Z. Rex (11 page)

Only one way to find out,
he decided.

The worn muscles in Adam’s arms and legs protested as he started to climb. But Zed had traveled for thousands of miles; Adam wasn’t going to let a few vertical meters get the better of him. With one arm gripping the drainpipe and the toes of both feet wedged against a fixing in the wall, he reached over to his bedroom window and wobbled the flat of his hand against the glass. It had never latched properly, and if he jiggled it in just the right way. . . .

“Got you,” he whispered as he felt it start to shift upward. As soon as he judged the gap large enough, he lunged over the sill and pulled himself clumsily inside, collapsing onto the bed.
His
bed.

He closed his eyes, breathed in the familiar smells and clung to the soft mattress. If only he could sleep here properly for a few hours, to “wallow in his pit” as Dad used to say.

At the thought of his dad, Adam’s eyes sprang open. He got up from the bed almost guiltily—and frowned.

His belongings were strewn all over the room, a knotted landscape of comics, clothes and DVDs.
Burglars,
he thought. And yet the LCD television was still on the shelf. In a daze, he walked out into the bright magnolia hallway. His bike was still there, that was something—he wouldn’t have to walk back to the warehouse, and could enjoy his time away for a little longer.

Adam checked his dad’s room. It had been royally trashed too. Suddenly he remembered the way Bateman had gone searching through his father’s room in New Mexico for something he hadn’t found. Someone had tried the same thing here.

Angrily, Adam crossed to the phone in the hallway. It had been smashed along with the answering machine. The kitchen was a mess, all the dishes, pans and cutlery upended in the middle of the room. The coffee jar containing the emergency stash of cash lay empty.

He filled a chipped mug with water and drained it dry. Then he wandered around the apartment again, bone-weary and shell-shocked.
Well, what did you expect?
asked a voice somewhere inside.
This is your life, now—all messed up with the good stuff broken. Just grab a few bits and creep back to the monster and the old, cold building in the dark. What else are you going to do—give up and cry?

He wiped his nose. The idea had some appeal, but no way was he caving in now. Not after coming so far.

He went to the bathroom and took a quick shower; no time to wait for hot water, so it was cold but still welcome. Then he squeezed half a tube of toothpaste into his mouth and swilled it about with water from a tap—
God, what luxury!
Mouth tingling, he pressed an old roll-on deodorant into service, put on fresh clothes and strode into the living room. It was a mess, but hadn’t been gone over as badly as the bedrooms.

Feeling a little more human now, Adam deliberated his next move. He decided the most important thing was to get Dad’s message to Jeff Hayden, maybe try to smuggle out some of the files. Zed had wanted to share the story of his creation with Adam—he was sure Mr. Hayden would explain. . . .

He started to search for his dad’s other phone—Mr. Adlar lost handsets so often he always kept a backup good to go. Jeff Hayden’s contact details would surely be held on there. Adam found the battered old Nokia handset and its charger beneath a pile of scattered magazines. A double result—the charger would work for his phone too.

Then he suddenly remembered: back in the state park, Bateman had said Adam’s phone was bugged. Would they be able to track him here too, and come to get him?

And if they did, and took him back to his dad . . . in some ways, wouldn’t that be a relief?

Suddenly Adam found he wasn’t sure. He pictured Zed waking up in that run-down warehouse, alone. Coming looking. What might the dinosaur do if Adam could not be found?

And what might his dad be forced to do, if Josephs and Bateman threatened Adam’s life?

Leaving his phone on charge but safely switched off, he returned to his bedroom and grabbed his school sports bag. He stuffed his dad’s headset, a sleeping bag, toiletries and fresh clothes inside. Then he collected some groceries from the back of the cupboard and shoved them into the bag along with a jacket, a flashlight, an alarm clock and an old bobble hat. On the floor, he saw a framed photo of him and his dad, smiling over ice creams. Amazingly, the glass in the frame hadn’t cracked. He decided to pack that too. If only the cash hadn’t been taken—

Suddenly, Adam remembered his old piggy bank. He’d kept it hidden in the drawer under his bed ever since his mate Kevin had teased him about it, saying it was babyish. Perhaps it had escaped discovery.

It was just as he crouched down to see that he looked over and saw the broken length of thread trailing from the windowsill.

His blood ran cold. The thread must have pulled tight and snapped as he’d clambered through the window, triggering . . . what?

Holding his breath, Adam followed the thread to a tiny electronic device screwed to the underside of the sill. It was too small for a bomb, surely—and why hadn’t it gone off as soon as he’d entered? Maybe it was broken?

A signaling device,
he realized.
Whoever planted it knew the bedroom window was someone’s best bet for getting in.

With fumbling fingers, he grabbed the piggy bank and jammed it into the sports bag. Then he unplugged the charger and his phone and stuffed them in after it. He swung the bag onto his shoulder, grabbed his bike and wheeled it out of the apartment. Stopping briefly to slam the door behind him, he carried the bike down the stairs, the crazy rebounding echoes of his feet on the steps like the pounding of his heart. How long had he been in the flat—maybe twenty minutes, tops? And it was barely six A.M. on a Monday. Surely they—whoever “they” were—couldn’t have sent anyone so fast?

The screech of rubber on tarmac gave him his answer as he threw open the outer door. Feeling sick, Adam jumped down the steps and froze as a large car, a burgundy Daimler, slowly rounded the corner.

He stared.
Oh, my God. . . .

One of the Daimler’s rear windows was opening. The next moment, a gun muzzle appeared, and the car started screaming down the street toward him.

H
eart bouncing off his ribs, Adam jumped recklessly onto his bike and raced away. Behind him, the growl of the Daimler’s engine rose to a roar. He glanced back.

There was good old Frankie Bateman, in the front passenger seat. Josephs’s head of security, back on his tail.

A bicycle against a V-8,
thought Adam, pushing himself harder, faster.
Not much of a contest.
He swung right onto Howe Street. There were no alleyways to duck down, no shelter.

Behind him, he heard the thrum of the Daimler as it pulled out into the road. No rubber-burning antics this time. It accelerated smoothly, deliberately.

As though the driver knew that his prey could not escape.

Adam powered along the street on his bike, the wheels humming over the flat cobbles. Muscles in his calves burned as he pedaled. The wind wolfed at his ears. He kept heading north, a single, desperate plan solid in his frantic thoughts. He knew he couldn’t outrun the car, but if he could just turn left up ahead. . . .

Luck was with him—if you could call it that. As he leaned into the sharp turn, a van was filling the road, heading straight toward him. Its high-pitched horn blared at him and the driver made obscene gestures.
Yep,
thought Adam, swinging his bike clear of the obstacle,
I know I’m going the wrong way up a one-way street, thanks very much
. But the driver of the Daimler was forced to screech to a halt as it tried to take the corner and found the van blocking its path. The horn sounded a second, longer time. Adam glanced back over his shoulder; he saw the Daimler trying to reverse out of the way while the van driver yelled more abuse through his window.

Adam cycled onward, his little victory lending him new strength, careening to the end of the street and the posh private gardens he saw there. He braked, jumped off and, with a mad rush of adrenaline, threw his bike over the railings and into the dense bushes. Then he scrambled over himself, using his sports bag to blunt the black arrowheads that dug into his ribs, and dived into the shrubbery. Dry mouthed and gasping for breath, he pulled off his gray shirt and changed it for a red top. The hat ought to help disguise him too.

He waited in the bushes, watching out for burgundy Daimlers. The mere clamor of the early weekday traffic was starting to build and he decided to stay put for a while. It would be trickier for Bateman to give chase if he spied him in the Monday morning rush hour.

Finally he emerged from the greenery, looking very different now as he lowered his bike over the locked gates of the private gardens and hauled himself after it. He cycled along India Street, looking all about for signs of trouble.

It was going to be a long old ride back to Granton.

Adam made it back across the suburbs of North Edinburgh without spotting the Daimler, and no one appeared to be following him, not even mysterious shadows in the sky.

The thought of returning to the dark warehouse and the deadly creature that hid there made his bones cold. But what choice did he have? For a start, the files he needed to show Hayden were in the rucksack. Somehow, he had to persuade Zed to let him out on his own again—with the top secret notes—back across the city to the scientific sprawl of the BioQuarter.

Is that all,
he thought.

He cycled onward, the road starting to get busier now with grimy trucks and pickups. But no traffic ventured up the turning that led to the old warehouse. Adam slowed down, enjoying the malty smell blowing over from the breweries, the feel of the strengthening sun on his skin.

But then he saw a huge pile of mud and broken concrete in the wasteland beyond the warehouse. It looked like a dirty great bomb had gone off there.

“Zed?” Full of foreboding, Adam quickened his stroke on the pedals. The metal roll-up at the delivery entrance was fully closed. He bombed up to the fire doors at the side of the building instead, jumped off the bike, took a deep breath and pushed open the doors.

He wasn’t expecting the glare. Harsh and yellow, it shone from fluorescent strip lights in the ceiling, the bulbs wrapped in thick scarves of cobweb. There was a hole in here too, concrete and mud piled up high around it. And there was Zed, sitting up in a curiously human posture beside a tangled spaghetti junction of black leads snaking down into the hole.

“What happened here?” Adam stared at him incredulously. “I left you sleeping a few hours ago—when I come back, you’ve got the electrics working!”

Zed’s lethal jaws stretched open in a wide yawn, and he shrugged as if to say, “And your point is . . . ?”

“Did you tap into the power supply from the gas place next door? How would you know how to do that?” Adam marveled at the thick knot of cables. “It’s like the bomb disposal stuff again, or the way you flew us halfway around the world to reach Edinburgh right on course. You can do all these incredible things, but still Josephs goes and orders you killed. Why?” He licked his lips. “What did you do?”

Zed scrambled up a little shakily and stalked closer. Adam held himself very still, hoping desperately he hadn’t gone too far. The dinosaur creature reached out one muscular, concrete-dusted claw toward him. . . .

And snatched away his sports bag.

“Hey!” Adam protested halfheartedly. “That’s just some stuff I packed. In a bit of a rush.” The events of the morning piled back suddenly. “I . . . I was chased by Bateman and some other guys out there. They’d rigged a transmitter in my room and I set it off when I broke in. I dunno if it was meant for me, or my dad if he ever escaped. But now Bateman knows I’m here.”

Zed stared at him coldly, seeming scarier than ever in the stark shadows thrown by the lights.

“I got away though,” Adam quickly continued. “Hid out for a bit, changed my clothes. Lost them.”

Suddenly, Zed thrust his face forward, massive teeth bared, and growled a single syllable: “Trick?”

“No!” Adam protested, shaking his head. “They didn’t see me come here, I’m sure of it.”

Zed clawed open the sports bag and emptied out the contents. The piggy bank cracked open on the damp concrete, bleeding copper change over the damp floor. Adam didn’t dare protest as dexterous claws sorted through his belongings—and then closed on the framed photograph of Mr. Adlar and Adam.

The dinosaur beast lifted it slowly, staring at it intently. Then without warning, he opened his gigantic jaws and shoved the picture inside.

“Wait!” Adam shouted, reaching on instinct for the photo.

Zed roared in his face. Adam recoiled, stumbled over and pushed himself away with his feet, terrified. The huge reptile stared down at him, face twisted in a savage snarl.