‘Yeah, right,’ she snorted, disentangling her mp3 player headphones from around a desk lamp. ‘I was sent to a brat camp back home in the States once. It sucked big time. Cold showers. Disgusting food. Early starts. Unbelievably hard work. Demeaning chores. And that’s not counting the sadistic bitches that think you’re only there to carry out their orders.’
I stared at her. ‘It sounds awful.’
‘It’s hell on earth,’ Dylan said, darkly.
‘Hurry up, girls,’ Maria called out from the door. ‘Time to leave.’
Dylan swore. ‘Geri is so wrong about this,’ she said. ‘We’re a freakin’ team. We are disciplined already.’
I caught her arm as she turned. ‘Thanks for earlier,’ I said. ‘I couldn’t have managed the wires on that bomb without you.’
Dylan met my gaze. For a second I saw her acknowledge what I’d said – and how, for all her aggression, she appreciated my thanks. And then the familiar sneer curled across her lips. She wrinkled her nose. ‘Whatever.’
Nico and Ed were waiting at the foot of the main stairs with James and Mr Fox. A large, dark-windowed 4x4 stood outside. We were bundled in, our bags placed into the boot. Mr Fox said goodbye, giving both Nico and Dylan awkward hugs and patting me and Ed on the back.
We sat in silence in the back of the car as James, with Maria next to him in the passenger seat, drove off.
The car had two rows of seats behind the drivers’. Nico and I were at the very back. In front of us, Ed and Dylan both shoved in headphones and started listening to music. Dylan’s was extremely loud, but neither James nor Maria said anything.
Nico put his arm round my shoulders and I leaned against his chest. He smelled of soap powder and grass.
‘I’m sorry you have to leave Mr Fox,’ I said.
Nico shrugged. ‘‘S okay.’
We were silent for a bit, lost in our own thoughts. Then Nico turned his face to mine and smiled.
‘It was scary earlier,’ I whispered.
He bent closer. ‘I know.’
Our lips were almost touching and I felt that terrifying, overwhelming feeling again. Like he was reaching the most secret, fragile part of me.
‘I’m scared now,’ I whispered.
‘At least we’re together,’ he murmured.
‘I mean . . . I’m scared of . . . of how I feel . . .’
‘Yeah?’ Nico’s lips grazed my ear. ‘Me too,’ he whispered. ‘It’s because I love you.’
We gazed at each other and, in that moment, I forgot about the past few days and boot camp and not saying goodbye to Lex and realised the truth at last.
‘I love you too,’ I whispered back.
Boom!
The huge explosion rocked the car. We both whipped round. Behind us, through the car window, the broken outline of Fox Academy was clearly visible. Smoke poured out of what had once been the main building, flames licked the sky.
Dylan and Ed had turned round and were staring out of the back window too. Ed’s eyes were wide with horror.
‘Guess they set that bomb off, then,’ Dylan said drily.
I stared open-mouthed at the smoke, unable to believe my school was gone.
So my vision had come true. What did that mean? That I couldn’t change the future after all? That, one way or another, the universe would always have its way?
We were all silent – shell-shocked – for a few minutes, then the four of us started talking – quietly, so James and Maria couldn’t hear up front.
‘I still don’t see why Geri had to blow up the entire school,’ Nico said.
‘She wasn’t telling the whole truth about that,’ Ed said darkly. ‘I could sense it.’
‘Yeah, I think you’re right,’ Dylan agreed. ‘There are loads of other ways she could have faked Lex’s death.’
I sat back. Two weeks ago, I reflected, this conversation would have been impossible. Back then Nico hated Ed and Ed hated himself and everyone hated Dylan . . . but now . . . well, I guess after being in a room together when a bomb’s about to kill you all, it’s hard not to feel like you belong with each other.
Which meant Dylan was right. We were already a team.
‘Team Medusa,’ I murmured.
Dylan raised her eyebrows.
‘What, babe?’ Nico asked.
‘Nothing, it’s just you guys . . .’ I paused, trying to work out what I wanted to say. ‘It’s just I’ve never belonged to anything, ever. Well, apart from a running club . . . And nobody ever made me feel like I belonged, either. But I do. Now. Because you three could have saved yourselves earlier but you didn’t. You stayed down in that music room even though it meant risking your lives.’
Nico stared at me. ‘Course we stayed,’ he said.
‘We’re friends,’ Ed said shyly.
‘Plus your brother’s hot,’ Dylan added.
I laughed. ‘Anyway, it’s just that we’ve got to go to this horrible training camp place and I’m . . . well, I just want to say that I’m glad that . . . that you’ll all be there.’
‘For God’s sake, babe.’ Nico rolled his eyes. ‘D’you think you could ratchet down the cheesiness levels a bit?’
‘Yeah, because I might hurl all over Ed if you don’t,’ Dylan said.
Ed grinned. ‘Please, Ketty,’ he said. ‘Think of my chinos.’
‘Oh, piss off.’ I laughed again.
And somehow the prospect of boot camp didn’t seem quite so bad any more.
If you enjoyed The Hostage,
look out for the next exciting book
in THE MEDUSA PROJECT series,
The Rescue – turn the page to read
the first chapter . . .
1: Arrival
Spain was unbearably hot. We’d made a pit-stop at a roadside café after a solid five-hour drive and even though it was late afternoon, the sun was still fierce on the back of my head. Everyone else was still inside the café, but I’d come outside for a moment by myself. I was leaning against the car, the metal hot through my shirt, looking into the distance. All I could see was desert – sand . . . rocks . . . and, further away, a range of purple-tipped mountains.
The café door banged and Ketty emerged. ‘Kind of bleak, isn’t it, Ed?’ she said, with a grimace, as she reached me. ‘And way too hot to run in.’
I nodded. Ketty’s my best friend – and a keen runner. Like me, she has the Medusa gene, but whereas I can read minds, Ketty can predict the future. I glanced at her, careful not to look her straight in the eye – if I make eye contact with anyone I automatically see into their thoughts and feelings.
You probably think that would be cool.
Trust me, it isn’t.
Ketty looked surprisingly unbothered by the heat. She was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. No sweat patches – unlike me – though a couple of her dark brown curls were stuck damply to her forehead.
‘Did Geri say how much longer?’ I asked. Geri Paterson, head of the Medusa Project, was driving us to a training camp where we were going to have to stay – with no contact with our families – for six whole months.
‘Another hour or so.’ Ketty sighed.
I shook my head. Everything felt wrong. The journey was long and boring, sure. But I was in no hurry to reach the camp, either – the whole point of being sent there was to ‘learn discipline through hard work’ according to Geri. Goodness knows what that would be like. The thought of it filled me with horror. Physical activities are not exactly my strong point.
Nico emerged from the café. ‘Depressed because you won’t be going to school for half a year, Ed?’ He put his arm round Ketty, a big grin on his face.
She beamed up at him. I turned away. I’m not going into it here, but a few weeks before, Ketty and I had dated a bit. Then Nico told her he liked her and now they were all over each other. As Dylan might say, it sucked big time.
Geri strode out of the café. It didn’t look as though stopping for a break had improved her mood at all. She was posing as
a parent/school liaison officer responsible for taking the four of us to the camp, but she didn’t look like any parent I’d ever met. She jumped into the driver’s seat, calling angrily for us to join her.
‘Come on.’
We sat as before, Nico and Ketty in the back, Dylan on her own in the middle row of seats and me up front next to Geri. I get a bit car sick if I sit anywhere else.
Mind you, the next part of our journey was enough to make anyone puke. The road quickly disappeared and we started bumping over really rocky ground.
With a snarl, Dylan appeared from behind her oversized sunglasses and took out her headphones. ‘When are we going to quit freakin’ bouncing around?’
I closed my eyes. Geri was in a bad enough mood without Dylan provoking her further.
Geri sucked in her breath. ‘May I remind you that if you four hadn’t taken matters into your own hands on your last job, you wouldn’t have to be here at all,’ she snapped.
Behind me, Ketty sighed. Her brother, Lex, was the reason we’d gone off on our own before. The criminal we were investigating, Damian Foster, had been holding him captive and Ketty had been attempting to find out where he was. The rest of us were helping. I knew Ketty felt responsible for getting us all into trouble with Geri. I turned round and smiled at her. She smiled gratefully back.
‘Just because you’re sending us to some brat camp doesn’t mean it has to be in the middle of nowhere,’ Dylan snapped back, shoving her headphones back on.
‘It’s in the middle of nowhere for your own protection,’ Geri said. I glanced down at her hands, gripping the steering wheel. She was holding on so tightly that the knuckles were white. ‘And may I remind you that I was up for hours last night finding a new camp after the original one was compromised.’
The atmosphere in the car chilled further. Geri had reminded us of this fact on average once every ten minutes since we started the journey.
‘Yeah, you said,’ Nico said sarcastically.
‘This is not what I signed up for,’ Geri muttered. ‘I expected you all to behave . . . to do what I told you . . .’
I looked away. As usual I’d been lumped in with the others. It wasn’t fair.
‘We didn’t sign up for any of this, either,’ Nico muttered.
I could hear Ketty whispering in his ear, presumably telling him to calm down. I sighed. Nico was right, of course. None of us had chosen to be part of the Medusa Project – not the original gene implantation before we were born, nor the crime-fighting work we were being trained to do now. Geri was forcing us to work for her.
After another half-an-hour or so, with the sun hovering over the distant mountains, a long white building shimmered into view.
‘Is that it?’ I asked, leaning forward to see the place that was going to be our home from now until October.
‘Yes, dear.’ The sharp edges of Geri’s bob batted her chin as she gave a vigorous nod. ‘Camp Felicidad.’ She raised her voice. ‘Dylan, take those headphones out. I need to go over your final briefing.’
Grumbling, Dylan did so.
‘What does Feliss-y-whatsit mean?’ Ketty asked.
‘Camp Lucky,’ I translated. ‘Hey, maybe the name’s a good sign.’
Behind me, Dylan snorted. ‘Yeah, right, Chino Boy.’
Dylan was always taking the mickey out of my clothes . . . out of me generally, in fact. Not that I cared, really.
As we drew nearer, Geri went through our cover stories again. We had each been assigned a new surname and background, part of which was that we’d all attended the same school. I was Ed Jones, bright but lazy – a formerly straight A student, who was now giving his wealthy parents a massive headache because he wanted to spend his days smoking weed instead of concentrating on his GCSEs.
‘Remember, you’re all the delinquent children of well-off, middle-class, concerned parents,’ Geri cautioned. ‘Like everyone else at the camp.’
‘Oh good,’ Dylan drawled. ‘Six months with a bunch of spoilt brats . . . I can’t wait.’
‘Don’t worry, Dylan,’ Nico said. ‘You’ll fit right in.’
‘Freakin’ shut up,’ Dylan snapped. ‘And don’t call me Dylan. It’s bad enough going to some hell hole Brat Camp, without you starting on me.’
Geri just pursed her lips. ‘Discipline . . . discipline,’ she tutted.
The large white building was now identifiable as three separate houses. The biggest was in the centre – a low, sprawling concrete structure with small windows and a few thorny bushes by the front door. A man stood outside, arms folded.
‘Camp Lucky’s not very nice-looking, is it?’ Ketty said, disappointed.
‘It’s not supposed to be,’ Geri snapped. ‘You’re here to learn to behave yourselves. It’s perfectly adequate, with a good record on discipline.’
Nico muttered something from the back of the jeep.
‘Most importantly, it’s safe. No-one here knows who you are, so you’ll be able to lie low while we can make sure your identities are still secret from Damian Foster and Blake Carson and all the other criminals who’d give their eye teeth to get their hands on you.’
I gritted my teeth. The worst part of us being sent here was that, in the outside world, everyone apart from our parents thought we were dead. Geri had gone to extreme lengths over this. She’d exploded a bomb in our school, then changed all our records to say we’d died in the blast. She insisted this was necessary for our own protection but it made me angry – if Geri hadn’t forced us to become the Medusa Project, we wouldn’t need protecting.
Anyway, we were under strict instructions to keep our skills under wraps while we were at the camp. That I didn’t have a problem with. I hate being able to mind-read. It’s an invasion of privacy. It’s wrong.
The jeep juddered over rough paving stone and came to a halt. I opened my eyes. We’d arrived. The man who’d been standing by the door was now advancing towards us, a big smile on his face. He looked very Spanish – dark hair and eyes and the same olive skin as Nico. He pulled open Geri’s door and extended a hand to help her out. The hot air surged into the car like somebody had trained a hairdryer on us.
‘Welcome to Camp Felicidad. You must be Ms Paterson.’
I stared at him. Apart from a slight nasal twang in his voice, the man could have been English.
‘Welcome.’ The man glanced round at the four of us. I quickly averted my eyes, not wanting to make eye contact and be forced to dive into his mind.
‘Do any of you young people speak Spanish?’ the man asked.
‘Ed does,’ Geri said, indicating me. ‘And Dylan here’s good at it too.’
Senor Fernandez looked at us expectantly.
‘Hola,’ Dylan said, sulkily.
‘Como se llama usted?’ I asked, trying to sound polite.
‘You may call me Senor Fernandez,’ the man replied. ‘I hope your stay here will be fruitful. Now, I’m sure you’re eager to get your bearings.’ He stood back to make way for Geri and pointed towards the house. ‘Beautiful ladies first.’
Geri smiled – one of those knowing smiles that basically mean the person knows they’re being flattered but likes it anyway.
We followed the two of them into the house. It was still steamily hot outside, despite the fact that the sun was so low in the sky. The contrast inside the house was startling. So cool I almost shivered. The thick stone walls clearly blocked out much of the heat. A fan blasted away in the corner. I blinked, taking in the stone flags on the floor, the reception desk in the corner and the long trestle table down the middle of the room.
‘Looks like a hostel,’ Ketty whispered in my ear. ‘I was expecting worse from what Dylan said about brat camps.’
‘This is where we eat.’ Senor Fernandez indicated the table with a sweep of his hand. ‘Our other young people are busy with evening chores. You’ll meet them a little later.’ He turned to Geri. ‘Is it to your satisfaction so far, Ms Paterson?’
Geri gave him a brisk nod. ‘I
t seems suitably basic,’ she said. ‘Though to be honest, dear, I don’t care what it looks like, so long as these kids learn some discipline while they’re here.’
Ketty and Nico exchanged exasperated glances behind Geri’s back.
‘Of course.’ Senor Fernandez gave a little bow. He led us down a corridor to the girls’ quarters – a six-bed dorm, much bleaker than the one back at Fox Academy. The walls were plain white – no posters or pictures. Each bed was covered with a pale blue quilt and stood next to a small locker. The tops of the lockers were completely clear.
Geri nodded approvingly.
‘Clean and simple,’ Fernandez said.
‘. . . like a cell,’ Nico muttered.
Senor Fernandez flashed a fierce look at him. ‘Rule number one,’ he snapped. ‘Young people must ask for permission to speak.’ His face relaxed. ‘However, an adjustment period for new young people is only fair, so no de-merits tonight.’
‘De- what?’ Nico said.
Senor Fernandez shook his head and made a clicking sound at the back of his throat. He turned his attention back to Geri. ‘The boys’ room is identical, just in a different part of the building. Would you like to see that now?’ he asked.
Geri hesistated, checking her watch. ‘I really don’t have time,’ she said.
‘Absolutely fine – of course, you need to get going.’ Fernandez gestured back to the main lobby. ‘Let me see you out.’
We left Dylan and Ketty in their room and followed Fernandez back down the corridor.
As we reached the lobby, Geri turned to me and Nico.
‘Please use this as an opportunity to learn some discipline,’ she said, with heavy emphasis. ‘I’ll call on the Camp phone one week from tonight to see how you’re getting on.’
I nodded. Nico just stared sullenly at the floor.
‘Right, well, goodbye, then.’ She took a step towards the front door.
‘Let me see you to your car, Ms Paterson,’ Fernandez said. He turned to Nico and me. ‘You two boys wait here. Don’t move.’
The Hostage Page 17