Page 49

Solange took the razor out of her bag. “Ready? We have to do this quickly, or the whole plan will go wrong, and Tyler will know you’re trying to escape.”

“Ready.” Alex held out his wrist, and she pressed her fingers over each side of the chip and then sliced the skin over it, making him wince.

A large red droplet of blood welled up in the wound, but the chip slipped out easily.

He held it, still winking, in his hand, while Solange, inhaling sharply, made a small cut in her own wrist. Then Alex pushed the pulsing chip under her skin, and she covered it with the sticking plaster to keep it in place.

He wrapped his handkerchief around his own wrist to stop the bleeding, and they both stood there for a moment, on tenterhooks, as they waited to see if the chip would keep working.

After an agonising wait, Alex placed his fingers on Solange’s wrist and felt the device still pulsing beneath the plaster.

“That must be more than thirty seconds,” Solange said.

“It is.” Alex glanced at his watch. “It worked.”

“Then go. You need every single second you’ve got left.”

“Yes.” He swept her up in a hug and kissed her cheek. “Oh, shit. I just realised – I might never see you again.”

“I hope so.” She caressed his cheek. “I really hope we never meet again, Alex. I hope you escape and have a long, happy life far away from here.”

“And you. I hope you and Ted are able to leave Tyler one day, and find a flat, and get married, and have babies, or whatever it is you want to do.” He swallowed down a lump in his throat. “Thank you, Solange.”

“Go!” she ordered.

He pulled away and wrenched the door open.

“Act normally,” she hissed. “Remember what I said. ”

He took a deep breath to collect himself, and then sauntered out of the toilet and along the corridor, trying to act nonchalantly.

He passed little gaggles of people from the conference on his way, and did his best to smile at them as if he were allowed to be out here, wandering around by himself.

He paused at the end of the corridor to glance at the map, then navigated his way down the back stairs, away from the CCTV cameras.

He exited through the catering area, where dozens of Benitos staff were bustling around in the kitchens.

Nobody paid him any attention. Alex saw a navy-blue hooded sweatshirt with the Benitos logo etched onto the left breast slung over the back of one of the chairs, and with a surreptitious glance around to make sure its owner wasn’t nearby, he grabbed it.

On his way out he saw a scarf abandoned on a table, so he grabbed that, too.

He put the hoodie on over his tux. It was three sizes too big for him, but that worked to his advantage, hiding his tuxedo.

He pulled the hood over his eyes so it obscured his face, and then sauntered out of the back tradesmen’s entrance.

There were dozens of people coming and going, so nobody paid him any attention.

It was dark outside, and the cold air hit him the minute he left the building.

He pulled off his bow tie and shoved it into his pocket, then did up the hoodie to the neck, completely obscuring what he was wearing beneath.

Finally, he wrapped the stolen scarf around the hood so that it obscured most of his face and kept out the wind, then he put his head down and ran down the road to the bus stop.

He only had to wait five minutes for the next bus, but every second seemed like a lifetime.

He could see Vertex Tower across the street, rising up taller than all the other buildings on Ghost Eye, its lights blazing, and he hopped from one foot to the other, feeling so scared he wanted to throw up.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the bus duck arrived.

He paid the fare with one of the cash cards and took his seat by a window.

He felt ridiculously conspicuous, so he pulled the scarf even more tightly over his face, wondering what was happening back in the ballroom, and if his escape had been noticed yet.

The bus hit the water and began chugging across it.

He turned to get one last glimpse of the floating city that had been his prison for the past few months.

Ghost Eye was an oasis of lights in the dark, but they soon faded from view as the bus hit a patch of land and drove away.

They travelled slowly across various lost zones for a couple of hours, stopping at several little island drop-offs, before coming to a halt at a terminal in Streatham.

“Final stop,” the driver called, turning off the lights.

Alex got off and stood on the dark street, wondering what to do next.

It was late, and there would be no more buses tonight.

He decided to find somewhere to hunker down for the night, so he followed a sign to Streatham Common, which sounded like a good place to hide.

This turned out not to be the case – what had once been common land, a rough area of grassland where people walked their dogs, had been filled with cube dwellings of the kind hastily constructed during the Rising. There was nowhere to hide here.

Walking up a long, sloping hill beside the cubes, he found a small park which was all that was left of the common, and there, at the very top, was a café, surrounded by a low wooden fence.

It was closed for the night, but there were several wooden picnic tables on the forecourt.

It was surrounded by large trees, which screened it from the road; this might do.

He climbed over the fence, crawled under one of the tables, and sat there with his knees drawn up to his chest and his arms wrapped around them.

It was cold and dark, there was a bitter wind, and he suddenly felt very alone.

He remembered the nanopad, and took it out of his pocket. There was only the one nym programmed into it, and no name. He clicked on the number, and it began to ring.

“Come on, come on,” he whispered, blowing onto his fingers and wishing he’d stolen some gloves as well as the hoodie and scarf.

Nobody answered. He wondered if the nym was still in use.

Solange had kept the nanopad for eighteen months; maybe the person the nym belonged to wasn’t around anymore, and he was all alone out here.

Then, suddenly, a woman’s voice answered, sounding blessedly warm and motherly in the dark night.

“Hello, this is Elsie. What can I do for you?”

“Elsie, I need help. A friend told me to call you. I just ran away from my houder,” Alex said rapidly, wondering if he sounded as pathetic as he felt.

“Well, you’ve come to the right place, sweetheart,” she said comfortingly. “Whereabouts are you right now?”

“Streatham,” he said. “I’m hiding. Um, under a picnic table.”

“Okay, my love. Do you have any money?”

“Yeah. A bit.”

“Right. Well, we can get you out of the country, but the earliest pick-up I can offer you is Monday week.”

“Is there nothing sooner?” he asked miserably, wondering what the hell he was going to do for over a week.

“I’m sorry, sweetie – we’re full up until then. Look, stay strong. Will your money stretch far enough to feed you for the next ten days?”

“I think so.”

“Lie low, don’t act suspiciously, and keep out of sight as much as possible. I need you to make your way to West Wickham – can you do that? It’s not too far from where you are now. That’s where the pick-up will take place.”

“I’ll get there,” he said.

“Good. I’ll call you again on the day to tell you where and when. Is this the right nym to call?”

“Yes.”

“Now, what’s your name, sweetie, so I can put you on our list?”

He hesitated. He was the most famous IS in the land, and Tyler would pay bounty hunters a fortune to bring him back. Also, he knew nothing about this Elsie woman, and whether she’d sell him out if she knew the price he could command. He didn’t trust her with his name.

“Sweetie?” she prompted. “I need your name.”

Alex panicked, his mind going completely blank. He looked down and saw the logo of the catering company on his hoodie: Benitos. “Ben,” he told her. “My name is Ben.”