by Jack Heath
Someone grabbed the plastic and pulled it. Jarli was dragged feet-first towards the open door. His legs were out in the open air before he realised the person pulling wasn't going to stop.
THUMP! Jarli fell out of the van and hit the dirt, burned skin smarting. He was unable to suppress a grunt.
'Yeah, I thought you'd be awake by now.' Frink's voice. 'Get up.'
Jarli emerged from the cocoon of plástic and looked around. He was at the quarry on the outskirts of Kelton. He and Kirstie used to come here on their bikes, riding dangerously close to the cliff edge. Frink's van was the only vehicle in sight, all the way to the horizon. Everything valuable had been ripped out of the ground long ago. Frink had the place to himself.
A shipping container stood nearby. Windows had been cut into the sides, and an air conditioning unit installed on top. Maybe it had been used as the site office, back when the quarry was still active. But now there were bars on the windows, and the glass had been painted black. Jarli could hear muffled screams from inside the container. 'Help us! Somebody! Please! Help!'
'Four days now, they've been doing that,' Frink said. 'It hasn't done them any good. We're a long way from anywhere. No-one's coming. You got that?'
He was holding a handgun. Jarli didn't know much about guns, but it looked like the kind which probably had at least six bullets in it. And Frink was a police officer—he would have good aim.
Jarli was shaking. He could hardly breathe. 'Why are you doing this?'
'I'll ask the questions,' Frink said. 'And this time I want the truth.'
'I told you everything already,' Jarli said.
Frink's phone beeped. LIE He smiled. 'That's what I thought.' He tossed Jarli a ring of keys. 'Open that container.'
Jarli went o ver to the shipping container. Opening the doors would be complicated. There were four handles, each padlocked, all attached to vertical bars. As soon as he started fiddling, the screaming intensified. The people inside thought they were getting rescued.
The keyring had four large keys and one smaller one. The four big keys matched the padlocks. Jarli guessed that the small one was a handcuff key. As he worked on the padlocks, Jarli slipped the small key off the ring and hid it in the palm of his hand. If Frink cuffed him, he could use the key to get away— assuming Frink didn't notice it was missing.
'Hurry up,' Frink said.
'I'm trying.'
Finally the doors creaked open. A foul smell washed out. Light fell across the faces of the four people inside.
Doug.
Priya, the pilot.
Two middle-aged blond people who were probably Doug's parents. Missing for four days now. When their home was destroyed, Frink must have sent them a message, telling them to meet him somewhere safe. Safe for him.
'Oh, thank God,' Priya said, when she saw Jarli. Then she saw Frink standing behind him and her face collapsed.
The shipping container had two clear sections, although there was no barrier between them. The back half looked like storage. There were transparent plastic crates of clothes and documents. One huge crate contained nothing but fifty-dollar notes. Jarli had never seen so much money in one place.
The missing RCG device sat on top of one of the crates, out of reach of the chained-up captives. Blanco must have been right about the reason for the bomb. Viper had wanted the police to think all the magnetic weapons had been destroyed.
The front half of the container was a prison. There was a single water bottle, and a bucket which Jarli guessed was used as a toilet. All four prisoners were chained to the walls by their ankles, which explained why Frink was happy to leave them alone with his crate of money. They wouldn't be able to reach it.
The sadness in their eyes was horrible. Doug's parents looked gaunt and frail in the glare of the sun. Priya had survived a plane crash and turned to the police, only to discover that she had trusted the WRONG COP.
Doug's face was grim, but he didn't look as ruined as the others. He hadn't been a prisoner for as long. He still had hope.
Jarli's back was still turned to Frink. He met Doug's gaze, and flashed the handcuff key in his hand.
'Throw the keys back to me,' Frink said.
Jarli had never been good at sports, and he had never expected his life to depend on a perfect throw.
He took a deep breath and turned around. He tossed the keyring over to Frink. He deliberately threw it too high. While Frink was looking up, Jarli concealed his other hand behind his back, and flicked the handcuff key backwards, hoping desperately that Doug would catch it.
He didn't hear it hit the floor of the shipping container. Hopefully that meant someone had caught it. But it wasn't as though he had given them much of an advantage. They were weak, and Frink was armed.
Frink caught the ring of keys.
'What are you going to do to us?' Jarli asked, distracting Frink so he didn't notice that the handcuff key had been removed from his keyring.
'That depends,' Frink said, 'on whether or not you tell the truth.'
Jarli said nothing.
'Every time you lie to me,' Frink continued, 'I'm going to shoot one of your friends.' He held up his phone. 'And believe me, I'll know.'
Jarli could feel his heart racing faster and faster. He tried to take deep breaths—the app looked for signs of nervousness.
'Question one,' Frink said. 'Do you know who Viper is?'
FINAL ROUND
'I thought it was you,' Jarli said.
'I'm not Viper,' Frink said.
His phone didn't beep.
'Now that you know that,' Frink said, 'do you have suspicions about who it might be? Clues?'
'N-no,' Jarli stammered. 'I know he's a man with scars on his face.'
'You've seen the picture?'
Jarli nodded vigorously. If he told Frink that he hadn't seen the picture, Frink would ask where he heard about it. That would lead Frink to Eaton, or to Scanner.
Frink had said 'the picture', not 'a picture'. Was there only one? Had Frink only seen his sinister boss in a photograph?
Frink didn't seem to no tice that Jarli hadn't answered out loud. 'Question two,' he said. 'Do you know anything about Viper's operation?'
'No,' Jarli said. 'I only know what Blanco told me, months ago.'
'Which was what?'
'He makes people disappear. I don't know how.'
The phone didn't beep.
'Question three,' Frink said.
Cold sweat ran into Jarli's eyes. If Frink asked about Scanner, Jarli would be forced to tell the truth. But if he did, Viper would know he had a leak in his organisation. Lives will be lost. Definitely mine, and possibly yours.
But that wasn't what Frink asked.
'What evidence,' he said, 'did you extract from the computer in the control room at Magnotech?'
'Videos of people going in and out of the building,' Jarli said.
'How did you get them off the computer?'
'I used a computer virus.'
'That was your phone I found plugged into the computer?'
'No,' Jarli said. 'It was Doug's.'
This explained why Blanco hadn't asked about the burner phone. Frink had removed it before she got there. He must have also deleted all the files on the computer. The virus hadn't malfunctioned after all.
'Did you send this footage to anyone else?'
Jarli's heart sank. He was going to have to sell Reynolds out.
Frink's eyes narrowed. 'Did you send or show this footage to anybody?'
'Yes,' Jarli said.
'Who?'
'Dana Reynolds.'
'The reporter?'
Jarli nodded.
'When?'
'Yesterday.'
Frink pressed a few buttons on his phone and held it to his ear.
'Viper,' he said. 'We have a problem.'
Jarli could faintly hear Viper speaking, but he couldn't make out the words. The voice was distorted with some kind of filter, turning it into a rasping growl. The soun
d made Jarli's skin crawl.
Once Viper had destroyed all the video evidence, he would order Frink to kill the witnesses—Jarli, Reynolds, and the four people in the shipping container. Jarli had doomed them all.
'No,' Frink was saying. 'Durras doesn't know anything important. But he has the footage from Magnotech. He sent it to a journalist, Dana Reynolds.'
Viper said something else.
'Yesterday,' Frink said. 'She may already have watched it. If so, she's seen me meeting with the engineer.'
Reynolds had been wrong, Jarli realised. Viper had not collected the RCG in person. The evidence they'd collected could prove Frink was guilty, but wouldn't help them find Viper.
'I need to disappear,' Frink said. 'Can you book me in?'
Viper said something. Just one syllable.
'OK,' Frink said. 'What should I do with the prisoners?'
He listened for a minute.
'All of them?' he said.
Viper said something else.
'OK,' Frink said again.
He turned to the open doorway of the container, and aimed his gun at the prisoners. At this range, he couldn't possibly miss.
'No!' Jarli screamed. 'Don't!'
Ignoring him, Frink fired directly into the open doorway. Eight deafening shots rang out.
Then he swivelled and pointed the gun at Jarli.
Jarli turned to dive out of the way—
But it was too late. At point blank range, Frink pulled the trigger three times.
BANG. BANG. BANG.
NO ESCAPE
Jarli slammed into the dirt and rolled sideways. The sun dazzled him.
There was pain. But only from the torn skin under his bandages, and the rocks digging into his shoulder blades.
None of the bullets had hit him.
Frink noticed this. Scowling, he levelled the gun at Jarli again—
And then it flew out of his hand. The gun disappeared into the shipping container, where Doug was holding the RCG. He had switched it on!
The gun hit the device and crumpled like paper. A halo of bullets was also stuck to the RCG, quivering.
His heart pounding, Jarli saw the other three prisoners cowering on the floor. No-one seemed to have been hit by the gunfire.
Frink, now unarmed, looked like he was trying to figure out how Doug had freed himself.
'What—' he began.
Then Jarli tackled him.
Frink was bigger, but Jarli had the element of surprise. The phone went flying from Frink's hand as he hit the ground. Doug dropped the RCG and scrambled over, grabbing one of Frink's arms while Jarli held the other.
'No!' Frink shouted. 'Don't!'
In the shipping container, the fallen RCG was whining louder and louder. Doug hadn't switched it off. The handcuff chains were straining in the air, trying to reach it. The metal walls of the shipping container began to buckle. Soon the other prisoners would be crushed.
Jarli was still wrestling with Frink, but he saw that Priya had freed herself from the chains. 'Priya,' he yelled. 'Turn off the device!'
Frink ripped his arm out of Doug's grip and tried to punch Jarli. Jarli grabbed his wrist just in time. Doug regained his hold on the loose arm and pushed Frink back down.
Priya grabbed the RCG. 'How?'
'Red button,' Doug shouted. 'On the underside!'
Priya found the button, and the whining stopped. The container settled on the concrete slab.
'You idiots!' Frink roared. 'You don't know what you're doing!'
Priya ran over and grabbed Frink's legs. Together they dragged him towards the shipping container.
Doug fastened a set of cuffs around Frink's ankles. When Frink was secured, Doug got to work freeing his parents.
Jarli went to pick up the phone Frink had dropped. A phone number glowed on the screen.
Viper's number. He was still connected.
'Don't touch that!' Frink cried.
Jarli ignored him. He picked up the phone.
'Viper,' he said. 'This is Jarli Durras. We've captured Frink.'
'Shut up!' Frink hissed.
Viper said nothing.
'So there's no point going after Dana Reynolds,' Jarli continued. 'She might have video files of Frink picking up the RCG from the engineer, but Frink's busted either way. It's over.'
The only sound was the faint hiss of static. But Jarli could somehow sense that Viper was listening.
'It's over,' Jarli said again. 'The prisoners are free. We have Frink, and the RCG, and the money. The cops will find you soon. You should turn yourself in.'
Viper was a slippery character, but Jarli didn't see how he could escape now that Frink was caught. Frink knew who Viper was. He had said so when he turned up at Jarli's house, and Jarli's phone hadn't beeped.
'Ow,' Frink said. 'Ow!'
Jarli looked over. Frink was clutching his hand. The one with the scar. Jarli could see a faint glow through his skin. As if something was under there.
The other prisoners backed away from him.
'What is that?' Doug's father asked.
Frink didn't reply. His eyes had rolled back into his head. Churned-up spit leaked from the corners of his mouth. His arms and legs quivered, as though he was freezing.
And then, suddenly, he lay still.
'Frink?' Jarli said.
Frink didn't reply. Something he'd said flashed through Jarli's mind: Viper's identity is a dangerous thing to know.
Jarli looked back at the phone.
Viper had hung up.
CLEAN-UP CREW
The debriefing officer had black hair, cut army-short. Her dark eyes were watchful, and she spoke in a clipped monotone. She had introduced herself as Detective Zee Arno.
'The pathologist said it was an RFID chip. It was linked to a capsule filled with . . .' she rummaged through some papers, and then gave up. '. . . some kind of poison. I forget which one. Viper activated the chip using Daniel Frink's phone. If you'd been standing a little further away from him, it wouldn't have worked.'
Arno didn't seem to care how Jarli might feel about this. He looked down at his hands. They were still shaking. He'd been through a lot—the plane crash, the tunnels under Kelton, the liquid nitrogen— but he'd never seen someone die before.
Doug's parents had used Frink's phone to call emergency services. By the time the ambulance arrived, Frink's body was already cold. Everyone had been taken to hospital except Jarli, who had come straight to the pólice station. He had told Arno the whole story—almost. He hadn't told her about Scanner. And he hadn't told her about the tunnel under the school, because he'd made a promise to Nurse Eaton.
Rule number five: don't trust anybody.
'You already know what happened, mostly,' Arno said. 'Viper ordered an RCG device from Magnotech and sent Frink to pick it up. Then Viper used the device to crash a plane into your friend's house, hoping to sabotage a federal investigation. But the device was damaged in the crash and the intended victims survived. So Viper sent Frink to hunt down the pilot and your friend's family. Frink eventually got them all. Viper also ordered more RCG devices from Magnotech, to replace the broken one.'
'Why?' Jarli asked.
'We don't know. But Frink's prisoners overheard other phone calls between him and Viper. It sounded like Viper had at least one other target. Our theory is that Viper ordered several RCGs and told Frink to plant the bomb so that pieces of the devices would be scattered everywhere. After the explosion, we'd never realise one was missing. Thanks to you and Doug, the factory was not destroyed and we became aware of the theft. The stolen device has since been recovered from the quarry.'
'What does the owner of Magnotech know about all this?' Jarli asked. 'Kellin Plowman?'
'Possibly nothing,' Arno said sharply. 'It's an unmanned factory. Other than the engineer who died, we can't be sure that any other employees knew about Viper. I'd advise you to give Plowman a wide berth while we investigate. Understood?'
Jarli nodded. 'Is Dan
a Reynolds OK?'
'Yes. We sent units over to her house and her office. No-one was there who shouldn't be, but the protective details will stay for a while just in case. It's lucky you and Doug got the drop on Frink when you did. If you hadn't, Frink would have killed all the witnesses, delivered the RCG to Viper and, presumably, come after Reynolds.'
So I killed Frink to save Reynolds, Jarli thought. That was definitely better than the other way around, but it still felt wrong. He should have realised Frink would be chipped. He shouldn't have tried to talk to Viper on the phone.
'You think Reynolds is still in danger?' he asked.
'I doubt it. Knowing about Frink would have made her a target, but now the cat's out of the bag.'
'How's Constable Blanco taking the news?'
'She's suspended while internal affairs investigates.'
Jarli's eyes widened. 'You think she was involved?'
'It doesn't look good,' Arno said. 'Her partner was corrupt. That makes her either complicit or oblivious. Neither is acceptable.'
'Can you trace the call from Frink's phone?' Jarli said. 'To find Viper?'
Arno shook her head. 'The number Frink dialled led us to a burner phone in an abandoned warehouse. No calls were ever made by it. It was only used to receive calls from Frink.'
'Can you figure out where it was sold, maybe?'
'We already did. It was purchased with cash from a petrol station here in Kelton. We pulled the surveillance videos from the day in question. Frink bought it himself.' She pressed her pen against a sheet of paper, as though hoping to bore a hole through it. 'Viper's smart, and smart criminals avoid touching evidence themselves. Even if we knew who Viper was, we might struggle to prosecute him.'
'So what about Doug?' Jarli asked.
'He's going to a motel with his parents while we look for a new house for them.'
Jarli wondered what Doug's name would be next time. 'Will I get to say goodbye?'
'You don't have to. They're staying in Kelton.'
'Really? Viper tried to kill him and his whole family—'
'To stop his mother from meeting with Steven Fussell. The two of them might have seen Frink on the security video from the factory and realised he was working for Viper. But there's no point protecting Frink anymore. And, according to the Federal Police, there was never any such person as Steven Fussell. It was a trick, designed to lure Viper into the open. Viper has probably figured that out by now.'
