‘Taxi’s arriving!’ Bo shouted from the doorway.
Robin and a refugee helped the pregnant woman out to the taxi and the little kid threw a massive tantrum as they all piled in, tucking muddy backpacks between their legs as blobs of rain pelted the roof.
‘Good luck,’ Emma shouted, giving the driver a roll of cash, then slid the door shut.
Back inside, the hall felt quiet, with a puddled floor, half-drunk mugs and soggy clothes piled around the chairs.
‘Kids. I’m sorry,’ Emma told Robin and Marion as she took out a bunch of keys. ‘I know this isn’t pizza and PlayStation. But we’ve had more tip-offs about refugee sightings today than in the previous two weeks.’
‘Why so many?’ Robin asked, as he took the keys.
‘Refugees in small boats wait for warm weather and calm seas,’ Emma explained. ‘You two better not stick around here in case the cops come looking, but you know the way to my cottage from here?’
‘Sure.’ Marion nodded.
‘Did you see that big radio on my desk?’ Emma asked. ‘I’m supposed to be here monitoring that, but Neo’s crewmate didn’t show. With a storm brewing, we need all of our rescue boats ready to help any arrivals that get into trouble. Do you think you can take the radio with you? Listen to the CIS channels and log anything they say about boat positions and refugee sightings.’
‘Happy to,’ Robin said.
‘Happy to be useful,’ Marion agreed.
‘I’m going to radio Neo and try to catch up with our boat,’ Emma said, before turning urgently to Bo. ‘Can you clean up the mess here? Then head up to meet these two at my place and you can run communications between our boats.’
Bo got a bucket and mop as Emma took a deep breath, then glanced about like she’d forgotten something. ‘Kids, I am so sorry, but I have got to run.’
‘Stay safe,’ Marion said, as Emma ran out. ‘And nothing to be sorry for.’
‘If you order food, there’s money in the kitchen, under the knife block,’ Emma yelled back. ‘Have a good night and stay out of trouble!’
10. THEY SEEM TO JUST VANISH
Robin pitied the drowned-rat delivery rider as he opened the door of Emma Scarlock’s cottage.
‘Keep the change!’ he told her, as he handed over a twenty then kicked the door shut.
‘Today we eat all the healthy foods!’ Marion said cheerfully, as Robin carried two pizza boxes into a low-ceilinged living room with rustic beams and plates on the wall.
By fiddling with the aerial, Robin had got the stolen CIS radio working so they could monitor communications between prowler boats and their base.
Bo had arrived after cleaning up the church hall and they’d spent the last hour logging potential refugee sightings called in by Delta Rescue’s network of lookouts. Their aim was to keep track of the organisation’s four high-speed dinghies, so they could pick up refugees while avoiding the Customs and Immigration Service’s better-equipped prowlers.
If CIS found refugees first, they’d be given a two-year prison sentence before being sent home. Robin and Marion had tipped the Delta Rescue boats off about several refugee sightings, but the five Emma and Neo brought to the church hall remained Delta Rescue’s only success of the night.
‘This is Prowler Nine, north of Conch Island,’ a voice announced over the CIS radio, as Robin settled on a sofa and took a pizza slice. ‘We’ve got an upturned boat, floating luggage and one body, female.’
‘Roger that,’ the CIS controller answered. ‘Do you need assistance?’
‘Negative,’ the agent answered. ‘Will recover body and seek SOL.’
Robin looked across to Bo. ‘What’s SOL?’
‘Signs of life,’ she said.
Marion sounded frustrated. ‘Is it always this depressing?’
Bo sighed as she grabbed a slice of vegetarian and opened a diet cola. ‘Delta Rescue used to have seven dinghies, and Customs and Immigration had boats like ours,’ she explained. ‘But two of ours got seized by cops and their new prowlers outmatch us.’
As they ate the pizza one of the dinghies radioed news of a minor success. A Delta Rescue volunteer lookout had spotted two refugees walking along a breakwater. They’d been taken aboard and were now on their way to the welcome centre.
The radios stayed quiet for a while, but as Robin came back from dumping pizza boxes in the recycling, a call went up saying that Prowler Four had boarded a fishing vessel.
‘Smuggled goods, six or seven refugees,’ the CIS captain said. ‘Will escort vessel to Landing Dock Y for processing,’
Marion looked across the living room to Bo. ‘Shall I message one of our boats?’
‘No point,’ Bo explained. ‘There’s nothing our little dinghies can do about a large boat that has already been boarded by a prowler. But I’ll let Emma know. She likes to be kept up to date.’
Bo couldn’t get through to Emma’s radio, so she messaged her phone. When Emma called back a couple of minutes later, Bo got excited and kept saying stuff like yes, OK and I’ll get on that right away.
Robin and Marion could only hear Bo’s end of the conversation, so they were intrigued as she ended the call.
‘Tonight just got interesting!’ Bo announced while diving out of a rocking chair and shuffling on her knees to a glass-topped coffee table.
They didn’t have a detailed chart like the one in Emma’s office, so Bo found a roll of baking paper and drew a crude map with a Sharpie. The approximate locations of the four Delta Rescue dinghies were marked with lapel badges, refugee sightings were paperclips and penne pasta represented the last known position of CIS prowlers.
Bo checked a map on her phone before adding the approximate location of Landing Dock Y to the table map.
‘None of our boats will get there,’ she groaned as she thumped the table, making coins and badges rattle.
‘What’s the problem?’ Marion asked as she and Robin knelt over the other side of the map.
‘Emma and I were looking at government statistics on how many refugees are captured in this part of the delta,’ Bo explained. ‘The number of refugees in the stats is far lower than what we hear reported over their radio.’
‘Maybe the numbers are wrong,’ Marion suggested. ‘Like, two boats report the same incident so you count people twice?’
Bo nodded. ‘That’s possible, but this is what made us suspicious.’ She tapped Landing Dock Y on the map before clarifying. ‘The government spent eighty million on a new Customs and Immigration headquarters with docks for all prowlers that work the southern half of the delta. It’s got state-of-the-art facilities and detention cells for three hundred people. So why do boats still get sent to unload at Landing Dock Y?’
‘What’s at Dock Y?’ Robin asked.
‘It’s a fishing wharf. There used to be a fish processing plant, but now there are just a couple of crab boats.’
‘That makes no sense,’ Robin said.
Marion thought about her smuggling trips with Diogo. ‘Actually, an abandoned dock makes a lot of sense if you’re a crooked immigration officer offloading gear.’
‘If we can prove that CIS are corrupt, it would be an amazing boost for our campaign to have refugees treated with respect.’ Bo said. ‘But our nearest dinghy is fifteen kilometres from the wharf, and the storm means rough water and poor visibility, so they have to keep slow.’
‘Can I see where it is?’ Marion asked, as she reached for Bo’s phone, which still had the delta map on screen.
Bo slid her phone across the table.
‘Dock Y is only eight kilometres from here,’ Marion said.
‘I’m trying to think of someone who lives out that way,’ Bo said.
‘Me and Ross can go,’ Marion said boldly.
Bo scoffed. ‘It’s over an hour’s walk. The roads aren’t lit, it’s blasting with rain and you might be dealing with dangerous people.’
Robin sniffed adventure as he glanced at Marion. ‘We’ve got our dirt bikes pa
rked just outside the village.’
Marion nodded. ‘We’d be there in fifteen minutes, twenty tops.’
‘No offence,’ Bo laughed, ‘but you’re just kids.’
‘We are just kids,’ Marion said. ‘But we’d just be observing.’
‘Let’s see what Emma thinks,’ Robin said, pulling out his phone.
Marion snatched it out of his hand. ‘I’ll speak to her,’ she said. ‘You’re bound to say something dumb.’
11. JUST DO IT
‘You and Robin are bright kids,’ Emma told Marion. ‘But the weather is atrocious and we’ve got no idea what you’ll run into at Dock Y.’
Marion ended the call, took a big gulp, and lied. ‘Emma says it’s fine if we’re careful.’
Bo’s eyebrows crossed suspiciously. ‘Emma Scarlock said that?’
Marion hoisted Robin off the couch and dragged him into the hallway.
‘Get your shoes and bag,’ she said urgently.
Robin whispered. ‘Did Emma say yes?’
‘Do you want to sit here on your butt doing nothing useful?’ Marion hissed through gritted teeth, as she grabbed her crash helmet off the hallway carpet.
‘I love it when you’re bad!’ Robin said, cracking a huge grin.
‘I’m going to call Emma back,’ Bo yelled from the living room. ‘You two, wait! I need to see exactly what she wants you to do.’
But Robin and Marion were out of the front door. In Robin’s case, with one shoelace undone and his waterproof jacket still rolled up in his backpack. His T-shirt and jeans were soaked after five steps and on the sixth his trainer sploshed a giant puddle.
‘This rain is mental,’ Robin said. ‘Are you sure it’s safe to ride?’
‘Pah, drizzle!’ Marion said, as a massive flash of lightning lit up the village. ‘Stay with your girlfriend Bo if you’re chicken!’
For better or worse, Robin was a thrill seeker. His whole body fizzed with excitement as they sprinted through the cobbled street in lashing rain. They could see that there was a cop car on the seafront by the church hall, so they cut along a back alleyway and scrambled over a hedge, before sprinting uphill towards the gravel lot where they’d parked their dirt bikes.
‘I think we’ll get there before the bad guys,’ Marion said, as she checked directions on her phone. ‘Prowler Four may be fast, but the boat they’re escorting won’t be.’
She glanced back as she straddled her bike, but Bo hadn’t chased.
Robin had doubts as he put his helmet on. It was dark, his visor instantly fogged and the water streaking down the outside meant he could barely see to get on his bike, let alone ride it.
He felt scared as they set off and seriously considered pulling over as he rode with eyes locked on Marion’s blurry rear light, far enough back to avoid spray off her back wheel.
They were on a main road that started at Boston seafront and threaded through woodland and a couple of tiny villages. After six kilometres and a soaking when a van coming the other way hit a massive puddle, they turned onto an unmarked, unlit, gravel track.
Robin watched in horror as Marion’s front wheel pitched into a rut made by tractors regularly exiting a farm gate. She almost went head first over the handlebars, and Robin had to swerve to avoid her.
As the track merged into a stretch of concrete waterfront with the fishing wharf over to their left, Marion pulled off into tall grass.
‘That got hairy!’ she said, as she got off the bike and held out a palm to check the rain. ‘At least it’s slowing down.’
Robin felt shell-shocked as he pulled off his helmet, then looked down and saw that his jeans were a wet, chalky mess.
‘You look like you’re gonna puke!’ Marion said, as they wheeled their bikes deeper into the weeds to hide them.
Marion was less sure of herself when she pulled out her phone. The three missed calls from Emma were to be expected, but she felt crummy when she saw a missed call from her mum and imagined her back at Designer Outlets, worrying.
‘I predict a lot of people yelling at us tomorrow,’ Robin said.
Marion pocketed her phone and tried to brush off the mum guilt. ‘No point both of us copping blame. Bo heard me tell you that Emma said we could go. Just say you believed me.’
‘They always blame both of us,’ Robin said, then looked towards the wharf. ‘At least you were right about us getting here before the boats.’
12. THE GREAT WHITE WHALE
They moved stealthily through the dark towards the wharf. Robin wished he had his bow. But he’d left it at The Station, because carrying made it easier for people to figure out who he was.
Luckily Robin never cleaned out his backpack, so besides the toothbrush and change of underwear for his night at Emma’s cottage, he was carrying a multitool with a sharp blade that Marion had bought him for his birthday, and a small pair of binoculars that he used when he shot distant targets.
‘Give us a peek through those,’ Marion said.
The rain was now a fine mist, but they were both wet through as they squatted in swaying grass behind the metal-sided fish processing plant.
‘Thoughts?’ Marion asked, as she scanned the binoculars along the wharf, looking for movement.
‘There’s no obvious surveillance cameras. No lights, no people,’ Robin said.
Marion nodded. ‘Bo and Emma must be right. The only reason to dock here is if you don’t want anyone seeing what you’re up to.’
‘What now?’ Robin asked, as his phone pinged noisily.
Marion’s head snapped around. ‘Put that on silent, dumbo!’
‘Thought I did,’ Robin said, as he pulled his phone.
He had messages from Will and Emma Scarlock. The latest ping was a message that Neo had clearly typed in a rush.
Robin, you’re being a massive duck.
Go back to the collage before you get in tremble.
‘I can never remember if it’s silent when the shush icon is lit up, or silent when it’s grey,’ Robin explained. ‘But now I think about it, we should both put our phones into airplane mode. Those prowlers have surveillance tech, and I’ll bet they can detect phone signals.’
‘Good idea,’ Marion said, as they both found airplane mode. ‘Now I guess we find the best view and see what happens.’
‘So itchy,’ Robin moaned, peeling his shirt off his skin as he walked. ‘Trousers, neck, armpits . . .’
‘Wet clothes suck,’ Marion agreed.
They rounded the side of the processing plant and kept low as they crossed a flat, windswept area that had been used to dump everything from tractor tyres to photocopiers.
A pigeon fluttering out of a hole in the metal building gave them a fright, but also a chance to peek inside. They saw nothing but silhouettes of a conveyor belt and stacks of crates that had once been used to pack fish.
At the waterfront, the pair got a proper look along the wharf. There were two small crab boats and a plastic-hulled pleasure boat that had flooded and tipped on its side. A manmade rock barrier reached into the water, protecting boats from strong tides, while a maze of disused piers and pontoons stretched across the waterfront.
Robin looked around. ‘How about hiding in the tall reeds over there?’
‘If you want your ankle bitten by a snake,’ Marion scoffed. ‘We’ll get a better view from that building.’
Marion led as they jogged to a two-storey wooden structure at the edge of the wharf. The lower floor had been a workers’ cafe, with a faded menu offering mugs of tea and fry-ups. The upper level was accessed by a set of external metal steps and had been the wharf’s admin office.
The office door, windows and half the tin roof had been stripped, making it wet but easy to peek out.
‘This is ideal,’ Robin said, as he crossed the mildewed space, almost twisting his ankle where some floorboards were missing.
‘It’s not much of a jump from here,’ Marion said, as she looked out of a small back window. ‘And we’re near our
bikes if we need a quick getaway.’
Robin found an office chair with squeaky wheels and a missing back and rolled it so he could sit by the window. Marion propped herself against the edge of a desk, looking concerned as she stared at her phone screen.
‘Did we do the right thing?’ she asked.
Robin was scanning the water beyond the wharf through his binoculars and tried to laugh it off. ‘Bit late now, Marion.’
‘My mum worries about everything,’ Marion sighed. ‘She’s always threatening to send me to live with my dad. What if she really does this time?’
‘Your dad’s OK.’
‘For a day or two,’ Marion said. ‘But imagine living at that Brigands compound. With the fights and booze and . . .’
‘Hush!’ Robin said urgently as he spotted the mast of a boat sweeping above the reeds.
‘Is it the prowler?’ Marion asked, as she scrambled to the window.
‘Too tall,’ Robin said.
‘Maybe it’s just passing by.’
But a half-minute later the bow of a large white pleasure boat rumbled into the harbour. It was over twenty-five metres long, with three decks, but the hull was streaked with rust and several windows had been crudely replaced with wooden boards.
‘Let’s see,’ Marion said.
Robin handed her the binoculars. Marion noticed that the boat’s name had been covered up by hanging tyres and fishing nets over the side. The cruiser turned sharply as it used a bow thruster to dock, and this enabled Marion to check out a rough-looking bunch drinking beer on the rear deck. One burly woman in camouflage trousers was bossing everyone around and had a gun holstered over a loud shirt.
‘No idea who they are,’ Marion said, as Robin snapped pictures with his phone. ‘But they’re up to no good.’
13. LANDING DOCK Y
A few minutes after the cruiser docked, Robin and Marion watched a rust-streaked ocean trawler crawl into the wharf. It had a communist hammer-and-sickle symbol moulded into the belching funnel and people crammed on the open rear deck.
Jet Skis, Swamps & Smugglers Page 4