Trigger Mortis

by Anthony Horowitz

  They crossed Fifth Avenue. A car screamed at them, swerving to avoid their path. Bond peered to the right but now, impossibly, the railway had disappeared. Where was it? Where was the train? The passed an ugly block of apartments and there, suddenly, it was. A grey concrete wall with the railway above and a temporary road that had been built specially for the construction workers rebuilding the station. Bond saw the R-11 racing them neck and neck even as Jeopardy veered off the road, across the sidewalk and up the ramp that would take them into the station itself. There was a low gate ahead of them, closed and padlocked. Jeopardy twisted the throttle and, propelled by its own momentum, the Thunderbird left the ground and soared over the obstacle.

  The wheels hit the ground. Somehow they stayed upright. And then, impossibly, they were inside the station, rushing along the platform with a brick wall on one side, a canopy overhead and the R-11 right next to them, a silver blur slicing through the night. Bond saw the lights in the windows. The howl of the engine echoed in his ears. There was a flash of electricity as the train rolled over a contact point, as if a storm was about to break. Jeopardy had slowed down. She had no choice. The platform was narrow, strewn with debris left by the builders. It was also about to come to an end. The R-11 was pulling ahead. Bond tensed himself, knowing what he had to do. One last desperate throw of the dice. It was all he had left. They had almost reached the end of the platform. The last carriage, the driver’s cab, was slipping past.

  Bond let go of Jeopardy and balanced himself carefully, transferring his weight to the balls of his feet. They were still travelling at forty miles an hour and she must have guessed what he was going to do. She had steered the bike to the edge of the platform so that the rushing wall of the train was only eighteen inches away. She continued straight and at that moment Bond threw himself sideways, using the muscles in his thighs to propel himself across the gap, reaching out for the silver railings that formed a safety barrier across the rear driver’s door. For a single moment he hung in mid-air. If he missed, he would fall onto the tracks and break his neck or electrocute himself. But somehow his flailing hands caught hold of the railings. There was a terrible shock as his arms were almost pulled out of their sockets by the forward momentum of the train. But then he was being carried along, hanging onto the back. He had one last glimpse of Jeopardy, on the platform, bringing the Thunderbird to a scything halt. Then she was gone. The station walls flashed past. And finally darkness took over as he was swallowed up, instantly and irrevocably, by the mouth of the tunnel.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Tunnel Vision

  The train, with Bond attached to the back of it, thundered through the tunnel. It seemed to have picked up speed, perhaps an illusion caused by the walls and ceiling pressing in on three sides – but certainly the R-11 was making a journey like no other. It was stopping at no stations. It was the only train making the journey on the Sixth Avenue line from Coney Island, the points changed and the signals turned green by a trainmaster in Sin’s pay. It was almost a straight line from the northern edge of Brooklyn to the Empire State Building. The bullet had been fired. Nothing could stand in its way.

  For the first minute he stayed where he was with his arms spread out, clinging onto the railings, a bit like a fly on a windscreen, it occurred to him. He needed to regain his strength, but at the same time he was already making his calculations, reminding himself of what he had seen. Five carriages. The one in front of him with the engine for the journey back. Then came the carriage with Sin’s taskforce: seven men, probably armed. Bond only had the knife, still pressing against the small of his back, in the waistband of his trousers. Not good. If he could get past them, he would arrive at the carriage which contained the bomb. Two more men were travelling with it. Then the fake rocket. And finally there was Sin and the driver. Think, Bond. Think. You can reach Sin and kill him. Presumably his men will abort the operation. But suppose the C4 explosive is on a timer? Sin had talked about blasting caps but that could mean anything and the bomb might go off anyway. Forget Sin. Think about the bomb. You still have half an hour. Twenty minutes, certainly. Get into the carriage, deactivate the bomb, make New York safe, then worry about the rest of them. Ten against one. You’ve had worse odds than that.

  The train erupted out of the tunnel and into a station. Bright lights sliced Bond’s eyes. He saw white tiles, an empty platform, a sign – CARROLL STREET – benches, iron maiden turnstiles. He was rushing through the open space and then, just as suddenly, it was dark again. Cautiously, he looked round the side of the train and was rewarded with a blinding rush of warm air and soot. OK. Time to make a move. Clinging on with one hand, he swung round with the other and tried the handle of the door of what, on the return journey, would be the driver’s cabin. It was locked.

  So he was going to have to go over the top. Moneypenny had accused him of the same often enough. Slowly, Bond pulled himself upwards. He was protected while he was on the back of the train but he knew that he would be pulverised by the wind rush the moment he tried to crawl along the roof – and anyway, there wouldn’t be enough room. Much of the subway system had been built using the cut-and-cover method, digging into the soft earth as close as possible to the street surface and then rebuilding over the trenches. The shallower, the cheaper – and the workmen had made sure money wasn’t wasted. The trains were twelve feet and two inches high. The top of the tunnel was only a few inches higher and although it was hard to tell in the darkness, Bond was aware of steel beams, lethal weapons, rushing past. If he raised his head at the wrong moment, it would be knocked clean off his shoulders. Even lying flat, there was every chance that a loose cable or any other projection could scrape him off and send him to an instant, bloody death. With the wind beating at his head, Bond examined the roof of the carriage. Yes. Perhaps it could be done.

  The roof curved. It was an integral part of the design, making the R-11 sleeker, more streamlined. If Bond made his way along the very edge, half his body actually touching the side of the train, just above the windows, he should be out of harm’s way. But it would be incredibly difficult to hang on. The aluminium roof was ribbed and that would give him fingerholds. But he would be absolutely dependent on the strength of his right hand. If the train rocked, even slightly, he would be thrown off. If he relaxed for a second, he would simply slide into oblivion. And what if a train came the other way? The blast of compressed air might be enough to dislodge him. Bond could see himself falling between the two silver monsters. A blast of light. A scream of metal. And then minced up between the wheels.

  But there was no other way and Bond had already wasted enough time hanging on here. The tunnel was shattered by light as they entered the next station – Bergen Street – and swept through. That was something else to consider. If there was anyone standing on any of the platforms, they would see him as he made his way across the carriages. Better to get started while he was in the dark. The train entered the next tunnel and Bond pulled himself onto the roof, making sure that he was on the edge of the curve, an inch or two below the highest point. He hooked onto the ridges with his right hand and pressed his left palm against the vertical side of the carriage. At least the friction would provide him with a modicum of support. Then he began to edge forward, his eyes closed, feeling the wind hammering at his shoulders and head, desperately trying to force him back. It was even harder than he had expected. If he could have stretched himself out along a flat surface, he would have been able to crawl forward at a steady pace. But he was tilted, on the edge of space. He had to use half his strength and all his concentration simply to stop himself from falling. Looking up, he could just make out the top of the tunnel, rushing past, reminding him how fast he was travelling. There was a sudden crackle and a searing burst of electricity. For a few seconds, Bond was blind, as if his eyes had been burned out. The train didn’t care. It seemed determined to travel ever faster.

  With half his body hanging off the edge, Bond pulled himself forward. His progress was painfully
slow. He felt something swipe across the top of his head, shockingly hard. A loop of wire must have been hanging down. If he had accidentally raised his head at that moment and allowed it to catch around his neck he would have been garrotted. Another thought scratched away at his consciousness. How long did he have? How many stations would he pass before the train dipped under the river and entered Manhattan? As if to answer him, they burst into Jay Street. Bond saw the name, black letters on a white panel. They were going faster and faster. He wasn’t imagining it. They were no sooner in the station than they were out again, another tunnel reaching to swallow them up.

  He reached the end of the first carriage and manoeuvred himself across the narrow gap that separated it from the second. Now he had to be more careful. Sin’s men were directly underneath him and although the noise of the train would cover almost any sound, there was still the chance that one awkward move, his foot striking metal, might give him away. The effort of keeping himself on the sloping surface was taking its toll and Bond’s right hand, supporting most of his weight, was aching. The pain was spreading to his shoulder. It was hard to breathe. It felt that as much soot as air was entering his throat and his eyes were smarting. He pulled. He shuffled forward. He pulled again. But another two stations had shot past before he found himself at the next gap in the carriages, on the other side of Sin’s men.

  The gap was barely eighteen inches wide. Bond had to contort himself to fit into it. There was only one porthole window in the centre of the door and he was careful to avoid it so that Sin’s men would not catch sight of him as he wriggled down. He glanced at the rails, flashing along beneath the spinning wheels, then lowered his foot onto the coupling. It was a tight squeeze. He was trapped between two metal walls, both of them vibrating, shifting, as if about to crush him. He found the handle of the door and pressed down. This time, it moved. The door was unlocked. He glanced in through the window and saw the guards sitting about halfway down, facing each other with the dull faces of two commuters on their way to work. The bomb was at the far end of the carriage, beyond them. Bond checked that the knife was still in his waistband. Then he pressed the handle, threw open the door and tumbled in.

  He was only vaguely aware of the inside of the compartment as he propelled himself forward: a bright red floor with empty seats, battleship grey, scattered around him, facing different directions. Three lines of neon lights. Advertisements. Slender silver rods reaching from the floor to the ceiling. The two guards hadn’t heard him enter. How could they have with the roar of the train in the tunnel? But now they saw him and rose to their feet, scrabbling for their weapons.

  Bond dealt with the smaller one first, guessing that he would be the faster of the two. His hand reached behind him for the knife and, as the man drew his gun out of a shoulder holster he’d been wearing outside his coveralls, Bond plunged the blade into his chest, aiming for the on/off button that was his heart. Blood fountained out and the guard fell back, carrying the knife with him. The second guard had also produced a gun, moving surprisingly quickly given his bulk. He brought it round and fired. Bond felt the bullet pass over his head as he plunged forward, slamming his shoulder into the man’s stomach. The guard twisted round, trying to break free. The train rushed on and, propelled by its momentum, the two of them were sent in a macabre dance, spinning down towards the door through which Bond had come in.

  They crashed into the metal surface. The guard was trying to bring the gun round to aim at Bond but the angle was wrong and Bond was gripping him too tightly. Instead, he pounded it against Bond’s head and the back of his neck. Bond chose his moment and jerked upwards, one hand flying out to seize the guard’s wrist, the other closing against his throat. The two of them were trapped in a recess with the door behind them. It seemed that Sin’s men in the next carriage hadn’t heard the shot but surely one of them would look up and see the fight taking place on the other side of the porthole windows. Bond tried to free the gun with one hand while the other burrowed through the folds of flesh that surrounded the guard’s neck, searching for the larynx. He had it! Bond pushed with all his strength, cutting off the airflow. The guard panicked and grabbed hold of Bond’s wrist. At once, Bond let go of the gun and, straightening up, used his extended fingers to jab the guard three times, viciously, in the throat. The man went down. Bond hit him again for good luck. He wouldn’t get up again. That much was sure.

  The door handle rattled and a furious Korean face appeared at the window. Sin’s men had finally seen what was happening. They had opened the door of their own carriage and were attempting to enter this one, but they had reacted too slowly. The body of the guard – dead or unconscious – had slid to the floor and was lying inside the recess, blocking the second door. Well, that was useful. They could push all they liked. There was no way they were going to get it open. But it was only a brief respite. One of the men raised his gun to fire and Bond only just had time to step out of the way before a torrent of broken glass came rushing in with the wind. A hand reached through, searching for the handle. Bond snatched up the fat man’s gun and fired three times. The hand fell away. That would show them! The door was stuck and the porthole was too constricting to allow them to aim and fire simultaneously. The moment they showed their faces, they would make themselves too obvious a target. Nor could they climb through. They would have to come at him another way.

  Bond had no doubt that they would find it. He had perhaps minutes to deal with the bomb, with Sin, to stop this whole thing in its tracks. Being careful to keep out of the line of the window, he lurched through the carriage, jerking the knife out of the body of the man he had stabbed. As he moved forward, the advertising billboards mocked him with their inane, irrelevant messages BET YOU COULD DO BETTER IN A HAT. 84 OUT OF 100 WOMEN PREFER MEN WHO WEAR HATS. SUNNY BROOK WHISKEY. CHEERFUL AS ITS NAME. SUNKIST CALIFORNIAN LEMONS. INSTEAD OF HARSH LAXATIVES.

  Ahead of him, the bomb sat like a church altar. It was utterly alien, dominating the space around it, warning him not to come close.

  Bond took out the knife, then spun round as the sound inside the carriage changed. Had the Koreans somehow managed to open the door? Had Sin himself heard what had happened and come to investigate? No. Bond turned his attention to the bomb. C4. Sin had volunteered the information, as always giving too much away. What did Bond know of it? It was a British invention. Cyclotrimethylene-trinitramine. Also known as RDX. He had handled one of its precursors during the war and still remembered the feel of the putty, the smell of almonds. It was stable and insensitive. He could set fire to it. Nothing would happen. He could empty the gun into it. The same.

  He used the knife to cut the string holding the tarpaulin in place, then pulled it back to reveal the block itself. The substance was a dirty white colour and Bond saw that there were half a dozen detonators pushed into it, with wires leading to a single battery pack. These were the blast caps, first developed in Germany but now in use across the world. In essence, they were little more than oversized matchsticks. A spark from the battery would fire the ignition charge – silver acetylide or lead styphnate. The result would be a small explosion which would immediately cause a chain reaction, setting off the whole thing. Sin didn’t need six blast caps. He was taking no chances. One would have done.

  But for the first time in a while, luck was on Bond’s side. Sin had expected to prime the bomb without any interruption. Nobody would know it was there. The tunnel would be empty and he would have plenty of time. So he hadn’t needed a complicated detonation system with fake wires or a capacitor concealed inside the C4. In fact the whole thing was connected to a simple, cheap alarm clock sitting between the blasting caps and the battery. Sin would set the minute hand to give himself enough time to leave, and that would be it. It was about as crude a device as Bond had ever seen and it would be simple enough to defuse . . . provided he concentrated and kept a steady hand. The trouble with blast caps was that they were unreliable. During the war, Bond had seen trainee agents crimping the f
uses with their teeth before inserting them into the ignition mix. It hadn’t been that uncommon for them to blow their own heads off.

  He glanced at the door. It was being rocked back and forth, thudding into the body of the man who lay across it. But he wasn’t moving. A face appeared behind the shattered window and Bond fired off a fourth round, smiling to himself as the head jerked back with a bright red crater between the eyes.

  Quickly, he disconnected the battery. Then, crouching in front of the altar, he gently removed the first blast cap and laid it on the floor. He wished now that the train wasn’t moving so quickly. He could feel every jolt, every vibration and knew that even without an electrical charge, the detonators could all too easily go off. The train howled through York Street. Was the R-11 accelerating or were the stations getting closer together? Keeping half an eye on the door, Bond focused on what he was doing. One after another, he removed the other blast caps, laying them gently on the nearest seat. The last one came out. For good measure, Bond threw the alarm clock on the floor and smashed it.