Kingdom: The Complete Series (15 page)

The hiss of an opening
door lets the tension out of the room like a pressure valve, and the men relax.
Mark whips his head around to see who has joined them, from the door opposite
the one he entered through.

This man is shorter
than the guards, but only just. His face is unassuming, neutral in a cheerful
sort of way. His left eyebrow seems to always be raised in pleasant surprise
and his hair is slicked to the side like an old soldier's. His three piece suit
isn't quite as exquisite as Mark might have expected; it looks like it was
tailored for comfort rather than style, and it's navy blue.

He walks into the
middle of the room, and every eye is on him. Looking between the guards and
Mark like misbehaving children, he says in a clipped Glasgow accent:

“
I
sense some tension here, lads. Am I missing something?”

The guards say nothing,
meeting his eyes but remaining silent. He turns to Mark, eyebrows raised in
question.

Mark's voice is as flat
and ordered as the perfectly aligned furniture.

“
I
was asking them where my mother is.”

The man smooths his
suit and sighs, turning to the guards.

“
Leave
us.”

“
Sir?
But -”

“
He's
bulletproof, Gregor. You'll only make matters more difficult. Now leave us. Go
and see to Mark's mother, see if she needs anything.”

Mark stands up out of
his seat at the mention of his mother.

“
I
want to see her,” he demands, and the look from the blue-suited man stops him
in his tracks.

Like am owner staring
down a bad dog, the man glares through Mark's skin, into his soul, and Mark
sits back down in his seat.

The malice leaves his
face with a deep breath.

“
Remember
the scenario, Mark,” the man tells him with an apologetic smile. “Neither of us
want this to get out of hand.”

The four men leave the
room, heads down, the door sealing shut behind them.

Taking the seat at an
angle to Mark and leaning forward, the man in the blue suit extends a hand,
which Mark looks at in disgust.

“
Hello
Mark,” he says, smiling and looking at his hand again. Mark says nothing, and
the man withdraws his hand, sighing again. “Ok,” he says, smoothing his tie. “I
understand why you're angry.”

“
Do
you really.”

The man stands up from
the seat, and paces out into the middle of the floor like an orchestra
conductor.

“
You
have every right to be. Try to see this from my point of view, Mark. I can't
threaten you directly; I needed leverage. It's regrettable, and it makes me
feel a little dirty, so I'd like to remove your poor mother from this equation
as soon as possible; a desire I think we share.”

Mark cuts to the chase,
conscious of the small tracking device attached to his hip.

“
I
don't know who you are,” he says, “but I want the King. The real King, not some
imposter. The last imposter who tried to negotiate with me got his knees
broken, so get me the real King.”

The man looks around in
confusion.

“
I'll
wait, don't worry,”says Mark, leaning on his knees again and staring at the
man. “I'm in no rush.”

“
Well,”
the man lets out a breath, and puts a hand on his chest, nodding in
understanding, “how rude of me.”

Mark watches as the
façade slides from the man's face, and the raised eyebrow and the quiet charm
are replaced with the hollow shell of a man that's been emptied out as a vessel
for something much worse. Mark can almost smell his ego from the chair; his
face betrays no patience for anything save his own ends, his lip curled in a smile
that no painter could capture. Mark almost moves back in fear from the sudden
change.

“
You
are a significant investment, Mark,” he says, his neat-clipped tones gone and
replaced with a businessman's charm. One hand goes in his pocket like a
street-corner dealer and he leans backwards on his own confidence. “I wouldn't
be so stupid as to try and play with your expectations, not when we can offer
each other,” he smiles a cruel grin, “so much.”

Mark narrows his eyes.

“
You're
him,” he says; and he knows it's true. He can sense it. Taste it in the air –
that aura of absolute control. He fights the urge in his bones to submit to the
man and offer his services, so overcoming is the sense of crushing dominance.

He seems to smile at
the recognition.

“
Paul
King,” he nods. “
The
King. In the flesh,” he lets out a hollow, lifeless
laugh that has no humour in it, “which makes me sound like some cartoon
villain. I got lucky as far as surnames go. Could've been worse, could've been
called Queen.  You should be flattered, Mark,” he barks his name. “I can count
on two hands the number of people who get to deal with me face to face. I
believe you've met one of my...” he waves his hand, searching for the word.

“
Doubles?”

“
Aye,
double. He was a good lad. Really
bought
into the role.”

Mark tries to match the
lifeless tone in the King's voice.

“
So
much so that he'd rather eat cyanide than talk to me.”

“
I
know,” the King shrugs. “Dangers of the job, they all understand when they take
the position.”

“
He
died for nothing: I'm here anyway.”

“
Yes
you are, and I didn't think you'd appreciate another double. They wouldn't have
the authority to make the kind of negotiations that I want to anyway.”

Mark tilts his head
back, trying to show his refusal to bow down, but the King is still standing
above him by merit of the chair.

“
I
wouldn't have spoken to anybody else.”

The King observes him.

“
You're
confident. I'd expect no less from a bulletproof man. No less.”

“
I
want to see her.”

“
I'm
sure you do,” the King shrugs, and steps back, motioning to the door. “You'll
understand if I stay out of arms-reach, of course. Just follow me through this
door – oh, and Mark?”

Mark stands up, staring
at those icy, black eyes – and they
are
pitch black: huge pupils and
little else, barely any white.

“
Yes?”

“
I
understand you may have come here with certain...
assumptions
. I assure
you – we want the same thing. We both want this to go smoothly, but right now
we, as two upstanding businessmen, are in what we call a Mexican stand-off. You
have a gun to my head and I have a gun to your head. You could kill me with a
single punch if you wanted; I could kill your mother with a single word. We're
trusting each other not to pull the trigger here, ok? Think of this like a
nuclear deterrent, mutually assured destruction – look, I don't want to kill
anybody, ok?”

Mark says nothing.

“
It's
my firm belief,” the King gives him a confident smile, “that you will shake my
hand when this is over, and leave here as a valued business partner. An equal,
of sorts.”

The King turns and
walks to the door, opening it with another hiss. Mark lets the hiss mask a
tense breath that he lets out. Holding the door open, the King gestures for
Mark to walk through first.

Mark runs a hand around
the waistband of the trousers and depresses the tracker with his thumb. It
buzzes like a phone being switched on, letting him know it's there. He
stretches the rest of his body to keep up the act, and then steps through the
door as the King watches him, wincing at the invasive scent of the man's aftershave
as he does.

On the rooftop of the
Gardens, Jamie stands with one hand on the Trespasser's shoulder and the other
entwined in Chloe's. The roar of helicopters drowns out any chance of words –
two are coming in quickly over the distant roofs, flying low.

The Trespasser holds up
a thumb: they're transport choppers. All to plan.

Chloe squeezes Jamie's
hand in the deafening storm, rain lashing them like whip strokes. He turns to
her, and she mouths:

Ready?

He nods, and squeezes
her hand tighter to try and fight the shaking. The helicopters, wide and
round-bodied beasts, circle them like waiting vultures. Jamie watches the
Trespasser raise his hands in mock surrender, and the helicopters come in
closer. He tempts them in like a snake charmer, taking his time to show them he
means no harm. They come closer in concentric circles as he lowers himself to
his knees.

The last thing that
Chloe feels is the roaring, whistling hurricane that the helicopters are
making: the wind from their rotors buffets them, driving her back. She holds
onto Jamie, her own safety line, as the helicopters lower themselves at either
corner of the roof, and – sure enough as the Trespasser predicted – twin ropes
drop from the open doors and onto the gravel.

The Trespasser watches
them, waiting, his unmasked eyes following them like a nervous fox surrounded
by wolves.

“
Be
ready,” he roars to Jamie, and whether the thief hears him or not, he
understands:

Wait until they're all
on the ground.

Like shadows falling
amidst the static rainstorm, more soldiers in black armour descend the ropes in
rapid succession, dropping to the roof and spreading out, keeping their weapons
on them. Jamie tenses, ready to stop the clocks at the first hint of a trigger
being pulled.

The roof is filled with
armoured men aiming rifles at them. Jamie looks at the Trespasser, who is
counting under his breath, marking each of the men. He nods, and turns to Jamie
as a soldier approaches through the crowd.

The soldier points at
the Trespasser, and makes a sign with his hand that Jamie does not understand.

The Trespasser shakes
his head, and turns to Jamie, his eyes telling him everything that he needs to
know.

Jamie puts his hand on
the Trespasser's shoulder, takes a deep breath, focuses his mind, and watches
as the colour and movement drains from the world, turning the soldiers into
lifeless statues before his eyes.

Time stop.

Drawing his pistol, the
Trespasser quickly takes aim and, with surgical precision, begins to
incapacitate the soldiers with knee and shoulder shots, leaving thin trails of
half-exploded rain drops in the air where the bullets have flown, little clouds
of pink mist marking the soldiers that are hit.

Like a metronome the
pistol shots echo rhythmically, every second: aim – fire – aim – fire.

Then silence.

“
Hold
in there, Jamie, I'm reloading,” shouts the Trespasser, deafening in the
silence that has encompassed them.

“
Hurry,”
Chloe urges the Trespasser, and the soldier looks around to see why.

Jamie is trembling, his
nose gushing blood again.

Without a word, the
Trespasser slots a new magazine into his pistol and racks the slide. He resumes
his task, turning as steadily as a clock hand, disabling career soldiers who
might never walk again unaided. He grits his teeth and, mentally apologising as
he goes, pulls the trigger over and over.

Out of nowhere, time
returns with a rush of colour and light, knocking the Trespasser off aim. A
shot goes wild, and now he is surrounded by screaming men, writhing and falling
to the ground. All he can hear is the roar of the helicopters and the desperate
confusion of the soldiers.

Turning to look, he
finds Jamie clutching his head and screaming, inaudible over the noise. Chloe
has sheltered him with her body, grabbing his shoulders and trying to shield
him from the rain. Blood is pouring from his nose and pooling around his knees
in the storm water.

Training takes over.

He may not be able to
stop time, but the Trespasser's adrenaline kicks in and time slows for him. The
operating system of his own training guides his thoughts before he can think
them, and he quickly assesses the situation and acts.

There are five soldiers
left standing, confused and disorientated by the sudden split-second burst of
gunfire that has disabled three quarters of their unit.

There's a seventy five
percent chance that their officer is screaming in pain rather than screaming
orders at them, so they haven't acted.

He has a second, maybe
two, to use before they gun him and the couple down. A mental check-list tells
him what he has left to use: his rope gun is useless here. His parachute is
gone and it would be no use anyway. His launcher is empty. His pistol is
already up and raised, but he can't out-shoot five trained men.