William’s gaze flitted across the wall of screens, the various news channels and webcasts from across the globe tiled side by side in a giant mosaic. Suddenly, his eyes stopped dead.
His body felt weightless.
From one of the screens across the room, his ex-wife was staring right at him.
Not just at him, she stared into the eyes of hundreds of thousands of people in Sweden and beyond, and at the same time she wasn’t staring at anyone in particular, just into a camera somewhere in Amsterdam and what the hell was she doing there? She was standing alone on a roof, lights from helicopters sweeping over the night sky behind her, and right between her and the sky was a metallic cube of ice-blue illuminated windows and there was no doubt what he was looking at.
‘Is this now?’ he asked, straight out, even though he knew.
Nobody answered.
‘This. The feeds. All this, is it live?’
Connors was the first to put two and two together. He saw the caption with the woman’s name on the Swedish newsfeed, and of course it could just be a coincidence, but the urgency in Sandberg’s voice told him that it wasn’t. He nodded slowly. His face hard like a general’s. And sad like a human being’s.
‘This is live,’ he said.
And William said nothing.
Christina Sandberg was in Amsterdam. She was standing in front of a hospital that was about to be razed to the ground. And he was all too aware and she had no idea.
Albert van Dijk registered the fighter jet as it passed, and immediately realised what was about to happen.
He was still sitting in Christina Sandberg’s rental car, huddled behind the wheel and wearing her assistant’s baseball hat, his collar pulled up against his face. Hopefully, it would look as if he was cold and not as if he was worried that one of the hundreds of policemen milling around would pass the car and see who he was. In reality, both were true.
He didn’t want to be there.
Christina Sandberg had persuaded the police to allow them inside the cordon, telling them she had come to collect her daughter from the student residence. Sooner or later they were bound to start wondering what was taking so long. And then they would knock on the window, and it would all be over.
But he had nowhere else to go. So here he was, wishing that Christina and her assistant would finish what they were doing and hurry back so they could all get out of there.
He’d been there twenty minutes when the military jet made its first pass.
It shot by at an amazingly high speed, almost frighteningly close above the rooftops, a whizzing silence followed by the roar of the engines as the sound caught up and cut like thunder through the night before it disappeared together with the plane.
Albert stared through the windscreen, trying to assimilate what he’d just seen. There was nothing for a fighter jet to do here. A helicopter could keep the area under surveillance, it could assist police on the ground chasing vehicles or people, perhaps even keep other helicopters at a distance, those from the various newspapers and TV networks that were moving in to cover the breaking story.
But a jet? What purpose could that serve?
And then it occurred to him. There was one task that was perfectly suited to a fighter jet. One single task.
He sat up in his seat, pulled out his pay-as-you-go phone, fumbled around in his pockets for the business card with Christina Sandberg’s number. Jumped out of the car, cast his eyes up at the roof above. He didn’t care if they recognised him. If he was right, Christina and Leo were in danger. He had to warn them, and if the police took him then so be it.
A fighter jet.
It would be madness. But then, so was everything else that had happened in the last twenty-four hours.
He couldn’t find the business card, kept rummaging around, next pocket. Panicking.
If he listened carefully, he could already hear the jet coming in for the second pass.
Inside the blue parliament, chaos bubbled under the surface.
Glances were exchanged between the uniformed men, phones were pressed against ears to hear better, someone would leave the room and someone enter, everyone chasing the same information.
The jet had passed its target without executing its orders.
The hospital was still standing even though it shouldn’t be, and questions bounced around the room without being answered. What had happened? Was it a malfunction? Had the pilot refused orders? What was their next step and how long before they could try again?
William watched it all happen around him.
Until now he hadn’t realised how powerful the Organisation was, how closely linked it must be to the world’s governments, or at least to their defence organisations. In a matter of hours they had been able to identify a target, set out a strategy and then obtain the resources to make a move.
A staggering, awe-inspiring move.
He felt himself sweating. He clenched his fists so tightly he could hardly feel his fingers; this was how it must be to sit in the electric chair and watch as someone pulled the lever without anything happening. And now they were going to try again.
On the wall of screens stood his wife, one face among the countless reporters up there.
But her picture was a little clearer, a little closer, a little better.
Christina Sandberg wanted to be the best. Once again, she’d succeeded.
And he was terrified that this time, it would cost her her life.
‘Connors?’ he said.
Connors looked at him. He hadn’t heard Sandberg walk up to his table; he’d been standing with a phone pressed to his ear and his eyes glued to a laptop, and whatever Sandberg wanted, now was not the time.
But Sandberg’s gaze was steady, refused to let him go.
‘It’ll be the last thing I ask of you,’ he said. ‘But do me this one —’
‘Sandberg, this is not the time —’
‘That’s my wife over there,’ he said, pointing at the monitors. ‘It’s the only time there is.’
‘It’s too late to stop it,’ Connors said.
‘She has nothing to do with this. She’s what, fifty metres away? Less? A blast wave at that range – for fuck’s sake, Connors, let her get out of there first, let her take cover, she’s innocent —’
When Connors cut him off, it was with a voice so sharp it sliced through the entire room.
‘They’re all innocent!’
Every set of eyes in the room was watching them, everyone was following their argument as if it were a painful intermission before the real show started again.
Connors lowered his voice, desperation and uncertainty evident in his eyes. This wasn’t their plan A, or even plan B; they were so far down the alphabet that he’d lost track of which particular last resort this was. All he knew was that he’d started the game with a stack of chips and reasonable odds and now their money was gone and they were about to go all in with absolutely no chance of winning.
And the scenario was all his. He was the one who’d created it, though it had never occurred to him that one day they’d be standing here for real.
‘They’re all innocent,’ he said. ‘Everyone inside that building, everyone aboard flight 601, everyone who was on the ground when it hit. Every single one of the millions of people who are going to be infected by this disease, passing it on like rings on the water until there’s no one left to spread it to. Innocent. That’s why we have to stop it. No matter how wrong and inhumane and how much of a fucking disgrace it is.’
His calm was back. But it was a sad calm. His eyes pleaded for William’s understanding. He didn’t want to take command, didn’t want to be alone in this. Understand me. That was the only thing he wanted to say. Forgive me, and try to understand.
‘There’s nothing I can do, Sandberg,’ he said.
‘You can give me my phone.’
He thought he’d said it matter-of-factly, calmly, but judging from the silence around them he’d shouted it.
For a moment he sensed a hesitation, and he realised that he had a chance: there was still time, seconds, maybe less, but there was a window and it was closing for every second that passed.
‘You have my phone,’ he said, each syllable working its way up from his belly, a restrained force vibrating with fear and anger and the threat that there was no telling what he’d do if Connors didn’t comply.
And William looked into his eyes.
‘Somewhere, you have my phone. You can give it to me. And you can do it now.’
Leo Björk was so intent on his task that he jolted from sheer fright.
One second, he was staring into Christina’s composed face, watching her mouth move without hearing her voice above the sounds of wind and helicopters and the traffic in the street below, concentrating on keeping her in the frame with the hospital visible behind.
Then, the next second, he was looking at William Sandberg.
He stood smiling and tanned in a slanted sun, the sky behind him a burning blue, his image filling the screen where Christina had been a second ago. The contrast with the reality around Leo was so striking he didn’t understand what he was looking at.
Incoming Call, it said. William Sandberg.
And for the first time he heard Christina’s voice above the chaos.
‘Leo! What’s happening?’
He raised his eyes from the screen, saw her pushing her earpiece harder into her ear. Someone from the newsroom was speaking to her.
‘They’re saying they lost us!’
‘It’s him! It’s William!’
For a moment she didn’t understand what he was saying.
She’d been surfing along her own thoughts, she’d heard every one of her sentences lead seamlessly into the next, she’d been on a roll – and the next moment she had an entire newsroom shouting into her ears that she was gone.
It was all extremely frustrating. She’d been right in the middle of a terrific monologue about fear and uncertainty, and now here was Leo, shouting her ex-husband’s name and making no sense whatsoever.
He turned the phone around.
And then she got it.
Now he calls me, the bastard. Now.
Part of her wanted to take it. After all, he was the reason she’d come here. But the reporter in her knew that she couldn’t, not with a screaming editing room in one ear and the racket of a news inferno going on around her and the wind pulling her hair and drowning her thoughts.
She had to make a decision.
And she already knew what it would be.
‘He can call back,’ she shouted above the commotion.
‘It’s William,’ Leo protested.
‘And he’s alive. And that’s great. And he can call me back!’
She was still shouting as she took the few steps towards Leo, grabbed the phone from his hand and rejected the call.
In less than a second she’d switched it to meeting mode, directing all incoming calls to her voicemail. When she handed the phone to Leo the camera was already running. She returned to her spot, pulled the headset microphone in front of her mouth:
‘We were cut off. But we’re back. We’re ready to go live when you are.’
Jameson had passed his target, and it hadn’t gone unnoticed.
The radio had screamed in his ear.
The commander had raised his voice, launching a tirade about duty and conscience, and eventually Jameson had been worn down.
He had turned his jet 180 degrees in a long, smooth motion and now he was heading back towards the web of highways and suburbs. In the middle of it all lay his target, and he already knew that this time, he’d do it.
Jameson had never said a prayer in his life. But as he flipped up the transparent cover on the firing switch he sent out a plea for forgiveness.
Christina Sandberg’s voice spoke across time. It spoke from back when everything was the way it used to be, from a place where the only background noise came from office machines and phones and journalists, busy at their desks.
It said her name and declared that she couldn’t take his call right now, and William let the seconds pass until the tone told him he could leave his message.
‘Get down from the roof, you’re in danger!’ he said. ‘Call me. I’m okay, call me now!’
He hung up and tried again. Refused to give up that easily. There had been a number of tones before the voicemail kicked in, which meant the phone was on and she’d presumably rejected him manually.
The green button. A second’s silence. Then her voice again.
It was the same formal voice, from the same preserved moment, and then came the same tone and William closed his eyes in frustration and hung up.
This time, no signals.
She’d turned it off.
She was working, and she didn’t want to be disturbed. The stubborn woman had turned off her phone. He raised his eyes in exasperation and that was when he saw her again.
He felt Janine touch his arm to get his attention, but he was already watching: on one of the monitors in front of them, where a second ago there had been a black screen and emptiness, the feed was back. And there she was again: Christina, as serious and professional as before, looking straight into his eyes and into everyone else’s, as if she hadn’t been cut off, as if she hadn’t rejected his call, standing in the thick of the action, just as she’d always wanted.
He stood there, watching her.
She stood there, didn’t see him.
And there was nothing more he could do.
He didn’t even turn around as the uniformed officer stepped in from the lobby, stopped on the other side of all the dark blue chairs, cleared his throat with eyes directed at Franquin.
‘He’s in the zone,’ he said.
‘His orders still stand,’ said Franquin.
And the officer nodded, made his way back outside, while nobody else moved.
All their eyes glued to the news screens.
Amsterdam in front of them.
There were twenty people in the room and every one of them was holding their breath.
Albert had finally found the business card. He punched the number with shaking fingers, hoping that he was wrong and that the roar of the oncoming jet didn’t mean what he feared it would.
As soon as she answered he interrupted her. But her voice carried on, a recorded message in a language he didn’t understand, a few short words and then a tone to give him the chance to speak. But he didn’t.
Instead, he lowered the phone. Screamed her name straight out into the chaos of the rumbling night. Knew perfectly well that she wouldn’t hear, but what else could he do?
It was out of his hands.
And he looked up at the sky and searched for the lights of the jet and waited.
The seconds that ticked by in the parliament couldn’t seem to decide whether they were fractions or eternities or both.
There was nothing anyone could do.
Time rushed past.
And yet it lingered long enough for each new moment to pierce everyone’s consciousness with an icy clarity.
Connors’ eyes on William.
William’s on Christina.
Everyone’s on the screens.
The seconds came, floated and left, each one perhaps the final one before the inevitable happened, not now, but maybe now, or now, or now —
The light news helicopter hovered around the hospital, the cameraman pressed against the Plexiglas in search of the best angles, his lens chasing across the hospital façade to catch a glimpse of what was going on inside the windows and why.
But there were no signs of movement within, no one looking out, no one walking the corridors, not a single shadow that shifted in any of the windows on any of the floors in any corner of the building.
Perhaps everyone was locked into some other part of the hospital. Either that, or the rumour was true. The rumour on the street, the one saying that everyone inside was dead, that this was the reason nobody was answering
their phone, not patients, not staff, not visitors.
The cameraman ordered the pilot to fly as close as possible.
If he could only zoom in on the wards, come up with a shot that would prove or disprove all the speculation, his images would end up being regurgitated on every media outlet worldwide. And so his lens kept hunting while the helicopter slowly, slowly hung in front of the façade like an insect looking for that last, fresh flower.
And then, everything changed.
The moment the windows turned to milk he knew something was wrong.
William exhaled. Not because the tension was over but because his body needed oxygen. For a moment he allowed himself to believe that the pilot had passed by again, decided to disobey orders. But before he’d finished the thought, it happened.
The blast wave, taking out the windows.
The first thing he noticed was how the huge building behind Christina shuddered, almost imperceptibly, then lit up in purest white for a fraction of a second, and before he could grasp that the white was made up of millions of cracks in the hospital’s windows as they shattered everywhere and at the same time, the white was gone, transformed into blackness as the panes collapsed, tumbling down along the façade, leaving the entire building as a black hole behind it.
Christina dived to the ground in front of the camera, instinctively turning to see what was happening. Beyond her, the open floors lit up from inside, a raging glare from a growing flower of fire, starting from somewhere deep inside where the missile had detonated, and swelling, spreading like a concentric cloud, outward and upward and downward through all the storeys until it reached the open windows and the air outside and engulfed the building in a wall of smoking gold.
When Christina turned back to the camera, her eyes fell on Leo.
But on the other side of the European continent, William stood looking deep into the eyes of his own wife, and there were so many things he wanted to say.
Chain of Events Page 26