“And maybe the question I should be asking,” Stannard retorted, “is who’s sent you after us? And where did you get those weapons you’re using? Not the guns, the other ones. The old-fashioned ones.”
“Who’s sent us? I can honestly say I don’t know.”
“That’s convenient.”
“I mean it. I know who I answer to, but he’s just a middle man. He answers to someone else, and who that is I have no clue. As for the weapons” – Roy shrugged – “we’ve been given them, instructed to kill our targets with them. Don’t know why; no one’s told us. Above my pay grade, as they say. I have some theories, but they’re vague.”
“Go on.”
“At first I thought the weapons were symbolic,” said Roy, “although I couldn’t figure out what of. Now I reckon they have some direct relevance to you and your kind. They’re the only things that can really hurt you. They’re your – at the risk of sounding daft – kryptonite. Like stakes and crucifixes to vampires. Which leads me to wonder...”
Roy was almost embarrassed to carry on. If he hadn’t seen the things he’d seen, the things that Daniel Munro had been capable of, the things Vega and Stannard had shown they could do ...
“Are you vampires?”
Stannard snorted a laugh. “Yeah, no.”
“Standing out in broad daylight like this,” Roy said. “Obviously you’re not. I just thought maybe the legends didn’t tell the whole story, or else you’re a new breed of vampire, resistant to the sun, or...”
Stannard stared at him.
“Forget it. Forget I said anything at all. But you definitely have this whole superhuman aspect to you. I’m not wrong about that, am I?”
“We’re... different,” said Stannard. “It’s complicated.”
“Government experiment? Advanced black-budget military programme? Genetically enhanced super-soldiers? Am I even in the right ballpark?”
“Why does it matter to you?”
“Normally it wouldn’t. Normally this would just be a job to me and I couldn’t give two shits who my targets were or what sort of people, or why I’m being paid to kill them. Now, though, I’m feeling used and manipulated. The contract doesn’t sit right with me at all. It’s not my habit to worry about this sort of thing: don’t judge, don’t question, just do. But I can’t help thinking I’m somehow on the wrong side of this fight. For the first time in my career I have the impression that whoever I’m working for is someone I really shouldn’t be. As if to prove it, they’ve started blackmailing me in order to keep me under their thumb.”
“My heart bleeds.”
“I’m not asking for sympathy. In my line of work you do deals with wankers all the time. Goes with the territory. You should expect the occasional back-stab. But there’s more. I’ve never before been made to feel that I’m a henchman. That grates. Like I’m one of those disposable goons in a James Bond movie whose sole purpose is to throw themselves at the hero and get mown down.”
“Still not exactly tugging at my heartstrings, Mr Young. Mowing you down is something I would deeply love to do right this minute.”
“Hear me out, Stannard,” Roy said. “What I’m trying to say is that I’m not innocent, God knows, but nor am I the villain of the piece. My boss’s boss is. He or she is sending us Myrmidons against a group of people whose have exceptional abilities or powers or I don’t know what, and it strikes me that we’re going after an endangered species. White tigers, snow leopards, mountain gorillas, that sort of thing. Rare creatures on the brink of extinction.”
“No one’s ever described me as rare before,” said Stannard. “Or endangered.”
“Far as I’m concerned, you’re both. Someone really seems to have it in for you and your kind. They’re throwing a ton of money at eradicating you.”
“To the extent of having bespoke Hellenic-style helmets made for their private army of assassins. And is that what the ‘M’ on the arm is for – Myrmidons?”
“Yes. Ant soldiers. So’s we know just where we sit on the scale of importance.”
“Myrmidons were well-respected, back in ancient times. Brave, feared in battle. I’m not saying that to boost your ego, just stating a fact.”
“Do you have any idea who you might have pissed off so badly that they want you dead?”
“Me personally? I could name a couple of people, perhaps. But us as a group? My ‘kind,’ as you put it? Who would want us all dead?” Stannard rubbed the back of his neck. “Again, I could name a couple of people, but it’s still a puzzler. I just can’t see what the benefit is. Cui bono, as the lawyers say. It means –”
“I know what it means. ‘Who benefits?’”
Stannard eyed him with surprise and a glimmer of curiosity.
“I may be a henchman,” said Roy, “but I’m not brainless.”
“So I see. Are you the only one among you Myrmidons who’s uneasy like this? Are you the sole bearer of a conscience?”
“So far, none of the others seems bothered. If they’ve realised we’re up against superhumans, they don’t care. I haven’t canvassed opinions, but the general mood is that as long as we’re getting paid in the end, you lot could be green tentacled Martians and it wouldn’t matter.”
“Your colleagues aren’t as smart as you.”
“Oh, they’re all pretty smart.” Roy thought of Travis Laffoon. “Almost all.”
“Then they’re less observant.”
“Or can compartmentalise better. But I think it’s beginning to dawn on them, even so, that there’s something unusual going on.”
“Do you think you can use that to your advantage?”
“In what way?”
“Well...” Stannard took a step back, so that he was no longer in Roy’s face. “Let’s say you and I may be able to find some sort of common interest.”
“You mean apart from me having read one of your novels?”
“Was that a joke?”
“It was trying to be.”
“Then don’t do it again. I am still only an inch away from ending you. But if we can both agree that we aren’t actually enemies, then perhaps we can be useful to each other.”
“I like the sound of this,” Roy said. He was thinking of Josie. Since her kidnapping, he had been preoccupied with his daughter. Barely anything else mattered. Theo Stannard might prove a valuable ally; certainly a powerful one. With his help, his knowledge, there might be a way for Roy to apply leverage on Badenhorst and get the Afrikaner to reveal where Josie was. That or he could enlist Stannard himself to look for and rescue her. This – something like this – was why Roy had thrown himself on Stannard’s mercy in the first place. It had been a desperate measure, but these were desperate times. “Go on.”
“What if,” Stannard said, “you could turn the other Myrmidons? Bring them round to your way of thinking?”
“Tall order.”
“But...?”
“Doable. I can think of at least two of them I could make headway with. Get them on side, and the rest might fall in line. You want me to start a revolution within the team?”
“It would degrade the Myrmidons’ effectiveness and give us an edge.”
“If I were to do that...” Roy began.
“You’d expect something in return. Of course. Such as?”
Roy was about to answer when he felt something snaking around his neck: an arm, heavily muscled. But the crazy thing was he could see nothing there. There was fabric pressing against his skin, warmth from another’s flesh, and his clawing hands found solid flesh to grab onto – but whoever had seized hold of him from behind was invisible. Was not there.
Even as his mind attempted to fathom the anomaly, the arm applied pressure. Intolerable, choking pressure. Roy had already had Daniel Munro try to strangle him once recently. Now someone was doing it again.
Stannard’s expression showed confusion, which rapidly became alarm. Roy heard him shout, “Chase, no! Don’t!” But it sounded as though his voice was coming from de
ep within a hurricane. Everything for Roy was a churn and a roar and a thunder.
And an abrupt, engulfing blackness.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Location Unkown
IT OUGHT TO have been a Black Day. The days preceding it had been Black Days, very Black, but today it seemed as though something had given way inside Josie, like a plank breaking under too much weight, and she was just empty.
Give it a name, she heard Dr Aeschbacher say inside her head. Give it a colour.
But it had no colour, this nothingness, this lack of caring.
So it was White.
A new kind of day.
A White Day.
The room where she was being held prisoner was beautiful. The ceiling had leaf patterns moulded into its plasterwork. The walls had marble panels. The floor was laid with carpet so thick it was like a mattress. The upholstery on the furniture was silk brocade, the wooden parts painted gold. The bed was a handsome oak four-poster. There was a vast mirror above the fireplace and a glistening glass chandelier overhead. Josie had never stayed anywhere so ostentatiously, opulently rich. If only she were here of her own free will. If only she was not a prisoner in this gilded cage.
The room was part of a large suite; that much she had been able to work out. It was either an apartment or belonged to a swish, exclusive hotel. Double doors led to a living area, where her jailers resided. They were on guard duty in there, and seemed to spend most of their time watching football. All day long the TV blared the cheers and boos of stadium crowds, a sound that rose and fell like waves crashing on a beach. Every so often they would switch to a music-video channel for a change, or else porn, but generally it was football. From the way they yelled at the screen, the games seemed to exasperate them more than bring them enjoyment. The players on the pitch were, to a man, cripples and incompetents, except when one of them scored a goal, which elevated him to godlike status.
Josie caught only glimpses of the jailers, who all communicated in English with a variety of accents, most of them Baltic-sounding. Now and then, when the doors were opened, she would see them sprawled on the sofas – big men, blockily built, with rugged faces and meaty complexions, stubbly scalps and a variety of beards and moustaches. There were always three present, and the roster changed constantly. She guessed there were ten of them in total. Ten men, just to keep little her under lock and key.
Why did she need that many jailers? Why did she merit such a lavishly grand prison? What was this all about? Why on earth would anyone hold Josie Young captive? What had her father done?
Since waking up in the suite three days ago, these questions had raged around her head. It was agonising. She had spent most of the time in bed, curled up, her stomach in knots, a hand over her mouth to stop herself from screaming. Meals came, meals went; sometimes she ate, sometimes not.
After three days, however, resignation set in. She didn’t have the energy to stress over the situation any more. She just had to accept it. This was where she was, and this was how things were. She couldn’t alter it. She could only live with it.
Thank God for Benedikt. On several occasions Josie had looked at that splendid gilt-framed mirror and thought how she could smash the glass and use a shard to open up a vein. Without Benedikt, she would have done it.
Benedikt had been provided with a camp bed in a corner of the room. He had been asked for a list of the medications she needed, and doled out the pills as and when required. He never left her except to fetch a meal tray from the other room or go to the bathroom. He was a constant, levelling presence.
He was scared. He admitted that to her on the very first evening, shortly after she was forced to record the video message for her father. He had no more idea than she did what was happening and he hated being trapped here. But, he told her, his primary goal was to look after her. That consideration overrode all others.
Still, she had noticed his hands trembling as he uncapped a bottle of her lithium tablets, and seen how his shoulders hunched whenever he went into the other room and spoke to the men. Bravery had its limits. Benedikt was saying all the right things, but inside he was as close to snapping as she was.
ON THIS WHITE Day, when Josie realised she no longer felt anything, not even afraid, she began to think hard about where she was.
What the purpose was for her being here.
Her mind was working with uncanny clarity. It was as though the Whiteness of the day had somehow freed up a mental logjam. Instead of returning again and again to her obsessions – herself, her inadequacies, her mistakes, her shortcomings, the general pointlessness of her existence – she found she was paying attention to things outside her. She was making connections, letting logic drive her.
It was midmorning. Bright sunlight filtered in around the edges of the curtains, which were kept shut by order of the jailers. Josie and Benedikt were forbidden from opening them and looking out, and so far they had both obeyed the edict.
Now Josie padded across the spongy-carpeted floor to the windows. Benedikt was dozing on the camp bed, his breathing heavy and slow. Josie cast a glance at his sleeping form, then at the double doors. It was football in the other room, of course; the fans were roaring their tribal chants.
She knew already that she was in a city. She had heard traffic grumbling outside and church bells chiming the hours. She knew it was a city in mainland Europe, because the sirens of the emergency vehicles gave a tinny two-tone toot you didn’t get anywhere else. But which city?
She raised the curtain edge ever so slightly and put an eye to the chink. The suite was high up, on perhaps the seventh or eighth storey. It had a commanding view of a broad avenue, some monumental-looking buildings, tram tracks, a slow parade of smart, clean cars. There was a palatial office block across the way. Down at street-level Josie saw shops – branches of chains that sold high-end goods – and a couple of coffeehouses. The people passing along the pavements were well dressed and almost exclusively white. A crocodile of schoolchildren threaded along behind a teacher. A walking-tour group followed their guide in a gaggle, taking photos.
“What are you doing, Josie?”
She dropped the curtain shut. Benedikt was awake and frowning.
“They said do not touch the curtains,” he said. “Do not even go near the windows.”
“I had to have a look.”
“What do you think they would do if they caught you? It would not be good.”
“Well, they haven’t caught me.” She walked back to the four-poster. “And even if they had, they wouldn’t hurt me.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Because I’m a hostage, aren’t I? They need me alive and well.”
“But not so much me, eh? You they might leave alone, but me, I am not so important. Poor old Benedikt Frankel might suffer while Josie Young does not.” He laughed hollowly, uncertainly.
“I wouldn’t let that happen.”
“How would you prevent it?”
“I would threaten to kill myself if they even raised a finger against you.”
“You mean it.”
“I do.”
Benedikt pushed himself up to a sitting position. “Are you all right, Josie?”
“Fine.”
“You just seem... It is not like you to be so bold. So assertive. Not like the Josie I have known. Not that this is bad, far from it.”
“Listen, Benedikt. I’ve been thinking. About this whole fucked-up situation we’re in. I don’t know what these men want with me. They haven’t said, and won’t say. But I have my suspicions.”
“We should not even be talking about this. What if one of them walks in?”
“Football’s on. They’re busy. But if you’re worried, come and sit next to me over here. We’ll keep our voices low.”
Benedikt, with a furtive glance over his shoulder towards the next-door room, joined her on the bed.
“Why me?” Josie said. “Why, out of everyone at the Gesundheitsklinik Rheintal, all those celebs a
nd execs, did they go for the least valuable patient? Doesn’t that strike you as odd?”
“Your father. You told me he’s an IT specialist. A troubleshooter, yes? He has wealthy clients. He must also be quite wealthy himself if he can afford to meet the clinic’s fees. So they are ransoming you to him.”
“But it still doesn’t make sense. By Gesundheitsklinik standards Dad and I are small fish. There are people there from families worth billions.”
“Perhaps one of his clients is displeased with his work. They have gone to these extreme measures to get him to finish a piece of coding that didn’t meet with their standards.”
“Bit far-fetched.”
“Or perhaps somebody wishes to learn the secrets of somebody else, a rival. What is it called? Industrial espionage. Your father might know how to access the computer system of some corporation, and another corporation would like to him to reveal that knowledge. You are the method for persuading him. They are using you to twist his arm.”
“I’d buy that, only...”
“Only...?”
Josie took a deep breath. “I’m not sure my dad actually is in computers.”
Benedikt’s eyes narrowed. “It is a lie? A cover story?”
“Maybe. I think so.”
“So his real work is perhaps not so legitimate? At the clinic we hear rumours about this sort of thing. Clients whose money is not honestly earned. Their bills are paid by transfer from bank accounts in unusual places, like the Cayman Islands. They’re businesspeople, but it is not clear what business they do. The rule for us staff is not to worry about it, definitely not ask questions about it. So possibly you should not tell me anything more.”
“But if I’m right about him, you ought to know. Because it’s relevant.”
“Okay,” said Benedikt warily.
IT HAD NEVER been much more than a hunch, but over the years Josie had become increasingly less convinced that her father did what he said he did for a living. The older she got, the better idea she had of how an IT specialist looked and behaved. Whatever the image of a computer expert might be – bespectacled, nerdy, somewhere on the autistic spectrum – Roy Young was not it. He did not fit the stereotype.
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