The Secret of Excalibur

‘Don’t start! I didn’t know that would happen!’

Mitchell grappled with his door handle. ‘It’s jammed. The frame’s bent.’

Nina tried her door, but with the same lack of result. Snow slid past the window as they picked up speed. Behind her, Chase crawled towards the rear door. ‘I’ll open the tailgate. Jack! Find the bonnet release!’

‘What?’

‘The hood, the hood release! It’ll drop down and act like a brake!’

Mitchell hunted for the lever as Chase batted aside the coiled tow-cable dangling from the emergency compartment. The roof shuddered beneath him as the SUV bumped over the snow.

‘Got it!’ Mitchell shouted. He pulled the lever and the bonnet slammed down in front of the windscreen, its broad front edge digging into the snow. The Suburban slowed, but didn’t stop. Snow sprayed up from each side of the bonnet, gravity and three tons of upside-down truck continuing to drag them down the mountainside.

‘Shit, we’re spinning!’ Nina shouted. The bonnet was scooping up snow unevenly, slewing the SUV round. The trees further down the slope drifted into view through her side window.

An idea flashed through her mind. She squeezed under her seat’s headrest, straining to reach the handle of the door behind her.

Chase reached the rear door and tugged the handle. The tailgate popped open; he braced himself and pushed it down like a drawbridge.

A sound reached him over the thumps of the truck’s descent - engines, rasping and raw. Snowmobiles.

And the helicopter, swooping down to pass them . . .

Nina pulled the handle. The rear door opened slightly. She forced it wider. Snow spat into the cabin, biting at her eyes. Wincing, she pushed harder as the Suburban continued to turn sideways, picking up speed . . .

It swung back, the door acting as a rudder. They straightened out, slowing again as the bonnet gouged into the snow—

The open door hit something under the snow and the window burst apart. Nina shrieked and jumped back. But her idea had worked, and the Chevrolet was back in a straight line - for now.

A large bump threw Nina and Mitchell against the seats, loose items bouncing around them as the slope steepened. Even with their makeshift brake, they were still gaining speed. She looked back - and saw Chase clambering on to the open tailgate. She thought he was going to jump off, but instead he leaned forward, reaching for something on the SUV’s underside. ‘Eddie! What’re you doing? Jump, get off !’

Squinting into the spraying snow, Chase had no intention of jumping, however. Instead he bent over the rear bumper for the spare wheel mounted under the cargo bed, all the while aware that the top of the cliff was rapidly getting closer.

The helicopter moved into a hover past the cliff edge, wanting a grandstand view of their deaths. And from behind, Chase heard the rattle of automatic weapons fire, the snowmobilers trying to bring them about even sooner—

The Suburban hit a rock hidden beneath the snow, throwing the entire vehicle into the air. It crashed down nose first, ripping the bonnet loose. The windscreen shattered. The SUV immediately picked up speed on its hellish sledge run down the mountain.

Nina fought her way up the cabin as snow flew all around her. Chase had somehow managed to keep hold, silhouetted in the open tailgate. ‘Eddie!’ she yelled. ‘Save yourself, jump!’

He crouched. ‘Not without you!’ Another side window exploded as the truck smashed over a rock. ‘Give me that line!’

Nina used the headrests to pull herself along. The tow-cable hanging from the emergency compartment twitched crazily at every bump, just out of reach. She stretched for it . . .

Bullets clanked against the Suburban’s flank, one of them piercing the thin steel and hitting the seat above her with a whump. She flinched, then grabbed for the cable as it continued its mocking dance. This time, she caught it.

She used it to pull herself closer, then untangled it. Chase leaned into the cabin, arm outstretched. Nina reached out for him . . .

‘Oh shit,’ said Mitchell in a voice of imminent doom. Chase looked ahead. The line of trees was coming up fast - as was the cliff edge just beyond. ‘Whatever you’re doing, do it now!’

Chase’s gaze met Nina’s.

With a final effort, she lunged forward. Chase snatched the cable from her hand and straightened, the wind slashing at his face as he leaned over the rear bumper. He had already freed the spare wheel from its recess; now, he rapidly uncoiled the cable and threaded one end between the alloy spokes before knotting it.

Another window shattered, snow and glass showering around his legs. He ignored it, tying the other end of the cable around the SUV’s towhook. The treeline was only seconds away—

He hurled the spare wheel.

It spun off to one side, the cable snaking behind it. Snow sprayed into the air as it bounced down the slope parallel to the Suburban.

The snowmobiles closed in. Chase ducked, gripping the towhook tightly as another bullet blew out a light cluster just inches from him. The whining chatter of the helicopter rose ahead, chainsaw snarl of the snowmobile engines behind as the Chevy hurtled towards the cliff.

The spare wheel bounced past a tree - on the opposite side from the Suburban.

The cable snapped taut, whipping the spare wheel round the trunk once, twice, before it smashed into the bark. The SUV suddenly jerked round, sweeping across the clifftop at the end of the line, so close to the edge that there was nothing below the frame of the broken windscreen but empty space. Nina screamed as centrifugal force tore loose her grip and threw her towards the hole—

Mitchell’s hand clamped round her wrist.

The Suburban continued along its arc, swinging back up the slope. One of the snowmobilers had swerved to avoid the trees - now he found three tons of battered steel whooshing straight at him like a giant’s hammer.

The two vehicles collided, the sheer momentum of the SUV swatting the lightweight snowmobile backwards. The rider was flung skywards as its rear end flipped up. He somersaulted over the Suburban, over the cliff . . .

And into the blades of the hovering helicopter.

The man instantly became nothing but a red haze spraying out from the whirling rotor. The helicopter reeled from the impact. Its nose dipped sharply, pulling the aircraft into a steep descent despite the pilot’s desperate attempts to level out.

Rotor blades slashed against the sheer rocks, shattered—

The helicopter ploughed into the cliff, smashing the cabin and its occupants flat before the rest of the fuselage tumbled down the wall and exploded.

Chase finally lost his hold, thrown from the tailgate into the snow as the SUV swung round the tree. It hit a rock broadside-on, the roof caving in and rolling the Suburban back on to its side. Its wheels dug into the snow, flipping it upright and bouncing it into the air—

The second snowmobiler had stopped his stolen vehicle short of the cliff - only to be smacked from his seat as the Suburban tumbled over it at chest height. He hit the ground, - and the SUV landed on top of him. Roof crushed, chassis bent, it finally slid to a stop, upside down once again.

Chase shakily stood and picked his way across the steep slope. He passed the idling snowmobile and reached the wreckage of the Suburban, a long red smear marking where the rider had been scraped along beneath it. ‘Nina! Nina! Are you okay?’

No reply. He crouched and looked inside.

The flattened interior was filled with snow and dirt. He peered round the seats. ‘Nina!’

Movement from the front. ‘Eddie?’ grunted Mitchell, dazed.

‘Jack! Where’s Nina?’

‘I dunno. I . . . I couldn’t keep hold of her.’

A cold stone formed in the pit of Chase’s stomach. ‘Are you okay?’ he asked, forcing himself to check on the closest person first when every part of his mind was screaming at him to search for Nina.

‘Think so . . . banged up, but I don’t think anything’s broken . . .’