A Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons story
For 2006 Halloween Challenge
By Chris Bishop
PART 2
Chapter 1
– Back on Duty
“You’re sending me on an
assignment?”
Colonel Blue nodded at Captain
Scarlet’s question, as they both walked out of the elevator at the lowest level
of the Underground Base. The
Spectrum commander had given Scarlet a rapid briefing as they were making their
way there, and it was with some bewilderment that the English captain now
considered his upcoming mission.
“Let me get this straight… you
don’t completely trust me, but you allow me to leave your base – which location
must not become known at any cost –
and that, after you have revealed all your secrets to me?”
“Not all our secrets, Paul.
Far from it. And give me a little credit, please.”
After walking down a corridor toward a large door – which, Scarlet
reflected, could easily let an SPV pass through it – Blue punched a security
code into the keypad. The door slid
open in front of the two men. “I do
not intend to let you go on your own,” Blue added with a grin.
“You don’t say… You’re assigning me a guardian, then?”
“I’m assigning you a partner.”
Invited by Blue, Scarlet crossed
the threshold… and stopped in his tracks as soon as he cleared the doorway,
looking around in wonder.
He was inside a huge natural cave,
with a rocky, arched ceiling high above their heads, half covered with
stalactites, and a smooth man-made concrete floor that led to a large,
underground lake. The whole place
looked like a hangar, with aircraft lined up on one side – helijets and planes,
painted with camouflage colours – and armoured vehicles and speed cars. Moored to docking bays that jutted out
into the lake were a number of
ships, of different sizes and shapes. Most of them looked like submarines –
while the largest of these ships resembled small-sized carriers. There was a helijet on the deck of one of them,
with technicians busy folding its rotor
blades neatly against one another, and checking that its floats were well
clamped to the deck.
“Great Scott…” Scarlet muttered.
“This is quite a sight…”
“Impressive, isn’t it?” Blue
commented. “Welcome to the Cave,
Captain. This is where we store our
means of transportation.” He
invited Scarlet to follow him towards the carrier with the helijet onboard. “This is also the domain of a very good
friend of yours.”
As he said these words, one of the
men checking the helijet floats got to his feet and turned to them. Scarlet wasn’t sure he recognised him at
first, until the man smiled broadly, jumped from the deck and onto the dock to
approach them.
“Captain Grey,” Blue said in
welcome. “Is she ready to go?”
“Only waiting for your order,
Colonel Blue,” Grey answered. He grabbed
Scarlet’s hand before the latter could even react and pumped it vigorously.
“Hey Paul! So good to see you again after all these
years. You haven’t changed a bit,
sport!”
“Brad.” Scarlet responded to the energetic handshake in kind, smiling
in turn. “Brad, I nearly didn’t
recognise you at first! That look
becomes you…”
“It’s just a way for you to say I
look much older now,” Grey answered.
“Not like you, apparently.
Oh, I know all about the jump through time thing.
Must be pretty disconcerting, right?”
He gave another lively shake of Scarlet’s hand before letting go of it.
Scarlet was sure it would take long minutes before the feeling came back to his
fingers. “So, it looks like you’re coming back into the game?”
“Apparently. Are you by any chance
the person who’s coming with me on this assignment?”
Grey was shaking his head, when a
voice came from behind Scarlet in answer to his question: “Captain Grey rarely goes on assignments
other than commanding one of our vessels.
He will merely take you to your destination, Captain Scarlet. But he will
not be the one to go with you on the assignment.” Scarlet turned around to find
Captain Black and Lieutenant Brown approaching them. Both men were holding huge rucksacks.
“You will be my
partner, Captain Black?” Scarlet
asked, lifting a brow, as he took note of the bags.
“Me? I’m just playing delivery boy, Scarlet.” Black gave Blue a large bracelet, which
Scarlet examined with interest, noticing it was covered with all kinds of
electronic devices. Then Black
turned to him again, and tossed his bag towards him; Scarlet caught it with both
hands just as it collided with his stomach.
“Lieutenant Brown is going with you.”
“Brown?” Scarlet said with obvious
surprise. “But…”
“Don’t worry, Paul. The kid’s good.” Black gave an
encouraging pat on Scarlet’s shoulder.
“I taught him all I know.” He
grinned at Scarlet, then left them to follow Grey to the carrier behind them. Scarlet exchanged glares with Brown and
held his stare in silence. Then, responding to a call from Black, the young man
briefly nodded his salutations to Blue, and jogged to join his mentor who was
climbing on deck. Scarlet followed him with his eyes.
“Brown?” Scarlet repeated,
addressing Blue. “Adam, you can’t
be serious… he’s just a kid…”
“Don’t let his age fool you,
Captain,” Blue answered. “Black
didn’t lie: the kid is good.”
“Still very young…”
“You were very young too, when you
had your first mission with the WAAF, weren’t you?”
“Not that young… You really expect him to…‘keep his eye on
me’?”
“Did I say he had to keep his eye
on you?”
“Not in so many words… but yes.”
“I’m actually assigning him to
assist you. He’s good – but he
needs experience.”
“Oh sure. You’re a pitiful liar.
Besides, the kid hates me.”
“No… he doesn’t hate you. He’s just distrustful of you. Don’t worry, he won’t shoot you in the
back at the first move he might find suspicious.
Chip is quite efficient in his work. He’ll do fine.” Blue seemed to find
this conversation somehow amusing.
Which didn’t please Scarlet at all; he didn’t like anyone having fun at
his expense – even if he was a friend.
“I’m not worried,” Scarlet
retorted, putting the bag down. “But maybe
you
should be worried for your man – and for this mission. What if I’m really not to be trusted?”
“I’ll take that risk.”
Scarlet frowned. “Colonel… that thing you want Brown and
me to search for in Cloudbase’s wreckage...”
“The Quantum Transmitter.”
“Yes. The same thing that was used to trigger the bomb that
destroyed Futura City… fifteen years ago…”
“And that sent you to this time.
Similar, yes.”
“It’s important, then?”
“Quite frankly, I don’t know
exactly how important it might be.
But I’d rather not wait any longer to find out.”
“But you’ve waited all these years already.
Why the rush now?”
“Because…” Blue sighed. “We didn’t know it
might be of importance, until fairly recently. Apparently, the World
Government thinks it’s important enough to have sent many expeditions to the
Himalayas, over the years, in order to find it.”
“But they didn’t find it?”
Blue grunted. “According to Green, the few men who
returned did so empty-handed. Most
of them… did not return at all.” He
paused. “Cloudbase crashed in a particularly treacherous area. Anything could have happened to these
expeditions – from falling into a crevice to being swallowed by a snowstorm or
an avalanche – or even encountering bandits, who reportedly are common to the
area. That’s why I need you to go
there. I know that if anyone can
succeed in such a mission, it’s you.”
“Your confidence is really
touching, Colonel.”
Blue chuckled. “It’s because I know you.” He presented
to Scarlet the bracelet Black had given him minutes earlier. “Here.
Put this on. It will be
helpful to you.”
“What is it, exactly?” Scarlet asked, as he took the bracelet.
“Various instruments you will need.
There’s a radio communicator in there, a tracker and emergency signal,
electronic maps and compass, chronometer, short-range radar…
Mysteron detector…”
“Mysteron detector?” Scarlet asked
with a raised brow.
“We’re a long way from that
‘Polaroid-like’ device we had fifteen years ago,” Blue noted with a faint smile.
“And from that back-breaking Mysteron gun too… Our instruments are more sophisticated now. Oh, the Mysteron gun still uses
electrons, like the old one – except now it’s handgun-sized.”
“Let me guess – Brown will be
carrying one during this assignment?” Scarlet asked, frowning.
“You will be too, don’t worry.
Just in case. Do remember that
you were not around these last fifteen years, and that therefore, we didn’t need
to restrict the availability of the Mysteron gun for your safety anymore … In
case it might fall into Mysteron hands and be used against you. It’s standard equipment now.”
“Of course. How silly of me.”
“If the Mysteron gun is using the
same technology as fifteen years ago, it’s not the same for the Mysteron
detector. We’ve found new ways to
detect Mysteron agents now...” Blue pointed to the bracelet Scarlet was
strapping around his wrist. “I had this one especially designed for you – to
take into account your unique metabolic signature, so it won’t go off whenever
you turn it on. As we learned from Doctor Fawn… it’s slightly different from
that of a ‘real’ Mysteron.”
“Still good to hear that.” As
Scarlet closed the last catch on the bracelet, he heard a beeping sound coming
from it, and looked down, to see a small screen coming to life. The word ‘activated’ appeared in red letters onto the screen, and he turned an
inquiring look at Blue, wondering what it meant. The latter was watching him
gravely.
“Remember the Scarab Protocol?”
Blue asked with a quiet tone.
Scarlet blanched. “Oh no…” He glanced down with an
incredulous look at the bracelet, then back at Blue.
“You had a bomb planted in this thing?!”
“Nothing you should worry about if
you are on the level, I can assure you.
But if I were you, I wouldn’t try to remove that bracelet.”
“Oh, that’s precious!” Scarlet fumed. “What a friend you are,
Colonel!”
“Give me a break, will you?” Blue
suddenly cut in sharply, before Scarlet could protest further. “If you were in
my place, and confronted with the uncertainty your sudden reappearance
represents, what would you do?”
“I…” Scarlet hesitated.
Quite frankly, he didn’t know what to say.
Blue wasn’t really wrong. He couldn’t take too many chances with such
an uncertain situation. He angrily
pointed to the bracelet. “You
should at least have told me before I put this
on!”
“And what? You would have agreed to
snap it around your wrist willingly?”
Blue ignored the annoyed – nearly murderous - look Scarlet addressed him,
and shrugged almost dismissively.
“At least I told you about it.
But as I said: if you are on
the level, you don’t have anything to worry about.
We’ll have it removed after your return from your assignment.”
“Small comfort,” Scarlet muttered.
He took his rucksack and followed, as Blue was now walking toward the carrier. “You said I would have a sidearm for this mission?”
“It’s waiting for you onboard.”
Blue stopped in front of the carrier.
“Beautiful, isn’t it? This is
Sea Turtle One. We have five of
these ships. Submersible carriers. They are unique in the world.”
“Submersible?” Scarlet asked. He was indeed impressed.
“Yes… the only accesses in and out
of the Cave are underwater.
That way, we are able to avoid detection from above ground. Oh, like all our means of
transportation, the subs are equipped with stealth capability.
Once it’s turned on, they are totally invisible to sonar and radar.”
Scarlet nodded his understanding. “If they’re submersible… How about the craft they carry? Surely, they can’t go underwater…”
As he said those words, he heard a
humming sound. Then, before his
eyes, he saw the deck supporting the helijet slowly lowering itself into the
ship, while a shield made of multiple metallic plates started moving over to
cover the gap, gradually forming a rounded bulge over the deck. Scarlet watched in fascination, as Blue
grinned at him.
“Does that answer your question?
That’s why it’s called ‘Sea Turtle’.”
“I see why you chose the name.
But… it looks more like an armadillo…”
“Don’t say that to Brad – it’s he who chose that name, actually.
Anyway, it’s quite appropriate.”
“Sea turtle?
Doesn’t it imply that it’s a bit on the slow side?”
“Quite the contrary.
Brad explained to me that if sea turtles are slow on land, it’s certainly not the case in the ocean.
They can travel great distances – and at amazing speeds. Which is the case for our vessels, too.
They’re the latest in supersonic, yet sound-proof, undersea technology…”
“The latest…?” Scarlet asked with a raised
brow. “What did you do – steal it from the World Navy?”
“The WASP, actually…”
Blue’s honest answer made Scarlet chuckle, almost despite himself.
“Hey, since our humble beginnings, after the destruction of Cloudbase,
we’ve had to be content with second-hand – I would say even third-hand – equipment. So today I do not have any scruples in
actually calling on industrial espionage - not to mention other methods – to get
this organisation working as efficiently as possible. Especially if it means
saving lives.”
“It does help to have millions of
dollars at your disposal too…”
“It does indeed.” Blue paused
again. “Are you ready?”
“As ready as I can be.
And I promise you, I’ll return.” Scarlet showed his bracelet, glaring
meaningfully at Blue. “If only to
have you swallow this thing.”
“Threatening a superior officer is
not a good way to win his trust, Captain.”
“I haven’t officially signed up to
your set-up… Colonel.”
Scarlet watched as the shield of the Sea Turtle finally snapped into
place with a loud clang. “But I’m
willing to lend a hand – if it doesn’t mean losing it in the process,” he added
in an undertone.
“I knew I could count on you.” Blue
walked up the gangway leading to the carrier, and Scarlet followed.
Captain Grey was waiting for them, standing on what little was left of the
visible deck; some distance from Grey, they could see Captain Black with
Lieutenant Brown, just in front of the entrance of the submersible, obviously
giving the young man his last instructions.
Brown nodded in silence at what Black told him, before disappearing inside,
after a last handshake with his superior.
“Captain Grey will take you within
flying distance of your destination,” Blue explained. “Once there, the Sea Turtle will
surface… and you’ll use the helijet to reach the objective. The approximate location is marked on the map within the
bracelet. Sorry, that’s the best we
could come up with.” He pointed to
the rucksack. “You have your
personal equipment in there, and the rest is in the helijet, along with the
rations you’ll need for the duration of your journey.
You will have three days to find Cloudbase, search the wreckage and
retrieve what we need…”
“If there’s anything to be found and retrieved to begin with,”
Scarlet commented.
“I know it’s a possibility you
might not find anything at all.”
“If you should encounter any
trouble, activate the emergency signal,” Grey said in turn. “The Sea Turtle will
be within range and we’ll do all in our power to send a retrieving team… That
is, if you can’t make it back by yourself.”
“Much obliged, Grey,” Scarlet said
in a rather gloomy tone.
“Let’s just hope the kid and I will not find ourselves in the
statistics.” He moved towards the
entrance to the sub, passing in front of Blue, and then Black. The latter raised his hand and put it on
his compatriot’s shoulder, stopping his advance.
“Paul…” Scarlet turned to Black, with an
inquiring look. Black glanced
through the entrance, and down the ladder that Brown had climbed down, just a
few minutes before. “Take care of
the boy, will you?”
Scarlet hesitated; he could hear a
genuine concern in Black’s voice.
He considered his answer, for a second or two. “If Junior is half as reckless as his father was…”
“Unfortunately, he is,” Black
commented, with a slight smile.
“Then I’ll have my hands full.”
Scarlet nodded. “But I promise: I’ll keep a close eye on him – and will do my very best to
keep him safe.”
Black nodded his thanks, and
Scarlet turned for the last time to Blue, as he stood just inside the doorway.
“Do be careful out there,” the
Spectrum commander recommended. “And remember your promise to come back.”
“Oh, I will…” Scarlet grinned. “There’s still a lot more I want to know about this world…”
“I’m not sure you want to know
everything,” Blue said in a sombre tone, shaking his head. “But… I will tell you all you want to
know…. Ah… within reason, or course.”
“Of course.” Scarlet backed into the entrance, just
over the ladder. “See you later,
Colonel.”
And he disappeared down into the
submersible carrier.
Chapter 2 – White Snows
“We’ll be reaching our launch site
in a few minutes.”
Straight after leaving the Cave,
the Sea Turtle had set a course south, and had travelled full speed all evening
and night, and the rest of the next day undersea, avoiding the World Navy
patrols all the way across the Atlantic Ocean.
It rounded Cape Aghulas and then sailed into the Indian Ocean in record
time, pushing its engines to their maximum capacity – without encountering any
challenge. It was only within the
Bay of Bengal, off the shores of Bangladesh, that the carrier surfaced, in the
middle of the night, keeping all lights and communications off, and in full
stealth mode. Time being of the
essence, the helijet was quickly prepared, and, its flight plan being already
drawn and completed with the last needed details, both Scarlet and Brown climbed
aboard, with their required equipment and took off without delay.
The silent and invisible craft flew
across Bangladesh, and then over a small region of India and Nepal. As Captain Grey had explained, before
they had left the carrier, the Asian Republic wasn’t as hostile towards Spectrum
as the World Government had proven to be in the last few years. They mostly ignored the outlawed
organisation’s activities – and even if its presence did become known to them on
their territory, they would often look the other way. However, Spectrum couldn’t always count
on that fact, as, in order to keep a relatively good relationship with the World
Government – a relationship that had been deteriorating over the last few years
- the Asian Republic might, from time to time, make a gesture to ‘apprehend the
dangerous criminals’ that set foot on their territory and fell under their
jurisdiction. Grey was just hoping
that, these days, the government led by the Asian Director General was in a good
mood…
It probably was, as Scarlet and
Brown didn’t encounter any major problem during their flight, and soon found
themselves approaching their objective.
Before reaching the area they had
to search, they made a landing on a safe, uninhabited plateau, to take the time
to rest a little, eat, and to refill the craft with fuel transported in
jerricans kept in the cargo bay. Then, after a few hours’ rest, they took flight
again, and reached the search area, where they started looking around without
delay. Brown was flying the helijet, and Scarlet served as co-pilot, consulting
the onboard map, and comparing it with the information he had received of the
approximate location where Cloudbase had crashed, years ago. Their landing point, where they had to
set up camp, was to be positioned in the middle of the search area, to
facilitate their mission.
Scarlet looked down through the
cockpit windshield, and pointed to the snowy high valley bordered by menacing
peaks, and almost entirely hidden by clouds heavy with snow. It seemed to be just below their feet,
but in reality, it was still a few miles ahead.
“Over there,” he said to Brown.
“That should be the valley where Cloudbase crashed.”
Brown looked in turn and nodded.
“I see it. Colonel Blue told me that, according to
the locals, this area is considered evil – haunted… or inhabited by demons.”
“The yeti, perhaps?” Scarlet
suggested, obviously unimpressed by the statement.
“The name was mentioned…” Brown conceded.
“I don’t believe in indigenous
myths, Lieutenant. This is a
dangerous area – see how treacherous the topography looks. People bold enough to venture in there might have paid for
their audacity with their lives…”
Scarlet grinned. “And when
they didn’t return, rumours were that the yeti
ate them…”
Brown shrugged. “You think that’s what happened to those
expeditions the World Government sent to find Cloudbase?”
Scarlet didn’t answer, his eyes
were scanning the area as the helijet drew closer to it. The winds had became
stronger, and were crossing over, threatening to push the craft off its course.
Scarlet couldn’t help but marvel at how expertly the young man was handling the
controls.
“You’re a natural flyer,
Lieutenant,” Scarlet said with an admiring nod. “You obviously take after your father.”
“Colonel Blue taught me everything
I know about flying,” Brown admitted.
“He told me that my father was nearly as good as he was himself…”
“And your father always said that
Colonel Blue was almost as good as he was,” Scarlet chuckled.
“Really? The colonel never told me that…”
“Did he tell you about the time
your father flew between Cloudbase control tower’s pylons?”
“No… He did that?”
“Remind me to tell you the story
when we have the time. It’s worth
hearing. Of course, you had to have
seen the control tower to realise how reckless such a feat was at the time…” Scarlet pointed down toward the valley. “Can you get us down through those
clouds? According to the
instruments, it should be calmer below…”
“I’ll try my best…”
Brown pushed the controls and the
helijet plunged into the puffy clouds; Scarlet’s admiration of the young pilot’s
skills grew as he watched him using the winds themselves to manoeuvre the craft down where he wanted it, smoothly and
effortlessly. Within seconds, the craft emerged beneath the clouds and over the
valley below. They could see the ground now; it was very uneven, covered with a
thick layer of snow, blasted by the strong winds, through which emerged the
peaks of dangerous-looking rocks.
Scarlet grimaced as he looked
around with his binoculars, trying to find their quarry. Not surprisingly, he couldn’t find
anything in this treacherous landscape. Not even a safe place to land the
helijet. There was no way to tell if the ground
was suitable for landing under all that snow.
For all he knew, the craft would sink down up to its rotor blades or fall
into a hidden crevice, if they were not careful enough.
“This is not going to be
a piece of cake,” he muttered under his breath.
“In the meantime, we have to land
shortly, Captain,” Brown remarked pointedly.
“We are flying on our reserves right now, and we should really fill her
up, before we do the same as Cloudbase and crash here. Which won’t help with
this mission.”
“Right…” Scarlet scanned the area for a few minutes more, then stopped
on a specific point ahead of them. He lowered the binoculars and pointed
forward. “One o’clock, nearly
straight ahead,” he said to Brown.
“There’s a large ledge which seems even enough to land the bird. Plus, it would be a perfect vantage point – and it’s almost
right in the middle of the search zone.”
Brown narrowed his eyes in the
direction Scarlet was pointing.
There was indeed an outcrop over there just on the side of a cliff, sheltered
from the high winds which were sweeping the peak overhead. It did look like a
safe place. “I see it… here’s hoping that the ground underneath all that snow is
solid enough to hold the helijet’s weight.
Let’s go.”
He tenaciously pushed the helijet
forward. Scarlet was looking ahead,
towards their destination, when suddenly his bracelet began to emit an insistent
beeping noise. He froze, a little wary of what it might be – he had not
forgotten the bomb that Blue had revealed was installed in the bracelet.
He looked down at it, to see that a little screen had lit up with a small red
dot blinking nearly in the middle of it.
“Hold it… what is that?”
“Ground scan,” Brown explained.
“Seems your instruments have picked up something, Captain.
Might be some life-form, heat… or some kind of power source.”
“Cloudbase?” Scarlet suggested.
“Perhaps… But somehow I doubt it. It would not be working after the
crash, right? Certainly not after
so many years.”
“I think the same. And I can’t imagine we would find it so
easily… Not after so many World
Government search expeditions have been unsuccessful in the last fifteen years…
And we’ve been here, what, three hours at the most?”
Brown was concentrating on handling
the controls, bringing the helijet down as gently as he could on their chosen
lading site; until the floats touched down he had very little time to pay much
attention to the beeping sound coming from Scarlet’s instruments. The English
captain, however, couldn’t detach his eyes from the small blinking red light.
He was chewing on his lower lip, trying to figure out what it could be exactly.
“Strange,” he murmured, “but it
seems to be heading in our direction.”
“That’s not pos…” Brown stopped himself, just as, from his
onboard instruments, a much louder and more urgent signal than the one from
Scarlet’s bracelet made itself heard; he knew what that sound was, but
nevertheless looked down at the panel in front of him in alarm. “We’re under attack! Something’s coming straight at us!”
Scarlet swore, and rolled his eyes
at the realisation of what his
bracelet had actually picked up.
Heat source indeed…
“Bail out!” he shouted, as he
pressed the panic button to undo his safety belt. That was an unnecessary recommendation, as Brown was
unfastening his own belt, then he reached for the bag of instruments stacked
behind his seat. Scarlet grabbed their two rucksacks and kicked open the cockpit
door. Both men jumped feet first into the snow, and made a run for it, getting
as far away as possible from the helijet.
Scarlet actually heard the sound of
the missile before he saw it coming, trailing a long tail of white smoke behind
it. It passed right over their
heads, heading to the helijet behind them.
They were still too close and Scarlet, in desperation, pushed Brown down
the slope as they reached the edge of the ledge, jumping after him. Both men
fell into the thick snow and slid down the slope, their loads escaping them as
they went bowling down the steep incline with increasing speed.
They were barely halfway down the
slope when the missile hit its target and exploded in a ball of fire that
completely destroyed the helijet, sending pieces of metal, snow and rocks all
over the place – causing a small avalanche that fell down the side of the
mountain, chasing after the two men.
That they managed to escape the
threatening rain was like a miracle and when they finally were able to stop
themselves from rolling down the slope, both men looked up in disbelief at what
was left of their craft –burning like a bonfire on top of what was left of the
ledge.
“Okay,” Scarlet gasped, forcing
himself to regain a normal breathing rate.
“It does look like we won’t be able to make it back on our own, after
all…”
“Who could have been shooting at
us?” Brown said, gasping as well. “The World Government? The Asian Republic? None of them’s supposed to know we’re
here.” He addressed a meaningful
glare at Scarlet, but the latter feigned ignorance of the underlying suspicion
he detected in the young man’s attitude. He had no time to deal with such
fancies.
“Don’t ask me, I’m the newbie in
your time,” he said with a snort, getting to his feet with difficulty. He grimaced as he fully straightened up
and reached for his back. He had
probably pulled a muscle.
Fortunately, it would take no time for his retrometabolism to heal that. He glanced at Brown who was standing too, shaking his legs
and patting the snow off his clothes.
“Nothing broken?”
“Not as far as I can see, no…”
Scarlet nodded his satisfaction.
“Well, whoever used us as target practice is not very far away from us…”
“How can you say?”
Scarlet pointed to the sky; they
could still see remnants of the smoke trail that had followed the missile.
Scarlet’s finger traced the trail, going beyond their position and straight
ahead of them; the tail went over a ridge, a short distance from where they were
standing, and seemed to continue beyond it.
“Despite our rather hasty retreat,
I did see that it looked like a small, short-range projectile,” Scarlet
explained. “Like it was from a
rocket launcher, hand-held weapon.
Did you notice its erratic flight trajectory?
It wasn’t shot straight at us, but was probably equipped with a heat-seeking
warhead…”
“You’re sure?” a doubtful Brown
asked.
“Positive. I was Cloudbase’s weapons expert. We had something VERY similar in our
armoury back then.”
“Are you saying someone was waiting
for us?”
Scarlet shrugged. “I’m saying that whoever tried to shoot
us down probably saw us arrive the minute we emerged from the clouds…”
“You mean we might still be being
watched as we speak?”
Scarlet grunted. “I doubt it – those people must be over
that ridge – which would be blocking us from their view.”
“And vice-versa…” Brown mumbled,
looking in direction of the ridge.
“Unless they’re hidden somewhere
between the rocks…”
Scarlet took his binoculars, which were still
hanging from his neck and checked the ridge carefully. The inbuilt computerised
instruments within the binoculars also told him the distance separating them
from it.
Five kilometres…
“I can’t see anyone in view,” he
reported, lowering the binoculars.
“What would you say if we go over there and ask our welcoming committee who they are, exactly?”
Brown approved with a nod. “Sounds like a good idea… I’ll follow
your lead.”
Scarlet raised a brow. “Do you trust me, Lieutenant?”
“I’ve been told to do so within
reason, Captain,” Brown answered truthfully.
“If I were to kill you without a good motive, I’ll have hell to pay with
the Colonel.”
Scarlet grinned. “I knew there was a reason why I liked
Adam so much…” He thumped Brown’s shoulder. “Come on… Let us see who’s over there and why they seem to dislike
us so much.”
After checking that the material
they had saved when they escaped the exploding helijet hadn’t suffered any
damage that would hinder their mission, Scarlet and Brown started walking toward
the ridge, silently and very carefully.
While the uneven ground and deep snow made their progress extremely
difficult, it also had the advantage to give them enough cover to approach their
objective, without risking being seen by whoever had taken their craft as a
target. As far as they knew, their
enemy, after seeing the helijet explode, could very well have assumed that they
had perished. If it was the case,
neither Scarlet nor Brown had any intention of showing them they were wrong in
their assumption – and maybe there was still a chance to surprise them.
It took the two men far more time
than they expected to reach the ridge, because of the roughness of the terrain
and the fact that they did not exactly follow a straight line to get there. Brown discovered an easy enough route to
get over the ridge and to the other side – a gap in the rocky and icy side of
the mountain. After they had
checked that no-one was guarding that way in, they walked purposefully through
it.
Scarlet was looking around, a
little edgy. Since the
destruction of the helijet, he hadn’t seen a single trace of life anywhere. No footprints, no forgotten item left by
whoever had fired at them… No-one
about. It was as if the place was
totally devoid of life – human or otherwise – apart from themselves.
As if this place is indeed
haunted…like the natives say.
Except ghosts didn’t fire missiles.
As they carefully cleared the last
rocks hiding the view of whatever was on the other side of the rocky wall, both
Scarlet and Brown suddenly stopped in their tracks – and stood there, staring in
bewilderment, at the spectacle offered to their eyes. Almost despite himself, Scarlet felt a
twinge of pain stab into his heart.
He never thought that such a sight would grieve him that way.
Cloudbase was lying there, like a
giant dragonfly, her back broken against the rocky and uneven surface of a
narrow valley, half covered with deep snow that had accumulated over it during
the passing years, and which served as a cover, hiding her completely from
anyone who would have been searching for her from the sky. Of the four sets of two nacelles
containing the fans and stabilisers that originally kept the base hovering many
miles over the surface of the Earth, only one was still attached to the main
body, and another was still only visible, lying far away from there, broken in
two parts. The other two sets had
completely disappeared, as if torn apart by the hand of a gigantic, destructive
child. The giant pylons were no
more, and the control tower was nothing but an almost indistinct heap of
junk, a broken disc, fallen on its side.
Only the first part of the word ‘SPECTRUM’ was still visible, the paint faded
and covered with snow, the second part looking as if it had been driven
forcefully into the ground.
The main body had at least three
major fractures – at least as far as Scarlet could see, considering the amount
of snow covering it. Through the
biggest of them, he could see the multiple layers of floors. There were burn marks – probably caused
by massive fires and explosions. By
the look of it, if Cloudbase had been inhabited when it crashed, nobody would
have survived.
As he looked at what remained of
the once mighty and proud base, his home for many years, Scarlet couldn’t help a
feeling of deep loss and sorrow clutching at his mind and heart.
“That’s… an impressive sight,” he
heard the voice of Brown say, as if through a deep mist.
“That’s a heartbreaking sight,”
Scarlet sighed in answer. “There’s
nothing but desolation.”
Brown heard the sadness in
Scarlet’s voice, and suddenly felt a little inadequate. “I… I mean… this is huge. That thing… really hovered 40,000 feet
above the surface?”
“Yeah…” Scarlet said with a tired
nod. “It could at that…” For him, it was only a few days before
that he was strolling down the corridors of Cloudbase. To think it crashed
nearly fifteen years ago, he pondered, still with bewilderment. I
will never get used to it… But
if he still had any lingering doubt about the truthfulness of his situation… he
had the proof there, right in front of his eyes.
It is very well hidden in this valley, he
mused, looking around at the high peaks surrounding the valley, and casting
their shadow upon Cloudbase.
If it wasn’t for that rocket
that hit our helijet – and the trajectory we were able to track down – we would
never have found it…
“Captain…”
The voice of Lieutenant Brown
pulled Scarlet out of his fugue and he turned an inquiring look to the young
man. Somewhat agitated, the latter
pointed towards a precise point, just at the foot of the fallen Control Tower.
Scarlet narrowed his eyes, struggling to see against the almost blinding
whiteness of the snow. He saw then, just beneath the huge black
letter ‘T’ of what remained of the name ‘Spectrum’ what seemed to have impressed
Brown that much. He opened his eyes
wide.
“Flaming Nora…”
Skulls – human skulls – thoroughly cleaned and bleached by the sun – were
planted on wooden pikes just next to what was left of the tower. Ten of them – no, eight, Scarlet counted
– neatly aligned to form some kind of barrier directly in line with the large
opening ripped into the hull of Cloudbase, metres behind them.
The first moment of surprise
passed, both Scarlet and Brown approached, guns drawn, and looked around
carefully.
“So…” Scarlet muttered, “it looks
like we now know what happened to the members of those expeditions the World
Government sent to find Cloudbase.”
“And you were joking about the yeti
having eaten them,” grumbled Brown.
“Maybe you were partly right… who could have done that to them?”
“Someone who doesn’t want anyone
coming here…” Scarlet noted. “Someone who left that… ‘warning’ to scare off
unwanted visitors.”
“The same someone who shot our
helijet with that missile, Captain?”
“Seems very likely, Lieutenant.”
“Whoever it is, they must be mad to
plant those human skulls here like that.”
“And potentially dangerous,”
Scarlet acknowledged, quickly scanning the area with his eyes. “And certainly around.” He looked in the
direction of Cloudbase’s wreckage, resting silently there – the large rip
taunting him. It was large enough
to walk right through it. “Be
careful where you put your feet, Lieutenant.
I’m sure they’re watching us
from somewhere… Waiting to fall on
us like birds of prey…”
“S.I.G…” the younger man murmured.
Brown was walking around,
inspecting the area with his eyes, his gun still in his hand; Scarlet turned
towards his companion, in order to give him further instructions when his eye
caught something… just at the young man’s feet.
“Brown! Step back!
It’s…”
Too late the warning came, even
though Brown stopped dead in his tracks upon hearing it. He heard a whistling sound coming right
at his feet and lowered his gaze quickly.
He barely saw the net that had been hidden under the light snow as it
swiftly rose from the ground around him, and imprisoned him tightly. He yelped in surprise as he was swept
off his feet, and taken into the air.
Scarlet had watched in dismay as
his young companion had fallen into the carefully laid trap. Now Brown was dangling about six feet up
from the ground, feet over head, totally and tightly enveloped in a crude,
wide-meshed net that had obviously been made by hand with scraps of whatever
kind of fabric had been lying around.
Scarlet moved quickly to grab the net as it swung wildly round,
threatening to bang its contents against the side of the destroyed control
tower. He scanned it closely as he
stopped it in mid-movement, noticing how it was now securely sealed at the top
by a strong loop of rope, the other end of which was tied up to a long piece of
flexible, but obviously strong, metallic rod.
It probably had been bent down to ground level, and a mechanism had made
it recoil suddenly, probably triggered by Brown’s weight on the net.
Clever…
“You okay, Brown?” Scarlet asked in concern. At first sight, the young man didn’t
seem badly hurt – perhaps shaken, more than anything else.
“Yes,” gasped Brown, his fingers
clutching through the mesh. “Just…
feeling a bit stupid, hanging like a caught fish…”
“Hang on,” Scarlet said, smiling
despite himself. “I’ll get you down
in…”
He was interrupted as his ears
heard another whistling sound – but this time, different from the first one. He
saw something coming quickly at him, a split second before it thudded violently
against his shoulder and embedded itself deep into his flesh, at the same time
driving him to the ground. He gave
a brief cry of pain as he fell onto his back, stars dancing in front of his
eyes, his fingers letting go of his gun, and his hand instinctively reaching for
whatever was protruding from his shoulder.
“Captain!” Brown roared in
apprehension from the net imprisoning him.
Scarlet swiftly got to his knees,
his fingers closing around the projectile that had hit him. An
arrow… he realised, befuddled.
What a strange array of weapons their enemies were using, both high
technology and primitive at the same time…
He tore the arrow from his shoulder, grimacing at the pain.
A new whistling sound… and another
arrow came to plant itself in the snow, just in front of his hand. Quickly, Scarlet raised his eyes to the
direction it came from, and caught sight of a dark silhouette standing just over
the top of Cloudbase’s wrecked hull.
That silhouette was obviously holding something that looked like a
crossbow – and was aiming it straight at him yet again.
Scarlet jumped behind the wreck of
the control tower, just as the new projectile was released. He felt the shaft grazing his arm as he
reached his cover.
“Captain!” Brown called again from
where he was dangling, seeing his superior officer in danger. He struggled to free himself, but with
no avail.
“Stay where you are, Chip!” Scarlet
called from his hiding place. The
kid was safe as long as he stayed inside his net.
Obviously, whoever was shooting arrows at him right now considered him a more immediate danger. Once he had dealt with him – he would
turn his attention to Brown.
Well, I’ve no intention of letting
him do any harm to the kid…
Scarlet made a quick check of the
shooter’s position. He saw him move
atop his perch, to get to another spot quickly. Scarlet could see no other movement. One man alone… he
realised. There was obviously only
one man attacking them, and he seemed determined to kill them both.
The man disappeared from view, and
Scarlet gauged the distance separating him from the huge gap in Cloudbase’s
side; probably, he would be able to surprise his opponent from behind if he
could enter the base. He looked
around for his gun, but couldn’t find it – it obviously had been swallowed by
the surrounding snow. So… he’d have
to make do without it, then. He
crawled a short distance behind a heap of snow and then got to his feet, to make
a run towards the wreck that was Cloudbase, and the gash in its hull.
He saw his adversary briefly appear
again atop the wreckage to swiftly release a new shaft in his direction. It hit Scarlet in the right thigh and
with a groan of pain, the Englishman leapt the remaining distance separating him
from the large gash. He landed
roughly on snow-covered ground, grunting.
Whoever that guy is – whatever side
he’s on – he’s certainly a good shot…
He heard footsteps echoing from
above, and realised that his adversary was coming down for him. If he stayed there, he would be an easy
target. Swiftly, Scarlet pushed
himself to his feet, his teeth clenched against the throbbing in his leg. He limped, almost falling, far away from
the opening and deeper under the wreckage.
There were tears and splits everywhere, leading off from these devastated
rooms, and half-crushed corridors with torn-out doors could be seen, and Scarlet
realised that his enemy could appear from anywhere to kill him.
He certainly knew the labyrinth that Cloudbase had become much better than
Scarlet did himself.
He stopped when he realised the
footsteps were approaching his position.
He listened carefully, trying to figure out where it was coming from
exactly. From that half-destroyed
corridor on the left, apparently… Scarlet chewed his lip, and looked around.
Ahead, the large rip ran deep into Cloudbase; part of the sky was visible in
some places. To the right…
Scarlet noticed the heap of
distorted metal, leading directly up onto the next level, to an indistinct room.
An easy enough climb, if he had not been wounded, but with his bad leg and his
sore shoulder…
Nevertheless…
Like the first time, Scarlet pulled
out the arrow from his leg, biting his lip so not to cry out. Blood started pouring profusely from the
fresh wound. Then, he threw the
shaft deeper into the rip.
Staunching the flow of blood from his thigh by pressing his hand against it, he
climbed up the heap, as swiftly as he could… just as he heard the sound of his
opponent approaching behind him.
As he reached the level above,
Scarlet looked down, in time to see his adversary appear below. Heavily dressed in fur, with coat, boots
and hat, the man was advancing very carefully, looking at the ground as he did
so; he was now carrying his crossbow across his broad shoulders, and was holding
a handgun in his right hand. He was obviously expecting to execute Scarlet up
close once he found him.
If you think I will end up as yet
another skull for your collection, mister, you’re badly mistaken…
Scarlet lay in wait, as the man
slowly approached under his position. He never looked up, all his attention
drawn to the ground, soiled with blood, and he advanced until he reached the
large smear left on the spot where Scarlet had stopped to remove the arrow.
The man crouched down to examine it more closely.
Scarlet moved above him, as silently as a cat.
The man got up on his feet, and
looked ahead into the rip where he could see the arrow, lying ahead on the
ground. Probably he realised at
this instant that he’d been led into a trap, because he hesitated suddenly – and
raised his head.
Too late.
Ignoring the pain in his leg,
Scarlet leapt from his perch straight at his adversary, without giving him time
to react. The man raised his arm,
trying to get a good shot at him with the gun, and his finger squeezed the
trigger – but the bullet went wide.
Scarlet landed on him with his whole weight, driving him to the ground
with great force. The man fell roughly onto his back with a loud huff, and
rolled to the side.
Scarlet did everything in his power
not to land on his bad leg, but it was all he could do to avoid any pain. Grimacing, he rose to his feet, looking
down at the man lying there, motionless – obviously unconscious. His gun lay
only a metre away from Scarlet’s feet.
He hobbled towards it, grunting under the effort, and leaned down with
difficulty to pick it up. His back
was hurting again.
He heard his adversary moaning as
he regained his senses. Scarlet approached, aiming the gun at the man. At the same time, he activated the
Mysteron detector in his bracelet, as Brown had taught him. Considering all the effort this man had put into stopping and
killing Brown and himself, and seeing that he had killed a number of people
prior to that, from the evidence found outside Cloudbase’s wreck, Scarlet wasn’t
dismissing the possibility that he might indeed be an agent of the Mysterons.
But the reassuring beeping sound he
heard told him it wasn’t the case.
He stood over the gasping man who was slowly pushing himself up from his lying
position. He cocked the hammer of the
gun, and the sound made the man stop his movement.
“Stay where you are,” Scarlet said
between clenched teeth, spitting out each word. “Don’t make any false moves… or I’ll shoot!”
“Kill me right away!” the man
demanded in a raging, coarse voice.
“Kill me, and be done with it, you Mysteron scum…”
The sound of that voice – different
and yet so familiar – made Scarlet freeze on the spot. It
COULDN’T be possible… And yet…
He watched the man rise to his
knees and lift his head proudly and defiantly.
He had completely white hair, long and unkempt, sticking out under the
furry hat, and an equally white and too long beard, which hid his chin and
cheeks; the skin of his face was marked with more lines than Scarlet remembered,
and tanned a deep nut-brown, but he still recognised it easily – especially
those intense blue eyes that now were looking up at him with such intensity and
the same surprise – and hesitation born out of disbelief – that he knew had
registered in his own face.
“Oh, my God,” Scarlet whispered,
“it can’t be…” He glanced once
again at the Mysteron detector on his wrist, just to make sure. But there could be no doubt the man was
human – unless the instrument was defective. He didn’t think it was the case.
Forgetting the gun, he got down on his knees, at the man’s level. “Colonel
White…” he said, taking him by the shoulders and looking into his disbelieving
face. “It is you… You’re alive!”
“Scarlet,” White mumbled in a low
voice, obviously unsure if he should believe his eyes. “It can’t be you… You’re dead.” He
shook his head, doubt obvious in his features.
“It must be a Mysteron trick…”
“I was thinking the same of you…
but the instruments say you’re clean.
Colonel… it really is me…”
“No Mysteron?” murmured White. “No
ghost?” He raised his hand and
tentatively touched Scarlet’s face. The fingers trembled, then they touched
something solid and recoiled, almost instinctively.
“No more than you are,” Scarlet
said, now smiling. “You nearly
killed me.” He looked into the
confused man’s face. “And I nearly
killed you… Are you all right? Can you stand…?”
While saying that, he was helping the older man, who didn’t offer any
resistance, to get on his feet.
“I’m all right,” White confirmed in
a still unsure – and somewhat gruff – tone.
“These old bones are still very solid, despite the passage of time… And I had to keep myself in shape in
this Godforsaken place.” He sighed
as he finally stood up – as straight as he always had been years before. He
turned to Scarlet yet again, frowning.
“You… haven’t changed a bit.”
“Well, there’s a reason for that,”
Scarlet said, with a shake of his head.
“And I’m sure it makes… an
interesting story.”
“It certainly does. But how about you, sir? Have you been here all this time?”
Scarlet asked with a frown of his own.
“Isolated? Hiding inside the
wreck of Cloudbase?”
White grunted. “Someone… had to
guard it. To keep scavengers out.”
Scarlet nodded. “Well, I’m sure that also makes an interesting story.
But before we exchange our explanations, what do you say we… free my
companion from his rather uncomfortable position?”
White agreed with a slow, still
uncertain nod; still unsure if he should fully trust him, Scarlet made sure the
older man walked in front, keeping very close to him, while trying to look
inconspicuous. He was still limping
heavily on his wounded thigh, but he could already feel the itching, announcing
that his retrometabolism had kicked in and was taking care of his injuries.
Before long, his leg and shoulder would be as good as new.
They walked back the way Scarlet
had come and soon emerged out of Cloudbase, to direct their steps towards the
spot where Brown had been trapped; the latter was still hanging in his net, but
his position had shifted slightly, an indication that he had struggled to get
free, without much success. When he
saw Scarlet coming back with another man he didn’t know, he stopped his efforts
and turned in their direction.
“Captain!” he called. “You’re alive! You captured that scum!”
White briefly stopped in his tracks
at this insult before starting again.
Scarlet winced. “That’s not quite accurate, Brown,” he said with a little
hesitation.
A bemused Brown watched as they
both approached him, and noticed that the stranger, who was still marching up
front, increased his pace, putting some distance between him and the following
Scarlet. The apprehensive Brown saw the man open his coat and his hand close
around the handle of a knife, hanging from his belt.
“Captain, look out!” Brown warned,
suddenly becoming agitated. “He’s
got a knife! He…”
Before Scarlet could do anything about it, White
grabbed the rope holding the net up and sliced through it with the knife in a
single stroke. The net and its load
fell heavily to the ground.
Brown landed on his back with a loud groan. Scarlet grimaced.
That’s gotta hurt…
He came to a stop right next to
White and watched in concern as Brown, despite the pain he was surely in,
angrily disentangled himself from the net, muttering barely comprehensible
insults and various words of irritation. Scarlet quickly glanced at White to
discover his old commander was quietly sheathing his knife, without a single
worry in the world.
Brown got to his feet, and finally
emerging from under the net, threw it aside in annoyance. He glared furiously in White’s
direction.
“You crazy old man!” he shouted.
“You nearly killed me!”
“More than once, I believe…” White deadpanned.
Brown purposefully walked to him,
his face pale with fury, his fists clenched in rage. “Why, you, I should…” He stopped in his tracks and the words
died on his lips, as he reached White; the latter had swiftly unsheathed his
knife again, and was now threatening the younger man with it. The blade was but an inch from his
throat.
“Watch it,” White warned between
his teeth, glowering at Brown.
“I’ve grown accustomed to peace and quiet, living in these parts for all these
years. Either you calm yourself
down… or I will do it for you.”
Brown swallowed hard, but his eyes
didn’t fall under the colonel’s intense stare. He clenched his teeth. “I don’t know if you’re mad, or…”
“Insulting me will not help your
case, son,” White replied, very coldly.
“So I advise you to change your ways.”
“Or what? You’ll take my head and
add it to those other poor souls over there?”
“I think the two of you have
started off on the wrong foot.”
Scarlet stepped forwards, and putting his hand on White’s wrist, in a way not to
antagonise him, pushed the blade down, away from Brown’s throat. “Chip, believe me, you don’t want to get in this man’s bad books…”
But Brown snorted, with obvious
contempt, not really taking heed of his partner’s cautionary counsel. “Captain, this man tried to kill us…” He
turned to White. “That rocket that destroyed our helijet – and nearly ourselves…
That was yours, wasn’t it?”
“You were trespassing,” White
noted. “I didn’t invite you in…”
“Well, excuse us if we didn’t phone
first!” snapped Brown. “We didn’t realise this was a forbidden
zone!”
“It is. Didn’t you hear it was haunted?
You did see the warnings… You’ve just mentioned it yourself.”
“So you don’t deny that’s your
work, then?” Brown gestured towards
the row of skulls, planted on wooden pikes behind them. “Now if that isn’t proof enough that you’re out of your
mind…”
“You really think I’m as mad as you
imagine, don’t you, boy?” Brown didn’t have to speak; the way he was glaring at
White was enough of an answer. The older man nodded slowly. He raised a brow, addressing Scarlet,
whilst not taking his eyes from the incensed Brown.
“Your… friend… is the frantic sort, isn’t he, Captain?”
“I’m afraid he takes very much
after his father,” Scarlet agreed. “And like his father, he’s also… a bit
reckless.”
“If you say so yourself, knowing how reckless you can be, then he must really be quite a case,” a poker-faced
White remarked.
“You know this man, Captain?” Brown
asked, his tone still edgy.
“Quite well, actually. Lieutenant Brown… this is Colonel
White.”
“White?” Brown’s face, already pale with anger, suddenly changed to an
expression of disbelief.
“Brown?” White turned to Scarlet, finally breaking eye contact with
the younger man. “Any relation
to…?”
“His father,” Scarlet answered with
a nod. “This is Steve Blackburn
Jr.”
“Now I see what you mean – about
him being reckless.” White turned
again to face the now silent Brown, who was still staring at him incredulously. “And yes… I can see the resemblance
too.”
It was Brown’s turn to look at
Scarlet. “Shouldn’t he be dead?” he asked in a murmur, frowning.
Scarlet contented himself with
smiling, while White huffed loudly, obviously annoyed at the remark. “I wish you would all stop saying that.”
He turned towards Cloudbase. “Come.
You lads must be cold. I’ll make you some tea and then we’ll
talk.”
“Just like that?” Brown growled,
watching as the man started walking away, his back turned on them. “He’s
inviting us for tea, and we have to believe he’s on the level? I don’t believe this guy!”
Scarlet put a calming hand on his
shoulder. “Better do as he says,
Chip,” he advised cautiously. “You
will never have the last word with him. Take my word for it.”
|
Chapter 3
– The Ghost of Cloudbase
Colonel White had established his
‘camp’ inside what was left of a second lieutenants’ room – in a section of
Cloudbase’s main body which had withstood the force of the crash, years ago, and
which had not been damaged by flames or smoke at the time. All the electronic systems were, of
course, defective, as they were in the rest of the wrecked base. That meant the sliding doors weren’t
working anymore either, so a blanket had been hung in the opening. Not only did it prevent any heat from
escaping, it also prevented the winds that often twirled around the destroyed
corridors of Cloudbase from entering.
White had successfully fixed a
small electrical system within the confines of his habitat, using a small
emergency generator and whatever tools and equipment he had been able to
retrieve during his multiple scavenger hunts inside Cloudbase. He could pump plenty of fuel from the
only container that had not been destroyed and had not exploded years ago during
the crash – and he had torn as many solar panels from the base’s hull as he
could, in order to collect energy from the sun whenever the weather permitted.
He had lighting, and enough heat not to suffer from the cold.
Food was rationed – that is,
whatever White could keep for many years without fearing any danger to his
health whenever it would be consumed.
As for the rest, he hunted down whatever prey was roaming alive in the
area – which, he admitted to the younger men he had invited to share his meal
with him, was not that much.
While Colonel White was preparing tea for his
hosts, on the small survival kit that permitted him to cook his meals, Scarlet
looked around, and marvelled at the assortment of electronic devices that were
stacked up in the room.
Connected to the generator installed by White, was the equipment that
obviously permitted him to keep a close check on the area. There was a makeshift radar screen on a
table, next to a monitor which was showing the very place where Brown had been
so efficiently netted. Indicator
lights, made with whatever bulbs were found around, were lined on the wall,
right above that monitor. On the
other wall, just above the only bunk left of the four that had occupied the room
in the time when Cloudbase was operational, there were rows of weapons of all
kind. Obviously taken from the base
armoury, Scarlet mused.
Probably those are the weapons that survived the
crash, fifteen years ago.
With the tea ready, the three men
sat around the heat generator, and drank the warm beverage, eating ration
biscuits. Brown grimaced, making no
effort to hide his distaste. Not
only did he have a profound dislike of tea, but this one had a strange taste to
it, and the biscuits were obviously stale.
Scarlet, also noticing the taste, shrugged inwardly, and continued to
drink and eat, without mentioning anything.
Only White seemed to savour his tea and biscuits, as if they were the
most delicious repast he had ever taken.
While they were all eating – with
different degrees of enjoyment – Scarlet related his story to White – with Brown
adding various details to it, and explaining much of what he was allowed to say
to the older man. White, of course,
sensed that he wasn’t completely trusted – by either of them – but he didn’t
seem to mind, as obviously, he didn’t trust them that entirely either. He was simply waiting to
hear all of what they had to say before deciding what he could believe of their
tale.
His frown had deepened as Scarlet’s
story unravelled, and by the end of it, many minutes later, his eyes had
completely disappeared under his now bushy eyebrows. Aside from that, however, there didn’t seem to be that
much surprise registering on his face.
“I stand corrected. This is indeed an interesting story…” White put down his empty cup. “A remarkable one, even.”
Scarlet looked at him in
perplexity. “You don’t seem as
surprised as I would have expected you to be. You don’t believe me?”
White shrugged. “When you were involved, I came to
expect anything, Scarlet. Even the
unexpected. And,” he said with a
sigh, as he stood on his feet, “I have heard of Professor Barnard’s theory of
the Quantum Effect – and what it might do. Living out here all on my own, and
considering the events that happened in Futura City – I became somewhat
interested in the subject, and read whatever I could find about it, that was not
destroyed in the databank. More
biscuits?”
“Er… no thank you,” Scarlet
answered as the old man went to the nearby counter to fetch a new packet. Brown shook his head vehemently. White looked directly at the younger man
as he came back to his seat.
“They are not poisoned, you know,”
he told him. “Or I would’ve been
dead long before now…” He opened the packet and started eating a biscuit.
“Maybe your stomach has grown
accustomed to them, sir,” Scarlet suggested carefully, before Brown could make
an incensed remark. “Lieutenant Brown’s
belly might be… too delicate for them.”
White shrugged again, eating the
rest of the biscuit. “Anyway,” he
continued, “I know that Professor Barnard’s theory – or rather ‘theories’ – were
never truly verified for their accuracy.
But I’m guessing that if anyone could bring the proof of those theories –
and survive the jump in time he described…
it would be you, Scarlet, with your unique metabolism.” He took another biscuit and devoured it.
“After all,” he said with his mouth full, “all the required conditions were met
for the… ‘experiment’ to succeed, when Futura City was bombed.”
Scarlet raised a brow. “You obviously have less trouble than I
did believing it, when I was told about it,” he noted.
“You had trouble believing in your
own invulnerability, when you were first told about that,” White reminded him.
“Years ago…”
“Indeed,” Scarlet mused. “What about you, sir? What is your story? How did you survive
Cloudbase’s crash – and why did you stay here all these years?”
“How did I survive?” White marked a pause, swallowing what
was left of his last biscuit. He
looked into empty space, without answering right away. “Damned if I know exactly.
I felt for sure that the crash would kill me. I guess some of your own luck rubbed off on me at some
point…” He glanced at Brown. “And I know I’m not a Mysteron
reconstruct, Lieutenant Brown.”
“Don’t worry,” Brown answered
rather sourly. “I already
double-checked that with my Mysteron
detector.” He pointed to his
bracelet of instruments, before nodding in Scarlet’s direction. “Even after the Captain assured me you
were clean…”
“It’s good to see Spectrum is still
using efficient officers,” White deadpanned.
“Even when they seem to be fairly young…”
“I may be young by your standards, Colonel,” Brown replied a little
defiantly, “but I can assure you – I have plenty of experience.”
“Experience in what exactly? You look hardly old enough to drive…”
“That’s hardly fair, Colonel…”
“Chip,” Scarlet called in a calming tone. Instantly, the younger man grew quiet,
biting down the rest of his reply.
“Sir,” Scarlet continued, addressing White, “the Cloudbase crash? What happened?”
“The crash… Well, as you can see for yourself, it
destroyed the base without any hope of it being repaired. I was at the helm, manning one of the
wheels. The other wheel was set on
auto-pilot. When the base crashed,
I was tossed around the room like a rag doll.
I must have hit my head somewhere, because I don’t remember much of what
happened next, except that I saw fire erupt from various parts of Cloudbase on
the screens. When I came to, hours…
maybe even days later… I was lying in the snow. I had a concussion, a broken leg, a few cracked ribs, a
dislocated shoulder, and cuts and bumps everywhere on my body. But I was definitely alive.”
“And you obviously survived after
that,” Scarlet mused.
White nodded. “Putting my shoulder and my leg right
wasn’t the toughest thing to do – but Hell, did that hurt… After that, I found a proper shelter, within the wreck of
Cloudbase. Then I searched for whatever I needed to
take care of my wounds and survive in this environment, and nurse myself back to
health. It took a long time… But I somehow made it.”
“You’ve always been a survivor,”
Scarlet said with a faint, admiring smile.
“Once I was able to walk around
with relative ease, I set up camp in this room, using whatever I could lay my
hands on that would be useful to me, and prepared myself for a long stay… At least, until I would be strong enough
to make it back to civilisation on my own.”
“Wait,” Brown interrupted suddenly.
“With all the stuff you found around – those electronic devices, those weapons –
you mean to tell us you didn’t find any communication device that you would use
to call for help?”
“And whom would have I called?”
White asked pointedly. “I had
refused a direct order from the World President to surrender Cloudbase – and I
did so without mincing my words, I have to say.
I had ordered my own people to go into hiding, and crashed the base.
To all intents and purposes, I was considered a traitor to the World Government. What kind of fate do you think would have befallen me, if my
calls for help had attracted the unwanted attention of those I had supposedly betrayed?”
Brown hesitated. “Good point,” he finally conceded. “But…
you didn’t leave this place.”
“Well observed, Lieutenant.”
“Why?” Scarlet asked with a frown.
“Why did you stay?”
White chewed on his lip,
thoughtfully. He hesitated, looking
squarely at the two younger men. He
sighed deeply. “To be truthful, I
was about ready to leave the wreckage,” he admitted, “and make it back to
civilisation on foot. I did find a radio, which permitted me to
intercept communications which obviously came from nearby. Somewhere beyond this valley, beyond
those mountains, there were people…
I simply needed to find these people, and then I’d be able to leave this place –
to leave Cloudbase behind me – and maybe… go back home.”
“What happened?” Scarlet asked
softly.
Colonel White’s expression
darkened. “They came,” he said in a low tone.
“They?” Scarlet repeated in puzzlement.
“Mysteron agents,” White specified,
his voice dropping an octave, as he went pensive. Both Brown and Scarlet
straightened up on their seats, and exchanged a concerned glance. White continued, “At first, I thought
they were an expedition, sent by the World Government. Some of them wore WAAF winter uniforms. They approached the crash site, and started rummaging around…
looking for something.” He gestured
around. “As you can see, Cloudbase
was not entirely destroyed. There
was still… equipment… devices… that could be retrieved from it. I managed to destroy most of the files,
before the crash, giving a copy to Lieutenant Green for safekeeping, but there
was still a risk that certain files might still be retrieved and used. Besides, Cloudbase was built with very
advanced technology that must not fall into the wrong hands. I came to the
realisation at that moment… that I couldn’t leave Cloudbase, and abandon it to
scavengers.”
“But you said they wore WAAF
uniforms,” Scarlet remarked.
“Yes – agents of the same
government to whom I had refused to surrender Cloudbase,” White said coldly.
“As long as Roberts was in office, I wasn’t going to hand him Spectrum’s crown
technological jewel. Beside, they were not from the WAAF.”
“Yes, you said they were Mysteron
agents,” Brown remarked. “Are you
sure? Did you have a Mysteron
detector?”
“Did you think I had time to check
them in the heat of the battle?
When you shoot someone and you see him getting back on his feet five minutes
later, as if he didn’t have a half dozen bullets in his chest, and shouting ‘the
Mysterons will get their revenge’, what are you liable to think, Lieutenant?”
“That he is a Mysteron,” Scarlet
admitted.
“That’s what happened. My first move was to approach those men
cautiously… but as soon as they saw me, they started firing and I returned fire.
I was lucky to get out of that alive, with no more than a few scratches.”
“What happened to them?” Brown
asked.
“I killed them, of course.” White pointed to the monitor screen
behind him. “There were five WAAF
officers, and three sherpas. You
saw what’s left of them when you arrived here.”
“Those skulls planted in front of
Cloudbase?” Brown asked incredulously.
“I didn’t have a Mysteron gun – so
to make sure they wouldn’t come back from the dead and attack me again, I burned
them, after I shot them – and as an added precaution, I cut their heads off…
I reckoned if it worked for vampires in folklore, it would surely work for
Mysteron agents.”
“That’s why you decided to stay
here,” Scarlet said thoughtfully.
“To protect Cloudbase from further incursions.”
White nodded. “I planted the skulls of those Mysteron
agents over there as a warning to whoever might approach… And there were people who approached
this location, and came close to finding Cloudbase or even actually found it. Many expeditions over the years. I managed to scare some of them off. The others…” He let the sentence hang.
“You killed them?” Brown said,
lifting a disbelieving brow. “But
surely, they didn’t all deserve…”
“They were warned, lad, by the
example of what would happen to them if they chose to move any closer,” White
said icily. “And as far as I was
concerned, when they decided to ignore that warning, I was free to do what was
needed to stop them from approaching any closer to Cloudbase – or even to leave
and report that they had seen where it was.
Besides, be assured that all who came had an ulterior motive.”
“They couldn’t all be Mysterons…”
“I checked most of them out with
the only Mysteron detector I had. Some of them were Mysteron agents.
Others were World Government agents… and others were unscrupulous sherpas
who had guided those men here and who would do to me worse than what you think I did to that
first expedition – if there was money to be made from it.”
“You blew up our chopper…”
“With my last rocket, yes. As far as I knew, you also came to take something out of Cloudbase. Two weeks ago, I had
to fight off another expedition – There was one survivor who ran away from here
as if he had encountered the devil himself.
I imagined your helijet was the next expedition – coming fully prepared
after this man’s report – if he had made it back to civilisation alive, of
course. Believe me, son, I had
every reason to be suspicious.
No-one comes here to pick daisies…”
“You are mad…”
“Lieutenant,” Scarlet started
warningly.
But White raised a hand to stop him
from intervening. He still could
fight his own battles. “No. I was merely doing my duty, boy.
I couldn’t know you were Spectrum – that helijet was unmarked – with good
reason, I believe. Maybe I would have shot it down anyway, if I had known it was
Spectrum. From what I heard from
the radio, Spectrum agents are wanted by the authority not only for treason, but
for acts of terrorism.”
“Those are damned lies!” Brown said
between his teeth. “We are no
terrorists.”
White glared at him coldly. “And how can I be so sure of that?” he
demanded. “How can I be sure that
you might be my allies – or yet another group wanting to take from Cloudbase
whatever technology you need for some nefarious purpose?”
“Colonel…” White turned to Scarlet, who had kept
his composure during the altercation between his two companions. The English captain looked levelly into
his compatriot’s livid face. “You
know me. Would you believe I would
ally myself with terrorists?”
“On your own admittance, you only
have been with them a while, since your… arrival.”
“Yes, but I’ve seen their set-up.
And what they told me is quite in accordance with what you’ve told me of the end
of Cloudbase.” Scarlet put a reassuring hand on White’s
shoulder. “And Blue is in charge of
this Spectrum.”
“So I’ve heard…” White grew calmer; but his eyes were
still set on Brown, in a suspicious way.
“You have yet to tell me why you came here.”
“It’s true we want something from
Cloudbase,” Scarlet admitted.
He felt White tensing under his
fingers. “Of course – otherwise you
wouldn’t be here. What is it you’re
looking for?”
“I believe it might be the same
thing that those World Government expeditions wanted to find. Something called the Quantum
Transmitter.” White’s face remained
without reaction. “Colonel Blue
told me that aside from the one which served as detonator when Futura City was
destroyed; there remained one last prototype, which had been brought to
Cloudbase, prior to the crash.”
“Yes, that is true. For
safe-keeping. What do you want with it?
Planning a return to your time, maybe?”
Scarlet frowned in curiousity. “What do you mean exactly?”
White shrugged. “One of the latest theories I came
across in the databank mentioned a possibility of harnessing the Quantum energy
to actually be able to travel efficiently in time… And I mean, a controlled
trip. Not doing it by accident, like you
seemed to have done yourself.
Perhaps it would be possible, with the proper technology, to travel back in time.”
“According to Captain Green, the
trip can only be performed forwards,” Brown remarked. ‘Going back’ is impossible, at the moment.”
“‘At the moment’… But who knows, perhaps somewhere – somewhen – someone is actually planning to
make it work – and eventually put the theory into use. If I were you, I would
start to seriously consider looking into that option, Scarlet.”
“Well, it would surprise me if
that’s the actual reason Colonel Blue wants the Transmitter,” Scarlet replied,
all the while wondering if Colonel White was serious or only talking in jest.
“Or the World Government for that matter.”
“Did he tell you why the World
Government might want it?”
“No… only that he had just found
out recently that they wanted it, that he believed it must be for an important
reason – and that he would not wait any longer to find out exactly how important
it might be.”
“Sounds rather ominous.” White glanced in Brown’s direction. The younger man was keeping silent. “And what about you, Lieutenant? What do you know about this that we
don’t?”
“What makes you think I know
anything?” Brown asked suspiciously.
“You were very quiet, the whole
time Captain Scarlet and I were talking about it. Which makes me think you might have something on your mind.”
Brown shook his head. “Even if it
was the case… and I’m not saying it is… I’m not allowed to say anything…” He caught sight of Scarlet glaring at
him with a reproachful look. “…sir,” he added, almost despite himself.
White nodded slowly, before
addressing Scarlet. “It would seem
your ‘old friend’ doesn’t trust you entirely, Captain.”
“Considering the circumstances,
sir, I can’t say I blame him…”
Scarlet discreetly rubbed the bracelet he was wearing on his left wrist. He
didn’t know if Brown knew about the bomb in it –
probably,
he thought, and he might even have the
detonator, with the instructions to use it if he feels any need for it.
He wasn’t going to ask him directly, though.
At the moment, the young man was still rather edgy – not only towards
Scarlet, but towards White as well.
He really had issues with trusting people.
He’s not called ‘Chip’ for nothing…
A beeping sound suddenly resonated
from behind him. White instantly
was on his feet, moving with a speed and swiftness that were rather surprising
for a man of his age. Both Scarlet
and Brown looked on as he moved toward the radar screen on the table.
“What is that sound?” Scarlet
asked.
“Radar alert,” White answered
gruffly, as both Scarlet and Brown stood up to approach. “There’s an aircraft approaching
Cloudbase’s position.” He pointed
to the screen, where there was a luminous point bleeping, almost dead centre. “Too slow to be a jet. It’s probably a helicopter.”
“That’s how you knew we were here,”
Brown noted. “Through that radar.”
Scarlet nodded. “Cloudbase was equipped with the best
scanning systems in the world. We
might have escaped the Asian Republic radars on our way here, but we obviously
didn’t escape this one…”
“They’ll be here shortly,” White
commented, analysing what the screen was telling him. Another beeping sound made him raise his head. One of the many indicators on his walls
was now blinking steadily.
“Correction, they are already here.” He walked to his computer screen. “That’s the perimeter alert,” he
explained. “Someone is approaching
Cloudbase and has tripped one of the alarms I set around the place… That’s
also
how I knew exactly where you were when you came on foot.” He typed a command on the keyboard below
the monitor. “Looks like someone’s
coming almost the same way you took.
Was there anyone else with you?” It
was almost an accusation. But
Scarlet shook his head.
“Only the two of us,” he answered.
“They might have followed our footprints – if the winds have not erased them
completely.”
“Whoever they are, they are
probably with that helicopter your radar picked up,” Brown remarked.
The image on the screen changed and
another part of the area surrounding Cloudbase was shown. Six men in brown uniforms
were advancing on the ground, very carefully, guns at the ready. White grunted.
“Asian Republic soldiers,” he said
between his teeth.
“Probably, that rocket you launched
earlier which destroyed our chopper has alerted them,” Brown noted. “The explosion was big enough to be
noticed.”
“Or maybe you didn’t escape all their radar screens as you thought
earlier,” White replied.
“Either way, these men have been
sent to investigate,” Scarlet concluded.
White shook his head. “They’ve arrived a little too soon after
the events for my taste,” he mumbled.
“They were probably already in the area.”
“On routine patrol, surely…”
“What is there to patrol about in
this area, Lieutenant? Believe me,
I’ve been living here long enough to know that there’s nothing of interest for
the military to check. The
conditions around here are too harsh for any settlements – and apart from a few
bandits, hiding from the authorities…”
“If you’re saying the Asian
Republic would send soldiers around to look for Cloudbase – why would they?”
Brown asked. “Their government
mainly ignores Spectrum’s activities…”
“Maybe as a favour to the World
Government? In a gesture to try to patch things up between the two of them?
I’ve learned through the radio that the relationship is rather strained at the
moment.”
“Captain Grey did mention something about that,” Scarlet concurred.
“Perhaps,” Brown admitted,
pensively.
White was flicking the screen,
going through the various cameras he had installed in and around Cloudbase.
The men they had seen previously were not the only ones; there were others, in
various locations around the base, searching through the wreckage.
“How many did you count?” he asked
his two companions.
“Fifteen so far,” Scarlet answered.
“Too many to imagine they won’t find us eventually – especially if they continue
to search the wrecks.”
On the screen on which White had
stopped, they saw one of the men suddenly snatched by the foot by a concealed
noose, which took him high into the air – in a similar way to that which had
trapped Brown earlier. The young
man snorted.
“My traps might buy us some time,”
Colonel White said with satisfaction, as he turned around and took an automatic
rifle from the wall behind him.
“Some time to do what?” Brown inquired.
“I knew this day would come,” White
explained, unhooking a clip of ammunition as well and arming the weapon. “The day when the odds will be too high
and I will have no other choice but to destroy Cloudbase entirely. I haven’t done it before, because I was
concerned that such an explosion would attract unwanted attention… But now, that’s a moot point, it seems.”
He presented the gun to Brown.
“Since you are here, you might as well make yourself useful.”
“You want me to shoot at soldiers
from the Asian Republic?” Brown
asked with a frown.
“How different are they from the
WAAF or the WGPC?” White asked. “If
I believe the news, Spectrum doesn’t hesitate to exchange fire with them… Unless you’re going to tell me those are
lies as well?”
“No… that did happen. But not by our choice, Colonel, and only
to defend ourselves. And only
because we were unable to avoid it.”
“I am sure.” White shoved the gun
into the young man’s arms.
“Consider that we have no choice now either.
Besides,” he added in an undertone, “I have the feeling that these men
might not be who they appear to be.”
“Mysterons?” Scarlet said, lifting a brow.
“So far, most of my ‘visitors’ have
been.”
“This is ludicrous,” Brown said
vehemently. “Why would the
Mysterons come here in the first place? You haven’t told us that, Colonel.”
“I’ve been asking myself the same
question from years, but quite frankly,
right now might not be the time to try to find the answer.”
“The Quantum Transmitter,” Scarlet
then suggested. “They could be after it themselves…”
“Like the World Government?” Brown
said with a frown.
“It is a possibility.”
“But…”
“We’re wasting time, men.” White pointed to the bracelets both
Scarlet and Brown were wearing.
“Those are certainly more practical to carry around than my own detector. Feel free to check if these men are
Mysterons or not if you want, before making your decision. But I have a feeling that they wouldn’t
let you come close enough to use them.”
“I have quite the same feeling,”
Scarlet commented.
“So – are you with me or not?”
Scarlet took the rifle that White
was handing him and checked the ammunition. “Always, Colonel.” He glanced in Brown’s direction, and
White did the same. The
younger man remained silent.
“Lieutenant?” White asked.
“All right,” Brown grumbled under
his breath. “But only because these
men’s presence might interfere with our mission.” He glared at Scarlet.
“You do remember we have a
mission, don’t you, Captain?”
Scarlet only took a few seconds to
give it some thought, before addressing White again: “He’s right, Colonel. We did come for the Quantum Transmitter
ourselves.”
White shrugged dismissively. “All right.
If it is so important to you…
But you will have to fetch it yourself – that is, if it’s not been
destroyed by the crash.”
“Where is it?”
“The last time I heard of it –
years ago before the crash – it was in the R and D Department.”
“Bottom level, starboard of the
Control Tower.”
“That section has been nearly
completely crushed under Cloudbase’s own weight. If you find anything intact there… you’ll be lucky.” White chuckled despite himself. “Imagine so many people possibly looking
– and dying – for something which doesn’t exist anymore.”
“I’ll go get the Transmitter,”
Brown proposed.
“You don’t know the base,” Scarlet
pointed out. “The colonel and I
do.”
“And I do know the ground which
our… opponents are walking on,” White added, looking at the screen, where he
could see the men fanning out to explore the wreckage. “We’d better move fast, or we won’t have
time to do anything.” He turned to
the two men. “You get the
Transmitter, Scarlet. Brown will
come with me. I’ve already placed charges around
Cloudbase, but I didn’t have the mechanism to set remote timers. We’ll have to do it by hand and then get
the Hell out of here before everything goes up in smoke.”
“We can call Spectrum and they’ll
come to fetch us,” Brown said.
“Since we don’t have any means of transportation to leave anymore.”
White rolled his eyes. “You’re an unforgiving kind, aren’t you,
Lieutenant?” White remarked coolly.
He took a communication device from the top of his desk.
“I’ll need your radio frequency to keep in contact with you.”
“I think we’d better not use
communicators,” Brown intervened.
“We don’t know what frequency these soldiers use for their own radios, so we
might accidentally stumble on it…
Besides, the Asian Republic Army has advanced technology to intercept radio
communications – however protected they might be. It’s too big a risk to take.”
“You’re right,” White admitted,
after listening to Brown’s argument with interest. “For once…”
“I get better,” Brown grinned
mischievously. “I have a remote
that can be used for your bomb.”
Scarlet’s ears pricked up at the announcement, but he said nothing. “If it can be useful to you…” Brown
continued.
White looked impressed. “Well, it
can be handy, yes. Thank you for
the offer, Lieutenant.”
“We’d better set up a rendezvous
point, then,” Scarlet suggested. “How much time can you give me, before you blow
it all up?”
“I calculate forty-five minutes to
set timers in strategic charges. When they detonate, they will set the other
charges off as well. That’s as long
as we’ll be able to play hide and seek with these men before they catch us.
Longer than that, we won’t be able to avoid confrontation.”
“Will we be able to get far enough
away in forty-five minutes?” Brown asked in concern. “An explosion in this narrow valley could start an avalanche
that could engulf Cloudbase…”
“I’m counting on it,” White
retorted.
“… And us at the same time,” Brown
finished.
“We’ll have to make do with the
time we have.”
Scarlet nodded, before turning to
Brown. “Use our most secure
frequency to contact the Sea Turtle,”
he instructed. “Make it an
encrypted message to reduce the risks of being picked up. Tell them to send us
the second helijet for pickup, as soon as possible.”
“S.I.G.”, Brown answered.
“I know a cave in which we can
establish camp, while waiting for them,” White continued. “It’s near the
entrance of the valley, and it goes right through the mountain, to the other
side where they’ll be able to pick us up.
Once inside that cave, we’ll be safe from any avalanche, Lieutenant.”
“Right. If it doesn’t collapse on top of us…”
“The cave’ll be perfect,” Scarlet
interrupted before White could give Brown a piece of his mind. “Because I don’t expect the craft to
arrive before a day or two.”
Scarlet moved towards the exit. “We’ll
rendezvous by the entrance of the valley,” he said.
“That would be far enough away to avoid being hit by the explosion, I
believe?”
“Agreed. Be careful over there,
Scarlet. The place is quite a
mess.”
“I’ll be as careful as I can,
Colonel.”
“I’ll believe that the day pigs fly.”
Scarlet smiled despite himself at hearing the
doubt in his former commander’s voice.
He was about to get out when he heard the old man call him again. “Uh… Paul?”
Scarlet stopped in his tracks and
turned around. White gave him an
encouraging thumbs-up. “It’s good
to see you back in action.”
“The same here, sir,” Scarlet
answered with a smile. “Please, while I’m away, do try not to kill each other,
the pair of you.”
And he disappeared behind the
blanket.
“We’d better get a move on, too,”
White said, walking to the door in turn, Brown on his heels.
Chapter 4
–
Heat of Battle
Colonel White had not lied. The way to what was left of the Research
and Development Centre was indeed a mess. It was across the large rip – where
Cloudbase had obviously suffered the most damage from the crash, and Scarlet was
barely able to recognise it from the base he knew so well. The walls that were
still standing were dangerously distorted, blackened by smoke, and covered with
an ice and snow layer many inches thick.
Most of the corridors and rooms in this part were either destroyed or
blocked by debris, and in some places, Scarlet barely had the space to squeeze
through, in order to continue his advance.
Snow had penetrated through various openings, and was all over the place,
while ice had rendered the floor very slippery.
It took Scarlet the better part of
twenty minutes, just to reach R and D – or rather, what was left of it.
The room was in total chaos –
barely holding together at all.
Part of the upper decks had fallen straight into it – Scarlet thought he
recognised the varnished floor from the gymnasium - which had been three levels
up – with equipment scattered all around, broken and twisted.
There was barely space to walk in
the room, and after having lost precious minutes in searching for what he was
looking for – checking under and behind various heaps of wreckage, Scarlet was
despairing of ever finding it – let alone in one piece. He stopped in the middle of the
destroyed room and looked around, thinking.
It’s probably gone, he reflected with a
grunt.
Destroyed by the crash, most certainly. Colonel White was right. People died needlessly for a piece of
junk…
He checked his watch. If he wanted to make the deadline and
meet the others before Cloudbase was destroyed, he had to leave now – in fact,
he should have left five minutes ago.
With a sense of defeat, he turned around to go.
When suddenly, he saw something.
The R and D safe was lying there,
trapped under part of the fallen ceiling – just beneath the varnished floor of
the gymnasium. It was half-crushed,
and the door had burst open under the shock but was still held by one hinge.
Scarlet remembered that the Quantum
Transmitter had been given to Spectrum for safe-keeping – so what better place
to keep the thing, than in the safe itself?
Scarlet walked over to it and
crouched under the destroyed ceiling and floor. The safe was within reach, and so he pulled on the door
handle, with all of his strength.
He had all the trouble in the world to successfully open the door completely. He peered inside the safe. It was too dark for him to see beyond
the opening, so he extended his hand inside and rummaged blindly.
His fingers touched something
small. Like a box, the size of a
medium-sized television remote control. He closed his hand on it and holding his
breath, pulled it back out of the safe, at the same time crawling out from under
the floor.
When he finally was able to stand,
Scarlet opened his hand and looked at the object he had taken from the safe.
He exhaled loudly.
It was indeed the Quantum
Transmitter – he recognised it from the picture that had been shown to him,
before his mission onboard the Goliath II.
It was handheld size, made of plastic and metal, and covered with
electronic chips, with a yellow screen surmounting a digital pad…
Except it was damaged, and so
didn’t look quite like what Scarlet knew of the Quantum Transmitter.
A dark, lightbulb-like component,
which originally should have been screwed on top of the device, was missing, and
Scarlet could see a sharp edge where it used to be. The box was barely holding together, and
electronic bits seemed to be missing from within it. The yellow screen was split in two, one half gone, and ice
had entered under the digital pad.
It’s useless,
Scarlet told himself, looking bitterly at the device in his hand.
This thing will never work
again.
Nonetheless, he put the Quantum
Transmitter into his rucksack – maybe, he thought, Spectrum’s scientists would
be able to make something of it, when they examined it…
He looked at his watch again.
I’d better step on it. I’m already
late as it is… He started making his way back out, the way he entered
through the wreckage.
He certainly didn’t want to be
buried alive, under tons of rocks and debris, when Cloudbase was destroyed…
Following their own schedule,
Colonel White and Lieutenant Brown, after separating to install the timers on
the already set charges, met once more, outside Cloudbase, just at the entrance
of what had been, in its time, one of the recreational rooms of the base. White actually jumped in surprise when
the young man suddenly arrived at a run behind him, and he turned around, his
gun at the ready. Brown stopped in
his tracks and put up his hands in a defensive way; before he could say
anything, White put a finger to his own lips and motioned Brown to approach
cautiously. When the young man
crouched beside him, White pointed through a rip on the wall, towards a group of
three Asian Republic soldiers walking amidst the wreckage.
“Have you placed your timers?” the
colonel asked in a whisper.
“Yeah – following your instructions
– and your carefully drawn plan. You did the same?”
White nodded in silence.
“What were you in another life,
Colonel? An explosives expert?”
“An admiral in the World Navy. Why the stupid questions?”
“I was just wondering where you had
learned to set up explosives like that.
I will admit, I was quite impressed by the way those charges were set all
around the place. The way it is,
Cloudbase will surely be completely destroyed by the blast.”
“Yes, well… one can only hope so,”
White muttered. “Have you set the
remote to the right frequency?”
“Yes, I have.” Brown said, presenting the remote to
White. “If we need to set off the
explosion before time… we just push the button. But I do hope we won’t be doing that. We are cutting it short enough as it is right now.” He consulted his watch. “Fifteen minutes. About time we went. And no trace of Captain Scarlet.”
“I wouldn’t worry about Scarlet if
I were you. He knows very well how
to take care of himself. And he did
say he would meet us at the entrance of the valley.”
“So you suggest we go without him,
then?”
“He suggested it. Not
me. He knows what he’s doing. Did you call for our pickup?” Brown answered with a slow and silent
nod, much like White had done before.
Colonel White slowly rose to his feet.
“Come on, then. Our ‘visitors’ are
far away enough now. Let’s make a
run for it.”
They left their hiding place and
carefully took a few steps into the open.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, four
soldiers in brown uniform appeared, surrounding them, their rifles raised.
“HOLD! Do not move!”
The order was spoken in bad and
heavily accented English. White and
Brown instantly froze in their tracks, and looked at the men who had trapped
them.
“Throw guns down!” said the man who had
spoken before.
“NOW!”
Reluctantly, White and Brown
obeyed.
“Where did they come from?” White
said between his teeth.
“Beats me…” Brown muttered under
his breath.
“SILENCE!”
The man closest to them struck White in the face
with the butt of his rifle, sending the older man sprawling in the snow.
“HEY!” Brown protested, making a step forward. “That’s an old man!
Show some respect!”
“SILENCE!”
was the automatic reply. This
time, the butt of the rifle hit Brown violently in his stomach.
He fell to his knees, beside White, groaning.
The latter was on his hands and knees, trying to get up, and shaking his head to
get his bearings back.
“Thank you for your support,
Lieutenant,” he gasped. “I’ll try
to forget you called me an old man, though…”
“QUIET!”
White was pulled up onto his knees.
The barrel of a rifle was shoved under his nose and he raised his eyes defiantly
to the man who was holding the weapon. A large, blueish swelling was starting to form on what could
be seen of his cheek, under his left eye, the rest being hidden under his beard.
He watched as one of the men took out his communication device and started
talking into it. They’re speaking Chinese,
White realised – he didn’t understand much Chinese, but he didn’t need to, to
understand that their presence was being reported to these men’s leader.
White glanced to Brown, who was
kneeling by his side, and the younger man glanced back at him. He quickly lowered his eyes to his right
hand, which was resting by his side.
White briefly looked down and saw that Brown was still holding the
hand-held remote, hidden within his palm.
He gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head.
“Not now,” he muttered.
But he knew the young man would be
ready to act, whenever he gave the signal.
Which would be soon, before these
men discovered the remote in Brown’s hand…
White didn’t have to give that
signal. From behind the Asian
Republic soldiers, a man dressed in dark clothing suddenly emerged from the
shadows, and grabbed the last of them from behind, breaking his neck in one
swift movement. The others heard
their companion fall and instantly turned around to deal with the newcomer, but
it was already too late, as the latter was on them, knocking out one with his
rifle, and kicking the other in his stomach.
The surprise was such that it
allowed both Brown and White to act in turn, and they quickly jumped the last
two soldiers and dealt with them very quickly.
Brown tackled one and brought him down to the ground, where he punched
him in the face, knocking him out instantly, while, White, more deadly, pulled
his opponent down and hit him at the throat with the butt of his own rifle.
Brown and White got to their feet
and crossed the fallen soldiers, to stand before Scarlet. “You’re late,” White grunted, checking
the ammunition in his newly acquired weapon.
“Next time, I’ll try to be on
time,” Scarlet answered. “How much
time do we have left before the charges explode?”
“Just enough to make it out of here
in one piece… Without taking the
time to hide ourselves. The others
were alerted, I believe – so let’s go now!
Follow me!”
The three of them took off, in the
hope of putting as much distance as they could between them and the wreckage,
before the other Asian Republic soldiers came after them.
They were not so lucky. They had barely left Cloudbase’s
vicinity when the soldiers suddenly emerged from amongst the wreckage, and
discovered them. A voice shouted
after them. Volleys of shots rang out around them –
and they ran faster, the soldiers now hot on their tail.
As the bullets flew closer around
them, they realised they would never make it to the cave Colonel White had
mentioned earlier – not without one or more of them being hit from behind. They might all be killed before
reaching safety.
Near the ridge, they found refuge
behind a formation of boulders, and from there, started returning fire. They saw
the Asian Republic soldiers plunging into the snow and behind huge rocks to seek
cover. Exchanges of fire followed,
with each group displaying the same determination to either capture – or not be
captured.
“Where’s the cave?” Scarlet asked
over the shots, leaning towards White.
The later shook his head. “Forget it now. It’s still too far, and we’ll be too much in the open trying
to reach it. They’ll shoot us like
flies as we run to it.”
“So we hold station here?” Brown
asked. “Until they get us anyway or
we freeze to death from exposure?”
“You have a better suggestion?”
White replied with a frown.
“Oh yeah… I definitely have a
better suggestion!”
In surprise, both White and Scarlet
turned to the younger man crouched behind them, wondering what he meant.
It was only then that they noticed
a camouflage-painted helijet hovering just over the ridge behind them. White turned swiftly, and raised his gun
to get a crack at it, believing they had been surprised from behind by the
enemy, but Scarlet put his hand on the barrel of his rifle.
“Wait!” He looked up to the approaching craft. “It’s Spectrum!”
“… Spectrum?” White narrowed his eyes at the helijet. It was moving swiftly, almost silently,
as it cleared the ridge and flew over the valley.
It came low enough for them to get a good view of the pilot – who gave
them the thumbs up. Brown answered
with a similar signal, and then turned to Scarlet and White, grinning from ear
to ear. Scarlet looked rather
perplexed.
“I can imagine that craft are
faster in this day and age, but this is ridiculous!” he said, looking as the
helijet gained some altitude and hovered around, looking for a landing spot.
“How did it arrive here that quickly here?” He turned to Brown; he saw the young man
redden violently under his inquiring stare.
“I… er… It was already around,”
Brown explained. “Colonel Blue gave
instructions that it should follow us from some distance. It left the carrier a
few hours after us, and landed within a short flying distance from our position.
Ready to intervene if we should need it.
You weren’t told because…”
“… Of security reasons. I understand.” Scarlet sighed.
“Remind me to give Colonel Blue a big hug next time I see him.”
“I don’t know if protocol allows
such displays, Captain,” Brown said with a nonetheless amused smile.
“You don’t strike me as a man who
would let protocols dictate your actions, Lieutenant,” White said gruffly.
“Whenever it suits me… sir,” Brown
answered. There was now a newborn
respect in the young man’s voice for the elderly man, and both Scarlet and White
noticed it instantly.
The three men looked on as the
helijet finally made its touch-down approach.
To ensure that the Asian Republic soldiers kept their distance, it spat a
volley of bullets in their direction.
The soldiers ran away, to find better cover, preferring to save their
lives instead of catching their escaped captives.
“Right,” Scarlet said. “Let’s not
waste any more time. Here’s our
chance. Let’s go!”
Urging the other two to run for it,
Scarlet lingered behind, covering their retreat, by firing on their pursuers.
Caught between Scarlet’s automatic and the machine gun from the helijet, the
soldiers didn’t dare leave their shelter, and barely responded to their fire. Scarlet gave his companions a few seconds’ advance,
then backed away towards the helijet in turn, still firing at the soldiers; he
only glanced briefly behind him to make sure that both White and Brown were
safely approaching their objective.
The helijet had touched down,
holding its fire to do so, and the door slid open to welcome the escapees, who,
to avoid the wind stirred by the rotating blades, had crouched down for the last
steps of their run. Colonel White
was the first to reach the door, where the silhouette of a man – dressed in what
he understood was the new Spectrum uniform – appeared, leaning forwards to lend
a helping hand. White reached for
that hand and raised his eyes to the man, to thank him for his assistance – and
froze instantly on the spot.
With the same, obviously stunned
expression that he could see in the man’s eyes, he was staring straight into the
face of Captain Black.
“Charles?” Black murmured
incredulously. “You’re alive?”
The voice, White noticed instantly,
had nothing of the Mysterons’ ominous
tone to it. Yet, he was unsure if this wasn’t some kind of a trap set by his
enemies and was hesitant to climb onboard the helijet.
“Conrad – is it really you?”
Black noticed that White’s hand was
hovering over the butt of his handgun. Both of them were uncertain of the
identity of the other, and obviously uncertain what he should do. Just at that moment, Brown arrived next
to White, out of breath, and putting a hand on the older man’s shoulder to urge
him to move on.
“You two can do the niceties later
on,” he said quickly enough. “Now
is not the time! Get a move on!”
The tone of his voice snapped both
White and Black out of their surprise and White finally decided to climb aboard
the helijet when the sound of a new volley of shots coming from behind made all
of them duck instinctively. As none
of them were hit, they turned around, in time to see that one of the soldiers
pursuing them had crawled around a formation of rocks to avoid Scarlet’s fire,
and finally take pot shots at him from the flank. The new shots obviously surprised Scarlet, and even as he
spun on his heel to return fire, a new volley cut him down and he fell face
first into the snow.
“Scarlet!” Black roared. “Brown,
cover me! Colonel White, get inside the chopper!” And before anyone could answer or stop him, he dashed from
the safety of his position and ran straight where Scarlet had fallen. Behind him, he could hear Brown’s gun,
as the young man, following his order, was covering his progress. The soldier who had shot Scarlet down,
was hit in the shoulder, and forced to take cover again, like his companions,
who were also attempting to fire at their opponents.
When he arrived next to him, Black
realised that Scarlet was still alive and attempting to haul himself up; he was
obviously badly hit, because he was hardly able to move more than an inch.
“Hang on, Paul, I’m getting you out
of here.”
Black barely stopped. He threw
himself on his knees beside the wounded man, took him by the armpits and lifted
him over his shoulder, causing him to groan in pain. Black winced under the added weight as he got to his feet and
started to make a run back to the helijet, clenching his teeth with
determination. Brown was covering
his retreat, as best he could – but he could still feel the bullets from the
Asian Republic soldiers flying around him.
He reached the helijet door and
pushed Scarlet inside to White’s helping hands and then climbed aboard. Brown got in last, still firing.
“Gaylord!” Black barked to the
pilot. “Take her up! NOW!”
“S.I.G…” The man pushed the helm
and the helijet jumped upwards. It
took merely seconds for it to get out of range of the guns of the soldiers on
ground – who had now came out of hiding to shoot freely at them.
As the helijet was taking them away
from the danger zone, Black helped White to lie Scarlet down on the floor, as
comfortably as possibly. Brown
found a blanket in a seat compartment, and unfolded it to cover the wounded man;
the latter tiredly opened his eyes.
He winced when he tried to move.
“Ow… That hurts…”
“Keep still,” Black advised. “Let your retrometabolism do its usual
stuff.”
A sudden thundering sound was
heard, and all heads turned to the nearest window; through the glass, they saw a
huge ball of fire emerging from within the wreckage of Cloudbase, quickly
followed by another, and then another.
Like a chain reaction, all the charges installed by Colonel White
detonated, one after the other. The
men all looked in fascination at this show of fiery destruction. The explosions
caused the side of the mountain on which the base was resting to collapse and
with a loud rumble, rocks and snow started sliding down the slope – to engulf
what was left of the once proud and powerful hovering base.
“There won’t be anything left of it
to be found,” Brown murmured.
“That’s as well,” White said
gloomily. “That technology will not fall into unworthy hands…” His words sounded
harsh enough, but Brown wasn’t fooled by them. He had been able to discern the tone of
sadness, as White’s voice obviously caught in his throat.
“That’s why you brought it over
here to crash, all those years ago,” Brown noted, his tone now quiet and
deferential as he addressed the older man.
It was more a statement than a question – Colonel Blue had told him that
story so many times, that it had become like catechism for him. “Now you’ve completed your work.”
“Yes… I’ve completed it,” White
agreed. “After fifteen years…” He looked down into the valley. “Those soldiers will be able to avoid
the avalanche,” he noted. “So they
might be able to alert their superiors of our presence here and call for
backup...”
“We won’t be staying around to wait
for them,” Captain Black answered from his place in front of Scarlet. “Gaylord is already taking us to safety…
But I’m afraid that the Asian Republic Government won’t be happy with Spectrum,
when they hear of what occurred here.”
“What else is new?” Brown asked with a shrug.
Black smiled thinly. “Not much, you’re right.” He turned to Scarlet, who had his eyes
closed. “Relax and get comfortable,
Paul. You’ll probably have healed
completely by the time we’re back on the sub.”
Scarlet nodded very slowly and
opened his eyes. “Thanks for
fetching me…” he said in a slurred voice.
“Hey… You’ve just returned to us – I wasn’t about to leave you
behind…”
“When… did you come onboard the Sea
Turtle?” Scarlet asked. He winced.
“I… didn’t see you come onboard.”
“Well, you probably remember you
went down the sub before me,” Black explained.
“I just waited until Grey took you to your assigned quarters… And then I went to mine. I just kept out of your way while you
were onboard. It’s as simple as that.”
“Simple all right…”
“You should get some rest.”
“I have your Q Transmitter...” Finding himself out of breath, Scarlet
sighed – only to wince again. “It’s
in the rucksack…”
“Later,” Black said with a soothing
tone. “That’s not important for
now.”
“And… we found… someone… too…” Scarlet’s voice trailed off and he
closed his eyes again, falling out of consciousness with a low groan.
Black simply nodded, looking down
at him.
“That’s right,” he murmured,
addressing Scarlet, although he was sure the man couldn’t hear him anymore.
“Rest now… You’ll feel better later.”
As Brown was leaving to take the
co-pilot seat in the cockpit, Black watched as Colonel White sat on the floor,
right next to the now sleeping – or unconscious – Scarlet, dismissing the more
comfortable seat not that far away from him.
“He’ll be all right,” White said,
his eyes set on those of Black.
“I know,” the latter answered. “I might not have witnessed his healing
powers as often as you did in the past, but I have a fairly good knowledge of
how it works…”
“I bet,” White said coolly. “So… I see you’re free of Mysteron
control now.”
“Yes. And… you survived the crash, and they found you here?”
“Obviously.” White tilted his head to the side. “I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to
shoot you earlier.”
“Quite frankly – the same goes for
me, when I saw you,” Black admitted.
“But I realised almost instantly that if Brown was keeping so close to
you – then you couldn’t be a Mysteron.
He would have checked you out.”
“That he did.” White pensively
scratched his bearded chin. “He
seems like a competent enough officer – despite being so young,” he confided in
a low tone. “But I won’t tell him that –
he’s got enough overconfidence as it is.”
Black permitted himself a faint
smile and glanced in Brown’s direction; the younger man, who was presently
consulting with the pilot, had obviously not heard the last of White’s remark.
“I’m afraid I have to claim
responsibility for most of what he knows – and what he is,” Black confided.
White nodded his understanding,
lifting a brow with some irony. “That explains a lot, then. Including the arrogance.” He glanced around, and then looked
straight up towards the cockpit and beyond the windshield, where all he could
now see were blue skies and clouds – and the peaks of high mountains. “So where are we going from here?”
“Somewhere safe, as I said,” Black
answered without compromising himself.
“Where you will meet some of our old friends – Colonel.”
“As long as I’ll be allowed to take
a long, relaxing bath…” White
sighed and leaned his head against the surface of the wall behind him, closing
his eyes as he did so. He suddenly felt so tired and in need of rest. He certainly felt he was entitled to it.
“Please wake me up when we arrive, Captain. I think I will… shut my eyes for a
little while.”
Seconds later, the only thing that
Captain Black could hear from his old friend, was the sound of quiet breathing –
punctuated with faint snoring.
END OF PART 2
TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 3
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