‘Well isn’t that just lovely!’ he exclaimed. ‘Not a single can to be found in the whole bloody fridge! Darling? Darling?!’
‘Yes?’ came the muffled reply from outside the room.
‘Where are the extra cases of soda water?’
‘Next to the fridge, stacked up around the right side.’
Ranomi’s blood froze in her veins. There, right next to her, bathed in bright blue light from a neon beer sign above, were the objects he was seeking. All the man had to do was to step around the corner and he’d see her standing there, damningly illuminated without a spot of shadow to hide even a finger or toe in.
‘Thanks doll, I’ll grab one now.’
There was no time to plan or to panic; Ranomi’s reaction was instinctual in its rapidity. She shot her arm up, gripped a handful of the beer sign’s wires and ripped as hard as she could. With a loud bang and a shower of sparks the neon sign exploded, and in a hiss of acrid smoke and a low crackle of neutered electricity, the pool of light in which she was bathed faded rapidly into hollow black shadow. The bartender, meanwhile, shrieked with fright and sprang back.
‘Shit! Oh my God!’ he shrieked.
‘What?’
‘The light in here just, just exploded! Just as I was about to get the soda water!’
‘Well we’ll call in an electrician tomorrow. Move it, just bring the water, there’s already an order for gin and tonic up north!’
‘Oh my, it’s just so … uncanny that it happened right now, right as I was going there. It’s almost like there’s a … a ghost in here.’
The man tiptoed into the corner while Ranomi remained pressed against the fridge, camouflaged by the black intensity of the shadow. She held her breath and kept utterly still as the man fumbled around in the dark mere inches from her. For a second, his head passed so close to hers that she felt his breath on her cheeks.
‘Oh my, how creepy! I could swear that someone is staring at me,’ he muttered to himself as he picked up a case of soda water. ‘Good God, what if there really is a ghost in here! I’ve been watching too many bloody horror films. Oh my, oh my! Time to get back to the bar, fuck this!’
He hurried out of the room with the soda water and shut the door behind him. Ranomi breathed out a long sigh of relief, thankful for both remaining undiscovered and not having been electrocuted when she had ripped the wires out of the sign. She glanced down at her smartwatch and checked the time; everything was still on track.
With a few swipes on the touch screen she brought up the blueprint of the building and quickly spotted what she sought: the control room where the building’s air conditioner system was set up. She needed to get down two flights of stairs and head along a few passages, and then she’d be there. Once in the control room she would climb into one of the ducts and crawl along its length, and then make an ascent inside it, totally vertically, which she would do with the aid of a pair of hi-tech gecko gloves.
Then would come the part of the mission that everyone was worrying about: whether or not the prostitute on the inside of the restricted area would actually complete her task and unscrew the grille, allowing Ranomi to get out of the duct and into the building, and thereby open the bulletproof, bombproof doors from the inside to let the others in. Without the girl doing her part though, Ranomi would remain stuck in the ducts, and the mission would be doomed to failure.
‘You’ve got a lot resting squarely on your shoulders, girl,’ she muttered to the darkness, not entirely sure if she was speaking to the unknown prostitute or to herself. ‘More than you can possibly understand or know. I can only pray that you deliver.’
She checked her watch one last time, breathed in a deep breath of calming air and hurried off.
***
‘Hey! Empire Strikes Back or Return of the Jedi?’
Chloe turned around to glare at the young man who had just accosted her. She quickly realised, as her countryman, dressed in a Freddy Krueger costume, continued to grin stupidly at her, that her face and eyes were entirely obscured by her stormtrooper helmet, and thus any expressions of annoyance were completely invisible.
‘Come on girl, you gotta tell me!’ the young man insisted. ‘I’m an Empire man myself, like, last year I was totally in Japan for Halloween, in Tokyo—’
‘Don’t touch me,’ Chloe hissed, jerking her arm out of his grip.
‘Whoa, back up, no need to be like that! Come on, we’re clearly both Star Wars geeks—’
‘I’m busy. Seriously, please just go away.’
‘Well shit, if that’s your attitude then you can go eat a bag of dicks! Bitch.’
He turned around in a huff and tramped off the dancefloor, heading towards one of the bars. Chloe, meanwhile, began pushing her way through the seething mess of bodies, who were all gyrating, grinding and twisting to the deafening music in a Boschian tumult. As she navigated the churning horde, she caught a glimpse of her wristwatch, and a surge of adrenalin, mixed with quick fear and a hefty dose of panic, ripped through her veins. It was time.
She fired a glance across the room at William, who saw her, examined his own wristwatch and then gave her a subtle nod. Both of them looked up at Sharaf, who acknowledged them without making it too obvious. He was about to hit the button on
