Sugar & Squall (19 page)

14. HOPE

“Do not move,” he said. The command was loud and resolute. The gun Logan had dropped was behind the Eagle on the floor. My chance was gone.

But there was something I hadn’t realized. Because of the way the room door swung inwards, Logan was completely out of the Eagle’s sight. It had to be close, though. Another step inside the room and he’d see his outstretched legs. But if Logan could keep quiet, under the rain, he might be okay.

I stepped forward to make sure. The Eagle stepped back, holding the gun higher.

“Stop,” he barked, in a deep rasp.

“Do
exactly
as I say and you won’t suffer the same fate as your friend.” His English was surprisingly good.

It took me a while to work out what he was saying. Then it clicked. He thought Logan was dead.

The Eagle’s eyes locked with mine. He pulled a walkie-talkie from his belt and raised it to his ear, speaking foreign words. The only reply was static.

It might have been the fact we were cocooned somewhat by Carver’s stone walls or maybe that the person who he was trying to contact was rotting away at the bottom of the rat’s nest. I didn’t imagine moisture and mud would be conducive to a clear radio signal, not with a storm like this passing over.

Snap.

I could still hear the sound of bones breaking in my head.

I knew Logan was right there, but I didn’t dare look at him directly.

The Eagle addressed me. “We are leaving. If you try to escape, I will shoot you in the leg,” he said, tagging it with a shift of the gun barrel. “Do you understand?”

I nodded.

“Move,” he ordered, and stepped back out into the hall. As he did so, I looked to Logan. He tilted his head in acknowledgement, but I couldn’t make out what he meant. Did he want me to go? Did he want me to try and get away? I hated not knowing. I hated being in the dark, in a storm and feeling like I’d just been dragged across a bed of nails. I hated Logan sitting there, bleeding out by my hand.

I filed out the door, leaving Logan helpless.

The Eagle kicked the spare gun down the hall. I heard it slide away. And then he waited.

We moved down the hall, the Eagle walking behind, his gun trained on my back. The rain had not relented.

Logan could have made it into the hall by now, to the gun.
Shoot!
I thought.
Shoot him.
Then I realized that would not be as smart as it sounded. We walked at such close proximity, this Eagle and I, that the bullet might run right through him and into me, or Logan could miss, hit me. It was too risky. Once we were out of the hallway, that would be it.

I saw the knife glint on the floor to my right. A second of thought and I reached to grab it. The air parted to my side and something hard smashed into my ribs. I cried out, collapsing to the ground.

The Eagle lifted me to my feet.

“Walk!” he commanded.

I tried to slow down the pace, give Logan time to act.

“Faster!” the Eagle demanded, pointing.

The further we walked from the room, the more I shook. I wrapped my arms around myself.

I kept thinking
Logan, save me
. Problem was, I knew the effort alone to follow us would make him weaker. With every step he’d come closer to me and, in doing so, death.

The wind had taken on a keen chill outside. Rain dotted my face until it pooled together, heading south over my exposed skin.

I held my hands up to my face and saw blood caked all over. I wiped them on my jacket, but it did little.

The Eagle was sporadically prodding me in the back and attempting to find reception for the walkie-talkie. Every time he’d mutter some obscenity when all it gave up was white noise. I suddenly realized why he was so keen to make contact. It was so simple.

“I know where the keys are,” I shouted, turning to face him, “the keys for the helicopter.”

He pulled up.

“Your man. He’s dead on the track, down there.” I pointed in the direction of the rat’s nest.

The Eagle eyed me suspiciously. “Show me,” he said, raising his voice to power over the din of the storm.

The walk to the rat’s nest would take fifteen minutes, tops. I couldn’t expect Logan to save me, shoot the Eagle’s head off from a window, especially not in this weather. I had to come up with a contingency plan.

Worst case, I would be killed when the Eagle realized where the keys were. Or maybe he’d twix some wires together and the helicopter would kick into life. I’d be taken hostage after all.

Whatever the case, it couldn’t come to that. I wasn’t prepared to be the Presidential jewel in their captive collection.

The faster I could be done with the Eagle, the faster I could return to Logan, the faster I could help him, help everyone perhaps.

A fork of lightning kissed the ocean far ahead. I hoped another would strike the Eagle. After all, he was the one with the big metal gun.

We continued to walk down the path. I was going as slow as I could, emphasizing my limp, which wasn’t hard with my legs aching as they were.

The rat’s nest drew closer. Before, I’d had the element of surprise on my side. Now I had nothing.

I could run, but in the open the Eagle would have a clear shot at my leg. I could fight, and lose. No, that wouldn’t do. Every idea and suggestion my head threw up all ended the same way – a big, fat dead end. I had to make a choice, though. I had to do
something
.

We’d arrived at the rat’s nest.

A boy in seventh grade once told me I had ‘kickassitude’ after I punched Lucy Myers in the nose for calling me a PMSing bitch-slut – whatever that meant. My period hadn’t even started. That was the funny thing. It hurt like all hell, the punch, given I’d tucked my thumb in, but she never bothered me again. I had to summon that now. I had to tap into the primal side of myself that had put me here in the first place.

I took us slowly around the edge of the rat’s nest. I looked back to see the Eagle surveying the pit. If he was surprised there was a giant, gaping hole in the middle of the path, he didn’t show it. I just hoped he wouldn’t get the urge to use his walkie-talkie. The other end of it was lying at the bottom. If he worked that out, what I’d done, trouble would come fast. It was just as likely lightning would illuminate the bottom, but that relied on the Eagle looking down at the same time. Even with the extra light, it still might be too far down to make anything out, though.

Two for one?
My head was spinning.
Could it work again?

Could it? The Eagle was keeping his distance. I had to bring him closer if I had any chance. Coming to the other side of the hole, drawing as close as I could to its edge, I made my move.

I feigned tripping over, but put too much effort into the action, collapsing largely on my funny bone and sending nervous oscillations down my arm. I cried out, a little too late, and grabbed my ankle with my free hand. I moaned and rocked in an attempt to add some degree of realism to the fall.

“My ankle,” I stated, craning up to him. The edge of the rat’s nest was a few feet away. That would have to do.

The Eagle approached.

“Get up,” he commanded.

“I don’t know if I can.”

“Get – up,” he repeated, sterner.

“
Okay
. Hang on.”

This was it. I pressed my left hand deep into the mud, scooping it together. I prepared myself, swung around and threw it straight at the Eagle’s ugly, three-holed head.

While I was a poor soccer player, I’d always been good at throwing things, sport or otherwise, so the mud met its mark accurately accounting for the slop that had run out between my fingers.

It hit the Eagle square in his eyes. He grunted, but did not drop his gun as I’d hoped. I brought my leg around in a low roundhouse to his knee, but he didn’t falter.

I sprung up, charging his torso with my shoulder and all the effort I could muster to force him off balance and into the rat’s nest.

We collided. It felt like I’d run into a marble column. His footing remained firm. I tried again, harder, ramming into his side. Twisting his head, he struck out with the body of the gun. I tried to dodge it, but miscalculated. It hammered into my side, the full measure of the Eagle’s anger behind it, and I was thrown onto my back, sliding down the slope.

Defeated, I watched the Eagle’s one free hand reach to his face to pull away the mud that had stuck fast to his balaclava. A sheet of lightning threaded through the clouds above. An aching sensation radiated from my ribs.

I took the remaining steps to the Eagle full-speed, crazed. He raised his gun above his shoulder, butt out, bracing to drive it into my head, and I pulled up, panting.

“Stupid bitch!” he cried, pulling off the balaclava and peeling away at the mud around his eyes as his head twisted back and forth. He couldn’t find focus.

The revelation of his face made me cower. A deep scar ran from his forehead to his chin, a giant chasm of crimson red. I’d seen it before.

You’ve got be kidding me,
I thought.
He’s the God-damn janitor
.

He was here the whole time, watching, waiting. No wonder his room was spotless. He knew what wa
s going to happen all along. He’d planned it. The schematics, the maps. It all made sense.

The Eagle adjusted his gun. There was a distinct ‘click’ as something flipped into action. The barrel wavered in the air, struggling to find its mark, to find me.

A gunshot rang out from the direction of the school.

Logan.

The Eagle turned.

I made my mind up while he was distracted, heart pumping afresh. I turned and ran as fast as I could.
I put one foot in front of the other. I was out of options. I would draw the Eagle away and work out the rest from there.

I decided to head for the chapel and hide. Buy time. Clear my head.

A bullet zipped past me and into the ground to my left, sending dirt ricocheting off my shin.
He’s aiming for your legs.

Another shot. Too close, the mud spraying up.

The Eagle was somewhere behind me, but all I could feel was the slant of the rain, tiny spear-points pressing against exposed skin.

I sprinted, so fast, building speed, building distance. 

Thunder boomed down again, crashing into the shallow valley below, and there was the chapel, perched like a stranger about to leap into the ocean, slide off into the sea.

I turned back to see the Eagle had disappeared from sight, not that I could see much past the hill.

The chapel came into view. With the background of the storm, it really did like look like a deck of cards teetering on the edge of a table. Some of the side boards flapped or bended in the wind. Creaks and groans emanated from every side. It was the last place I wanted to be in these conditions.

There’s no choice,
I told myself.

Reluctantly, I ran through the entrance. It had been light and open with Logan. Now, with the storm, it was hard to distinguish anything inside but jagged shapes and planes. Everything had closed in. Wind and rain howled around the interior. Being blown over was one issue, but when I stepped on the first board and felt how slippery the surface had become, I realized there were more dangerous obstacles at hand.

I stood behind the doorway and watched through the cracks. Slowly, something emerged past the hill. The Eagle was coming, and the best hiding place was below.

Carefully, I moved from board to board. I’d paid close attention when Logan had led and knew the best path was directly down the middle between the pews.

Most of the wind was being funneled through a triangular opening in the roof, which created a whistling resonance even more terrifying than the walk itself.

The ocean felt like it was literally under my feet. Rain flew about the room, making it hard to see.

I stepped up onto the small stage at the back and dragged the rug aside, pulling the trapdoor open only to reveal a vortex of wet bluster. I eased down onto the ladder, the wood heavy on my skin. With my head just past the top of the trapdoor I reached up onto the stage and dragged the rug over the top, just as I lowered my head and the trapdoor to see the Eagle step through the chapel door.

I swallowed hard. Had he seen me?

I moved down the ladder fast, visualizing Logan waiting in the cave below.

Above, I could see the
Eagle moving between the floorboards. One of them cracked and I stopped dead, fearful he’d set into motion some perilous chain reaction.

The ocean had been stirred up into a washy soup of white and black below. It heaved itsel
f against the cliff-face, the force of each impact sending a tremor up the rocks. It was laying siege to the island.

The ladder was moving with the wind
, twisting against the straightjacket of gravity that a storm of this nature imposed upon it. I was beginning to question its safety.