26
Only a slight widening of Lucas’s eyes betrayed how he felt about Bane’s statement, but Jon’s jaw frankly dropped. “I…usually hate to use the word, but surely it’s impossible. Us three? The place must be crawling with EuroArmy.”
I was thinking the very same thing, but then I saw Lucas’s eyes narrow, a look of intentness covering his face.
“No, it’s not,” I said. “Lucas has a plan.”
He gave a wry smile. “Well, I have an idea.”
“Good,” said Bane briskly, as I yanked a blonde wig from the bag and started pinning it into place. “First things first, have you both got a nonLee? And you keep that knife of yours in your pocket, Lucas, okay? Obviously the situation is totally different to how it was at the end back in Gozo—there was absolutely no hope of success then even if we did fight, so we’d have been killing people for nothing—but right now, even leaving aside all the normal moral considerations, the EuroGov are using nonLethals. For political reasons, yes, but it will still look really bad if we kill anyone. So lethal violence can only be our last resort, understood?” He tilted his head particularly at Lucas, looking endearingly stern.
“Understood,” said Lucas gravely. “I have a nonLee, anyway.”
I wanted to stay and listen, but… No time. I clapped a football cap over my wig, pulled low over my forehead, and put a pair of sunglasses on my head, ready to use as soon as I got somewhere light enough.
“I have a nonLee too,” Jon was confirming.
“Good,” said Bane again. “So, Lucas, enlighten us?”
“Well, we play to our strengths,” Lucas said.
Right…I turned towards the stairs. Yikes, no! I took the nonLee from my waistband and tucked it into the bag. Made myself take stock from head to feet. Nothing else incriminating. Oh yes, just one more thing.
I hugged each of the others, quick and hard, and kissed Bane. “Don’t you dare get killed,” I said. “Any of you!”
Bane held me so tight I thought he wasn’t going to be able to let me go after all. But finally he whispered, “If we lose, don’t you dare come back!” and released me.
I hurried away up the stairs before I could lose my nerve or give in to curiosity and stay to hear more about their plan. If I didn’t stop Father Mark, it wouldn’t matter if they succeeded or failed.
The stairs led up to a hallway with a front door. Opening it, I stepped out into the street as boldly as I could. Now, which way? Bother, should’ve checked the map before coming out.
I walked briskly a few streets, then stopped to consult the map of Rome in the bag. I was several hundred meters from the Vatican—the station was quite a walk. Didn’t know when the first train was, so I’d better step on it.
Rome still slept, the streets deserted. As I neared my destination, I began to see the odd person, mostly trundling suitcases in the same direction, so at least I knew I wasn’t lost.
Roma Termini—I saw the sign over the door at last and hurried inside, slipping the sunglasses on as I entered the lit area. Screens…there. Brussels, Brussels…there. 04:52. Platform 5. It was a twelve hour journey, right? Next train not until…06:02. My eyes flew to the clock. 04:48… Lord!
I ran for the ticket office. “Brussels, please,” I gasped in Esperanto, swiping my fake ID card without a second thought. Quick…quick…
The reader beeped happily and the sleepy-eyed ticket clerk glanced dispassionately at her screen and deigned to move her fingers over the keyboard slightly faster. “Return?”
“Uh…yes.” Though with an unconscious Father Mark to lug along, I’d probably have to ‘borrow’ a car. Still, just in case I had to get out of Brussels in a serious hurry.
I handed over rather a lot of the emergency eurons Eduardo had given me, accepted the ticket and legged it for platform five. Dived on board and hadn’t even taken a seat when the doors hissed closed. Too close! But I’d made it.
It was only when I’d settled into a seat in the mostly-empty carriage and my heart rate had gone back down and I’d started to relax that it hit me what I’d done.
I’d left the Vatican.
I was on EuroGov territory.
And this time, I had no diplomatic immunity. If they caught me…
I forced the wave of fear back down. Father Mark had risked the same for me when he helped Bane rescue me from inside the Lab itself, back at Salperton Facility. Risked much more for me, what with the current moratorium. And it wasn’t just Father Mark’s life at stake, was it? But my body insisted on flooding me with panic and adrenalin. I scowled, tried not to fidget, refused to burst into tears and kept my face determinedly turned to the window.
The train raced on. The carriage filled up a bit. The ticket collector came by, and checked my ticket without even looking at me.
Seven o’clock. What was happening back home? Were Bane and Jon and Lucas okay? Captured? Hurt? Was it even possible that they could actually be…winning? From the determined set of Bane’s spine as he marshaled his unlikely troops, they were going to go down trying. O Lord, keep them safe.
Eight o’clock. I checked my ticket. Arrival time…16:34. I might even be able to be waiting for Father Mark at the hotel. How was he going to get there? Oh Lord save me, could he be on this very train? When would he have got to the train station?
As long as Father Mark didn’t see me, it would be fine. But if he did… I couldn’t pull out the nonLee on the train, it would spell disaster for both of us…but it would be equally disastrous if he went for me…especially for me. Why hadn’t I thought this through?
Wait…over there, a leaflet of train times. I got up casually and went to pick one up. Carried it back to my seat and had a look. 01:52…no, 03:52… Could he have made it for that train? What time had Lucas woken us? About three o’clock, surely? There was a pretty good chance, then.
There wasn’t really anything I could do about it, anyway. Not like he’d have any reason to walk up and down the train.
Nine o’clock. Oh dear. Almost a twelve-hour journey and I didn’t have a book.
Well, I’d better pray. Pray for Bane and Jon and Lucas, for Unicorn and Eduardo and the others—what would a fifty-percent-lethal grenade have done to Bee? Pray for everyone at the Vatican. And for the vote tomorrow, and for me and Father Mark. For the Chairman, even. Was Father Mark’s attempt really meant to fail? If Reginald flaming Hill had come up with this, perhaps he meant to step into the Chairman’s vacated shoes.
Not my problem; nothing I could do about it, anyway. Father Mark was my problem right now.
The day crept past. I prayed and prayed some more. I pounced on abandoned newspapers and magazines. Quite a lot about the vote: evenly balanced in opinion. Prayed again.
I was so tired…but I fought against sleep. All it would take would be for me to start sleep-talking. Even if I didn’t speak some dangerous name, I might use Latin.
All the same, I was dozing when the train stopped with a jerk. My eyes fixed on a station sign and I sat up straight, sleep forgotten.
Brussels.
I took a surreptitious look at my reflection in the window. Wig straight. Hat pulled forward over my scar. How would Lucas feel if I got caught, after refusing his help?
Stop it, Margo. Stop thinking like that. It won’t help. Get off, find Hotel Champagne, save Father Mark.
I consulted a tourist map on a display board on the platform—I’d been to EuroSquare when I was here before, the obvious location for the speech, but not Euro Boulevard, where the speech was actually going to take place—no doubt to avoid memories of the January protests that had led to the vote. So…Euro Boulevard…there…I was here. Not far. Good. Already quarter to five.
Off I hurried, trying to move with the confident step of one who knows exactly where they’re going. Fortunately the directions were simple, and I didn’t have to crane around too much for street names.
Here it was. Euro Boulevard. There was the podium for the speech. The Chairman’s car would drive in along that bit of road, stopping there. He’d walk along the side of that building…yes, Hotel Champagne, said the sign.
I worked my way through the crowd already gathering, slipped across the road through the gaps where the crowd control barriers hadn’t been put into their final position yet, and strolled casually into the hotel.
Expensive place. I probably didn’t fit in very well. Confidence was the key. There were the lifts. I’d head that way with my breeziest air…uh oh! Barriers ran across the lobby, funneling everyone between two rectangular arches. WeaponScanner arches. Oh…rats.
Some other department of the EuroGov had noticed this building was the perfect place for an assassin, too. Father Mark didn’t need a weapon. I did. But no amount of confidence would get me through with a nonLee in my bag.
I stopped and glanced around the foyer for a moment. What, what could I be looking for? Ah-hah! I moved determinedly to a stand of business cards, selected one for a taxi company and strolled out of the hotel again.
Now what?
Slipping down a back street let me reconnoiter the Hotel’s second accessible side, where I found a locked service door. No weaponScanners beyond that, no doubt, but I had neither lock picks nor crowbar.
What to do?
I could…go back to the lobby, put my bag on the floor to get something from it and casually slide it under one of the sofas while no one was looking. Then go up and…what? Get Father Mark’s attention and run like billy-ho, beat him to the lobby and get my bag, run outside, lure him down the back street and shoot him?
I’d need a lot of paper to write down all that could and probably would go wrong with that. Starting with the whole outrunning bit. I’d barely beaten him along half a corridor, when he… I swallowed a sick lump of rage-pain and tried to think.
What other option was there?
I’d have to wait here—surely someone would come out, and I could slip in, even if I had to shoot them with my nonLee. I hunkered down behind a refuse bin and waited.
No one came out. I could hear the crowds growing and glanced at my watch. Quarter to six! Please Lord! Let someone come out?
Minutes crept by. Ten to six. Lord, it’s the speech that starts at six; when will the Chairman arrive?
My blood froze in my veins. He could arrive at any moment. And once I saw that car pulling up, it would be too late. There was no more time. I had to get up to room one-oh-eight, even without the nonLee. So long as Doctor Reynar hadn’t undone the original programming—unlikely—I’d hopefully be sufficient distraction to allow the Chairman to pass under the window un-attacked.
I licked dry lips. Father Mark was fast, fast like Lucas. Could I really outrun him, even with a head start? In the distance, the crowd began to cheer.
Bane, forgive me. My heart accelerated in my chest, but I was already running down the back street. I yanked the bag off over my head and chucked it at the base of the wall, then pushed my way with a total lack of charity through the crowd to the hotel entrance.
Cool as a cucumber… I walked in, straight across the lobby, through the right hand weaponScanner arch and up the stairs. As soon as I was around the turn, I ran again. Skidded to a halt on the first landing, my eyes desperately searching the signs. Rooms…51-100, 101-150…there. I sprinted through the corridors, my eyes skidding over door numbers, come on, come on, drive slowly, car, drive slowly, let the Chairman wave, take your time.
There!
I hadn’t got a door card. Oh no… I reached out and turned the handle. It opened. Ah, not locked. One less complication when programming Father Mark.
Pulling off my sunglasses to show my face, I stepped inside, making sure the door wouldn’t swing closed, and looked around.
Father Mark crouched in the open window, behind the curtain, like a panther about to spring, his gaze intent on something below. He’d not heard me over the sound of the crowd.
“Father Mark,” I said clearly.
His head jerked around, his eyes widened—for a split second, I saw terror in them, then that other thing slid back in and he sprang.
I was already moving, but as he leapt, his hand reached out, grabbing a cushion from the window seat and throwing it with tremendous force…it struck the door squarely, knocking it closed. I lunged for the handle—felt him hurtling up behind me—had to get out of the room or I was dead but…had to move or I’d be dead sooner—I leapt away—too slow, he carried me to the ground, knocking the air out of me, not like screaming was an option anyway.
I twisted, trying to get to my feet but he was on me, his hands closing around my neck. I tried to kick him, thrust him off with my feet, but his weight held my legs immobile. I couldn’t breathe, pain around my neck, I struggled frantically grabbing his hands, trying to drag them off but it was hopeless, too strong…of their own volition, my fingers began to claw at the backs of his hands, but his knee caught me in the stomach and the last of my air was forced out of my closed throat and with nothing to replace it, my vision began to gray out, can’t breathe, can’t breathe, can’t breathe, can’t breathe, air, air…
I writhed with increasing feebleness in an agony of panic and pain, one thought whispering in my head… Bane, I’m so, so, sorry…so, so, sorry…
Something else, as well, something important, air, please, air, air…important…to do with that blurred shape above me, something I hadn’t said, needed to say, wanted to say. No breath for speech, blackness creeping up to swallow me, but I managed to mouth, “I forgive you.” Hope he saw, hope he remembered…
Blackness won.