Ice Claw

24

The vans pulled into a vast underground area. It had an industrial chill. In the depth of the tunnels that led off from this massive cave torn out from the mountainside, Sayid could see machinery, lots of it-big earth-moving equipment, tunnel-boring machines, excavators; this was the workmen’s entrance.

The men pulled him towards a set of lift doors. An armed, uniformed guard without insignia watched them approach. He nodded to Sayid’s captors and pressed a button. Doors hissed open and Sayid was pushed into a crystal elevator. It felt as though he were inside a diamond: purposefully cut edges illuminated with soft-glow halogen lamps splashed colors about, like refracted light. They ascended rapidly. Light flickered, catching the bare rock face visible through the etched crystal, every scar on the rock’s surface throwing back the colors.

There was sufficient distraction for Sayid to stop being scared for a few moments. The lift slowed, its power source purring gently, bringing it to a halt. Only when the doors opened did he realize just how high up he was inside the mountain.

His captors pushed him out. In front of him was a massive window. Clouds drifted below. He must be thousands of meters high. The temperature was cool; the smooth, polished rock floor gleamed with reflection.

“I hope you are impressed,” a voice said from across the far end of the room.

The man moved closer and Sayid squinted against the mountain-top light, trying to make out the man’s features as he got closer. When he did, he shuddered.

“And scared, I see. Good. You should be,” Fedir Tishenko said.

Abdullah’s words bothered Max during the flight to Geneva. Just what did he mean? Sophie had chosen him? And would fight for him? But she had stolen the pendant. That was theft and betrayal. Who was she selling out to? No. It didn’t make sense. One thing did, though-the clock was ticking and it seemed to be moving faster than usual. Twenty-four hours and Zabala’s prediction was going to smash this area like a hammer on a walnut. Max gazed down at the banana-shaped Lake Geneva as the plane banked for landing. The city huddled along the western shoreline, nudging the border with France. Max looked across the runway. Barely a couple of kilometers from the airport, modern shedlike structures huddled together on the open plain. That was CERN. How or why they were involved in Zabala’s disaster Max did not know, but he could see that if anything catastrophic went wrong there, Geneva would be wiped off the face of the map.

Beyond the lake and city, piranha-toothed mountain peaks raised themselves skywards, snapping at him as if he were a morsel being tossed into their jaws. Welcome to the land of cuckoo clocks, chocolate and violent death.

Corentin watched the passengers move through Geneva International Airport’s arrival hall. Max Gordon would be heading for the airport’s train station, which would take him to the center of town, six minutes away. He didn’t want to miss the boy. Trains ran every fifteen minutes, but if Max Gordon spotted him he would run-and that could ruin everything. There were other kids milling around, a damned school trip. He flipped open his mobile. Thierry was looking out for Sophie at the Gare de Cornavin-the main train station in town.

“She there yet?”

“Train’s running early. Another five minutes.”

“Damn. It’s too close, Thierry. He’s gonna miss her. Stay with her. I’ll take the kid here.”

Corentin broke cover. He had to flush Max into the open. Make him run. Scare him into panic. That was when Corentin would get him, when the boy’s head gave him wrong directions and few choices. Out the doors, into the streets-vulnerable. Traffic, and the chance that the kid didn’t know Geneva, would give Corentin the edge.

Max mingled with the school trip. The Italian youngsters chatted and shouted, excited about going to Lake Geneva; the cacophony of voices mangled any chance of the teachers’ instructions being followed. Nonetheless, their practiced herding abilities shepherded the children towards the main exit doors.

Max allowed the surge to carry him along, his eyes looking beyond them, flitting along the scattered people in the terminal. He checked a wall clock. Still time. Sophie’s trans-European train wasn’t due for another half hour. As the school tour swarmed, Max stepped out from among the confining bodies. He quickly made his way towards the escalators at the end of the terminal that would take him down to the platforms. If he could reach Sophie he’d get straight on a city train to the nuclear research center and warn them. Had Fauvre got through? Had he convinced them of anything? Or was Max going to arrive and be met with blank incomprehension-or the police?

As he passed one of the automated ticket machines he saw the dark shape of a big man in a leather jacket. And his eyes bored right into Max. It was the same hard man from Mont la Croix who had tracked him to the hospital at Pau. How had he found him? It didn’t matter, Max was already sprinting for the escalators, but he could see that the big man moved just as fast-he was fit and strong. The escalator’s grooved tongue swallowed Max downwards, but not quickly enough. Max got his backside onto the rubber handrail and slid down faster than he could run.

A train clattered away. The platform was empty except for a couple of bewildered tourists. Max sprinted towards the end of the concourse; he’d jump down and run if he had to, right between the tracks. He didn’t have to look behind him to know that the man chasing him was close. Max was younger and fitter; he would outrun him. He would make the older man suck air until his lungs couldn’t take it any longer. But that wasn’t happening. If anything, the man was gaining on him.

Max was running out of platform. The tunnels would be dangerous, but there was no choice. He had to jump onto the tracks. In the split second of his decision he saw a service door to his left. The NO ENTRY sign was for the rest of the world, not Max Gordon. Throwing his weight against the push bars, he tumbled into the corridor. Halfway up the service corridor’s walls, red, blue and green stripes ran like London’s Underground route map. If only it were-he’d know exactly which direction to take. The doors slammed open behind him.

“Max Gordon! Stop!”

Max ran on, momentarily bewildered as to why the hard man called him by name. He ran deeper into the corridor, bounced his shoulder against the end wall as he turned left, almost ricocheted off the opposite continuing wall, and saw another door, painted red, another sign-it indicated HIGH VOLTAGE DANGER. It was a T-junction. Blue line left, green line right.

He ran left, saw the flight of stairs, knew he’d made the right decision and leapt up the first four steps.

Double doors, one-way exit. Fresh air blasted his face. It was a stunning day. The cold air gave him a spurt of energy, and the brightly lit sky was a glorious cosmic arc lamp that beamed down, adding power to his legs.

Running hard along the side of the building, he saw that the area was enclosed by security fencing-access was through a manned barrier four hundred meters away. If he didn’t get out of this enclosed space, the man chasing him seemed intent on only one thing.

Max reached the fence. Coiled razor wire meant he could not go over the top. He turned, pushing his back into the mesh, using it as a springboard to push himself away again. The bulk of his pursuer loomed a meter away. How had he caught him so quickly! He anticipated Max’s dummy jig to the right, an arm caught Max around the neck, and suddenly he was smothered. But the man didn’t squeeze the life out of him, he held him, letting Max squirm and fight and yank at the encircling arm. Max kicked hard against the man’s shins. He never flinched. Max was held like a wild animal in a net, and the more he fought the quicker he weakened.

He was not going to die! Not without a fight. He slumped, let his weight fall, knowing it would take the man by surprise as the wriggling mass suddenly became limp. Then he would roll free.

It didn’t work.

The man went down on one knee, supporting Max’s weight, and twisted his arm, so that Max was turned away from him. His knee pressed into the small of Max’s back as he held him with a grip that felt like iron.

Facedown, arm behind his back, cheek pressed into the tarmac. This was the end. Max knew it. This gorilla was going to snap his neck. Dad! Help me! Max was blacking out, the air forced from his lungs. Yet still he tried to kick and squirm. A useless attempt to stave off the inevitable. The sunlight blinded him, blood pounded in his ears. He saw peaks and snow, remembered Aladfar’s warmth, smelled the mountain bear’s musty fur as the eagle’s scream echoed through his memory. But no strength came to him. No animal power surged through his body.

Max had become an endangered species.

Sayid shivered. The men searched him, ripped apart his backpack, shredding it for any evidence the boy might have about Zabala’s clues. They found nothing. They let him get dressed, but Sayid’s trembling was not due only to cold and fear; his body needed food and drink. His throbbing foot hurt, the pain robbing his nervous system of what little stamina he had left.

Tishenko knew Sayid had little value other than to entrap Max. His killer had sent word to the Moroccan girl. She would bring Max Gordon to Geneva because no one would let their friend die. Not that it mattered. In a few hours they would all die anyway.

“Get him a wheelchair,” Tishenko said to one of the men.

He sat opposite Sayid, his scaly fingers lifting Sayid’s chin so he could not avoid Tishenko’s eyes. “You are tired, boy.”

Sayid nodded. He did not want to begin any kind of conversation with this man.

“And you are in pain from your broken foot. I understand pain. It can suck the life out of you, take you to a point where you no longer care whether you live or die. Are you at that point?”

“No, no. I don’t want to die.”

“Of course you do not. There is nothing for you to be afraid of. I will not cause you any pain, I promise you. But you would like some hot food and to sleep?”

Again, Sayid nodded. The whisperlike voice was almost hypnotic.

Tishenko turned to the men. “Bring him,” he said as he stepped towards the lift’s doors.

They plummeted silently to below ground level. This was a different area from any that Sayid had seen before. The glistening machinery, pristine in its technologically sophisticated environment, hummed with subdued power. A fanlike structure towered above him; it had to be at least sixty meters high, taller than a cathedral. Sayid felt the size of an ant as Tishenko walked across the vast floor. Immense cables encased in copper-colored bindings, conduits thicker than a bus, snaked away from the machine’s rim and disappeared back into the rock face. Tishenko watched Sayid’s amazement.

“You like science?”

Sayid could only nod. The complexity of what he was looking at was beyond his comprehension.

“Twelve years, thirty-seven billion dollars, fourteen inter-locking tunnels with a twenty-one-kilometer particle accelerator circuit, one hundred and fifty meters below ground-and the best brains money could buy. Each scientist completed his area of speciality and then left. Only I and a chosen few understand the importance of what we shall achieve here.”

“Which is what?” Sayid said, hoping the man’s ego would allow him to give away vital information.

“An energy source the likes of which no one has dared contemplate. That capacitor you are looking at weighs nineteen thousand tons. It will store energy for a microsecond, then blast it to the heart of the mountain, where …”

Sayid watched the man’s barely moving features, the skin destroyed so long ago it was like a mask. But the eyes sparkled from a mind’s-eye vision of something beyond imagination. Tishenko had stopped short, allowed his secret to remain buried, and looked again at Sayid.

“I don’t want to bore you with the details. You need your sleep.”

Sayid felt tears of fear well up again. There was something final in those last few words.

They went deeper into the tunnels, the colder air creating plumes of breath, sapping the last of his strength. Even the men shivered, but Tishenko showed no signs of discomfort. Sayid could stay awake no longer. His head dropped onto his chest. He snapped it up again. He must be hallucinating. Blurred figures behind a wall of ice moved away, the colors from their clothing seeping into nothingness. He was in a chamber like the inside of an ice cube. Moist air flowed around him and froze. Forcing his mind to beat the exhaustion, he opened his eyes. They hurt. Frost stung them. He tried to lift his arm and wipe away the frozen tears, but something held him. He was pressing against an invisible wall. His body was restrained. What little warmth remained in it retreated under the onslaught of the freezing air.

Starlight glistened, the sky so black it was impenetrable. Shooting stars flickered across his eyes; surging waves of deep blue, purple and whiter-than-white light stole his consciousness. A small whisper took perverse pleasure in telling him that his core body heat should not fall below thirty-seven degrees centigrade, that when it reached thirty-five degrees hypothermia set in; below thirty-three death was likely.

Sayid’s mind teased him with numbers that meant death. He was already much colder than that.

He held one last breath in his lungs.

His final thought before the swirling stars turned to dark matter and nothingness was how to get the decoded message to Max.

Max sat strapped into the front seat of the black Audi. The big man had scared the life out of him less than ten minutes ago, but now he was more relieved than he could imagine. The hard man’s name was Corentin, and ever since Sophie Fauvre had run away from her father to seek out Zabala, Corentin and his partner, Thierry, had been paid to shadow her. To make sure she didn’t get into trouble. They didn’t know at the start how Max was involved, but when they lost her at Oloron, they traced him to the hospital. Find Max Gordon, find Sophie Fauvre; but Max had given them the slip. They thought they’d succeeded in scaring Sophie home when they finally caught up with her at Biarritz and let her see them. They followed her to the old chateau, kept track of the two of them down to the station and watched them get on the train. Corentin’s job was done. Fauvre was a dear friend-from the old days when Corentin lived in Paris. Fauvre had phoned again, when Sophie ran from Morocco to Geneva, and asked him to protect both her and Max.

The ex-Legionnaire kept the car in low gear as he cut and thrust through the traffic, his cell phone attached to the dashboard. Thierry’s voice gave a nonstop commentary.

“I can see her. She’s heading across the bridge for the park.”

“Don’t let her see you. She’ll spook and we’ll lose her,” Corentin replied as he floored the accelerator and powered past slower-moving traffic.

“Shut up and do your own job,” Thierry sparred back. “How close?”

Max could hear he was running.

Corentin ducked his head and checked their position, his eyes flitting between rearview and wing mirrors, searching for any gap in the traffic where he could take advantage.

“Two minutes.”

“There’s another girl. She’s seen another girl, walking towards her now. She’s slowed. Something wrong here….”

“Damn!” Corentin swore as a city trolley bus blocked his way. He thrust a street map at Max with one hand, swung the steering wheel with the other. “Can you read a map? Get us to Parc la Grange!” Corentin didn’t wait for an answer. “We’re on Rue du Roveray.”

Max’s eyes scoured the street map, but his mind raced faster than the engine revved. Who was the girl Sophie was meeting?

Max’s finger traced their intended route as the big car swung through the traffic. “Rue de Montchoisy, left!” Max instructed.

“No! Gridlocked! Next! C’mon, kid, c’mon!”

The pressure was on him, but Max stayed focused. He was the navigator now, and the big man had to follow his instructions. “First left, Rue de Nant, it’s one way-in our favor.”

Corentin was driving fast and expertly, ducking and weaving. Horns blew. A near miss. Brake. Heel, toe, clutch, change down, high revs, engine screaming. Redline the rev counter.

“I see it!” he told Max.

Thierry’s voice: “Can’t get any closer, Corentin. Come on! How close?”

“One minute …” Another surge of power.

“I have to take her now. They’re arguing. She’s got a necklace or something. Trouble! Bikers!”

“Give them the pendant!” Max shouted. “It’s worthless!” But he knew his cry of alarm meant nothing. “Turn left, fifty meters, then right!” he ordered Corentin.

“Dammit, kid! More warning!” Tires burned rubber as Corentin heaved the big car across the intersection. “I see the park!” he yelled at the phone. “Three hundred meters! Two … one fifty! Thierry, where are you?”

Thierry’s labored breathing heaved down the phone. “Picnic site …” Interference scrambled the line, then the last words picked up again: “… fighting … Get here!”

Max gripped the dashboard.

Corentin’s face was dark and threatening, eyes locked onto the park entrance. He shuddered the car to a halt and was out of the door before Max could release his seat belt.

Max ran. Sedate rose gardens and sculpted ponds lay farther to the left, then the park merged into trees and open grassland. He could see the rolling fight two hundred meters ahead. Thierry was throwing one of the bikers to the ground, the machine’s wheels spinning dirt and grass, roaring as the throttle jammed. The kid had no chance against Corentin’s partner-he was unconscious before he hit the ground.

Bikers swirled like attacking wasps. Corentin, fifty meters ahead, was already grabbing one of the outriders, literally kicking the bike from under him. Max knew what those iron fists were doing to the rider.

He saw Sophie run after the girl whose back was to him. She spun around, faced Sophie and grappled with her.

Peaches!

Max almost stopped running in shock. Two other bikers headed for the girls. No sign of Sharkface. Where was he? He had to be here. Had to be.

“Peaches!” Max yelled.

His ploy worked. The girl lost concentration for a split second, looked across towards him, and fell hard to the ground as Sophie stepped in and body-slammed her down.

The two bikers would have reached Max but for Corentin and Thierry, who were playing their own game of block-tackling. The hardened ex-soldiers had known war and conflict, had endured physical and mental punishment few could imagine, so those two bikers were going to get stopped. And hurt.

Max was just thirty meters away now. He knew that Peaches was not only a strong athlete but also a killer, and she wasn’t going to let Sophie win an easy victory. She scissor-chopped with her legs. Sophie went down, rolled, grabbed the edge of the nearby park bench, pushed her legs like pistons, balanced, twisted her body as if she were on a pommel horse in a gymnasium, and was back on her feet.

Max could see that Peaches had the pendant wrapped around her fist. That didn’t matter anymore. Saving Sophie did.

It was then that Peaches spun like a karate expert.

Generating enormous power, she gripped something else in her fist: a blunt metal stick.

“Look out, Sophie!” Max shouted.

His warning saved her. She lurched back. Another grapple and she would have Peaches at a disadvantage. But her leg gave way and she fell badly, going down on one side, her head hitting the concrete base of the park bench.

Max saw her slump. She was unconscious.

“Corentin!”

The warning cry was no sooner out of Max’s mouth than he saw the hard man react. Max sprinted after Peaches. She had all the answers.

Corentin was almost at Sophie. “Look after her!” Max yelled, then ran as fast as he could towards the escaping girl.

There was no further threat from the bikers, who were all down. Max sucked in air, pumped his arms and drove his legs. He was gaining.

Sharkface loved his crew. They were the only family he had ever known. And he was well aware that Tishenko could hurt one of them if he didn’t succeed-that was a hold the withered-faced man kept on him. But now Tishenko’s killer, the pretty one, the one who looked so glamorous, who had no physical blemish-she was taking the glory. She had replaced Sharkface, a common thug, in Tishenko’s favors. Once she delivered the pendant she could have whatever she wanted from the madman.

Sharkface waited, silent and unmoving, in the cab of a 4?4 in the trees. From his vantage point he saw the men in leather jackets fight his boys, saw them getting hurt, and watched as Max Gordon ran into the fray. Tishenko had told him that only the Fauvre girl and Max would arrive. But these two men were professionals. Their presence was a mystery.

Peaches had won her fight, and she ran towards him. Sharkface’s instructions were to get Peaches, the pendant and Max Gordon back to the mountains. But the situation had changed. Max and Sophie were outnumbered, but these two men had turned the tables. Priorities shifted. Sharkface could not take on the English boy. Not that he couldn’t beat him, he thought, but it was he and Peaches who were now outnumbered. It was the pendant Tishenko prized more than anything. Deliver that and Sharkface could have whatever he wanted.

He knew the Hungarian girl was a cold-hearted killer, and he also knew that if their roles were reversed she would grab the opportunity that now presented itself.

The engine was idling. She was running straight up the hill towards his vantage point. He was far enough back in the trees not to be seen. She ran hard, but Max was less than thirty meters behind. He was going to catch her. Sharkface blinked the headlights. This way! She sprinted, made up some lost ground and crested the hill.

Sharkface floored the accelerator and two tons of 4?4 traction leapt forward from the trees. Potyncza Jozsa, the smiling Peaches, the chic expert skier, adored by young men and a ruthless killer, took the impact full on. The last thing she saw before life went out of her eyes was a smiling ragged-toothed mouth.

Sharkface slammed on the brakes and skidded five meters-straight at Max, who threw himself to one side. He tumbled and rolled down the incline. By the time he was on his feet, Sharkface had retrieved the pendant, leapt back into the car and roared away, the wheels tearing grass.

Max raced through the trees and caught a final glimpse of the 4?4 as it slowed, dipped out of view and then moments later joined the main road, heading east. It was the wrong way! If there was going to be a problem at CERN, the nuclear research center lay to the west! Then the 4?4 disappeared from view.

Moments later Max’s trembling hand touched Peaches’s neck. She looked as though she were sleeping, curled on her side. But there was no pulse. Conflicting feelings confused him. Was he afraid of touching the girl he had once thought of as a friend, who was now dead-or fearful of resting his hand on a killer?

Corentin checked Sophie’s injuries. She was slipping in and out of consciousness. Thierry tied up the bikers, leaving them facedown, wrists bound to ankles.

“Police will be here any second,” Corentin said. “We’re taking her to the hospital.”

Max nodded. “How badly hurt is she?”

“I don’t know. A crack on her head and something wrong with her leg. There’s blood, look, in her ear. I think it’s a fractured skull. We have to be careful with her.” Corentin turned away, whistled to Thierry to join him.

Max pushed the hair back from her face. “Sophie, what’s going on? I don’t get it.”

Her eyes opened, blinked a few times, and stayed open, as if she were just waking from sleep. “Max?” She smiled. “Thought I was dreaming. Knew it was you. I’m sorry.”

“Why did you steal the pendant? You should have told me everything.”

She was weak but she could hear him. Her voice faltered. “You were sick. You did not trust me.”

Her words hurt, but it was the truth.

The Audi rolled across the grass towards them. Sophie tried to reach something in her jacket pocket. “Max, he’s in the mountains. My phone, get my phone. She told me, Peaches told me. That’s where they have him … in the Citadel.”

Max pulled out her phone. She was losing consciousness again.

“Sophie, hang on. Your dad sent these men to help us. We’re OK now.”

She shook her head. “Sayid …,” she whispered. A brief smile and she reached up her hand to touch his face. “I tried…. Sorry, Max.” And then her eyes closed.

Max held her, not wanting her to die.

Corentin eased her away from Max, checked her pulse. “She’s alive. We’ll get her to Emergency.”

Corentin and Thierry lifted her gently onto the backseat of the Audi.

“Get in,” Thierry told him.

He shook his head. “I can’t. I have to go on and try to stop this thing. Whatever it is. Look after her, Corentin. If you hadn’t been here they’d have killed her. Thanks.”

Max pulled his backpack from the car.

Corentin was behind the wheel and Thierry cradled the unconscious Sophie on the backseat. They had done their job. Max Gordon was not their problem, but Corentin admired the boy.

“And you? What thing? Where are you going?”

It was suddenly all too big a problem. As if someone had told him to climb a sheer wall of ice dragging a Land Rover behind him. “Somewhere called the Citadel. I’ll find it.”

“Other end of the lake,” Thierry told him. “Mountain ranges. You can’t go there-you don’t have the gear. Come with us.”

Max looked at Corentin. They both knew he wouldn’t.

The stubble-faced man pushed a folded map through the window. “Take this. You’ll need it.”

Max nodded his thanks. “Corentin, if you know anyone in the French security services, cops, anyone, talk to them. Any contacts you might have.”

“And tell them what?”

“Check back with Laurent Fauvre. He’ll explain.” He snatched the folded drawings and notes from his backpack and shoved them at Corentin. “There’s a triangle. It pointed to CERN, the nuclear research center. Here! Geneva! I was wrong. I got it wrong. The line crossed those mountains, same direction, different location. You tell them there’s going to be something huge, in these mountains. It’s critical. Tell them!” Max pulled the pack onto his shoulders and was already running as Corentin eased the Audi away.

Sirens announced that the police were on the way. Max looked at Sophie’s cell phone. Why was she trying to reach it?

She wanted him to have it. Why? He pressed the buttons, found the text messages and his heart almost thudded to a halt.

Man who takes the animals has Adrien. Bring monk’s pendant and Max to Parc La Grange, Geneva 7. Sayid is with me. I can help.

Your friend, Peaches

Sophie had realized her friend was a liar and had betrayed them all. There was no Adrien. He did not exist. Peaches could not have known that.

But they had captured Sayid.

Today was the seventh. Zabala predicted catastrophe for the morning of the eighth. Max had been wrong about Sophie. She had tried to save Sayid. Abdullah’s words now made sense. She had fought for Max. Now it was up to him to fight for Sayid. He had to get to the mountains to save his friend.

And stop the madness.