She sounds like a Bond villain…
“Wow… you are seriously tapped in the head, aren’t you? I guess watching me beat your old man to death and leaving you for dead has left you with a few issues.”
Her smile fades, and her eyes go dead, staring at me like she isn’t human. She holds my gaze for a moment, and then looks at one of the men sitting watching and nods. He stands and walks over to the lab opposite. The man behind me pushes me forward with his gun, and I step farther into the middle of the area, standing directly in front of Clara.
A moment later, the guy reappears, escorting Tori by her arm. Her hands are behind her, presumably bound together, and her eyes are red — I’m guessing from crying.
“Oh my God, Adrian!” she shouts.
She goes to run toward me, but the guy restrains her, and she struggles in his grip.
“Let go of me, asshole!” she yells at him.
I fail to suppress a small smile. That’s my girl, defiant to the last.
“Tori, are you okay?” I ask her, trying to remain as calm as possible. “Are you hurt?”
Before she can reply, Clara steps forward. Without a word of warning, she leaps toward me and unleashes a right knee into my side. I didn’t see it coming, and I wince at the impact, doubling over and dropping to one knee. As she lands, she smashes her left elbow across my face, catching me on my cheek. It hurt likes hell, but I do everything I can not to register it. I stay still, staring at the floor and breathing hard through gritted teeth, absorbing the pain and using it to fuel my growing anger.
I look up at her. “You’ve gotten brave in your old age,” I say, slowly getting back to my feet. “Makes such a difference being surrounded by all your friends, doesn’t it?”
She strolls over to Tori and strokes her hair, twirling it in her finger as she looks at me. Taunting me.
“I see nothing changes, Adrian. You’re still blind to the truth that is so clearly laid out in front of you. What’s happening is inevitable. Times have changed and have left you behind. You cannot stop what’s now in motion.”
She turns to Tori and grabs both her cheeks in her hand before kissing her lips, forcing herself onto her with no emotion. As she moves away, Tori spits on the floor, and Clara looks at me and smiles.
“I’ve worked closely with Hamaad El-Zurak to make this organization what it is. Yalafi Hussein is an idealist, but he’s naïve. He still thinks you can impose your will upon the people by using archaic methods of terrorism. El-Zurak is a great man, and his vision for a new world is… extraordinary.”
She’s really boring me now, so I tune her voice out and focus on the environment around me. I have to admit, I’ve been so focused on getting Tori back, I think I’ve lost sight a little of the bigger picture. Not since back in New York, when I took Hussein’s laptop, have I really thought about what’s actually at stake.
Oblivious to what Clara’s saying, I look around the room and start to see things that I hadn’t noticed before. Time slows to a stop as I take in every single detail. It’s almost like an epiphany. Like speaking to Clara has made me see that I don’t actually care that she managed to get away from me years ago. She’s not Wilson Trent. She hurt my pride more than anything, which is the only reason I held a grudge. But I don’t anymore.
There are ten guys to my left, with one behind me, who has a gun to my head… but the group of ten all have their guns in their holsters. Average time for someone to draw their weapon and effectively take aim is three seconds. It’ll only take me two to disarm the guy behind me and fire at least four bullets…
The screen behind her has a technical diagram of what looks like a satellite, so I can only assume it’s Cerberus. The set-up of this scene is like a lecture, as if everyone was looking at her as she gave them information. That, to me, says that she knows a decent amount about what Cerberus does, which validates her claim that she was close to El-Zurak.
The table on my right is covered by papers and a laptop… those papers are confidential documents. I’ve seen enough in my time to recognize material that should be redacted. If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say CIA. I can’t think of any way someone like Clara would’ve been able to get their hands on classified files like that without at least having an inside man. But the CIA isn’t the kind of place where you can bribe people…
Slowly but surely, the pieces of this puzzle are starting to slot into place… Now I just need to get out of here and tell Josh I’ve solved things all on my own!
Clara slaps me hard across the face, speeding time back to normal and bringing me back to the real world.
“Are you even listening to me?” she screams.
I look at her with the most neutral poker face I have. “Not in the slightest,” I say with a shrug. “Sorry.” I look across at Tori. “Baby, we’re gonna get out of here, okay? Just trust me.”
She nods, and then Clara slaps me again.
“You arrogant bastard!” she says. “You’ve always been so full of yourself and why? You’re outnumbered, and on the losing side of a war your country doesn’t even know it’s fighting!”
I sigh and look at her with feigned sympathy. “I actually feel pretty bad for you, Clara,” I say. “I imagine you’ve spent the last few years harboring a grudge against me that’s slowly consumed you to the point where you probably don’t even care about El-Zurak’s plans for Cerberus. All you care about is getting back at me. Am I right? I mean, you were the one who told these extremist pricks about me in the first place. You would’ve known then that I wouldn’t have come and worked for you. I think you did it knowing it would prompt me to come looking specifically for you, so you could make some half-assed attempt at getting revenge.”
She’s taken aback by, what I’m guessing is, a pretty accurate assessment of things, but quickly recovers.
“Well, you’re here, aren’t you?” she says, like a petulant child. “So you’re just as stupid as you’ve always been, walking right into a situation you knew was a trap.”
“Yeah, but I’m not here for you, Clara. I’m here for her.” I nod at Tori. “I couldn’t give a shit about you — don’t you get that? I stopped holding a grudge against you a long time ago. You’ve built yourself up to this fantastic showdown between us, and the fact of the matter is, I simply don’t care.”
Okay, so that was a small lie. I do care — I’d happily snap that psychopathic bitch’s neck right now. Never mind the betrayal years ago — she kidnapped my girlfriend. That alone signed her death warrant. But she doesn’t need to know that. More fun to make her think she’s insignificant and watch her fester until she bursts.
I look over at Tori who, bless her, is trying not to smile. I wink at her, and I see her swell up as she takes a deep breath, full of pride for her action hero who’s about to save her.
Those are her words, by the way…
I slide my left foot subtly out to the side, just a couple of inches, widening my stance a little. Then, in one movement, I flick my right heel up behind me, catching the guy behind me in his balls. At the same time, I duck to the left, to avoid the potential stray bullet. Luckily, there isn’t one. Sensing him bend forward, I spin around, pushing him over and snatching the gun out of his hand in one motion. As I complete my turn, the room slows down once more. I look past Clara and go straight for the guy standing by Tori. Mid-turn, I fire once and put a bullet between his eyes. He falls backward, and Tori jumps in shock, putting her hands over her mouth to suppress a scream.
I continue the turn, coming round to face the bunch of ten. I know I’m only going to get a couple of shots off before they start to react, so I fire three bullets at the guys nearest to Tori. I hit two in the chest, killing them instantly, but only wound the third by catching him in the arm.