One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night

by Christopher Brookmyre

  ‘Ally. McQuade.’

  ‘Well, you looked like you had some initiative earlier on, and I’m gonna need a bit of help. Grab that guy’s Uzi. There’ll be a handgun on him, too. Get that and whatever ammo he’s carrying.’

  McQuade looked a little startled, but he nodded and moved off towards the indicated corpse.

  ‘Anyone here got any combat training?’ Jackson asked. It was worth a shot. ‘TA, anything.’ No response. ‘Paint-balling? Clay pigeons?’ Still nothing. Jesus. He looked to McQuade. ‘Who can I rely on?’

  McQuade swallowed. ‘Charlie,’ he said, pointing towards the bloke who’d helped him after Connor beat him up. He’d have been Jackson’s first choice, anyway: he looked ballsy, alert and fit as a butcher’s dog.

  ‘You up for this?’ Jackson asked him.

  He got to his feet. ‘Aye. And I’ll see you later,’ he told McQuade.

  ‘Good man,’ Jackson said. ‘What’s your surname?’

  ‘O’Neill.’

  He indicated the other body. ‘Get yourself tooled up, O’Neill. We’re gettin’ out of here.’

  Jackson surveyed the floor again. The clock was ticking, no time to work out who among them could best handle this. He looked to the woman who’d shut up the screamer – she’d been ahead of the game then, so she was as good a shout as anyone. She nodded back nervously once he’d caught her eye, then stood up and walked forward.

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Lisa McKenzie.’

  ‘I’m Jackson. McQuade, give her your handgun and any spare clips.’

  McKenzie walked across to where McQuade still squatted, pulling items from the dead guard’s belt. He handed her the Beretta, gripping it by the barrel, which Jackson took to be an encouraging sign: at least he knew which end the bullets came out. McQuade then passed her the three clips he’d been able to find. Having no pockets in her dress, she slipped them into her evening bag and slung it over her shoulder.

  ‘There’s one more gun, so might as well have one more volunteer,’ Jackson announced. He walked closer to the huddle of resort staff. ‘Who here knows the layout of this place?’

  An unsure hand went up, some teenager who looked barely old enough to be legally in work. Jackson thought of the kid downstairs, with his roaches and his pin-ups. At least this one would get the chance to shoot back.

  ‘I don’t know it well, like,’ he ventured. ‘I’ve just takken a few walks aboot the place.’ Jackson recognised the Makkem accent with a smile.

  ‘What’s your name, son?’

  ‘Potter. Jamie Potter.’

  ‘O’Neill, give Potter that pistol. Maybe there’s someone from Sunderland who can get his shots on target.’

  Jackson checked his watch, estimating he could allow himself all of ninety seconds for basic weapons training. Tactical tutorials he’d have to carry out on the move.

  ‘Are you … an undercover agent or something?’ McQuade asked.

  ‘No, I’m just a bad guy havin’ a crisis of conscience. Keep your fingers crossed it doesn’t wear off.’

  ‘So what’s this all about?’

  ‘Later. Right now we’ve got to get everybody out of this place before the search parties get back. McKenzie, O’Neill, get everybody lined up two-by-two, we’re goin’ out the side door there. Do you both know how to use those things?’

  ‘This is the safety here, right?’ McKenzie said, correctly indicating the switch.

  ‘Yeah,’ Jackson confirmed, taking the gun from her. ‘Potter, you watch this too. When your clip’s empty, you press this release, slam the new one in, then pull back here. McQuade and O’Neill, I want you holding those things with both hands at all times. I know you’ve seen guys firin’ them one-handed in the movies, but believe me, that’s the magic of Hollywood. If you tried it, the recoil would have you shootin’ into the ceilin’ after about three rounds.’

  ‘What do you do if it jams?’ asked McQuade.

  ‘Pray that your partner’s doesn’t. Potter, we can’t go near the front, so where can we get to from here?’

  ‘There’s lifeboats at the back of the hotel on this level.’

  ‘No good. There’s look-out teams at the north-east and south-west corners.’

  ‘Aye, but if we’re already away—’

  ‘They’re armed with rocket launchers. They might even have worked out how to use them. We need somewhere we can make a stand. Elevated position, good lines of sight, with access channels we can control.’

  Potter looked blank.

  ‘All right, I’ll settle for whatever’s the furthest point on the rig from here.’

  ‘The Carlton, then. It’s the hotel at the north-western corner. There’s no electricity there, though.’

  ‘It’ll do. If they can’t see us, that makes us harder to shoot. Can you get us there?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘I mean, without using the surface level? Without going outside?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Good man. All right, listen up. McQuade: you, me and Potter will take the front. O’Neill and McKenzie, you guard the group from the rear. Everybody else, keep your mouths closed, your feet moving and your eyes open. Let’s go.’

  21:55 fipr a game of soldiers

  Ally was glad he’d nothing left to puke. The Uzi was heavy in his hands as he ran, a solid weight of cold steel and responsibility. Seeing Jackson alongside him should have been a reassurance, but in fact it only made him feel worse, as the soldier’s expertise thickly underlined how little Ally knew what he was doing. As soon as they’d got out of the ballroom’s side door, for instance, Jackson had waved him and Potter ahead while he crouched in front of the exiting group, covering them against anyone appearing in the corridor that led back to the lobby. He’d made it to the front again by the time Ally and Potter reached the stairs, where he nipped nimbly through the door first, pointing his machine gun up then down the stairwell in a blink of the eye. After that he’d practically glided to the level below, and signalled that they were clear to follow. They descended again to sub-level two, where Potter said there was a staff access-corridor linking the Laguna’s lower reaches to the central entertainment complex.

  Every corner threatened Ally with the dry heaves, as it seemed the more of them they turned without meeting confrontation, the greater the likelihood that it would be found around the next one. The drill was becoming no less terrifying for its increasing familiarity: he and Jackson approached ahead of the group, Ally crouching on the floor tight to the wall; then after a silent, gestured count of three, Ally would stick his head and his gun around the bend to provide potential covering fire, while the big man dived across the gap and righted himself into a kneeling position on the other side. After that they’d signal Potter to bring the party forward; or rather, Jackson would, while Ally gave himself CPR.

  ‘You’re doing all right, McQuade,’ Jackson assured him, presumably when he was looking particularly liable to barf up his actual stomach now that its contents were all gone.

  ‘What’s the plan?’ Ally ventured to whisper, breathing out again after another bend mercifully failed to yield a firefight.

  ‘Plan?’ Jackson replied, his voice a low burr. ‘We get to the Carlton, we barricade ourselves in, we shoot anyone we don’t recognise and we hope they run out of bullets first.’

  Ally swallowed. He was hoping for something a little more Jerry Bruckheimer and a little less Zulu. He knew Michael Caine’s mob won that one in the end, but doubted tonight’s assailants would be as likely to retreat in tribute to their opponents’ bravery.

  ‘That’s it?’

  ‘So far, yeah. Unless you had some scheme in mind for once you’d finished ferretin’ through the ventilation ducts?’

  ‘Well, can’t we try and contact the police or somebody?’

  ‘Telephone transponder and radio transmitter have been disabled.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I helped disable them.’

  ‘Oh. Wh
at about your radio?’

  ‘The range is too short. It operates on a limited frequency too, so the cops can’t hear us. Outside contact was something we took great pains to prevent. It’s unfortunately one of the few things we actually pulled off tonight.’

  They got to their feet as Potter caught up again. According to him, the staff access-corridor was dead ahead.

  ‘So what is this about?’ Ally asked.

  ‘What do you think?’

  Ally remembered the mix of accents: Irish, Scots, English; there might even have been a Yank. Politics could make for strange and varied bedfellows, terrorist politics more so, but for that perverse an orgy, there could be only one lubricant.

  ‘Money.’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘The usual. Give us some or we’ll blow your head off.’

  ‘Gavin?’

  ‘All of you. But it’s his show, so all the transfers were to go through him and thence to the time-honoured unnumbered offshore account.’

  Ally didn’t quite follow the technicalities, but the principle was familiar enough.

  ‘That’s all this is about? Fuckin’ robbery?’

  ‘Extortion, technically, but yes.’

  ‘Christ, if I’d known Gavin was worth that much I’d have mugged him myself,’ he muttered. Jackson gave him a look he couldn’t quite read, but he looked away before Ally could enquire further.

  The access corridor was unlit, smelled strongly of gloss paint and was only wide enough to travel one-abreast. Jackson went first, pointing a small torch, Potter next, blocking Ally from what little light the beam spared. Behind Ally the rest of the group were filing in and along as fast as they could, hand-to-shoulder, enveloped completely in darkness. It felt like walking down the barrel of a gun. Fifty-odd people crammed into a tight passage with no idea whether there were killers waiting for them at the end. Tactically speaking, Jackson said, it was Russian roulette: nothing to worry about if the chamber’s empty, but no getting out of the way if it’s not.

  Potter recommended that they keep going past the first door they reached, which accessed the multiplex (‘a bloody rabbit warren’), and take the next one, into the bowling lanes. Ally didn’t fancy extending this march through the blackness, but as the latter route sounded like it would involve fewer corners, he counted his blessings when Jackson opted for it.

  Once through the door, Jackson handed Potter the torch and told him to find some lights: ‘The bare minimum – we don’t want it to look like bloody Blackpool.’

  Ally watched the beam bob away along one wall, leaving them in darkness as the rest of the group began to spill one-by-one from the door. Potter flicked a switch somewhere and a row of lamps came on at the front of the hall, above some of the pool and air-hockey tables, on-hand to gobble your change while you waited for a lane. Jackson signalled that it was enough and Potter returned. The three of them stood to one side as they waited for the whole party to reassemble intact before progressing further.

  Jackson looked darkly at Potter. ‘There’s something you should know, lad,’ he said in a low, hoarse tone. ‘Those two blokes missing from the staff head count – they’re dead.’

  Potter nodded solemnly. It didn’t look like it had come as a huge surprise, but Ally suspected few things would tonight.

  ‘Who were they?’ Jackson asked. ‘Did you know them?’

  Potter nodded again. Even in the half-light Ally could see tears glistening. ‘Stevie Grant. He was same as me – just here for the summer, skeleton staff, like. Christ. Stevie.’ He swallowed. ‘And Mr Vale, the security bloke.’

  ‘Security guard?’

  ‘No, he’s – was – some sort o’ consultant. I didn’t know him, meself. I knew Steve, though. Steve was a mate.’

  Jackson put a hand on Potter’s shoulder. ‘I’m sorry to lay this stuff on you, lad, but it’s best that you know now, so that if you get any of these shitehawks in your sights, you won’t have any little moral dilemmas about pullin’ the trigger.’

  Potter nodded, wiping his eyes. ‘Who are they?’ he asked with a sniff.

  Jackson sighed. ‘Oh, a real advert for the human race. Mercenaries, thugs, what you call “adventurers”. The couple I bagged back there were ex-terrorists. IRA or UVF, I don’t even know. They’re all the fuckin’ same under the balaclavas: vicious little cunts who like shootin’ people. Their excuse used to be politics. Tonight it’s money.’

  ‘And who are you?’

  ‘Don’t ask, lad. Don’t ask.’

  Jackson shook his head and looked behind, to where Eddie Milton and Allan Crossland were emerging from the access corridor, bearing the unconscious figure of Kenny Collins. Eddie had his torso, Allan his legs, and Ally realised they must have carried him like that all the way from the ballroom.

  Eddie shook his head as he caught Ally’s eye. ‘Never even liked the cunt an’ here I am savin’ his life,’ he said. ‘Bet he’s no’ even fuckin’ grateful.’

  ‘Aye,’ Ally replied, ‘but think of all the people who love him.’

  Eddie stared back sternly. ‘I’m tryin’. I’ll gie you a shout if I come up wi’ wan.’

  Lisa McKenzie and Charlie O’Neill appeared finally at the rear, at which point Ally feared the insanity of the evening had begun to infect his perception: each of them was starting to appear less incongruous holding a gun. Charlie had his sleeves rolled up, Uzi cradled in his muscular arms, steely expression, close-cropped bullet-head: Ed Harris, The Rock. Lisa, party dress, pretty face, evening bag, hand-cannon: Ann Parrilaud, Nikita. Ally didn’t feel he merited an equivalent comparison. He was wearing a white shirt but he suspected it might as well be a red jumper. He even had the poignant, all-to-live-for, baby-on-the-way back-story, and was grateful that he hadn’t shared that with anyone yet, as it invariably sentenced you to a bullet in the next reel.

  All present and correct, Jackson gave the signal to get moving again. They headed to the doors through a seated snackbar area that overlooked the polished, unused lanes. The smell of wood varnish would have had Ally hallucinating if things weren’t mental enough already. All around, the floorspace was cluttered with polythene-wrapped bundles of skittles, and larger, moulded-cardboard pallets of brand-new bowling balls, like enormous egg-boxes.

  Potter guided them along a tiled corridor lined with empty shopfronts, familiar names on many of the signs above the doors. Obviously Gavin was the expert when it came to resorts and all that, but Ally couldn’t help wondering if he’d ever heard the phrase ‘getting away from it all’. This place would be like going on your holidays to the St Enoch’s Centre. He imagined how hilarious Annette would have found the place, then put the brakes on the thought. When he pictured her face, it drove home everything he had to lose, and everything she had to lose too. Images of his pregnant fiancée standing by his graveside were not constructive. He had to keep her out of his head, and concentrate solely on the matters at hand.

  ‘By the way,’ he therefore asked Jackson, ‘why have they got rocket launchers?’

  ‘Emergency measure. Part of the contingency if the authorities find out what’s going on. They’re for taking pot-shots at anything that comes near this place, air or sea, to deter attempts at intervention. After that, it would be a matter of negotiating hostages’ lives for a helicopter out of here.’

  ‘But that’s Plan B.’

  ‘Yeah. Plan A was – is – to get in an’ out of here without anyone knowin’ about it. That’s apart from you lot, who can’t contact the mainland and aren’t due to be picked up until tomorrow morning, by which time the bad guys – who you can’t describe because they were wearing ski-masks – will be long gone.’

  ‘Sounds like the better bet. I’m no’ sure you could negotiate a helicopter against a bunch o’ scrotes fae Auchenlea. Be lucky to get a rowin’ boat.’

  Again, Jackson gave him that quizzical look. ‘What?’

  ‘Just a joke.’

  After that they had to n
egotiate another blind chicane along a second access corridor. The good news this time was that it was only about half as long. The bad news was that there were no lights to switch on at the end of it, Potter having been right about the Carlton’s lack of electricity. There was, however, a staircase only a few yards away from the exit, flanked by windows that looked out the back of the structure, over the water. The pale glow of the moon somewhere above seemed ample illumination after such total blackness. Ally reckoned that if he could see his own pupils, he’d look like Betty Boop.

  According to Potter, half of the top floor was taken up by an open area earmarked for a restaurant, as opposed to the standard warren of rooms and corridors. Jackson decided they would make their stand up there. Ally didn’t imagine this was well received by the Kenny-bearers, but no-one was in much mood for dissent. Up they climbed.

  ‘What’s Auchenlea, by the way?’ Jackson asked, his voice rising above a whisper for the first time since the bowling rink. ‘Is that the name of your company?’

  ‘Eh? Naw, it’s where we’re all from,’ Ally told him. ‘Just ootside Paisley.’

  ‘All of you are from there?’

  ‘Originally, aye. This was a school reunion, remember. Until you lot fronted up.’

  ‘This was a what?’ Jackson hissed, stopping dead.

  ‘A school reunion. St Michael’s Auchenlea. It’s where we all know Gavin Hutchison from, although nobody seems to remember much aboot him. Christ, they’ll no’ forget him efter this, right enough.’

  Jackson began moving again, now aware that the whole group froze every time he hesitated. ‘Wait a minute, let me get this straight,’ he said. ‘This is a school reunion?’

  ‘Aye, how many times—’

  ‘Not a hospitality junket for investors in the floating-resort project?’

  ‘Whit?’

  ‘And you’re not all wealthy venture-capitalists, here to be entertained while you greenlight the electronic transfer of investment funds to Gavin Hutchison’s company?’