Lockdown

by Peter Jay Black

  Jack hesitated. ‘OK,’ he said finally. ‘But remember what we discussed and be careful – don’t disturb anything.’ Last thing Jack wanted on his conscience was the destruction of some rare bird nesting site.

  ‘I’ll be as stealthy as a ninja on a cloud,’ Slink said, rubbing his hands together. ‘Or not.’ He winked.

  Jack nodded at Drake.

  Drake eased back on the throttle and aimed the boat at the shoreline. When he was a few metres out, he cut the engine entirely and the boat’s nose kissed the shore.

  Slink leapt off the bow, glanced around, then followed a path into the trees and vanished.

  There was a buzzing sound.

  The drone flew over the boat and Charlie caught it.

  ‘Sweep of the island is complete,’ Obi said. ‘Can’t see any more cameras and I’ve gathered as much point data as I can.’

  Charlie returned the drone to her bag and everyone waited in silence.

  As the minutes passed, Jack’s stomach tightened.

  He wasn’t sure this was going to plan.

  Suddenly there was a light through the trees.

  ‘What’s Slink up to?’ Charlie said. ‘He should know better than to use his torch.’

  Drake hurried to the bow of the boat and shoved it off the beach with his foot.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Charlie hissed.

  Drake climbed back in front of the wheel and went to start the engine.

  ‘No!’ Wren said, grabbing his arm. ‘We’re not leaving Slink behind.’

  ‘Now we’re ready to go when he arrives,’ Drake said.

  ‘Guys?’ Lux pointed.

  Wren and Charlie gasped as several figures emerged, striding down the path Slink had taken.

  As they came closer, Jack recognised their outlines – Connor, and the hulking frame of Monday. Monday had Slink by the shoulders.

  Hector was in the lead and Jack could just make out the self-satisfied smirk on his face.

  Hector opened his arms wide. ‘Jack, it’s so nice to see you here.’ His gaze moved over Lux and Drake. ‘New recruits for your merry band of vagrants?’

  ‘Give him back,’ Jack said.

  Hector glanced at Slink. ‘I don’t think so. Not this time.’ His eyes locked on to Wren for a moment, then moved to Jack again. ‘I have no idea how you found me, or how you got here, but your friend will be our insurance. If you come near this island again, I will kill him.’

  Slink struggled, but winced when Monday’s grip tightened on his shoulder.

  ‘Well?’ Hector cocked his head. ‘What are you waiting for?’ He waved them off. ‘Go away.’

  Jack looked at Drake and nodded.

  Drake started the engine.

  ‘No . . .’ Wren said, rushing forward.

  Jack held her back. ‘There’s nothing we can do.’

  Hector remained frozen, staring at them, as the boat backed away. Even though it was dark, Jack could still make out the hatred in Del Sarto’s eyes. The man wanted to kill them all, and Jack had a feeling that he already had a plan for how to do that.

  Drake put the boat into forward gear and they moved from the island.

  Jack sat on the bench and glanced over his shoulder.

  Hector and his cronies were marching Slink back through the trees, towards one of the buildings.

  ‘They must have seen him on one of their cameras,’ Lux said.

  Jack nodded. ‘Yeah, that’s what I expected.’

  The others frowned at him.

  ‘You what?’ Charlie said. ‘Wait a minute, if you expected –’

  Jack held up a hand and spoke into his headset. ‘How are you doing, Obi?’

  ‘I’ve got a clear signal, and I’m recording it like you said.’

  Wren crossed her arms. ‘What signal?’

  Jack looked at each of them in turn. ‘I thought there was a good chance Hector would have the island well protected. So Slink volunteered to get caught.’

  Charlie stared at him. ‘He got caught on purpose?’

  Jack nodded.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, I couldn’t see any other way for us to do a proper recon mission. The drone was good, but it needed someone on the ground to scope the place out. Someone to get us eyes inside the buildings.’

  ‘Ah,’ Lux said, smiling. ‘I get it – Slink’s wearing a camera, isn’t he?’

  Jack nodded again. ‘And a mic.’

  Wren looked furious. She balled her fists. ‘Why didn’t you tell us?’

  Jack spoke in a calm voice. ‘If we all knew it was a trick, Hector would’ve been able to tell. I couldn’t risk that. I needed it to be believable. He had to be convinced he’d captured Slink himself.’

  Wren’s face screwed up and her cheeks flushed. ‘I’m the best actor out of all of us. I’ve tricked loads of –’

  ‘I know,’ Jack said. ‘But you care about Slink too much, and Hector knows that too. That’s why he looked straight at you. Remember?’

  Wren huffed and turned away.

  ‘I’m sorry, Wren. I did what I thought was best.’ Jack glanced at Drake. ‘Can this boat go any faster?’

  A smile swept across Drake’s face. ‘Hold on to your hats.’ He opened the throttle and the bow of the boat rose into the air by several feet, then crashed back to the surface of the water and they sped into the darkness.

  • • •

  Jack hurried straight into Serene’s office, with Charlie, Lux, Drake and Wren following close behind. They all gathered around Obi at the computer.

  On the screen in front of him was a darkened image of a doorway. Torchlight glinted off the lens of a camera in the corner of the wall and ceiling.

  Obi was making a note of where the camera was located. ‘Hector’s well paranoid,’ he said. ‘He’s set up loads of cameras.’

  ‘Is that from Slink’s hidden camera?’ Wren asked.

  Obi nodded.

  ‘Where are they?’ Jack said.

  Obi sped the recording back until the image was outside again. As they walked, with Hector in the lead, they followed a broken path through the trees, picking their way carefully over debris and rubble from the abandoned buildings.

  After a while, they pushed through an overgrown bush and a large brick structure loomed before them.

  ‘That’s the main building – the first one we saw,’ Charlie said.

  Jack leant in to the screen and watched closely.

  As Hector walked through a door, Jack saw the first sign of technology – the high-resolution camera mounted above the frame.

  They marched down a corridor with several more cameras and motion sensors, then entered a vast room.

  Most of the paint had peeled from the walls, and large chunks of concrete and plaster had fallen from the ceiling. A thick layer of dust coated the floor.

  The room looked as though it might once have been a hospital ward, because there were rusty metal beds and chairs piled up against the far wall.

  The middle of the room was different – it had been swept clean and there was a glass box, hexagonal in shape, about four metres on each side and three metres tall.

  The group strode over to the box. Hector entered a code on a keypad, opened a door and went inside.

  Monday grabbed Slink and shoved him through, closing the door behind them. Then he forced Slink to sit in a chair in one corner and tied him to it with rope.

  Connor, Cloud and Monday then sat in their own chairs, each facing a different direction.

  Slink’s view panned slowly around the glass room.

  Against one of the far walls was a metal rack holding row upon row of circuit boards, all with red and blue lights blinking.

  ‘What’s all that?’ Drake said.

  ‘A custom computer he’s built.’ Charlie leant in to get a better look too.

  Jack frowned. Each circuit board was connected by hundreds of wires, and there was a stack of hard drives at one end of the rack. That, no doubt, was where Hector would s
tore the stolen data he collected.

  Jack wondered how many top-secret documents Hector had managed to acquire so far. How many secrets had he pinched?

  At the end of the rack was a junction box with several cables going out through the wall, snaking across the floor and disappearing under a door.

  Next to the junction box were two black cylinders, one and a half metres high by half a metre wide.

  ‘What are they?’ Jack said, as the camera lingered on them.

  Charlie’s eyes narrowed. ‘Not sure.’

  There was another thick cable that ran from the main computer stack and went straight up through the ceiling.

  Jack pointed at it. ‘What about that?’

  ‘If I had to guess,’ Charlie said, ‘I would say it was a communications feed.’

  ‘It is.’ Obi brought up one of the images from the drone.

  On the roof of the building was a large satellite dish.

  ‘Hector must have good tech support,’ Lux said. ‘That’s clever.’

  ‘Knowing Hector,’ Obi said, ‘it’s probably hooked up to his own private satellite or something.’ He clicked the image and returned to Slink’s camera view of inside the glass box.

  In the middle of the room was a desk with several monitors, a few keyboards and a chair.

  Hector was sitting in the chair. He glanced over at Slink, then flexed his fingers and started to type. After a minute he looked up again. ‘It seems as if your friends took my advice and got out of here.’

  ‘Great,’ Slink said. ‘You can let me go then.’

  A cruel smile played on Hector’s lips. ‘I’m going to keep you here for a while yet. I have to pay you Urban Outlaw brats back for all the trouble you’ve caused me and my father.’

  ‘Oh, yeah,’ Slink said, with a heavy measure of sarcasm in his voice. ‘How is your dad? Still a bit burnt around the edges?’

  Hector’s face twisted with rage and he balled his fists. ‘He’s still in a coma, thanks to you.’

  ‘No,’ Slink said. ‘That was his fault.’

  Hector stared at Slink for a while, then seemed to relax. ‘I’m going to burn you. Everything my father felt, I’ll return a thousand times.’

  Wren grabbed Jack’s arm.

  ‘That won’t happen,’ Jack said. Though he didn’t feel as sure as he sounded.

  After a moment, Hector’s focus moved back to the screens in front of him and he started typing again.

  The view from Slink’s camera continued to pan around the room. Occasionally it would stop on a heat sensor or computer terminal long enough for the camera to focus and send a clear image.

  Finally, with the sweep of the room complete, Slink’s view centred back on Hector.

  Jack straightened up and looked at Charlie. ‘Well?’

  She shook her head. ‘It looks impossible.’

  ‘Exactly what I was thinking.’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Obi turned in his chair to look at Jack and Charlie. ‘Are you two serious? Why’s it impossible to break into Hector’s hideout?’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ Wren said. ‘Why’s it so hard?’

  Jack pointed at the screen. ‘First, that box they’re in.’

  Wren frowned.

  ‘It’s made of glass, so Hector and his henchmen have three-hundred and sixty degrees of visibility. They’ll spot anyone coming. That’s if anyone actually gets past the rest of their security.’ Jack reached over, took the mouse and sped the recording back to where Slink was entering the main room. ‘Look at this.’ There were several lights mounted to floor-standing poles in each corner of the room. Some were pointed at the centre, while others lit up the rest of the space around it. He let the recording move forward frame by frame as Slink walked. ‘There are tamper-proof cameras inside the glass room and all around the outside. ‘Speaking of which’ – he turned to Obi – ‘how many cameras did the drone find?’

  ‘Fourteen.’

  Jack sighed. ‘That’s how he knew we were there and when we’d left. Not to mention all the motion and heat sensors he’s got set up too. There’s no way we’re getting near that island without him knowing about it.’

  Everyone stood in silence for a long while, staring at the monitor.

  Wren muttered something under her breath.

  Charlie glanced at her. ‘What?’

  ‘I said,’ Wren looked at Jack, ‘why didn’t Hector just kill us when he had the chance?’

  Jack stared at her for a moment, then his eyes widened. ‘She’s right.’

  ‘He couldn’t,’ Charlie said. ‘The gunshots would have drawn too much attention.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jack said, pacing back and forth, thinking, ‘but there’s another reason too.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Lux said.

  ‘Hector could have put a gun to Slink’s head, demanded we all get off the boat, then taken us to one of those derelict buildings and killed us there.’

  ‘OK,’ Charlie said. ‘So why didn’t he?’

  Jack stopped pacing and looked at them all. ‘He wants us to break in.’

  Wren’s eyebrows knitted together. ‘He what?’

  ‘Think about it,’ Jack said, resuming his pacing. ‘Even if Hector and his gang had killed us in some abandoned building on that island, eventually someone would have found the bodies, right?’

  Lux nodded. ‘It’s a bird sanctuary. Conservationists go there now and again to check the nests.’

  ‘So what?’ Obi said. ‘It’s New York. Don’t people get shot here all the time?’

  Drake laughed.

  ‘Maybe not all the time, Obi,’ Lux said with a smile.

  Obi’s cheeks reddened. ‘Sorry.’

  Jack turned to Lux. ‘If the police here found the bodies of six teenagers, all murdered, what would happen?’

  ‘It would be national news.’

  ‘Manhunt?’

  ‘Yeah, and the rest,’ Drake said. ‘They wouldn’t stop until they caught the people responsible.’

  ‘And who told the police to stay away from the island in the first place?’

  ‘Chief Whitaker,’ Wren said.

  ‘Exactly,’ Jack said. ‘He has emails linking himself to Hector. He’d be in serious trouble.’

  ‘I’m confused,’ Wren said. ‘Does all of this mean that Hector can’t kill Slink or any of us?’

  Charlie gasped. ‘No.’ She looked at Jack. ‘I get what you’re saying.’

  ‘What’s he saying?’ Wren sounded impatient.

  Charlie swallowed, glanced at the monitor, then looked back at the others again. ‘Jack’s saying that Hector wants us dead, right?’

  They all nodded.

  Charlie continued, ‘But he can’t just murder us. It would draw way too much attention.’

  ‘So?’ Wren said.

  ‘So,’ Jack said, ‘he’ll want to make our deaths look like an accident.’ He gestured to the screen. ‘He wants us to try and break Slink out of there and then, oops.’

  Lux’s eyes widened at that. ‘He’s set a trap?’

  ‘Yes,’ Jack said. ‘Hector hoped we’d follow him over here and he’s planned for the eventuality that we’d catch up with him.’ He glanced at the screen, then at the others. ‘By going there, we’d be playing straight into his hands.’

  Obi waved a finger at the screen. ‘He must know that Slink is wearing a camera too.’

  ‘Yep.’ Jack watched the screen as Hector continued to type and click. Who was he setting up now? What was he hacking into? What was his overall plan? Jack let out a long breath. Getting Slink out of there was likely to be the most difficult mission they’d ever attempted, and there wasn’t any room for error.

  • • •

  Thirty minutes later, Jack was still sitting in front of the monitor in Serene’s office. He’d watched Slink’s recording over and over, soaking up every detail of the island, the main building and the glass room.

  ‘Hey.’ Charlie walked into the office, pulled up a chair and sat
next to him. ‘Any luck?’

  Jack shook his head. ‘I can’t see where the trap is, but I’m not surprised by that.’

  ‘Can you guess where it is?’

  ‘Yeah, I think so.’

  Charlie nodded at the screen. ‘Want to show me?’

  ‘Well, Hector would think that we’d plan this like any other mission, right? That we would look for a weakness, concentrate on that, break in and try to destroy the virus.’

  ‘OK,’ Charlie said. ‘Sounds reasonable.’

  ‘He’s made sure the security is tight.’

  ‘To make it look convincing?’

  ‘Exactly,’ Jack said. ‘But more importantly, he’s left one tiny weakness, to steer us in that direction.’

  ‘What weakness?’

  Jack brought up a screen grab of the end of the racks with the circuit boards. He pointed at the power breaker on the wall. ‘One of the cables leaves through that.’ His finger traced the path of a wire as it left the room, meandered across the floor and disappeared through a doorway.

  ‘You think there’s a power generator in there, don’t you?’ Charlie said.

  ‘Yes. And I’ve also worked out that the room has an external wall, which means –’

  ‘It’s probably got a window.’

  Jack nodded. ‘Hector expects us to break into that room, destroy the generator and shut down all his security.’

  ‘OK,’ Charlie said. ‘But if that’s true, how would that get all of us killed? It would take only one person to get in there and shut off the generator.’

  ‘I’m not sure. My guess is there’s some sort of trap that would need all of us to get past it. Something that means we’d all have to be in there at the same time. Or, maybe, one of us would get trapped and the others would come to the rescue. I don’t know, and we have no way to find out.’

  Charlie looked thoughtful. ‘Have you seen another way in?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  She leant into the display for a moment, examining Hector’s computer set-up. Finally she straightened up. ‘That generator room can’t be the main source of power.’

  ‘I know,’ Jack said. ‘I thought the same thing – there’s no way Hector would even let us anywhere near the generator, but I can’t see another way for him to power all of that stuff.’ He brought up a screenshot he’d taken from Slink’s camera earlier. It showed another thick cable, which rose from the end of the rack, went up through the glass roof and on into the ceiling of the room above. ‘I tried looking at that to see if we could at least cut Hector off from the outside world. It’s the only way he can connect to the internet.’