Blood Ransom

by Sophie McKenzie

  I zipped my jacket up, pulled the hood over my freezing ears and trudged on.

  I arrived in Tromstorm, cold and exhausted, towards the end of the afternoon and immediately started asking if anyone had seen two men meeting Elijah’s and Milo’s descriptions.

  It wasn’t a huge town and actually quite pretty – though that may have been all the snow. All the shops were shutting, so I trailed round the bars, noting the names of the streets I was checking out.

  I pretended I was looking for my grandfather and brother who were staying somewhere in the area and who’d arrived by helicopter three evenings ago.

  Two hours later I’d exhausted all the bars I could find and had found out nothing. I was on the verge of letting myself give way to panic when I passed a small supermarket. It was open, with a 24 hr sign flashing above the door.

  I went inside and began my usual conversation. ‘Hi, do you speak English?’

  ‘Mmm, ja.’The lady behind the counter looked at me suspiciously.

  I wondered whether, after all my travelling and that long walk into Tromstorm I was starting to look – and smell – like a homeless person after all.

  ‘I’m looking for my brother,’ I said. ‘He looks like me, but in a wheelchair?’

  The woman shook her head.

  ‘Or my grandfather? He’s a bit taller than I am . . . greyish hair . . . brown eyes. He speaks English and Spanish and German. They came in a helicopter three days ago and they’re staying nearby, but I’ve lost the address and phone number.’

  ‘Mmm, ja,’ the lady said with a sniff.

  ‘So have you seen them?’ I said, fully expecting the answer to be no.

  ‘The brother in the wheelchair, no.’ The lady sniffed again. ‘But an older man, ja. He comes twice.’

  She told me, in broken English, that Elijah had visited on two occasions in the past three days – once to buy a brand of commercial cleaning fluid and a second time to purchase some sort of powerful acid, which she said he’d told her was in order to clear his drains.

  ‘This one is special chemical,’ she said. ‘Ja.’

  I didn’t like the sound of that.

  ‘So do you know where he lives?’ I said. ‘Is it nearby?’

  ‘Oh, ja,’ she said, with another sniff. ‘It is near. Everyone knows this place. It has a special fence all around the property to stop burglars.’

  ‘A fence?’ I said.

  ‘Ja.’ Another sniff. ‘They call it the . . . how would you say? Ja, the death fence.’

  83

  Rachel

  I’d tossed and turned all night.

  I badly wanted to know about Elijah’s plans for me. And yet, why should I trust anyone from RAGE, let alone offer them help? Last year – and in the recent attack on Calla – RAGE had proved just how brutal they were. And Amanda Lennox was not just the head of that vicious group – she was also a selfish blackmailer who – if she’d been telling the truth – was putting the needs of her sister ahead of a whole bunch of innocent people. Not that anyone who had anything to do with RAGE truly thought that most people were innocent – especially clones. I could still remember that guy, Franks, from last year, telling me that I was a freak . . . that I shouldn’t exist . . .

  I’d finally fallen asleep at about six a.m., then woken several hours later to find I was still locked in my room. Paul came up with some food and drink, but refused to answer my questions. There was no sound from the room opposite, where Lennox was being held.

  I had no idea what was going on . . . or why I was being treated differently all of a sudden. I could only assume Elijah was trying to keep me and Lennox apart. Which surely meant she did have some knowledge about Elijah’s plans for me.

  By early evening, when Paul finally unlocked the door and brought me downstairs, I was totally freaking out, though trying hard not to show it. Paul, still refusing to answer my questions, went outside for a smoke.

  I turned to Milo, who was stirring a saucepan on the hob.

  ‘Why’ve I been locked in my room all day?’ I said, the words blurting out of me. ‘What’s happening? Why am I out now? What’s Elijah doing?’

  Milo shook his head. He ladled some soup from his saucepan into a bowl, then wheeled himself across the room and placed the bowl on the table.

  ‘Eat it while it’s hot,’ he said.

  I stared at him. ‘Why won’t you talk to me?’ I said.

  My voice cracked as I spoke. I couldn’t stop it. Tears threatened to well up.

  Milo placed a roll on the table beside my steaming soup bowl. I noticed his hand trembled slightly as he did so.

  ‘You act like you care about me,’ I said, ‘but if you really did then you’d tell me what’s going on.’

  Milo stared up at me, his brown eyes so like Elijah’s and Theo’s but without the former’s haughty confidence or the latter’s gentle strength.

  ‘Elijah’s rattled,’ he said quietly. ‘He knows Lennox came to blackmail him with those files, but he didn’t believe RAGE would really let her go without keeping copies. And he was right.’

  ‘How does he know?’

  ‘He hurt Lennox . . . forced her to tell him where RAGE were based.’

  I nodded. ‘Then what?’

  ‘He got John, the other guard from Calla, to go round there with some back-up and find and destroy the copies. He just received news that it was done.’

  I closed my eyes. Another defeat.

  ‘What’s he doing now?’ I said.

  ‘Elijah? He’s upstairs having a shower then he’s planning to take some blood from you and go back to the bunker to work. He’s in a terrible mood. Says he’s wasted nearly a whole day.’

  I picked up the roll beside my bowl of soup and nibbled a little. It was soft and warm, but it tasted like cardboard in my mouth.

  ‘What about Amanda Lennox?’ I said.

  ‘She’s still upstairs.’ As he spoke, Milo’s eyes flitted across the room to the front door of the chalet.

  Elijah’s greatcoat was hanging on the hook on the back. Peeking out from underneath it was Amanda Lennox’s brown leather bag.

  Was it possible that Elijah had left the contents in the bag? No, surely he wouldn’t have done that. And yet I had to check.

  I glanced upstairs. No sign of Elijah. I jumped up from the table. Through the window I could see Paul, still puffing on his cigarette down by the lake. He wasn’t looking towards the house.

  I headed for the bag.

  ‘Rachel, stop,’ Milo hissed.

  I ignored him. Reached the bag. Opened the flap and thrust in my hand. Nothing.

  I hadn’t seriously expected Elijah to have left incriminating and revealing notes about his work lying around on the back of the kitchen door, but even so – after being cooped up in my room for the whole day, it felt like the last straw.

  ‘Rachel, please.’

  I dug my hand right into the far corners of the bag. It was totally empty.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ Elijah roared.

  I jumped. Spun round, my cheeks burning. Elijah was at the top of the stairs, glaring down at us.

  He strode downstairs, his furious gaze fixed on Milo.

  ‘You useless idiot,’ Elijah shouted. ‘What are you doing letting her look in that bag?’ He advanced on Milo, who shrank back in his wheelchair. Elijah reached him in two strides. He slapped him across the face with the back of his hand.

  I gasped. Milo yelped, his hand shooting up to his cheek.

  ‘You’re unbelievable,’ Elijah went on. ‘What do you have to say for yourself?’

  Milo gaped at him. ‘I didn’t . . .’

  ‘You didn’t what? Think? Care?’ Spittle flew out of Elijah’s mouth. ‘Words fail me.’

  I stepped away from the bag, my heart thumping.

  Milo was totally shrunk down in his chair now. Despite my earlier irritation with him, I felt a wave of pity rise up. Elijah had never given him a chance.

  ‘I’m sorry,’
Milo muttered.

  Elijah’s lip curled with scorn. ‘You’re pathetic,’ he said. ‘But I will make a man of you today, whatever it takes.’

  I stared at him. What on earth did that mean?

  Milo looked similarly horror-struck.

  Ignoring us both, Elijah stormed across to the kitchen door and yelled out to Paul. ‘Fetch Amanda Lennox down here now!’

  Paul jogged in and disappeared up the stairs.

  Elijah was still fuming, his arms folded.

  Long, tense seconds ticked by. Lennox appeared, glancing anxiously round as Paul brought her down to the kitchen. She looked visibly shaken – a different person from the confident, stylish woman who’d turned up at the chalet the day before.

  As soon as she saw Elijah, Lennox clasped her hands together in a gesture that was both emphatic and beseeching. ‘Please, just listen to me, Elijah,’ she said. ‘I didn’t know RAGE kept copies of the files I brought with me. You have to believe me.’

  ‘Really?’ Elijah said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. ‘I don’t think I have to do anything.’

  ‘But nothing’s really changed,’ Lennox protested. ‘You’ve destroyed the copies of my files. The situation is exactly as I said it was. Do a deal with me, and you’ll be safe forever. Please, just think about it.’

  ‘Oh, I have thought about it.’ Elijah snorted. ‘In fact, let me tell you what I think. I think RAGE knows you’re here. I think you’re working undercover with no real intention of blackmailing me. I think that you thought that once you were inside and we were talking and my guard was down, you were banking on finding and destroying my work. As RAGE has attempted to do at least twice before, under your predecessors.’

  I stared at Lennox. Was that true?

  ‘No,’ she said, her whole face tensing up. ‘No, they—’

  But Elijah wasn’t listening. ‘What RAGE didn’t count on was that I’m far better at this game than they are.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Now, where’s your gun, Milo?’

  Milo patted his jacket with trembling fingers.

  Oh, God.

  ‘Good.’ Elijah paused. ‘Now, the truth, please, Miss Lennox, or I’ll make sure this is very slow and very painful.’

  ‘I’ve told you the truth,’ Lennox spat. ‘If you don’t believe me and you’re not going to pay me for the data I’ve brought you, just let me go.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Elijah snarled.

  I stared at him. If he wasn’t planning on letting her go, what was he going to do with her?

  ‘You don’t have another choice,’ Lennox persisted. ‘If anything happens to me, people will come after you.’

  ‘How will anyone know you were here?’ Elijah said nastily. ‘I thought you came here under your own steam to blackmail me?’

  Amanda Lennox’s mouth opened, then shut again. For a split second I could see the defeat in her eyes, then they hardened again.

  ‘You’ll be caught,’ she spat. ‘This is stupid.’

  ‘I’ll take my chances.’ Elijah’s voice was icy. ‘Gun, Milo.’

  He was going to kill her. My heart thundered against my throat.

  ‘Okay.’ Lennox gritted her teeth. ‘Okay, you’re right about why I’m here, but that makes killing me even more stupid. Other people know about Eos – about your foul agenda . . . the evil work that you do. You’ll never be free of us.’ She held her head high.

  ‘I’ve been living as a refugee for fifteen years,’ Elijah snarled. ‘I’m not scared of your pathetic threats.’ He turned to Milo. ‘I told you to get out your gun.’

  Reluctantly, Milo drew the pistol out of his jacket. He offered it to Elijah.

  I stared, transfixed, at the small black weapon. This wasn’t really happening. It couldn’t be.

  ‘No, not me.’ Elijah waved the gun away with a flick of his little finger. ‘I already said, Milo, today we make a man of you.’

  I gasped. Surely he couldn’t mean . . .?

  ‘Go on, Milo.’ Elijah narrowed his eyes. ‘Kill her.’

  I froze. He couldn’t do this.

  Milo’s mouth gaped open. ‘I can’t,’ he stammered.

  ‘You have no choice,’ Elijah sneered. ‘Either you kill this woman, or I kill you – and then her.’

  I stared at them both. Milo was clearly totally overwhelmed, his hands shaking as he grasped the small gun. Elijah could barely contain his fury, his hands clenching and unclenching as he stood there, waiting.

  And then I looked at Amanda Lennox, standing defiantly in the middle of the room. She was a woman who, by rights, I should have wished dead. She worked for RAGE, which believed I shouldn’t even be alive. She stood for prejudice and bigotry and hatred. As I stared at her, my mind flashed back to the moment last year in Washington D.C., when Theo had stood in front of me, to protect me from Elijah’s bullet.

  I didn’t have to think about it any more. Whatever Lennox had done, Elijah had no right to take her life.

  Or anyone’s.

  Or to force Milo to do it for him.

  I stepped in front of Lennox.

  ‘If you want Milo to shoot her,’ I said, looking straight at Elijah. ‘You’ll have to make him shoot me first.’

  84

  Theo

  I stared at the lady in the shop. ‘What’s the death fence?’

  ‘You will see when you arrive. It is well-known around here . . . but you will have no trouble getting through. You will just ring at the gate and they will let you in, ja?’

  ‘Ja,’ I lied. ‘So, how do I get there? To the house, I mean?’ The lady gave me the directions. It sounded like a fair walk away, but adrenalin was coursing through me now.

  I set off, walking fast, trying not to dwell on how on earth I was going to get past this fence the woman had talked about. Despite the fallen snow, the sun was shining. The roads had clearly been properly swept with snow ploughs and there was little traffic.

  The lady in the shop had told me the house was hidden from the street, but the long gravel drive, surrounding woodland and huge fence made it easy enough to spot if you kept your eyes open. After about thirty minutes, I found it – a drive in the middle of a pine forest, with a tall metal fence visible through the gaps in the trees.

  I headed cautiously up the drive. Rounding a short bend, I could see a set of large metal gates in the distance. The house must be beyond those.

  I’d been feeling hungry as I walked, but the pangs in my stomach vanished as I stood, staring at the huge fence next to the gate. It was high. Really high. Far higher than any tree I’d ever climbed. But that wasn’t what terrified me.

  I suddenly understood why the woman had called it the ‘death fence’.

  Strapped to the fence and bounded with a thick black line, was a sign with the outline of a man and a lightning bolt shape.

  I didn’t know exactly what the words underneath said, but I certainly understood what they meant.

  This was an electric fence.

  I followed it round, away from the gate, to where the woodland was most dense. I was hoping there would be a gap, or a hole . . . something that I could wriggle through without touching the sides.

  But the fence was completely intact.

  How on earth was I going to get past it?

  85

  Rachel

  So much for grand gestures.

  Elijah just laughed when I stood in front of Amanda Lennox, though I noticed he did turn and check that Milo wasn’t pointing the gun anywhere near me.

  ‘I’m astonished by your stupidity, Rachel. Do you not realise that this woman would cheerfully see you dead?’

  ‘That doesn’t make killing her right,’ I said.

  ‘We don’t target clones now,’Amanda Lennox said behind me. ‘I know I lied about certain things, Rachel, but that part of what I told you was true. Since Simpson . . . he was the old head of RAGE . . . since then we’ve got a new policy. We don’t blame the people cloned for the work of the cloner.’

  ‘What
about all the embryos in the clinic?’ I said. ‘You killed them.’

  ‘They were only a few weeks . . . for Christ’s sake, it wouldn’t be illegal to have an abortion at that stage.’

  ‘So abortions are okay, but clones can’t exist?’

  ‘They’re completely different things. Anyway, whatever crimes RAGE may have committed in the past, Lazio’s done far worse. You should see what he’s got in that bunker outside. Do you know what he’s using Eos for? What he’s planning to do to you?’

  I stared at her.

  ‘Quiet, both of you,’ Elijah snapped. ‘Rachel, please move out of the way.’

  I stepped closer to Amanda Lennox. ‘What’s he doing with Eos? What is he planning for me?’

  Elijah swore under his breath. ‘Move her, Paul.’

  As Paul strode over, Lennox darted closer.

  ‘Stop him, Rachel.’ She gripped my arm, her fingers digging in so hard they hurt. ‘For your own sake.’

  ‘What—?’ I started.

  But before I could say more, Paul grabbed Lennox by the wrist and wrenched her away. She clutched me with her other hand. Paul reached to stop her, but instead of pulling away from him, Lennox stepped backwards, into him. This unbalanced Paul, who stumbled for a second.

  In that tiny moment, Amanda Lennox lurched forward again, so her mouth was right by my ear. She flung her arms round me, as if clinging on for dear life, which, I suppose, she was.

  ‘The code is 2509,’ she whispered. ‘Find it and kill it. That’s why I’m really here . . . to stop Elijah . . . and to kill it.’

  I froze. What was she talking about? Code for what? Kill who?

  But Paul had already regained his balance and was stepping forward, fist raised.

  His arm swung past me. Wham. The punch hit home. Amanda Lennox went flying across the room. She fell against the far wall, winded and gasping for breath.