Blood Ransom

by Sophie McKenzie

  ‘Sure. This way.’ Roused by my irritation, Milo wheeled himself out of the room. I followed him down the corridor.

  As I walked, it struck me that the attack Elijah was so sure was coming would be a great chance for me to get away from him. If I could just reach the police, I’d be able to tell them everything.

  The storeroom turned out to be opposite the radio room. Milo unlocked it and let me in. ‘Sit there.’ He switched on the light and pointed to a chair by the door. ‘I’ll look for the stuff you need.’

  I sank into the chair, little Grace still in my arms.

  As I peered down at her, she opened her eyes and looked up, right into mine.

  ‘Hello, Grace,’ I murmured under my breath. ‘I’m Rachel. I’m your big sister.’

  Grace stared back at me. I couldn’t tell if she was really seeing me or not. It suddenly struck me that she had no mother to look after her. That her biological mother was the same as mine. Which made her my sister twice over.

  I smiled down at her, unable to tear my eyes away, and reached inside the blanket for her little hand.

  The fingers were unbelievably tiny and perfect. I stroked my own finger over her palm and she grasped it so tightly I gasped.

  ‘You’re strong, Grace,’ I murmured, still staring into her eyes. ‘Strong and beautiful. Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.’

  She carried on gripping my finger . . . hard. And in that moment something shifted in my heart and I knew that what I was feeling was love.

  Pure and unconditional love.

  46

  Theo

  I’d drawn Amanda Lennox the map she’d asked for, showing the location of the barn building containing Elijah’s weird experiments – and how to reach it from the jetty.

  I didn’t like giving away the information, but Elijah’s sinister lab was completely expendable as far as I was concerned. More importantly, if RAGE were focused on destroying the lab, then there was a greater chance that I could somehow get off the boat, find Rachel and rescue us both.

  Not that I had any idea how on earth I was going to do any of those things.

  Amanda Lennox had explained, rather boastfully, how RAGE had picked up my trail since I started looking for information on Rachel’s supposed suicide. I asked for more details, but she refused to give any.

  A little later, the man with the rifle brought Lewis in. He’d obviously been badly beaten: his face was bruised on both cheeks, his lip was split and one eye was so swollen it was nearly closed.

  ‘What have you done to him?’ I demanded.

  ‘Nothing he didn’t deserve,’ the RAGE operative said. ‘He shouldn’t have crossed us.’

  His words didn’t make sense for a moment. Then I remembered how Lewis had worked undercover at RAGE last year, keeping tabs on their activities for Elijah.

  No wonder they were mad at him.

  The RAGE man pushed Lewis to the floor and chained his wrist to a pipe sticking out of the wall opposite. He left without speaking again.

  I stared at Lewis’s crumpled body. He opened his eyes with a groan.

  ‘You look like crap,’ I said.

  ‘Thanks,’ Lewis mumbled.

  ‘D’you know what the time is?’ I asked.

  Lewis twisted round so he could see his watch. ‘Almost 2.30 a.m.’

  ‘What d’you think they’ll do with us?’ I said.

  ‘That woman . . . Amanda Lennox . . . has ordered that you’re kept safe until after the attack. I think she thinks you could be a useful bargaining chip with Elijah,’ Lewis said.

  ‘What about you?’

  Lewis shook his head.

  At that moment, the man who’d chained him reappeared at the door with a bunch of other guys. How many RAGE operatives were there on board?

  ‘Take the kid to a cabin,’ he ordered.

  I was quickly untied and led out of the room. As I walked along the corridor, I heard the thud of a boot kick, followed by Lewis’s groan.

  Suddenly I was terrified. RAGE was ruthless – and Lewis was of no value to the organisation. How far were they prepared to go to punish him for double-crossing them last year?

  A few doors down, and I was locked inside a proper cabin, tied by a padlocked chain to the bed. I had enough slack on the chain to walk to the toilet and back, but not to reach the door. There was a single porthole but it was covered with a locked shutter. If I’d had a crowbar I might have been able to force it open, but I didn’t. Apart from the bed and an empty fitted cupboard, the cabin contained just a single shelf stacked with a pile of RAGE leaflets.

  I sank down onto the bed. Along the corridor, Lewis yelled out in pain.

  I shut my eyes, not wanting to imagine what might be happening to him. After another thirty seconds, footsteps pounded past. They stopped outside the room Lewis was in.

  ‘What’s going on?’ It was Amanda Lennox, her soft Scottish accent suddenly sharp.

  One of the men growled a response.

  ‘He’s unconscious,’ Lennox said angrily. ‘This could have waited. Now, come up on deck.’

  Footsteps trudged past me and faded away.

  I closed my eyes. If Lewis was unconscious that meant I was on my own in the rescue attempt.

  And I still had no plan.

  I sat on the bed feeling seasick as the waves grew choppier.

  47

  Rachel

  It took a while, but eventually Milo found the nappies, milk, bottles and sterilising equipment in the storeroom. Keeping Grace carefully swaddled in her blanket, I followed him back to the kitchen.

  ‘I’ll work out the milk while you put a nappy on her, yeah?’ Milo said.

  ‘Okay.’ I laid Grace carefully on the table. She was still fast asleep.

  Keeping one hand over her stomach, I tried to get my head round the nappy instructions.

  ‘Why is Elijah cloning babies?’ Milo asked from the sink.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I admitted. ‘He said something about tests – on Grace, not just me – but I don’t know what he’s looking for. He calls it the Aphrodite Experiment. Apparently there’s something I’ve got in my blood that’s different from every other clone. Something that makes me special. He’s looking for the same thing in Grace, I guess.’

  ‘Well, she’ll certainly be easier to do tests on,’ Milo said. ‘No one’s going to be coming after her . . .’

  ‘What d’you mean?’ I said.

  ‘Just that Grace is in Elijah’s power. He can test anything he likes on her. No one even knows she exists.’

  I shook my head, not wanting to think about what Elijah’s tests might mean for Grace.

  We worked on in silence. In the end, the nappy was quite simple, though it was a bit big for Grace. Milo struggled with the sterilising equipment but eventually produced two small bottles of milk.

  Grace stayed asleep through the whole thing. Nappy on, I wrapped her in the blanket again and picked her up. ‘God, that was exhausting,’ I said.

  Milo nodded. ‘Hey, your foot looks really bad. Can I check it out?’

  I’d completely forgotten about the deep cut on my sole, not to mention all the bruises, but now Milo mentioned them my feet seemed to throb painfully. Milo took a tube of antiseptic and a pack of bandages out from under the sink. He held them out to me.

  ‘Please, Rachel, let me help you.’

  Part of me wanted to tell him where he could shove his bandages and yet he had been so helpful with Grace – and it would be easier to get away from him if he trusted me . . . and if my feet were less sore.

  I let him wash and bandage the cut.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Er, what’s going to happen now?’

  ‘Dunno,’ he said. ‘Paul told me to get some food ready in case we had to move fast. They’re expecting the police in about two hours, but hopefully we’ll be gone in the helicopter before that. Last I heard it should be here in the next twenty minutes, maybe less.’

  My mouth felt dry. This was going t
o be my chance. I had to get away from Milo, take Grace and hide somewhere for a few hours . . . then Elijah would be forced to leave us both behind and I’d be alone when the police arrived.

  ‘Rachel?’ Milo was staring at me. ‘Did you hear what I just said?’

  ‘No, sorry. What?’

  ‘Elijah’s got one thing right,’ he said softly. ‘You are different. Special.’ He hesitated. ‘I think you’re beautiful.’

  I looked quickly down at Grace, blushing. I didn’t know what to say . . . What was Milo doing, talking like that?

  ‘Milo . . .’ I started.

  ‘Anyway,’ he said, his tone suddenly brisk and cheery. ‘Do you want a sandwich, I’m making—’

  Boom. An explosion echoed across the island. I froze, clinging to Grace as another went off, then another.

  ‘What was that?’ I said.

  Milo careered to the door, almost colliding with John.

  ‘It’s RAGE,’ John gasped. ‘They’re here – and the helicopter’s still ten minutes away!’

  No. What was RAGE doing here? Like everyone else, I’d been expecting the police. But RAGE was far worse. The people at RAGE would have no qualms about blowing up Elijah’s lab – or, indeed, killing Grace and me.

  ‘Get out of the house,’ John shouted. ‘Elijah says you have to go to the cave on the beach and hide till the helicopter gets here. I’ll come and find you then.’

  Milo and I both stared at him. He thumped the door with his hand.

  ‘Come on!’ he yelled. ‘Hurry!’

  48

  Theo

  One look at the RAGE leaflets and I was reminded of how extreme the organisation really was.

  We’d moored just over five minutes ago. I was pretty certain everyone apart from Lewis had left the boat, leaving me chained up in the cabin.

  Since his yell of pain a while back, I hadn’t heard Lewis make a sound. And he hadn’t responded to my shouts either.

  I didn’t want to think about what RAGE might have done to him.

  There was no way of getting rid of the chain round my wrist, so I focused on the RAGE pamphlets again.

  Cheaply printed, the leaflet I was holding featured a picture of a puppy with an ear growing out of its back. Ugh. The headline read: Is this the future you want? Genetic manipulation is unnatural and cruel. Join us now and STOP this evil!

  I shook my head.

  A puppy with an ear growing out of its back was certainly disgusting – but genetic engineering meant good things too, didn’t it? Elijah had told me before that a lot of his work had meant people who couldn’t otherwise conceive could have children – and cloning a human being . . . well, that was really just like test-tube babies, wasn’t it? Not good, maybe, but not really bad either.

  RAGE might think it was immoral but they weren’t much better. There was nothing in these leaflets that suggested the extent to which they were prepared to go to fight genetic engineering.

  Anyway, as far as I was concerned, it wasn’t Elijah’s science that was the problem. It was the way he thought it gave him the right to play God over everybody else that made him dangerous.

  Boom.

  Was that an explosion?

  I strained my ears. Water lapped at the hull of the boat. A seagull squawked overhead.

  Boom. Boom. They sounded like grenades going off.

  Man, this was horrible.

  I prayed that Rachel wasn’t anywhere near the lab.

  I ran my hands through my hair. There had to be some way of getting free. For what felt like the fiftieth time I stared at the chain around my wrist. It was fastened with a small but powerful padlock which I had no hope of opening without a key.

  I picked the chain up, following its length down to where it was tied round one of the bed’s wooden legs. I’d already tugged on it several times, so I knew there was no way of moving the bed leg – the bed was built into the wall, anyway – but what if I tried to separate the bed itself from the leg? Then I could just slide the padlocked chain over the top.

  I lifted up the mattress. The bedpost was wooden, held in place by four small screws. If I could just undo them, I might be able to prise the rest of the bed frame far enough apart to make this work.

  But what could I use as a screwdriver?

  I suddenly remembered Rachel’s hairgrip. It was still in my jeans pocket. Hands trembling with excitement, I fished it out and got to work.

  49

  Rachel

  Keeping Grace carefully wrapped up, I grabbed my trainers and a jumper and followed John and Milo outside. It was pouring with rain now. I strained my eyes, looking towards the hill in the centre of Calla. I could see nothing, though shouts and gunfire echoed around us.

  RAGE must be attacking the lab. But were Theo and Lewis with them?

  My heart pounded at the thought that Theo might be back on the island right now. Was he safe? And what about all the embryos in the lab? I still thought what Elijah was doing was grotesque but each one of those tiny alien shapes in the pods was – nevertheless – a life.

  Killing them was wrong.

  John led the three of us onto the beach. By the time we reached the shelter of the cave my hair was drenched, though Grace was still dry inside her blanket, under my jacket. John carried Milo over the patch of sand between the path and the cave, then went back for his wheelchair.

  I thought about running, but only for a second. Better to wait until John had gone. Milo wouldn’t be able to follow me, after all. Except . . . where would I go? RAGE weren’t exactly going to welcome me with open arms.

  Still, they must have come here in a boat. It was probably moored somewhere near the jetty. If I could just get away from both sides and make it there, I’d surely find a phone or a radio I could use to call home . . . or the police.

  I hugged Grace to my chest as John helped Milo into his chair. She was stirring, her little head twisting against my top, her arms and legs wriggling inside the blanket.

  ‘We’ll be okay, Grace,’ I whispered. Again I felt that fierce tug of love. I thought about what Milo had said . . . Grace is in Elijah’s power. He can do what tests he likes on her. No one even knows she exists.

  ‘I know,’ I whispered. ‘I’ll protect you.’

  Grace made that pitiful mewing sound I’d heard before. I headed for the back of the cave and sat down next to a pile of stones. She was probably hungry. I fished out the bottle of formula Milo had prepared.

  John was still at the entrance to the cave, giving Milo some last-minute instructions from Elijah.

  ‘Whatever happens, stay here until I come back for you. If I don’t appear in thirty minutes, then head for the area just east of Calla Hill. That’s where the helicopter’s landing, okay?’

  John left. As Milo wheeled his way towards me, I put the bottle to Grace’s lips, but she turned her head away and carried on wailing.

  I looked up. Milo was smiling at me. ‘I wish I’d met you a different way, Rachel,’ he said, hesitantly.

  For God’s sake.

  ‘She won’t feed,’ I said. I had enough problems to deal with without Milo getting all sentimental on me.

  Milo wheeled himself nearer. Grace’s cries got louder. I gave up trying to make her drink from the little bottle of milk and tried rocking her in my arms.

  ‘Sssh,’ I said, soothingly.

  Grace just wailed even louder.

  ‘If RAGE hears her, they’ll find us,’ I said.

  Milo nodded. ‘We could hide behind that,’ he said, pointing at where a piece of rock jutted out at the very rear of the cave. ‘There’s an opening behind it, into a tunnel. We could go a couple of metres inside – that might muffle the noise.’

  I stood up, my heart racing.

  ‘Where does the tunnel lead?’ I said.

  ‘Nowhere,’ Milo said. ‘I mean, it goes along under the rocks, down to the beach near the jetty, but there’s no proper exit, just pipes, and it floods at high tide.’

  ‘Is it high t
ide now?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Milo said nervously. ‘I just know Elijah said the tunnel was dangerous.’

  I snorted. ‘Of course he said that.’ I walked over to the rock that jutted out. From where I’d been sitting, it had looked just like part of the cave formation, but as I got closer I could see it concealed a low, squarish opening. I peered inside. There wouldn’t be room to stand up properly, but the tunnel inside was definitely passable. Maybe the pipes it led to would be big enough for me to crawl through. If I came out on the beach near the jetty, I’d be in a perfect position to make it to the RAGE boat.

  ‘Rachel, we can’t go more than a few metres down there. Elijah wasn’t lying about that. It’s dangerous.’

  ‘I get it,’ I said impatiently. Grace was almost screaming now – a high- pitched squeal. ‘We’re just going to take Grace along the tunnel for a little way while she’s crying,’ I lied. ‘You’re the one who suggested it. Otherwise if anyone from RAGE comes they’ll hear her.’

  ‘Okay.’ Milo looked relieved.

  I turned and led the way into the tunnel. I had to walk hunched over. Even Milo, sitting in his wheelchair, had to dip his head slightly. The wheels rattled over the uneven ground. Milo’s breath came out in uneven gasps. He was clearly having to work hard to manoeuvre the chair. Worried about stumbling myself, I kept a tight hold of Grace as I ventured along in the darkness. Her squeals were deafening now, echoing off the tunnel walls.

  After a few metres, Milo let out a frustrated sigh. ‘Hang on, let me get my flashlight . . . er, torch,’ he said.

  I stopped.

  A second later a beam of light lit up the tunnel. I peered into the distance. The passageway extended as far as I could see.

  This was it. My chance to escape.

  Holding Grace with one arm, I turned and reached for Milo’s torch.

  ‘You need both hands for the wheelchair,’ I said.

  I tucked the torch under my arm and took a few more steps. It was easier now I could see the ground in front of me. The tunnel was colder than the cave and it smellled of salt and damp. I sped up slightly.