The two women rounded the corner a moment later, coming from the rear of the hangar. They passed the clubhouse, now torn apart by bullets, all the windows shattered and the deck splintered and the insides churned to shreds. They saw the dead bodies scattered across the runway, dressed in the same olive-colour khakis, most now stained red.
Kitchener couldn’t hide the shock from her face. In her police uniform she seemed out of place, suddenly timid, taken aback by such a concentrated level of death. Her dirty blond hair had come mostly loose from the ponytail she’d put it in earlier that day. Locks stained with sweat and dirt hung over her forehead, adding to the disbelief plastered across her face. King studied Kate, and saw nothing but numbness in her gaze. As she looked over the death and destruction she did nothing but stare blankly, almost vacantly. As if she wasn’t entirely there. He didn’t blame her. It had been the most unbelievable three days of her life.
The pair of them recognised his urgency and piled into the back seat of the Hawkei. Without a word, he slammed the accelerator as soon as they were inside the chassis and the armoured vehicle peeled off the mark, tyres squealing.
‘How did you do that?’ Kitchener yelled above the wind pouring in through the open windows.
‘Do what?’ King said.
‘They’re all dead. It was ten-on-one and you killed them all.’
‘I’m not sure if you looked hard enough into my file,’ he said. ‘That’s what I used to do for a living.’
‘Are we heading for Lars?’
He nodded. ‘The last man managed to get in contact with him before I could kill him. He knows we’re coming. We might be too late.’
On the other side of the back seat, King noticed Kate grip the Hawkei’s frame and close her eyes. He saw her breathing increase rapidly. He knew panic had begun to set in.
‘Kate,’ he said, looking at her.
She met his gaze. ‘You keep throwing yourself towards danger. Doesn’t it go against your instincts? How aren’t you scared out of your mind?’
‘I’d rather die trying to stop him than sit back and watch him kill hundreds of thousands of people. That’s just how I’m wired.’
She looked away, silent.
‘I can go on alone if that’s what you two want. It’s what I’ve been doing my whole life.’
‘No,’ Kitchener said, firm and matter-of-fact. ‘You need all the help you can get.’
Kate still did not reply, but she looked at him and nodded reassuringly.
That was all he needed.
The runway ended abruptly and then they were back on the main road, this time with no regard for the speed limit. King mashed the pedal to the footwell’s floor until the trees on either side of them blurred into one stream of woodland. Thankfully, no traffic passed them by. He knew a collision at this speed would prove disastrous. The Hawkei was a speeding battering ram. An innocent passerby wouldn’t stand a chance.
The wind howled as Kate guided him with short, sharp gestures through the forest, heading back to the concrete plant and — presumably — the hidden runway buried somewhere behind.
‘What if it’s too late?’ she said. ‘What do we do?’
‘I don’t know,’ King said. ‘I haven’t thought that far ahead. We’ll need to contact some powerful people. This is a shit-storm.’
‘What will they be able to do?’
‘Not much,’ he admitted. ‘If the plane is gone when we get there, then Lars wins.’
They blazed back through the town of Hurst, attracting the attention of every pedestrian in sight. Now, it didn’t matter. Secrecy had been thrown out the window. He had a single goal of utmost importance, and if they failed to achieve it every moment of the last three days would be for nothing.
It took another five minutes to find the same gravel trail that cut through pastures and farmland, leading to the concrete plant at the very end. Every second that ticked away drew another bead of sweat from King’s forehead. He felt suffocated by the tension, like every breath took a gargantuan effort. At that moment he did not care for his own safety whatsoever. The urgency flooding his system overpowered all other emotions.
He simply had to succeed.
The Hawkei’s chassis rattled violently when they hit the gravel, shaking him to his core. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a farmer driving a tractor in one of the pastures. The man stopped what he was doing and stared in awe at the sight before him. In the middle of nowhere, a powerful armoured vehicle shot past his farm at close to eighty miles an hour, kicking up swathes of dust in its wake.
King battled to control the wheel against the bucking suspension. He kept his foot pressed firmly against the accelerator. There was no time to slow down. Then they were through into the forest. He saw the path leading to the concrete plant, branching off. He aimed the Hawkei for it.
‘Wait!’ Kate cried. ‘You won’t access it from there. Keep heading straight. I’m sure of it.’
‘If you’re wrong…’ King said, not daring to think of the consequences if they hit a dead end. Intercepting Lars would come down to a matter of seconds, even if they timed it perfectly.
He blitzed past the trail to the concrete plant and roared further into the forest, narrowly avoiding the pine trees pressing in on either side. He couldn’t see far ahead. The trail twisted and curved, showing nothing but thick forest in all directions.
‘From the layout of the map…’ Kate said, then she trailed off. Thinking hard.
‘Are you sure?’ Kitchener said to her.
‘No. Are any of us?’
Kitchener made to reply but the Hawkei slid sideways across the trail, dropping her stomach, making her hesitate. King grit his teeth as he turned the corner, faster than he should have. For a second he thought they would continue sideways, crushing the vehicle into one of the sturdy trunks lining the road.
Then it corrected course and they continued down the trail, narrowly avoiding harm.
‘Oh, shit — here!’
He heard Kate’s startled exclamation and looked ahead to where the path branched off two separate ways. One continued deep into the forest, trailing away out of sight. The other led down to a metal chain-link property gate, roughly the height of a man. Beyond it, the trees dissipated into some kind of open area. It had to be the runway.
He spun the wheel and the Hawkei shot down the right-hand path, gaining momentum. The speedometer began to climb.
‘King!’ Kate screamed.
‘Hold on to something,’ he said, eyes locked on the road ahead in concentration.
Stopping the vehicle to open the gate would kill precious time they did not have. There was no guarantee it would even open for them. He studied the flimsy, rusting supports and the hinges that looked like they hadn’t been oiled since their creation. He figured a fifteen-thousand pound armoured vehicle would win in a head-on collision ten times out of ten.
At least, he hoped.
Kate and Kitchener scrambled for hand-holds, panicked and urgent. He gripped the wheel with both hands and touched the accelerator a little more, giving the Hawkei a final surge. By now it was too late to slow down. They would collide with the gate no matter what.
With a groan of tearing metal and a heavy jolt of impact the Hawkei’s bonnet struck the middle of the gate at close to seventy miles an hour. King shot forward viciously, but the seatbelt dug into his shoulder, slowing him. He felt Kitchener’s hair whip the back of his neck as her head whiplashed forward. Then the gate was under them. Then behind them. They burst out onto open road, losing little speed in the process. The violence of the impact abruptly ceased. Kate let out a gasp of exertion.
They were okay.
The gate had buckled under the pressure and they had shot through into the property.
The Hawkei roared out onto another runway, this one more cramped than Paul’s dropzone. The tree line ran right to the edges of the tarmac, demonstrating that the area had been carved out of the forest before the runway was constructed. Its surface was nowhere near as smooth as the dropzone’s. King got the sense that grand plans had been made for this runway while under construction, then hastily abandoned. Perhaps its location was too secluded. Whatever the case, he presumed it had not been used for commercial purposes in years. Much like seemingly every building in these parts.