Thanks to Hazel Kohler – with some help from Mary J. Rudy – who had graciously
offered to be my beta reader and had proof-read this story. This is this chapter revised version.
C.B.)
Chapter 7
There were reactions of surprise when Captain Ochre entered the capsule,
carrying an unconscious Captain Scarlet whom he dumped unceremoniously onto a
large seat. Their surprise then turned to amazement
when Commander Torey entered, and carefully told them his story, just like he
had told it to Ochre a few minutes before.
Then pure outrage took Captain Grey over, as he turned an accusing glare
on his fellow officer who, putting a new coat on, related how he had knocked
Scarlet out, in order to prevent him from shooting the UAE pilot.
“Are you completely out of your mind?” Grey
bellowed at Ochre. “You actually
hit him? How can you be so sure Torey has even told you the truth? He could be
lying through his teeth!”
“I’m really touched by your trust in me,
Captain Grey,” Torey noted in a cold and cynical tone.
“Shut up, I’m not talking to you,” Grey
replied bitterly. He turned back to
Ochre who was now proceeding to cuff Scarlet’s right hand to one of the metal
feet of the seat. Grey was
absolutely dismayed. “Ochre, you’re
going too far!”
“Look, I had no choice!” Ochre replied
harshly. “He was about to shoot
Commander Torey! I had to stop him!”
“Did you have to hit him so hard?” Destiny
asked Ochre. She had come nearer to
examine the gush of blood from Scarlet’s forehead. He had a large, deep wound that seemed serious enough. She put a damp dressing on it, to stop
the bleeding. “You could have
killed him, Captain,” she said, addressing Ochre again.
“Give me a break! Nothing can kill that
guy. He’s survived worse. I HAD to hit him hard if I was to be
sure I’d actually stop him.”
“How do you know he was really about to
shoot Torey?” Grey retorted.
“I saw it, Grey!”
“And what if he had a good reason to do
it?”
“Spectrum agents don’t act that way. We’re not killers!”
“We didn’t have to face the Mysterons
before, Ochre! New enemies mean new ways to deal with them!”
Ochre sighed. He crouched next to Grey.
“Look, we all know where this guy comes from,” he almost whispered. “We all know what he tried to do to the
World President. How can we be sure
he hasn’t reverted to that?”
“How can we be sure he has?” Grey responded
dryly.
“Why hasn’t he told us about the
Mysteronised jet, like Jim did?”
“He told ME, Ochre!” Grey almost shouted.
“He told you?” Ochre repeated
incredulously.
“Just did, before you came from the cockpit
with Destiny and the battery.”
“Why didn’t he tell US, then?”
“I guess he never had the chance. Remember? You argued with him before
going outside… And then you clobbered him!”
“I see.” Ochre sighed again. “Is there anything else he told you,
without telling the rest of us, Grey?” he asked roughly.
“I don’t see your point.”
“I’d say this is a good way to win your
trust, my friend,” Ochre said shaking his head. “I know about the dizzy spells.”
“What?” Grey’s face paled. “How?”
“That’s not important.”
“The Hell it isn’t! How did you find out?”
Destiny, who was still attending to the
unconscious Scarlet’s wound, turned a curious gaze toward the two officers.
Torey was keeping away, watching the scene in silence.
“What dizzy spells?” the Angel pilot asked,
sounding suddenly uneasy.
“You remember how Scarlet seemed to get
sick before boarding the plane?” Ochre replied.
“He didn’t seem well either during the
flight,” Destiny nodded. “But
what…”
“According to Doctor Fawn,” Ochre
interrupted her, “those spells might be an indication that the Mysterons are
trying to regain control over Scarlet.”
“What?” Destiny murmured, frowning. “Are you sure?”
“I heard Scarlet himself telling Grey, in
the plane.”
“So you were listening,” Grey exclaimed.
“I would never have thought you would spy on us, Ochre!”
“Come on, Grey! I came upon that
information by chance.”
“It’s FALSE information! There is no way
Fawn could be sure. Even Colonel
White was certain there was something else about this…”
“The Colonel KNOWS about this?” a
bewildered Destiny asked in dismay.
“That’s what Scarlet said to you,” Ochre
replied, addressing Grey. “How do we know for sure it’s the truth? Why would
Colonel White send him with us if there was any chance Doctor Fawn could be
right?”
“I can’t believe the Colonel would take
such a risk,” Destiny sighed. “Not
with what has happened since the beginning of this…”
“I think you’re jumping to conclusions, the
both of you,” Grey noted.
“Really?” Ochre pointed to Scarlet. “You heard Torey describe how Scarlet
acted up there, after the crash? Didn’t it sound somehow familiar? Don’t you remember what Blue and the
World President told us about Scarlet, after the Car-Vu incident?”
“Then why would he have risked his life
saving ours, so we could escape today?” Destiny remarked in an uncertain and sad
voice.
“I don’t know.” Ochre sighed heavily. “Maybe he’s not totally responsible for
what he’s doing. Maybe he acts
normal and then answers the Mysterons’ call when they need him…”
“Mon
Dieu…” Destiny whispered, a shiver running down her spine.
“One thing is for sure, he may be
dangerous. He left Commander Torey for dead up
there… A few minutes ago, he tried to kill him.
What’s he planning for us?” Ochre shook his head. “My guess is that he would have killed
us, one by one, fulfilling the Mysterons’ threat.”
“And to do that, he came here, with that
transmitter, and proposed to go install it on top of a mountain to call Spectrum
to our rescue?” Grey sounded sceptical.
Ochre shrugged. “And an unsuspecting Spectrum rescue team would have come
here to save us,” he replied grimly.
“And would have collected reconstructed Mysterons agents…”
Destiny stared at Captain Ochre with horror
in her eyes. She then looked back
to the still unconscious Scarlet, with the same horrified expression. “Even knowing what he is, I can’t
believe he would have premeditated such a horrid plan…” She shivered, looking
away. “This is a nightmare…”
“Oh, for God’s sake…” Grey could not
believe what he was hearing. He
turned a furious glance toward Ochre.
“Your paranoia has got out of hand! I know you haven’t trusted Scarlet since
he’s been back with us, but I would never had imagined you would go to those
lengths… He’s our field commander for this mission and you actually hit him…”
“Look me in the eyes, Grey,” Ochre replied
roughly, “and tell me that at no time was there any doubt in your mind about
Scarlet’s loyalty to Spectrum.”
“I…”
Grey stopped. There was a doubt, he had to admit. If just the shadow of one.
He had always preferred not to think about it. Seeing his hesitation, Ochre nodded thoughtfully and got to
his feet, sighing.
“I thought so,” he said. “I’m sorry, Brad, but as long as we’re
stuck up here, we’re going to keep Scarlet secured.”
“I take it you’re taking command?” Grey
asked bitterly.
“I have no choice. You’re out of action, right now. That leaves me.”
“You realize you’re risking a
court-martial? What you’re doing could be interpreted as mutiny.”
“I’ll take the risk.”
There was an uncomfortable silence for a
little while, as Grey, still unsure, stared defiantly at Ochre. Torey still waited silently, away from
the conversation. To say he didn’t
seem interested by it would have been a lie.
“Would one of you explain to me what all this is about?” he asked
suddenly. “I feel like I just jumped right in the
middle of a movie… What are these Mysterons exactly? And what’s their
relationship with Captain Scarlet?”
“Sorry, Jim,” Ochre replied. “Most of it is restricted information.”
“Restricted maybe, but this all seems
pretty bizarre…”
“We really can’t tell you,” Ochre sighed.
“At least, not now…” He looked toward Grey and got to his feet.
“Look, Grey, we’ll settle this later.
The blizzard’s coming fast. I have
to get that transmitter up on a mountain and make that call so we can be
rescued.”
“You’re going ahead with Scarlet’s plan?”
Grey asked ironically.
“It was a good plan nonetheless,” Ochre
retorted. He turned to Destiny. “The transmitter’s ready?”
“Yes it is,” the young woman said, a bit
hesitantly. “But, Captain, you
can’t go up there alone. The same
reason you gave to Captain Scarlet applies to you too.”
“Do I have a choice?”
“I’ll go with you,” Torey proposed. There was a moment of silent surprise
following his words. Grey looked up
at him suspiciously. Even if Ochre
had installed some doubts in his mind concerning Scarlet’s loyalty, he didn’t
trust Torey at all. But he didn’t
want to show it too openly.
“I don’t think it would be a good idea,” he
noted.
Ochre hesitated. He too had some mistrust of Torey, the same as for Scarlet,
but perhaps less strongly. If only
there was a way of being totally sure… In the case of the UAE pilot, however,
the idea was to not leave him with the others.
Just in case.
“All right,” Ochre said. “You’ll come with me, Jim. Get yourself ready. We go in five minutes.”
“What is it you Spectrum agents
say?” Torey asked with a grim smile.
“S.I.G.?”
He walked toward the emergency
cabinet to fetch some more winter clothing.
Ochre crouched in front of the transmitter next to Grey and was putting it back
in the cloth bag Scarlet had brought it in.
Grey was staring at him with worry in his eyes. When his colleague closed the bag and
started to get to his feet, Grey grabbed him by his sleeve.
“Rick… You better be careful up there.”
Ochre looked at his friend. He noticed the tired, pale features.
He’s getting weaker, he thought. There’s no telling how long he will be able
to stay conscious now… He put a reassuring hand on the wounded man’s
shoulder. “I’ll be all right,
Brad.”
“The commander… I don’t trust him,” Grey
insisted in a whisper.
“I’ll keep my eyes open,” Ochre promised.
“You’d better.” Grey shook his head. “For Scarlet’s sake, I hope you’re
wrong. But if you’re right, you…”
“Hey, don’t worry about me. I’m a tough guy. I can take care of myself.” Ochre’s tone had softened a bit. He patted his friend’s shoulder. “You better get some rest. You’re tiring yourself.”
Grey nodded quietly and lay down. Ochre pulled the blanket up to his
colleague’s neck and stood up.
Taking the bag, he went to Destiny, who stood up when he drew level with her. He gestured towards Grey. “Take care of him,” he whispered. “I’m worried…”
“Yes, he grows weaker by the minute,”
Destiny agreed in the same tone.
“And all this agitation is not doing him any good…” She looked up at Ochre. “Where are you going, exactly?”
Ochre shrugged. “The peak Scarlet described.
It’s the highest one surrounding us, and the nearest. I figure about two hours to get to the
top and then back...depending on the weather, of course.”
“You’ll be careful?”
“Sure! I’ve got all of you to think about.”
Ochre addressed a roguish smile to the young French pilot. “Aren’t I always?”
“I’d swear I’m hearing…” Destiny stopped.
The faint smile on her beautiful face disappeared to be replaced by an
expression of sadness. She looked away from Ochre, somehow
embarrassed by her apparent weakness.
The American Captain gently touched her face and she glanced at him
again.
“You’re thinking about Paul, right?” Ochre
asked her.
She nodded and then stared uneasily at
Scarlet. “He looks so much like
him. He’s so much like him…” Her
beautiful eyes came back to Ochre.
“I can’t believe he would do us any harm, Captain.”
“Well, we’ll find out soon enough,” Ochre
replied. “Appearances can be
deceiving, you know… While Commander Torey and I are away, be careful with him. DON’T LET him manipulate you. I’m sure he’ll try to convince you to
free him.” He put his hand in his coat pocket and brought out a red colour-coded
pistol he discreetly presented to Destiny.
The young woman stared at the weapon.
“You don’t expect me to use this, do you?”
she muttered.
“I don’t think you’ll need it, but… Better
safe than sorry, you know? Just in case he gets free and threatens your life and
Grey’s… He may be indestructible, but he’s sure not invulnerable. This pistol will stop him temporarily,
if you use it.”
“Let’s hope it won’t be necessary,” Destiny
said, taking the weapon.
Torey was coming back from the emergency
cabinet. He had taken a couple of
stout ropes, a grapnel, a pickaxe, and some leather straps. He looked at Ochre and shook his head in dismay. “We could use some pitons, but we don’t
have much climbing equipment in here,” he noted.
“Remind me to correct that oversight when we get back to civilisation.”
Ochre shrugged, examining the equipment
Torey had brought back. “That
should be all right. The summit of
that peak doesn’t seem too difficult to get to.
We’ll make do with this.”
Torey handed him a rope and a new pair of
gloves. He nodded toward the exit. “Ready to go?”
“Yeah, let’s get on with it.” Ochre then
turned to Destiny to address her one last time. “Now don’t you worry.
We’ll be back as soon as we’ve made the transmission. Then it won’t be long before Spectrum
comes to collect us.”
“Let us hope so,” Destiny murmured.
Ochre gave her a reassuring smile and went
outside, followed by Commander Torey.
* * *
The first part of Captain Ochre’s
expedition proved to be fairly easy.
The path to the plateau where the Passenger Jet had crashed, even if it
was uphill, was clear, the snow not too deep, already marked by the previous
crossings of Captain Scarlet and Torey.
Upon reaching the plateau with Torey, Ochre looked back. He could distinctly see the outlines of
the capsule down there, surrounded by the orange flares he had put up. About twenty feet in front of the nose
of the capsule was the edge of a steep cliff.
A chill ran down Ochre’s spine.
If the capsule, upon landing, hadn’t stopped sliding in time, it would
have plunged right off that cliff.
Ochre then took a look around the wreckage
of the Aero Special One. It was
spread all over the place, the main body of it torn in half. Still having his doubts about Torey, Ochre went exploring, on
the pretext of wanting to see if there was anything useful for the survivors. Torey didn’t try to stop him and even
stayed out of his way. He would
take a little rest during that time, he told the Spectrum captain. Ochre lingered mostly around and inside the baggage hold,
where both Captain Scarlet and Commander Torey had been trapped during the
crash. The side of it was
completely ripped open, its contents lying everywhere.
Ochre found some traces of blood, staining what was left of the floor,
and some damaged luggage, but nothing else.
He wondered about Scarlet’s story.
According to him, he had found Torey’s body in the baggage hold. If it was true, and if the man quietly
waiting outside was indeed a Mysteron reconstruct, the body of the real Torey
would still be around. There was no
trace whatsoever that a dead body had been recently carried out of this place.
Then whose blood was this? Torey didn’t
seem injured to the point of losing so much of it. Scarlet, on the other hand, would have healed from his
wounds. He must have sustained
some, taking into account the sorry state of his uniform. And Torey did say he saw the British officer walking out of
the wreckage, injured but seemingly not shaken by it.
There was still some uncertainty in Ochre’s
mind when he came back to join Torey, who was waiting for him, quietly puffing
on one of those awful cigars the Spectrum agent remembered he was already
smoking some years ago when, as Richard Fraser, he had learned flying from him.
“Found anything interesting?” Torey asked
him, blowing out smoke.
“Nothing, really.” Ochre almost said
‘nothing conclusive’, but he stopped himself in time. No point in arousing Torey’s suspicions, he thought. He frowned, eyeing the cigar hanging
from the commander’s mouth. “Put
that thing out, please! Don’t you think you’ve polluted your lungs enough as it
is?”
Torey laughed. “Never like these things, did you?” he noted, throwing the
cigar away. “I remember how annoyed
you always seemed whenever I lit up … You were always saying that life was short
enough without having to shorten it even more.”
The remark stirred up some mixed feelings
within Captain Ochre. Was it just
an innocent attempt to reminisce over the past, to alleviate the awkwardness of
the situation? Or was Jim Torey trying to allay any suspicions the Spectrum
officer might be having toward him?
“My opinion on the subject hasn’t changed,”
Ochre said simply. “Come on.
We’ve lost enough time already.”
Torey nodded his agreement and the two men
directed their steps toward the mountain that was to be the end of their
journey.
Walking knee-deep in snow toward the peak
they would climb to make their transmission wasn’t easy. Fortunately, the blizzard hadn’t begun
yet, and a high crest was protecting them from the winds, though the snow was
falling thick and fast. As Ochre
had earlier deduced, the summit wasn’t really difficult to reach. The plateau was situated right next to its easier slope. The only difficult part presented itself
in the form of a large shoulder about fifty feet high.
Captain Ochre was a good climber, although
the equipment he presently had was pretty inadequate for the job. Using the axe, he scaled a very narrow
and slippery ledge, just wide enough for his feet.
Torey climbed up close behind him and joined him on the ridge. Then they slowly followed the side of
the cliff, grappling any boulder that could provide a good enough support.
For the last twenty feet, Ochre threw the
grapnel up, after tying it to the end of one of the ropes. The grapnel caught hold of something at
the first try. Ochre tested it with
his own weight, and then climbed up it.
It was not easy, the Spectrum Captain’s hands being numb from the cold, but he
succeeded in reaching the top of the cliff and crawled onto it. He was now on a large ridge, covered
with thick snow, from where he could still see the flickering emergency flares
surrounding the capsule down in the valley.
The falling snow was now too dense for him to actually see the capsule
itself.
He took a few seconds to catch his breath
and evaluate his position. The top
of the peak was now about a hundred feet from him, up a crest he would just have
to follow to reach it. All in all,
it had been a pretty easy climb, he thought.
Torey was now using the rope. When he came within reach, Ochre helped
him get his footing on the ridge.
The UAE Commander stretched his back, while Ochre was busy securing the rope
around a large, solid boulder of ice.
The Spectrum agent had figured it was best to leave it there, so they could use
it again to get back down to the capsule.
Torey looked over the crest leading to the
top of the mountain. “Not much
further to go, now, is there?”
Ochre agreed, shaking his head. “We don’t have to go farther. The snow is too thick. We can try to use the transmitter here. I’m pretty sure it will work. If not then… we’ll go higher.”
“Sounds good to me. Hey, climbing up here, that was Captain
Scarlet’s idea, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Ochre admitted. He made one last knot on the rope, while
glancing down the cliff, toward what he could see of the capsule’s position. “It was a good idea.”
Why was he having that strange feeling of
certain and imminent danger lurking around him?
“Wonder what his plan was, anyway?” Torey
continued. “Maybe he was going to
throw you off that cliff when the two of you reached it…”
The feeling within Ochre suddenly gave way
to an icy certitude. It was as if
he actually felt Torey reaching to hit him from behind. If he hadn’t already been on his guard, he probably would
have fallen victim to the traitorous blow the other man was preparing to lay on
him with a large piece of ice.
Ochre turned around quickly and raised his arm, elbowing Torey in the abdomen. He then reached for his pistol with his
other hand and drew it; the improvised weapon of his adversary knocked it from
his hand and sent it into the snow.
Ochre pushed Torey away from the fallen weapon, throwing him off balance; he jumped on top of him and grabbed him by the collar of his coat to look angrily into his eyes.
“Why you dirty traitor… You were trying to
kill me, weren’t you?”
Torey stared back at him, with an evil
grin. “Trying?” he repeated coldly.
“I’d say I’m about to succeed… Earthman.”
He pushed Ochre’s face away from his,
maliciously pressing his thumb into one of Ochre’s eyes. The Spectrum officer had to pull back to
avoid having his eye put out. Torey
hit him in the throat and pushed him toward the edge of the cliff. Ochre narrowly avoided falling over and
rolled on his belly to reach a safer point.
The American captain saw Torey going for
the gun. Ochre himself was too far
away to jump him, so he leapt swiftly to his feet and hid behind a nearby
boulder. A bullet rang close to his
ear the moment he took cover. He
heard Torey utter a loud curse.
“Come on, Rick! You can’t win! Make it easy
on yourself,” Torey sniggered wickedly.
“For old times’ sake…”
“Go to Hell!” Ochre lashed out angrily from
his hiding place.
“I’ve been to Hell, Rick. Believe me, it’s not what they say it
is. But you’ll see for yourself
very soon.”
“You’re not Jim Torey!”
“Are you so sure of that?”
Ochre could hear Torey’s footsteps
carefully approaching his position. He’ll kill me, he thought.
And when I’m dead, he’ll go back to the capsule and kill the others. Destiny won’t be wary of him, Grey is
wounded, and Scarlet is handcuffed.
They’re defenceless against him…
“Good God,” he muttered, “What have I
done?”
The steps were drawing nearer. In one desperate attempt, Captain Ochre
sprang from cover, roaring furiously.
He threw a handful of snow into Torey’s face and jumped him. The gun spat flame into the snow-covered
ground. Ochre smashed his fist into
Torey’s stomach and knocked him down.
He saw the Mysteron agent on his back,
raising the gun in his direction. This time, Ochre realized grimly, I’m done for. I’ve got no chance of avoiding the bullet.
It was at this moment that he noticed the
ground trembling beneath his feet.
To his horror, he saw it suddenly disappearing; the thick cover of snow he was
standing on crumbled and he fell with a cry of surprise into the hole that had
just opened to swallow him.
Torey watched with amazement as the enemy
he was about to destroy escaped from the death he had prepared for him, to
plunge into the darkness of another one.
He rose to his feet and approached what now appeared to be a narrow but
deep precipice. He could not get
too near, to get a closer look; the snow was threatening to slide down into the
opening and would have dragged him along.
“Rick?” he called loudly.
He received no response. Nor did he think he would. He smiled to himself. Alive or dead, Captain Ochre was now
finished. There was no way for him
to get out of the abyss all by himself.
Torey took one last look into the dark hole and then went to the edge of
the cliff he had just climbed with the Spectrum officer. His eyes gazed down toward the capsule
he could see in the valley, about an hour and a half away from him.
“One down,” he muttered, playing
distractedly with the yellow colour-coded pistol, “three to go… The Mysterons’ instructions will be carried
out.”
A QUESTION OF TRUST (complete story - zip)
Chapter 1
– Chapter 2
– Chapter 3 – Chapter 4
– Chapter 5
– Chapter 6 – Chapter 7
– Chapter 8
Chapter 9 –
Chapter 10 –
Epilogue
OTHER STORIES FROM CHRIS BISHOP