We’ll protect you.”
Badger looked over to the camera in the corner of the room and a moment later the door slid open. To Private Marvin L. Shwartz’s amazement, the long subterranean corridor running beneath Fort Knox was lined with well over a hundred insurance men. Each of them was wearing a light grey suit.
Ned had to think quickly; what time he had was running out. Which would be the safer route? To continue along the rooftops, or to risk the gardens below with their noisy dogs and fences? His assailant was experienced, extremely so, but uncomfortable off the ground.
“Concealment,” he whispered bitterly, repeating the first of his training’s many golden rules.
He’d stick to the rooftops for now. Ned needed every advantage against the man following him if he was going to make it. He’d learnt to make little noise on the lead-lined tiles beneath him, and now he scampered quietly to the edge. He closed his eyes and the ring on his finger hummed. A beat later and the tiles from number 37 started to move. A year ago it would have taken all of his concentration. But Ned was more powerful now, the Amplifications his dad had taught him came as easily as breathing, and “Seeing” had been the very first form of Engineering that he’d learnt to master.
He focused on the squares of slate in front of him. Atom by atom they bent to his will, as though the roof itself had come alive. Light, strong aluminium started to form up from the grey stone in layers of interlocking pieces, each one forming over the other in precise ordered segments. To anyone else watching it would have been a moving marvel, but to Ned it was the beginnings of a walkway between two roofs.
Something stirred in the shadows below. Even when focused he’d learnt to listen, to hear the difference between background noise and the rustling of a hidden assailant. The man below was waiting. If he knew Ned’s location, he was no doubt making ready to strike. Ned blinked and the aluminium clattered back to a row of lifeless tiles. He’d cross the old-fashioned way. His lungs filled, one pace, two – and Ned let his muscles throw him across the gap. The timing was perfect.
The corners of his mouth turned towards a smile as his foot made contact with the next rooftop. And then it happened – the temperature around him plummeted, the tiles beneath his feet suddenly turning to ice.
“Urgh!”
His feet skidded along the now-frozen rooftop and his belly hit the tiles hard; he was starting to slide. “Breathe,” he whispered, and a year and a half of physical and mental training took over. Ned’s eyes closed and his hands shot out beside him. As his body flew over the edge of the roof he grabbed at the gutter, his hand like a steel vice. But there was give, too much give.
“Plastic,” he groaned.
The gutter tore from the wall and a second later he was two floors below with the wind knocked out of him and frost-covered garden grass beneath his back.
“Oww,” he managed.
Using the ice had been clever, but the man in the shadows had not finished. There was a loud voom, and from somewhere in the darkness a ball of fire raced towards Ned. He rolled and the flames changed, sputtering into raindrops before they could singe the grass below. The family at number 42 were too engrossed with the news on their television to notice the scene beyond their sliding patio doors. Ned caught a glimpse of the rolling headline.
ANOTHER KIDNAPPING REPORTED. POLICE SAY—
But he needed to focus.
Ned could think of a dozen ways to escape. An impenetrable shield of rock or iron could be yanked up from the lawn. He could disassemble the atoms of every wooden fence and brick wall between where he now stood and the safety of his home. But Ned wasn’t allowed to think for himself – rules were rules and he would have to find a quieter way. A way of escaping without his neighbours knowing he’d been there, and more importantly without them learning what Ned could do.
A smoke screen – straight out of the Engineer’s manual and, as such, allowed. Begrudgingly he thought about wood, he thought about it in every detail, the grain, the texture, the smell, till he could see the atoms in his mind’s eye. And then he speeded them up, faster and faster, heating them all the time, till the ring on his finger crackled with life and the air in the garden folded in on itself. But the Engine on his finger responded violently this time, Amplifying his frustration to make a cloud of burning black smoke, too much for his needs, and in seconds he could barely see in front of his nose, let alone breathe.
Ned’s eyes stung and he ran to where he hoped the garden fence was, before stumbling headfirst into a rosebush.
“Ow!”
The mistake had cost him, as two feet padded across the lawn, closing the gap between Ned and his assailant. He fumbled frantically on, his hands and feet found a wall, and he was over and gaining ground in a moment, the cloud of noxious smoke now blissfully behind him.
Another wall, this time lined with high fencing, another family glued to their screens. Ned wished he could be more like them, seeing the world through the safety of a telly. But the man behind him would never let go, never let him forget who he was, who he had been behind the Veil. One more wall and he was home, one more and the chase would come to an end. He made ready to leap when he saw it forming in front of him: a complex array of iron spikes, sharp and cruel, growing out of the bricks and mortar.
The work was unmistakable: only a true master could have crafted them with such precise and intricate detail.
A voice in the darkness called out to him. A voice that had watched his every move.
“What is the family motto?”
“Look before you leap,” said Ned wearily.
“And I’m glad you did, son, the guard-spikes would have been sore as hell, and your mum’s fed up with having to mend your clothes.”
“It’s not great for me, either, Dad,” said Ned. “She’s rubbish with a sewing machine.”
“Good session, though,” said Ned’s dad. “You’re improving all the time. You really slowed me down with that smoke.”
“Not enough.”
“No,” said his dad. “But you’ll get there. It’s just a matter of time.”
Ned thought of the nights stretching ahead of him, nights of training, of climbing and jumping and falling, when everyone else was watching TV.
“Great,” he mumbled.
