Strikers Instinct

by A. D. Rogers

  For a few seconds Luke didn’t speak, then he rose and began to walk away. “Wait there a second.” he asked.

  Luke returned a few moments later with what looked like a fountain pen in his hand. “Given what you said about Ed I think that from now on you are going to need this.”

  He handed the pen across to Harry – for the first time today it was his turn to look puzzled. “I’m sorry Luke – I don’t understand, I have plenty of pens.”

  Luke grinned, “Ah, but I bet you don’t have one like this.” he said. “It’s one of the many toys I still get asked to test by my friends from my past life. It’s a digital voice recorder – but with a twist.”

  Harry gazed at the pen. “Why would I need something like that?” he asked.

  “Well not so much for the voice recorder,” Luke explained, “although that can be useful – but it’s the other feature that may come in handy. It’s a jammer.”

  “Jammer?” asked Harry nervously.

  Luke laughed, “Don’t worry,” he said, “it’s not like Dr Who’s sonic screwdriver! Quite simply, if you think that someone may be recording your conversation, then you flick the switch and voila – everything is scrambled! If you think that Ed – or anyone else could be monitoring your conversations then just keep this turned on.”

  Harry looked at Luke. “That’s a great idea – I’ll definitely start using it – I’m sure that over the next few months it could come in handy.” Then another thought struck Harry. “Do you use one of these?” he asked.

  “Why would I need one?” Luke asked innocently.

  Harry didn’t seem convinced but carried on. “OK – back to the original subject. What do you think about joining the study group?”

  Luke hesitated than smiled. “I trust you,” he said, “If you think it will help then I will do whatever you need – when do we start?”

  Harry sighed with relief. “That’s great – I can’t thank you enough. If you can make an excuse to disappear for 30 minutes or so over the weekend then we can sort everything out – is that OK?”

  Luke nodded and then both men shook hands. Harry had to check on some patients on his way home so he said goodbye to Luke and Sue and thanked Nell for the meal. Luke watched Harry drive away and turned and walked back into the house. As he walked he reached into his pocket and pulled out a fountain pen – and flicked a hidden switch to “off”.

  CHAPTER 27

  Monday morning arrived and Luke drove towards to the training ground. He had quickly established his routine so that he arrived well before the players – this allowed him the luxury of a cup of tea in the canteen and the chance to catch up with all the gossip from Maud. Today, however, wasn’t going to be a normal day. As Luke approached the gates he was surprised to see a large crowd on both sides of the road.

  As soon as the crowd noticed Luke’s vehicle they sprang into life and moved towards him. Some hoisted cameras onto their shoulders, others pushed microphones towards the car. They saw the large black vehicle with tinted windows and sensed that it could be their target. However, as soon as Luke slowed down and slid down his window they realised they would have to wait a little longer. Most of them simply turned their backs on Luke but one familiar face stepped forward.

  “Morning Luke,” said Sam, “Looking forward to today?”

  “Not as much as you lot it seems.” joked Luke. “I take it that I am not what this lot expected?”

  It was Sam’s turn to laugh, “Not really,” he said, “most of them don’t even know who you are! They’re all here to catch Mr. Pryce.”

  “I guessed as much but for a minute I thought I had become famous!” Luke said. “Any way – what are you doing outside with all the commoners – I thought you had special status?”

  “Sometimes it does a little bit of good to mix with these guys for a while,” whispered Sam conspiratorially, “you never know what you might pick up. I’ll listen for a bit longer then I’ll follow you in.”

  Luke waved goodbye to Sam and then the security guard waved him through the now-open barrier – he suddenly realised that it was the first time he had seen the barrier down, normally he just drove straight through. He parked as close to the canteen as possible and then strolled into the room to find Maud already pouring him a drink.

  “Morning Maud,” he called, “what’s new?”

  “Morning love,” Maud replied, “it’s all happening here today – I’ve never seen that sneaky sod in here as early as this before!”

  “I take it you mean our beloved Chairman?” said Luke as seriously as he could manage.

  “You know very well who I mean!” sniffed Maud, “and I can tell that you are trying not to laugh! He’s got the rest of the board with him – it’s like they are waiting for royalty!”

  They chatted for a little while longer as Luke drank his tea and then they started to hear other cars arrive outside so Luke stood to leave.

  “Did you have a good weekend love?” was Maud’s parting shot.

  “Not bad,” replied Luke, “same as usual really but it’s always nice to spend time with the family – and my mother!”

  They both laughed as Luke walked towards the door – Luke smiled to himself as he thought that this weekend had been anything but “same as usual”. Yesterday he had managed to slip away for an hour to visit Harry at the Dementia research clinic. He had arrived to find only Harry in the office and he was surprised that the first thing Harry presented him with was a bunch of papers to sign.

  “What’s this?” demanded Luke.

  “Standard paperwork.” replied Harry. “That first one is a confidentiality document from TxT saying that you won’t pass on the prototype drink to anyone. The second paper is from the clinic saying more or less the same thing about the tests we are going to run.”

  “And the final document?” Luke enquired.

  Harry grinned, “That just says that you agree not to sue me if your hair falls out!”

  Luke stiffened.

  “Calm down!” laughed Harry. “It’s all perfectly standard and perfectly safe.” Then he turned serious. “Look – I don’t want to bully you into this – if there is any doubt at all then you shouldn’t go through with it.”

  Luke shook his head. “No, I trust you,” he said, “let’s get on with it.”

  Luke signed the documents and then Harry began to beam.

  “What’s so funny?” asked Luke.

  “I love this bit!” replied Harry as he pulled out something that resembled a space-age phaser.

  “Please don’t tell me you are hoping to use that on me?” said Luke nervously.

  “Don’t be a wuss,” Harry grunted, “you won’t feel a thing!”

  “That’s exactly what you told me when I had to have that prostate examination as part of my last medical,” replied Luke, “and that certainly brought tears to my eyes!”

  Harry ignored Luke’s protests.”You may have seen a version of this on Tomorrow’s World or maybe The Gadget Show – it delivers an injection without actually using a needle.”

  As usual Luke was sceptical. “Let’s just get this over with.” he urged.

  Harry went behind Luke and placed the gadget near Luke’s neck. There was a sudden hiss and then Harry moved away.

  “Is that it?” asked Luke.

  “Yep,” replied Harry, “all done. The gadget uses a compressed mechanism to fire the drug straight to the cerebral cortex.”

  Luke frowned. “You know,” he said, “it’s a bit creepy when you refer to this thing as a drug.”

  “Force of habit.” Harry said, “When we have proved that it works and we start to hand it out to patients then we will have to refer to it as a drug – but once again just let me say, it’s perfectly natural and perfectly safe.”

  Harry then led Luke through into the next room.

  “OK,” he said, “I need to make sure you have enough TxT Plus to last you for a while. The finished product will be carbonated but for the duration of this ex
periment you can choose either fizzy or still – take your pick.”

  Luke picked up two identical bottles with two different coloured tops. He took a sip from both bottles.

  “That’s surprising,” he said, “they both taste quite nice!”

  Harry laughed, “I told you – Ed is going to make a fortune from this.”

  Luke decided to take equal measures of both types of drink and Harry helped him carry the cases to the car.

  “What now?” Luke asked.

  “That’s it!” laughed Harry. “For non-dementia sufferers there doesn’t seem to be a pattern. You may not get any reaction at all but then again you may notice something straight away. Just keep a diary on your phone and please call me if you have any questions.”

  And that was it. Luke had returned home and stashed the drinks in a locked cabinet in an outbuilding and as he moved towards the changing room on Monday morning he had to admit that he felt no difference whatsoever.

  A few of the now-familiar faces greeted him as he entered the room and he moved towards his assigned locker. Luke quickly changed and sat down to wait to hear what was in store for the rest of the day. A few minutes later the whole group were ordered outside and split into smaller units for the usual warm-up sessions. After 30 minutes the players had started muttering amongst themselves – it looked like once again Jake Pryce wasn’t going to turn up. The training staff were struggling to get the players to concentrate and they were becoming slightly concerned. Suddenly a group of people emerged from the admin block and all activity ceased.

  Leading the group was Ed Tierney together with a tall figure with long curly hair. Behind the two were Sandy Dunbar, the rest of the board and various hangers-on. As the group got nearer they could all see that one of the two leading figures was already dressed in full Wishton training kit – Luke recognised him as Jake Pryce. There was complete silence as the two groups came together.

  “Good morning gentlemen.” Ed boomed, “I’m sure you are all as excited as I am to welcome Jake Pryce to our club!”

  Ed then paused to wait for the round of applause that never came – in fact his words were met with complete silence.

  Ed didn’t seem concerned. “We are sorry that Jake couldn’t be here for the start of training but it’s my fault – we had a few details we had to attend to but he’s here now and raring to go.”

  To be fair to Jake he did look keen – which couldn’t be said for most of the Wishton team. Ed led Jake forward and began to introduce Jake to each member of the squad. It soon became clear that the players seemed to be split into two camps. Many of the younger players were secretly in awe of such a famous figure and one or two of them grinned as they shook hands. The older players were more hostile, most of them shook hands with Jake but didn’t seem happy. There were two players however, who definitely weren’t happy. As Jake approached Stan Taylor he held out his hand.

  “Good to see you Stan,” he grinned, “looking forward to playing with you again.”

  Stan’s eyes narrowed and he ignored the outstretched hand “Keep out of my way or I will snap you in two.” he said with silent menace. Stan then turned his back and walked away.

  “I’m sure he will come round.” smiled Jake and one or two of the players laughed.

  The last player in the line was Adi Abale – the veteran centre forward whose massive frame fairly bristled with suppressed rage. Once again Jake held out his hand. Adi just looked at him and then spat at the ground between Jake’s feet. He then turned slowly and walked away. Jake simply shrugged and turned and walked the other way.

  Sandy groaned and then stared hard at Ed. “I warned you about this,” he whispered angrily, “both Stan and Adi are two of the most level-headed and reliable members of the squad but do you know what else they have in common?”

  Ed shook his head.

  “They have both played with Jake before!” Sandy fired his words at Ed.

  Ed shot back at Sandy, “Well I suggest that you keep them apart until Jake settles in.” he then turned and strode away.

  Sandy and his assistants shouted and cajoled the group back into training but it had to be said that the rest of the day continued under a cloud. There were no more incidents but there was a nasty atmosphere that wouldn’t go away.

  For once Luke was glad when training finished and he stopped by the canteen for his final brew.

  Maud looked at Luke and shook her head. “I’m guessing that didn’t go as planned love?” she asked.

  Luke shook his head. “No.” he said, “To be fair to Jake Pryce he did seem to try his best – if he carries on like that I don’t think that there will be a problem.”

  “I think it may be too late.” said Maud sadly.

  “What’s happened?” asked Luke.

  “I’ve heard on the grapevine that Stan and Adi have asked to go on the transfer list!” whispered Maud conspiratorially.

  CHAPTER 28

  Everyone was very surprised that the rest of the week continued without incident. Each day at the training camp the mood seemed to lift a little until by Friday things seemed almost back to normal. This was due in no small way to Jake Pryce who seemed go out of his way to be nice to everyone. He wasn’t sickly-sweet nice but he was pleasant and courteous and this seemed to win over several of the doubters. There were still one or two however who would not be swayed.

  “He was exactly like this at the last club.” Stan said. “Nice as pie for a while then he just flips and doesn’t care who he hurts.”

  Adi agreed. “I’m not hanging around here to put up with all that again – as soon as my agent sorts out a move I’ll be on my way. It’s sad really because I’ve been happy here and I think we could go all the way this year but I know he’ll screw it up for everyone.”

  Jake was early for training each day and did everything he was asked without complaint and then at the end of each day he did extra training alone. Sandy shook his head.

  “Either he has been abducted by aliens,” he said, “or everything we have all heard about him was wrong.”

  One person who was very happy about the peace and calm was Ed – he took every opportunity to tell everyone that he had been proved right and that Jake would be a great long-term asset for the club. Luke wasn’t so sure – he had a bad feeling about the whole situation. He laughed to himself that it may be the plant extract sending him a message!

  Harry questioned Luke daily about any possible reaction to the treatment but in all honesty Luke felt no difference at all. In one sense he was disappointed but in another he was relieved – but he felt like he was letting Harry down. By Friday afternoon Luke had stopped expecting something to happen and everyone else was distracted by the preparations for the club pre-season tour. The first-team squad were going out to Holland for a week where they would play three friendly games against hand-picked opposition. Sandy wanted to really push the team so that he could assess if they still needed to sign other players before the season started. He also wanted to spend the time away building the team spirit within the club.

  The squad were due to fly out on Saturday morning but Luke didn’t have an invitation to join them. Harry said that if he really wanted to go then he could probably make it happen but Luke didn’t want to rock the boat – he had a few things he needed to do at home anyway. Both Stan and Adi were also allowed to stay back in Wishton and there were also a few players with injuries who carried on with their treatment rather than travel to Holland.

  The following week the training ground seemed deserted and Luke decided only to train for a few hours in the morning and use the afternoons to catch up on some business work and also to take Sue out to lunch a couple of days. She was spending less and less time at her old job at the moment and was counting down the days to her new role.

  The week went by quickly with very little news coming back to the training ground from Holland. It seemed that the team had won their first two games and were due to travel back home after their final game
on Friday. It had been a good week for Luke. He continued training each day but had managed to catch up with a lot of his business commitments each afternoon. He did so well that he decided to take Friday afternoon off and spend some time at one of his favourite hobbies.

  Apart from spending time with his dad watching Wishton Clough, Luke also used to go with his father to watch horse racing. Haydock Park near Wigan was the closest track to Wishton and Luke and his dad spent many happy days at the Lancashire track – all year round. He noticed that there was a meeting on Friday afternoon and in the middle of the week he asked if any of the few remaining players would like to be his guest at Haydock on Friday? Adi and Stan both agreed along with a couple of the walking wounded so Luke booked a box and all was set.

  One of the reasons Luke was keen to go to Haydock was to meet up with an old friend who was a trainer. Ever since his retirement Luke had been considering buying a racehorse and he was going to speak to his friend to get some more details. Not many people knew about it but Luke liked to gamble – in fact Luke was quite a good gambler. Frequently during many of his overseas trips he had played poker and backgammon to combat the boredom – usually just for a couple of pounds – but he also liked to have occasional wagers on the horses. More importantly, he knew his limits and he knew when to stop.

  After training on Friday the small group of players and Luke left the ground and travelled to Haydock Park. On arrival they were taken through to Luke’s private box where they enjoyed a buffet meal. Luke introduced them to his friend the trainer who passed on a few tips for the afternoon before presenting Luke with information about the horse he was interested in. Luke said he would look at the details over the weekend and discuss things with Sue.

  The afternoon then fell into a familiar rhythm. Before each race some of the group would go out to the parade ring to watch the horses before they were saddled and then they would place their bets and retreat to the box to watch the race in comfort. One or two of the group had wins in the first few races but Luke hadn’t had any luck – but to be fair there wasn’t anything that he had really fancied.