Private Games

Chapter 83

MID-AFTERNOON THAT SECOND Friday of the Games, the third from last day of competition, Peter Knight entered the lab at Private London and hurried gingerly to Hooligan, holding out a box wrapped in brown paper and parcel tape.

‘Is this a bomb?’ Knight asked, dead serious.

Private London’s chief scientist tore his attention away from one of the Sun’s sports pages, which featured a piece on England’s chances in the Olympic football final against Brazil. He looked uneasily at the package. ‘What makes you think it’s a bomb?’

Knight tapped a finger on the return address.

Hooligan squinted. ‘Can’t read that.’

‘Because it’s ancient Greek,’ Knight said. ‘It says, “Cronus”.’

‘Fuck.’

‘Exactly,’ Knight said, placing the box on the table beside the scientist. ‘Just picked it up at the front desk.’

‘Hear anything inside?’ Hooligan asked.

‘No ticking.’

‘Could be rigged digitally. Or remote-controlled.’

Knight looked queasy. ‘Should we clear out? Call in the bomb squad?’

The scientist scratched at his scruffy red beard. ‘That’s Jack’s call.’

Two minutes later, Jack was standing inside the lab, looking at the box. The American appeared exhausted. This was one of the few breaks he’d had from running security at the Olympic Park since taking over on Monday. There had been no further attacks after the Mundaho incident; and that was, in Knight’s estimation, largely due to Jack’s herculean efforts.

‘Can you X-ray the box without blowing us up?’ Jack asked.

‘Can always try, right?’ Hooligan said, picking up the box as if it had teeth.

The scientist took the box to a work table at the far end of the lab. He started up a portable scanner similar to those being used at the Olympic venues, set the box outside the scanner, and waited for it to warm up.

Knight watched the box as if it could seal his fate. Then he swallowed hard – suddenly wanting to leave the lab in case there actually was a bomb in it. He had two children who would be three years old tomorrow. Somehow, he felt, he still had his mother. So could he risk being in a closed room with a potentially explosive device? To get his mind off the danger, he glanced at the screen showing the news highlights and image after image of gold medal-winning athletes from all over the world taking their victory laps, waving the flags of their nations and that of Cameroon.

It had all been spontaneous, the athletes showing their respect to Mundaho and defiance of Cronus. Scores of them had taken up the Cameroonian flag, including the English football team after it won its semi-final against Germany two evenings before. The media was eating it up, selling the gesture as a universal protest against the lunatic stalking the Games.

The American diver Hunter Pierce remained at the fore-front of the protest against Cronus. She had been interviewed almost every day since Mundaho’s tragedy, and each time she had spoken resolutely of the athletes’ solidarity in their refusal to allow the Games to be halted or interrupted.

Mundaho’s condition had been upgraded to ‘serious’: he had third-degree burns and wounds over much of his lower body. But he was said to be alert, well aware of the protests, and taking heart from the global outpouring of support.

As encouraging as that all was, Knight still tore his attention away from the screen in Private London’s lab, believing that the assault would not stop simply because of the athletes’ protests. Cronus would try to attack again before the end of the Games.

Knight was sure of it. But where would he strike? And when? The relay races tomorrow afternoon? The football final between England and Brazil at Wembley Stadium on Saturday evening? The men’s marathon on Sunday? Or the closing ceremony that night?

‘Here we go,’ Hooligan said, pushing the box received from Cronus onto a small conveyor belt that carried it through the scanner. He twisted the scanner’s screen so that they all could see.

The box came into view and so did its contents.

Knight flinched.

‘Jesus Christ,’ Jack said. ‘Are those real?’