The Homecomer
It was time. Aron had left his car in the bathing area car park, at the far end of the inlet. Then he had walked south along the deserted coast road and turned off towards the cairn. He had crept silently through the long grass to the edge of the ridge, just above the entrance to the bunker. The cairn was now on his left, like a broad black cupola in the darkness.
He listened, and heard the throb of a small motorboat out in the Sound. Nothing else.
He moved on, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. Finally, he dropped to his knees on the gravel at the very edge of the rocky outcrop.
Searching in the dark was hard, but after a couple of minutes he found what he was looking for: the end of the pale plastic tube he had run from the bunker and buried a few days earlier. It was sticking out from under a stone, protected from dust and moisture by a small piece of tape.
Aron removed the tape and carefully pulled a little more of the tube free of the gravel. It didn’t look like a fuse, but that was exactly what it was. The modern kind was hollow, like a thin tube, and the inside was filled with highly flammable gunpowder. The fuse wasn’t lit with a match but with a metal spark igniter. It was smaller than a pistol butt, and Aron was already holding it in his hand. He attached the igniter to the fuse, and slowly got to his feet.
He gazed down from his vantage point but saw only darkness. Then he heard a shout, echoing through the dip: ‘He’s got a gun! He’s outside the bunker!’
It was a woman, and he recognized the voice.
Paulina.
Aron understood her warning, but didn’t have time to react or move before the sky was suddenly lit up. A white light was switched on in the dip; it swept upwards in a broad arc and shone straight in his face.
‘Aron!’ a man’s voice yelled.
Kent Kloss. He had a torch in his left hand and a gun in his right hand. An old gun that Aron knew very well. It was his own Walther.
Aron remained standing in the beam of the torch; he knew Kloss could see him. It didn’t matter any more.
He nodded to Kloss, brought his hand into the light and felt the button under this thumb.
‘Drop the gun!’ he shouted. ‘Otherwise, up she goes.’
But he was still too close to the bunker to risk pressing the button, and he hesitated a fraction too long.
‘Fuck you,’ Kloss said.
He raised the gun and fired. The bullet sped upwards in the darkness, and Aron reacted fast. He crouched down and shuffled backwards. He dropped to his knees again, then flattened himself on the ground; the second bullet whistled over his head.
Aron had dropped the igniter and the fuse. He began to feel around, and that was when he heard the crunch of gravel.
Kent Kloss had started to climb up out of the dip.
Where was the igniter? He saw it glinting in the grass but didn’t have time to pick it up.
‘Aron!’ a voice yelled. ‘It’s over!’
Kloss had reached the top and was just a few metres away, waving his torch around. Aron could see that the gun was still in his hand. At any minute, he would spot his target, take aim and fire...
Aron reached out, but not for the igniter. There were plenty of sharp pieces of stone lying around among the gravel, and he picked one of them up.
He turned to face Kent Kloss, raising his arm ready to throw as hard as he could.
He was aiming for the torch.
Lisa
‘Run, Lisa! Don’t stop!’
Paulina was holding on to her arm, and she sounded so determined, so definite, that Lisa simply allowed herself to be dragged along, fleeing blindly through the night, away from the steep rocks and down towards the flat part of the inlet.
Lisa didn’t slow down, but kept catching her toes on the bigger stones sticking up through the gravel; she almost fell several times.
‘Wait,’ she panted eventually.
When they reached even ground, she stopped to catch her breath; she could see the lights of the campsite, perhaps three hundred metres away. She looked back one last time and saw that Aron Fredh had been joined by another figure up on the ridge. Kent Kloss, holding his torch high in the air. They shouted at one another, and then they came together.
Two shadowy figures seemed to merge into one, fighting on the edge just above the bunker.
Paulina had also stopped and turned. She was just as breathless as Lisa, panting and staring up at the ridge, where the beam of the torch was still whirling around.
‘I have to go back,’ she said, taking a step towards the ridge.
‘No!’
‘Yes. He needs help.’
‘Who?’
Paulina didn’t reply, and Lisa grabbed her arm. ‘He’s dangerous!’ she said, although she didn’t really know which of the men she meant.
For a few seconds, they stood there motionless, engaged in a static tug-of-war. Lisa thought she was gaining the upper hand, persuading Paulina to change her mind and stay.
But it was already too late. The beam of light disappeared — had Kent dropped the torch?
It looked as if there was only one figure left. It was moving along the ridge away from the cairn, swaying unsteadily. Paulina stared at it and let out what sounded like a curse, in a foreign language. Then she suddenly shouted, ‘Look out!’ She pushed Lisa to the ground; Paulina was strong, and practically covered Lisa with her own body.
A few long seconds passed. The entire coast seemed to be waiting.
And then the silence was smashed to pieces, and chaos broke out. The darkness disappeared in a flash of yellow light, and the night was split in two by an enormous explosion.
The Homecomer
Aron had missed the torch with the stone, but he had hit Kent Kloss instead, on the right shoulder, and the sharp blow had made him drop the gun. Aron heard it land somewhere down below.
He didn’t wait; he spun around and crawled along on all fours, away from the cairn, pulling the plastic fuse behind him like an umbilical cord.
The gun was no longer a problem, but Kent Kloss certainly was. He was like a wild animal now, younger and angrier than Aron.
‘Stop right there!’ he yelled. Kloss hurled himself at Aron, gripping his arm, pulling at his jumper. ‘Stop, for fuck’s sake!’
Kloss was growling and swearing, but Aron fought back and managed to pull away. He carried on crawling along the edge. Kloss kicked out at his legs to try to knock him over, but Aron gritted his teeth. He was a soldier now; he could deal with pain. He kept on going.
Just a few more metres... The igniter was lying on the ground, a little metal tube with a round button at one end. He reached out, so close...
He felt a hard blow on his back. Kloss loomed above him, the beam of the torch pointing downwards.
‘Give it up!’ he shouted, lifting his foot to deliver a vicious kick with his leather boot.
Aron grabbed hold of the boot and twisted the other man’s leg like a joystick. Kloss lost his balance, his arms flailing. The torch flew out of his hand and the gravel crunched as he tried to regain his footing, but Aron didn’t give him any time. He punched Kloss in the chest.
‘Shit!’
Kloss screamed and seemed to hover for a second, clawing at thin air, before he fell backwards.
It wasn’t a long fall, only a metre or so down a scree slope, but the landing was hard. Aron heard a dull thud at the bottom, followed by gravel rattling down on Kloss.
Aron was free now and quickly covered the remaining distance along the ridge. He picked up the igniter, which was still attached to the fuse.
Kloss would be back once he had found the gun. Aron didn’t have much time.