Newton’s Fire (39 page)

‘Thank you. And General …’

‘Yes?’

‘Your best people. Your
very
best. Let them know that these fanatics want to start a war that could mean the end of Israel. Our nation’s survival depends upon them. So they have my authority to do whatever it takes.
Whatever it takes
. If they see even a glimmer of an opportunity,
any
glimmer, they’re to take it.’

He nodded soberly. ‘Yes, Prime Minister,’ he said. ‘I’ll let them know.’

Walters found himself watching the flight-map obsessively. Finally they passed south of the Aegean and reached unbroken deep water. Croke nodded when he went to notify him. ‘Craig says we shouldn’t depressurize at thirty thousand,’ he said. ‘Too much stress. He says to wait until we’re on our descent.’

‘Won’t we be too close to the coast by then?’

‘Apparently not. We’ll be coming in over water. And it will still be dark enough. Okay?’

‘Okay,’ said Walters. But he was fuming as he left, angry at himself more than anything. It was clear to him now that Croke had been stringing him along. He’d never intended to get rid of Luke and Rachel. Why should he care if Walters went down for murder, after all? It would just mean one less salary to pay.

Bollocks to that
, thought Walters. Croke liked his
faits accomplis
– it was time to give him one.

He made his way back to the cargo hold, found Kohen kneeling before the Ark, cleaning it with swabs of cotton wool dabbed in solvent. ‘Take a break,’ he told Kieran, who was on watch.

‘It’s okay,’ said Kieran. ‘It’s pretty interesting, actually.’

‘I said take a break.’

Kieran hesitated, then nodded. ‘Yes, boss.’

Walters walked him to the door and closed it behind him, leaving himself alone with Kohen. He hadn’t come equipped for this, but there were abundant raw materials to hand. The shrink-wrap and other packaging materials from the pallets had been stuffed between the oak chests and the wall. He found a length of five feet or so of woven blue polythene strapping, tugged it to make sure it was fit for purpose. ‘How’s it coming along?’ he asked Kohen.

‘Nearly ready,’ nodded Kohen. ‘I’ve tested all the components. They each do precisely what they’re supposed to do. And the design itself … it’s
brilliant
. I honestly think it’s going to work.’

‘Is that right?’ asked Walters.

‘It’s been three hundred years,’ said Kohen. ‘So there’s no way to know for sure until we try it. But yes, I think so.’

Walters wound the polythene strapping twice around each hand to give himself a good grip, while leaving enough free in between to do the grim business. He crossed his arms as he walked up behind Kohen, making a loop of it. ‘Why not try it now?’ he asked.

‘At thirty thousand feet?’ scoffed Kohen. ‘What if I’ve misread the plans? What if we hit turbulence? No, thanks. I vote we wait until we land. It won’t take long, after all. Just pour in the acid and—’

Walters brought the loop of strapping down around Kohen’s throat and pulled it tight before he could cry out. Kohen dropped his swab and tried to claw his fingernails beneath it, but the garrotte was a cruel weapon: it didn’t allow for comebacks. And Kohen was far too late, too slow and too weak. Already he was struggling for air. His face turned hideous colours, he flapped his arms, he kicked. A wet patch appeared on the crotch of his trousers. His struggles weakened into spasms that became twitches and then even those stopped.

Walters laid Kohen on his back. He pulled the blue strapping as tight around his neck as he could, then tied a knot in it, like a macabre string tie. He flapped out a tarpaulin, dragged Jay onto it, then folded it back over him so that he couldn’t be seen from the main cabin. Satisfied, he wiped his hands on his trousers then went to find a fresh length of strapping.

It was time for the girl.

Galia Michaeli had dreamed all her young life of being at the heart of a breaking news story. Now, in just her second week of work experience at the Tel Aviv studios, she was at the heart of the breaking story of the decade. And her main task had been made very clear to her three times already. It was to make coffee on request, and otherwise stay out of the way.

The news channel had a generic email address, but no one ever used it. No one who mattered, at least. It was, however, one of Galia’s jobs to check it every morning, just in case. She did so now. It included another copy of the already notorious email from the Dome assailants. They’d obviously sent it to everyone they could think of. She opened the various attachments out of curiosity. Most were photographs that had already been shown on the news. And there was also the list of prisoners to be released. Without any great expectation, she checked this Word document to see if it had its Track Changes feature on, and whether she’d therefore be able to see earlier drafts. She sat up a little when she noticed a few minor changes in formatting. And then, as if by magic, a whole extra paragraph suddenly appeared.

Our final demand: Aircraft registration number N12891F has now landed at Ben Gurion Airport. Its passengers and cargo are to be escorted by military convoy to the Golden Gate on the Temple Mount. Failure to comply will result in the immediate destruction of the Dome.

Her mouth was dry as she copied the aircraft registration number into a search engine. The second result was for a flight-tracking website. She clicked on the link. A map of the eastern Mediterranean appeared, then a dotted line heading straight for Israel. Contrary to what the paragraph claimed, the aircraft hadn’t yet arrived at Ben Gurion.

In fact, it wasn’t due to land for the best part of another hour.

Something was going on in the cargo hold. Rachel was sure of it. Something bad. The look on Walters’ face as he’d gone in there; the look on Kieran’s after he’d been turfed out; the way Kieran had gone to Pete, was now murmuring with him and casting worried looks at the door.

She glanced at Luke. He nodded to let her know he’d seen it too.

The door opened. Walters came out, trying to look casual, but failing. She took and squeezed Luke’s hand. His answering squeeze made her feel incomparably better. ‘No hesitation,’ he murmured.

‘No regrets,’ she agreed.

Walters went to join Pete and Kieran. They held an intense conversation in low voices. Kieran shook his head angrily and walked off towards the cockpit, but Pete nodded. Walters passed him the taser and then they came over to Luke and Rachel.

‘Your friend Jakob wants a word,’ Walters told Rachel, nodding at the cargo bay.

‘With me?’ she asked.

‘He has a question about the Ark, apparently.’ He reached into his pocket for the handcuff keys. ‘Didn’t understand it myself, to be honest. But I’m sure he’ll explain.’

‘Maybe I should go,’ said Luke. ‘The Ark’s more my field than Rachel’s.’

‘He asked for her,’ said Walters. He inserted the key into the cuff, turned it and released her wrist. She threw a beseeching glance at Luke; this had to be their moment. It seemed he agreed. He lunged forwards and smashed his knee up into Pete’s crotch. Pete yowled and tried to fry him with the taser, but Luke anticipated him and slapped it against Walters instead. Walters screamed and fell to the ground, convulsing and clutching his chest. Pete tried to turn the taser on Luke, but he managed to hold him off long enough for Rachel to retrieve the dropped handcuff keys and release him. He instantly propelled himself from his seat, crunched his head up into Pete’s jaw, sent him sprawling. He wrested the taser from him as he went down, gave him a squirt. ‘The hold,’ he yelled at Rachel.

She nodded and leapt over the white leather seat onto the carpet behind, heaved the door open. Luke was close behind, but Kieran had obviously heard the commotion for now he charged into the cabin and rugby-tackled Luke, took him down onto the carpet. Luke tried to taser him but Walters was already up again. He kicked the taser from Luke’s hand then laid into him with his boot, and Kieran and Pete quickly joined in.

There were plastic bottles of solvent and sulphuric acid on the floor by the Ark. Rachel picked up one full of acid, uncapped it and swung it in a backhand arc, spraying it over the three men’s throats and faces as Luke rolled away from them. Walters turned his back in time but Pete and Kieran felt the sting of it at once, screaming in pain and rage as it scorched their skin. She grabbed Luke’s hand and dragged him into the hold then tried to slam closed the door behind her. Walters stuck his foot in the gap, however, and hauled it open again, aiming the taser at her. She grabbed a bottle of solvent and squirted it over his chest and face as he fired. The jolt stunned her and flung her onto her back, but what shocked her more was the way the sparks ignited the solvent as it spurted over Walters, erupting into a violent blaze. He shrieked and dropped the taser, tried to slap out the flames on his throat and chin and clothes and hair, but too late, they were already in his mouth, each breath drawing them further down into his chest and lungs.

Luke shoulder-charged him and knocked him backwards out of the hold. He grabbed the door by its interior handle and slammed it shut. Rachel was still trembling from the jolt, but she struggled to her feet to help him hold it. There was no lock on this side, no way to block it, opening outwards into the main cabin as it did; but there was a length of blue strapping on the floor, and Luke used it to tether the door to the base of the Ark, pulling it as taut as it would go. He found two more lengths of tape among some discarded packaging and anchored the door even more firmly.

‘Will that hold?’ asked Rachel.

‘It’ll give us time to find something better.’

‘Like what?’

He waved a hand to indicate the whole cargo bay: the Ark, the pallets of supplies, the overhead lockers and the oak chests. ‘I’ll take a look,’ he said.

Galia Michaeli printed off the flight map and the amended prisoner release document and hurried into the control room. Everyone was far too frantic to pay any attention to someone as lowly as her, however. They all waved her away. Her nerve failed her. These people were experienced journalists, after all. They knew what mattered and what didn’t. She was probably overestimating the significance of her find, she told herself. She retreated and went back out.

The editor of the morning show was on his mobile in the corridor, bawling out their hapless Jerusalem reporter for letting himself be scooped by Channel 2. He was infamous for his temper, her editor, for firing staff on the spot for the most innocuous offences. For all she knew, he’d seen the extra paragraph when the email had first arrived, had discarded it as nothing. The temptation to pretend she hadn’t found it at all, to keep her head down and not be noticed, almost overwhelmed her. But this was news, she realized; and news was her vocation.

She went to stand in front of him, nervously held out the two pages. He took them, scanned them, frowned. ‘What the fuck are these?’ he demanded.

She did her best to explain, though her tongue was a small mammal in her mouth. He glared at her as she spoke; he looked incandescent.

‘You’re trying to tell me this extra paragraph was in that fucking email?’ he asked.

She nodded, aware her eyes were watering. ‘They must have deleted it before they sent it out,’ she managed. ‘But not properly.’

He nodded. If possible, he looked even angrier. He marched straight into the control room, held the sheets up high. ‘Why the fuck did none of you pricks spot this?’ he yelled.

‘Spot what?’

They checked their own copies of the document as he explained, verified her story for themselves. For the first time, they looked at Galia with something approaching respect. It made her feel ten feet tall.

‘I want cameras in the air now,’ the editor said. ‘I want this fucking aircraft filmed all the way in.’

‘At this time of morning?’ asked Lev, his deputy, the only one who ever dared stand up to him. ‘Forget anything fixed wing. We’d never get it prepped and up in time. But maybe we could use the traffic chopper.’

‘What’s its ceiling?’

‘Three thousand metres, give or take. Enough to film their approach.’

‘Put them up now,’ he said. ‘I want to skull-fuck those Channel 2 bastards. You understand? It’s payback time.’ He turned to Galia. ‘You’re our new work experience girl, right?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And all the shit we give you, it hasn’t put you of
f
?’

‘I want to work here, sir. More than anything.’

‘Then congratulations,’ he told her. ‘You’re hired.’

Croke was checking the latest bulletins from Jerusalem when he heard the commotion outside. He ignored it at first, assuming it would sort itself out. But then came the shrieks. He opened his door to see Walters staggering backwards out of the cargo hold, his whole upper body ablaze. He fell onto his back and lay there screaming, his face charred and flames flickering from his mouth as if from some vanquished dragon as he died. Croke whirled on Pete and Kieran, washing their arms and faces in the galley sink. ‘What the hell happened?’ he demanded.

‘Acid,’ said Pete succinctly, turning to show Croke his blotched and blistered face, the frightening red of his corneas.

The sight shocked Croke into silence. But not for long. ‘Get in there,’ he said. ‘Finish them.’

‘You’re kidding, right?’ snarled Kieran. ‘They’ve got acid, solvent and a taser.’

‘We can cover up your exposed skin.’

‘We can cover up
your
exposed skin.’

‘That wasn’t a request,’ said Croke. ‘That was an order.’

‘Stuff it up your arse.’

‘Jesus!’ said Manfredo, arriving with Vig at that moment. ‘What happened?