Red Centre

by Chris Ryan

  Six monitors showed different views of the camp in dimming light. On one, the door of the control room opened and a figure in flying doctor overalls came out onto the balcony. The cameras in the trees adjusted focus automatically to zoom in on him.

  Pirroni put the Colt Commando rifle to his shoulder and surveyed his surroundings, sweeping his weapon around steadily in a wide arc.

  Li gasped as it swung directly at the screen. Had he seen something near the cameras?

  The figure lowered his rifle, apparently satisfied there was no danger nearby. He moved forward awkwardly and sat down at the top of the wooden steps with the rifle across his knees.

  Paulo and Amber stiffened as they recognized the shuffling gait. Having been so close to him before, they found that seeing him now on screen was rather disturbing. It connected those old stories with the figure they had been chatting to just the day before. They suddenly realized that they were taking part in a fresh chapter of the history of this violent man.

  ‘Sancho Pirroni,’ said Sergeant Powell quietly.

  ‘Bet he thinks he’s having a nice private think,’ Amber mused. ‘He’s got no idea we can see him.’

  ‘He probably needed to get away from Jonny Cale,’ said Li with a grimace.

  On the screen, Pirroni seemed to be looking thoughtfully at the cameras. He moved his head slowly to the side as though trying to see round them. For a moment something caught his eye and he remained still. Then he stood up, took his rifle in one hand and went purposefully back into the control room.

  ‘I hope he has not worked out that those cameras can move,’ said Paulo.

  Alex saw the head of the snake as it slid down the tree trunk. He stayed stock-still. It dropped to the ground near him like a heavy bundle of ship’s hawser, slithered past him and disappeared into the undergrowth.

  The twilight wouldn’t last long at this latitude. Alex was worried about getting back. He mimed a message up to Hex: Are you all right?

  Hex, able to move at last, gave the signal for ‘OK’, then worked like lightning to complete the splice. He snapped the weatherproof cover back on decisively and pattered lightly down the rungs.

  Alex signalled: Which way?

  Hex indicated. He jogged off into the undergrowth and was almost immediately no more than a shadow in the thickening dusk. Alex started to follow him when a rustle in the undergrowth made him pause. Surely not another snake? He froze so that it could pass.

  But the rustle came from above him. Foliage, disturbed by the movement of the camera. He heard the motor whirring as it rotated and came to rest with its glossy black eye pointing down at him. He heard a mechanical hiss and click as the lens adjusted to look at him. Pirroni had discovered how to use the cameras.

  Had he been seen? No point in waiting to find out. Caution didn’t matter now. Alex bunched his muscles, ready to sprint in the direction Hex had gone.

  A searchlight flared out of the darkness, catching him full in its beam. Alex flung his hands up to shield his eyes. In a split second he thought about dropping to the ground, but decided he would blend in better if he stayed very, very still. Had he been compromised? Cautiously, he opened his eyes. He was on the edge of the clearing in front of the control room. Straight ahead of him was the camp, with a blackened patch where the fire had been. Beyond that was the wooden control room on its stilts.

  And standing on the steps with a rifle in his hands was Sancho Pirroni.

  11

  CAPTIVE

  Hex hit the undergrowth a moment before the searchlight went on. He flung himself flat and crawled back to look into the clearing. He saw a silhouette against the blinding white light on the side of the control building. Night insects danced and skittered like a thousand dust motes in the beam. Alex stood square in the pool of light, caught like an insect on a pin.

  Hex couldn’t make out any details in the glare, but he knew the figure had to be Pirroni. Also, from the stance - feet planted solidly, raised shoulders, head slightly cocked to one side – he guessed he was holding a rifle. Obviously Alex had noticed that too, or he would have made a run for it.

  Hex saw Alex sink to his hands and knees, feigning exhaustion. ‘Thank God I’ve got back,’ he gasped. ‘I thought I was lost for good.’

  Pirroni was coming down the steps. He’d lowered the rifle now but he still carried it at his hip, trained on Alex. The adrenaline flooding through Hex’s system was charging him up to do something. He forced himself to think clearly. Should he rush Pirroni? He had the element of surprise. Pirroni was within a few metres of where Hex was hiding and his back was turned. While the terrorist was busy sizing up his new hostage, his attention was distracted. There wouldn’t be a better opportunity to subdue him.

  But Pirroni had killed the ranger without compunction. And in London he’d been ambushed by four Special Branch officers. He hadn’t been ready for them, and yet all four were dead. Each bullet right between the eyes.

  Hex knew he couldn’t break cover and pretend he was another of the TV contestants. Pirroni might buy the idea that one had got separated from the group, but two was pushing it. And the toolkit Hex was carrying would be incriminating; it wouldn’t take Pirroni long to guess what they had been doing. It would only risk provoking him, and that was a bad idea. He might decide that hurting one of the hostages was the best way to demonstrate that he was still in control.

  ‘Get up the steps,’ Pirroni said to Alex.

  Alex kept up his act. ‘Is this part of the show? Are we on TV?’

  Alex allowed Pirroni to prod him towards the control room. Hex knew that Alex’s words had been for him as well. Alex was reminding him that their mission was to get a feed from the cameras so that the SAS could see what Pirroni saw.

  While the light stayed on, Hex saw he had an advantage. The nearby camera would have adjusted its lens aperture for the floodlights. He could sneak away under cover of darkness. But the light wouldn’t stay on for very much longer. He’d have to go right now – abandoning any thought of rescuing Alex. That was the part he didn’t like.

  Crawling away from the clearing, he found cover behind a tree that was out of sight of any of the cameras. H e took out his palmtop and called up a fix on the GPS – the global positioning system that used US navigation satellites to pinpoint a position anywhere in the world. Hex chose a route that would take him well away from the cameras, setting the palmtop to draw a map as he went. Once he had got far enough away he would head back in the direction of the road.

  Night had fallen. As Hex crept away from the floodlit clearing, he couldn’t make out a thing except the soft glow of the palmtop screen. He moved carefully until his eyes started to adjust and he could see the shapes of the trees. The jungle floor was thick with shadows. Hex remembered diving in a Scottish loch: at the bottom it was murky and dark like this.

  His foot caught in a root and he went crashing to the ground. For a moment he lay wincing as pain stabbed up his leg from a twisted ankle. He sat up. His hands were empty.

  Panic gripped him. Where was the palmtop? He couldn’t find his way without it. He scanned the dark shapes of the jungle floor, looking for its comforting greenish light. There was nothing. Could the fall have switched it off? He felt around on hands and knees, patting the ground in a circle around where he’d tripped. His hands fell on knobbly branches, dank leaves, small stones . . . Insects wriggled and scuttled away under his touch.

  His fingers brushed something hard and smooth. He snatched it up. It was the palmtop. It had fallen face down – that’s why he hadn’t seen it. The green glow soothed him like a welcoming smile.

  Hex stood up. His ankle was throbbing, but he had to press on. Doubts kept whispering from the deepest part of his mind. Shouldn’t he have stayed for Alex? Tried to get him away from Pirroni? Or at least hung around to see if he could help? If Alex hadn’t insisted on coming in the first place, this would never have happened. Now he might die . . .

  No, Hex told himself. That was the r
eason he and Alex had taken on the mission – so that none of the hostages would die. But now Alex was a hostage too.

  Alex walked up the steps ahead of Pirroni. He listened to the uneven footfalls behind him. Although Pirroni had a limp, it didn’t seem to slow him down. As Alex reached the door he heard sounds from inside. There was a scuffling on the wooden floor like animals who have been disturbed by a predator, and the sound of panicky whispers. Of course – the hostages had heard one set of footsteps go out, and now an extra set was coming back. They might think that Pirroni was bringing in extra help.

  ‘Put your hands up,’ said Pirroni. ‘Don’t turn round.’

  Alex did as he was told. Pirroni saw his knife secured in a sheath on his belt, and the belt pouch containing his survival kit. ‘Take off your belt with your left hand and pass it back to me.’

  Alex had no choice but to obey. It pained him to hand over the knife; it felt like a part of him. Still holding the rifle, Pirroni slid the knife one-handed out of the sheath and tested its edge by shaving a chunk off the wooden banister. He nodded approvingly, then hooked the sheath to his own belt.

  Alex glared over his shoulder. ‘That was a present from my father.’

  ‘Then he’s a good judge of a knife. Don’t turn round again or I’ll shoot you.’

  Pirroni unzipped the pouch on Alex’s belt. His survival kit was in there, sealed in a tobacco tin – also a gift from his father. Pirroni looked at the small oblong tin sealed with waterproof tape, turning it over a couple of times, then slipped it into his pocket.

  Alex could think of nothing but the fact that Pirroni had his survival kit and his knife. The former he could replace, but that knife he had looked after for many years. It had seen him through difficult times. It felt like his right hand. He was surprised to find himself almost shaking with anger. He took care not to show it: the first rule in a hostage situation was not to antagonize the captor.

  Alex felt the barrel of the rifle nudge him in the back. ‘Open the door,’ Pirroni ordered.

  Alex had to focus on his immediate situation. The contestants had never seen him before. They had only just met each other – were they even all there yet? The presenter had met him only once, briefly, in the control room. Would they give him away? It certainly wouldn’t be reasonable to expect six frightened kids in a crisis situation to be able to simply back up a lie. No – he’d have to convince them that he was one of them . . . He turned the handle and pushed the door open. Eight faces looked up at him.

  The first thing that hit Alex was the fear. He could see it in the faces, smell it in the air. When he saw these people earlier today on television they had been animated, excited, showing off, goofily spilling water. The vulnerability stamped on those previously carefree faces came as a shock. The eight of them were bunched together in one corner of the room. Some were holding hands, some had their arms around each other. Jonny Cale was cuddling the female journalist.

  On one of the screens in front of him, Alex saw the camera’s view from outside the building as Pirroni closed the door. Even if Hex had succeeded in getting a video feed, the SAS soldiers monitoring them could not see inside the control room. Alex and the hostages were on their own.

  Pirroni nudged Alex with the stock of his rifle. Looking at Jonny Cale, he said, ‘Is this one of the children from the show?’

  Jonny Cale shrugged. ‘How should I know?’ he said. ‘I’ve met so many damn kids in the last few days.’

  Alex was thinking fast. He had to act the part. If he had been one of the contestants and had wandered off at dusk only to stumble in on this situation, how would he be reacting now?

  ‘Jonny, what’s all this about?’ he asked the presenter. ‘Is it one of the games?’

  Jonny rolled his eyes upwards. ‘No, you stupid kid, it’s not a game. Now sit down and shut up before you get us all killed.’

  At least Jonny hadn’t contradicted Alex’s story. Alex felt Pirroni’s eyes on him. He realized his fate was in the hands of the contestants. He cast his mind back to the shots he had seen earlier of them settling into the camp. He scanned the faces in front of him. He had to remember a name – and something that would convince them he was one of them. There was a girl with pink hair. No, he hadn’t seen her before. But, yes, he remembered a girl with very long dark curls that hung like a shawl around her shoulders. He made his voice quieter, less confident. ‘Holly,’ he said, ‘what’s happened to your glasses?’

  Holly shifted her position to get more comfortable. ‘They’re still down in the camp. I’m always putting them down and forgetting about them. I don’t suppose you saw them when you were out there?’

  ‘Sorry, no, I didn’t,’ said Alex. ‘I was off exploring the forest and didn’t realize how late it was getting.’

  A girl with the two blonde plaits nodded to Alex as he moved over to the group. ‘Here you go, sit here,’ she offered, and moved sideways to make a space for him. Alex remembered her name was Milla Davey. ‘Move your backside, Woody,’ she said. Alex picked his way over and sat down in the gap they had made for him.

  ‘Thanks, Milla.’ Alex smiled at her. ‘Did we talk earlier? My name’s Alex.’

  Milla looked at him, frowning as she tried to remember. ‘What did you say your father did? Or was it your mother?’

  To protect his cover, Alex’s parent would have to be famous, of course. But he realized these kids would be familiar with most areas of show business and might ask awkward questions. He needed to choose something they wouldn’t be very interested in.

  ‘My dad’s a celebrity fitness instructor,’ said Alex. Inwardly he grimaced and apologized to his dad. ‘Aerobic Vic. You probably won’t have seen him,’ he added hastily. ‘He’s on cable.’

  ‘Oh . . . yeah, I remember,’ said Milla.

  Alex suspected that what she was actually saying was: Now I remember why I didn’t find you interesting enough to remember the first time I met you. But all the same he could have kissed her for it. She had corroborated his cover story.

  Pirroni had taken up position on one of the two chairs by the door. From there he could see the bank of monitors with their view of the camp perimeter, and he also had a good view of the hostages. He was still looking at Alex, as though weighing up whether he believed him or not.

  Eventually he said, ‘Yes. I remember you too.’

  Alex’s mouth went dry. In the car park the day before, right after talking to Amber, Pirroni had got a good look at him. How was he going to get out of this?

  ‘Where?’ he said. He couldn’t make it look as though he remembered the encounter.

  ‘Out shopping.’

  Pirroni was clearly going to say as little as possible and watch how Alex reacted. Alex had to make sure he didn’t betray any extra knowledge. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t remember. When was it?’

  Pirroni was looking at him with the same expression Alex remembered from the car park. The same intense, probing telepathic stare. ‘Yesterday,’ he said. ‘Before these other kids arrived, come to think of it.’

  ‘I came long haul from the UK. I wanted a couple of days to get over the jet lag,’ said Alex. ‘I did a bit of exploring yesterday.’

  Pirroni seemed satisfied with that – as far as Alex could tell.

  In the monitoring room, Li, Amber and Paulo watched in horrified silence as Pirroni escorted Alex up the steps and into the control room.

  Murphy stared at the screen in surprise. ‘Where did he come from? Might have been better staying lost. Sergeant, should we get the negotiator to phone?’

  ‘No,’ said Sergeant Powell. ‘It might look as though we’ve orchestrated it and the kid will suffer.’

  Amber glanced at Sergeant Powell. His face was expressionless. She understood what that meant. He had made it clear it was a deniable mission. No-one should know he had sent Alex and Hex in. But it wasn’t long before Pirroni rang them. The ring tone came through as a crackle on the speaker attached to the computer.

  The nego
tiator was alone in the trailer next door. He was deliberately isolated to give the terrorist the impression that he was working on his own and that their conversation was private: background noise could give away vital plans, or the terrorist could get spooked if he thought a roomful of people were monitoring his every word. However, the negotiator was in closed-message contact with the other trailer, in case they needed to send him information.

  He answered the call smoothly, his voice welcoming. It was part of the technique to befriend the hostage-taker. ‘Is that you, Peter?’ he asked. Even though he knew Pirroni’s real identity, he used the name the terrorist had been living under when in hiding. It helped create an atmosphere of trust.

  ‘It is.’

  ‘How is everyone?’

  ‘They are fine,’ replied Pirroni. He eased himself into a sitting position on the top step.

  ‘What can I do for you?’

  In the hostage stronghold, Alex was listening. His fingers strayed to Hex’s watch on his wrist and he remembered the interference caused by the time-checking device. Experimentally, he turned it on, then peered up at the monitors. Sure enough, it caused a blip on the screen. He wondered if he could control it. He turned it off again. The picture became clear and smooth. He clicked the button on again, this time holding it down. The blip lasted for longer. That was good, thought Alex.

  Amber was looking at the screen, matching the plan to the wide-angle view, when the picture seemed to hiccup. It was like an eye blinking at her. Then it blinked again.

  Paulo was sitting nearest to her. She touched him on the arm and pointed. ‘Look.’

  They looked at the screen, willing it to happen again. It did. This time it was longer.

  ‘Alex,’ said Paulo quietly. He touched Li’s arm and indicated the screen. He mouthed Alex’s name at her. Relief flooded through her face like a light.

  Pirroni’s voice crackled through the speaker. ‘I have a new hostage.’

  Paulo still had his hand on Li’s arm. The fingers tightened.

  ‘Tell me about him,’ said Pirroni.