Hillary drew her blaster and trained it on the girl's chest. "Let him go, you little bitch!" she said.
"Not until you tell me where he is!" The young woman lifted Balthasar's head until it was directly in Hillary's line of fire. "If you don't tell me, I'll kill him." Her voice was menacing, but beneath it there was a waver which suggested she was unaccustomed to delivering threats.
Hillary was sure she could beat her; all she needed to do was distract her long enough to get a clean shot. "Who?" she asked calmly, taking a sidling step forwards.
The woman skittered back nervously and Hillary stopped moving for the moment. "The one-eyed man. You're wearing his clothes. You must know where he is."
Hillary smiled. "He's right behind you," she said.
Unbelievably, the woman glanced back, swinging O'Blarney's head round as she did. Hillary would have wondered how anyone could be that gullible, if she hadn't been too busy shooting the girl in the exposed soft flesh of her stomach.
After that, three things happened at once.
Balthasar's head fell from the young woman's suddenly slack grasp.
The young woman gave a muffled cry of pain and crumpled slowly to the ground.
And, behind her, the small shuttle that was their only means of escape reached the end of its ignition sequence and blinked out of existence.
The other Strontium Dogs stared at Jo in horror. The little room was so silent, Johnny could hear each individual breath everyone took, and the slight rasping sound as Middenface absently scratched the lumps on his head.
"Are ye sure?" Middenface asked.
"No, you cretin, she's just joking around," Red snapped at him.
"Dinnae take that tone wi' me!" Middenface snapped back, holding up his fist and advancing menacingly towards her.
Enigma started crying again. "Make them stop shouting," she said to Johnny.
"Now look what you've done!" Red said to Middenface.
"Ye're the one who-" Middenface began.
"Will. Everyone. Be. Quiet!!" Johnny yelled furiously.
Middenface and Red turned offended eyes on him, but at least they stopped talking.
"Thank you." Johnny turned to Jo. "This bomb. Where is it?"
She screwed her eyes shut, concentrating. "It's here," she said eventually.
Middenface snapped his head round the antechamber, but save for them it was entirely empty. "Where?"
"Everywhere," Jo said.
With a sick feeling, Johnny realised what she meant. "He's turned the whole planet into a bomb?" he asked.
Woman Man nodded.
Johnny took a deep breath, forcing down the bubble of panic that was trying to push the air out of his lungs and a desperate scream out of his throat. There'd be time enough for panicking once they were dead. "What sort of bomb?"
Jo's eyes widened in horror, as if only just realising herself. Perhaps she was, perhaps her mutant gift didn't work until she was asked. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out except a dry squeak. Only on the third attempt did she manage to get the words out. "A time bomb. When it goes off, the whole planet and everything on it will be destroyed at every point in time."
"Well what the hell does that mean?" Red asked angrily.
"It means," Johnny said, "that not only will it cease to exist, it never will have existed."
"Doesnae do things by halves, does he?" Middenface said with an attempt at nonchalance that would have been more impressive if his voice had been an octave lower. "I mean, most folks would settle for just blowin' it up."
Johnny thought he was finally getting it. He had to concede that Hillary and O'Blarney's plan had been brilliant. Brilliant and deadly. "It's not overkill, I'd say it's just the right amount of kill. See, O'Blarney's been having an affair with Galactic President Hillary the-"
"He's been what?" said Middenface.
Johnny shrugged. "It's a long story. Thing was, Chick Delater found out about it, and he was planning to blackmail Hillary with it - that kind of hold over her, he could pretty much write himself a blank cheque. Only thing he needed was some evidence - the kind of evidence O'Blarney would be carrying around in the memory circuits in his head."
"I get it," said Red. "Which is where we came in."
Johnny nodded. "Exactly. Except that Hillary and O'Blarney were one step ahead of Chick all the way. He didn't track O'Blarney here, O'Blarney meant for Chick to come here all along, the one place where he could build a bomb powerful enough to wipe Delater out as a threat. In fact, I'd bet any amount of money it was Hillary who got the original time bomb set off here in the first place."
Middenface looked doubtful. "Do ye really think they've been planning this for so long?"
"Why not?" Johnny said. "You don't get to be Galactic President by thinking small. So they came here. O'Blarney got the native people to help him excavate the chronite. Told them he was working on a cure for them, something that could slow them down. But he didn't care about them he just needed to stockpile enough pure chronite to make sure that once a chain reaction was set off it would take the whole planet. Then he sat here and waited for Chick to arrive. Only Chick didn't arrive. He did what O'Blarney couldn't have guessed. Hired himself some Strontium Dogs.
"O'Blarney must have panicked then, hidden himself away from the first party of Stronts till they'd aged to the state we saw them in. But by the time Delater sent us, Hillary and O'Blarney had Plan B in place. Hillary swapped places with one of the Stronts - lucky for her, One-Eyed Jack had already been on her payroll, so getting him to co-operate was a piece of cake. They pulled the switch on the way to the planet. I guess she used military espionage technology for the disguise."
"Hang oan a minute!" Middenface said. "You're telling me One-Eyed Jack was Hillary...?"
Johnny nodded. "From the moment of planetfall, yeah."
"Holy Hamish," Middenface said, "to think I was hobnobbing with the galactic elite without even realising it!"
"Point is," Johnny continued impatiently, "it let O'Blarney keep an eye on us, make sure there was never any chance of us sneaking up on him. My guess is they intended to keep just one of us alive to tell Delater that O'Blarney had been killed."
Middenface blushed. "Aye, well, I guess that would have been me."
Johnny shrugged. "Don't sweat it. I let O'Blarney pull a bait and switch on me - run off and swap his real head for the trigger while I'm too busy worrying about Min Qi Man to guess what he's up to. So thanks to us, while Hillary and O'Blarney head off into the sunset, Chick turns up to find a welcome he wasn't expecting."
During the course of this, they had all unconsciously stepped away from the thing they had believed to be O'Blarney's head. It stared up at them now, its dead gaze mocking.
"But," said Red, "I still don't get why they went to all this trouble. Why not just leave a nice dirty nuke behind?"
"Because," Johnny replied, "they couldn't be sure that Delater hadn't told anyone else what he knew. They didn't know if he'd stored the information somewhere, to be released to the public in the event of his untimely death. But with a time bomb, Delater wouldn't just be dead, he'd never have been alive. He'd never have found out about Hillary and O'Blarney so he never could have told anyone else. They'd get away with it scot-free."
There was a moment's silence as they all absorbed this.
"So I guess the question is," Red finally said, "what sets off the trigger and how do we stop it happening?"
"I know what I'd do," said Middenface. "You wouldnae want to go to all this trouble, only to ha' it go aff without Delater here."
Johnny nodded. "I think so too. I think the bomb's been set to trigger when Delater touches the head."
"Well, what are we waiting fer? Let's blow the wee thing away now!" Middenface drew his gun and pointed it at the head.
Johnny hurriedly grabbed his arm. "No! Too risky. For all we know, destroying the trigger might set off the bomb."
"Then what do we do?" Middenface demanded.
; "There's only one thing we can do."
"Let me guess," said Red dryly. "Make sure Delater doesn't touch the head?"
Middenface grinned. "Weel, that's awright then. Piece o' cake!"
His grin slipped as the room filled with a terrible grinding, tearing sound. It was the loudest thing Johnny had ever heard. He clapped his hands against his ears in agony. Then he ducked, as a rain of debris shook free from the ceiling, which suddenly seemed far further away than it should be and was getting further away still.
In a moment, the ceiling was gone entirely. Johnny squinted against the sunlight glaring in from the suddenly exposed sky. A moment later, the light was blocked out by an enormous metallic skeleton. Somewhere in its centre, a tiny pink figure could be made out.
"Oh good," said Chick Delater. "You've got him."
The huge, piston-powered exoskeletal hands flung the ragged remains of the roof casually away and reached in towards the thing that looked exactly like Bad Boy O'Blarney's head.
23 / GROUND ZERO MARK TWO
"Don't touch it!" five different voices screamed simultaneously.
The giant form of the exoskeleton paused, mid-stoop. Its outstretched hand was only a metre away from O'Blarney's head. "Why?" Chick Delater said. His voice, hugely amplified, boomed around the small chamber.
"It's a trap," Johnny said. "It's the trigger to a bomb."
The vast metallic head swung to face him, mimicking the much smaller motion of Chick's own body. Johnny felt two pairs of eyes boring into him: huge glowing red ones, and smaller, paler pinpricks. Neither set looked convinced. "What bomb?"
"That dirty wee nyaff O'Blarney's turned the whole planet into a time bomb," Middenface said. As he spoke, Johnny could see his hand drifting slowly, almost imperceptibly, towards his holstered gun. "If ye touch yon head, it'll be a trip to the jam factory for all o' us."
The huge head swung towards Middenface. "Ah, Mr McNulty, I thought I recognised your dulcet, albeit near incomprehensible tones. I'm delighted to see that you've managed to live through to the bitter end. However-" the volume of the voice suddenly increased dramatically, so that they all took an unconscious step away from Delater - "if your hand moves any nearer to that gun of yours, please rest assured that you won't be living for very much longer. Do you understand?"
Middenface hesitated for a second.
Moving unbelievably fast for something so huge, Chick's burnished steel fist flew through the air towards Middenface's head. Johnny could feel the wind of its passage from three metres away. He leapt towards his partner, not sure what he intended to do, just that he intended to protect him whatever the cost.
But the fist stopped a few centimetres in front of Middenface's nose. It was the same size as the Scottish mutant's entire body. Close up, Johnny could see the level of detailing that had gone into creating it the silvery mounds of the knuckles bisected by the strong, thin line of the bone, the glittering skin pocked with tiny pores.
"I said," Delater continued in a bored voice, as if nothing had happened, "do you understand?"
Johnny saw Middenface gulp visibly. "Aye," he said. He moved his hand away from his holster, holding both arms stiffly out at his sides like a self-conscious ballerina.
"Now," Delater continued, "far be it from me to suggest that there might be an element of dishonesty creeping into our discourse, but I can't help feeling that you might perhaps have ulterior motives for preventing the completion of this mission..."
As he spoke, Johnny saw Durham Red slowly sidle round his side. He frowned, trying to warn her to stay still, to prevent her from putting them all in danger. Middenface, Johnny knew, was lucky to still be alive. If Delater hadn't been such a fan of theatrics, he could just as easily have disposed of the Scottish mutant by detonating the small device hidden in his chest. And if he started with Middenface, there was nothing to stop him moving on to the rest of them. Now that Delater believed O'Blarney was dead, their usefulness to him was over.
So Johnny frowned at Red, willing her not to do anything stupid before he had had time to figure a way out of their problem. She caught his eye, saw his expression and smiled. Then she pointed at her own eyes, and pointed at Johnny's. It took him a second to work out what she wanted. She was suggesting that Johnny read her mind. He hesitated. What was she playing at? No one ever wanted their mind read, it was too much of a violation.
As Johnny tried to figure out what Red's game was, he realised that Delater was still talking. Johnny supposed he should be glad that the little mutant was so fond of the sound of his own voice. He had risen from his crouch again and was looming over the Strontium Dogs, hands on hips, like a giant statue of some ancient admiral. "Don't fear, though," he was saying now with mock solicitousness, "that your usefulness to me might be over. I rather like having Strontium Dogs at my beck and call. I might, if you're very good, even consider paying you some of the bounty I promised. Although, frankly, I wouldn't hold your breath..."
Johnny realised that he really didn't have a choice. Red might not be the most trustworthy Dog in the House, but he'd take her over Delater any day. Careful to show no trace of it in his face, he tuned out Delater's voice and focussed in on Red, on her eyes, into the dark depths of her pupils. He focussed all his attention down on those two little points, looking at them, through them and into the depths of her mind...
Red paused a moment in her silent movement around O'Blarney. Two small parallel frown lines appeared on her brows, as if she felt Johnny's alpha rays as a small annoyance.
Johnny felt the momentary blinding pain that always accompanied any use of his powers. But it passed quickly, and he was in, the journey more smooth than he was used to because for once he was being welcomed, guided to the memory that he needed to see...
He needs to see this, Red thought. I need him to distract Delater, to do whatever it takes, while I do what I have to do.
It was a very strange feeling, inviting someone into her mind this way, even stranger to be able to feel him there, a ghostly presence that was like an itch somewhere behind her eyes. But she ignored the discomfort as best she could and concentrated instead on feeding him pictures, of what she and Middenface did earlier, and of what she intended to do now. She wasn't sure if she'd succeeded, if her visualisations were clear enough for him, but after a moment she felt him withdraw. His mind, strong and warm and angry, was suddenly gone from her, leaving her alone with her thoughts. She felt an unexpected sense of loss.
But she didn't have time for that. Johnny's eyes locked fiercely with hers, then looked back at Delater's vast exoskeleton. She didn't need to be a mind reader to know what he meant. He had understood. She could trust him.
She continued her slow, careful manoeuvring to place herself directly behind Delater, out of his field of vision. Every little step she took, she expected him to turn to face her, to send his fist flying at her as he had at Middenface, only this time there would be no reprieve, no stopping, and the fist would smash her into pulp.
"So, in short," Delater was saying, "I am afraid I am going to ignore your warnings, imaginative as they are, and collect the prize for which I've come such a long way."
Sneck! Red thought. No more time. She wasn't where she had intended to be, she'd barely made it round to the side of Delater's hulking silver leg, but it would have to do. Now, all she needed to do was climb it. Only now she was here, it didn't look so easy. From a distance, the exoskeleton had looked as if its complex mechanics would provide plenty of handholds. But up close, she could see the sleek surface of the outer material. The workings were all hidden within the skeleton, well out of her reach. She put a hand against it. It felt as smooth as it looked, and much colder.
Slowly, the leg began to lean forward. Delater was crouching down, she realised, preparing to pick up O'Blarney's head. The other Strontium Dogs were shouting at him to stop, but he ignored them. The exoskeleton's leg was at eighty degrees, then seventy, then nearing forty-five. And though the silvery slope of metal still lo
oked forbiddingly steep, Red knew she must move now, or Delater would touch the bomb's trigger and it would all be pointless anyway.
She took one deep breath and launched herself onto the giant silver bone in front of her. For a horrible second, her feet failed to find any purchase and she began to slide straight back off again. But then the leg lowered still further, her foot settled into the metal, and she began to force herself upwards, trying to keep going through momentum and sheer strength of will.
Below her, she could see Delater's hand reaching for O'Blarney's head. As she reached the knee joint, his fingers were less than a metre away from it. Come on, Johnny! she thought. I'm doing my bit - do yours!
And he did. Seconds before Delater's fingers reached their target, Johnny Alpha leapt in, reaching for the head himself. Red, knowing he could only buy her a very little time, began to force herself up the inside of the silver thigh, pushing herself up by leaning against the thick central bone, and pushing her legs against the thinner bone which lay beside it. Little by little, she began to make her way towards Delater's hips.
Below, she saw that Delater was too quick for Johnny. One of his fingers flicked out and knocked Johnny aside, flinging his body into the wall with force enough to break bones.
Red stifled a despairing cry as Delater's fingers continued their motion towards the small robotic head.
But they never reached it. Somehow, the head was floating into the air of its own accord, lifting up, then flying towards Johnny.
Red realised it was Enigma. She saw the mutant, the woman who had become a little girl, being cradled in Woman Man's burnt arms. Woman Man was whispering something in Enigma's ear, and the girl had her arm out, pointing at O'Blarney's head, directing the power of her mind which, thankfully, seemed to have survived her strange de-aging.
Johnny, clearly shaken by the fall, still managed to catch the head and hug it to his chest.
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