The building Tariq directed them to was an abandoned factory, one of many crumbling into decay on an old industrial compound several miles from the bridge where they'd met Bateman. Beth and Dimitri were scrambling CO-19 , but Ruth and Harry reached the building first. A decision had to be made. Should they go in first, unarmed and without backup? Or should they sit tight, and wait for the cavalry to rush in? Both carried risks; if they took the first course of action, there was every chance that one or both of them would die before they reached Emilia. If they took the second, there was every chance that by the time CO-19 got through the girl would already be dead.
Ruth, it seemed, had already made up her mind as she vaulted out of the car the moment Harry put it in park. He scrambled after her, and this time it was he who stopped her with a hand on her arm.
"Wait, Ruth-"
She whirled on him, eyes flashing rage and terror in equal measure. "If we wait she could die," Ruth practically spat at him, and he tried not to flinch at her accusing tone. She was desperate and scared, he knew. So was he.
"Sometimes the direct approach is best," Harry conceded, and pulled her arm through his. "I have an idea."
Together they walked, arm-in-arm, from the car toward the factory. Every nerve in his body was screaming at him to run, but he forced himself to walk. He didn't know who was working with Bateman, but it seemed most likely that the men left guarding Emilia would be no more than that, just simple guards, cogs in a machine they didn't fully understand. Certainly Bateman would have warned them not to let anyone into the building, but would he have taken the time to make his cohorts learn their faces? Even if he had, Harry hoped that their unexpected, almost casual arrival would throw the guards off enough to earn him the split second advantage he would need. He wished to God that Ruth wasn't here, that he hadn't been forced to put her in this kind of danger, but he knew better than to try to argue with her any more. She'd chosen this, just as much as he had.
There was only one man standing in front of the building, leaning up against the door almost as if he were bored. He held a large, semi-automatic rifle loosely in his hands. Harry had to wonder at the bravado of that; was Bateman really so sure they wouldn't find this place that he allowed this man to stand thus armed in the broad light of day?
Harry made no move to slow down as they approached the man, who straightened up and pointed the gun directly at Harry's chest.
"Stop," he said.
Harry didn't.
"Seriously, stop! What the hell do you think you're doing, mate?" the guard asked in an baffled tone, and it was that question that proved his undoing.
While the guard was talking Harry had kept on walking, pushing Ruth behind him at the last minute and clocking the man right in the face with an almighty blow. The guard had been so distracted by Harry's mere presence, so surprised that he hadn't stopped moving, that he'd never even attempted to defend himself. He went down with a clatter as the rifle dropped from his grasp, trying and failing to take Harry with him. Harry was on him in an instant, punching him everywhere he could reach, directing all of his fury at the guard; to his credit, the man did attempt to struggle, but he was already on the ground and Harry was stronger than he looked. He hit him again, and again, raising up the man's head only to bash back it against the curb.
"Harry! Harry stop!" Ruth's voice cut through the red haze that had risen before Harry's eyes the moment he'd struck the first blow. Dimly the scene before him materialized, the guard's face bruised and bloody beneath his hands. The man was certainly unconscious, maybe even dead already. Harry didn't take the time to check.
Harry grabbed the rifle and started for the door, but a sudden idea stopped him in his tracks. He went back to the guard, searching underneath his coat until he found what he was looking for.
He might not have been particularly well trained, but at least the man was prepared; the guard had been carrying a second weapon, a handgun tucked down the back of his pants. Harry checked the gun over. Four rounds in the magazine and one in the chamber. Five bullets.
He handed it to Ruth, who accepted it without a word, and thus armed they turned and headed for the door.
The gun felt oddly familiar in Ruth's grasp. She'd done the requisite firearms training back when she'd first joined MI-5, and she prayed that she remembered enough of it to see them through this nightmare.
Once they'd passed through the door they found themselves in a long, dimly lit corridor. The hall was lined with doors, most of them open, and just ahead it turned to the left, leading off out of sight. They walked side-by-side, guns drawn and senses on high alert. She'd never been this tense, this on edge, in her entire life; not when she'd been the only thing standing between Angela Wells and the utter destruction of Thames House; not when she'd first landed in Rome after Cotterdam, broke and alone and convinced every shadow she saw was Oliver Mace, come to take her away; not ever.
Their first test came perhaps thirty seconds after they'd passed through the door. Someone came wandering out of one of the empty rooms off to their right, unaware of the threat of violence that hung in the air; Harry was on that side, and gunned him down without missing a beat. The sound of the rifle blast echoed horribly in the hallway, but they did not stop, could not stop.
On they walked, heading for the turn just ahead; two men came barreling round the corner and they fell like the first; Harry took the one on the right, Ruth the one on the left. She'd never actually shot anyone before, but now was not the time to dwell on this dubious new achievement. Her mind was oddly clear, only one thought crystalizing through the mayhem: get to Emilia. She cocked the gun, heard the click as the next round slid into the chamber. Four bullets left.
There was no need to speak. She and Harry were, as they had always been, utterly in sync, marching at a steady pace, though whether it was their doom or their salvation that awaited them, neither was sure.
There were two more guards at the end of the hallway, standing in front of the only closed door they had encountered so far. These men were more prepared than the first four had been, and began firing right away. Instinctively Harry and Ruth flung themselves to the side, he taking shelter in one doorway and she in another. The hallway echoed with the sound of gunfire and the ricocheting of bullets, but Ruth knew it was patience that was needed here. Her moment would come, she told herself, clutching the cold metal of the gun in her hands. Somewhere through the din she thought she heard footsteps, thought she heard the guards approaching and, crouching low, she chanced a glance around the doorframe.
A bullet grazed her face, searing pain splitting her cheek, but they had missed her, they had missed, and she took the opportunity to fire off two rounds, quick and low. The man on her side of the hallway went down, screaming, as she ducked back into the relative safety of her doorway. Two bullets left.
Across the hall Harry was watching her; she knew the moment he registered the laceration on her face because his own expression went grim and without hesitation he stepped directly into the path of the second gunman, firing.
That one didn't scream.
Ruth and Harry stepped back into the hallway, making their way around the two fallen guards. Ruth prudently kicked the weapon away from the man she'd shot; she was fairly certain he wasn't dead, and she didn't want him firing at her back.
Her gaze fell on the closed door. The only closed door they'd seen, with two guards standing outside it; surely that was where they were keeping Emilia.
Harry reached out for the handle, and Ruth came to stand beside him. Whatever was on the other side of that door they would face it, together.
Harry flung the door open, knowing that their firefight in the hallway had already given them away. There was no time to think, no time to asses; there would be a moment when whoever was in that room would think that maybe it was their fellows coming through, and it was that instant of uncertainty that would be his and Ruth's only advantage. He raised his weapon, and fired.
Ruth would be forever grateful that the guards had sedated Emilia; the little girl lay curled fast asleep in the corner, and would thus be spared the sight of her parents, blood spattered and furious, guns drawn, moving deliberately through that doorway like two avenging angels. Next to her Harry's gun roared, and she raised her arms to fire.
Two bullets left.
In the end, there were only three guards, and Harry managed to take down two of them in rapid succession while Ruth dispatched the third. The two Harry killed had been in the process of firing back, but their aim had been off, and he remained unscathed. The third guard had dived for Emilia when Ruth shot him in the back, and he landed in a blood-spattered heap two feet away from her sleeping daughter.
One bullet left, and not a guard in sight.
She was across the room in an instant, gathering her child in her arms, willing herself not to break, not now, not yet. They'd encountered nine guards, which seemed an awful lot for one little girl; then again, John Bateman knew exactly who he was up against. She took an instant to assure herself that Emilia was still breathing before she rose to her feet, cradling her daughter on her left hip in that gesture that seemed so instinctive in all mothers. She raised the gun in her right hand, and made her way back to Harry. He walked just a little in front of her on the left, shielding Emilia with the rifle. Slowly, deliberately, they made their way back down the hall, ignoring the blood and wreckage from the baptism of fire through which they'd waded to reach this point.
The minute they were out of the building they both broke into a run, sprinting toward the car. Ruth flung herself into the back seat, cradling Emilia in her arms, while Harry turned gunned the car the second the ignition turned and peeled away, tires squealing. It was only then, in the relative safety of the car, that Ruth allowed herself to break. She buried her face in her daughter's hair, and sobbed.