The Girl Who Ran (The Project Trilogy). Nikki Owen

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СКАЧАТЬ officer as he opens a door. The officer presses a green button and one hundred and seventy small LED wall-lights ping into life in a room that stretches in a long, tubular shape like an airplane cockpit of a space.

      I place one foot inside. When I inspect the initial area, I see that each light throws a soft blue glow on my skin, face and hair, and when I twist my arm around to reveal the spongy underbelly beneath, a kaleidoscope of tiny rainbows dances along my skin in drunk, swaying circles.

      ‘Please walk in,’ the officer says.

      I hesitate, then step forwards and the door behind me immediately whooshes shut, a draught of air sealing it behind me. I whip round, startled, and frantically scan the door, its metal whiteness a cold block of ice that freezes out the world from me, from these lights and sounds. A shiver breaks out all over me.

      ‘Walk three steps forward, please,’ the officer’s voice instructs over an intercom.

      ‘What is happening?’

      On the curve of the wall there is a small, square window with a deep blue rim and, through it, I see Black Eyes. ‘This is the next stage.’

      There appears to be two sections of the chamber. I move my feet into a different space where the light is almost gone. My pulse pounds. When I look once more through the window I see the officer. Worry shoots up my spine.

      ‘Stop there,’ the officer orders.

      I halt. Unsure what is expected of me, I shift slightly to the side.

      ‘I said, stop!’ he shouts.

      I instantly freeze, staggering at the loud volume assault. Black Eyes’ voice swims in, ordering the officer not to yell.

      ‘Maria,’ Black Eyes says after a fraction of silence has passed, his fingers, from the window, still clasping the file where Patricia’s head lies, ‘this is a place that can help you. Take a breath, calm down.’

      I feel a strong urge to run away as fast as I can, to pound down the door with my fists, but manage to stay put.

      ‘You see,’ he continues, ‘we have found that subject numbers sometimes need assistance in… controlling their feelings, their reactions to situations. Although, as I’m sure you are realising by now, you, my dear, are… well, unique.’

      As he cranes his head and speaks directly to the officer, my brain sparks somewhere at something Black Eyes just said. Other subject numbers. I don’t move, fear and uncertainty preventing me from barely breathing as I aim to think straight in this strange environment, attempt to locate what alarm is being triggered inside my mind. Why does the phrase other subject numbers suddenly tweak something in my mind, something distant, a hazy recollection of an event not long passed?

      ‘Maria? Are you ready, Maria?’

      ‘I think so.’

      ‘Good. Then let me tell you what will happen next.’

Chapter 9

      Goldenpass railway line, The Alps, Switzerland.

       Time remaining to Project re-initiation: 25 hours and 20 minutes

      With Interlaken Ost Station fifty minutes away, Chris grabs all his equipment, fingers shaking, and shoves it in his rucksack. Rising into the aisle, his full head height skimming the ceiling of the carriage, he rolls his shoulders and turns.

      I zip up my rucksack. Legs jigging in my seat at the nerves of what’s ahead, I afford a brief glance to the window. The early night air descending on the mountains has produced a low mist that merges from yellow to deep blue then black, and in the fields that yawn wide into the elbow of the valley below, the petals of the spring crocuses bob on the heads of their stems and sway in the breeze of the train as it rolls on by.

      ‘Right,’ Chris says, eyes to the left and right. ‘The hard drive’s erased. I’ve copied everything we need onto a file. I’ve tried using a signal blocker thing I have, but it’s not working, so we’ll try that later.’ He looks up to the far door of the carriage then back to our table. ‘How we gonna do this? I mean, why would this book woman warn us if she works for the Project?’

      ‘We do not have the answer to that at present. However, our priority is to reduce any threat level to us all, so the best course of action based on probability of harm or death is to alight the train and leave.’

      ‘Shit. What if it’s a trick?’

      ‘People, it seems, play tricks all the time,’ I say. ‘This is no different.’

      Patricia wrings her hands together over and over. She secures her bag to her shoulder, gripping it and, catching strands of her wig in the handle where it pinches her jumper, she stands.

      Chris glances over to her. ‘You okay? You seem jittery.’

      She nods but keeps her eyes down, and when I look at her other hand, wondering how jittery appears, I see her thumb nail picking at the skin on the cuticles of her forefinger. I spread out my five fingers; Patricia looks at them and gives a thin smile.

      I scan the train. I check the people and the families and the smattering of random, vague faces, observing life as it is: normal, regular, each person connected by an invisible thread of relationships. I glance to my two friends, slip my fingers into my bag and stroke, for one second, the spine of my notebook and rub the soft edge of the photographs tucked inside.

      Breathing in once, and with the Project’s mantra in my head – prepare, wait, engage – I withdraw my hand, secure my bag and start walking. ‘We have to find a way off this train.’

      We negotiate the sway of the carriage and come to a stop by the door that opens up to the outside between the two cabins.

      ‘Doc?’

      I am scanning for the best exit. ‘Yes?’

      ‘I’m not used to this kind of thing.’

      She chews her nails and I search for something appropriate to say. ‘It is highly unusual to be chased by a covert organisation previously unknown to the UK government, who would kill you if they had to in order to capture your friend.’

      She lowers her fingers from her mouth and, taking this as a signal that I have delivered an adequate comment, I recommence examining the area.

      I observe the eyes and the faces of each and every passenger. Patricia moves close by me now, nail nibbling again, and I use the partial cover her body provides to study the travellers. The old man is asleep in his seat, head hanging, brow tapping the window. The young girl has her face glued to her chewed copy of 1984, music shoved in her ears, while the father and his two boys, it seems, have fallen asleep, each body resting on the pillow of the other, the bread-faced woman opposite watching them, smiling. Nothing jumps out, nothing screams, run. I breathe a little easier.

      We move along one metre further to the far door where we are due to alight and consider our options of escape once on the platform. The train is moving a little faster now, not at great speed, but the chugging has increased in its ascent up a steep incline.

      ‘Have СКАЧАТЬ