"Hang on!"
Harry Sullivan hunched further down in the passenger seat and braced his arms against the dashboard as the little car careered wildly along the narrow rubbish strewn street between the tall concrete buildings and wondered not for the first time that evening whether or not he was going to be around to see all those newspaper reports about their 'heroic action' that the driver, Captain Avram Cohen, promised would be in all tomorrow's papers. At the moment, the only thing he expected to be printed about them were their obituaries. He decided after all that he really wasn't cut out for these James Bond style heroics. Sneaking into heavily guarded secret military installations, planting bombs...
The tyres shrieked as they took a corner too fast and Harry gritted his teeth. "I say, do you really think we should be going this fast? After all, we've quite a while until those charges go off - haven't we?"
Cohen just looked round at him and grinned. Harry was also beginning to wonder if the crazy things they'd told him about the Mossad agent were actually true. Cohen was proving to be as mad as they'd warned him he was. If not madder. Some bodyguard he was turning out to be!
It was all supposed to be so simple. As part of a UN team investigating reports of bacteriological weapons use in Lebanon, Harry was simply supposed to help collate information, interview a few victims and witnesses, and sniff around a little. But he hadn't reckoned on his guide, the aforementioned 'mad' Captain Cohen, who burst into his room at the shabby but heavily protected hotel he was staying in, and excitedly proclaim that he had discovered the site, source and culprit behind the weapons use.
Before he knew, Cohen had dragged him off to show him. Then showing him turned into breaking in to the place. Then breaking in turned into setting explosive charges.
And now they were running for their lives.
"Lockwood is going to kill me," he muttered, thinking of his immediate superior back at the hotel. fingers digging deeper into the sticky plastic as Cohen took another sharp corner with suicidal speed. Cohen overheard and looked round at him again, still grinning.
"Don't worry, Harry! We'll be back home before he knows it! And heroes too!"
Cohen took one hand off the jittering steering wheel to punch Harry on the shoulder, and Harry turned several shades paler.
***
The tall dark haired girl stood on top of one of the taller buildings overlooking the town and watched the wild progress of the little car through powerful lenses with a measure of apprehension. The way it was being driven, it wouldn't reach the spot she'd picked out, and she'd have to go to all the trouble of making her way over to where it crashed. And if the car exploded when it did, as these primitive vehicles often did in such situations (as she'd discovered in the past), she could probably scratch her target completely. That wouldn't please Lavarre at all.
And besides, Hayzel had her reputation to think of.
She turned her gaze back along the town to monitor the progress of their pursuers. They were still a minute or so behind them, which should allow her plenty of time to do what was needed. She nodded, satisfied, to herself, and reached down for her rifle. One shot kill the driver, drop down to crash site, finish off target if need be, remove head, go home. She almost smiled at the simplicity of it.
"Easy money," she murmured, settling the rifle butt snugly into her shoulder and drawing a bead on the speeding car. She counted down the seconds until it came into range...
Gunfire suddenly snapped and popped below her. Muzzle flashes sparked in the dark in the area around the car and she heard the distinctive pig-squeal of tortured brakes. There was a heavy thump as the car hit something immovable and crashed over on to its side, sliding along the road for a moment before coming to halt, a twisted wreck. Hayzel caught her breath, waiting for the resulting explosion, but none came. As she looked on, tiny figures came running out from the buildings surrounding the street and approached the car.
"Hellfire, an ambush!" She hadn't reckoned on that. She zeroed in on the crash site with her lenses, switching to infrared. Both occupants of the car were alive, but whether or not their attackers allowed them to remain in that state remained to be seen. What she really needed now was a good heavy-duty stun round, popped right into the middle of the street, so she could just drop in and take what she wanted. But the field kit she was carrying was light duty only, and the only stun rounds she had were lightweights - too lightweight for what she needed. If she wanted to get her target, she'd have to fight for it. She sighed. "Oh well, the exercise will do me good."
She folded the rifle stock away to make the weapon into a handgun and was about to activate her anti-grav lifts to drop down to the position when the rumble of several engines announced the arrival of the car's pursuers. Looking on, she saw dozens of heavily armed men drop down from the big vehicles and run up to the crash scene. "Too many, even for me," she murmured sadly. Best she could hope for now was for them to kill the target and leave the body for her. Just don't damage the head, she prayed.
"Oh no..."
As she watched, the men went to drag the two occupants out. The driver was conscious but obviously badly injured. He managed to draw a weapon with what looked like a broken arm, but to Hayzel's immense surprise he didn't turn it on his attackers. He pressed the thing to the side of his head instead. There was a flat report and the man slumped over, dead. Suicide, rather than be taken by his enemy. Hayzel grunted. She'd seen it done hundreds of times, and always thought it wasteful. "Where there's life, there's threat," Lavarre had always told her. Even as a prisoner, you could be a menace to your enemy. Or at very least, a drain on their resources. Better in fact to never take prisoners. She was suddenly concerned that her target might attempt the same thing. The head would be useless if it did. Mercifully, for her at least, it was still unconscious as they pulled it out from the wreck and threw it into the back of one of the vehicles. It revved up and sped off back to where it came from.
Hayzel swore softly. "Now I'm gonna have to chase you."
Shaking her head at the inconvenience, she activated her lifters and drifted off in pursuit.
***
A sharp stinging slap across his face awoke Harry from a confused dream full of tearing metal and screeching brakes. He blinked at the harsh neon glow and tried to take in his surroundings. It took a moment to remember where he was, and he nearly groaned when he realised.
He was back where he and Cohen and started their flight to freedom from.
And those charges were due to go off very soon...
"Dr Sullivan? You are awake?"
Harry squinted round at the speaker. His vision was still rather blurred, but he hoped it would pass. His whole body ached and he could feel sticky drying blood on his forehead, but apart from that he didn't think he'd been too badly injured in the crash. He raised his hands to touch his wounded head and found they were securely handcuffed together. A prisoner.
When he saw who of, he started to feel that it might have been better if he hadn't survived at all.
Colonel Hussein Al-Shahrani. The infamous 'Butcher of Beirut'. Self-styled leader of the so-called 'Palestinian Freedom League'. Terror League might have been a more apt description. There were few Middle Eastern terrorist leaders with a more bloodthirsty or terrifying reputation that Shahrani's. Even the infamous PLO regarded Shahrani as a loose cannon and someone to be avoided. He was bending close to where Harry was sitting in a battered plastic chair in the middle of a bare room lit by a glaring neon overhead. His thick swarthy features were suffused into a cruel grin, the gold tooth in the centre of his mouth glittering under the light.
"Where's Captain Cohen?" Harry gasped.
Shahrani put on an expression of mock apology. "I am afraid Captain Cohen declined to accompany us back to my little nest, Dr Sullivan."
"You murderous..." Strong hands restrained Harry in his chair. Shahrani clicked his tongue and wagged a finger in Harry's face.
"You accuse me falsely, Dr Sullivan. Captain Cohen's departure from this world was purely self-inflicted, I assure you."
"I bet," growled Harry, but his rage subsided all the same, replaced by a feeling of genuine sadness. Cohen might have been barmy, but he didn't deserve to die so soon. Harry remembered the picture Cohen had proudly shown him of his young wife and infant. Another widow, another child who would grow up never knowing their father. This horrible place had a nasty habit of doing that to families.
"I am so sorry that you will not be able to report on what you have seen to your superiors, but I can assure you, they will find out about my plan very shortly. Very shortly!" he chuckled.
Harry took this news with mixed emotions. From the sound of things he hadn't discovered the explosive charges they'd laid - Shahrani would have had him tortured long ago by now if someone had discovered one of them. But it didn't help him much. They were still due to go off, and he was going to be right in the middle of it. Cohen had got him killed after all...
"In the mean time, Dr Sullivan, you will remain here as my guest. You United Nations people make such excellent hostages, but, in case you get any foolish notions of escape, my people will kill you at the first hint of trouble. Do you understand me?"
"Perfectly."
He gestured to the guards. "Take him away for now. We shall - talk - later, Dr Sullivan." He grinned evilly again, the menace explicit in his tone.
The guards tugged Harry to his feet and dragged him off, leaving Shahrani alone in the room. Bungling UN fool... did he really hope to warn the outside world of what would happen this night? Shahrani's mind drifted to his latest acquisition sitting in its launch cradle, ready to spew death upon those Israeli dogs and their Western infidel lackeys. "Soon you shall all feel the wrath of God!" he murmured, eyes glittering fanatically.
***
They'd taken the target back to a complex of warehouses and concrete sheds in the centre of town. A double layer of fencing, one electrified, and roving armed patrols guarded the buildings, and there were more men stationed on the roofs. CCTV cameras were also dotted around, casting their beady electronic eye on doorways and entrances.
But getting in was child's play to Hayzel. Nobody saw her in her jet-black, light-reflecting combat suit, and the anti-grav lifters gave her total mobility while remaining whisper quiet. She hoped that she probably wouldn't need to kill anyone else at all, but considering the fact that the majority of the people here were going to die this night anyway, it didn't really make much difference how it happened. All the same, she preferred the low profile approach. It was more challenging that way.
The target was being held in the largest building, in the centre of the complex. She hoped they were intending to keep it hostage and not execute it straight away. It was more difficult to track a dead body.
As she stalked silently past one of the buildings her scanner went quietly crazy. Intrigued, Hayzel pushed open the door and entered cautiously. She found herself in a curious airlock arrangement, and through a thick glass window in the wall she could see a laboratory beyond.
"What have we here?" she murmured, going inside. It was an Aladdin's cave of various chemicals and expensive scientific equipment, some it brand new. But all horribly antiquated by Hayzel's standards. "Someone's been busy."
The scanner pointed her in the direction of a large steel fridge by one wall. Hayzel opened it and discovered a multitude of tightly sealed glass phials containing a sky-blue liquid. She held her gloved hand over the phials for a moment, allowing the sensors to digest the chemical data. Her eyes widened in alarm when the computer fed the results into her ear.
"Goddess! What the hell are they going to do with this stuff?"
She stepped back, shaking her head. She hadn't counted on something like this...
At that moment, the lab door hissed open and a short man in a white lab coat walked slowly in, engrossed in whatever was written on his clipboard. He wasn't even aware of Hayzel until a sinewy arm locked around his throat like a steel bar and he was yanked up off his feet. He choked and struggled and a voice hissed: "Keep still or I'll break your neck like a twig. Nod if you understand." The scientist was barely able to comply, the pressure was so much, but he just about managed. Hayzel eased her grip slightly and settled him back on his toes.
"Now," she murmured in his ear, "tell me exactly what you're planning to do with a powerful mutagen like that. Answer quickly, or I'll snap more than your neck before I've finished with you."
"We... are going to use it... to bomb Israel!" he gasped, face turning purple.
"Israel?" Hayzel laughed softly. "My friend, if you use this at all, you'll not only wipe out Israel, you'll destroy all life on Earth as well. Is there any more of this stuff around in other buildings? Quickly!"
The scientists' eyelids flickered erratically. "The rocket... nose cone... packed with it!"
"Idiots! Is that all?"
"Yesss..." he gasped out, praying the pressure would cease and he could breath again.
"Thanks." Hayzel twisted her arm suddenly, snapping the man's neck instantly. She dragged the body behind a workbench and kicked it underneath. "If you helped create that stuff, that was more than you deserved."
The scanner yelped again, drawing her attention to something stuck underneath the workbench. She plucked it free and studied the block of plastic explosive and its ticking timer carefully.
"Oh, this just gets better," she groaned. The target and its companion must have planted the device here. Blowing the chemicals up would only make the problem a lot, lot worse. Freed into the atmosphere, the virus would devastate the entire planet in a matter of hours. Angrily she flicked the timer to off and tossed the bomb aside. A thought struck her.
"I wonder how many more charges they've placed? If one goes off before I'm ready... damn! The damage to the time-line would be horrendous!"
Hayzel turned and loped out the lab. She needed to find the target more badly than she ever did before.
And this time, all life on Earth depended upon it.
***
The guards shoved Harry non-too-gently towards the building that served as the jail block. Shahrani had a pretty neat set up here, he reflected. Everything a budding power-mad dictator should have. If only he could find some way to break free and warn someone! It was obvious that the maniac intended firing some of his beastly germs at the Israelis, and very soon too. If only the charges would blow before he had a chance! There was a chance, being this far out from the main building, he might survive the blast.
There was a whistling sound past his ear and one of the guards staggered back and fell with a surprised grunt. The other one looked round in alarm, swinging his rifle round, jabbering in his own tongue. Suddenly he dropped his rifle and clutched at something sticking from his throat. Dark blood coursed down the front of his makeshift uniform and he fell to the ground, writhing briefly before going still. Harry looked round in fright as a voice hissed from apparently nowhere: "Stay still! Are you Sullivan?"
"Yes! Who are you?" he whispered back, straining his eyes to see where the voice was coming from.
"Never mind. Hold out your arms!" Harry complied and a dark figure seemed to materialise out of the gloom with a small rod in its hand. It pointed it at the handcuff chain, which melted and snapped. A pungent whiff of burnt metal tickled Harry's nose.
"I say, a laser! Are you one of Lockwood's boys?" Harry saw the shape of the figure more closely and hurriedly changed this to: "girls!"
But she ignored the question, pulling him down into the shadowy cover of one of the buildings walls. "Explosives," she whispered urgently, voice clipped and businesslike. "I found the one you put in the lab and switched it off."
Harry's eyes widened. "What? Why-"
"Because blowing that stuff up in that lab is the very worst thing you can do! Do you know what it is?"
"Some kind of beastly bug, I rather imagined. Jolly deadly to boot! Sooner it's wiped off the face of the earth, the better!"
"'Jolly deadly'? You have a gift for understatement! Your explosives would only succeed in releasing it. Releasing that into the atmosphere would end all life on Earth in a matter of hours. Do you understand? Your plan is not going to work! Now, where are the rest of the bombs?"
"Erm, main lab and the er, missile room, were the only places. I think."
"You think?" Hayzel hissed, exasperated. "Goddess, don't you know?"
"Well, er, Cohen did all the legwork. I just kept guard, as it were."
"And the detonation time?"
Harry winced and rubbed the wound on his forehead apologetically. "Sorry, got a bit of bump back there in a car crash, memory a bit dicky at the moment..."
Hayzel seethed. Amateurs! "Right!" she snapped, making a decision. She reached round and handed Harry one of the guards' rifles she'd recovered. "That is an AK-47 assault rifle, 32 round magazine." She scanned it rapidly. "Not terribly well looked after, kicks to left when fired. Bear that in mind when you use it."
Harry was turning the rifle over in his hands uncomfortably. "Er... look here, miss, er..."
"What's the matter? Don't you want to save your planet?"
"Of course, but this... guns and things, you know, aren't my cup of tea."
She recalled what she'd read about him on the database. "You were a soldier, weren't you? A Lieutenant?"
"A Surgeon Lieutenant, actually, yes, in the Royal Navy, but..."
"So? You know how to use a gun, don't you?"
"Yes, but I'm a doctor, not a... soldier. I save people's lives, I don't take them!" He tried to give the gun back, but she pushed it back at him.
"It didn't occur to you, I suppose, that those charges you helped place were going to be responsible for the loss of a lot of lives as well? Those blasts will kill just as surely as if you shot them with that gun." She took a calming breath. Getting angry with him wasn't going to help. "I just need you to find the bombs and watch my back! Leave any serious fighting to me." Even as she spoke the words sounded funny in her mouth. She never thought she'd see the day when she was asking a target to help her, but instinct told her she was in no danger from this man at all.
He even seemed to trust her, and that made her smile for the first time that evening.
***
As she feared, the missile room was teeming with people, most of whom were heavily armed. But they were all well positioned for a fast, accurate hit, and Hayzel had already planned her strategy. All she had to worry about was disarming that bomb in time. The missile itself was at the far end of the room, pointed upwards towards an open hatch in the ceiling. The control panels seemed to be situated around the room, unshielded from the rocket blast, and Hayzel wondered if they were planning to remotely launch it. That simply wouldn't do.
"Looks like they're going to be launching soon!" Harry hissed, as they crouched behind some crates near the doorway.
"Where's the bomb?"
Harry was looking around. "There were some canisters here - fuel or something, I suppose. But, er..."
"They are not here."
"No, er... there!" he pointed at the other end of the room, where a cluster of canisters sat on a pallet on the loading fork of a forklift vehicle. "Must have carried them over there to refuel, or something. Bit tricky getting over there, though."
"Hmmm. More of a problem, but we shall manage."
He chuckled ruefully. "Would have been quite a bang! Old Cohen would have loved it."
Hayzel gave him a withering look. "There's more to an explosion than the sound it makes."
Harry looked at her levelly. "You should know, eh? Look, who are you really? You're definitely not one of Lockwood's people." He suddenly took a breath, face lighting up. "I say, did the Doctor send you?"
Hayzel turned her face away to hide her smirk and concentrated on digging through her field pack, fishing out a slim plastic case. "You could say I'm here because of him, yes. Now keep an eye on those guards!" She scuttled over to the door and opened up the case, removing four small copper-coloured discs and a small control unit. She fastened a disc to each side and the top and bottom of the door and pressed a button on the handset. A tiny spark flashed across each disc. She reached down and tossed a pebble at the door. There was a brief flash and a crackling sound and the pebble jumped back at her. Hayzel stepped back, satisfied.
"What's that?" Harry hissed behind her.
"Miniature forcefield. Should last long enough for our purposes. It'll stop anyone else getting in." And anyone else getting out, she didn't add. Hayzel fully intended that she would be the only one to leave this building alive.
"Don't suppose you've got one for us, have you?"
She gave him another withering look. "Personal shields are for cowards and weaklings, and I am neither. I can probably knock one up for you if you prefer one."
"Oh no, no... I'm sure I'll be fine!" he managed to smile, weakly.
"Good. Now, listen carefully. I shall deal with the guards. While I am keeping them occupied, you shall go and disable the explosive. Understood?"
"You're, er, just going to take them on by yourself?"
She raised an eyebrow. "Are you actually volunteering to help?"
"Well, er, always ready to help a lady in peril, you know. Don't want to leave you in the lurch!"
She frowned. He actually meant what he said. "Just you worry about getting to that bomb!" She hesitated, then gave him the closest thing to a reassuring smile she could manage. "Don't concern yourself about me. I've been in tighter situations than this, believe me!"
Harry looked surprised. "Oh! Well, right you are then, old girl. You seem to know best!"
"Good. Now, I'm going to hit the power supply - less they see of me the better. When it goes and you hear firing, head for the rocket. Got it?"
"Right!" Hayzel moved off without a backwards glance. "Good luck!" he hissed, but she'd already gone. Rum sort of bird, he thought. Must come from the future or something. Someone the Doctor picked up on his travels, probably. I wonder if the old boy is here too? Possibly Lockwood called him up, or the Brig. Bailing old Sullivan out of trouble again...
His fingers clenched around the rifle and he looked down at it. He shuddered. "Only if I have to," he muttered to himself. "Only if I have to..."
He settled down to wait.
***
Shahrani gazed up at his missile with pride swelling in his breast. Finally the chance to teach that scum a lesson! The world would sit up and take notice of him then.
He looked down at the control box in his hand, thumb softly stroking the big red button in its centre. Soon, soon. He turned and snapped at a technician hurrying past. "How much longer?"
The man jumped nervously at the sound of his voice and stammered: "We're performing final pre-flight tests, sir. Another few minutes at most!"
"Good, good... then the fires of God shall burn down upon the unholy, and glory shall be ours! Praise be to Allah!" He turned back to the missile and spread his arms wide in worship.
"Er, yes, sir... praise be to Allah." The technician hurried away, glad to be out of the madman's attention.
Shahrani closed his eyes reverentially and imagined the glories to come... as leader of a united Arab front, taking the fight further, across the world to the Western heathens, and the Russians, and the Chinese... he would be irresistible! Invincible!
Something suddenly clunked loudly and people began to shout. He opened his eyes to darkness, which turned to a dim red glow as emergency lights kicked in. A power failure? He turned and called out. "What has happened?"
Someone answered: "Sir, we-"
An explosion flared in the gloom at the other end of the room. More shouts, screams this time. Automatic weapons began to rattle. Above it, Shahrani could hear a high-pitched whining, and mysterious green flashes started to light up the room.
And every time the light flashed, a man twisted and fell. They were under attack! But by whom?
Clutching the launch switch to his chest, Shahrani scuttled back towards the missile. The technicians had indeed nearly finished. All that was required now was to replace the panel... he bent down and picked up a screwdriver.
Nothing would stop him now. Nothing!
***
It was almost ridiculously easy. Hayzel could tell they weren't properly combat trained by the way they panicked as she attacked them. She'd read somewhere on a database that the people of this particular Earth region were supposed to be worthy warriors, but that must have referred to a different time period, as they were just lining up to be put down.
All the same, she advanced with measured caution, not lingering in any position, making full use of available cover taking each target down with a precise shot guided by her scanner from either her energy weapon or the needle gun attached to her left arm - just as Lavarre had taught her. But she gave away just enough to keep them interested in her and give Sullivan the chance to do his work.
It was good practice anyway, and Hayzel found the experience invigorating.
As she usually did.
***
Harry also advanced cautiously through the dark, but as the girl had said, the soldiers were more interested in who was firing at them. From the sounds and looks of things, she was winning. The firing around him was tapering off, becoming more and more sporadic. Harry put aside the feeling of disbelief at such a girl being capable of such carnage - besides the feeling of disbelief that the Doctor would associate with such a killing machine - and hurried to the missile.
It loomed above him under the dim red glow of the emergency lights above. Harry paused to get his bearings. There! He started forward towards the canisters, when he became aware of someone else close by. He whipped round, rifle levelled. Someone was crouching by the base of the missile, fiddling with its controls. "Don't move! Put your hands up!"
The figure turned slowly. Shahrani! Harry motioned him up with a jerk of his rifle. "Stand up, Colonel. Your bird isn't going to fly tonight!"
Shahrani stood up, an evil grin spreading across his face. "You think so, Dr Sullivan? It will take more than you to stop me now. I have been touched by Allah himself to perform this Holy duty!"
"Oh, you're touched, all right! Now stand still and raise your hands!"
But Shahrani advanced slowly towards Harry. He slowly held up a hand and displayed the control switch, thumb poised over the red button. "You are a healer, Dr Sullivan. Not a murderer! I do not believe you capable of shooting me."
Harry licked his lips. Suddenly he couldn't feel his trigger finger any longer. "I will if I have to!" he croaked.
"No. No you will not..." Shahrani slid his hand down to the pistol in his belt and grinned, the easy grin of a predator moving in to finish off a helpless prey. The fool was his...
Harry suddenly lashed out with the rifle butt, catching Shahrani across the jaw and sending him spinning to the ground. He lay still. "Howzat!" Harry gasped. He bent down and snatched up the remote control device. "You won't be needing that!"
"Sullivan! Have you dealt with the bomb?"
Harry looked up from Shahrani's body and gaped at the girl as she ran across to join him. All the firing had stopped, the enemy in the building completely vanquished. "The bomb!"
Harry dashed over to the canisters and started scrabbling around. "Here it is!" He tugged it free and held it up. The digital counter was ticking down from 7...6...5...
He jammed his thumb down on the stop switch. The readout flickered and stopped at 4. Harry closed his eyes and let out a relieved sigh. "We did it!" Harry stood and turned to face her, delighted. But her face was cold and distant.
"Yes, we did," Hayzel replied slowly, reaching for something at her waist.
Harry frowned. "What's wrong with- look out!"
Harry yanked Hayzel to one side as a gun fired behind them. Bullets screamed past, ricocheting off the walls and forklift but miraculously missing the canisters.
But they didn't miss Harry. Two bullets caught him in the chest, sending him tumbling backwards, clutching at the wound. Hayzel spun round, left arm raised. Shahrani was on his knees before them, his face contorted and swollen with rage and Harry's all-too-brief knock out blow. She flexed a finger and slim steel shaft buried itself in the centre of Shahrani's forehead. His eyes twitched up to look at it in almost comic surprise before he slumped forward, dead.
"Sullivan?" Hayzel dropped to her knees to support his body where it had fallen, casting a professional eye over its - his - wounds. They were bad, terminal. The gunman had saved her a job.
But...
"You saved my life," she stated softly, looking at him properly for the first time.
He looked up at her and chuckled weakly, blood frothing at the corners of his mouth as he did. "Happy... to oblige... only sorry... didn't have... guts... to... plug him... in ... first place... you... he... was right... got no... killer ... instinct..."
She found she was blinking at a stinging sensation in her eyes. Must be the smoke from the battle. "We can't all be killers, you know. Your instinct was... the opposite. But why?" she leaned closer. "Why did you do it? Sacrifice yourself for me? You don't know me, don't know what I do... don't know why I came..."
Harry managed to shake his head. "Doesn't... matter. You..." his eyes slid shut, and for a moment she thought he'd gone, then they opened again, and he continued painfully, voice getting quieter and quieter with each word.
"Always... wanted... to die... saving... life... of... pretty... girl..."
His eyes closed, and he slumped into stillness. Hayzel gazed down at his dying body, still trying to comprehend.
"Pretty girl? Me?" She stroked his cheek wistfully. "Do you know, no one's ever called me that..."
She reached for something at her waist, then bent towards him with it...
***
There was a terrible thumping inside his head and a powerful taste of copper in his mouth. For a moment he could remember nothing, not even who he was, then memory slowly came dripping back. He opened his eyes slowly. It seemed to take an age to focus. Stars, above him. Cool night air. Rough dirt beneath him. Outside. But how? He took a deep lungful of fresh air and gasped at the pain it provoked.
"Take it easy... the nanites repaired the worst of the tissue damage, but you'll still feel where the bullets went through you for a while."
He turned his head slightly to look at the girl crouching beside him. "What? You... I thought I was a goner!"
"You were. I saved you."
"Gosh... thanks!" he whispered. He didn't know what else to say.
She shrugged, seemingly indifferent. "Least I could do. You saved mine, after all." She looked down at something in her lap, something just out of his range of vision. "I've dealt with the base," she declared suddenly, as if diverting her thoughts. "Phased plasma implosion, designed to look like a standard incendiary blast. Just in case." She pointed to his left. "Turn your head that way and you'll see the flames."
Dimly he saw the orange glow of flames burning. "All gone?"
"All gone. Finished." There was a pause. "And so am I," she sighed, and stood up. He heard something being slid back into a sheath. A knife? Maybe she'd run out of ammunition, he thought fuzzily. "I gave you a little something for the pain, it'll suffice until your people turn up shortly. Listen."
Overhead he heard the sound of helicopter engines. A lot of helicopter engines.
"They've really pulled out the stops to save you. Someone up there must like you," she said slowly. He tried to raise himself up, but failed, and she pushed him lightly back. "Don't attempt to move, just yet. Here, use this when your rescuers come closer." She pressed a slim metal tube into his hand. "It's a flare. Pop the top and they'll see you."
"You're leaving?" he croaked.
"Must." She flashed him an almost regretful smile. "Better for you if I do, actually."
"But I don't even know your name...or anything!"
She bent down again and smiled. "I'm just a pretty girl you once nearly died to save. Goodbye... Harry." She kissed him on the forehead, stood and turned to leave. She paused and looked back. She had to raise her voice over the sound of the approaching helicopters.
"If anyone asks you, you died in the fire... right?"
She raised a hand in final salute, then melted into the night.
"What do you mean? Wait! Oh... goodbye!" he called weakly. "Good luck..."
But she had gone, leaving him alone with his thoughts... and the stars above. As he looked at the patterns in the points of light, the final image of the girl's face lingered in his mind and he felt a pang of apprehension for her. "Wherever it is you're going back to, I think you're going to need it," he murmured, without really knowing why.
He shivered slightly, then closed his eyes and settled back to wait.
EPILOGUE
Hayzel pushed open the study doors and walked quietly in. Lavarre was sitting at his big desk, writing something. He didn't look up as she entered. She came over and sat down opposite the desk, watching him, waiting.
Finally he spoke, without looking up.
"I see you've returned empty handed as well."
"Afraid so." She cleared her throat, suddenly very self-conscious and unusually nervous. She fought to keep her voice steady and matter-of-fact. "The place you sent me to to get him? Well, he was captured and taken back to the installation he was sabotaging. It exploded while he was there. I couldn't get to him in time. The body was destroyed in the inferno."
Silence.
"Sorry," she added.
"Hmmm..." was all he replied. With a final flourish, he signed the document he was working on and looked up at her for the first time. When he spoke, his voice was sad, almost apologetic. But his eyes were cold and hostile.
"Hayzel, why do you lie to me?"
"Lie? No, it happened just that way. Honestly!"
He sighed and picked up a remote control on his desk, pressing a button. A screen flickered on behind the desk. The picture on it showed Harry Sullivan lying on the ground, from her point of view. It was a repeat of the moment she left him.
Hayzel swallowed. "Bugged?"
"After Gydeon's little mishap, I thought perhaps I ought to take more interest in events. It seems I was right to, as people are proving to be not quite what they seem. Hmmm?"
Hayzel opened her mouth to retort - then closed it and settled back into her chair with a weary sigh, rubbing her face with her hands. "You don't know what it's like, Lavarre. It's never simple. Never straightforward."
"Evidently!" he snorted, slamming the remote back down and glaring at her. His quiet voice dripped with rage. "What was my first lesson? Never get personally involved! And what happens?" He jerked a thumb back at the screen behind him. "You get swayed by the first fool to pay you a stupid compliment!"
"It wasn't just the compliment!" she shot back, suddenly angry.
"Oh, developing fellow-feelings now, are we? Terrific!" He flung his arms up. "You of all people, Hayzel. The most dependable weapon in my arsenal! The coldest, coolest, deadliest of them all!"
"Is that all I am to you? A weapon? A tool? Is that all any of us are to you?" She found she wasn't afraid of him any more.
"That's how everything is to me, my dear. I follow my own rules." He snapped his fingers and two of his black-clad serving robots appeared out of the dark behind her chair and took her arms. Hayzel looked round at them, but didn't struggle. It would have been pointless.
"Take her down to the dungeons. Give her one of the more accommodating rooms. We'll allow you time to reflect, my dear. After a decade or two, you might come to alter your opinions."
The robots yanked her up. "Bastard!" she spat. "They warned me this would happen in the end!"
Lavarre pursed his lips. "You should have listened to them then. I've changed my mind, put her in one of the nastier rooms. With lots of chains, mind. Tymus tells me you like chains. Well, you'll like them even more by the time I'm through with you!"
They dragged her away. Lavarre waited until the door closed behind them, then in a fit of rage he flung everything off his desk with one single sweep of his arm and pounded on the empty space violently with his fists. Something cracked and splintered beneath them.
"I shall prevail! I shall, I shall, I shall!" he cried.
Then he put his head in hands and began to sob.
Next: Pieces of Hate
