I frowned and he simply said, “France.”
“Oh, right, come on.”
The rock was bereft of any vegetation apart from moss and the occasional tufts of heather and some very hardy grass. There were no visible buildings, with the exception of a wooden hut by the jetty. A small helipad was off to one side, with a helicopter under a tarpaulin and straps attached stopping it from being swept away by the wind. I was pleased to note the wind had dropped a little and the sky appeared slightly lighter.
Steps had been cut into the rock up from the jetty, so we followed them, cautiously. They reached the top of the small rise and then turned into a path that led to what at first appeared to be a natural cave, but as we got closer, it proved to be man made.
A door, left partially open by our Arabic friends, was set back into the wall of the cave, some ten feet into the gloom.
“Wait, cameras!” I said pointing at the small but very obvious security camera that faced outwards from above the door. I saw a single wire hanging down from the unit, meaning that there was a good chance that it wasn’t connected.
“Clear, go!” I said.
Mike entered first, his SLP in his hand, as I followed, checking for secondary cameras or any other security devices. The door led to a stairwell, constructed of basic concrete with metal handrails, heading downwards. There were two sets of damp footprints.
The stair led downwards, so, with little choice, we followed. I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t to go down, well below sea-level. I counted two hundred and eighty steps, in banks of eight, working their way down around a central shaft. The bottom was the only possible destination, where we found ourselves facing a long, well-lit corridor, cut from the living rock, with power cables running along the upper left corner.
“Where the hell does this lead to?” Mike whispered.
“Not Oz, that’s for sure,” I said, setting off up the corridor.
We felt the vibrations before we heard anything. My mind immediately cast back to that fateful, or was it a fortunate day, when this had all started. The noise and vibrations were excruciatingly familiar.
“What the hell?” Mike said.
“The device, they’re using it.”
The vibrations were distressingly uncomfortable, and neither of us wanted to progress further towards them, but we both knew that we had to. The corridor ended with a T junction, with two tunnels running right and left.
“You go right, I’ll take this one,” Mike said, so we split up and went our separate ways. After thirty yards, my corridor started going down a slight incline and the vibrations became worse.
The first indication that all was not well was when the electric lights started flickering. Then followed an alarm, sounding a long way off, but it meant enough to me. I’d been too damn close to this machine when it didn’t work, so I had no intentions of being anywhere near it when it was ten times as powerful.
The sound of human feet running came up the corridor towards me, so I simply turned and started running back the way I had come. There was an enormous blast of hot air and I was thrown forward off my feet, my last conscious thought was wondering why a man in a gas mask was watching me.
I was completely fed up with being rendered unconscious and then waking up in weird predicaments. I have to say, waking in hospital or in Howard’s bedroom were both preferable to my current state.
First, I was naked.
Second, I was tied at wrists and ankles to a steel pole that ran from the floor to the ceiling. The latter was a good ten feet above my head comprising of the same rock as the walls and floor. Moisture seemed to drip from every surface, including me, so then I realised that I was very cold.
“Well, well, well, who have we here?” said a very smooth and cultured voice from behind me. I couldn’t see him, despite trying to turn as far as my bonds permitted. As far as I could tell, we were alone in the chamber.
“Now, I need to hear you speak, just to know who sent you.”
I wondered whether this was Azif Bin Haffir. I thought it probably unlikely, and I was strangely relieved. I suppose I should have been frightened, but somehow I knew that he was bound to underestimate me and what this new body would do when pressed. The only danger was if he simply shot me. The fact I was tied up was a good sign, for he was less likely to kill me before at least trying to find out what I knew. I therefore had to confuse him and make him angry, because angry men make mistakes.
“You lump of camel turd, go stuff your head into an infidel’s arse and choke on his shit!” I said in coarse Arabic. It was the one thing I could do in the language, be very coarse.
There was a moment’s silence, but when he spoke, the culture fell away, and he sounded angry and genuinely Arabic, for he continued in that language.
“How dare you speak to me like that you female white slut!”
Oops, was he pissed. Gone was the ‘my dear’, and the Oxbridge accent. This man was just another tent dweller made good, so I told him, adding a few choice expletives.
I don’t think he’d ever heard some of these words, and certainly never from a woman, and a Caucasian one at that. He hit me.
It wasn’t very hard, but it surprised me. It was an open-handed slap across my left cheek. He came from somewhere to my right, and I didn’t get a good look at him.
“Feel good, does it, hitting a woman who’s tied up and defenceless, you arrogant piece of desert slime?”
He hit me again, the same way, but this time, I was ready and rode with it, testing my bonds as I’d been taught. Whoever had tied me up was good, but not brilliant.
“Who are you?” he screamed at me, losing whatever cool he had left.
“Saleena Q’aadima, Captain of the Colonel’s Select Guard, you traitorous pig!”
He strode into my vision for the first time. It wasn’t Azif Bin Haffir. I’d seen so many photographs of the man to know him anywhere. I had no idea who he was, but I imagined he was a trusted lieutenant. The man was frowning, as reference to Colonel Gadaffi’s personal female bodyguard wasn’t what he was expecting. He was a good-looking man, dressed in dark Special Forces combat coveralls. There was a holster on his webbing belt.
“You lie!” he said after a pause, and then he hit me again.
I rolled with the punch, straining my wrists and ankles against the ropes.
“When he hears how you treat his personal guards, you will only have the choice between the time it takes you to die and the amount of pain you will suffer!”
“Who are you, really?” he shouted into my face, the spittle from his lips making me close my eyes.
“Really?” I asked, in Russian.
Again he frowned, staring intently into my eyes. My left hand was almost free, as were my legs, after constant tensing and relaxing, as I gradually slipped out of the ropes’ grip.
“I am Captain Natasha Bruninski, of the Russian Naval Spetnaz,” I said still in Russian.
He shook his head, walking away from me.
“Impossible, you have to be American or British!” he said, in English.
“Nyet, Ruski.”
He started to laugh, but he was a good ten feet away from me, and while he was there, I couldn’t afford to draw attention to my hands or feet, as they were almost free.
“No, the Russians aren’t this good, as they’d never get someone here this quickly. You have to be MI5 or CIA.”
“All right, I give up,” I said, putting on a rough Belfast accent. I’m Brigade Major Yvonne O’Connor of the Provisional Irish Republican Army. We want your device to take on the bloody British. This time we might win.”
He walked right up to me, so our faces were a few inches apart.
“You’re a lying bitch, you tell me who you are, or I’ll give you so much pain, you’ll regret ever being born.”