r  edge  in  order to  reverse the
climbing process.
     Keeping the tension in the rope, I slowly lowered myself over, twisting
my right foot round the rope as my hips got to the  edge of the wall. Then I
let the rope take my weight and climbed down as quickly as I could.
     I  piled snow  on top of the charges  so the weight of the plank didn't
pull it down the other side, taking  everything with it. It was important to
keep the rope in place while I went  off  and did a quick recce; for now, it
was my only escape route.
     The  hum of  the generator was louder at ground level, more than enough
to drown the crunch  of my feet on virgin snow and ice as I moved toward the
rusty side door.  I took  the flashlight  from my pocket and switched it on.
Just a tiny pinprick of light emerged; I'd taped over most of the reflector,
leaving just a small hole.
     There  was work to be  done on the door. It's all well and good getting
on to a target, but it's just as  important getting away. If I didn't have a
better escape  route organized than just climbing up  a rope, I'd be in deep
shit if I was compromised. Working with the flashlight in  my mouth, I could
see that the  door was secured by a large bolt, maybe two  feet long, set in
the  middle,  covered in rust, and looking  as if  it hadn't been opened for
years.  I began to work on the lever with  both hands, gently  lifting it up
and down as I pulled it back  and forth, making a little progress with  each
movement until the  thing  finally  gave.  Pulling the door  toward me about
three or four inches to confirm that it would open, I then pushed it
     back into  position. Job done, I stopped and listened: no noise but the
generator.
     There was  no point in risking the rope being spotted now that I had an
alternative escape route, so I untied it and let it go.
     Shouldering  the  charges,  I  crunched along  the  front of the larger
building, trying to keep as close to it as possible to minimize sign. Now  I
could see that it was built of chalk-colored bricks that were way past their
prime.  If the target house was built of the same stuff, it wasn't going  to
be difficult to make entry.
     The generator noise increased as I reached the large opening. A mass of
tire tracks led in  the  same  direction. Going  inside,  I moved off to the
right  so  I  wasn't silhouetted in  the entrance, and stood  still  in  the
darkness,  listening to the  genny noise to my  far left. It felt  warmer in
here, but I knew it wasn't really, it was just more sheltered.
     Taking the flashlight out of my pocket, I pulled off the tape but  kept
two  fingers  over the lens to control its  brightness. A quick shine around
the cavernous interior revealed three vehicles: a Mercedes box van, with its
nose pointing out, and  two sedans haphazardly parked  at different  angles,
pointing in. The floor  was concrete, covered  in  several  years' supply of
frozen mud, lumps of wood and old crates.
     The  flashlight was too weak to reach the generator itself,  but thirty
paces took me right up to it. The machinery was standing on a new section of
concrete floor, about two feet above ground level to keep it well out of the
shit. Beyond it was the fuel tank, a large, heavy plastic cylinder supported
on cinder blocks. Seeing it gave me an idea for later on.
     Jutting from the front of  the generator was a power cable a good three
inches thick; it ran through  the gable wall, where three or four bricks had
been knocked out to accommodate it, and toward the target house.
     I  dumped  my  kit  at  the  back of  the  generator,  turned  off  the
flashlight, and went back to the large opening and out into the compound.
     Following the many footprints that had  been made between this building
and the target about fifteen yards away, I made my way toward the main door.
Directly ahead I saw  the triangle of darkness that stretched  from directly
below  the ground-floor  windowsill to about three  feet out into the  snow,
where the light hit the ground.
     I checked my weapon was properly placed in my jacket pocket so that, if
needed, I could bite off my glove and draw down with ease.
     Checking before passing the six-foot gap  between the two buildings  to
my right, I could see where the generator  cable came out  of the  barn wall
and went into the target's. I also saw  plenty of footprints from the path I
was on, branching off  between the two buildings and toward the  rear of the
target. People must be in and out of here all the time.
     Bending  down,  I edged  my way  under the first  window,  as close  as
possible to the wall.  The  glass above  me  was protected by steel bars.  A
television was on. The voices were English, and  it  didn't take  me long to
work out the channel was MTV. This got weirder by the minute.
     With my back to the wall, I looked and listened. The light above me was
shining through yellow floral curtains, though the material was too thick to
see through. I couldn't hear any talking, just Ricky Martin singing. Putting
my ear to the wall I listened again. I  didn't have to try hard. Bursting in
with the chorus  was  a heavy Eastern European accent trying to give Ricky a
hand.
        40
     ThE target building seemed to consist of a  concrete  frame filled with
red clay brickwork with  air  holes and serrated sides. Whoever  had put  it
together had never heard of a plumb line, and too many bad winters had taken
their toll  on the bricks; they looked as crumbly as the one I'd tied to the
plank.
     With  Ricky Martin reaching  the end  of his song, I moved up  the  two
concrete steps to the main door.  It was the same arrangement as the baar in
Narva, except the other  way  round, with the steel grill on the outside and
the wooden door set  back about six inches further into the frame. I  needed
to find out if it was locked. It wasn't my chosen point of entry, but if the
charges  didn't work and the  door  happened to be open, at least  I'd  have
options. More to  the point, if  I fucked up inside,  I had an  extra escape
route.
     The grill wasn't locked. I moved it gently backward an inch and it made
no  noise, so I pulled it toward me a couple of  inches, returned it an inch
and  pulled another two,  controlling  the  quiet  squeaks as  it  gradually
opened. Eventually the grill  was open enough to squeeze my arm past and try
the door. There were no  sounds apart from MTV and the generator as I pushed
the door handle down gently and gave a small push. It was locked.
     I stood and listened,  hoping to hear Tom's voice. Something was  being
fried, and the smell was wafting under the door. From upstairs came a shout,
muffled by the sound of the TV, but it wasn't Tom's voice.
     Then I realized the shouting wasn't shouting, it was meant to be
     singing.  My friend the Ricky Martin impressionist was on his way  back
downstairs.
     Moving  out of  the doorway,  I pulled my glove off with  my teeth  and
gripped my weapon. If he came  out, I'd be stepping over  his dead  body and
going  straight in with  so much  speed, aggression, and  surprise that  I'd
scare even myself.
     His  voice got louder as he reached the ground floor. A chorus of other
voices  bellowed from  the  rear of  the  building,  maybe in  Russian,  but
definitely telling him to shut the fuck up.
     He had reached the  hallway and was only  feet  from the door, shouting
back, along with at least two other voices from the TV room. It was  banter,
nothing more.
     The  singer  went back into the room and  the  MTV  show died down to a
slightly quieter level as the door was closed.
     I moved back to the front  door and listened. Nothing now but the sound
of more  music being  played. Replacing my weapon, I slowly closed the grill
the same way as I'd opened it.
     Moving back down the steps, I followed the tracks toward the far end of
the target, ducking  under the  left-hand window and into its dark triangle.
Even with my ear to the wet, cold  wall, I could hear no  sound from inside.
The  windows were  steamed  up  behind  the steel bars; maybe  this was  the
kitchen?
     I  reached the  corner of the  building and cleared it.  There were  no
windows this side, but plenty of footprints in the snow leading to the rear.
What could easily  be  seen,  however,  even  in  this light,  was  a  large
satellite  dish,  slightly jutting out  to the  left  of  the  building  and
pointing upward  at  about forty-five degrees. I felt  as  if I was having a
Microsoft  HQ flashback, and  hoped the  NSA didn't arrive  to complete  the
story. At the same  time I  was pleased  I'd seen it. The dish  was my  only
confirmation that this really was the target.
     I counted the paces as I moved toward it, in preparation for laying the
charges. Seventeen one-yard steps took me to the rear of the building.
     I cleared  the corner and the generator gained  a decibel or two. Light
was shining through curtains from both of the  upstairs windows, just enough
to cast a  dim glow over  the  satellite dish's two friends.  All three were
about the same size as those at Microsoft HQ, but made of solid plastic, not
mesh. They pointed skyward in  different  directions.  They weren't  static,
dug-in dishes, but on stands, with
     ice-covered sandbags over the legs to  keep them  in position. Like the
Finnish  ones,  they, too,  were clear of  snow and ice, and  the whole area
around them was trampled down. Beyond them, maybe forty yards away, was  the
dark shape of the rear compound wall.
     I  turned  the corner and realized that hidden in the shadow of the top
windows' dark triangles were two  more  windows on the ground floor, without
light. All four mirrored the ones on the front of the target.
     To get under the first  window took five paces, making it twenty two in
total so far.  I crouched by three thick, snow-covered satellite feeds which
came out  of the snow and disappeared into  a hole in the brickwork directly
beneath  the  first  ground-floor  window.  The gap around the  cabling  was
roughly refilled with concrete.
     The downstairs windows on this side were also barred. I  could now  see
chinks of light around the  edges  of  the  frame I was  crouching  beneath.
Lifting  my eyes to  the sill for a  closer  look, I saw  that the glass was
boarded over from the inside.
     I  heard a  humming noise coming from the  other  side of  the  boards,
high-pitched and  electrical, unlike  the throbbing  diesel further along in
the other building. No human voices, but I knew they were there somewhere. I
never thought I'd find myself longing to hear Tom asking for a cup of herbal
tea "My body's a temple, know what I mean, Nick?" but it didn't happen.
     Stepping over  the  cables,  it took me another nine slow  and  careful
paces to  the next window to  add to the  twenty-two. I'd soon know how much
det cord I'd need to take off the reel.
     This  window was  also boarded  up, but there  was  a little more light
spilling out. Two  sheets of quarter-inch  plywood,  which should have  been
flush against the glass, were not, leaving a half-inch gap on the right-hand
side.
     Doing  a Houdini,  I  adjusted  my head  to try and get  a good viewing
angle, pressing it  right  up against the iron bars,  the  hat working  as a
perfect  insulator  for  my head.  I got a glimpse of  very bright lighting,
under which I could see a bank of about five or six gray plastic PC monitors
facing away from  me, their rear vents black with  burned dust. Judging from
what I could see, this rear half of the building was one big room.
     As I  adjusted my  head  in an another attempt to  see more, everything
inside went dark. A body blocked my view. I watched as he
     leaned  forward on  his arms, his head  moving from side to  side as he
studied the different screens  in front of  him, no more than  two feet away
from me. He must have been about mid-thirties  with short dark-blond hair on
top of  a very square head, and he was wearing a  patterned crewneck sweater
that any geek's mother would have been proud  of. He started to smile,  then
nodded  to himself as he  turned toward the gap. He  was no more than a foot
away  now  as  he answered a quick  aggressive Russian voice  behind him. He
looked down at something, and  whatever  it was he was happy about it. Maybe
Tom  had come up  with the goods for them  and  they had  Echelon. If so, it
wouldn't be for long.
     He picked up a sheet  of  printed  paper  and waved  it at whoever  was
behind him, then  he moved out of  my line of vision, back into the room. It
was probably the  Christmas lunch  menu  from  the Space  and  Naval Warfare
Systems Command  in San Diego. They seemed to  know everything else that was
happening there.
     At least I knew where the kit that had to be destroyed was all I needed
to  find  now  was Tom. I  waited for further movement for  another  fifteen
minutes with my eye  to  the gap, but nothing  happened. I  was getting very
cold and my toes were numb. Lion King told me it was only 5:49; it was going
to get a whole lot colder yet.
     I moved to the next corner of the target, toward  the generator. It was
another five  paces,  which made thirty-six in total. I was happy; there was
more than enough det cord.
     I turned right and walked down the small gap between the two buildings,
stepping  over the generator  cable  lying in the  snow.  Just  as with  the
satellite cables, a hole had been punched through the target's brickwork and
the gap refilled with handfuls of concrete.
     I made my way back to the generator building and started to prepare the
kit. The first  thing I  checked was  that I still had  the batteries  in my
inside  pocket:  In dems,  it's the ultimate  sin  to  lose  control  of the
initiation device, on a  par  with  leaving  your weapon more than an  arm's
length  away from you. I'd been keeping them  close to  my body to stop them
getting sluggish in the cold; they needed to work first time.
     I didn't  need light for unrolling the  det cord because I knew  what I
was doing, but the generator noise would drown out any human movement coming
into the  building, so I  had  to keep my eyes on the entrance  while  I was
working. Placing the reel between
     my feet, I held the  loose  end in  my right hand and stretched out  my
arm, pushing the det cord into my armpit with my left. I did that thirty-six
times, plus an extra five to cover what I needed to do on the wall this side
of  the  target. I added two more for  luck, cutting  it  with my  blackened
Leatherman.  I then laid it on the floor, next to the  charges. This was now
called the  main line, and  would be used to send the shock wave to all  the
charges at once via their det tails.
     The next thing I  had to sort out was the little brain wave I'd had for
the  fuel tank.  What I had  in mind was the most spectacular explosion this
side  of Hollywood.  When  the  fuel  tank  blew it  wouldn't  be  the  most
productive bang in the world, but the effect would be phenomenal.
     I climbed the ladder of the tank with the det cord  in my  hand, slowly
un  feeding  it  from  the reel. When I  lifted  the  flap on the  tank, the
flashlight  beam hit  on  the  surface  of  shiny  liquid that filled  about
three-quarters of the cylinder. After tying a double  knot on the end of the
cord, I pulled  the gas-station  shopping bag from my jacket. In  it was the
spare four-pound ball of PE that any dems man worth his  salt always carries
to plug up any holes or damage to a  charge. The smell wasn't too bad out in
the open as I ripped off about half and played with it to warm it up.
     Once  it  was pliable enough,  I  squashed  it around the  double knot,
ensuring  it had worked its way  into the gaps of  the  ties, and finally  I
taped the whole thing up to keep the PE in place.
     I lowered  the ball  of PE into  the  tank by its  string of  det cord,
stopping when it was dangling about two  or three inches from the surface of
the  fuel.  It  only  takes a  split  second for fuel to vaporize  after  an
explosion, but when that detonates, the effect  is volcanic. If I  fucked up
this job, it would certainly give  the appearance that I'd  given it my best
shot. How  could Val  doubt my word when the fireball would  probably be big
enough for him to see it in Moscow?
     I taped the det cord  onto the side of the fuel tank, then climbed back
down the ladder,  carefully unreeling the rest of the cord as I moved toward
the hole in the wall. I wanted to  cut  a long  enough  length so that, once
laid out, it would reach the target house. Nine extra  arm's lengths  seemed
to put me on the safe side. I made the cut, then started  to push the end of
the det cord through the hole in the wall.
     Just then, light came bouncing down the gap from the front of
     the buildings.  I couldn't hear anything above the generator. I quickly
pulled the det cord back in  and froze. The only things moving were my eyes;
they  flicked from the hole  to the entrance, waiting for  any movement from
either direction.
     A shiny  wet pair  of  waders and a pair  of normal outdoor  boots were
illuminated  by  the beam of  light as it searched for the  generator cable.
What worried me was the AK wader-man had hanging down by his side, its large
foresight at the end of the barrel level with his knees.
     Once  over it, they carried on toward the rear and moved out  of sight.
There wasn't any  talking,  or if there  was, I couldn't  hear it  above the
generator. I didn't even hear their feet in the snow.
     They must  have been doing  something  with the dishes. I waited; there
was nothing else I could do. No way was I going out there again until I knew
they were safely tucked up back in the house.
     I lay on the  frozen mud and waited for  their  return,  my eyes  still
moving  between  the  gaps  in  the  brickwork.  The cold soon penetrated my
clothing, numbing my skin. The six or seven minutes it took before I saw the
flashlight flickering about on the snow again didn't pass quickly enough.
     Craning my neck to get a better view, I  watched their silhouettes fade
as  they reached the corner  of  the building.  I waited  a few more  frozen
minutes in case  they'd forgotten something or realized they'd fucked up and
had to come back to redo it.
     While I waited the lightbulb  went off  again. When I eventually got to
my  feet,  I went  across to  the vehicles  and  let  down their  tires. The
fireball  ought to sort out the vehicles and guarantee they couldn't be used
in a follow-up, but it didn't hurt to play safe.
     I grinned  stupidly to myself as the air hissed out  and  the tire rims
settled  on the frozen mud. Watching the hole  in the wall for flashlight, I
was eight years old again, crouching by my stepfather's car.
     Moving back  to the kit, I pushed the  det cord through the hole in the
wall once more, then  cut several eight-inch strips of packing tape from the
roll and stuck them around  both  forearms. Finally I shouldered the pack of
charges, gripped the coiled-up main line in  my left hand and moved back out
into the cold.
        41
     I headed for  the  gap between the two buildings.  Ahead  of me the dim
light from the house still spilt onto the snow.
     I  cleared  the gap and moved toward the rear.  Stepping over the genny
cable, I checked  the det cord was still in the hole, ready for  when I came
back for it later, then continued down to the corner.  The elevations of the
dishes had changed dramatically.
     I wanted  to make one last check for Tom through the gap in the boards.
Maybe I'd be in luck; there's a first time for everything.
     Angling my head, I peered through, but couldn't see any movement.
     Stepping over  the  satellite-dish cables, I made  my  way to  the  far
corner, then turned and counted three  paces toward the front of the target.
I crouched down at  that point and  placed the charges and  reel of det cord
onto the  snow. The computer room was on the other side of this wall. It was
going  to  be gloves  on,  gloves  off  for  the next  twenty  minutes as  I
positioned the charges.
     Undoing the  tow rope that kept the charges  together, I  placed one of
the foam squares against the  bricks, the base of the  Toblerones facing the
target, so the det tail dangled in front of me. Then, ramming the end of one
of the wooden pallet slats into the snow  at an angle, I used it to keep the
Styrofoam square in position against the wall.
     When I  checked the charge with the aid of the flashlight, I discovered
a tiny break where aPE joint had come apart. This didn't mean to say  the PE
wouldn't initiate, since the gap  was less than a  sixteenth of an inch, but
why take that chance?
     Manipulating  a small lump  of PE  between my gloved hands until it was
pliable, I  broke off a piece and plugged the space. After a final check,  I
killed the flashlight and moved over to  the nearest dish. I lifted  one  of
its ice-hard  sandbags  and placed  it halfway along the  wall, using it  to
weigh down the free end of the main line. I then began the process of laying
out its forty-three arm's lengths back  toward the charge. The weight of the
sandbag enabled me to pull the cord gently to ensure there weren't any kinks
or twists, so the shock wave had a free run to the det tails.
     Once  I reached  the propped-up charge  it was gloves-off  time  again.
Peeling one of  the strips of tape  from my forearm, I began to bind the det
tail  to the main line,  taping  the  two  sections  together as  tightly as
possible. I did it strictly by the book, binding the main line one foot down
the det tail in case some of the explosive had  fallen from the exposed end.
The binding was four inches, to guarantee enough contact between the two for
the shock wave to transfer across from  the main line to the det tail. Then,
of course, it would journey on down to the charge.
     As I peeled off another strip of tape it dawned on me  that whenever  I
was working on  dems, I always used feet and inches rather  that  meters and
kilos. That was the way I'd been taught, one  of the main reasons being that
it made life a lot easier when working with Americans, who weren't  too keen
on the metric system.
     There was a sudden  burst of loud  music from an upstairs window around
the back, stopping  as abruptly as it had  started. I instinctively  ducked,
and through the rear windows  I could hear various voices shouting. At least
another three different voices could be heard shouting back and laughing.
     It brought me back to real life. The act of tactically  placing charges
always seems to detach you from reality. Maybe it's because there's  so much
concentration involved, because there are no second chances.  That's why you
normally make sure that whoever is doing the technical stuff can just get on
with it and concentrate. It wasn't a luxury I had tonight.
     I swiped another sandbag from the base of the dish and placed it on top
of the main line, on the dish side of the det tail. I didn't want to pull on
it  and disrupt  the  charge I'd already set  up  as I picked up the  second
charge. I  began to unreel the main line over the satellite cable toward the
gap between the two buildings.
     Someone  was   fucking  with  the  volume  as  Aerosmith's  theme  song
"Armageddon" got  louder  and  then suddenly died  above me, prompting  more
shouts from the computer room. Just as I reached the next  corner, the heavy
Eastern  European  voices above bellowed out yet again  and the music blared
out at full volume.
     I knelt  between the  two buildings  and rigged up the second charge on
the other side of the  target house so that it was exactly facing the first.
Once it  was  propped and checked, I began  taping its det tail  to the main
line. The music hit full blast  again  for two seconds, then subsided. There
were more shouts from downstairs. The boys in the computer room were getting
ever so slightly pissed.  I reckoned there was  a  minimum of five people in
the building.
     I gave the  charge a final check; it was looking  good. Demolitions can
appear to  be  a dark art,  but actually all  you need to understand  is how
explosives work and then learn the hundreds  of  rules  for using  them. I'd
broken many of them today, but what the hell, I hadn't had a lot of choice.
     I went  over to the generator cable hole and  gently pulled out the det
cord that ran into the fuel tank, taping it to the main line in the same way
as I'd done with the other two.
     Aerosmith were still doing  their best  to annoy the computer room.  It
was a good game, and I hoped it would keep the boys occupied for a moment or
two longer.  I thought  about Tom and hoped he wasn't  standing too close to
either of the walls.
     Gloves back on, I pulled the main line  for  the last few arm's lengths
toward the  front  of the  building. Now  I just had to attach  the electric
detonator,  which was  already fixed to the  firing cable,  then unreel  the
cable round the  corner and get down below the  MTV window before the  shit,
and everything else in the building, hit the fan.
     I was a bit worried about the amount  of extraneous  electricity flying
about  and its possible effect  on  the firing cable. Once I'd untwisted the
two leads that were to go on the battery, they'd be potential antennae, just
like the dels in the Narva flat. The manuals would say I was either supposed
to be half  a mile  away when the shit went  up  or  very well  protected. I
didn't  think  hiding round the corner with  a few clay  bricks as cover was
quite what they had in mind.
     The main line stopped about  six  or seven paces short of the corner of
the target. Great, at least the firing cable would be long enough for  me to
be well under the window.
     As I gently pulled at the press studs holding the zip flap of my jacket
to extract the firing cable, the volume  of the  music changed again. It was
escaping outside. Then I heard the noise of the grill swinging open  and the
front door slamming shut.
     There was no time to think, just do. Biting off my  gloves, I jammed my
hand into  my jacket  pocket  for the Makharov,  right thumb taking off  the
safety as I moved toward the corner, taking deep breaths.
     I couldn't hear him them yet, but whichever it  was,  I had to take the
fight to them.
     Three more paces until the corner.
     There was flashlight  ahead.  I stopped, pushing my thumb  down  on the
safety catch to ensure it was off.
     One more second and a body appeared, heading toward  me. He was looking
down at where  his flashlight beam hit  the  snow. It glinted off his weapon
barrel.
     I couldn't give him  time to think. I jumped onto him, wrapping my left
arm around his  neck  and pushing the Makharov into  his stomach, digging it
into him hard. My legs  wrapped around his waist, and as we fell  together I
pulled the  trigger, hoping that our two bodies sandwiching the weapon would
suppress its report. No chance. The job had just gone noisy.
     Jumping  to  my feet, I  sprinted  round  to the  front  of the  house,
focusing solely  on the next corner, heading for the other  end  of the main
line, leaving a screaming Russian writhing in the snow.
     I racked back the weapon's top slide to eject whatever was in there and
feed  in another round, just in case we'd been  so  close that  it  had been
prevented from sliding back correctly when I'd fired and hadn't reloaded.
     I  had  the same feeling  in my  stomach as I  used to  have as a  kid,
running scared. As I neared the main entrance, I scrambled  frantically with
my left hand for the firing cable and det in my inside pocket.
     The door opened, MTV  still  blasting, and a body, too small to be Tom,
emerged. The grill was already open.
     "Gory? Gory?"
     I raised my weapon and fired on the move. I couldn't miss.
     There was a scream  and one round  hit  the grill with  a  high pitched
metallic ricochet.
     I carried straight on past, turned the corner and made a  headlong dive
toward the sandbag, dropping my weapon and desperately fishing for the  main
line  coming  from under the sandbag. I didn't look up  to see if anyone was
coming for me. I didn't have time.
     The wounded man's  screams echoed around the compound. I tried to  calm
myself and slow my frenzied movements. I held the det onto the main line and
wrapped  a strip of  tape around both not as tightly as I  would have liked,
but fuck it.
     I pulled out the battery and yanked the twisted end leads of the firing
cable apart with my teeth. Then,  falling  to the floor, I squeezed  my legs
together, opened my jaw  and buried my head in the snow as I pushed  the two
leads onto the terminals.
     Less than a single heartbeat later the detonator exploded and initiated
the  main line. The shock wave  of the explosion traveled along it,  met the
first det  tail and then the  one leading to the fuel tank. Then  the second
det tail got the good news.
     The  two  wall  charges  exploded  virtually  simultaneously,  and  the
resultant shock  waves met  in the middle of the room at a combined speed of
52,000 feet per second.
        42
     My whole world shuddered, trembled, quaked. It  was like being inside a
massive bell that had just been given an almighty bang.
     The air was sucked from my lungs as hot air blasted over me. Around the
compound snow,  and  ice  shot upward a foot  or so from the ground. My ears
rang. Brick dust,  snow,  and shattered glass cascaded around  me. Then  the
shock wave rebounded off the thick  concrete  perimeter walls  and came back
for more.
     Crawling forward to the corner of the target, I watched, mesmerized, as
an  enormous fireball whooshed from the  entrance of  the generator building
and leaped high into the  sky. Thick  black smoke  mixed with  bright orange
flames  that  burned  like an oil-rig flare.  The entire area was  bathed in
light and I could feel the heat scorching my face.
     Chunks of  brick,  glass,  and all kinds of other  stuff that  had been
blown sky high started clattering around me. Scrambling to my knees, I threw
my  arms over my  head to  protect  myself.  You're supposed to look  up  to
prepare for the stuff coming toward you, but fuck that, I just kept close to
the wall  and  took my  chances.  I wouldn't  be able to see  it anyway. The
sandstorm of  red brick  dust had  arrived, blanketing the compound; it  was
just a matter of hanging in there and waiting for the last of the fallout to
rain down. I began coughing like a lifelong smoker.
     I cleared each nostril in turn, then tried to equalize  the pressure in
my ears. A sharp, stinging pain seared across my buttocks. My ass  must have
taken some of the shock wave as it passed over me. At
     least it wasn't  my face  or balls. I checked for blood, but my fingers
came back just wet with water from the snow-soaked jeans.
     It  was time to get to my  feet and  start moving  back for  my weapon,
which was still in the snow somewhere. I felt around  on my hands and knees,
my ass in agony, as if I'd just been whipped.  I  found the Makharov by  the
sandbag and, checking chamber with my  finger to the heavy rumbling sound of
burning fuel, I stumbled toward the main door.
     There was a secondary  explosion in the  generator building, probably a
vehicle fuel tank in the path of the firestorm. For the next few moments the
flames burned higher and more intensely.
     The guy in the  gap  wasn't screaming any more, but he was still alive,
coiled up and holding  his stomach. I went over to where he lay trembling in
the snow. I picked up his AK and threw it  toward the  main gate, out of his
reach. I certainly wouldn't be needing it myself inside the house.
     When the two shock  waves from the  opposing explosions  had  met, they
would have wiped out everything in  the computer room. The  force would then
have  taken  the line  of  least resistance  to  escape the confines  of the
building: the windows and  doors.  Surging along the hallways, it would have
destroyed everything in its path. The MTV man wasn't looking good. Some bits
of him were draped on the grill like strips of meat hanging in a smokehouse.
The rest would have been scattered out  in the snow.  When humans  burn they
smell like scorched pork, but when they're blown apart like this, it's as if
you've walked into a butcher's shop a week after a power outage.
     The flashlight wasn't  much good in the hallway;  it just reflected off
the wall  of dust  like a car's headlights in dense fog. I blundered around,
stumbling over bricks and other debris, trying to find the  gap to the right
that would lead to the MTV room.
     I  found  the door,  or rather  the place where it had been. As I moved
through, my  feet collided  with  sticks of furniture, then what was left of
the television  set and a  whole lot more bricks.  I was still coughing shit
out  of  my  lungs, and was the only one  doing so.  I could  hear no  other
movement, no sounds of distress.
     Tripping over a large bundle on the  floor, I switched on my flashlight
and knelt down to check it. The body was on its side and smouldering, facing
away from me. Rolling him toward me, I shone
     the light into his dust-covered  face. It wasn't  Tom. Whoever this man
in his early twenties had been, he wasn't any more. The skin was pulled back
from his head like a partly peeled orange and the blood he'd lost was mixing
with the dust to look like wet, red cement.
     I continued across the room, kicking out  and  feeling like a blind man
as I searched for more bodies. There were two, but neither of them was  Tom.
I wasn't going to call out, in case someone  decided to reply with something
other than a voice.
     I  tried to get  into the  room opposite  the  kitchen but the door was
jammed. Leaving it to go upstairs, I decided to check the easy places first.
I didn't bother with the computer room: Even if there were any bodies there,
they wouldn't be recognizable.  In  other circumstances I might have taken a
moment  or two  to be quietly  proud; I was shit at most things, but in high
school Demolitions I'd got a distinction.
     I headed up  the stairs, my left hand on the wall, having  to  feel for
every step  as I  made my  way  to  the top. I cleared  my  nostrils  again,
spitting the dust out of my throat as I equalized my nose again to clear the
ringing in my ears.
     As I reached the  top  landing I  heard a short, faint  cry; I couldn't
tell  where it came from. I went left first, since it was nearer. Feeling my
way to  the  door, I pushed, but it wouldn't budge  more  than four  or five
inches. Pushing even harder, I managed to get my foot round and made contact
with the  body on the  other  side  that was stopping  it going  further.  I
squeezed  through  and  checked. It  was  just  another  poor  fucker in his
twenties who wanted his mother.
     I stumbled into a chair, moved round it  and heard someone else moaning
at my feet. Kneeling down, I got in there with the flashlight and turned the
body over.
     It was Tom,  red brick dust  over his  face and head,  red snot running
from his  nose, but alive.  I'd thought  this would be a cause to celebrate,
but now I wasn't too sure. He didn't look good.
     He was whimpering  away  in  a world of his  own,  reminding  me of the
glue-sniffing kid in Narva. I checked him  over to make sure he had  all his
limbs. "You're okay, mate," I said. "You're all right. Come on." He wouldn't
have a  clue  what I  was saying or who was  saying it, but it made me  feel
better.
     I brushed the crap from his face so at least he could open his
     eyes at some  stage,  then I reached under his armpits and dragged  him
out onto the landing, stopping twice to snort muck from my nose.
     Still  gripping him, I  went down the stairs backward. His feet bounced
from step to step. He was out of it,  still bound up in his own little world
of  pain  and confusion,  aware  that  he  was  being  moved, but not really
conscious enough to help.
     We  got clear  of the brick dust and into the fresh air. Dumping him on
the ground, I cleared my nose again and gasped clean air into my lungs.
     "Tom. Wake up, mate. Tom, Tom ..."
     I grabbed a  handful of  snow and rubbed it over his face. Beginning to
recover, he coughed and spluttered but still couldn't speak.
     The flames  coming from the generator building were licking hungrily at
the barn  door and dancing  on the  snow, illuminating us quite clearly. Tom
was wearing the same sweatshirt as when I  last saw him, but he had no shoes
or coat.
     "Wait here, mate. Don't move, all right?"
     As if.
     I headed back into the dust-filled MTV room.  The  cries  upstairs were
getting louder. I wanted to get away from here before they sorted themselves
out and the police or DTTS arrived.
     I found the first body again, still smouldering. He hadn't been wearing
a  coat, but it was his  footwear I was after.  They weren't exactly walking
boots, more  like basketball  sneakers, but they'd do.  Kicking and fumbling
around, I also came across an AK and a coat among the shredded furniture.
     Tom  was lying spreadeagled  on his  back, exactly  as I'd left him.  I
shook the  dust  out of what turned out to be a parka and put it around him.
The white sneakers were about two sizes too big, but what the fuck, he  only
had to make it as far as the car.
     As I began to  pull  them onto his  feet he  finally made  a  noise. He
lifted a hand to wipe the shit from his face and saw me.
     "Tom, it's Nick ..." I  shook his head. He would have been  deafened by
the explosion  and I couldn't tell  whether his hearing  had come back  yet.
"It's me Nick. Get up, Tom. We have to get going."
     "Nick? Shit. What the fuck are you doing here? What the fuck happened?"
     I finished tying his laces and slapped his feet. "Get up now, come on."
     "What? What?"
     I helped him up  and  into the parka. It was like dressing an exhausted
child. "Tom .. ."
     He still couldn't hear.
     "Tom ... Tom ..."
     "Huh ... ?" He was trying to get an arm into a sleeve.
     "I'll be back in a minute, okay?"
     I didn't  wait for a nod. Leaving him to it, I went back to retrieve my
gloves. I found them just feet away from the first man I'd shot, who was now
clearly dead.
     Tom had sat down  again in the snow. I got him upright,  zipped  up his
parka,  then helped him  move  slowly  to  the small  gate  leading  to  the
abandoned hangar.
     "We've got to get a move on, Tom. Come on, let's go. There's a car just
round the corner."
     Turning left onto the road, I checked for vehicle lights. I  lengthened
my  stride, keeping a tight grip on Tom, holding him as if  we were a couple
out for the night, arm in arm.
     Trying to keep upright on the ice as I urged  him  on, I looked  behind
me. The glow from the generator building was still visible,  but the sky was
no  longer filled with flames. In the  small amount of ambient light I could
see Tom's face. He was in a bad way; his hair was  sticking up all over  the
place, still covered in dust and blood, and he looked  like the victim of  a
cartoon explosion.
     "Tom?" I looked into his eyes for signs of acknowledgment but got none.
"We're going to the car. It's not far. Try to keep up with me, okay?"
     I wasn't  too sure  what his answer was. Something between "maybe"  and
"what?"
     His hearing had recovered a bit by  the time we got to where I'd parked
the car, but he still didn't  know what day  it was. I collapsed on my hands
and knees,  gulping in cold air. Fuck the teeth, my ass hurt even more  now.
But what hurt most of all was realizing that the car was gone.
     My head spun.  Maybe I had the  wrong  place?  No, there were  the tire
marks. There,  too, were some other  tire  marks;  and besides my footprints
there was a mass of others. The new tire marks were very
     wide  and  deep,  probably from  a  tractor.  The fuckers;  the karaoke
fanatics must have had the car away, along with my two spare weapons.
     "Shit, the car's been swiped." I wasn't too sure if I was informing Tom
or trying to get my own head around it.
     Tom was confused. "You said "
     "I know what I said, but the  car's gone." I paused. "Don't worry, it's
not a drama."
     It was.
     Chances  were they hadn't even had to break into  it,  just hitch it up
and slide the locked  wheels across the  ice.  Mr.  and Mrs. Fuckup had been
well  and  truly  at  home   from  the  moment  I  first  stepped  into  the
Intercontinental Hotel.
     For a second I wished I hadn't let the tires down on all three vehicles
in  the genny building, then I  remembered that by now they'd  all be toast.
The  best thing I could hope  for  in this  neck of  the woods  was  another
tractor, but if I lifted one I'd be  making people aware that we were on the
ground. In  any case, we didn't have the time to search. There  was only one
option right now, and that was to walk it.
     I got up off the ground. "Tom, change of plan."
     Well,  there would be once I'd worked one out. But first we  had to get
further away from the area, and  quickly. At  least the stars were now fully
out and it was easier to see and be seen.
     Slowly coming  to  his senses, he  stood  there, arms crossed and hands
tucked  under  his  armpits,  coughing  up brick  dust  and  waiting  for my
decision.
     "Follow me."
     I started to  move down the road, putting distance  between  us and the
target. Tom trailed slowly behind. We'd gone about 400 yards as I sorted out
a plan, then stopped and checked for Polaris, the North Star.
     Tom was starting to spark up a bit more now that he was generating some
warmth. He  closed up to me as I gazed  skyward. "It was a fucking nightmare
in there," he muttered, "but I knew Liv would get you to come "
     I cut in, hoping to shut  him up. "That's right,  Tom. Liv's your fairy
godmother."
     I didn't tell him what she had planned for midnight.
     His  hood  was down  and  I  could  see  steam  coming  off  his  thick
red-bricked hair now  that he had worked  up a sweat. I pulled  his  hood up
over  his head to retain some  of the body heat  and checked the North  Star
again.
     "Nick, what happened to ... you know... ? Fucking nightmare or what?"
     "What?" I had a load of questions  for him as well, but now  wasn't the
time or place.
     "You know, the fence, the house. What was all that about?"
     It just wasn't important right now. "Tom." I kept looking skyward, even
though I'd finished up there.
     "What?"
     I gave him the thousand-yard stare. "Shut-the-fuck-up."
     "Oh."
     I'd got the reply I wanted.
     I confirmed the plan in my head for the last time before I actioned it.
We'd  head  north and  cross country until we hit  the  railway line. If  we
turned left along it,  we'd be  facing west, toward Tallinn. Then  we  would
follow the tracks to a station and catch a train, maybe the first one out of
Narva. I wasn't sure, but  I thought it left there at about eightish in  the
morning, so we'd need to be at a station about an hour after that. Only once
we'd reached Tallinn would I start to worry about how to get us  both out of
the country.
     According to the Lion King, we had the best part of  fourteen hours  in
which  to cover what I guessed would be about  twelve miles not a problem so
long as we got a move on.
     Tom  was still facing  me,  trying  to work out why I was gazing at the
heavens. I got in there before he had a  chance to  ask. "We'll  have to get
back to Tallinn by train now."
     "Where's that then, mate? Aren't we going to Helsinki?"
     I looked down, but I couldn't see his face. He had moved the wire  sewn
into the  rim  of his hood  so the fur  closed off his face, making him look
like Liam Gallagher after a big night out.
     "We are," I said, "but we've got to go to Tallinn first."
     From behind the fur came a muffled, "Why's that?"
     "It's the easiest way. We've got to move up to the railway track, get a
train to Tallinn, then catch a ferry to Helsinki."
     I didn't even know if he was aware what country he was in. I got
     right up close so he could see me smiling, trying to  make it sound not
too much of a big deal.
     His mind was obviously on  other things as  his voice  came out  of the
darkness. "Are they all dead? You know, that lot back there?"
     "I think so. Most of them, anyway."
     "Shit,  you killed  them? Won't we get in trouble? You know, the law ..
."
     I couldn't be bothered to explain, so I just shrugged. "It was the only
way I could get you out of the shit."
     His shoulders  began to heave and I suddenly realized  he was laughing.
"How did you know when to set the bomb off? I mean, I could have been killed
if I hadn't been upstairs." It was nervous laughter.
     I  looked up, searching for the North Star again so he couldn't see  my
face. "You've no idea the trouble I went to,  mate. Anyway, we'll talk about
that later. We have to get a move on now."
     "How far, do you reckon?"
     His parka hood was looking skyward, too, but he didn't have a clue what
he was looking for. He started to shiver.
     "Not far, Tom.  Just a  couple of hours.  If we  play  our cards right,
we'll be on a nice warm train soon."
     Why  tell  him the truth now? I hadn't bothered  to  so far. "You ready
then?"
     He was coughing up the last of the brick dust like a TH patient.
     "Yeah, Is'poseso."
     I started down the road and he followed on behind.  After just a couple
of hundred yards we hit a treeline, about fifteen yards off  the road on our
left. I headed for it, leaving ridiculous amounts  of tracks  in  snow which
was up to my knees and sometimes waist high. It didn't bother me. Why  worry
about things you can't change?
     I waited for Tom  to  catch up. The pace wasn't going to be anything to
write home about. You have to move at the  speed of the slowest; that's just
how  it is if  you want to keep together. I wondered  about improvising snow
shoes by tying tree branches to our feet, but quickly decided against; these
things  look good on paper but  in the dark  it's  just a pain in the ass to
prepare and wastes time.
     I looked up.  Wispy clouds were  starting to appear and scud across the
stars.
     Tom caught up and I allowed him a minute's rest before we
     moved  on. I  wanted to get out into the  open  fields before  starting
cross country, following  Polaris. That way we'd  give the  compound  a wide
berth as we had to head north, back toward it.
     At the  end of the treeline, visibility  was about fifty to sixty yards
in  the starlight. The landscape was white, fading to  black. In  the middle
distance to my half left I could see the dim glow of the target area.
     I felt the cold bite into my face as I looked up at  the sky once more.
Tom shuffled up next to me, knees buried in snow, standing so close that his
breath merged  with mine, losing itself in  the wind. His hood was off again
as he tried to cool  down. I  put it  back  up and  slapped him on the head.
"Don't do that, you'll lose all the heat you've just generated."
     He pulled the fur around his face once more.
     I tried to find a reference point on the ground north of us, but it was
too dark.  The next best thing  was to  pick a star  on  the  horizon  below
Polaris  and go for that--it was easier  than constantly checking skyward. I
got one, not as bright as some, but good enough.
     "Ready?"
     The hood moved and the material rustled as a head nodded about in there
somewhere.
     We headed north. The only positive thing I could think  of was that the
pain  in my  ass had now disappeared. Either that or it was even colder than
I'd realized.
        43
     The ground beneath the snow was plowed, so both of us kept slipping and
falling on the angled, frozen furrows. The best way  forward seemed to be to
keep my feet low and push through the snow. I became the icebreaker and  Tom
followed in my wake; anything to speed him up.
     Clouds  drifted across  the  sky  more  frequently now, intermit  tendy
blotting out my guide on the horizon. Polaris, too, was in and out of  cloud
cover.
     Tom lagged  about ten yards behind, hands in pockets, head down.  There
was  nothing to  do but  keep pushing north  as the  clouds moved faster and
gained in mass.
     After about  an hour the wind began to pick up, attacking my  face  and
tugging at my coat. It was time to put down the furry earflaps. Each time we
lost  direction, all  I could do was keep  heading in  what I thought was  a
straight  line, only to find  that we  were way  off course when  the  cloud
cleared. I felt  like a pilot flying without instruments. Our trail  through
the snow must have been one long zigzag.
     My major concern  was that the wind and cloud would bring snow. If that
happened,  we'd  lose  our  means  of  navigation  altogether,  and  without
protection, catching the train would be the least of my worries.
     With a bad feeling that  we were  going to be in  even deeper shit very
soon, I stopped when I found a natural dip and used my back
     to  push  a groove in the  snow to get us out  of the wind. I scraped a
channel  in the lip  to act  as  my  north marker before Polaris disappeared
again.
     Tom reached me as I  dug myself in with my gloved hands. I expected him
to follow my  example, but when I turned he was having a piss, the steam and
liquid  disappearing almost immediately  in  the  wind.  He should have been
retaining his warm body fluids at all costs, but I was too late. I went back
to preparing  our makeshift shelter.  Stress hormones are released  in  cold
weather, filling out the bladder more quickly. That's why  we always seem to
urinate more when  it's cold. The problem is that you  lose body heat  and a
serious thirst develops. Unless hot fluids are taken on board it's a vicious
circle from there on out, with dehydration  helping to bring down the body's
core temperature. If  your core temperature falls  below  83.8 degrees F you
will die.
     Tom  was done,  and putting his hands back in his pockets he turned and
collapsed ass first into the dip.
     The wind hit the lip, sounding like one of  the gods blowing across the
neck of a bottle, and blasting the snow onto our  backs and shoulders. Tom's
fur rim turned to me as I slid into the dip beside him.
     I knew what he was going to ask.
     "Not long  now, mate," I preempted. "It's a bit further than I thought,
but we'll have a rest here.  When you  start  to get cold, tell me and we'll
get moving again, okay?"
     The  hood moved, which  I took to be a  nod. He brought his knees up to
his chest and lowered his head to meet them.
     I bit off  my gloves and held  them between my teeth while I fumbled to
tie the earflaps under my chin, then I unzipped his parka a  bit so he could
ventilate, yet still retain his  body heat.  Finally, standing  up  into the
wind, I undid my pants and tucked everything back in, and pushed the bottoms
of my heavy wet jeans into my boots. It was a cold and uncomfortable process
in wet, clingy  clothes,  but it was worth it. I would have lost  heat doing
it, but sorting my shit out always made me feel better.
     As I was about to lie down again in the dip, I saw Tom tucking his hand
into his  sleeve  and  lifting some  snow  to his  mouth. I put out  a hand.
"That's off the menu, mate."
     I wasn't going to waste energy explaining why. Not only does it use
     up  crucial body heat through  melting it  in your mouth, it also cools
the body from the inside, chilling the vital organs. Nevertheless, water was
going to  be a problem. I put my gloves back  on and scooped up a handful of
snow, but only  passed it over when I'd I  worked it into a compressed ball.
"Suck on that. Don't eat it, okay?"
     I looked at the sky. The cloud cover was now more or less total.
     Tom soon lost interest in the ice ball, hunching once more into a fetal
position, knees up  by his chest, hands deep in his  pockets and head  down.
His body was starting to shake, and I had to agree with  him; I'd had better
days out.
     Now that we'd cleared  the danger area and were resting for a while, it
seemed the right time to ask him a few questions. I hoped it would help take
his mind off the shit we were in. I also needed some answers.
     "Why didn't you tell me you knew  Valentin?  I know you were trying  to
access Echelon at Menwith Hill for him."
     I couldn't see his reaction, but there was  movement  in the hood. "I'm
sorry, mate,"  he mumbled. "She's got me by the  balls. I'm sorry,  I really
wanted to, it's just that... you know..."
     His hood dropped down as if his neck muscles had lost control.
     "You mean threats? Some kind of threat to you or your family?"
     His shoulders jerked up and down as he fought to contain the sobs.
     "Mum .. . Dad .. . and I've got a sister with kids, know what I mean? I
wanted to tell you, Nick, honest I did, but .. . well,  you know. Listen, it
ain't Valentin doing this shit, mate. It's her; she's freelancing.  He don't
know a thing about it; she's just using his  name, letting  you think you're
working for him."
     He didn't  need to say any more. Things were suddenly making more sense
to me than they had in  a long time. That was why she'd been able to say yes
straight away to the three million. That was why she'd insisted there was to
be no contact with anyone  apart from  her. It even explained why she didn't
want me to have a  weapon: She probably thought that if I found out what was
happening I'd use it against her.
     "How did you get sucked back into all this?"
     I waited for him to try to compose himself.
     "Liv. Well, not  her to begin with, but this guy Ignaty he came and saw
me in London. The day before you did."
     Where  had  I  heard  that  name before? Then I  realized. He  was  the
underwriter; it  had been his name on  the piece of paper in Narva. So maybe
Liv wasn't the only one of Val's people to be going freelance.
     Now Tom  had started babbling  it was  important not to ask the sort of
questions that might suddenly make him realize he was saying too much.
     I just said gently, "What happened then, mate?"
     "He said Liv  had a  job for me and that I'd be  going to Finland. That
someone would come and persuade me and all that stuff. I shat myself when  I
found out it was  Echelon again,  but  I had no choice,  mate. My sister and
what have you  .. . Nick, you gotta help me. Please, she'll kill everyone if
I don't sort this shit out. Please help me. Please."
     He wept into his hood.
     "Tom..."
     He didn't register. Maybe his sobs were too loud for him to hear me.
     "Tom. She wanted you dead. She will think you're dead if I tell her."
     His hood came up. "You were going to  kill me? Oh fuck, Nick.  Don't...
please don't..."
     "I'm not going to kill you."
     He  wasn't  listening.  "I'm  so sorry, Nick.  She  made  me  ask those
questions. You  know, in the train station. She wanted  to  know if you were
gonna stitch her up or what. I had to do it. She knows everybody's addresses
and everything.  The guy  showed me pictures  of  my sister's  kids. Honest,
Nick, I wanted to  tell you what was happening but..." His hood dropped back
down as a new spasm took hold of him.
     I felt like a priest in a confession box. "Tom, listen. Really, I'm not
going to kill you. It was me who got you out of there, remember?"
     There was a small nod from within the hood.
     "I'll make sure that you and your family are looked  after, Tom, but we
have to get back to the U.K. first. You'll have to talk with some people and
tell them exactly what's been happening, at Menwith and here, okay?"
     I sensed an opportunity for everything to work out whichever
     way  this went. I  wasn't exactly sure how,  but  there had to be a way
that Tom could get a new  life and I could get  my money. And if  the  money
didn't materialize, at least I could  still work for the Firm. I could  come
up  with enough bullshit to make it sound as if I'd known all along what was
happening, but couldn't tell  anyone because of the security risk of someone
printing off the information I'd told them in Russia.
     Liv need never know that Tom  was alive, and I could  still pick up  my
money and then  go  to Lynn. I knew it was flimsy as plans go, but  it was a
start--assuming she didn't shaft me.
     What was more important was getting out of Estonia. After that, I'd sit
down with Tom, get the full story and sort my shit out.
     "Why didn't she just tell  me that it  was you  coming with me,  rather
than  getting me to  try  and talk  you  into it? You  were  already coming,
right?" His babbling before hadn't exactly explained it clearly.
     "Fuck knows. You'll have to  ask  her. That's why I shat  myself when I
saw you. I thought your lot had heard about  it.  She's weird, mate. Did she
talk as if it was all coming from Valentin?"
     "Of course."
     "Well it isn't, she's  talking about herself. It's  all her  own plans,
mate, I'm telling you. If Valentin  knew he'd cut her in half, know  what  I
mean?"
     Well, not quite  in  half, but  I  bet  he'd have  her  watching  a few
squirming eels before he'd finished with her.
     For all  that, there was a part  of me that admired what she was doing.
Maybe the man from St. Petersburg was her feed in Val's set up,  leaking her
information to set this whole thing up? What was in it for her? What was her
goal in all this? Maybe Tom was right, it was everything that she had talked
about?  Question  after  question  leaped into my  head, but the  snowflakes
hitting my face  made me  remember that there were more pressing  matters to
attend to.
     We had no shelter, no heat and now  no navigation. The cold was getting
to me as the  sweat  on my back began  to cool rapidly now that  we had been
stationary for a while.  Tom  shivered badly where he sat curled  up on  the
snow beside me. Both  of us had inherited  a layer of snow. We had  to move,
but in which  direction? The marker  would only be good for a hundred meters
or so; after that, and  with out Polaris, we'd get disoriented and spend the
rest of the night walking round in circles.
     I looked at Tom and felt him shivering in almost uncontrollable bursts.
His brain was probably telling him  he must  start  moving, but his body was
begging him to stay where he was and rest.
     I lifted the cuff of various layers of clothing and had a quick look at
the  Lion King. Just  under twelve hours  to go until  we should RV with the
train. Even if I knew which direction to take, trying to cover that distance
in these conditions without navigation aids would be madness. Visibility had
worsened; it was down to about fifteen feet.  In  any other circumstances we
should have been digging in for  the night  and riding out the storm, but we
didn't  have the luxury of time.  Quite  apart from making  it to a train, I
didn't know what sort of follow-up the Maliskia would  go for, and  I didn't
want  to find out. Trying to think  of a positive, I finally dredged one up;
at least the snow would cover our trail.
     Tom mumbled under his hood. "I'm really cold, Nick."
     "We'll get going in a minute, mate."
     I was  still racking  my brain for some sort of navigation  aid. It had
been  years since  I'd  had  to use or  even remember  any  survival skills.
Scrolling through the pages of crap in my head, I tried hard to call up what
I'd  learned  all  those  years  ago.  I'd  never  been  one  for  all  that
hundred-and-one-uses-for-a-shoelace stuff; I'd just got on  with it and only
did the snow-hole and trapped-rabbit routine when I had to.
     I put my  arms around him. He wasn't  too sure what was going on and  I
felt his body stiffen.
     "It's a snow thing," I said. "We've got to keep warm."
     He leaned in toward me, shivering big-time.
     "Nick, I'm really  really  sorry, mate. If I'd told  you the  truth  we
wouldn't be in this shit, know what I mean?"
     I nodded, feeling slightly uncomfortable. It  wasn't all his fault. I'd
have tried to drag his granny over that fence if it would have given me half
a chance of pocketing 1.7 million.
     "I'll tell you  the  best thing I've  found  to get  over all this cold
stuff," I said, trying to sound as relaxed about it as possible.
     From under the hood came a muffled, "What's that, then?"
     "Dream, mate.  Just think to yourself that this  will all be over soon.
This time tomorrow you're going to be in a hot bath with a
     huge  mug of coffee and a Big Mac with extra fries. This  time tomorrow
you'll be laughing about all this shit."
     He kicked his heels into the snow.  "That's if these poxy trainers stay
on."
     "Don't moan," I said. "They're better than those fucking stupid daps of
yours."
     He started to laugh, but it turned into a cough.
     I looked up and saw  nothing but blankets of white tumbling down  at us
out of the blackness.  If I'd had access  to a genie at that moment, the one
thing I'd have wished for was a compass.
     Jesus, a compass. A compass  can be made from any iron metal. It should
have been  so simple, but it seemed to take me for ever  to work it out: Tom
had a faceful of the stuff in the rim of his parka hood.
     Could I use  it?  And if  so, then what? It was like trying to remember
the ingredients of a  particularly  complicated cake I'd  been shown  how to
bake twenty years ago.
     I tried  hard to visualize  the process, closing my  eyes  and thinking
back  to all those times when I'd  got so bored making shelters,  traps, and
snares with bits of string and picture wire.
     Tom had other ideas. "Let's go, Nick, I'm cold. Come on, you said .. ."
He was clinging to me like a baby monkey on its mother's back.  It was good,
I needed him to warm me just as much as he needed me for reassurance.
     "In a minute, mate. In a minute."
     Something had to  be in  the memory  banks  somewhere. We never  forget
anything; it can all be brought  back to the surface if  you press the right
button.
     It happened. The trigger was remembering  being given a silk escape map
in the Gulf, with a needle pinned in it.
     "Tom, are you still wearing those silk thermals?"
     He shook his head. My heart sank.
     "Nah, just the top. I wish I did have the bottoms, I'm freezing. Can we
go now? You said to tell you, Nick, and I'm telling you."
     "Hang on a minute, mate, I've just had a great idea."
     I unwrapped my arm from him. As I moved, I was forcibly reminded of the
awful  discomfort  of  my  wet  clothing. My jeans clung  to my legs  and my
T-shirt was cold and clammy.
     I removed my glove, holding it in my mouth while I pulled out
     the Leatherman. Opening the pliers, I put the glove back  on before the
skin of my hand was exposed for too long.
     "Look at me for a sec, would you, mate?"
     The parka hood came up and the snow that had collected on it fell  onto
his shoulders.
     Feeling around the frozen ring of  fur with my  gloved  hand, I located
the  wire,  then  trapped it in the jaws of the pliers  and squeezed until I
felt it give. Teasing apart  the material at the  site of the cut, I exposed
the metal, gripped one end  of the cut with the  pliers and pulled, grasping
the exposed wire in my hand. I made another cut and  put  the two-inch strip
inside my glove for safe keeping.
     I thought Tom might  have been interested, but he was concentrating one
hundred percent on feeling cold and miserable.
     Bending down some more, I peered into the darkness  behind his hood. "I
need some of that silk, Tom."
     He shrugged. "I don't have to take it off, do I?"
     "Just  unzip your coat  a bit more  so I can get a hand in. I'll  be as
quick as I can."
     His hands  slowly  came out of  his pockets and fumbled for the zip. In
the  end I shoved  both of my gloves between my  teeth so I  could help him;
then, having battled with  numb fingers to open the blade of the Leatherman,
I felt under his shirt.
     He sat  there like  a tailor's dummy as  I pulled  at  his clothing.  I
didn't  have  enough feeling in  my  hands to be  gentle  about  it, and  he
flinched as my  freezing fingers gripped the silk and came into contact with
his skin.
     My  nose  was streaming  as  I grabbed a handful of the  undershirt and
started cutting, pulling so hard that  I nearly lifted Tom off the ground. I
wanted  to make sure  the  material ripped,  so  there  were  loose  threads
dangling.
     The knife jerked as it made its final cut. Tom yelped as the tip of the
blade flicked into his  chest. He  sat there with an exposed finger over his
little cut, the snow settling on his hand.
     I said, "For fuck's sake, Tom, keep the heat in."
     He pulled his clothing together, shoving his hands back in his pockets,
and dropping his head. "Sorry."
     "I tell you what," I zipped him up once more, "I'm going to be a couple
of minutes  doing diis. Why don't you  do some exercises  to  get  some heat
going?"
     "I'm all right. How much longer do you reckon to the train, Nick?"
     I dodged the question. "Come on, move about, it'll warm you up."
     He started to  move  as if he  was snuggling under a comforter, but the
only thing covering him was snow.
     "No, Tom, you've got to  get up and get your  body  moving. Come on, we
haven't got that far to go, but we won't make it if you start seizing up." I
shook him. "Tom, get up."
     He hauled  himself to his  feet reluctantly as  I brushed the snow from
his shoulders. His fur rim was now a white ring of snow framing his face.
     "Come on, with me."
     Hands  in pockets,  we  started to play aerobics  with his  back to the
wind,  squatting down and  standing  up again,  elbows  out,  flapping  like
demented chickens.
     I kept my head down,  protecting it from the wind as I  got him to keep
in time with me. "Good stuff, Tom,  now keep going, I won't be long."  I got
back on my knees and into cover.
     It was gloves-off time again as I lay them in the snow. I crouched over
to protect myself from  the  snowstorm; my  hands were so numb that I had to
pull threads from the silk with my teeth.  Once I'd  teased out a decent bit
about  five  inches  long  I  put  it between my  lips  and  fished out  the
needle-sized  length of wire from my glove. Tying the loose end of  the silk
shakily around  the  middle  of the  metal,  I finally managed a knot on the
fourth attempt.
     Richard Simmons next to me grunted and groaned,  but was sounding a bit
happier. "It's working, Nick. I'm  getting warmer, mate!" He beamed, blowing
out the snot from his nose.
     I muttered encouragement through gritted teeth as I held the thread and
wire,  shaking the snow off my gloves and quickly  putting  them back on. My
hands were now so wet they stuck to the inners.
     After trying to  get some blood circulating by clapping  them  together
for a while, it was gloves-off time yet again.  As I bit on the free end  of
silk thread with my  teeth, it seemed to take forever to grasp the  dangling
wire in  one hand and  the  square  of silk  in  the  other. At last I began
stroking the wire along the silk, repeating the motion over and over, always
in  the  same direction. After about  twenty strokes I  stopped, making sure
there were no kinks in the thread that would affect the balance of the metal
once I let go.
     I fished in  my pocket for the flashlight, switched it on and put it in
my mouth. Still crouching over it to make  sure the wind wouldn't affect the
thread and needle, I  let go and watched it spin.  The short length of  wire
eventually steadied,  just moving slightly  from  side  to side. I  knew the
direction  of the North Star from  my  snow marker,  which was  now  quickly
disappearing in the storm, so all I had to do was identify which end  of the
wire,  magnetized  by  the  silk, was  pointing  north.  I  could  tell  the
difference between the ends from the way the Leatherman had cut them.
     The huffing and puffing went on behind me as I shivered and worked  out
what I was going to do next. Getting through this weather tonight was  going
to be  a  nightmare,  but we  absolutely  had to  be  at that rail  track by
morning. In theory, moving  cross country  in these  conditions was  a  huge
blunder,  but fuck the rules, it  was too  cold for them now.  I didn't care
about leaving sign; I needed roads to make distance, and besides, if Tom, or
I, for that matter, started going down with hypothermia, we were more likely
to find some  form of  shelter near a road. My new  thought was  to  go west
until we hit one, then hang a right  and head north for the train track. One
of the few things  I knew about this country  was that its main highway, and
the one  and only train  track,  ran east to west  between Tallinn  and  St.
Petersburg.  The  roads on  either side  were bound to make  their way to it
eventually, like streams toward a river.
     Nobody was going  to see the flashlight in  this weather so I turned it
on again  and looked down as I let the metal drop and  had another  check to
make sure it still worked. As the compass needle oriented itself, I realized
that the wind was doing its bit to help. It seemed to be prevailing from the
west, so  as long as  I kept  it  in my face I would be  heading the  way  I
wanted.
     I was ready to go, gloves back  on, the silk  in my pocket, the compass
thread  and  needle wrapped  round  my  finger.  I  turned  to Tom, who  was
squatting up and down with a vengeance, his arms swinging wildly.
     "Okay, mate, we're off."
     "Not long now, Nick, eh?"
     "No, not long. A couple of hours, tops."
     ii
     The gale had become a blizzard, bringing close to white-cut conditions.
I  was having to stop every  ten or  so paces, rubbing the needle again with
the silk to reactivate the magnetic effect before getting another navigation
fix.  In  this  visibility  there  was no  way  I could keep  us moving in a
straight line. We were vaguely zigzagging west, still hoping to hit a road.
     We'd been going for about forty minutes. The wind was still head on and
its stinging cold made my eyes  stream  with tears. I had nothing to protect
my face  with; all I  could do  was bury  my  head into  my coat for  a  few
moments'  respite.  Freezing  flakes blasted their way into every gap  in my
clothes.
     I still  led  the  way,  breaking  the trail, then stopping, though  no
longer turning, to allow Tom to catch up. When I heard him move up behind me
I'd go  on a few  more steps. This time I  did  stop, turning my back to the
wind, and I could just make him out coming toward me in the storm. I'd  been
so concerned about navigating that I hadn't  noticed how much he was slowing
down. I  crouched over  on my knees to protect the  silk and magnetized  the
wire while I waited.
     He finally got level with me as I was trying to stop the wind affecting
the compass, which was  dangling  from my mouth. His hands were  buried into
his pockets  and his head was down. I  grabbed hold of  his parka and pulled
him  down next to me, positioning him  so  he  could give  the  compass some
shelter, too.
     I wrapped up the compass but this time didn't get to my feet, instead I
just stayed where I was and shivered with Tom, both of us
     bent over in the snow. The snow that had built up on the outside of his
hood had frozen, and my hat probably looked  the same, matching the front of
our coats.
     "You okay, mate?"
     It was a dumb question, but I couldn't think of anything else to say.
     He coughed  and shivered. "Yeah, but  my legs are really  cold, Nick. I
can't feel  my  feet. We're  gonna be okay,  aren't we? I mean, you know all
about this outdoors stuff, don't you?"
     I nodded. "It's a fucker, Tom, but just dig deep, mate. It's  not going
to kill us." I was lying.  "Remember what I said? Dream, that's all you have
to do. Dream,  and this  time tomorrow--you know the rest,  don't you?"  His
iced-up fur moved in what I took to be agreement  as I added, "We'll be on a
road soon and the going will get much easier."
     "Will we get a car when we get to the road?"
     I didn't answer. A  nice warm vehicle would be heaven, but who would be
mad enough to be out here on a night like this?
     I struck out into the snow and he reluctantly followed.
     we  had a  result  about twenty  minutes  later.  I  couldn't  see  any
pavement, but I could make out the shape of tire ruts under the newly fallen
snow, and the fact  that  the snow suddenly  wasn't  as deep as  it had been
everywhere else. It was only  a single-lane road, but that didn't matter. It
could be enough to save our lives.
     I started to jump up and down on the spot to make sure I was right. Tom
took a long time to catch up,  and when he arrived I could see his condition
had worsened.
     "Time to sort yourself  out, Tom. New phase,  just jump up and down and
get  the  body going."  I  tried to turn it  into a  bit  of  a game and  he
half-heartedly joined in.
     It wasn't that long ago that he'd been crying. Now it was sarcasm. "Not
long to go now, I s'pose?"
     "No, not long at all."
     We  started to make  distance, huddling  together  at intersections  to
protect  the compass. Whether a road ran northeast,  northwest,  or even due
west, we took it. Anything to get us in the general direction of Tallinn and
the train track.
     After about  three hours Tom had slowed down dramatically. I was having
to stop more and more and wait for  him to close up on me. The fight through
the snow and the extreme cold had definitely got to him and he couldn't stop
shivering.
     He  pleaded with me. "I've had it,  Nick. Everything's  spinning around
me, mate. Please, we have to stop."
     The wind whipped the snow against our faces.
     "Tom, we must keep going.  You understand that, don't you? We're fucked
if we don't."
     The only reaction from him  was  a moan. I pulled his  hood apart so he
could see me.
     "Tom, look at me!" I pulled his chin up. "We must go on.  You must help
me  by  keeping  going,  okay?"  I  moved  his  chin  again,  trying to  get
eye-to-eye. But  it was too  dark, and every time  the wind got into my eyes
they started to water.
     It was pointless trying to get  any sense out of him.  We were  wasting
time and losing  what  little heat we had by just  standing still. There was
nothing I could do to help him here and  now. Our best bet was to get to the
train track and make the final push to a station. I wasn't too sure how many
miles we still had to cover,  but the most important thing was to get there.
I'd  know when  he'd finally had enough, and that  would be the time to stop
and take some action.
     I grasped his arm and pulled him along. "You've got to dig deep, Tom."
     We moved on, me with my head down and Tom past caring. It wasn't a good
sign.  When the body  starts  to go into hypothermia, the central thermostat
responds by  ordering heat to be drawn  from the  extremities into the core.
This is when  your hands and feet start  to stiffen. As the core temperature
drops, the body also  draws heat from the head, circulation  slows down  and
you  don't get the oxygen or  sugar your brain needs.  The real danger comes
from the fact that you don't realize it's happening; one of the first things
hypothermia does is take away your will to help yourself. You stop shivering
and you stop worrying. In  fact,  you are dying, and you couldn't care less.
Your   pulse   will   get   irregular,   drowsiness   will   give   way   to
semiconsciousness, which will eventually become  unconsciousness.  Your only
hope is to add heat from an external source--a fire, a hot drink, or another
body.
     Another hour passed. Soon I had to push Tom from behind. He took  a few
steps forward, stopped, and  complained  bitterly.  I  grabbed  his arm  and
dragged  him.  At least  the extra effort  warmed me up a  bit. The cold was
taking its toll on me, too.
     We  moved on, painfully slowly. When I  stopped to check direction, Tom
couldn't help me any more; he  just stood on the spot, swaying,  as I turned
my back to the wind, trying to create shelter for the compass.
     "You okay, mate?" I shouted behind me. "Not far now."
     There was no  reply, and  when  I'd finished and  turned  for him  he'd
collapsed in  the  snow. I  got  him  to his feet and dragged him on. He had
almost no strength left now, but  we  had to crack on. Surely there couldn't
be that far to go?
     He  mumbled to  himself  as I  pulled  him  along. Suddenly  he stopped
resisting and ran forward with a burst of manic energy.
     "Tom, slow down."
     He did, but only to stagger a few yards off to the side of the road and
lie down. I  couldn't run  to  him; my legs couldn't carry me  that fast any
more.
     When I got to him I saw that the sneaker on his right foot was missing.
His feet were so numb that he hadn't noticed.
     Shit, it  had been  there  minutes ago. As  I'd dragged him  along  and
protected my face from the wind, his  sneakers had been the  only things I'd
seen.
     I turned back down the road and retraced his quickly disappearing sign.
I found the shoe  and trudged back to him, but getting it back onto his foot
was not  far  short of impossible, my  numb  fingers trying to tie the laces
which were frozen with ice. I  touched my little finger to  my thumb to make
the old Indian sign that means "I'm all right." If you can't do that, you're
in trouble.
     "You've got to get up, Tom. Come on, it's not that far." He didn't have
a clue what I was saying.
     I helped  him to  his feet and dragged him on. Now  and again  he would
shout out and summon  up another  burst of energy fuck knows from where.  It
didn't  last for long before he slowed down or fell back into the snow  with
exhaustion and despair. His voice had become a whine as he begged to be left
where he was, pleading with me to let him sleep. He was in the latter stages
of  hypothermia  and  I  should be doing something about  it. But  what, and
where?
     I pushed him on. "Tom, remember mate, DREAM!" I doubted he understood a
word  I was saying. I felt sorry for him, but  we couldn't rest  now. If  we
stopped for even a few minutes we might not restart.
     It was  about  fifteen minutes later that we stumbled onto the railroad
line, and only by chance did I notice it.  We'd reached a crossing and I had
tripped over one of the tracks. Tom wasn't the only one losing his core heat
and spiraling down through the spectrum of hypothermia.
     I tried to summon some  enthusiasm to celebrate, but  I couldn't manage
any. Instead I shook him. "We're here, Tom. We're here."
     No  reaction whatsoever. It  was obvious  that what  I said  would make
little  difference to him now anyway. Even if he showed any awareness,  what
was there  to  get excited about? We were  still  in the shit--wet, freezing
cold, with no shelter, and I didn't know how or  where we  were going to get
on the train, even if it turned up.
     He  collapsed on the crossing next to me.  I bent down and got my hands
under his armpits, heaving him up again  and nearly collapsing myself in the
process.
     He  couldn't  control his  mouth or  teeth and  began  to make  strange
snorting noises.
     "We have to keep going just a bit further," I shouted into his ear. "We
have to find a station."
     I didn't know any more whether it was him or myself I was talking to.
     I turned him left, toward Tallinn.
     We  Staggered West.  over the snow-covered  gravel at the side  of  the
track.  At least the trees on either side  gave us some protection from  the
howling wind. It was thirty minutes? an hour? since we'd got onto the track.
I didn't know; I'd given up clock-watching long ago.
     Tom started to go crazy, screaming at the trees, crying, apologizing to
them, only to fall down again and try to cuddle up in the snow. Each time, I
had to pick him up and push on, and each time it got a little bit harder.
     We  came  across a row of small  sheds,  visible only  because  of  the
flatness of the snow on top of their angled roofs. We still couldn't
     see further than about fifteen feet and  I  didn't notice them until we
were right on top of them.
     I  fumbled  excitedly for  the  flashlight,  leaving Tom on  his knees,
shouting at the trees that were coming to get him.
     It  seemed  to  take  for  ever to press  the switch.  Soon  my fingers
wouldn't be able to perform even a simple task like that.
     I shone  the light around and saw  that the sheds were made of wood and
built in the form of a terrace, the door of each facing onto the track. Most
were clamped shut with old  rusty  padlocks,  but one  was  unlocked.  After
kicking the snow away, I pulled it open and turned round for Tom.
     He was curled up in the snow on the track and pleading to be allowed to
sleep. If he did there would be no waking up.
     As I gathered him in my arms, he  lashed out with his final reserves of
strength.  He  was having  a fit.  It was pointless  struggling  with him; I
simply didn't have the  energy. I let  him drop to the ground and,  gripping
his hood with both hands, pulled him along like a sleigh, stumbling backward
and falling over with the effort.
     I didn't talk to him any more; I didn't have the strength.
     The door was so low that I  had to bend down  to get in,  and the  roof
wasn't much  higher,  but the instant I was out of the  wind I began to feel
warmer.  The shed was about eight-feet square, and  the  floor was cluttered
with bits  of  wood  and  brick,  old  tools  and  a rusted  shovel  with  a
half-broken shaft, crap from over the years lying on a frozen mud floor.
     Tom just lay where I dropped him. As I put the flashlight down  to give
me some light I could see him curled up in a ball, his hands exposed, wrists
bent  as  if  he had suddenly  developed severe arthritis. His  short, sharp
breaths mixed  with mine and  looked like  steam in the flashlight beam. Not
long now and he would be  history  unless I got a grip on myself  and sorted
him out.
     If only this was a hunter's cabin, not a rail  worker's shed.  It's the
custom in extremely cold climates to  leave kindling in huts so that someone
in trouble can rewarm themselves quickly. It's also  the custom to  leave  a
box of matches with the ends  sticking out so that frozen, numb fingers  can
grasp them.
     I got my  gloves off and started to fantasize about warm train cars and
hot mugs of coffee. I dragged over a lump of wood that looked  as if it used
to be part of the paneling. I then played about with my
     Leatherman with  shaking  hands, trying to  pull out the blade. Once my
soaking  gloves were back on I started to scrape at the edge  of the wood. I
wanted to get to the dry stuff underneath.
     Tom filled the room  with his screams  and  cries.  It was as if he was
speaking in tongues.
     I yelled just as loudly, "Shut  the fuck up!" but wherever  he  was, it
was a place where he couldn't hear me.
     Once I'd cut away the damp stuff and exposed the dry wood I  started to
scrape thin shavings onto the shovel face. This was the under. My hands hurt
as I tried to keep a firm grip.
     Tom's body had started jerking around in the corner of the hut. We both
needed  to get this fire burning  soon, but I couldn't rush what I was doing
or I'd fuck up completely.
     Next task was  to  cut kindling,  a stage up from under, so that larger
bits  of  wood  could  then be  placed  in  the fire and stand  a  chance of
catching. I picked up any sticks of wood I could find,  and also pulled  off
some of the  roof lining and tore it into strips. It would burn well because
it  was partly coated with tar.  Then, with  the  rest  of the small bits of
wood, I started  to  make fire sticks, cutting very thinly into the  side of
the wood  and pushing out the shavings until each  piece looked as if it had
grown feathers.
     Tom was no longer thrashing around on the floor. Mumbling  incoherently
to himself, he was kicking  out, as if fending off an imaginary attacker. It
was pointless talking to him. I needed to concentrate on building  the fire.
Survival training might not be my strong suit, but I knew about fire. It had
been my job to make up  the one in  the front  room every morning  before my
stepdad  got out  of  bed, otherwise it  was slapping  time. Usually  it was
slapping time anyway.
     Once  I'd  prepared about five fire sticks I  stacked them  around  the
under like tepee poles.  Then I got out my pistol, taking  off  the magazine
and pulling the top slide to eject the round in the chamber.
     Using  the pliers of the  Leatherman, I eventually pulled the heads off
the  three rounds and poured  the dark  grain propellant onto  the under. My
hands were shaking as I poured,  trying my  best to get it over the wood and
not the mud. I left the third round half full of propellant.
     Tom's frenzied movements had dislodged his hood. Placing the
     round carefully on the ground so I wouldn't lose its contents, I got up
and crawled over to him, my  muscles protesting  now that they'd had a rest.
My cold, wet clothes clung miserably to me as I moved.
     I got hold of his hood and tried to pull it back on. He lashed out with
his arms,  shrieking stuff I couldn't understand, his hands  flailing around
and knocking my hat off. I collapsed on top of him, trying to control him as
I got his hood back up and my iced hat back on.
     "It's  all right, mate," I  soothed. "Not long  now. Remember to dream.
Just dream." But  I  was  wasting time  here.  It  was  heat he  needed, not
bullshit.
     Crawling back to the  shovel,  I dug  inside my  glove for  the compass
silk,  held  it in  my  teeth and cut some off  with my Leatherman scissors.
Then, using the screwdriver, I rammed  the cut silk into the half-empty case
as wadding on top of the propellant.
     I  loaded the  round into  the  weapon, pointed  it at the ground,  and
fired. The signature was a dull oomph.
     There  was no reaction from Tom as I  knelt on the  ground to pick up a
glowing, smouldering bit of silk. Once it was in my fingers I waved it about
gently to  fan the glow, then  put it into the under. The propellant flared,
lighting up the whole hut. I must have looked like a witch making spells.
     Once the under had caught, I started inserting more little bits through
the  fire  sticks into the flame.  It wasn't yet giving  out much heat; that
wouldn't happen until the under  was hot enough to ignite the fire sticks. I
got in close and blew gently.
     The  fire sticks  started  to  crackle and hiss as they  released their
moisture and smoke. I could smell  burning wood. I fussed around the  flames
on my hands and knees, carefully placing wood for the best effect as the hut
filled with smoke and my eyes started to water.
     The  flames  were now higher and threw dancing  shadows on the walls of
the hut. I could feel the heat on my face.
     I had to get more wood before all my  good work  was  undone.  I looked
around and gathered up  as much as possible from  what was to hand. Once I'd
established the  fire, I'd be able  to venture outside into the howling wind
for more.
     I kicked the door open slightly to get rid of the smoke. It let some of
the  wind and snow whistle  in, but it had to  be done. I'd block up most of
the gap as soon as I could.
     Tom was much quieter.  I  crawled over to  him, coughing smoke  from my
lungs. I wanted  to  see  if there was any wood under him  or in the corner.
There  was; only a few twigs, but it all helped.  I couldn't make a big fire
as  the hut was too small, and besides, we wouldn't need it; the walls  were
so close that the heat would bounce straight back on us anyway.
     I checked the flames and started to feed on some more  wood.  "Not long
now, mate. We'll be getting our kit off in a minute because we're so hot."
     My next priority would  be a hot  drink, to  get  some heat directly to
Tom's core.  Placing the  rest of the wood near the fire to dry  it  out,  I
turned and  looked  at his face. "Tom, I'm just  going to see  if I can find
something to heat snow in for a "
     He was lying too still. There was something very  odd about the way his
legs had now curled up to his chest.
     "Tom?"
     I  crawled back  to him, pulling him  over and getting the hood off his
face. Illuminated by the flames it told me all I needed to know. Tilting his
head  toward  the fire, I pulled open his eyelids. There  was no reaction to
the light. Both pupils stayed as fully dilated as a dead fish's. It wouldn't
be long now before they clouded up.
     I could hear the fire  sucks now collapsing on each other, with glowing
embers as well as flame. It was a wonderful sight, but  it  was  too fucking
late.
     I  tried  his carotid pulse.  Nothing. But that could  be  just my numb
fingers. I listened  for breathing and even tried  his heart.  Nothing.  His
mouth was still open from when he had taken, or fought for, his last breath.
I gently closed his jaw.
     It was time to think about me. Pulling off my wet clothes, I wrung them
out one by one before putting them back on.
     I sat and  fed the flames  some more,  knowing  there were still things
that I should  do to him. I should try to resuscitate and reheat him until I
was so exhausted I couldn't carry on, in the million-to-one  chance he could
be revived. But for what? I knew he was dead.
     Maybe if we'd  dug in  for the night once the  weather had closed in he
would still  be  alive.  We would  have  been in a  desperate state  in  the
morning, but maybe he would  have survived. Maybe if I  hadn't pushed him so
hard to get here, or had realized what condition he
     was in and had stopped earlier. All these questions, and the only thing
I was certain of was that I had killed him. I had fucked up.
     I  looked  at  his limp body, its  mouth  reopened, his long  hair  wet
against his cheeks, the  ice crystals on his peach fuzz now melting down his
face. I'd try and remember a gabby but  happy Tom, but I knew this image was
the  one that would stay with me. It was  going straight to  the top  of the
list of  my sweaty, guilty,  wake-upintheearly-hours nightmares. When I  was
put  into  the  counseling program  the Firm sets up for operators  now  and
again,  I'd  told  the shrinks I didn't  have  them.  I was talking shit, of
course. Maybe  it  was a  good  thing  I was  going  to be part  of  Kelly's
treatment now. I started to realize I might need it just as much as she.
     Dragging him  to the doorway, I sat  him up against the gap, leaving  a
space of a  foot or so above him for the smoke to escape. I covered his face
with his parka.
     Feeling  was already starting to come back to my extremities and I knew
I was going to be okay. All I had to do was find a station.
     I turned  back to the flames and watched the steam rise from  my drying
clothes. There  would be no sleep for  me  tonight. I had to  keep  the fire
going.
        45
        LDNDDN. ENGLAND
     Wednesday, January 5,2DDD
     I was nursing a hot frothy Starbucks in the church doorway opposite the
Langham Hilton,  the only place I could keep a trigger on the hotel and also
keep out of the drizzle.
     It was breakfast time, and the  sidewalks were packed  with over coated
wage  slaves  throwing Danish pastries and  coffee down  their  throats, and
shoppers out early for the  after Christmas sales. Judging by the frenzy, it
was  clear the  Y2K  bug hadn't brought the world to its knees after all. It
had been the last thing on my mind as I'd seen  in the new century aboard an
Estonian fishing boat, along with twenty  six cold and seasick illegals from
Somalia. Slipping away from  a seaside village under cover of darkness, we'd
battled across  the Baltic  in  huge seas, heading  for a peninsula east  of
Helsinki. Lion  King told me  it was midnight as we approached  the  Finnish
coastline, where we were suddenly  treated  to  one of the finest  fireworks
displays I'd  ever seen. The  whole place seemed  to light up as  towns  all
along  the shore celebrated  the new millennium. I  wondered  if it  held in
store any new beginnings for me. Christ, I hoped so.
     It was eighteen days since I'd left the hut and set off again into  the
blizzard.  Tom  had stayed behind,  parka  draped  over  his  face, his body
sterile of any item that could ID him. They probably wouldn't
     find  him before  the spring.  I  only hoped they'd  give him a  decent
burial. If  things worked out well here in London, maybe I'd go back and see
to it all myself.
     At first light, and without Tom, I was  able to make distance at my own
pace, even in the driving snow, and  it was only a couple of  hours before I
hit a station about five or six miles away.
     A  train arrived heading west, toward Tallinn, but  I let it go without
me.
     The  one after that was  heading  east,  toward  Russia, and I  climbed
aboard. Without  a passport it could take weeks to  get out of Estonia on my
own, but with Eight helping  me, maybe it would  be a different  story. That
was why I jumped  off at Narva, and that was how I'd ended up on the fishing
boat with my new Somalian friends. It had cost me all the dollars in my boot
and had  meant spending several uncomfortable days and nights hiding in  the
apartment with  the  land mines while Eight got  things arranged, but it had
been worth it.
     Eight wasn't too  happy about  his  car becoming  history, but he still
seemed thrilled to help me, even though he must  have been aware of what had
happened to Carpenter and the old guy in Voka, and put two and two together.
I wondered if he gave a shit.
     Eight didn't ask me again about  helping him to  escape to England, but
as I stood  on the jetty waiting  to board the fishing boat, I turned to him
and  handed over Tom's passport. From the  expression on  his  face  and the
tears in his eyes, you'd have thought I'd given him the three million.
     I knew I was taking a big risk, but I felt I owed him that much. I just
hoped he did a good job of doctoring Tom's picture, or that the day he tried
to  use it, immigration wasn't checking their computer  screens too closely.
Otherwise poor Eight would find  himself  being lifted by  a team of heavies
and whisked off to a 3x9 sooner than he could say "Crazy boy."
     I'd told myself then that the passport was part of what  I owed him for
his help, along  with  a new  car.  But now,  standing in London  with a hot
coffee in my hands and time to think, I knew  it was more  to do with trying
to  get over  my guilt  about Tom. I  had pushed  him  beyond his limits  in
outrageous conditions and I'd killed him. Giving  Eight the possibility of a
new  life was an attempt to square my  conscience and make things right: The
job was done, now cut away.
     At first I thought it had  worked and that things were all right. But I
knew  they weren't, not with Tom, not with Kelly. She was much the same; the
New Year had passed her by, too. I'd phoned the clinic twice in the two days
since I'd  got back. I'd lied both times, telling them I  was  overseas  but
would be back soon.  I was desperate to see her, but I just couldn't face it
yet. I knew I wasn't going to be able to look her in  the eye. Hughes picked
up the  phone the second time and told me that her plans for Kelly's therapy
sessions, which included me, would have to stay on hold until I got  back. I
still felt confused about  it. I knew it had to be done, and I wanted to  do
it, but.. .
     To  add to the confusion, I'd  also had a call from Lynn. He  wanted to
see me this afternoon. There seemed to have been a change of heart since our
last meeting. He said he had a month's work for me. I'd been tempted to tell
him where he could shove his 290 pounds a day, because if all went well with
Liv this morning, I'd never have to  depend on the Firm again. But there was
no guarantee that she was going to appear, and though  a month's  pay wasn't
much, at least I would be working instead of thinking.
     The exchange  was  going to be  simple. I'd  opened a bank  account  in
Luxembourg  by telephone  as soon as  I returned to the U.K. The message I'd
left  Liv  in the Helsinki DLB was  that she'd be required to move the money
electronically  using  a  Fed-wire  reference,  which  would  guarantee  the
transfer within hours. When we met in the hotel in a few minutes'  time, she
would  call her bank with  the transfer instructions I  would  give her, and
then we'd both just sit and wait until it happened.  I would call Luxembourg
each hour giving  my password and would  be told when  the  money  had  been
deposited. In my own mind I'd set  a  cut-off  time  of 4 pm.  If she hadn't
turned  up by then,  I had  to  assume  she  never would.  Then it  would be
decision time about her,  and how to go about contacting Val to explain what
Mr. and Mrs. Liv's little girl had been getting up to.
     As  my parting  shot when I was  sure the  money had  gone through, I'd
toyed  with the idea  of revealing that I'd saved Tom's life  and that  he'd
told me the whole story, just  for the satisfaction of letting  her know she
hadn't  outsmarted me. After all,  I intended  having nothing further  to do
with  ROC. All I wanted was the money, and then they  could carry on blowing
up buildings  and  ripping peo  pie's guts out for all  I cared.  Deep down,
however, I knew that telling  her would achieve nothing except to put  me in
the shit. She hadn't  got as far as  she had without damaging a  few bodies,
and I didn't want to be the next one on the list.
     Twenty minutes before the RV time, a taxi pulled up at the hotel's main
entrance.
     As I watched, Sinbad stepped forward and opened the cab door, and I saw
the  back of  Liv's  head  as she  got out and went inside. We had  the taxi
between  us,  but I could  see she had  decided on the jeans today, together
with her long leather coat, collar up against the cold.
     I let her go in  and  watched for  any surveillance or another  vehicle
pulling up shortly afterward. Neither happened.  I  waited, elated.  She was
here. She wouldn't have come all the way to London just to announce that she
was screwing me over.
     The  three million was  now  so  close  I could  almost smell it. I had
earned this  money. No, after a lifetime of shoveling shit  for  peanuts,  I
deserved it. I'd been working hard  to  control my excitement as I  stood in
the doorway, but now I reckoned it  wouldn't hurt  to let  myself enjoy  the
moment.  I ran through my game plan one more time.  As soon  as the transfer
was confirmed and Liv and I  had said  our goodbyes, I'd call the clinic and
tell them  that Kelly's new treatment could start  straight  away.  It still
worried me a bit,  but I'd just  have to  get on with it. Who knows, I might
even sort myself out.
     Hughes had  said  there was no telling how long the therapy would go on
for,  so  I'd been  thinking it might be a  good investment to  buy a little
apartment near  by and sell it afterward. I could also start  throwing a few
builders  at my house in  Norfolk and get it sorted for when Kelly was ready
to come home.
     Less than ten minutes to go now. She  still had to unload the DLB under
the  telephone,  which held  the keycard for  the suite I'd booked. I'd also
left instructions to place the "Do Not Disturb" sign on the door handle once
she entered. I waited and watched. There was  nothing to  see, apart  from a
woman getting splashed by a passing bus.
     I could almost feel the three million between  my fingers  as I counted
it in my mind. For about a millisecond I thought about
     giving Tom's share to some kind  of charity. For a millisecond. Because
then  I saw Kelly  again, sitting  like a frozen  statue  in  the clinic and
staring into space. Fuck it, she needed all the charity she could get.
     With just two  minutes to go, I  dodged the traffic  and approached the
hotel. Sinbad wasn't there to help  me as I pushed past the  revolving doors
and into the warmth of the foyer. The marble reception area was teeming with
businessmen  and tourists. I walked around them, past the Chukka Bar and the
reception desk, then took the stairs.
     I climbed  to the  third  floor, opening my leather jacket and checking
the  position of  the USP, tucked center front of my jeans. I'd gone back to
Norfolk  last night specifically to pick up a weapon,  and had found  myself
mopping up the worst of  the flooding that had come  through the hole in the
roof. Still, it wouldn't be long now before that  useless  tarp was replaced
by solid Welsh slate.
     Outside the door of Room 3161 stopped and listened. Nothing.
     I pushed my own keycard into the lock and opened the door.
     She was at the far end of the living room, her back  to me, looking out
of the windows that overlooked  the main entrance. The door closed behind me
with a gentle click.
     "Hello, Liv, it's really good to "
     I went to open my coat to draw down, but knew  it was useless. The over
coated body that had  moved out  from behind  the cabinet housing the TV and
minibar already had his pistol on me.  The other  body that sprang from  the
bathroom to my left was no more than four feet away, his weapon at my head.
     I released my  grip  on the  leather  and let my  arms drop to my sides
instead of raising them. There could still be a chance to draw.
     Liv turned toward me, only it wasn't her.
     She spoke in a soft accent wh