hole he had made.
Dirt and debris showered down, almost blinding him. But when he next looked up he saw that there was a space above him. If he could reach, he could haul himself up, over the door and jump down the other side.
He ripped out more tiles until the hole was wide enough to squeeze through. He could hear something a few floors below him—a faint crackling. The sound made his skin crawl. It meant that the fire was getting close. He forced himself to concentrate on what he was doing. The chair was wobbling underneath him. If he fell and twisted an ankle, he was finished.
At last he was ready. He tensed himself, then jumped. He felt the chair topple and crash to the floor—but he had done it! His hands had caught hold of an old water pipe and now he was dangling just below the ceiling, his arms disappearing into the space above. Once again he was all too aware of the stitches in his chest and wondered briefly if they would hold. God! The physio people had told him he ought to keep up his stretching exercises, but he doubted they’d had this in mind.
Gritting his teeth, Alex summoned all his strength to pull himself up into the cavity. His face passed through a cobweb and he grimaced as the fine strands laced themselves over his nose and mouth. His stomach touched the edge of the hole. He was half in and half out of the room. The crawl space was in front of him. The wall with the door was underneath him. Dozens of wires and insulated pipes ran inches above his head, stretching into the distance. Dust stung his eyes. What now?
Alex dragged himself along the pipe, bringing his feet up into the ceiling recess. He kicked down with his heels. More ceiling tiles fell loose and he saw the corridor below. There was a drop of about four metres.
Awkwardly he swung himself forward, then let his legs and torso hang. Finally he let go. He dropped down, landing in a crouch. He was in the corridor, on the other side of the locked door. With a sigh of relief, he straightened up. He was out of the room but he was at least seven floors up in an abandoned building that had been set on fire. He wasn’t safe yet.
The crackling of the flames was louder out in the corridor. The block of flats had seemed damp and musty to Alex but it was going up like a torch. He could feel the heat in the air. The end of the corridor—where he had been interrogated—was already shimmering in the heat haze. Where was the fire brigade? Surely someone must have seen what was happening. Alex noticed a fire alarm set in the wall, but the glass was already broken and the alarm button was missing. He would have to get out of here on his own.
Which way? He only had two choices—left or right—and he decided to head away from the interrogation room. He hadn’t seen a staircase when he had been taken there to meet Kaspar, but there might be one in the other direction. Smoke trickled up through the floorboards. It hung eerily in the doorways. Soon it would be impossible to see. Very soon it would be impossible to breathe.
He sprinted past the first room where he had been held and continued down the corridor, passing a set of lift doors. He didn’t even think about trying the lift. Nothing in the building worked and the doors were welded shut. But next to the lift he found what he was looking for: a staircase leading up and down. The steps were made of concrete, zigzagging round behind the lift shaft. He rested his hand briefly on the metal stair rail.
It was hot. The fire was near.
But he had no choice. He began to run down, his bare feet slapping against the cement. He would just have to hope he didn’t come across any broken glass. There were twenty-five steps between each floor; he counted them without meaning to. He turned a corner and saw a door leading into a smoke-filled corridor.
Definitely no way out there.
The further down he went, the worse it got. Twenty-five more steps and he came to another door. The corridor on the other side was well alight. There were brilliant red and orange flames, tearing into the walls, leaping up through the floor, devouring everything in their path. Alex was shocked by their speed and elemental strength. He had to put up a hand to protect himself, to stop his cheeks from burning.
He continued down. Force Three had started the blaze on the ground floor, allowing the air to carry the flames upwards. As Alex reached the third floor and began the next flight of steps down, he could barely breathe. The smoke was smothering him. He wished he’d thought to soak his shirt in water, to cover his eyes and mouth. But where would he have found water in the building anyway? Another twenty-five steps. Then another. Alex was choking. He could feel the sweat dripping down his sides. It was like being inside a giant oven. How much further?
He saw daylight. A door leading out onto the street.
And that was when Combat Jacket appeared, a nightmare creature, stepping out of nowhere as if in slow motion, his gun raised in front of him. Alex saw the muzzle flash and threw himself backwards as a bullet shot past centimetres above him. He landed awkwardly on the stairs and he was already rolling as a second bullet spat into the concrete, sending fragments of cement flying into the side of his face. Somehow he scrambled to his feet and began to climb up again. Combat Jacket fired twice more but for a brief moment, the smoke was on Alex’s side, and the bullets missed. Alex turned a corner. He didn’t stop until he was back on the first floor.
He felt sick—a mixture of fury and despair. He’d almost made it. What was Combat Jacket doing there, waiting for him? Had he guessed that Alex might somehow manage to escape? It made no sense. But he couldn’t think about it now. He was still trapped inside a burning building and he was rapidly running out of options. It was getting harder and harder to breathe. He looked along the corridor. It was a furnace. He couldn’t go that way. He couldn’t go down. That only left up.
Wearily, he started to climb. He made it to the second floor with just seconds to spare. As he continued up, there was a sudden rush of flames and a crash as part of the ceiling collapsed. Burning wood, metal and glass cascaded down. The fire had reached the stairs: now the way down was permanently blocked. He would have to try to make it to the roof. Perhaps he would be lucky. The police and fire brigade would be on the way. There might be helicopters.
Alex kept climbing. His hands were black; his face was streaked with tears. But he didn’t stop. At the very worst, he would die in the open air. He wasn’t going to let the fire finish him here.
He was no longer counting the steps. His legs were aching and the bandages around his chest had come loose. He ran past the eighth floor with a growing sense of despair. This was where he had begun. Forcing himself on, he continued to climb, past the ninth, the tenth … eleventh … twelfth… He was aware of the flames chasing him, filling the stairwell, licking at his heels. It was as if the fire knew he was there and was afraid of losing him. At last he came to a solid door with a metal push mechanism. He slammed his palms against it, terrified it would be locked. But the door swung open. The cool evening air rushed to greet him.
The sun had set but the sky was a brilliant red, the same colour as the fire that would be with him all too soon.
Alex was close to exhaustion. He had barely eaten all day. He was meant to be in bed. He almost wanted to cry but instead he swore, once, shouting out the ugly word. Then he wiped a grimy sleeve across his face and looked
