Chapter Four
Some time later, post-V-day
Eggsy blearily opened his eyes and winced when he was met with nothing but white, burning his unused retinas.
It took a moment for his vision to adjust and he sat up, bones stiff, until he realised he was connected to several beepy, flashy machines.
He groaned, no idea where he was or what had happened. He couldn't even remember the last thing he remembered.
He fumbled around himself until he came to the small, white plastic box by his hand and thumbed the button with the little strength he had in his numb limbs.
Only a few minutes passed and then the three remaining Kingsman agents were surrounding his bed.
"Hey." Roxy said immediately, enveloping him into an unexpected hug.
"Hey." He replied, voice groggy. He attempted to put an arm around her but found it hard to move under her insistent body weight.
When she let him go, he sat up fully. With every passing second, his strength returned and his fatigue lessened. He glanced around at all of them standing expectantly at him.
"How are you feeling?" Merlin asked.
Eggsy shook his head. "I dunno. What happened?"
"You were shot." Percival informed him rather bluntly. "In the chest."
"I..." But before Eggsy could get anything else out, Merlin was speaking again.
"We had to surgically remove the bullet from your chest cavity, and then induce a coma until the internal bleeding stopped."
"Shit." Eggsy muttered, eyes suddenly wide. "How long was I out?"
"Only a couple of days." Merlin said. "You're gonna be fine. You had a lucky break."
Eggsy glanced down at the bandage on his chest, disorientation dissipated and then everything became very real.
He used the hand that wasn't attached to anything to peel the bandage from around himself and looked down at the sore, pink scar below his collarbone.
Images of the old scar on Harry's face flashed before his eyes and he sat bolt upright.
"What?" Roxy asked suddenly. "Are you okay?"
"I remember," Eggsy said suddenly, as images of everything that had happened, and memories of the pain, came flooding back to him. He winced.
He remembered Harry pulling a gun from seemingly no where and firing. The bullet may not have pierced his heart but it might as well have done for the amount of pain the memory gave him.
"I'm not crazy," he said, panicked, as he looked at them all. "But...it was Harry."
"We know." Merlin said solemnly. "It was on your glasses feed." He explained, in response to Eggsy's confused expression. "I kept a recording, obviously, and we checked afterwards and saw everything."
"But, but..." Began Eggsy, breath quickening as he tried to process all this new information in his tired brain. "How in the hell did he survive...I mean...he couldn't have...why didn't he come home, why is he hurting people..." He gasped suddenly and then Merlin's arms were shooting out, grasping him firmly by the shoulders so he couldn't move.
"Don't get yourself worked up, Eggsy." Merlin instructed calmly. "I'm sure there is a reasonable explanation for all of this. Calm down, okay."
Eggsy nodded along with Merlin as he worked on controlling his breathing until he felt his heart rate go down and then after a moment, Merlin had let him go and Roxy was grasping his hand comfortingly.
"It's okay," she was saying. "Everything is going to be okay. I promise."
He nodded, mainly just to placate her, but found that agreeing with her actually seemed to help. He smiled gratefully at her and she beamed back.
It didn't really occur to him until that moment that Roxy had been in the tunnel with him, that had Harry known she was there then she would be dead.
He grasped her hand a little tighter.
"I'm so glad you're okay." He said and he meant it.
"I'm sorry," Roxy told him quietly, eyes wet. "I'm sorry for leaving you."
Eggsy shook his head, now suddenly the comforter. "It's all right, we're okay. That's all the matters."
They both knew that wasn't the end of it, but was good enough for now.
After a few hours of getting his shit together, namely having something to eat, including painkillers, and a much needed bathroom break, Eggsy changed into some normal clothes and met the other three in one of the drawing rooms in the mansion.
Percival was sat at a table, pouring some scotch into glasses and Merlin was pacing, playing around with his clipboard. Roxy helped him sit on one of the plush sofas.
He berated her softly, telling her he wasn't an invalid, but couldn't help but feel touched at the attention he was getting.
Especially now that he was having to deal with the literally Earth-shattering revelation that Harry was alive. But not just that; he was changed.
Percival handed him a glass of scotch. "It'll help." He said quietly, before going back to the table.
Eggsy took a sip, and it burned on the way down, but did help.
As he glanced around at them all, he couldn't help but feel a sense of melancholy in the air. Merlin seemed pre-occupied with whatever he was doing but the unflappable Percival was staring dejectedly into his glass.
Well, he figured that he'd just found out that his closest friend had killed his closest friends.
"To answer one of your questions, Eggsy..." Merlin voiced suddenly, startling them. "Harry isn't killing anyone."
It was as though Merlin had just read his thoughts. Confused, Eggsy turned to him, immediately regretting the quick movement as it made his sore chest constrict.
"What do you mean?" He asked.
Merlin turned to one of the hung portraits on the wall and flicked his wrist at his clipboard, as if physically throwing the image onto the frame of the portrait until it was glaring at them like a projector.
The image was of Harry, obviously taken from the feed from the train station, and Eggsy's heart hurt, but not because of the surgery.
Merlin rolled the image forward, pausing it on the moment that Eggsy had missed when he'd been too busy with a bullet embedded in his chest: Harry turning away and leaving.
The image then zoomed in and up, to Harry's exposed neck, revealing a very obvious scar at the join of his neck, behind his ear. Partially hidden behind the curl of his chestnut hair but definitely there.
Eggsy felt his blood run cold as he put the drink aside and leant in to get a better view. He'd seen the same marking too many times before.
"You think he's being controlled?" He finally asked.
Merlin shrugged, eyes wavering. "It's the only logical explanation." He said, in a tone suggesting that he was desperate to believe his own words.
Eggsy had a million and one questions soaring through his mind but settled on the obvious.
"...By who?"
…
A sleek black jet landed gracefully on a vast landing strip built into the side of a picturesque snowy mountain, standing out like an ink stain blotting on parchment.
The door opened and Harry Hart emerged, hands skimming the handrail as he jogged down the steps onto the landing pad, not stopping for a moment to adjust from the jet lag before walking purposefully through the other grounded air crafts and towards the main building hidden slyly in the rock.
There were a few soldiers outside at this time of evening, on protection detail against civilian or military air traffic, and even with their years of comprehensive combat training, they still shied away from him as he passed.
Harry didn't even look at them as he continued to walk. He knew that they were afraid of him, because everyone was afraid of him. But he didn't find it particularly distressing, or even amusing. He didn't feel anything.
He turned into the now familiar large electronics laboratory. Metal arms were manufacturing various coding chips and machines Harry was unfamiliar with were buzzing with life. Harry reached an elevated room and took the steps two at a time until he came to the office. It was just a normal office with a desk and a computer with the exception that at the far end, the wall had been knocked down and in its place was a large window allowing anyone within a clear view into the electronics lab below.
An ageing but strong woman was sitting, straight-backed, at her desk, talking quietly to a uniform-clad soldier Harry had never bothered to learn the name of. He was a right-hand man or a body guard or a lackey or something, he didn't particularly care. Not part of his mission.
He cleared his throat to announce his arrival and the two occupants turned to face him.
"Ah, Agent." The woman said, not happy to see him. But then Harry didn't think he'd ever seen her smile. If he could like her, he probably would. She was very forthright and efficient. Her plan was going to work, he could just feel it.
"Is Galahad dead?" She asked. The bodyguard apprehended him wearily with steely eyes.
For a moment, Harry contemplated telling the truth. He had no reason to lie, but then alternatively he had no reason not to lie, so he nodded. "Yes, he is."
She nodded, not bothering to congratulate him because she knew he couldn't feel pride or self-accomplishment.
She and her bodyguard exchanged a look until she looked at Harry again.
"Track down Lancelot next." She instructed.
"Yes, ma'am." He said simply before leaving the room and coming back the way he came.
…
The four remaining agents still sat in the drawing room, slowly making their way through the expensive scotch and contemplating their tumultuous existence.
Roxy was worried because Eggsy hadn't said a word for nearly an hour, instead he was just staring blankly into the distance. He'd been more chatty in his coma.
Percival was leant against the table, arms and ankles crossed, the very image of calm professionalism but his brain was churning away.
Merlin was pacing, it was the only sign he gave to show that he was troubled.
Then Merlin decided to say the only thing he could think of to break the silence.
"It makes sense that Harry is the killer." He said. "The assassin, whatever. He would know intimate details about our lives, he's our friend. Like where Gawain lived or where Tristan was taking his kids on holiday." His eyes lit up as something else occurred to him. "And of course he knew that Kingsman suits were bulletproof, everyone he attacked was out of uniform. Including Eggsy."
Eggsy was reminded of scolding Roxy for going out in their life-protecting gear when all it did was nearly get her killed. Catch himself making that mistake again.
"Harry didn't do any of this," Eggsy finally piped up. "His controllers did, we have to save him. I have to save him."
"We will." Percival assured him suddenly. "We look after our own. But we need to think right now."
They all fell silent. Eggsy tried desperately to remember any insignificant, finite detail about their night at the train station but, startlingly, all he could seem to recall was the love of his life looking at him for the first time in months with cold disinterest and then stabbing him in the back. Well, shooting him in the front, but same difference.
Roxy, doing the same as Eggsy but with less of the emotional manipulation, remembered something.
"Security cameras." She said, turning to Eggsy.
"What?" He asked.
"There were security cameras outside, do you remember?"
Vague memories of said conversation flitted back to Eggsy. "Yeah, I think. What, out the entrance?"
But before they could get their hopes up, Merlin was shaking his head. "No, Harry was – is – a good agent. He would have deleted his footage behind him."
Eggsy looked back down at the floor.
"But..." Roxy continued, "why would he?"
Eggsy looked back up.
"He's not exactly covering his tracks," she continued. "Plus he doesn't know Eggsy survived, or that I was there."
"It's worth a shot." Percival shrugged.
Merlin sighed before looking down at his electronically enabled clipboard. "All right, give me a moment. What station?"
Eggsy and Roxy spent the next five minutes detailing the location of the abandoned train station to Merlin and it took the genius in nice sweaters only twenty minutes to hack into the security link held by the neighbourhood watch.
"This could take a while," Merlin pointed out. "We don't know what time he left, if he even used this entrance at all."
"Well," Eggsy sighed. "Good thing we have booze."
Merlin used his flashy flick-trick to project the image onto the portrait and Roxy and Eggsy sprawled on one of the couches while Percival sat, in what turned out to be forty five minutes of watching flickering, grainy footage of a side view of a train station entrance with a few yards of adjoining street.
After a while, Roxy and Eggsy turned up in the picture and stood around talking silently for about five minutes before walking inside.
"It wasn't too long after this." Eggsy said, leaning forward. "Rox disappeared down a tunnel for like ten minutes and then..." He swallowed. "Then Harry was there."
The screen remained inactive except for two cats having a street brawl a little ways down for another twenty minutes.
Eggsy was ready to give up hope, to assume Harry had left through another entrance before a sleek, black Mercedes-type vehicle turned up in the image, pulling up directly outside the entrance and then Harry stepped out – Eggsy looked away – and into the vehicle which took off and then it was over.
Eggsy, still not looking back and fighting the void in his stomach, heard Percival comment: "What was the pink thing?"
"I saw it too." Merlin said slowly.
Eggsy looked back in time to see Merlin rewinding the strip until he got a frame by frame of the black car pulling away until a flash of pink flitted across the screen.
"What was it?" Roxy asked.
"It was on the car." Eggsy said quickly. "Go back a couple panels."
Merlin did as instructed and paused it when the pink was the most prominent, and then the grainy image sharpened slightly and the car was thrown into clearer view.
It was indeed a black Mercedes, so dark it blended in with the night quite effectively and on the back window, the flash of pink, was a logo.
A very pink logo, a very pink, V-shaped logo.
"It can't be him." Eggsy said immediately.
"I can't get a decent shot of the number plate," Merlin muttered and the image began to convulse under his tinkering.
"That was Richmond Valentine's logo, wasn't it?" Percival asked.
"But he's dead," Eggsy turned to Percival. "I watched him die, I stabbed him myself."
"People are coming back from all sorts of fatal injuries lately..." Merlin commented dryly, putting his clipboard down.
"But no one saw Harry die," Eggsy reminded him. "We all saw the hit, on the feed, but no one actually watched him. I watched Valentine die, he's dead. I promise you."
"You said once that there was a distinct possibility that Valentine could still have living operatives." Roxy told Merlin.
"It was a possibility," he muttered, "that just became a reality."
Eggsy laughed humourlessly, standing and throwing his hands in the air.
"Great, so we know...nothin'. The killers may or make not be workin' for Valentine in any location on the Earth, or even in the solar system." He said spitefully.
"We should start with what we know." Percival said quietly. Eggsy twirled on his feet to look at him.
"What do you mean?" He asked rather hotly.
"We know his last known location," Percival informed him patiently. "I suggest we start there."
Roxy frowned. "What, that base in that mountain range in the middle of no where?"
A white glare was thrown across the room and they all looked back to the portrait to see the image of the snow-topped mountain Eggsy and Merlin had flown to a few months ago.
"Apparently it went up for sale after it was cleared out, by the American authorities. Bought by some unknown third party." Merlin sighed, rubbing his eyes behind his glasses. "I should have had it torn down," he said guiltily. "I just assumed it would rot in the side of the mountain."
"It should have done." Eggsy said darkly.
…
"So how many of us are goin'?" Eggsy asked, checking the ammunition in his Kingsman issue pistol before stowing it away in his shoulder holster.
Merlin walked past him, donning a captain's uniform resplendent with four gold epaulettes.
"All of us." He said as he passed. "Not safe to leave anyone here, plus we have absolutely no idea what we're flying into."
"You realise," Eggsy began, walking with him. "That this is a totally reckless, dumb as fuck plan, right?"
"Absolutely." Merlin admitted. "But I don't know what else to do."
"Feels weird bein' all powerless like this." Eggsy commented. "When I first met Harry, I..." The young agent suddenly fell silent, eyes hitting the floor.
Merlin was forcefully reminded of the conversations he'd had with his friend about his feelings for the boy. About how he didn't want to bring it up and take advantage of him. But with the way Eggsy had coped with his death and by the way he was currently coping with his resurrection; Merlin was fairly certain it had been brought up.
"Hey." Merlin said, getting his attention. When Eggsy looked at him dejectedly, he attempted a comforting smile. "We're gonna get him back."
Eggsy nodded and tried to smile back, Merlin had to admire him for it. "I know." He said.
Once they were in the air, they began to arm themselves. Roxy loaded a Kingsman pistol, Percival stashed a few hand grenades in his pocket and Eggsy glanced at the umbrellas, but he felt a pit form in his stomach and left them where they were.
…
"Hey, you might want to come look at this." The uniform-clad bodyguard called over his shoulder.
The ageing, stealthy woman walked across the space and glanced at the large computer monitor her bodyguard was referring to.
On their security camera feed, she watched as an unknown black jet tore through the sky towards them.
"Can't seem to identify them..." The bodyguard muttered, tapping away at the keyboard but she knew it to be fruitless.
"No doubt our Kingsman friends paying us a visit."
"Oh." He said, and stopped tapping.
She raised an eyebrow at the image of the approaching jet and stood tall, crossing her arms.
"Alert the soldiers that we have hostile forces arriving." She instructed, eyes narrowing. "And bring me the Agent."
