10. Theory of Flight.
"Tchéky. I didn't realise you'd been assigned to this team." Anna Espinosa's voice was a languid drawl.
The pair of them stood on the runway of a private airfield. The sky overhead was leaden and overcast, rain falling in steady sheets. Behind them a sleek looking Lear jet gleamed, white and silver, lit up by the runway lights.
"I thought I'd volunteer." His hands were thrust deep into the pockets of the long overcoat he wore, rain dripping down his face and plastering his hair flat to his head.
"Thanks, but I'll decline." Her eyes were as hard and empty as diamonds.
"I know her better than anyone. I should have been assigned to the team. Why don't you correct that oversight?"
Anna laughed. "Oh, priceless. You've fallen for her, haven't you? Don't bother denying it. I can see it in your eyes. Hear it in the desperation in your voice. I can't even begin to express just how funny that is. Mother and daughter both."
He said nothing, simply holding her mocking gaze with his.
"And you don't know her. Be honest with yourself, Tchéky. You know Svetlana. The fake plastic woman you tried to make. Spy Barbie. This is Sydney now, and I'm the only one of us who really knows her."
Again he refused to rise to her baiting. "They want her alive, Anna."
"And alive they shall have her."
Tchéky snorted. "The only thing you're ever good for is death."
Anna punched him in the stomach, so fast that he didn't even begin to react. The blow knocked the wind from his lungs, doubling him up. He collapsed onto his knees on the rain-drenched tarmac, gasping for breath
"Bye, bye Tchéky."
He heard her heels clicking as she walked away from him. All he could do was watch the back of her legs as she climbed up the steps into the plane.
* * *
The pay phone rang beside her.
Sydney stopped and stared at it, her heart thudding. She was walking through the main concourse of Bishkek airport. Her hair was died black and she'd used fake tan to darken her skin several shades. She'd also used make up as best she could to alter the lines and angles of her face, at least from a distance, and she was wearing thick black-framed glasses. She wasn't sure how much good any of it would do her though.
The phone kept on ringing. Someone pushed roughly past her, telling her brusquely to get out of the way. After a moment or two she resumed walking, leaving the phone alone.
Ten yards further along was another pay phone. As she drew level with it the phone behind her fell silent and this one started ringing instead.
Her pace quickened.
As she passed a third phone that started ringing too. She gave in and snatched it up, aware that people were starting to stare at her. "What do you want?" she snapped.
"Svetlana. Thank god." The voice was Tchéky's. She recognised it instantly. "Svetlana, wait. Please. Don't hang up. I want to help you."
Indecision warred within her. "My name is not Svetlana," she finally answered him, clearly and deliberately in English.
There was a pause from the other end of the line, followed by a sigh. "No. No it's not."
"If you really want to help me you'll start by using my real name."
Another period of hesitation. "Sydney. Sydney Bristow."
"You lied to me!" she was speaking Russian again, pent up emotion breaking loose in a rush. "You stole my life. You raped my mind. You used me. You pretended you were my friend, and you told me lie after lie after lie!"
"I . . . I would apologise, but it means nothing does it? It's not something I can make right with an apology."
"You can't make it right full stop!"
She heard him sigh again. "I-I just wanted to warn you. They've sent Anna after you. To bring you back."
A quick flash.
It was Belgrade. A flat in a nondescript tenement block, seated at a kitchen table over breakfast. She finished off her cup of coffee and stood up, extending her hand to the man seated across from her. "Thank you for your time Mr. Jugovic."
He smiled, standing up too and shaking the proffered hand. "A sincere pleasure Miss Bristow . . ."
Then his head exploded.
She was aware of the glass from the window cascading across them both as time seemed to slow down a thousand fold. Blood and brain tissue had splattered across her face from an exit wound the size of a teacup.
As she gasped in shock, he toppled over sideways . . .
"I can take care of Anna," she answered Tchéky grimly.
There was a pause. "Perhaps. But even if you do there will be others. And they'll keep on coming till they get you. You have a tracking device . . .."
"I know," she said curtly. "Implanted in my side. The scar."
"You know," he echoed. "Look, Svet . . . Sydney. I know you have absolutely no reason at all to trust me, but I can help you get away from them. If we meet . . .."
"Do you take me for a complete idiot, Tchéky?" she interrupted him. "If we meet you'll turn me in. We both know that . . .."
"No. I won't." He sighed – started talking quickly. "But you're not going to believe me and you're going to hang-up in a moment, aren't you? Look, have you remembered how to contact the CIA? The location of their nearest safehouse? Who to contact about arranging papers . . .?"
"Why the hell do you even care?"
"Because . . . because . . .. Oh what the hell. I'm not going to persuade you whatever I say, am I? Three hours from now I'll be in . . .." she listened to what he said despite herself. "I'll be there whatever. On my own. You'll either be there too and accept the help I can give you, or you won't be. Keep on the move Sydney. They're closing in on you fast . . .."
She hung up. For a moment she bowed her head, eyes closed, breathing heavily. Then she looked up again and resumed walking.
* * *
Tchéky jolted hard as the cell phone started to ring almost the same instant that Sydney was disconnected. For a moment he stared at it as if it was a poisonous insect crawled up onto his hand. Then, finally, he answered. "Romatsev."
"I've received information I find disturbing Agent Romatsev," the distorted voice began with no preamble.
"Oh? How so?" Tchéky could feel himself sweating all of a sudden.
"You were supposed to meet with Director Karpuchin an hour ago. Did that slip your mind?"
"Something cropped up. Something important."
"Only Director Karpuchin was of the opinion that you might have gone after our missing asset in an unauthorised capacity," the voice continued as if he hadn't said anything.
"Really?" Tchéky tried to keep his voice impassive. "Well I'm not sure where that idea came from."
"I've spoken to Anna too," the voice continued. "She informed me of your meeting, and her concerns that you would interfere with her recovery operation once she rebuffed you."
Tchéky grimaced. "I should be part of the recovery team. I've come to know the asset better than anyone, and I believe I have the best chance of bringing a non-violent resolution to this situation."
"Our analysts disagree with that assessment. For one thing, they believe that she is likely to see your actions as a particularly personal betrayal, and your presence is just as likely to inflame matters as help the situation."
"For one thing?"
"For one thing," the voice agreed.
"Your analysts hardly have a spotless record in this do they? I don't recall that they foresaw her breaking her conditioning and fleeing. Or is that something else you didn't think I needed to know?"
"Now I understand your frustrations Agent Romatsev," the voice went on blithely. "But I did warn you about developing emotional attachments. I'm ordering you to return to headquarters and report to Director Karpuchin. Non-compliance will be taken as sign that you have gone rogue, and sanctions will be invoked accordingly."
"Fine." Tchéky hung up. He realised he was shaking.
For a moment he stared at the phone, wondering how it had come to this. He was staring into the abyss, but he could still step back. That chance was still there . . ..
The phone started ringing again. He switched it off. Then he wound the car window down and threw the phone out.
He'd made his choice. For once he would do something right. Even if it killed him.
* * *
Sydney stepped inside the first-aid room, grabbing a chair and forcing its back up beneath the door handle to keep any unwanted intrusions out.
Quickly she moved to the glass-fronted cabinets on the other side of the room, rifling through them systematically until she had turned up everything that she would need. Then she laid it all out on the table in the room's centre.
Not pausing – in case her courage deserted her if she actually stopped and thought about what she was doing – she stripped her top off. Expression fixed with concentration, she took a pencil and wrapped it up in several layers of gauze bandage. Something to bite down on in case the pain became too much.
Taking the penknife from her pocket, she proceeded to disinfect the blade. While doing so she noticed that her hands were shaking and took a deep breath – tried to calm herself. Unsteady hands would be very bad right now.
Once that was done, she applied more of the antiseptic to the skin around the scar on her right side. Almost as an afterthought, she undid the top couple of buttons of her jeans and folded a white hand-towel into the waistband. To catch the blood.
Holding the gauze wrapped pencil between her teeth, she probed at the scar with her fingertips until she had located the slight hardness that indicated where the implant was. The knife blade hovered millimetres above her skin as she struggled to stop herself tensing up. Tensing was absolutely the worst thing she could do, increasing the blood flow to the area and making the pain of cutting more severe.
Deep, calming breaths. She pressed the knife in, smooth and firm.
She bit down hard on the pencil, a low sobbing moan welling up from the back of her throat. Blood ran from the wound in a steady steam. She forced herself to push deeper and slid the knife along, groaning, her eyes watering as the scar slowly unzipped.
She had to stop briefly as the pain grew too much for her, hyperventilating. The penknife was far from the ideal tool for the job, not nearly as sharp as a scalpel would have been. And raw, living flesh was surprisingly tough and unyielding to saw through.
She tried reaching with her fingertips into the wound, but it wasn't wide enough yet. She could feel the plastic casing of the tracking device, hard and slippery, but she couldn't gain enough purchase. The noise coming from her throat was reminiscent of a kettle boiling.
Briefly leaning against the table, blood falling in coin-sized spatters across the floor, she steeled herself to resume cutting. Sawing at the flesh that had healed up round the tracking device she bit down so hard on the pencil that it broke in too. Blood streamed over her hand making the grip on the knife slippery.
Finally she laid the knife aside, sobbing, and tried again to pull the tracking device out. Her grip was better this time, but her blood-slick fingers kept sliding on the plastic casing. Crying out – in frustration as much as anything – she dug her nails in and yanked hard.
Briefly the pain flared so intensely that her vision redded out entirely. Then the tracking device popped free, flying from her grasp and bouncing away across the floor leaving a long bloody smear behind it.
She dropped onto her haunches, panting. She felt dizzy and light-headed, though she knew it couldn't be from blood loss yet. More likely it was the onset of shock. The urge to lie down on the floor and curl up into a protective ball was a powerful one, but she fought it off, forcing herself to stand up again. She could feel the muscles in the backs of her thighs trembling.
The job was only half done. She still had to patch herself up.
She daubed the edges of the wound with more antiseptic, hissing through her teeth at the vicious stinging this caused. Then, hands shaking, she picked up a tube of superglue she'd bought from an airport shop.
She applied the glue as carefully as she could manage to the hole's raw edges and pressed them together, her face clenching tight. Raw sobbing gasps sawed through her, but when she eventually took her hands away the wound stayed shut.
As quickly as she could manage she crossed over to the sink, every movement tugging painfully at her side. There she washed away the blood.
There was a lot of it. More than she'd thought there would be. The white towel was almost completely red, and it had seeped through to stain the waistband of her jeans regardless of her efforts. It had also gotten under her fingernails in thick red crescents, and she scrubbed at her hands until they were almost raw in an effort to get all of it off.
When that was finished she picked up a small aerosol can from the table, spraying clear antiseptic sealant gel over the wound. Finally she used bandages to tightly wrap the injury, before pulling her top back on.
She looked at her reflection in the mirror. It wasn't good. She looked sickly through the fake tan – decidedly ill. She could see herself trembling still.
More deep breaths, though every one of them pulled painfully at her side. Slowly her head stopped spinning and her equilibrium began to return.
Her eyes went to where the tracking device had landed. She walked over to it and was about to crush it beneath the sole of her shoe, but something made hesitate. Instead she bent over gingerly and picked it up
Perhaps there was another use for it.
* * *
Tchéky sat alone on the park bench and pretended to read the newspaper. He'd been sitting there for over half an hour now, and he was fairly certain he was going to be sitting there alone for the next three and a half hours too, all to no avail.
She wasn't going to come. Of course she wasn't. It was already fifteen minutes after the appointed hour, but he had no intention of leaving until all hope of her showing up was gone.
He couldn't explain the compulsion. She wasn't going to thank him even if she did show. Hell, he'd be lucky if she didn't try to kill him. He turned the page of the newspaper. He'd been staring at it for at least ten minutes and hadn't managed to take any of it in yet.
The bag resting on the seat beside him gave an electronic beep. He looked around, startled.
There was someone sitting next to him. A woman. He hadn't seen her approach and it took several long seconds for him to see Sydney in her.
"You came alone." Her voice was cool and he was unable to read any emotion from it.
"Yes. Of course I did. I said I would."
"No. That was a statement. I spent the last hour checking to make sure."
"Oh?"
"So is that the first time you've been honest with me?"
He started to protest reflexively, but then sighed. "That's fair I suppose. I didn't really expect you to show up."
She regarded him expressionlessly. "You said you could help. Right now I could use help. It would be . . . stupid to let my emotions interfere."
The way she said it he wasn't sure he believed her. He went on anyway. "The bag between us. It contains papers, $10,000 US dollars cash, a change of clothes, plus a firearm and assorted other op tech you're familiar with the use off."
She nodded.
"The papers are good for about two days. My superiors may be able to track the source I used to get them given time, so I wouldn't rely on them any longer than that if you can avoid it."
"Why?" she asked after a short period of silence.
He blinked, then realised that she didn't mean the papers. "I . . . What they did to you in Kyrgyzstan opened my eyes. It crossed a line where I wasn't willing to follow."
"But everything up to then was fine with you?" For the first time emotion – anger – leaked out into her voice.
To Tchéky it almost came as a relief. Her calmness up to that point had been disturbing. "I've never claimed any great moral rectitude. Most of the time I just do the job in front of me."
She snorted.
"I – I liked you as a person. Believe that or not. It was no longer an academic exercise involving somebody I didn't know and didn't care anything about."
She opened her mouth to say something, but then shut it again. He saw more anger flash in her eyes, but she just looked away from him. Silence lingered uncomfortably.
He cleared his throat. "I knew your mother, you know. Used to work for her."
Sydney looked at him again. "Laura Bristow?"
"Irina Derevko."
She blinked a few times – eventually nodded. "You know, considering what I'm starting to get back up here that admission is not likely to make me any more inclined to trust you."
"I know," he said quietly. "How are the memories? It hasn't all come back yet?"
"I know my name now. I know a few other things. Everything else is one big tangled up jumble of images. It's almost worse than having no memories at all. It feels like a thousand voices all trying to make themselves heard at once. I can't find any of the details I most need right now amid all the other mess."
"But the conditioning is broken. It will all sort itself out naturally over the next few days. The damage won't be permanent."
"You can't know that." Again there was that flash of anger, swiftly suppressed.
He changed the subject – back to business. "I'd advise against flying straight to America. They'll be watching for that. Go to a third intermediate country first."
"I know what I'm doing."
"Yeah, I guess you do." He hesitated briefly. "In the bag there are contact details for a surgeon I know. Your absolute first priority must to get the tracking device out. You've got no chance otherwise."
"I'm not an idiot Tchéky."
"I managed to spoof the satellite signal, so they've hopefully been chasing shadows for the last few hours. That won't last. They've probably corrected my hack already, and I have no idea how much of a head start you have. Assume that it's not much."
She nodded. After another lengthy silence she said simply: "I should go."
"Yes." There was so much he wanted to say, but he knew that none of it would be welcomed. In the end he settled for: "Safe journey."
"Thank you." It was almost inaudible.
As she stood up, slinging the bag over one shoulder, he noticed her wince. He laid the newspaper down on the bench beside him, sitting back and closing his eyes. For some reason he didn't want to watch her as she walked away, out of his life forever.
He didn't hear footsteps.
"They're going to kill you, aren't they?" Her voice still came from close by.
"If they catch me," he agreed, not bothering to open his eyes.
This time he did hear footsteps. Part of him wanted suddenly to cry.
"Tchéky."
The unexpectedness of hearing her voice again made him jolt. Almost involuntarily he opened his eyes and looked at her. She had stopped about fifteen yards away and was facing him.
"Your left jacket pocket."
His eyes widened as he reached into it and felt the small, hard object that definitely hadn't been in there originally. He blinked at it stupidly as he pulled it out. The tracking device. "How . . .?" he started.
"I cut it out with a penknife and brought it here in a lead lined box to mask the signal. I was going to use you as a decoy." She shrugged. "But that . . . doesn't really seem fair now. Smash it. Get out of here before they come."
Tchéky continued to stare at the tracking device sat in the centre of his palm. Small and gleaming. He nodded distractedly. "Yeah. Yeah, I'll do that."
He heard her start walking again. This time she didn't stop.
* * *
"We've got her. The warehouse across the street. She's stopped moving."
Anna watched the monitor screen, already having reached that conclusion. "Move alpha team into position and block off all exits," she ordered. A smile touched her lips as she looked at the satellite image showing the heat signature of a single person superimposed with the signal from the tracking device. Got you.
About thirty seconds later her comm crackled. "Alpha team in position. Awaiting instructions."
"Hold fast, team leader. Don't let anybody past you." Then she took of her headset and stood up, looking round at the six heavily-armed men dressed in assault gear who shared the back of the van with her.
"Okay, let's move in."
* * *
"There's nowhere to run Sydney." Anna's voice echoed through the warehouse. She had to break off, stifling a coughing fit as the acrid black smoke hanging in the air caught the back of her throat. Quickly she moved from her position, though the crackling flames were probably enough to cover the sound.
Still, she'd already seen all too clearly that it didn't do to take unnecessary chances.
She wiped at the blood oozing slowly down the side of her face from a tear in her scalp. Her foot nudged against something and she looked down. It was a severed hand. Part of one of her team who'd been blown up when they came in through the side entrance. She kicked it away almost absently.
The sound of footsteps came from about ten yards to her left, scurrying away rapidly. She whirled, but didn't catch more than a fleeting flash of movement.
"It doesn't have to be this way Sydney. I don't want to hurt you." Anna knew that her words were unlikely to draw a response from her target, but that wasn't their primary purpose. They might just distract Sydney long enough to allow the remainder of her team to get the drop on her. And there was also the fact that most of her surviving team members were dazed, wounded and in shock, their comms system jammed from an unknown source, and likely in the mood to fire on the first thing they saw moving. She didn't want that first thing to be her.
Slightly to her surprise it worked. Suddenly from somewhere close up ahead of her came the sound of a scuffle. She moved quickly to close.
"Shit, it's not her . . .." The voice was cut off abruptly by a sound she recognised instantly as a suppressed pistol shot. A fraction of a second later there was a heavy thud.
Anna didn't hesitate, eyes fastening on a vague silhouette in the gloom and rushing up behind it. It was too big to be Sydney. In fact it was distinctly male. She registered these facts even as she was driving the butt of her tranq gun into the target's neck.
He fell to his hands and knees, groaning, the pistol flying from his grasp and sliding away beneath one of the shelves. She kicked him viciously in the ribcage, laying him flat, then pulled him up by the hair to get a look at his face.
"Tchéky!" She let him drop again in disgust, administering another kick to the ribs for good measure.
"Hello Anna," he gasped. "Lovely to see you again."
Her face twisted and she planted a floor into the small of his back, pressing him flat to the floor again. "Where is she?"
"She?"
Anna shifted her foot so that it was pressed against the back of his elbow. Then she grabbed hold of his hand and yanked back on it. There was a rather distressing sounding pop as the elbow joint dislocated and Tchéky screamed rawly. "Sydney. That she. I know she's here somewhere."
Tchéky just laughed raggedly.
Anna grimaced, straightening. "Move to cover the exits. Now!" she called out to the remainder of her team.
After a moment there came the sound of two sets of footsteps, moving to obey. Tchéky chuckled again, breath sawing in agony. "Your men seem somewhat depleted Anna."
She planted her foot against his other elbow. "Do I have to ask you again?"
"You know, sometimes a please works wonders." She grabbed hold of his wrist; started to pull. "Okay, okay!" he yelped. "The back pocket of my jeans."
A sudden unpleasant thought occurred to Anna – one she'd been skirting round for the last few seconds. The satellite surveillance of the warehouse had shown up only one person inside. One person matching up exactly to the tracking device's signal. "You move a muscle and I kill you," she warned him.
Inside Tchéky's back pocket was a small, hard, plastic-coated object. She pulled it out and looked at it for several seconds, before lashing out and kicking him the ribcage again. "Where the hell is she?"
He was silent.
"You have to have met her to get this. Tell me where she is." She let go of him and took a step back, her thoughts racing. She couldn't have lost again . . .
Tchéky rolled over onto his back. His face was taut with pain, slick with sweat. "She didn't tell me. I didn't ask. It's not like we're best palls or anything Anna."
"Why are you doing this? She's not going to thank you for it. She's not even going to give it a second thought." Anna's voice contained barely suppressed fury. "Why throw your life away for her?"
He snorted. "You know Anna, for someone with such a high IQ you're quite possibly the thickest person I've ever met."
She kicked him again, doubling him up. "Whereabouts did you meet with her?"
"D'you know where . . . I'd start . . . looking for her, Anna . . . if I were you?" His voice came brokenly between gulping intakes of breath.
"Where?"
"Los Angeles." He gave a choking laugh.
She aimed another kick at his ribs, but this time he was expecting it, managing to twist and catch her leg with his good arm. Then he swung round, sweeping her legs out from under her.
They came to their feet together.
Tchéky snapped a fist into her face, knocking her head back and bloodying her nose. Anna returned with a violent flurry of kicks that blasted through his weakened guard and sent him crashing into the shelf behind him. He reached above his head with his good hand and pulled down the first thing that came within his reach – a tool box – aiming it at Anna's head.
She crossed her arms in front of her face and the toolbox bounced off, clanging against the floor and spilling its contents in a ringing cascade. In the moment of distraction it caused Tchéky kicked her hard in the midriff.
She didn't seem to feel it, coming straight at him without so much as a pause, ducking as he tried to swing at her and punching him viciously in the side. As breath hissed between his teeth, she grabbed his injured arm and yanked down hard, making him shriek in pain. Then she raked her foot down the back of his calf, dropping him to his knees.
Behind him now, Anna wrapped one arm around his throat in a chokehold, the other hooking over the top of his head and yanking it sideways.
Tchéky struggled in vain to break her grip, driving an elbow back into her stomach as his face slowly went purple. He groped with one hand across the floor, fingers closing over the handle of a screwdriver as she continued to squeeze tight, one of her knees pressing into his back now to increase her leverage.
Mouth working desperately for air, he drove the screwdriver as hard as he could manage, deep into her thigh. Her leg gave way dropping her down to one knee behind him, but the pressure on his throat only slackened slightly.
Her face twisted in a snarl as he groped upwards, trying to claw at her eyes. With every ounce of strength she could muster she wrenched her arms violently to one side, twisting his head sharply with them. Bone cracked like a pistol shot.
Releasing her grip on him, he fell face forward onto the warehouse floor and lay unmoving.
She stood up, breathing heavily, the screwdriver still embedded in her thigh. Grimacing, she spat on him contemptuously.
* * *
Sydney walked slowly through the night lit streets of downtown Shanghai, largely ignored by the tide of people ebbing and flowing around her.
She'd taken Tchéky's advice about not trying to fly directly to the US, though she couldn't have explained why she had chosen here as a location. It didn't hold any significance as far as she could tell in the crazy tangle of disjointed memories spinning inside her head. Perhaps that in itself had been reason enough.
Aeroflot, flight number 47. It had simply been the first one on the board to catch her eye.
As she walked an incredible, deep-seated weariness crept up on her. She hadn't been able to sleep on the flight. In fact she hadn't slept more than about four hours in the four days since she'd escaped from the Vissarion's bunker in Kyrgyzstan. Now, suddenly, it seemed to catch up with her all at once.
Neon lights blurred and danced before her vision. Although there were people all around her she felt detached and apart from it all. Even the noises of the street seemed somehow distant and removed from her.
Part of her just wanted to sit down where she was in the middle of the street and cry. A larger part of her simply wanted to go home, if there was such a place anymore. She forced herself to keep on walking, towards her hotel a couple of blocks away.
Then she stopped abruptly, blinking.
For a short while she wasn't sure why, but then she realised it was the face of the woman she'd just walked past. A woman of Caucasian origin, late thirties to early forties, a fraction plump and matronly looking. Nothing out of the ordinary that should stick in the mind or attract attention.
Except it was the same face as the woman she had seen tailing her in a St. Petersburg marketplace. The hair and clothes were different but the face was identical
Something inside her lurched. She tried to keep calm but everything around her seemed to be spiralling out of control. Suddenly she could feel her heart pounding, adrenaline pumping through her veins, nerve endings twitching. She glanced around and thought she saw the second tail from the St. Petersburg marketplace – the man with the leather jacket and moustache – looking straight at her from a distance of less than ten yards away.
Reflex overrode thought and she broke into a run, sprinting down the nearest gap between two buildings.
The alleyways and narrow back streets were like a maze and she chose her direction almost at random, her only thought to run – to put as much distance between her and her pursuers as she could. Seconds became minutes, and the air started to burn in her lungs, sharp pain tearing incessantly at her right side. She forced onwards regardless, legs pumping hard.
Eventually – after how long she had no idea – she stopped, panting for breath. She leant against a wall and wiped a hand across her brow. Inwardly she cursed herself for her overreaction – struggled to reassert control over herself. The pain in her side made it feel like a knife had been plunged in and was being twisted repeatedly back and forth.
She had no clue as to where she was anymore and looked around cautiously. Another narrow alleyway, indistinguishable to half a dozen others she had ran through. Boxes and junk were piled high on both sides, further narrowing it. She looked and listened hard, but there was no sign that she had been pursued.
Light and noise came from somewhere up ahead of her. After she'd got her breath back somewhat she started walking cautiously towards it.
Someone was standing at the head of the alleyway, backlit by streetlights.
She blinked.
It was a very familiar someone. He wasn't tall – about the same height she was – and he looked to be somewhere in his fifties with close-cropped grey hair and a heavily stubbled jaw. His suit was casual but expensive and a half smile touched his lips as he looked at her.
"Sloane!" Her shout was equal parts shock and outrage. She reached for her handgun. "What the hell have you done to me you son of a bitch?"
"Hello Sydney," he said calmly. "It's good to see you again."
Her face twisted into a snarl and she aimed the gun at the centre of his chest.
He held up his hands. "Please Sydney. I know you're confused right now, and angry, but for once I'm not the cause of your woes."
"Why the hell would I believe a single word you say? Why shouldn't I just shoot you right now?"
"What can I say Sydney? I know you'll find this difficult to believe, but right now I'm not your enemy. I'm here to help you."
"Help me?" Her voice was incredulous. "You help me?"
She heard a stealthy footstep directly behind her and whirled. There was a soft whooshing sound and something hit her in the left shoulder.
She looked down and saw a tranq dart, protruding from her jacket. Suddenly everything was spinning, her vision blurring, and the ground beneath her swaying like a ship in a violent storm. She span back towards Sloane, but suddenly there were six of him, gyrating and spinning crazily. The look of concern for her on his face made her blood boil . . .
Suddenly everything seemed to be rushing away from her down a long black tunnel. She aimed at one of the rapidly dwindling Sloanes and pulled the trigger. The bullet seemed to pass straight through his face, but it didn't even manage to alter his infuriating expression. She fired again, trying another face this time, though the result was no better than before. Something hit her in the back. All control over her legs went and she toppled over, face forwards. Her gun was suddenly no longer in her grasp.
Vaguely, miles away, she was away of two people standing over her. "Was that really necessary?" she was dimly aware of Sloane asking.
"Normally one dart does the job straight away, sir" a second voice said. "I don't know what happened . . .."
Consciousness slipped away in a tide of darkness.
* * *
Arvin Sloane sat with Sydney's head cradled on his lap. He gently stroked her hair.
"I wish things could be different between us. I wish we could go back and all the hate and betrayal could be expunged." He sighed to himself, twining a strand of her hair around his finger.
After a moment or two he gave a soft little laugh. "I spent so much time looking for you, trying to track you down, then finding a way to extract you. You hardly made it easy for me, you know?" A wry sounding chuckle. "I should have trusted you, shouldn't I? I should have known that you'd find a way to break your conditioning and extract yourself. I'm so proud of you, you know. I hope one day you'll let me say that to you for real."
For a time he fell silent again, continuing to stroke her hair.
"If I could Sydney, I'd let you return to your real life, away from all this. I know that is all you really want." For a moment or two he bowed his head, closing his eyes, his expression looking pained.
Then he went on. "But there is one more thing that I need you to do for me, Sydney. Just one, very important thing. Then my days of using you are over for good, I promise."
THE END