pot. “Where’s Yannick?”
“Outside. Let him have a break.”
“Oh, ‘let him have a break’,” Jimmy mocked. “Looks like I’m the one who’ll spend my life cooking now.”
“What’s the matter with you?”
Jimmy tried to hold back his anger. “Sorry, Georgie,” he said. “I shouldn’t take it out on you. It’s just that…” he paused mid-sentence to baste a chicken. “I hate this. How come I can cook?”
“It’s your programming,” Georgie answered as gently as she could.
“That’s what I told him,” Felix chipped in.
“But it’s a stupid skill,” Jimmy grumbled. “It’s like whatever dumb idea Dr Higgins had eleven years ago is inside me.” He felt himself becoming more and more worked up, and he couldn’t hold it back. “They don’t know where I am,” he yelled, “and they don’t know what I’m doing, but NJ7 is still controlling me.”
Helen slipped into the kitchen with concern on her face. “What’s all the noise about?” she asked, picking up a potato from the floor.
“Jimmy doesn’t want to cook,” Felix announced.
“That’s OK,” Helen said immediately. “I’ll help and—”
“No!” Jimmy screamed, “I don’t want to be able to cook and I don’t want to be able to kill.”
Jimmy’s mother looked across at Georgie, then back at her son. There was one thing they had to discuss, so she forced herself to bring it up. “Look,” she began, “I know this must be confusing for you both. About me and your father, I mean.”
Jimmy glanced at his sister then dropped his eyes to the floor. Felix shifted uneasily from foot to foot.
“Er,” he stuttered, “I have to, er, go finish my…” He edged towards the door, “…you know, on that…string.”
Once Felix had gone, Jimmy found the atmosphere even more stifling.
“Whatever happens,” his mother continued, “none of this is your fault – either of you. Don’t blame yourselves.”
Jimmy let the words bounce off him. He knew what his answer was, but he refused to let himself say it. Then his sister said it for him.
“I don’t blame myself,” she mumbled. “I blame you and Dad.”
Jimmy didn’t know where to look. His sister’s words had stoked the anger inside him. He noticed his hands were shaking slightly, then saw that his mother’s were too.
“OK,” sighed Helen, “that’s fine. But we both still love you just as much. And I know you still love your father.”
“How can you still love someone,” Jimmy flashed back, “when you know what they’re doing is wrong?” He immediately regretted his words, but couldn’t take it back now. His mother said nothing. She had no answer. For a few seconds she stared at Jimmy and Georgie, then she backed out of the kitchen. As she did, the seething liquid in one of the pots bubbled over.
Helen walked straight into Christopher Viggo, who caught her delicately by the shoulders and looked into her face.
“What’s going on?” he whispered. Helen made sure the door was shut behind her so that her children couldn’t see.
“It’s nothing,” she quivered. “Forget it.”
“Listen,” Viggo rasped, “the kids are just restless. They need to get out of the house – let off some steam.”
“It’s too dangerous.”
Viggo looked deep into Helen’s eyes and let out a sigh. “Yannick says the village up the road is pretty small. The risk of NJ7 picking it out is minimal. He says there’s a lake nearby and stables…” He softly lifted Helen’s chin. “Let them have some fun. It could be days before we hear from Stovorsky.”
“You think I’m being overprotective,” Helen whispered, “but they’re my children.” She held his gaze for a moment then pulled away and hurried upstairs.
Viggo was about to follow, but there was a pounding on the front door. Jimmy had heard it too and rushed out of the kitchen followed by billows of steam. He looked to Viggo for guidance and the ex-agent shook his head as if to say, “Don’t worry”. At that instant, Felix came tearing down the stairs.
“Who’s at the d—” he started. Viggo grabbed him and put a hand across his mouth. He was too late. Whoever was outside had heard them and hammered again.
“Coming!” Viggo called out, then stuttered the same thing in French: “On arrive?’
Jimmy pointed at the shadow in the crack under the door. There was clearly only one person there, but what if there were others further from the door? They couldn’t look out of the windows as Yannick had boarded them up after the DGSE had smashed them.
Jimmy ran upstairs and approached a window that overlooked the front of the building. Crouching low, he scanned the horizon. He could just discern the rooftops of the village up the road, but nothing out of the ordinary. His heart was pumping and he was almost relieved that at last he had something to occupy him.
He opened the window as quietly as he could and squeezed out, trampling the carnations in the window box. The wind tousled his hair; what a great feeling it was to be outside again. From here he could only just make out the person waiting at the front door – the overhang restricted his view. Jimmy quickly moved up the side of the building, clinging to the timber, each finger hard as rock.
It was a matter of habit now to call up his programming when he needed it. When the swirl from his belly engulfed his brain then saturated every muscle, it was a kind of comfort. Too much of a comfort in fact. He had to keep a part of his human self active. He knew how easy it would be for him to slip into the evil ways his body craved. He knew also that the programming would grow more powerful every day until he was eighteen. It was designed to completely swamp the human in him by then. That was a terrifying thought.
Jimmy reached the roof and stalked along until he was directly above the front door. Then he jumped. The wind rushed into his face. His eyes watered, his stomach lurched, then…
BAM!
Jimmy landed right on top of the figure, flattening him. Jimmy held him down, but couldn’t see anything. His face was full of flowers. The man under him was terrified, cursing in French. The front door swung open. Viggo was ready for action.
But there wasn’t any – just a flower delivery man, quaking with fear. Jimmy brushed the man down while they were still on the ground, then rolled to one side, spat out a flurry of petals and made a mental note to land with his mouth closed in future. Viggo seized the mangled bunch of flowers and flicked a tip into the dust. Jimmy muttered an apology and skulked back indoors where Felix was laughing hysterically.
“That was so funny,” he howled. “Did you see the look on his face?”
“What’s
