15

HOW TO OVERCOME VERTIGO IN PEOPLE OF SHORT STATURE

The major is waving his pistol to and fro, confronting a semicircle of thugs. They’re a mix of builds and ages, but all look like they’ve come through a lot of bad living to find themselves in the Black Dragon—their eyes are hard, glittering, glaring intently at Zamora and Danny. Ponytail’s tucked amongst them, shaking his head as if clearing a bad dream.

“Keep back,” Zamora shouts, “or I’ll drop you where you stand.”

The men edge closer, not convinced.

“Mister Danny,” the major whispers, “this pop gun’s not loaded. I took the bullets out—to be on the safe side. Make a run for that fire door. I’ll hold them off.”

“But—”

“Stay back!” Zamora thunders, backing around the wall with Danny close beside. “Unless you want bullet acupuncture!”

Suddenly he drops the gun, grabbing a huge barbell off the wall. He hurls himself at the gang members, spinning the barbell hard, his tattoos and muscles twitching, flexing.

Danny goes scrambling for the fire door, glancing back over his shoulder. Zamora has already knocked two triads to the floor, and the others are momentarily taken aback by the force of his attack. One of them pulls a gun from his baggy pocket, but Zamora spots it and brings one end of the barbell smacking down on the thug’s hand. The man howls, wrist cranked at a horrible angle, and the gun clatters to the floor. Gang members peel off, grabbing sticks and cudgels from the walls.

Danny pushes at the fire door, but it won’t budge. Glancing over his shoulder, he sees Zamora retreating slowly, blocking blow after blow, edging toward him. A wooden sword shatters against the barbell.

“Vamos!” Zamora grunts, shoving the barbell into a thug’s stomach. The man collapses, all the wind driven from his lungs.

Danny takes a deep breath and kicks the bar hard. It still doesn’t budge. Refocus, Danny. Need to imagine the strength. Imagine energy building in your belly, legs like metal. Take a deep breath and then release down through the leg, the foot, through the door right to the other side. Now!

It bursts open, taking out a gang member lurking on the other side. His face is astonished, then blank, as he keels to the floor.

“Come on, Major!”

Zamora parries one more blow, then, with all his strength, hurls the barbell two-handed at his adversaries.

“Let’s go!”

They’re through the door and slamming it shut before the gang manages to close. “Need to brace it,” the major shouts, looking around frantically.

A fire extinguisher—rust-spotted with age—is leaning against the wall. Zamora grabs it and jams it under the door’s external handle, wedging it up and locked.

“It’ll buy us a few minutes. Now what?”

“Find a way out.”

“What about your aunt?”

“They’ve taken her somewhere else. I’ll explain later.”

The landing is dark now, choked with cardboard boxes that fill the space and overflow down the stairs. Each one stamped with Chinese characters. Zamora cranks the lighter into flame and peers at them, running his finger along the English underneath. WING LUCK FIREWORK COMPANY. EXPORT. FLAMMABLE.

Angry voices yell on the other side of the door. Then the first thump as the gangsters make an effort to break it open. The door gives slightly, but the extinguisher holds fast.

“This way for the exit then,” Zamora says, holding the lighter over his head.

They hurry down the darkened stairwell, but they haven’t gone more than half a flight when they hear voices echoing below them. A second later comes a deafening gunshot, the bullet ripping out a chunk of wall just above Zamora’s head, showering them both with plaster.

“Caramba, Mister Danny. These jossers mean business!”

“We’ll have to climb instead.”

Going back past the gym door they can hear the effort to break it down: a steady boom, boom as the door is rammed with something heavy. The fire extinguisher shifts again, making an ominous drawn-out hissssss.

“Keep climbing, Major.”

But Zamora pauses, looking at the boxes. He bends to one at the bottom of a stack and holds the lighter’s flame steadily against it. It catches, takes hold, sending bigger flames licking up the box’s side—glinting on the major’s face. He smiles.

“Light at arm’s length. Oh boy. Run, Danny! As fast as you can. Don’t wait for me!”

Danny climbs swiftly, but pauses at each landing to wait for Zamora. The voices below are climbing faster for sure, closing the gap. There’s not much time.

“Come on, Major!”

“It’s all right for you, Mister Danny. This is where my build holds me back, you know.”

Smoke is curling up the stairwell, stiffening the air. As Danny arrives at each new landing, he tries the door, but every single one of them is locked tight shut.

“This place is a deathtrap, Mister Danny,” the major says, puffing hard, as yet another refuses to budge. “Somebody ought to close the whole thing down.”

From below comes another gunshot, then another. They’re deafening in the confined space, and a bullet ricochets off the metal handrail, setting it ringing.

Then a moment later there’s an eruption of sound below—something like machine gun fire: loud, stuttering. The corridor is lit up by flash after flash as the box of firecrackers ignites and detonates. And that sets off a chain reaction: rockets scream and bang in the gloom, Roman candles pump out their flares, brilliant and extraordinarily loud in the echo chamber of the stairwell. Bursts of blue, green, luminous orange. A rocket comes hurtling up out of the chaos and goes fizzing crazily off the walls and the smoke billows blackly toward them.

And then, amidst the chaos, a deeper explosion that rocks the stairs.

“Fire extinguisher, no?” Zamora says, rather proudly.

“Good job,” Danny says, patting him on the back.

“Even better than the end of the Wonder Chamber.”

They come to the top floor. No more steps, and the stairwell below engulfed in smoke as the fireworks display stutters to a close. A number on the wall says 24. No doorway here, just blank wall. Above them a trapdoor is cut into the ceiling with an extendable ladder clamped tight against it. EMERGENCY ROOF ACCESS, a sign says, but the steps are well out of both Danny’s and Zamora’s reach. The smoke is stinging their eyes, making them gag.

“There ought to be laws,” Zamora says. “What about equal opportunities? I’ll bunk you up.”

He puts both hands together and Danny places his left foot in them.

“Ready?” Zamora says. “Just like voltige. On three . . .”

Danny reaches up as the major propels him to the ceiling, making a grab for the release lever—and the ladder comes rattling down, nearly braining them both.

Danny scrambles up the metal rungs, bangs open the trapdoor, and finds himself in blinding sunlight on the Mansions’ roof, gulping good clean air. Zamora follows him up, coughing furiously.

All of Kowloon, the harbor, the island, lie spread out before them. Perpendicular lines of the skyscrapers cut the curve of the hills beyond. A dizzying world.

To the right there’s a smart office block, the same height as the Mansions. It’s tantalizingly close across a narrow—but lethal—twenty-four-floor drop. A gust of wind sweeps the rooftop, stirring the rubbish and weeds, and then dies again.

“Caracho!” Zamora blinks at the view. He turns quickly back to the trapdoor, but bullets come zipping up the stairwell and he ducks away. “Give me a hand to barricade this or we’re done for.”

Danny’s eyes scour the rooftop. Maybe there’s something big to heave over the trapdoor, but then what? Any other way off? The asphalt roof is covered in rubbish: old TVs, lamp shades, plastic chairs, a tangle of aerials and wires . . . nothing useful. And no other doorways. But then he spots something else glinting in the sunlight, and runs over to it.

A tall metal ladder lies amongst the weeds, slowly being throttled. The idea springs to mind in one clear inspiration—and puts him in motion before he has time to think it properly through. Tugging the thing free from the tangled plant growth, he drags it to the narrow chasm at the far side of the roof. Cautiously he edges to the very brink.

Far below he recognizes the alleyway where he hypnotized Ponytail at the bottom of a gut-wrenching drop. He eyes up the ladder—it should just span the distance from this roof to the next. It looks sound enough. Aluminum or something like that. No rust and definitely in one piece.

He stands it up vertically, judging the gap, struggling against the wind, which is gusting again—and then lets it fall across the chasm, one foot anchoring the bottom rung.

Just forget the drop, Mum would say. It’s only as real as you allow it to be. On the wirewalk nothing exists but the wire, and the wire is there to hold you up. It’s your friend, Danny.

“Major!” he calls, looking back to where—wreathed in smoke—Zamora’s struggling to close the trapdoor. The dwarf looks up questioningly. It’s only as Danny takes in the backdrop behind that he realizes there’s a problem: Zamora’s profound vertigo.

He’s already waving his hands in front of him as he picks his way across the roof, guessing the worst. “It’s no use saying ‘don’t look down,’ Danny. I can’t do it. No way, nooo way.” For the first time during the last twenty-four hours he looks scared. “No, I’ll take my chances in a straight fight with those boys. You save yourself. And find Miss Laura.”

There are voices behind him now, and a head pops up through the trapdoor. A long arm extending, aiming a pistol in their direction. Danny calculates the possibilities. Leave Zamora behind? Unthinkable. He needs Zamora’s solidity. Strength. But it’s unlikely he’s going to get across the chasm either. Danny imagines wandering the sprawling metropolis on his own . . .

“I’ll be just fine,” Zamora is saying, glancing over his shoulder.

“No time to argue!” The wind’s gusting again, ruffling Danny’s hair. “They’ve got guns. Dad would want you to do it! Just follow me.”

He turns back to the drop and eyes the rungs of the ladder. He’s walked slack wire before. And been on the practice rig for tightwire. Barely above the ground. Never had the inclination or courage to go much higher. That was Mum’s domain. You need the height, she would say, encouraging him to give it a go. You need the height to feel things matter.

He’s never done anything like this.

Despite himself he glances down and immediately feels the drop pulling, as if it’s hungry for him. He remembers watching the grainy YouTube video of the legendary Karl Wallenda falling to his death from the skyscrapers in Puerto Rico. Over and over again.

He breathes deeply.

Nothing but the wire. He takes another breath, lets it out slowly, and then he’s taken that first step, onto the ladder, holding his arms straight, softening his knees, feeling it solid against the soles of his shoes. Must make it look easy for Zamora, he thinks. Place one foot, then the next, then the next.

Just a short walk, as if the ladder’s on the ground. He frees his right foot from the safety of the roof. The first step establishes the rest—it’s the one you need to get right. In his peripheral vision the void gapes below, and then he realizes something. Even if they weren’t running for their lives, there’s something irresistible about taking that step. It can’t be denied.

Here we go. Left, right, left. Steady. He uses his arms to balance a wobble and waits for a second as the wind twists around him, poised midway across the chasm.

Need to trust my center of gravity. Take time to balance. The wind drops again. For a fleeting moment, he feels a kind of bounding elation, feels vital, alive—fully alive! He looks around at the vastness of the city, eyes wide open.

And then he’s away again.

It takes five more quick steps, treading with purpose on each rung. There’s just his feet and the ladder and nothing else, not a single stray thought, and then he feels the gritty surface of the next rooftop and his knees suddenly threaten to buckle. Another deep breath steadies him and he turns to look back, the blood singing in his veins, tingling all over.

A gunshot shatters the glory of the moment.

“Come on, Major!” Danny shouts, putting strength into each syllable. “You can do it. Head high.”

Zamora hesitates, puffs out his cheeks. Takes a breath, and then half a hesitant step toward the edge. He stops. He’s not going to be able to do it!

Another gunshot. Figures on the roof running toward the major.

“For goodness’ sake, Major. Call yourself a showman! I’ve seen braver jossers!”

That does it. Zamora crosses himself three times, taps the bowler hat firmly onto his head—and takes a shaky step onto the ladder, then another. He puts out his arms resolutely to either side, fingers splayed.

The gang members are scrambling across the roof, angry shadows in the billowing smoke.

“Keep looking at me,” Danny calls. “Trust your feet.” The wind gusts again, and Zamora reaches up to hold his bowler. He wobbles.

“Forget your stupid hat. Keep your arms working!”

Danny ducks as another gunshot zips over their heads. And then Zamora virtually breaks into a run, the ladder chattering under his heavy tread, bouncing dangerously—and he’s standing with Danny, astonished. He opens his mouth but nothing comes out, and instead he turns and gives the ladder an angry kick, sending it tumbling, clanging off the air conditioning units and fire escapes, down into the alleyway below. It’s a hellish fall, and Zamora regrets the seconds he spends watching it go, his stomach knotting.

“Let’s go, Major!”

They’re on a roof garden among pot plants, benches, sun loungers. A woman in a business suit sits up on one of the reclining chairs, staring at Zamora and Danny as they hurdle a low barrier and charge toward an access door.

“Hope you enjoyed the show,” Zamora says, tipping his bowler.

Danny glances back to see triad members running toward the chasm, and then he and Zamora are in the stairwell, down a flight of steps, through a deserted boardroom, the bright hum of an open-plan office—and straight into a waiting elevator.

Zamora thumps the ground-floor button so hard it nearly implodes. “I think I’m going to be sick,” he says, steadying himself against the lift wall.

Unlike the elevator in the Mansions, this one’s smooth and fast, and they plummet the twenty-four floors almost as fast as the ladder.

Out on the pavement Danny squints back up at the roof of the Mansions. Black smoke is smudging the air, and a tiny figure peers down at them, pointing. Faintly you can hear him shouting, but the words are lost.

There’s a siren approaching.

“Taxi!” Zamora calls. Pushing past a confused backpacker, he propels himself and Danny onto its waiting seat.