Then alarms started sounding all over the site and everything spiralled into a fresh level of hell.
Barney could run fast. He could unicycle even faster, especially as the path down towards the caravan and the coast was on a slope. It had been worth slinging the unicycle through the window first, even though it had slowed him down by three or four seconds. Normally, a fast dash through a holiday village on a single wheel and saddle would have caught a lot of attention but right now the holidaymakers were tearing out of the pavilion, the pool and the chalets and making for the big sports field behind the adventure playground — the muster point for fire alarms and bomb scares. With the blaring of the siren and the mild panic of managing their kids, most of them barely blinked as he slipped between them all, travelling against the flow, angling the wheel and the saddle with the fluid expertise of someone born to it.
He’d had dealings with the police before — what traveller hadn’t? They didn’t tend to go well. He was an odd person and your average copper didn’t take to odd. He knew it was only a matter of time before he found himself getting helped into the back of a patrol car, and there was just one thing he needed to do before that happened.
Because his chance might never come again. He’d waited seven years for this. Seven years of thinking about it. Seven years of wondering how things might have been if he hadn’t ever met that particular bunch of Bluecoats. If he hadn’t met Kate Sparrow.
It had taken a lot of mental preparation for him to finally express himself. This time tomorrow, his last chance to do that would be gone. So, evading capture for these last crucial hours instead of tamely handing himself over… it was worth the risk.
He was almost at the caravan before he realised they might be waiting for him there and so he flipped left across the grassy lane between two chalet blocks, narrowly missing a mother and toddler. He angled right again, navigating the familiar alleyways, like a live Pac-Man arcade game. The mother had shrieked but he hadn’t slowed down. He was going to finish what he had started. Whatever it took.
‘Lucas?’ The young man stepping out in front of him was undoubtedly Francis. He’d been six or seven the last time Lucas had seen him, but there was no mistaking the Scandinavian colouring and the way he wrinkled his brow, just like Kate.
‘Need your help, Francis,’ puffed Lucas, grabbing hold of the lad’s arm and dragging him along against the tide of worried holidaymakers. ‘Kate’s back in the chalet with her friend Talia. Someone attacked Talia. They killed Bill too. The police are here but I haven’t got time to tangle with them. I’m chasing down the killer.’
Francis ran alongside him, face creasing with shock and fear. ‘What the fuck?! Is Kate all right?’
‘She’s fine… I think,’ said Lucas, because, as ever, he was never entirely sure of himself when it came to Kate. ‘But I’m getting the feeling I need to be on the coast. I think that’s where this killer is heading. And I don’t think he’s finished yet. Have you seen Kate’s other friends..? What are their names..?’
‘Nikki and Craig,’ said Francis. ‘Shit… I haven’t. I don’t know where they are, but they were supposed to be sticking together.’
Lucas felt a ping in his jeans pocket and hooked out his mobile. A voice message had come through from Kate. He pressed it close to his ear as he ran on alongside Francis, his knee singing out painfully every other step.
‘I’m out,’ came Kate’s message, breathy and urgent. ‘The police are with Talia, but I got out of the bathroom window. Where are you? I’m heading for the bunkers on the beach. I think that’s where the killer’s sent Craig and Nikki. Please get there! Get there as soon as you can!’
He snapped the call off and slowed down a fraction, grabbing Francis by the arm. ‘That was Kate — I — WAIT! Sshhh!’
The path was suddenly clear; the holiday crowd now funnelled away to the sports field by the ongoing alarm and the eerie, repetitive recorded voice. Lucas stopped and held Sid in his fist, allowing the pendulum to drop and spin and swing. ‘He’s close,’ he said. ‘He’s around here and he’s moving fast. Stick with me.’
They cut across one of the smaller toddlers’ play parks and down a narrow alley between two chalet blocks. ‘Left,’ said Lucas, feeling the pull and the buzz of Sid, and the patterns of something ugly and violent pouring along like a malevolent river between the blocks. ‘Stay behind me. Right behind me.’
Francis did, but he murmured: ‘I’m a brown-belt in karate and taekwondo. You don’t have to protect me.’
‘If I don’t, your black-belt sister will kick me into next week,’ Lucas muttered back.
There was a flash of silver and then another blur of blue. A guy in a blue jacket suddenly shot into the alley turn ahead of them, and there was a crash and a cry and the silver man sprawled into view.
‘THAT’S HIM!’ hissed Lucas.
‘Which one?’ hissed back Francis, picking up speed behind him.
‘Fuck it — I don’t know — they’re both moving too fast!’ Lucas felt his abilities spin uselessly as the two figures twenty metres ahead disentangled themselves and departed in different directions. ‘It might be both… I’m going for the guy in blue,’ he puffed. ‘Can you follow the guy in silver?’
‘Yes,’ Francis puffed back.
‘Don’t tackle him — just keep tabs. Call for
