Matthew Reilly - Scarecrow

Schofield's eyes never wavered.

His whole appearance was unnaturally still.

When he finally spoke, his voice was low, dangerous.

'You once told me that Westerners don't understand suicide bombers,' he said slowly. 'Because suicide bombers don't fight fair. That the battle is meaningless to a suicide bomber, because he wants to win a far more important war: a psychological war in which the man who dies in a state of terror or fear—the man who dies against his will —loses.' Schofield paused. 'While the man who dies when he is emotionally ready, wins.'

Killian frowned.

Schofield never flinched, not even when a totally fatalistic, nihilistic smile washed across his face.

Then he grabbed Killian roughly by the throat and brought the billionaire right up close to his face and growled, 'You're not emotionally ready to die, Killian. But I am. Which means I win.'

'Jesus Christ, no . . .' Killian stammered, realising what was about to happen. 'No!!!'

And with those words, hauling the screaming Jonathan Killian with him, Shane Schofield stepped out through the shattered panoramic window beside them, out into the storm, and the two of them—hero and villain—fell together through 400 feet of sky down to the jagged rocks below.

At the very same moment that Schofield pulled Killian right up close to his face, Aloysius Knight had got the jump on Delacroix.

A quick sidestep to the left had caused Delacroix to stab one of his knives deep into the wood-panelled wall of the office—and allowed Knight to whip his blowtorch out from his utility vest and jam it into Delacroix's mouth and pull the trigger.

The blue flame from the blowtorch blasted out the back of Delacroix's head, spiking right through his skull, sending burnt brains flying across the room. The Swiss banker slumped instantly, dead, a char-rimmed hole driven right through his head.

Knight emerged from behind the fallen Delacroix just in time to see Shane Schofield step out into the storm, taking the screaming Killian with him.

Schofield fell through the rain with Jonathan Killian at his side.

The rocky mount rushed past them, while directly below them, Schofield saw the rocks, assaulted by the waves of the Atlantic, that would end his life.

And as he fell, a strange peace came over him. This was the end, and he was ready for it.

Then suddenly, from out of nowhere, something struck him hard in the back and he jolted sickeningly and without warning . . .

. . . stopped falling.

Jonathan Killian shrank away from him—falling, falling, falling—disappearing with the rain, before slamming into the rocks at the base of the mount where he bent at an obscene angle and

then vanished in a foul explosion of his own blood. He screamed all the way down.

And yet Schofield did not fall.

He just hung from the panoramic window at the end of a Maghook rope—from the Maghook that had just been fired by Aloysius Knight, the Maghook he had taken from Mother before— a desperate last-gasp shot that he had fired as he leaned out the window a second after Schofield had jumped—the bulbous magnetic head of the Maghook having attached itself to the metal plate inside the back section of Schofield's borrowed flak vest.

Schofield allowed himself to be reeled back up to the office like a fish on a line. When he got there, Knight hauled him back inside.

'I'm sorry, buddy,' Knight said. 'But I just couldn't let you go like that. That said, I still think you made your point to Killian.'

Ten minutes later, as the sun appeared on the horizon, a lone Aston Martin sped away from the Forteresse de Valois with Aloysius Knight at the wheel and Shane Schofield, Mother and Rufus inside it. The car took the side-road leading up to the castle's airfield. There, after a very one-sided gunbattle, its occupants stole an Axon helicopter and flew off toward the rising sun.

Over the next few months, a strange variety of incidents took place around the world. \

Just a week later, in Milan, Italy, it was claimed that there had been a break-in at the Aerostadia Italia Airshow, and that an aircraft had been stolen from one of the airshow's outlying hangars.

After the disappointing non-appearance of the fabled US X-15 rocket planes already, this was not the kind of publicity that the air-show needed.

Witnesses claimed that the aircraft taken was a sleek, black fighter which—so they said—took off vertically. While this description matched the description of the experimental Russian Sukhoi S-37, airshow and Italian Air Force officials were quick to point out that no such plane had been slated to appear at the show.

In the lead-up to Christmas, there was also a spate of unfortunate deaths among some of the world's richest families.

Randolph Loch disappeared while on safari in southern Africa. His entire private hunting party was never found.

In March, the Greek shipping magnate Cornelius Kopassus suffered a fatal heart attack in his sleep.

Arthur Quandt was found dead with his mistress in the spa of his Aspen lodge.

Warren Shusett was murdered in his isolated country mansion.

J. D. Cairnton, the pharmaceutical tycoon, was hit and killed by a speeding truck.outside his company's New York headquarters. The driver of the truck was never found.

Heirs took over their empires. The world kept turning. The only connection made to their deaths was in a confidential memo to the President of the United States.

It read simply: 'sir, it is over, majestic-12 is no more.'

MAJORCA, SPAIN

9 NOVEMBER, 1100 HOURS

The hired Volkswagen circled the charming cobblestoned piazza on the Spanish island of Majorca, the famed luxury hideaway for the rich and reclusive.

'So where are we going again?' Rufus asked.

'We're going to meet our employer,' Knight said. 'The person who engaged us to keep Captain Schofield alive.'

Knight parked the car outside a streetside cafe.

Their employer was already there.

She sat at one of the sidewalk tables, smoking a cigarette, her eyes hidden behind a pair of opaque Dior sunglasses.

She was a very distinguished-looking woman—late forties, dark hair, high cheekbones, porcelain skin, her posture all at once refined and cultured and confident.

Her name was Lillian Mattencourt.

Billionaire owner of the Mattencourt cosmetics empire.

The richest woman in the world.

'Why if it isn't my knight in shining armour,' she said as they approached her table. 'Aloysius, my dear. Do sit down.'

Over tea, Mattencourt smiled warmly.

'Oh, Aloysius, you have done well. And you shall be rewarded handsomely.'

'Why?' Knight said. 'Why didn't you want him killed?'

'Oh, my dashing young knight,' Lillian Mattencourt said. 'Is it not obvious?'

Knight had thought about this. 'Majestic-12 wanted to start a new Cold War. And Jonathan Killian wanted global anarchy. But your fortune is based on the opposite of that. You want people to feel safe, secure, to be happy little consumers. Your fortune rests on the maintenance of global peace and prosperity. And nobody buys make-up during wartime. Warfare would ruin you.'

Mattencourt waved his answer away. 'My dear boy, are you always so cynical? Of course, what you say is absolutely true. But it was only one small part of my reasoning.'

'What was it then?'

Mattencourt smiled. Then her tone became deadly. 'Aloysius. Despite the fact that I have a greater net wealth than all but a few of them, and despite the fact that my father was once a member of their little club, for many years now, for the sole and single reason that I am a woman, Randolph Loch and his friends have consistently refused to let me join their Council.

'Put simply, after years of suffering their various innuendos and sexual taunts, I decided that I'd had enough. So when I learned of their bounty hunt through sources of my own within the French government, I decided that the time was right to teach them a lesson. I decided, Aloysius, to hurt them.