‘What? I … Wait.’ A scream, a gurgled cry. ‘Doc, I’m hurt!’
Panic swells. ‘Drag yourself free. Quick!’
‘I don’t want to die!’
‘Stay awake!’
‘I … I can’t breathe.’
I struggle to cough, try anything—a lick of my lips, a last gulp of oxygen—anything to dismantle the rolling tide as, to my side, Patricia groans.
‘Pull your arms up!’ I shout. ‘See if there is anything you can grip on to.’
‘There’s nothing! Only a … Oh, Jesus, help! It hurts! Doc, help, please …’
Her voice stops, abrupt, a TV being switched off. ‘Patricia?’
Nothing.
‘Patricia! Patricia, shout to me that you are …’
I stop breathing.
My hands form two fists, knuckles white, chest bursting, ribs ready to crack, as my mind prepares, because this is it. The final seconds of me, of my life. Dr Maria Martinez.
Gone.
Salamancan Mountains, Spain.
34 hours and 32 minutes to confinement
I shut down the alarm and haul in a breath.
‘What’s going on, Maria?’
‘Wait.’ My eyes remain locked on the computer screen, but my vest has become sweaty and it itches my skin. I scratch my stomach, up down, unable to stop as the nerves seep out.
‘Maria, for God’s sake, what’s happening?’
‘The red icon is flashing.’
My skin flushes, feels as if it’s burning, nerve endings so sensitive to the change in the fabric. It is too much to bear. I rip off my vest, throw it to the floor. The relief is almost overwhelming.
‘Anyone on the cameras?’ Balthus says now.
I flip open the surveillance programme then pause. The reality of what could happen slams me in the face and I recount Abel’s binomial theorem to focus my mind.
No matter how many times I scan the CCTV film, it comes back blank, eight square, grey, live pictures of the fields and walls around the villa. No trespassers, no intelligence officers, just everything as it was before I stepped inside the house.
‘The cameras are displaying no signs of intruders.’
My body leans back as my mind attempts to get a handle on what is happening, already planning ahead on what I may need to do. As I think, a whip of wind lashes at a funnel of cypress trees outside, sending a swarm of starlings scurrying into the sky, and it is so sudden, so fast and loud that I jump, slapping my hand to my chest.
‘Maria, is everything all right? Talk to me.’
The starlings rush away, their swarm temporarily blackening the sky.
‘Birds,’ I say.
‘What?
The last remaining starling flies into a candy floss cloud. ‘I was frightened by a murmuration of birds.’
‘A mumur-what …?’
I stare at the now empty branches outside, wiping the sweat from my face. The air is static. For a moment, I swear a shadow glides over the sand-coloured earth, its hazy contours rippling over the deep green cypress tree giants that guard the perimeter of the villa, but when I blink and rub my eyes it is instead the tall, scorched grass reeds I see, their long, stretched shadows swaying innocently in the morning air, but each movement of the reeds vibrates in my eardrums. I take the heels of my palms, bang them to the sides of my head to try and dislodge the sound.
‘Maria?’
One more hit and the reed rush will be gone …
‘Maria? Maria, answer me.’
Bang. Done. ‘What?’
‘Did you install the tripwire system I told you about?’
‘Yes.’
‘And it’s not flagging anything up?’
‘Negative.’
‘Then what could have triggered the surveillance? Could there have been a system error?’
I consider this but am unconvinced. The CCTV shows no trespass entry, so why the alarm? My mind scans through every tiny detail, yet still concludes that all is as before—the fields are empty for several kilometres, the long gravel drive is free of foreign vehicles and the only car is an old black truck I use on the rare occasions I need to drive into the village in the fading evening sunlight for supplies. So why did the alarm sound? A colony of nerves collects in the depths of my stomach and my thumb taps my forefinger.
‘Maria, do you think you are in danger?’
My eyes flicker to the window then return to the red icon that still flashes on the laptop. ‘I cannot say with certainty until I run a complete check. But …’
Another shadow creeps across the cypresses again, this time more distinct, more clear.
More human.
A bolt of electricity shoots down my spine. ‘Someone is here.’
‘What?’
I grab my notebook, hide it behind a stack of books and run to the window, adrenaline immediately spiking as I slam my back against the wall and count to three.
‘Maria, have you seen someone?’ Balthus calls out, but I ignore him because if I shout now, if I utter one single word, whoever is out there will know my location.
Another shadow passes by. I track it. Breath heavy, heart rate way beyond acceptable, I count my steps as I drop to the ground, crawling to the opposite side of the window then standing again, acutely aware that I am unarmed, and yet instinctively knowing what to do. It scares me, always has. It scares me that if someone came in now, I am trained to not even need a gun to kill them.
Slowly, I inch my head up to the window ledge, one millimetre, two, three, until I reach the edge where the citrus scent from the groves beyond drifts in. If someone is standing by the outside of the wall, then, if I move one centimetre further, they will detect my presence. My cortisol peaks. Taking one bare foot forward, I raise my hands and step to the left, manoeuvring my body so it slips almost invisibly to the side, my brain instructing me, from some hidden training tactics manual, what to do. Prepare, wait, engage. For some reason, the phrase flicks into my mind. Prepare, wait, engage, and I realise, with revulsion, that I am recalling something the Project must have trained me on.
But, despite my disgust, I do it. I track the area, I pause, listen to every minute sound, to each tweet, rustle, bleat, creak, creating a full itinerary, a complete map of the exact scene before me until I am ready. Ready to engage.
I exhale, long, deep into my diaphragm as the sunlight dances across my eyelids, cheeks, onto my forehead, my neck, onto my bare sweat-drenched shoulders as, gradually, one millimetre after the other, I peer over the edge to the glazed window.
There is a face staring right back at me.
Salamanca, Spain.
34 hours and 28 minutes to confinement
Dr Andersson stares straight back at me.
I yell out her name, alerting Balthus, still on the cell, as Dr Andersson ducks out of sight, running towards the far entrance where the kitchen yawns wide open,