© mywriter 2010

04.00

Lisa sat up startled. She realised she’d drifted off to sleep while
scanning the maps. In the bathroom she splashed her face with water
and then wiped it clean with a dry towel, which she left on the floor
once she was done. She saw her whole face was as white as a sheet in
the mirror and shook her head as though disbelieving that the
reflection was hers.

Slowly, she made her way back to the bedroom but found herself
drifting in and out of consciousness. She couldn’t fall asleep, she told
herself. Not now! She knew she had to do something but she couldn’t
put her mind on what it was exactly. Stopping outside her parents’
room, she listened to the snoring sounds over the sounds of the heavy
rain outside. They were still fast asleep…but for how much longer?

Gently she nudged open their door and watched them sleep
innocently, totally unaware of what was happening in the outside
world.

That’s when she saw it – the car keys were dangling over the side of
one of the open draws. Ten minutes later she may not have done it but
acting on impulse she moved swiftly and quietly across the room,
grabbed the keys and then closed the door behind her again. For a
second she considered putting them back but she couldn’t stand
around any longer.

She didn’t believe I was safe and the truth was, neither did I. In fact, to
know she was coming for me would have raised my hopes quite
significantly. Instead, though, I was being held on the other side of a
wall from just about everyone I knew by some men who could have

© mywriter 2010
even been the people who caused the destruction happening all
around.

Lisa grabbed her laptop before leaving the house and wading through
the thin blanket of flooded water that now covered the driveway and
front lawn. The car was quite old but had large tires and would easily
be able to drive across the flooded areas.

She climbed in, soaking the seat and floor in doing so, and placed the
laptop on the seat next to her, immediately turning it on. The flooding
wasn’t a problem right then; the fact she didn’t know how to drive was,
though.

While she was getting in the vehicle, I was getting out of another. The
two men, Barney and Carl led me along an unbelievably muddy
country path up to a large barn in the middle of a landscape made up
entirely of fields.

“A barn?!” I spluttered. “This is where you work?”

“It’s temporary. Our main office is hundreds of miles away but we were
positioned here recently near where Karlos was reported to be seen.
We needed a place which wouldn’t be suspected,” Barney explained.

“As you say, it looks like a barn. But inside we’ve got extremely
important technology,” Carl supplemented.

“So how long do you work here for? How many are there in here?” I
asked but they seemed reluctant to answer at first. Then, I realised
that they wanted me to see the answers for myself, motioning for me
to the lead the way inside the barn.

I opened the door, cautiously, unsure what I’d find. I was shocked to

© mywriter 2010
see computer monitors, keyboards, speakers and many electronic
devices I wouldn’t be able to name covering almost every inch of the
main room. Ten or so men and women worked at the monitors,
glancing up briefly to see me and the two men were standing there
and then returning back to their work like robots.

“Is this everyone who works here?” I asked.

“There used to be rotations and we get many visitors from the

organisation each day to keep us company but with everything going
on at the moment, we’re all working at once, and we’re all on high
alert. About thirty important people in the organisation are heading
down here soon so we can work out our next steps. But for now…I’d
like to introduce you to Rodrick, the operations manager of the Karlos
investigation.”

I saw a broad, dark skinned man step out from one of the side rooms.
He wore khaki and his black hair was a total mess. When he spotted
us, he came over and spoke in a voice that showed he was out of
breath and I had a feeling that was more to do with stress than him
running a marathon.

“erm…hello. Everything run smoothly?” he said to Barney.

“Yes, sir. This is the boy – Jamie.”

“Hi,” I said, trying to give a smile.

“You’re the kid in the car, right?” Rodrick said not once smiling back.

“Yeah.”

“You have a lot to tell us. Please, sit down…”

I saw the chair he was pointing to, and, reluctantly, I sat. They didn’t

© mywriter 2010
ask any questions straight away, just told me to tell the story but as
soon as I began, I found myself being interrupted ever few seconds
with a query about colours of clothing, facial expressions, the shape
and type of guns, the sounds of the motorbike I heard…everything!

I struggled to answer most of them, unable to collect my thoughts

together enough to remember everything as it happened. Some things
I pictured clearly and vividly as though they’d happened just now while
other things were a distant blur.

“Sorry, I can’t really help,” I croaked as they turned away from me to

discuss amongst themselves once I’d finished.

Rodrick turned and bent down, staring me in the eyes. “Trust me,
Jamie. You’ve told us a lot. If Karlos hasn’t changed clothes or
somehow modified his facial features, we should be able to pick him up
the instant he hits a nearby town or city. He’ll be heading for higher
land if he wants to be safe from the flooding and we know the rough
speed of the motorbike from your description of the noise. We know his
direction too along that road. See, there’s a lot you can gather from
one story…”

Rodrick stood up and called the men and women at the monitors.
“Everyone, listen up! I want men to be on the ready in the following
positions…”

He turned to me and said quickly, “Go with Barney to the bed area.
You must be exhausted.”

* * *

Lisa was tense as she started the engine. She’d seen her mum do this
a thousand times, she thought. It didn’t look that hard. She glanced
over at the screen of the laptop and the instructions on the page- “How

© mywriter 2010
to drive an automatic car”.

“Easy,” she muttered to herself but didn’t hear the words come out of
her mouth. The rain was pounding against the front window and she
realised she couldn’t see out of it. She flicked one of the levers and
was relieved to see the windscreen wipers had started as expected. It
would be treacherous driving in such conditions for even a normal
person…but then again she wasn’t normal. Other cars were off the
road which would make it fairly easy going and hardly anyone would
be up at this time anyway.

She finally put her foot on the accelerator and she was off, straight out
the driveway and a sharp turn round into the road. It took her a good
few minutes to get the hang of the controls but then she was fully
awake, and pumping with adrenaline.

Round another corner and she was driving along a half flooded road
which she decided to take slowly. Everything was going reasonably
fine and she calculated it would take a good few hours to get to the
marshes and back.

A good few hours…her parents would be up by then she realised. Her

heart sunk and she considered turning back but the adrenalin kept her
going. She had to find me, she kept telling herself. She had to.

That’s when it happened. The sky glowed red again, like setting alight
for the fifth or sixth time that night. She stared up, taking her eyes off
the road. The second she looked up, she lost control of the steering
and the car swerved onto the other side of the road. She reacted fast
and grabbed the steering wheel to try and force it the other way but it
was too late. She was about to collide with a motorbike heading the
other way.

© mywriter 2010
At the last moment, the motorbike skidded round so low that the three
riders were flung off the seat and onto the pavement. The motorbike
slid straight under the car, but burst into flames as it smashed straight
into the lamppost at the edge of the pavement.

In hysterics, Lisa slammed her foot on the break and her breathing
sped up. As the car pulled to a stop she undid her seatbelt and virtually
bashed open the door. Three men on a one-man motorbike…it didn’t
really figure but she wasn’t able to think straight at that moment and
put it to the back of her mind. What would her parents say?

As she rounded the side of the car she saw the three men approach
her like they wanted to kill her. She didn’t have the guts to stick
around a see what they had to say and started to sprint towards the
entrance to the park a little way away. She glanced back and managed
to make out the men climbing into the car. What were they going to
do?

The car started to move and for a second she was worried they would
try to run her over. She reached the trees at the edge of the park and
found cover behind one just as the car passed by. A volley of bullets
suddenly ripped through the air just meters from her, slamming into
the mud and dirt.

She didn’t dare move from her hiding and she was glad because just
seconds later, more bullets were shot across the park. She held her
breath and waited, listening for any sounds of the men approaching
but all she could hear above the rain was the squealing of tires on road
as the car turned a corner. They were leaving her…in her parents’ car.
Jamie’s not going to believe this, she grimaced.

© mywriter 2010
© mywriter 2010