Chapter 19
"Sorry," Gawain whispered, and pulled the knife from Holly's leg. She drew the edge across the rope tying her other hand to the chair, wincing as the muscles in her broken wrist screamed.
She threw the ropes to the side, and cut Holly's restraints.
Holly grabbed her with one arm and pulled her down, just as a new hole was blown in the door by Marcel's Five-seveN.
She kicked out with one leg, launching the wheelchair towards Marcel and turned the doorknob with her good hand.
They emerged into a corridor with no other doors, and a turn to the left at the end. Voices bounced off the walls, and footsteps echoed off the dirty floor.
Gawain went along the left wall, gripping the knife in her good hand, and waited.
The barrel of a TAR21 poked around the corner, next to her face.
She hooked her other arm around the barrel of the rifle pulled, causing the soldier holding it to stumble around the corner. Gawain pushed the knife into the soft flesh of his neck, before pulling the gun off him and slowly stepping back.
Holly tore off the duct tape and flexed her jaw.
The doorknob turned, and opened a crack.
Gawain pulled the trigger in short bursts, sending several bullets through the weakened wood. As she turned to aim back down the corridor, a soldier leaned out and something flew from his hand, bouncing off the right wall and landing at their feet.
Gawain threw herself forwards, past the flashbang and landed flat on her stomach on the floor as it detonated, and a blinding light filled the corridor. Her ears rang, and her vision swam, as she propped her rifle up on the floor.
As expected, the soldier rounded the corner.
She squeezed the trigger, sending him flying back into the wall.
"Holly!" She got up and ran over to the girl, who was turned against one corner of the room with her eyes closed.
"I'm fine," Holly said, and although Gawain couldn't hear her, she could read her lips.
She looked down the corridor, where more shouting was coming from. Holding the rifle with one hand, Gawain opened the door back into the interrogation room, to find Marcel leanet against the wall, bleeding from a stomach wound. "Up!" she commanded.
Groaning, he got to his feet. His gun laid a next to him.
Gawain picked up the pistol, handed the TAR21 to Holly and wrapped an arm around Marcel's neck. She walked down the corridor, keeping Marcel in front of her.
A soldier popped out to shoot.
"No!" Marcel shouted.
Gawain fired her pistol, forcing him back around the corner. "Let us go or he dies!"
"Not a chance!" came Jade's voice.
"Jade, let them go!" Marcel called. "We can catch them again later. Diana doesn't have to know!"
"Wait, Diana Vex?" Holly asked from behind them.
"None of your business! Jade, retreat. It's an order!"
She was quiet for a moment, before poking her head around the corner. "We're going outside."
"Good. Wait for me there."
"Where's the exit?" Gawain asked.
"I can lead you to it."
"If it's a trap, I'll fucking take you with me."
"It's not a trap," Holly said. "Just look at him. Can't stand to sacrifice himself for his own people. He won't risk himself getting shot." She made a tsk-tsk sound. "You're a fucking disgrace."
Jade's head disappeared around the corner.
"Let's go," Gawain said, pushing Marcel forwards.
"What seems to be the problem, officer?" Jonas leaned out his rolled-down window and flashed his warmest smile.
"Have you seen this man?" The policewoman held up a blurry photograph of Caradoc. "They're suspects in an investigation."
Jonas squinted, frowned and shook his head. "Can't say I have, officer. May I ask what they've done?"
"I'm not allowed to tell you that. I'm afraid I'm going to have to search your vehicle, sir."
"Feel free." He flicked a switch under the dashboard, unlocking the back doors. "Try not to wake my friend, though, he's a bit ill right now and I'm supposed to get him home by sunrise."
The woman turned on her flashlight and went around the back. Jonas looked back at her, smiling, as she inspected Oberon's sleeping form, and then the equipment inside the van.
"Everything alright?" he asked.
She nodded, biting her lip. "This is pretty far for your network."
"We get what we can," he said. "Got a tip something was going down in Paris, so my boss thought I should check it out. Was going there anyway because of my friend."
The officer nodded. "Seems clear, sir. Have a nice evening."
"As to you."
She closed the back doors and he locked them and pressed down on the accelerator. The car moved under the bridge, leaving Belgium and entering France.
Jonas turned the radio to a rock channel, and sunk back in his seat as he navigated through the winding roads of France's countryside.
The sun was rising.
Gawain pushed Marcel out the back doors of the car just as Holly stepped on the accelerator, shooting off down the road that was just outside the bunker hatch. Bullets immediately began pinging off the chassis, and she ducked from the window.
"They're going to scramble the chopper," Holly said.
"Of course they are. Speed up."
The car shot forwards when Holly put her foot right down on the pedal, shooting off down the road, which was covered in a thin layer of snow. The sun was shining, reflecting off the white sheet as they headed down a hill, and then back up again.
"Where the fuck are we?" Gawain asked.
"No idea. Some mountains. Maybe the Alps."
"I hate it here. Keep going; there might be someone down there."
"Oh shit, I see it!"
Gawain turned in her seat just in time to observe a large black object rising over the trees behind them, a soft breeze from it blowing at the treetops. "Eurocopter Tiger. You're right - we might be in the Alps."
"The road's straight!"
"Just keep going!"
There was a rhythmic thup-thup-thup as the cannon mounted under the Tiger's nose spat, and the snow beside them leapt up in thin columns. The machine gun made a zig-zag pattern in the snow before stopping, then beginning anew, this time the bullets punching through the door of their car.
Gawain sunk down in the backseat, closing her eyes. Sooner or later, the stream of bullets was going to reach them, and tear straight through her and Holly, and there was not a single thing they could do about it. She just hoped it was quick.
Rather than tearing flesh, all Gawain heard was the loud whoosh of a rocket, a distant boom and then the machine gun firing again, albeit further away.
"Valerie, look!"
Gawain opened her eyes and warily poked her head from the seat, to see the Tiger now firing into the trees on the left side of the road, a smoke trail from a rocket that had barely missed it still hanging in the air. "Holly, into the forest!"
Without another word, her protege twisted the wheel to the left, and their car leapt a little off the side of the dirt road, into the deep snow that was the forest floor. The heat from the engine made the snow melt, but the wheels had no traction.
Gawain picked out the door to her side and climbed out, hugging herself in the chill of the snow. "I'm starting to miss that bunker."
"Who do you think they are? Dirk?"
She shook her head. "Doubt it. He'd never find us here, wherever we are. I still say we meet up with them."
"And if they kill us?"
"At least Marcel won't get the credit. Jeez, this is cold." She reached to wrap her coat around herself, only to find that it was no longer there, Marcel's men haven't removed it.
Holly sneezed. "Oh, shit."
"We'll get Doctor Estok to look at you. Now come along." She started into the snow, taking large steps and truding through the thick, slushy pile that had formed on the forest floor.
The gunfire got louder as they headed towards the source of the rocket, and figures in white military camo flitted between the trees, pausing occasionally to fire at the sky but not long enough to become an easy target. Periodically, the Tiger's machine gun ripped through the trees, failing to hit any of the figures.
Holly cupped her hands around her mouth. "Hey!" she shouted.
One of the figures turned, his or her face obscured by a black snow mask, and raised a palm before firing a burst at the Tiger. He urgently trudged towards them, rifle raised. "Stay away!" a male voice commanded.
"Who are you?" Gawain asked, squinting through the snow mask.
"Doesn't matter. You're who they were chasing?"
They both nodded.
"Good. Come with me; once a sniper gets here that blasted thing will be off our backs."
"You speak English," Gawain said. "Where are we?"
"The Alps. You're Valerie Izaks and Holly Beckett?"
As if she was a blur, Holly pulled the rifle from the man, turned it around and pointed it at him. "How do you know that?"
"I-"
A burst of cannon fire from the helicopter tore into the snow around them. The man dived behind a tree, while Gawain and Holly moved through the snow away from the shots.
He poked his head out from behind the trunk. "Our base is on that plateau; we have to get there. Are you with me?" He pointed between the branches to a heavily obscured flat mountain slope.
Gawain looked at holly, and then back at the man. "Fine. We'll go. Betray us and Holly shoots you, understand?"
He nodded. "Come!" He began pawing the snow in front of him to the side, creating a path that was slightly easier to wade through. Gawain and Holly went along it, with holly covering their back.
For about half and hour, Gawain saw nothing interesting apart from the helicopter and heard nothing new. The melted snow caused by her body heat was seeping into her trousers and her shirt, numbing parts of her legs. Still, she advanced, determined to get to the base and get help.
As they were ascending a small hill, the barrel of a sniper rifle poked over the edge and down at them. "Michael, who are these people?"
"The ones I'm looking for. Give me the rifle." The man that had rescued them beckoned with one hand.
The woman behind the gun paused, staring down the scope at the three of them, before unslinging it and handing it to Michael.
He raised it at the helicopter, aimed for a long moment, and took a deep breath. The licked his lips and pulled the trigger.
A loud bang rang across the treetops, and the tip of the sniper rifle's barrel flashed once and the bullet whistled through the air.
Straight through a cockpit window.
The helicopter wobbled slightly in midair, and plunged towards the ground, its impact with the trees shearing it apart and tossing its pieces through the forest.
Michael lowered the rifle and passed it back to the woman. "We should go before more of them turn up."
"Who the fuck are you?" Gawain asked.
"Me? I'm an outside contractor. Jonas emailed me last night about finding an attack helicopter so I decided to look for one. And I found it." He glanced towards the smoke cloud rising from where the helicopter's fuel was burning.
Neither Holly nor Gawain said anything for the duration of their hike up the mountain, and onto a plateau, where a compounded surrounded by a chain-link fence sat waiting for them, surrounded by more trees.
Gawain recognised it almost immediately. "You're with Phoenix."
Michael raised his right hand and made a thumbs-up sign without even a glance at her. "Like I said, I'm an outside contractor."
Holly raised her gun at him, only to have the woman point her sniper rifle at her.
"It's pointless," Michael said. He turned around, and took off his mask, revealing his brown eyes and short mustache and brown hair that was streaked with grey. "You're completely surrounded."
On cue, more soldiers - some in snow camo and some in standard black Phoenix camo - marched out of the compound, forming a semicircle in front of Michael, all their weapons pointed at Gawain and Holly.
"Before I shoot you," Michael said. "Tell me: why did your people attack my compound?"