  I’m not going to hurt you, I thought-spoke, trying to calm Tsonga down. Carson just wants information. Where are the weapons?

  No . . . no . . . no . . . Another explosion of terrified fury. Please, no. Do not ask this. I cannot tell you.

  I broke the connection and turned to Carson.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘He can’t tell me,’ I said. ‘He doesn’t know.’

  Carson swore. In a swift move he grabbed my shirt under the neck and bunched it in a fist that pressed into my chin. ‘Enough pissing about,’ he said. ‘I know what you can do. Get inside his head and find out where the weapons are. Which village. Which house. How well protected . . .’ He shoved me away and pressed his gun against my head again. There was a loud click as he cocked it.

  Heart pounding so loudly it seemed to echo round the tiny room, I turned back to Tsonga. He was staring down at the table, rocking back and forth.

  Carson signalled to the guard, who came over and forced Tsonga’s head up. I met his eyes.

  Please, please, please . . . the earlier fury was now mostly fear.

  I’m sorry but you have to tell me where the weapons are.

  I can’t, you don’t understand. My brother is hiding them. And if they find him, they will kill him – and his family and my . . . my little girl. We need these weapons to fight back against Djounsou’s army. Please, please help me.

  I badly wanted to break the connection, to refuse Carson. It was evil, forcing this man to reveal information that would hurt his family. And whoever this Djounsou was, I was certain that he needed fighting against. I felt sick to my stomach, yet what could I do? Ketty, Dylan, Nico and Luz’s lives were in danger if I didn’t do it.

  ‘Find the information I need, Ed,’ Carson hissed in my ear, clearly sensing my thoughts, ‘or your friends die . . . one by one.’

  I steeled myself, focusing fully on Tsonga.

  I’m sorry, I thought-spoke.

  Please, think of my daughter, Victoria. She is only five. Please, I beg you.

  I’m sorry. I dived into Tsonga’s mind. After my experience reading minds in the Spanish bar, I had learned to hold less tightly to the concrete thoughts I came across and to let my instinct guide me – to try less, in a way, while remaining completely focused. In moments I’d probed deeper into his thoughts and feelings.

  My sense that he was a good person was only reinforced. I saw great loss – his wife and their second child had died in childbirth. There was also anger at Carson and his bullying and – far more powerful – fury at the man he’d mentioned before, Djounsou. Plus exhaustion . . . and physical pain . . . and a strong religious faith.

  Where are the weapons? I thought-spoke, keeping my communication as calm as possible. I could feel Tsonga’s panic rising.

  No, no, no. Mahore. No. My brother. No . . . Church, St Luke’s , cellar. No, no, no . . .

  I sighed. It was always the same. As soon as people knew what you wanted, what they mustn’t think about, that was always the very thing that thrust itself to the front of their minds. But I didn’t need to tell Carson the whole story. If I told him the overall place, but gave a different specific location for the weapons, Tsonga’s brother might have time to see Carson’s men coming and get to safety.

  ‘Mahore,’ I said out loud.

  Noooo. Inside Tsonga’s head something had broken. Like glass that had cracked and shattered. I am betraying them, oh God, please help me.

  It’s okay, I tried to reassure him, I won’t say where the weapons are or who’s responsible.

  You don’t understand.

  ‘How well are the guns protected?’ Carson asked, his voice tight with excitement. ‘Where are they hidden?’

  What shall I say? I thought-spoke.

  I waited while Tsonga gathered himself.

  Tell him the guns are hidden in a hut on the road out of town going west. The hut is on the outskirts of town – it has a . . . a blue painted wall and a red flag on the roof.

  I repeated this information.

  ‘How is this hut guarded?’ Carson said.

  Tell him several men take turns. Usually there are two at the hut at any time.

  Again, I repeated the information Tsonga gave me.

  ‘But you should know that they change the location of the hiding place all the time,’ I added, pleased with myself for having come up with such a clever way of covering myself, while still protecting Tsonga and his family. ‘By the time you reach the hut, the weapons may have been moved.’

  I brok
e the connection.

  ‘Good,’ Carson said. ‘Good work. You can go now.’ He signalled to the guard to take me away.

  ‘You won’t hurt him any more?’ I asked.

  ‘No, if you’ve passed on the information you saw correctly, there’ll be no need for him to feel more pain.’ Carson narrowed his eyes. ‘In fact, there’ll be no reason for him to feel anything any more.’

  17: Communication

  The guard pushed me out of the room and back into my own. I sank down on the bed, my head in my hands. Did that comment about Tsonga not feeling ‘anything any more’ mean Carson was planning to kill him?

  I looked up, determined to try remote telepathy again. If I’d managed that brief connection with Ketty, then surely if I practised a bit more I’d be able to reach Geri and explain what had happened so she could come here, rescue us and save Tsonga and his family. But before I could begin to focus on Geri’s face, the guard knocked me out with another injection.

  I had no idea what time it was when I finally woke up, but my room was in darkness, though the air was barely less stifling. I was lying on the camp bed, as before. I turned and looked at the door, my head throbbing with every movement. A tiny camera I hadn’t noticed before was positioned just above the door, the lens pointing towards the bed. I blinked. Was that how Carson had known I was conscious earlier? I quickly closed my eyes again. Even in my fuggy state, I was aware that I had to buy myself enough time to clear my head and attempt to communicate telepathically with Geri.

  A few minutes passed. I lay awake, concentrating on keeping my breathing deep and steady. I was desperately thirsty – my mouth felt dry and swollen – and hunger gnawed at my stomach, but I didn’t dare look round to see if Carson had left any food or drink in the room. I kept my eyes closed as my head slowly settled and cleared, then started to picture Geri Paterson’s face – her piercing birdlike eyes, delicate-featured face and sharply-cut blonde bob. I slowed my breathing and really focused – but nothing happened. I waited, trying not to push it, knowing that half the skill of remote telepathy was in the not trying. But still nothing came.