it had apparently changed. He wouldn’t be spending years in a Russian jail after all.
Stratton remained where he was for many hours. At one point he drifted off to sleep, the long hours and violent events of the day getting the better of him, despite the grim prospect of his impending end. He woke up at one point after hearing a sound close by only to discover that it was the young guard holding a cup of water out to him. Stratton drank it as the man held the cup.
During his conscious moments, Stratton considered every possible avenue of escape, one of which included getting back down into the emergency tunnel and taking his chances with the vertical shaft. But no matter what he came up with, while he was chained so heavily to the bracket and with a guard seated at the door holding a gun and watching him, the opportunity for any kind of escape attempt looked highly unlikely.
He had no accurate sense of the passing time and how long he had dozed off for. The only clue that it had been several hours since his capture was that his clothes had practically dried on him. The lights remained the same and the only sound was the constant hum of machinery. After another period of pondering a variety of dead ends he fell back into a fitful half-sleep, his bottom aching on the cold concrete floor, his back uncomfortable against the rock wall, his wrists chafing against his chains, his bruises and burns combining with the other pains and discomforts.
As Stratton dozed he was distantly aware that the lights had gone out and although he heard the door open it was not enough to drag him fully out of his slumber. Even the sound of a dull thud followed by the clatter of something metallic on the concrete floor came like a distant echo and could easily have been part of a dream. But something deep inside his mind called to him to wake up and it was eventually a rush of fear that startled him into consciousness.
He opened his eyes to a room in near darkness, the only light coming through the open door and from the glowing bulbs on the pumping machine’s control panel. A figure crouched by another that was lying on the floor. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light Stratton realised the guard was lying prone and the other figure was searching his pockets.
The figure stood up and walked towards him. The red and green lights on the machine beside him revealed its identity: Rowena, in a boiler suit a few sizes too large for her. She crouched beside him, holding a couple of keys.
‘Are you injured?’ she asked calmly as she tried the first key in the lock.
‘No,’ Stratton replied, getting to his knees.
‘That’s good. I suspect we’re going to have to run at some point. And maybe more than that.’
He could only stare at her as she fitted the next key and twisted it in the lock that then popped open. He removed the chains and got to his feet.
She stood up in front of him, looking into eyes that were full of questions. ‘I always suspected Jason,’ she said. ‘Not of being a traitor, though. A woman knows when a man is hiding something from her. I thought he was cheating on me. But my digging only led to him and Binning. I even wondered if they were gay. I was almost relieved when I found out. Female ego.’
‘How long have you known?’
‘Couple of hours. I thought you’d all perished with the platform. I watched it sink from the lifeboat. Then the Russian mini-sub arrived and took us away. I’ve been here a week, kept in an office with a bunk bed.’
‘How did you get to me?’ Stratton asked as he walked over to check on the young guard.
‘I wasn’t always a scientist.’
Stratton glanced at her, remembering what Jason had said about her.
‘I did a selection course for a military undercover unit. I got pulled out after I finished it. We covered hostage situations,’ she explained. ‘I learned a few things. From the moment they took me from Binning I played the pathetic frightened child.’
‘That must have been a challenge.’
Rowena was not offended by the remark.
The young guard remained unconscious but Stratton decided he would live.
‘The guards took to locking me in the office. They felt sorry for me and stopped checking on me every few hours. After a