Мик Херрон - Real Tigers

Running alongthe corridor, Louisa noticed her heart rate . . . It had been a while since she’d been conscious of the beating of her heart.

Two paces ahead, River barely slowed before launching himself through a set of swing doors; they banged off the walls and swang back at her, and she fended them off with her forearms. Any of the instructors they’d had, back before their fall, would have had seven kinds of fit watching this: they were more like schoolkids having a race than agents on an op . . . If that’s what they were. If that’s what this was.

What it mostly felt like was an unholy mess, but there was nothing unusual about that. Last year, she and Min had had the sniff of an op: little more than a handholding exercise, but it had made them feel more alive than at any time since being kicked out of the Park. As things turned out, they were playing someone else’s game: Min died, and all she’d had since was the daily grind of make-work and nightly stands with strange men; so many strange men, she was near to forgetting there was any other kind.

And now this.

More doors. She’d lost track of which corridor they were in, F or E, but that didn’t matter because here they were, in the room they’d seen on the monitor, with its rows of newly assembled shelving, and crates packed in what looked like cages, as if the information they contained was savage, and needed to be kept behind bars. A lot of it probably was. At the far end of the room, visible along the aisle between the rows, Ben Traynor was by the far set of doors: he’d erected a barricade, and was standing on an overturned cabinet, sighting through a fraction of a porthole window. His gun hung loosely by his side, but on their arrival he spun round, aiming it in their direction.

River and Louisa leaped in opposite directions, taking cover behind caged crates.

Traynor lowered the gun. “What the hell are you doing?”

River emerged, hands raised to shoulder level. “Was about to ask you the same thing. Where’s Donovan?”

The sound of a box file hitting the floor betrayed his position.

Traynor said, “I thought I told you to go.”

“And I thought you said you were after the Grey Books.”

Louisa joined River as he lowered his hands. “Are they showing signs of coming in?” she asked.

He hesitated. Then said, “There’s a room a few yards down the corridor. They’re in there at the moment. I imagine they’re planning their next move.”

Which presumably involved all-out assault, thought Louisa. That or surrender, which didn’t seem likely. “Have they got guns?”

“Maybe one or two of them. They haven’t fired any yet.”

Another box file hit the floor.

River said, “If he’s going through them one by one, we might be here a while.”

“We know what we’re doing.”

“They won’t need guns. They can just wait for the hinges to rust off the doors.”

Louisa moved down the aisle towards Traynor, and stopped when she reached the row where Donovan was. There was something incongruous about the scene: like watching Rocky play librarian. In his hands was a box file. Before she opened her mouth he’d dropped it and was reaching for the next one.

She said, “I found your online musings.”

“BigSeanD,” he said, without stopping what he was doing.

“BigSeanD has a thing about the weather,” she said. “He seems to think They’ve weaponised it.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Wasn’t too clear on who They were.”

“I expect They’re the same crowd putting chips in people’s heads to track them when they’re abducted by aliens.” He looked at her briefly. “They get up to creepy shit, They surely do.”

He’d reached the end of the row of box files; next up were manila folders, of varying thickness; some bound with ribbon, others paper-clipped closed. They had catalogue numbers stamped in red ink on the cover; Donovan checked each before unbowing the ribbon, discarding the paper clip. A quick glance at the top sheet seemed to be all he needed, and the folders joined the mess on the floor.

“You have to admit,” he said in a conversational tone, “it doesn’t sound that far-fetched. If the weather’s not being controlled yet, you can bet your life someone’s trying to make it happen.”

“But you don’t care about that, do you? You were just building a legend to get you access to this place.”

“What’s the matter, don’t I fit your image of a conspiracy nut? What have you been told we look like?”

“I gather they come in different sizes,” River said. He stood in the aisle, with a sight line on both Donovan and Traynor. “But whatever you really want, we can’t let you take it.”

“Is that so?”

“Making a move now,” said Traynor.

“How many?” River asked.

“Six. More. I have limited vision here.”

Donovan looked unmoved. He said, “You might want to leave. One or two of them have real guns. They even know which way to point them.”

River said, “You took Catherine Standish. Sent me her photo.”

“I took her,” Donovan said. “But it was Monteith sent you the photo.” He plucked another folder from the shelf. “And I think you’ll find he’s outside your jurisdiction.”

A glance, the barest shrug. The folder hit the floor.

“You knew her from the old days,” Louisa said. “Back when she was at the Park.”

Donovan opened another folder. He looked at the front page, seemed about to drop it, then looked again, more closely.

“But what I want to know,” Louisa said, “is how come you knew about Slough House?”

Glass splintered, and she turned. Through the gap on the shelves left by Donovan’s predations, she saw Traynor raise the gun to the window he’d just broken: two shots ricocheted down the corridor. In immediate response came a louder bang, and a flood of light which filled the room before receding, leaving a dark blur in its place. Traynor was thrown from the cabinet, which juddered across the floor with a heavy scraping sound. The doors bulged inwards, the left-hand one torn free of the wall by the blast, and the rows of shelving toppled like dominoes, as those nearest the blast collapsed onto their neighbours. Donovan dropped to the ground; Louisa followed when he pulled her arm, and the falling shelves spewed files and folders onto their heads. What had been an aisle was now a tunnel, and the overhead crashing continued until the last of the shelves came to rest on the first of the rows of crates. River had gone. For two seconds Louisa was blank confusion, her ears full of noise, her eyes full of light, and then a survival instinct kicked in: on her hands and knees, she scuttled through debris to what had been the central aisle, where she could make out figures pouring through what was now a hole in the wall where the doors had been. Scrambling upright, she found herself grabbed by a stranger, his features obscured by black wool. When she rapped his throat with the side of her hand he backed off two steps, comically choking for breath, and another man, identically clad, took his place. This time Louisa was flung to the floor, with something like a cosh swinging down towards her. It would have connected if a box file hadn’t hit the man in the face first. He staggered sideways, then fell when River punched him in the head.

Louisa got to her feet. A light haze had filled the room, smoke, but mostly dust. Some of the Black Arrow crew didn’t appear to know what to do now they’d broken through; a couple of others, more proactive, were sitting on Ben Traynor; had rolled him over and were cuffing his wrists. Sean Donovan emerged from behind her, and she saw him reach for the folder he’d been looking at when the doors had blown open. He tucked it inside his shirt before standing up.