utensils in the galley.
Dana was fifteen and had lived on CHERUB campus since she was seven. She’d been baked, frozen, half drowned and shot at during training exercises, she’d read eight-hundred-page computer hacking textbooks, learned to speak Russian and had her nose rubbed in puke by a sadistic training instructor; but all she had to show for it were a string of missions that had fizzled out or only been partially successful.
Now Dana had a chance to prove it had all been worthwhile. She felt like the last eight years of her life had all been building up to what was going to happen in the next few hours.
*
Chloe sat in a car at the roadside, with the Ark glowing serenely two kilometres ahead. There was no hint of the brewing trouble. The helicopter attack was due in nine minutes. She had a satellite phone at her ear and could barely hear the man talking to her, because his voice was being patched through from a helicopter that was thirty kilometres off, but closing in rapidly.
‘Why won’t you listen to me?’ Chloe shouted. ‘There are more than a hundred children inside the Ark. I have two undercover operatives who have positively identified an array of heavy weaponry.’
‘We’re aware of their capability, Miss,’ the TAG unit commander shouted back patronisingly. ‘This raid has been planned carefully. We’ve been in training for two months.’
‘You’re not listening to me,’ Chloe yelled, growing increasingly exasperated. ‘I have reason to believe that Joel Regan is dead. You’re attacking at the worst possible time. The Ark has been locked down tight and the Survivors are in an emergency state of readiness.’
‘Well, I haven’t received any such intelligence …’
‘Yes you have. I just told you.’
‘… from credible sources,’ the commando added sourly. ‘We’ve trained for this raid. We’re an elite unit. Now I know you’re worried about your undercover operatives, but this plan has been authorised at Prime Ministerial level.’
Chloe groaned. ‘Is there anyone from ASIS up there in the chopper with you?’
The TAG commander seemed only too pleased to get Chloe off his back and handed the radio across without another word.
‘Who are you exactly?’ the ASIS officer asked stiffly.
Chloe wasn’t about to reveal the existence of CHERUB to a helicopter full of commandos. ‘I’m on attachment from British intelligence,’ she explained. ‘I have two agents inside the Ark and they’re telling me that Eleanor Regan has issued weapons to every able-bodied adult. If you go into that Ark tonight, you’re going to face a significantly – I repeat significantly – more hostile reaction than the one you’re expecting.’
‘Miss Blake,’ the ASIS officer said bluntly. ‘I’m not even aware of any undercover operation inside the Ark and there’s no way we can pull out at this stage. If you’re still in contact with your undercover officers, I suggest you tell them to find refuge. The raid will commence in five minutes. If you feel we’re behaving inappropriately, you can file an official complaint after the event.’
‘Arsehole,’ Chloe gasped, losing her temper. ‘I just hope you live that long.’
Chloe ended the call and threw the satellite phone down on the passenger seat in frustration. After a groan, she grabbed another radio that was resting on the glovebox flap.
‘James, do you copy?’
‘Loud and clear. What’s going on, are they still coming?’
‘Looks that way,’ Chloe said. ‘Eight on the dot. What’s your situation?’
‘Same as,’ James said. ‘Eleanor put out an announcement over the Tannoy that Joel died and told everyone to protect themselves from a possible attack by devils. Everyone here is tooled up and running around dressed like Action Man. When they hear those choppers they’re gonna think it’s the bloody apocalypse.’
‘What kind of weapons are you seeing?’
‘Automatic rifles mostly,’ James said. ‘AK-47s, M16 carbines. There’s heavier stuff being set up inside the turrets: twenty-millimetre cannons and rocket-propelled grenades.’
‘Where are you now?’
‘We’re in a classroom on the first floor of the adult education centre. Rat took us here because it’s deserted: it’s been mothballed since they stopped letting guests inside the Ark.’
‘OK,’ Chloe said. ‘Can you find somewhere with better cover, like an underground bunker or something?’
‘Yeah,’ James said. ‘Rat says there’s a bunch of tunnels right under here. But we won’t be able to see what’s going on once we’re down there.’
‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ Chloe said. ‘We’ve got total communication breakdown. The Special Forces commander won’t listen to me and the ASIS officers up there haven’t been briefed on the CHERUB mission. In the end