Johnny O'Brien - Day of the Assassins

“Well, Professor?”

“I am a scientist not a cable-car operator,” the professor said pompously. Then he surveyed the control room and smiled mischievously back at the boys, “Which means, for me, it won’t be that difficult.” He manoeuvred himself in front of the main control panel. “I have always found that, in the case of technical difficulty, the best thing to do is to press the biggest button you can find…” The professor poked an index finger at a large green button and then, reading a few of the other labels, made a number of further adjustments. A bell rang above them and he pressed another button. The machinery sprang into life.

The professor jumped up in excitement, “Let’s go!”

They moved across to where the cable car waited. The professor slid open the door and they piled in. He inspected the control panel inside the cable car.

“Here goes!” Suddenly, the car moved away from the gantry and began its descent into the valley below. The castle was soon receding into the distance.

“What happens when we get to the bottom?” Angus said.

“They’ll telephone down… someone will be waiting for us there.”

“Unless we can find some way out,” the professor said.

Angus laughed, “Be serious, we’re suspended several hundred metres up in the air.”

The professor moved over to the large metal bench at one end of the car. It had a small hatch in the side. He slid open the cover.

“Just as I thought. Nothing overlooked.”

They peered into the chest. There was a medical kit, a tool bag, some harnesses and an array of other equipment. But there was also rope. Lots of rope.

Angus said, “Well that’s a fat lot of good. What are we supposed to do — suspend it from the bottom of the cable car and abseil down…?”

Jack and the professor looked at each other, and then Jack said quietly, “Angus, I think that’s exactly what the professor has in mind.”

Angus turned white, “No way. There is no way that I am climbing out of this sardine can and dangling myself on the end of a bit of thread two hundred metres up in the air… I’ve already risked my life to time travel back a hundred years to rescue you…”

Jack smiled at him slyly, “Not scared are you?”

The professor was already unloading the rope from the chest.

“Is it going to be long enough?”

“Should be. Otherwise someone has made a stupid mistake.”

“How do we get down it?”

“Here,” the professor handed Jack a small metal object. “It’s a friction device. One end attaches to you. The other to the rope.” The professor was busy securing an end of the rope to the anchor point inside the car. He leaned over and slid free the bolts on the trapdoor, which was built flush into the floor of the car.

“Stand to the side and hold on!” the professor said. And with that, he released the trapdoor and flipped it over on its hinges so it landed with a crash on the inside of the car. There was now a large square hole in the floor of the car. Cold mountain air blasted up through this gap as their descent continued. Jack stole a glance through the hole — far down, a landscape of firs, rock and alpine grass flitted silently past as the cable car floated downwards.

Angus was staring out of the front window, “I think you’d better hurry, Professor.”

They looked up and spotted the cause of Angus’s concern. Soon they would be at the mid-point of their journey. Still quite far below, but approaching fast, was the return cable car — making its way up the other cable to the castle just as their own cabin descended. Even at this distance, the trio could make out a number of figures eyeing them from the on-coming car.

“What do we do now?”

“We keep going. What can they do?”

“They can shoot us for a start,” Angus said.

The professor dropped the rope through the trapdoor. It rapidly uncoiled and trailed freely from the cabin until it started to drag along the ground way below.

The other cable car was approaching them rapidly. The professor looked towards it. He was working something out in his head.

“Let’s get ready,” he said.

They attached the friction devices to sections of the rope, ready for descent.

“Angus — you go first.” He pointed at the gun, “And you’ll need to leave that thing.”

“Great. Just as I was beginning to enjoy myself.”

The professor showed them how the friction devices worked. That bit seemed straightforward. The problem was going to be launching into the abyss in the first place.

Angus’s face was white. Jack didn’t look much better.

“Fun isn’t it?” said the professor enthusiastically.

Angus nodded in the direction of the professor, “Where did you get him from, Jack?”

The professor ignored him, “Right. I apply the brakes. Then you go. Then it’s my turn. Then Jack, you wait a little, and then you go.” The on-coming car was closing in on them fast. They waited, poised above the open trapdoor, the air still rushing in and the earth racing by, way below. They gripped their friction devices anxiously. The professor held his hand over the red emergency stop lever. And waited.

“OK…?”

Jack and Angus nodded. They were getting so close to the approaching car now, that they could see the whites of the VIGIL guards’ eyes. The professor pulled up the lever. The cable above their heads decelerated. As it did so, the cable driving the other car also slowed. Their forward momentum caused their whole car to arc upwards alarmingly as they held on tight. The car swung back on its pivot point. Out of the window, they could see that the men in the other car had all tumbled over — unbalanced by the surprise halt of the cable cars.

“Go!” The professor shouted.

Angus froze. Unable to move. He just stared blankly into the abyss.

“Go!” the professor shouted again.

But he still couldn’t move. The professor gave him a sharp kick up the backside. One moment he was there. The next he was gone. He just had enough presence of mind to apply the friction device to control his descent.

“Sorry about that,” the professor called after him. “Right — my turn.” He leaped through the hatch with what Jack thought was an unnatural degree of enthusiasm and slid down the rope, just as Angus had done seconds before. The car continued to sway as it slowed and it was all Jack could do to remain on his feet. Both cars were nearly side by side. Peering down, he could just see the white smudge of Angus’s face as it craned upwards to the two cable cars way above. He had made it.

Suddenly, Jack noticed that the roof hatch in the opposite car had been flicked open. A VIGIL guard was crawling up onto the roof with a grappling iron. In a moment, he had tossed the device over to Jack’s car before crawling, monkey like, across the precipitous divide that separated them. There was a loud scraping on the roof hatch of Jack’s car, as the guard started to prise it open.

Jack wasn’t about to find out what would happen next. Swallowing hard, he plunged out through the floor hatch, just as the others had done moments before. Initially, he closed the friction device too hard, so he barely moved on the rope. By gradually loosening it he gained speed. He glanced downwards. The professor and Angus had made it to the ground and both seemed to be safe.

Suddenly the speed of the rope through the friction device accelerated. It didn’t feel right. Instinctively, Jack locked the device and waited, swaying in the light wind, suspended from the rope, the Austrian Alps all around. And then, slowly, he felt himself being pulled… up. There was no doubt about it… he was being pulled back towards the cable car. He felt a wave of panic as he realised what was happening. The guard above had started to yank the rope up… with Jack suspended on the end.