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..
