After that, everything happened very quickly.
The severed pipe coiled left and right like a wounded snake. Propane gas in liquid form was still being pumped through, and as the severed end whipped past the burner, it ignited, becoming at once a huge ball of flame. The pipe twisted back again and spat its deadly payload in the direction of Nile.
Nile had just managed to raise the second sword in the start of what would be his final throw. He was aiming at Alex’s chest. Then the fireball hit him. He screamed once and disappeared. One second he was there, the next he had been blown into the air, a spinning, burning puppet of a man, falling to his death one hundred metres below.
It looked as if Alex was about to follow him.
The entire platform was on fire, the plastic melting. There was burning liquid propane everywhere and it was dissolving everything it touched. Alex struggled to his feet as the flames licked towards him. What now? The burner had gone out but the balloon didn’t seem to be falling. The platform, however, would – and very soon. The four ropes securing it to the envelope were made of nylon and all four of them were on fire. One of them snapped and Alex cried out as the platform tilted, almost throwing him over the edge. His eyes darted to the machinery. The electric cables must be fireproof. The little red lights showed him that the three remaining dishes were still transmitting. More than a minute must have passed since Nile had appeared, surely! Alex pressed a hand against his chest, expecting at any moment to feel the stab of pain as the poison broke free and entered his system.
But he was still alive, and he knew he had just seconds left to escape from the burning platform. No chance of jumping to safety. He was a hundred metres above the ground. He heard a snapping sound as a second rope began to break. The fire was out of control. It was burning him; it was burning everything.
Alex jumped.
Not down – but up. He leapt first onto the control box and then up so that his hands caught the metal frame surrounding the burner. He hauled himself up and stood. Now he could reach the circular skirt at the bottom of the envelope itself. It was incredible. Looking up, it felt as if he were standing inside a huge, circular room. The walls were fabric but they could have been solid. He was inside the balloon, imprisoned by it. He saw a nylon cord. It led all the way to the parachute valve at the very top. Would it take his weight?
And then the remaining ropes holding the platform gave way. The platform fell, taking the burner and the dishes with it, disappearing from under Alex’s feet. Alex just had time to wind the nylon cord around one hand and grab hold of the fabric of the balloon with the other. Suddenly he was dangling. Once again his arms and wrists took the strain. He wondered if the balloon would crumple and fall. But most of the weight had gone; only he was left. It stayed where it was.
Alex looked down. He couldn’t stop himself. And that was when he saw – in the middle of the fire and the smoke, the spinning platform and the falling ropes – the three red lights had gone out. He was sure of it. Either the flames had destroyed the machinery or the dishes had deactivated themselves the moment they dropped below one hundred metres.
The terahertz beams had stopped. Not a single child would die.
Nobody was sure where the bag lady had appeared from. Perhaps she had been dossing in the small cemetery behind the Church of Forgotten Saints. But now she had wandered into what, until a few minutes ago, had been a full-scale battle.
She was lucky. The SAS men had taken control of the church and the immediate area. Most of the Scorpia people were dead; the remainder had put down their weapons in surrender. A final explosion had breached the entrance of the church itself. SAS soldiers were already pouring in, searching for Alex.
The bag lady was clearly confused by all this activity; possibly she was also drunk. There was a bottle of cider in one of her hands and she stopped to force the neck between her rotten teeth and drink. She had a repulsive, withered face and grey hair that was long and knotted. She was dressed in a filthy coat, tied around her bulging waist with string. Her other hand clutched two dustbin bags close to her, as if they contained all the treasure in the world.
One of the soldiers saw her. “Get out of here!” he yelled. “You’re in danger.”
“All right, love!” The bag lady giggled. “What’s the matter, then? It’s like bleeding World War Three.”
But she shuffled off, out of harm’s way, while the SAS men rushed past her, heading for the church.
Underneath the wig, the make-up and the costume, Mrs Rothman smiled to herself. It was almost incredible that these stupid SAS soldiers should let her walk away, slipping between them in plain daylight. She had a gun hidden under her coat and she would use it if anyone tried to stop her. But they were so busy rushing into the church, they had barely noticed her.
And then one of them called out.
“Stop!”
She had been seen after all. Mrs Rothman hurried on.
But the soldier hadn’t been trying to detain her: he had been trying to warn her. A shadow fell across her face and she looked up just in time to see a blazing rectangle fall out of the sky. Julia Rothman opened her mouth to scream but the sound didn’t have time to reach her lips. She was crushed, driven into the pavement, flattened like a creature in some hideous cartoon. The SAS man who had shouted could only gaze at the burning wreckage in horror. Then, slowly, he looked up to see where it had come from.
But there was nothing there. The sky was clear.
Freed from the platform and the mooring ropes, the balloon had been blown north, with Alex still clinging beneath it. He was limp and exhausted; his legs and the side of his chest had been burnt. It was as much as he could do simply to hang on.
But the air inside the envelope had cooled and the balloon was coming down. Alex had been lucky that the fabric of the balloon was flame-resistant.
Of course, he might still be killed. He had no control of the balloon at all and the wind might choose to steer him into a high voltage wire. He had already crossed the river and could see Trafalgar Square with Nelson’s Column looming up in front of him. It would be a sick joke to land there and end up getting run over.
Alex could only hang on and wait to find out what was going to happen. Despite the pain in his arms, he was aware of a sense of inner peace. Somehow, against all the odds, he had come through everything alive. Nile was dead. Mrs Rothman was probably a prisoner. The nanoshells were no longer a threat.
And what about him? The wind had changed. It was carrying him to the west. Yes. There was Green Park – just fifty-odd metres below. He could see people pointing up at him and shouting. He silently urged the balloon on. With a bit of luck he might make it all the way to Chelsea, to his house, where Jack Starbright would be waiting. How much further could it be? Did the balloon have the strength to take him there?
He hoped so, because that was all he cared about now.
He just wanted to go home.
DEEP COVER
It ended – inevitably, it seemed to Alex – in Alan Blunt’s office in Liverpool Street.
They had left him alone for a week but then the telephone call had come on Friday evening, asking him to come in. Asking, not telling. That was at least a change. And they had chosen a Saturday, so he wouldn’t have to miss school.
The balloon had dropped him on the edge of Hyde Park, lowering him to the grass as gently as an autumn leaf. It was the end of the day and by that time there were few people in the park. Alex had been able to slip away quietly, five minutes before a dozen police cars had come roaring in. It was a twenty-minute walk home and he had more or less fallen into Jack’s arms before taking a hot bath, wolfing down dinner and going to bed.
He wasn’t badly hurt. There were burns on his arms and chest and his wrist was swollen where he had dangled from the balloon. Mrs Rothman had also left her mark on his cheek. Looking at himself in the mirror, he wondered how he was going to explain the very obvious-shaped bruise. In the end he told everyone he had been mugged
. In a way, he felt, he had.
He had been back at Brookland for five days. Mr Grey was one of the first people to see him crossing the school yard before assembly, and he shook his head warily but said nothing. The teacher had taken it as a personal insult that Alex had disappeared on his school trip to Venice, and although Alex felt terrible, he couldn’t tell him the truth. On the other hand, Tom Harris was overjoyed.
“I knew you’d be OK,” he said. “You sounded a bit down when I spoke to you on the phone. That was after that place had blown up. But at least you were still alive. And a couple of days later, Jerry got this humongous cheque for a new parachute. Except it was about five times too much. He’s in New Zealand now, thanks to you. BASE jumping off some building in Auckland. Just what he’s always wanted!” Tom took out a newspaper cutting. “Was this you?” he demanded.
Alex looked at it. It was a photograph of the hotair balloon drifting over London. He could see a tiny figure clinging to it. Fortunately the picture had been taken from too far away to identify him. Nobody knew what had happened at the Church of Forgotten Saints. And nobody knew he was involved.
“Yes,” Alex admitted. “But, Tom – you mustn’t tell anyone.”
“I’ve already told Jerry.”
“No one else.”
“Yeah. I know. Official secrets and all that.” Tom frowned. “Maybe I should join MI6. I’m sure I’d make a great spy.”
Alex thought of his friend now as he sat down opposite Alan Blunt and Mrs Jones. He lowered himself slowly into the chair, wondering what they were going to say to him. Jack hadn’t wanted him to come here at all.
“The moment they know you’re capable of walking, they’ll probably have you parachuting into North Korea,” she had said. “They’re never going to leave you alone, Alex. I don’t even want to know what happened to you after Venice. But just promise me you won’t let it happen again.”
Alex agreed with her. He would rather have stayed at home. But he knew he had to be here. If nothing else, he owed it to Mrs Jones after what had happened in her flat.
“It’s good to see you, Alex,” Blunt said. “Once again, you’ve done a very good job.”
Very good. The highest praise Blunt knew.
“I’ll just bring you up to date,” Blunt went on. “I don’t need to tell you that Scorpia’s plot was a complete failure, and I very much doubt that they’ll try anything on this scale again. They lost one of their top assassins, the man called Nile, when he fell out of the balloon. How did that happen, by the way?”
“He slipped,” Alex said shortly. He didn’t want to go over it again.
“I see. Well, you might like to know that Julia Rothman also died.”
That was news to Alex. He had assumed she must have escaped.
Mrs Jones took up the story. “The platform underneath the balloon fell on her as she was trying to escape,” she explained. “She was crushed.”
“I’d have been disappointed too,” Alex muttered.
Blunt sniffed. “The most important thing of all is that London’s children are going to be safe. As that scientist – Dr Stephenson – explained, the nanoshells will slowly pass out of their bodies. I have to tell you, Alex, that the terahertz dishes were transmitting for at least a minute. God knows how close we came to a major disaster.”
“I’ll try to move a little faster next time,” Alex said.
“Yes. Well. One other thing. You might be amused to hear that Mark Kellner resigned this morning. The prime minister’s director of communications – remember him? He’s telling the press that he wants to spend more time with his family. The funny thing is, his family can’t stand him. Nobody can. Mr Kellner made one mistake too many. Nobody could have foreseen that stunt with the hot-air balloon. But someone has to carry the can, and I’m glad to say it’s going to be him.”
“Well, if that’s all you called me in for, I’d better get home,” Alex said. “I’ve missed more school and I’ve got a lot to catch up on.”
“No, Alex. I’m afraid you can’t leave quite yet.” Mrs Jones sounded more serious than Alex had ever heard her and he wondered if she was going to make him pay for his attempt on her life.
“I’m sorry about what I nearly did, Mrs Jones,” he said. “But I think I’ve more or less made up for it…”
“That’s not what I want to speak to you about. As far as I’m concerned, your visit to my flat never happened. But there’s something more important. You and I have never spoken about Albert Bridge.”
Alex felt cold inside. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Why not?”
“Because I know what you did was right. I’ve seen Scorpia for myself now; I know what they are capable of. If my father was one of them, then you were right. He deserved to die.”
The words hurt Alex even as he spoke them. They caught in his throat.
“There’s somebody I want you to meet, Alex. He’s come into the office today and he’s standing outside. I know you don’t want to spend any more time here than you have to, but will you let him talk to you? It will only take a few minutes.”
“All right.” Alex shrugged. He didn’t know what Mrs Jones wanted to prove. He had no wish to return to the circumstances of his father’s death.
The door opened and a tall man walked in, bearded, with brown curly hair that was beginning to grey. He was casually dressed in a beaten-up leather jacket and jeans. He looked in his early thirties and although Alex was sure he had never met him, his face seemed vaguely familiar.
“Alex Rider?” he asked. He had a soft, pleasant voice.
“Yes.”
“How do you do?” He held out a hand. Alex stood up and felt his hand taken in a grasp that was warm and friendly. “My name is James Adair,” he said. “I think you’ve met my father, Sir Graham Adair.”
Alex was hardly likely to forget. Sir Graham Adair was the permanent secretary to the Cabinet Office. He could see the similarity in the faces of the two men. But he knew James Adair from somewhere else too. Of course. He was a lot older now. The hair colour was different and he was more thickset. But the face was the same. He had seen it on a television screen. On Albert Bridge.
“James Adair is a senior lecturer at Imperial College here in London,” Mrs Jones explained. “But fourteen years ago he was a student. His father was already an extremely senior civil servant—”
“You were kidnapped,” Alex interrupted. “You were the one Scorpia kidnapped.”
“That’s right. Look, do you mind if we sit down? I feel very formal standing up like this.”
James Adair took a seat. Alex waited for him to speak. He was puzzled and a little apprehensive. This man had been there when his father was killed. In a way, it was because of this man that John Rider had died. Why had Mrs Jones brought him here now?
“I’ll tell you my story and then get out of here,” James Adair said. “When I was eighteen years old, I was the victim of an attempt to blackmail my father. I was snatched by an organization called Scorpia, and they were going to torture me and kill me unless my dad did exactly what they said. But Scorpia made a mistake. My father could influence government policy but he couldn’t actually change it. There was nothing he could do. I was told I was going to die.
“But then, at the last minute, there was a change of plan. I met a woman called Julia Rothman. She was very beautiful but a complete bitch. I think she couldn’t wait to get out the redhot pokers or whatever. Anyway, she told me that I was going to be exchanged for one of her people. He’d been captured by MI6. And they were going to swap us. On Albert Bridge.
“They drove me there very early one morning. I have to admit that I was terrified. I was certain there was going to be a double-cross. I thought they might shoot me and dump me in the Thames. But everything seemed to be very straightforward. It was just like in a spy film. There were three men and me on one side of the bridge. They all had guns. And on the other side of the bridge I could see a figure. That was your
dad. He was with some people from MI6.” The lecturer glanced at Mrs Jones. “She was one of them.”
“It was my first major field operation,” Mrs Jones murmured.
“Go on,” Alex said. He had been drawn in. He couldn’t help himself.
“Well, somebody gave a signal and we both began to walk – almost as if we were going to fight a duel, except that our hands were tied. I have to tell you, Alex, the bridge felt a mile long. It seemed to take for ever to get across. But at last we met in the middle, your father and I; and I was sort of grateful to him, because it was thanks to him that I wasn’t going to be killed, and yet at the same time I knew he worked for Scorpia, so I thought he must be one of the bad guys.
“And then he spoke to me.”
Alex held his breath. He remembered the video Mrs Rothman had shown him. It was true. His father and the teenager had spoken. He had been unable to hear the words and had wondered what they had said.
“He was very calm,” James Adair went on. “I hope you won’t mind me saying this, Alex, but, looking at you now, I can see him as he was then. He was totally in command. And this is what he said to me.
“There’s going to be shooting. You have to move fast.
“What? What do you mean?
“When the shooting starts, don’t look round. Just run as fast as you can. You’ll be safe.”
There was a long silence.
“My dad knew he was going to be shot?” Alex asked.
“Yes.”
“But how?”
“Let me finish.” James Adair ran a hand across his beard. “I took about another ten steps and suddenly there was a shot. I know I wasn’t meant to look round, but I did. Just for a second. Your father had been shot in the back. There was blood on his padded jacket; I could see a gash in the material. And then I remembered what he’d told me and I began to run … hell for leather. I just had to get out of there.”
That was another thing Alex had noticed when he’d watched the video. James Adair had reacted with amazing speed. Anyone else would surely have frozen. But he’d clearly known what he was doing.