She aimed a punch at his sternum, high and fast, but not fast enough. He leaned back, grabbed her arm and reeled her in backwards, crushing her against his chest, the tip of his knife suddenly pushing into her chin.
“Got you right where I want you now, honey.”
“Yeah,” said Shirley, “me too,” and flexed her free left arm up over her shoulder to drive the splintered edge of half a compact disc into his eye. When he screamed and released her, she turned and landed a kick where her punch had been aimed. He staggered backwards, his thighs hit the window ledge, and over he went, still screaming.
Shirley made a crosshatch sign with her fingers. Hashtag epicfail, dickhead.
He’d taken the knife with him, but when she patted her jacket pocket the other half of the Arcade Fire CD, broken in her recent fall, was still there. Might come in handy.
On the ground below, a shadow was heading towards the Black Arrow van.
Shirley ran back to the stairwell.
Donovan fired three times on his way to where Traynor lay, his shots directed at the space where the door had been. When he reached his friend he dropped to his knees and cut the plastic ties binding his feet. Louisa stood and fired twice, both bullets carving chunks from the already battered door frame.
The thought felt like an intrusion from an onlooker; someone not immediately involved in the action, and thus able to adopt judgmental attitudes.
A figure popped briefly into sight through the doorway and squeezed off a shot at Donovan that went wild.
He was cutting Traynor’s wrists loose now.
River said, “He won’t make it.”
“Thanks for the input.” Louisa stood again and fired twice, thinking
“Welcome.”
And then River was gone again—he was doing that a lot—had leaped from their cover and was running towards where Donovan was struggling with Traynor. The figure in the doorway popped into sight again: he fired once, then jerked back to safety when Louisa shot back. River shouted Donovan’s name, and the soldier stooped and slid his gun across the floor, then hauled Traynor to his feet. River scooped the gun up and slid to a halt behind the overturned filing cabinet just as the figure behind the broken wall appeared again and rattled off three shots at the two soldiers. Donovan and Traynor collapsed. River stood, aimed, and fired at the precise moment Louisa, somewhere behind him, did the same. The Black Arrow with the gun jerked backwards as if his strings had been cut.
There were smells in the air now: cordite, blood. The dust that hangs around archives was swimming in the air.
A baton slammed into the cabinet next to River’s head, but it had been hurled, not swung. A shape disappeared behind a stack of crates. River thought about shooting, but didn’t; if it was armed, it would have fired at him.
Louisa joined him. “There’s at least one loose in here,” she said. “No idea how many through there.”
The corridor behind the blasted door, she meant.
River said, “They’re sitting ducks if that’s the only way they can get in.”
“We don’t have much ammo.”
“They don’t know that.”
He plucked a ledger from the floor and lobbed it at the doorway. Neat throw: it sailed right through unmolested.
“Good shot,” Louisa said. “Proving what exactly?”
“Maybe they don’t have much ammo either. Cover me.”
She stood and took aim at the doorway, arms steady on the top of the cabinet, but nobody appeared there. River ran in a crab-like crouch for Donovan and Traynor, who were in a heap on the floor; when he pulled Donovan up his face was covered in blood.
But the blood was Benjamin Traynor’s, the back of whose head was missing.
Donovan had been hit too, but a good-guy wound—good guys get shot in the shoulder. His eyes were out of focus, though, and River struggled to get him off the ground. He half-dragged half-carried him back to the cover of the overturned cabinet, then dropped him, panting.
“They’re either mustering their forces or have no fucking clue what to do.”
“Or they’ve gone,” Louisa said. She was unbuttoning Donovan’s shirt; to check his wound, River assumed.
Donovan came awake, and he seized her by the wrist with his good hand. “Don’t.”
Louisa laid her gun aside, and unclamped his hand. “Your friend’s dead,” she said. “And an unknown number of hostiles are shooting at us. I think we can safely say your operation’s fucked.”
“Ben’s dead?”
“I’m sorry.”
He closed his eyes again, and she undid another button, then pulled free the folder he’d been carrying. An ordinary manila one, its top corner stained with his blood, or his friend’s.
She handed it to River. “Let’s keep this safe.”
