Lockdown

Sixty-eight

The room was empty when Lock got there. There were some books, some of the boy’s clothes, but no Josh. The thought that the escapees had already reached him first flitted briefly through his mind, although there was no blood or sign of a struggle.

He picked up one of the boy’s sweaters and stood there for a second. Then he walked back out, and straight down the barrel of an M-16 wielded by a white-faced Hizzard.

‘Get down on your hands and knees.’

‘Hizzard, we don’t have time for this bullshit.’

Fear seemed to have defaulted Hizzard to auto-pilot. ‘How did you escape the accom block?’

‘I teleported.’

Hizzard jabbed the gun at him. ‘Get down on the ground.’

Lock waved a hand in front of his face. ‘Hizzard, it’s me, Lock. Remember?’

‘You’re a detainee. I’m tasked with apprehending and returning all detainees to the accom block.’

‘Well, good luck with that. You’ve got twelve pissed-off Chechens, or Iraqis, or Pakistanis, or whatever the hell they are, on the loose right now, and we don’t have much time to contain them.’

A burst of small-arms fire neatly punctuated Lock’s condensed rundown.

‘How do I know you ain’t lying?’

‘Who gives a damn if I’m lying or not? Didn’t you understand what I just said? This is a level four bio-research facility which is in the process of being taken over by terrorists. We act now or we all die.’

Hizzard reached for his radio.

‘That’s not going to do you much good either. I’m guessing the ops room’s been breached. You won’t get any sense from anyone up there.’

Doubt flickered in Hizzard’s eyes. ‘Base from Hizzard.’

The response was the empty crackle of static, then a voice, female, with an accent. ‘Hizzard from Base. Go outside and lay your weapon on the ground.’

Under other circumstances, Lock might have allowed himself a smile as he watched the oh shit expression seep across Hizzard’s face. Instead he grabbed the M-16 from him.

‘You have a sidearm?’

Hizzard lifted the flap of his jacket. ‘Glock.’

‘Better than nothing, I guess,’ Lock said, setting the M-16 to single shot and heading back outside, Hizzard trailing reluctantly in his wake. ‘How many guards you guys have on duty?’

‘Round about a dozen.’

‘Round about?’

‘I think.’

A classic Brand-run operation, thought Lock. ‘And what about weapons? M-16s and Glocks?’

‘There’s other stuff in the armoury.’

‘Whoa there, soldier, what armoury?’ Lock asked, looking around for the door back to his own universe.

‘That building over there.’

Hizzard pointed through the gloom to a small squat building about four hundred yards away placed between two other blocks. Lock had assumed it was some kind of boiler room or back-up generator facility.

‘You have access to it?’

Hizzard reached down to his belt. ‘Sure, got the key right here.’

‘Terrific.’

‘What?’

‘Well, if you have the key I’m assuming the other “dozen or so” guards have one as well.’

‘I dunno.’

‘Come on then, Einstein, let’s go take a look.’

The main door was wide open when they got there, reinforced steel rendered useless by a profusion of keys. Amateur didn’t even begin to describe the place. Lock let Hizzard step through first, then followed him inside.

A few boxes of assorted shells lay scattered on the ground, but judging by the empty shelves and gun racks, the place looked to have been pretty much picked clean.

The distorted lid of a large grey metal chest stuck up at forty-five degrees. Hizzard yanked it open and peered inside. ‘Oh shit.’

‘What was in there? Rocket launchers?’ Lock asked.

‘No, that was where Brand kept the plastic explosives.’