Scorpia Rising

by Anthony Horowitz

  They passed through a soaring archway, part of a stone tower that might have housed a princess out of an ancient fable. There were thick pillars and narrow, barred windows. The archway led into a square filled with stalls and shops on all sides. The tourists were already evacuating the area. It was obvious that something was going on. They were surrounded by police cars. There were sirens howling in the air. And people were running! Nobody ever ran in the souk. The whole point of life there was to take it slowly. By the time Alex and Smithers stumbled to a halt, taking in their options, they were almost alone. Only the astonished shopkeepers gazed at them from behind half-open doors, wondering what was going to happen next.

  There were three ways out of the square, but Alex saw at once that they were blocked. Yet more Scorpia men had been brought in, and this group had somehow second-guessed them. They were closing in from every direction. At least these new arrivals didn’t seem to have guns. But they were carrying knives with long, vicious blades and they were ready to use them. Alex and Smithers were unarmed apart from the one gadget he had mentioned and that might be anything. What next?

  “Mr. Smithers!” Alex called out the warning as one of the men raised his knife and moved in for the kill. At the same time, Alex ducked sideways and grabbed a brass pyramid, one of thousands on sale in the souk. It made an ugly souvenir—but it was heavy, with a lethal point, and that made it a useful weapon. Alex hurled it with all his strength, watching with satisfaction as it sailed over Smithers’s shoulder and hit the knife man in the center of his forehead. The man went down like a stone, dropping his knife. Smithers snatched it up, spun it in his hand, and threw it across the square. Alex looked around. A man had appeared just behind him, carrying a machine gun. The knife turned in the air, then buried itself in his chest. As the man fell back, his trigger finger tightened and suddenly he was spraying the air with bullets. About a dozen glass lamps exploded. Brass plates were blown off their hooks, falling with a great clatter. The windows of a silver shop shattered. Then it was over—but the silence after the last bullet was immediately broken by more sirens, frantic shouting, the panic of people trying to get away.

  There were still two more knife men. Before he could react, Alex was seized from behind. He felt himself being dragged away and tried to struggle—but the man was too strong for him. He writhed helplessly, expecting to feel the point of the knife slide into his back at any moment. He wondered why it hadn’t happened already. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the other knife man close in on Smithers, who was standing in front of him, his great chest rising and falling as he caught his breath.

  Alex had to break free. As he was pulled back, he passed a spice shop with sacks of powder and leaves piled up outside. He knew at once what he had to do. His hand shot out and scooped up as much brown powder as it could hold. Then he twisted around and flung it into the man’s face. It was chili powder. The man screamed as it invaded his eyes and nostrils. He couldn’t breathe. He was blind. Alex felt the man release him. He pulled free, then turned around and lashed out with a side kick—the yoko geri he had been taught at karate, his foot powering into the man’s solar plexus. The man was thrown back into a counter filled with silver jewelry. He smashed through the glass, his head and shoulders disappearing. His legs twitched for a moment, then became still.

  Alex wanted to rest, but he could see the last knife man closing in on Smithers on the other side of the square. The man was smiling, perfectly balanced on the balls of his feet, about to strike. Alex looked around him for another weapon. There were none—but then he noticed one of the brass plates that had been shot off its hook. He picked it up and threw it in a single movement. Unconsciously, he was back on the beach—with Tom Harris, with Sabina—playing Frisbee. The plate was heavier, but it was exactly the same shape, and its aerodynamics were more or less the same. It was a perfect throw. The plate sailed across the square, curving slightly, then crashed into the side of the knife man’s neck. Alex saw his eyes go white and his legs crumple. He collapsed, leaving Alex and Smithers facing each other, alone.

  Smithers seemed amused by the whole affair. “Well done, Alex,” he crowed. “I always wanted to see you in action and you really are as good as they say!”

  “I think we have to get out of here, Mr. Smithers,” Alex panted. They had taken out four of the men but he knew there were plenty more.

  “Quite right. It’s time I disappeared.”

  “What?”

  “No time to argue. It’s me they’re after. That much is obvious. Heaven knows why. Mr. Blunt will find out. The important thing is for you to get on that plane and get home.”

  “But what about you?” Alex couldn’t keep a note of dismay out of his voice. Smithers would be easy to spot wherever he went. It wasn’t just his clothes. It was his bald head, his size.

  “They won’t be able to find me if they don’t know what they’re looking for,” Smithers replied. He reached down between his legs. “This may come as a bit of a shock, Alex, old chap.”

  For a moment, Alex thought that Smithers was about to unzip his trousers. He was certainly unzipping something. As he straightened up, there was a tearing sound and the waistband of his trousers divided into two. His shirt did the same . . . and to Alex’s horror he saw that Smithers’s bulging stomach was also splitting in half. It was like a snake shedding its skin. The brightly colored shirt and the plump, oversized arms fell aside as a second pair of arms, lean and suntanned, appeared from inside, pushing their way out. The shoulders rolled away and finally the bald head with its round cheeks and several chins crumpled and fell back as a younger head emerged, and Alex saw what should have been obvious from the start.

  A fat suit! That was Smithers’s last and most brilliant gadget—and he had been wearing it from the day the two of them had met. The real Smithers was actually thin and wiry and about ten years younger—in his late thirties, with short brown hair and blue eyes. He was looking at Alex with a mischievous smile, and when he spoke again, even his public-school accent had gone. It seemed that he was actually Irish.

  “I never meant to deceive you, Alex,” he explained. “I developed the Smithers disguise for work in the field, but somehow I got used to it. It was like my office suit . . . you know?” Quickly, he tucked the rubber and latex body behind one of the stalls. He was now wearing scruffy jeans and a T-shirt. For his part, Alex was too astonished to speak. “I don’t feel comfortable taking it off now, if you want the truth. I feel as if I’m exposing myself. But needs must . . . if I’m going to get out of this place alive. No time to worry about it now. We’d better go different directions. Get home to Jack. Give her my best wishes. Try not to mention this if you can help it.”

  And then Smithers was walking briskly away. Alex watched him climb down a flight of stairs and turn a corner, and then he was gone. He was reminded of an advertisement he had once seen in a newspaper . . . for diet pills. What had it said? “Inside every fat man there’s a thin man trying to get out.” Well, he’d just witnessed a vivid demonstration of that—although if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he wouldn’t have believed it.

  He retraced his steps, putting as much distance between himself and the square as possible. Smithers might be wrong. The Scorpia people could still be looking for him. As he hurried away, a group of white-suited tourist police ran past him. The House of Gold yesterday and now this! Cairo must be wondering what had hit it. All the shops had locked their doors. Alex joined a crowd of frightened tourists and followed them as they made their way out of the souk.

  Somehow he managed to find his way back to the bridge that he and Smithers had crossed. He tried to hail a cab, but he realized at once that he didn’t have a hope. They had all been taken by people wanting to get back to their hotels, and anyway the police must have set up roadblocks everywhere. Nothing was moving.

  He looked at his watch. Almost half past twelve. He still had plenty of time to make the plane. Jack had given him her own mobile phone and he u
sed it to call her at the apartment. There was no answer. That was odd. Maybe he had misdialed. Jack had definitely told him she would wait for his call. He called again and allowed the phone to ring ten times, but there was still no answer. Where was she?

  Suddenly, Alex had a bad feeling. Jack wouldn’t have left the apartment. She might have heard that there’d been a further disturbance in Cairo, but she wouldn’t have come out looking for him. So if she wasn’t answering the phone, where was she?

  Alex was on his own. Smithers had gone and he had no one else to call. Pushing through the crowds in the lingering heat of the afternoon, he hurried away from the souk, following the main road back into the center of the city, searching for a taxi or a bus or anything that would give him a lift, knowing with a sense of dread that he had to get home.

  17

  CITY OF THE DEAD

  ALEX FINALLY MANAGED TO FLAG down a cab in the Opera Square—an open space full of modern shops and ugly offices, cut in half by an overpass. It still took him an hour to get back to Golden Palm Heights, and half the time he found himself motionless, sweating on the backseat, surrounded by traffic. He rang the apartment three more times. There was still no answer and he had to clamp down on his imagination, trying not to think the worst. But the fact was that if Jack had had to go out, if there had been some problem with the school or with the air tickets, she would have called him first. There was something terrible about the silence and Alex clutched the mobile until his hand was aching, hoping against hope that it would ring.

  He was also worried about Smithers. It still made his head spin to think of the young Irishman who had stepped out of the fat suit. His work clothes, that was what he had said, but it must have taken a bizarre frame of mind to get rigged up like that every day. It just went to show that you couldn’t trust anyone or anything that belonged to the world of espionage.

  As he sat in the back of the cab, waiting for a traffic light that seemed to be stuck deliberately on red, Alex cursed Alan Blunt and Mrs. Jones—and himself for listening to them. They had set him up against Scorpia without even telling him. And Alex was absolutely certain now that whatever was going on in Egypt had nothing to do with the Cairo International College of Arts and Education. It was as if he had been lured there deliberately, part of the evil jigsaw puzzle that Scorpia was putting together. Well, to hell with all of them. Alex just wanted to find Jack. It was time to get out.

  After what seemed like an eternity, the taxi turned into the compound—silent and empty now as it was still a few hours before the end of school. Alex gave the driver a handful of bills without even bothering to count them, got out of the car and ran into the apartment. The front door was open. Was that a good sign or a bad one?

  “Jack!” He called out her name, standing in the middle of the living room. Despite everything, he had still hoped she would be here and he was disappointed by the silence, by the knowledge that he was alone. He could see that she had been packing. There were two suitcases open on the floor, both of them full. The few books and bits and pieces that they had brought from England were neatly stacked beside them along with some cash and their passports. There was a half-finished glass of Coke on the kitchen table. Alex examined it. The ice had melted and the liquid was lukewarm. She had been here. She had been getting ready to leave. Something or someone had disturbed her.

  Then Alex saw the letter pinned to the bedroom door. A white envelope with his own name written on it. His first thought was that it wasn’t Jack’s handwriting. There was already a hollow pit in his stomach as he took it down and opened it. What he read made it worse.

  We have Jack Starbright. If you want to see her again, come to the City of the Dead at 3:00p.m. this afternoon.The Tomb of the Broken Moon. Do not be late. Do not speak to anyone. If you call MI6, she will die. If you contact the school, she will die. If you are not alone, she will die. We are watching you now. We are listening. Obey these instructions or you will never see your friend again.

  Alex felt physically sick. The marble floor seemed to be shifting beneath his feet. Three o’clock! He looked at his watch. It was already after two. They had left him hardly any time . . . presumably on purpose. Despite that, he forced himself to slow down, to think this through. The wrong decision now could kill them both.

  He knew about the City of the Dead. They had actually been talking about it at school only a few days before. It was a vast cemetery in the north of the city, not far from the Citadel. The Tomb of the Broken Moon? He could find that when he got there. But should he go there at all? If he allowed himself to be captured, he would be no use to Jack. They might simply kill him then and there. After all, this was Scorpia he was talking about, and he had given them more than enough reason.

  But that didn’t make sense. If they wanted him dead, that would have been easy enough to arrange. They could have had someone waiting with a gun in the apartment. They needed him for some reason—perhaps the same reason that had drawn him to Cairo in the first place. This wasn’t about Cairo College. It was about him. If he walked into their trap, who could say what the consequences might be? But if he didn’t, Jack would die.

  He could get a message to Smithers. He still had the electronic notepad. But it wasn’t worth the risk. First of all, Smithers had been forced to abandon his home and might not even have access to his computer. And anyway, Scorpia might be able to intercept the message. He could ring England. He could leave some sort of written message here. But Alex had no doubt that the apartment would be thoroughly searched. It was probably bugged even now. The note had made it perfectly clear what would happen if he tried to disobey the instructions.

  It took him about fifteen seconds to run through all the options and to come to the only possible conclusion. He had to do what he was told. He had to deliver himself into Scorpia’s hands and hope that some sort of opportunity would arise further down the line. The one thing he wouldn’t do was put Jack’s life at risk. He remembered how she had insisted on coming with him on this trip. How he wished now that he had persuaded her to stay behind.

  He was already out the door and back down the stairs—and at least there was one piece of luck. The taxi that had brought him from Cairo was still parked outside, the driver talking on his mobile phone. Alex had snatched up another handful of cash before he left, and he banged a fist on the window, showing it to the driver.

  “The City of the Dead,” he instructed. “Can you take me there?”

  The driver nodded.

  “Do you know a place called the Tomb of the Broken Moon?”

  The driver’s eyes were still fixed on the money. “I know it.”

  “You can have all this if you get me there in half an hour.”

  The driver must have had enough English to understand, because Alex had no sooner got in than they were away with the back tires spinning and spitting up dust. He gazed out of the window, trying to assemble his thoughts. Why did they want him to come to a cemetery? Was there something ominous about the choice? Perhaps he should try calling someone after all, using Jack’s mobile. But that was too dangerous. It was always possible that Scorpia agents were following in another car. And the iPhone itself could be bugged.

  The City of the Dead, also known as the Northern Cemetery, lay sprawled out next to the Salah Salem Highway with lanes of traffic roaring past continuously, filling the air with fumes of burned rubber and gas. It really was a city in itself, dusty and crumbling, hammered by the sun. Ever since the fourteenth century, the Egyptians had brought their dead here, building not just tombs but miniature complexes with mosques, mausoleums, and even living rooms for relatives who happened to visit. The wealthier the family, the more elaborate the complex, with high brick walls and arched doorways leading into courtyards that really could be someone’s home. Indeed, a lot of the poorer people of Cairo had seen an opportunity and had actually moved in so that many of the buildings were now occupied with TV screens flickering behind windows, television antennas on the roofs, and la
undry hanging on lines that stretched over the graves. There were even a few bars and supermarkets with cans and bottles spread out on wooden shelves that might once have held dead bodies.

  The taxi slowed down once they entered the cemetery. It was impossible to speed through the narrow, twisting streets. The driver seemed to be looking for something and suddenly drew in, stopping beside a wooden door. Alex saw a name—TORUN—written in Arabic and English characters on a plaque. Was this the place? The driver pointed and he looked up. There was a dome and a minaret surmounted with a crescent moon that someone had shot at. The bullet had snapped off one end. The moon was a Turkish symbol. Torun could well be a Turkish name too. Had a Turkish family moved to Cairo, died in Cairo, and decided to be buried in Cairo? At least Alex could be fairly sure that he was in the right place.

  He gave the driver all his money. With his nerves tingling, he got out of the car and went through the door. He heard the taxi pull away behind him and knew that he was on his own. He looked at his watch. It was five to three. He had completed his part of the bargain. He wondered what would happen next.

  Alex was surrounded by three walls. The fourth had crumbled away, revealing more tombs scattered haphazardly and a few shrubs and trees. No squatters seemed to have moved into this part of the cemetery and Alex was quite alone. He felt trapped, hemmed in on all sides. As far as he could tell, the City of the Dead stretched out for at least a mile, and at this time of the afternoon, in the full heat of the sun, there would be few tourists or visitors.

  He heard footsteps. Somebody was approaching. Alex drew himself up, his whole body tensed, not sure what to expect. A figure appeared.

  Alex stood where he was, completely shocked, as he watched himself walk between the graves.

  It was him. The boy had his face, his hair—cut in exactly the same style. He was even dressed similarly, as if he had deliberately checked out what Alex was wearing. The only thing that was different was the cruelty in his eyes. Alex had never smiled like that, with such a degree of malevolence. And suddenly he knew who it was . . . who it had to be.