Max managed the most spectacular piece of damage by lifting up an office chair and shattering the glass partition behind the receptionist’s desk.
Ryan was first out of the building and alarmed to see a posse of four blokes striding purposefully across the car park towards him. They were all big, and all but one wore safety boots and the wood shop’s distinctive green sweatshirt.
‘Oi-oi!’ the one in the lead shouted. ‘Stop walking right where you are.’
‘Thieving little bastards,’ another added.
Ryan turned back inside and shouted, ‘We’ve got company.’
Max raced out, closely followed by Alfie, who had the collapsible ladder in one hand and held a yucca plant like a spear in the other.
‘You poofters can’t catch us!’ Max shouted, making a wanking gesture as he started running after Ryan.
Alfie’s bulk made him slower than Ryan and Max, but he still had an edge over the chasing pack. Ryan pushed through a waist-height hedge and reached the approach road. He saw Amy driving the Mercedes into the trading estate’s entrance about a hundred metres away and realised they had a problem.
The road Ryan stood in reached a dead end at the locked gates of a toner supply company. To get to Amy they’d have to get through the four men, two of whom appeared to be brandishing lengths of wood.
‘Why run this way, dick brain?’ Alfie asked, as he emerged from the hedge.
Ryan knew he’d get into a pointless argument if he replied.
‘They’re old and slow,’ Max said contemptuously. ‘Let’s have ’em!’
‘Put your stuff down and wait for the cops,’ one of the men shouted.
‘Slags,’ Max shouted, shaking his fist in the air as he led a charge.
Ryan wasn’t convinced that taking on four well-built blokes was a better course of action than getting arrested by the cops and waiting for CHERUB to arrange their release, but on the other hand he’d never live it down if he left his mates to fight alone.
As Max launched a two-footed flying kick, Alfie brandished the yucca plant like a lance and used it to fend off a bloke swinging at him with a two by four plank. Ryan was a few metres behind and faced a mad-eyed fellow who’d circled behind Max and Alfie.
‘Stay,’ the man ordered, as he swooshed a plank of wood through the air. ‘Wait for the cops or I’ll give you a pasting.’
‘Make me,’ Ryan said as he kept jogging.
The man swung with the plank, but Ryan kicked back explosively. The plank shattered against the sole of his trainer. He caught its pirouetting end out of the air and swung it around, belting his opponent hard across the knuckles. As the man stumbled back, Ryan dropped him with a kick in the guts.
Up ahead, Alfie had triumphed medieval style with a yucca plant sword and the collapsible ladder serving as a shield. Max’s opponent was crawling away holding his stomach, while the fourth man didn’t like what he’d seen and was running for cover.
Amy pulled up fifty metres away. She blasted her horn and shouted into her earpiece.
‘Move your butts, the cops will be here any minute.’
Max got in first. Alfie climbed in the other side and rather than faff about opening the front door Ryan dived in quickly beside Max. Amy set tyres squealing as Ryan pulled up the door. The boys flew across the car as she launched into a high-speed reverse, followed by a squealing handbrake turn.
‘Not exactly textbook,’ Alfie said, as Amy put the car in drive and sped off, ‘but that was the best ruck I’ve had in months.’
Amy sounded cross as she blasted her horn and cut on to a section of dual carriageway. ‘Please tell me that amidst that carnage you kept hold of the invoices.’
‘I’ve got them,’ Max said, as he pulled them from the pack still strapped to his back.
It was only as Ryan reached around to put on his seatbelt that he considered the clump of muddy roots resting in his lap, stretching across Max’s knees and ending up with spiky leaves sprouting up around Alfie.
‘Why have you still got the bloody yucca plant?’ Ryan asked.
‘I’ll find a new pot for it when we get back to campus,’ Alfie explained. ‘I’m thinking of naming it Doris.’
48. RESULTS
Ning felt down as she showered in her room. She’d strained her shoulder in the pool, and it really hurt as she scrubbed and scrubbed with a watery deodorising soap that smelled of alcohol and left her skin raw and dry.
When she stepped out, she saw that someone had been in her room. They’d left a tray of sandwiches, juice and tea on the bed, taken the foul-smelling kit away and replaced it with a clean set. As she sat down in a robe, pulling the sandwiches apart to see what was inside, Ning noticed a piece of folded paper tucked between the tea pot and the milk jug:
Please report to my office at 6 p.m. Do not leave your room unless you hear a fire alarm. If you need anything urgently dial 75 on your phone and speak to my assistant.
Zara Asker, Chairwoman.
It was just after three and Ning knew the wait would be agony. She nibbled sandwiches and flipped through news channels on the TV. Some actor had died, someone had been blown up in the Middle East, an MP had resigned.
She’d seen the news regularly at Kirkcaldy and the fact that there were hardly ever any stories about China always made her feel homesick. The news also made her wonder about her stepdad. Was he in prison? Had his trial begun? Had he already been executed?
Ning spotted a pencil next to the bedside phone and used the back of the note to write down her prospects:
Fight – Did better than Carlos, but argued with Zara.
Exam – Did pretty good ???
Rabbit – Good.
Pool – Carlos crushed me.
Height – Did OK, except at the end. Lost temper.
She’d hoped things would seem clearer in writing, but the results looked as mixed on paper as they’d been in her head.
At half-five she flicked off the TV and started getting dressed. She felt like a visiting alien as she peeked into rooms, and saw CHERUB agents having Saturday afternoon video game competitions, or watching sport on TV. In the lift down to the ground floor, she was accompanied by two girls dressed for tennis. They chatted confidently as Ning stood in the back corner of the lift with an intense feeling of paranoia.
She reached Zara’s office eight minutes early, but Zara let her straight in and she sounded warm as she told Ning to sit down.
‘You did well,’ Zara said, making Ning break into a smile. ‘Amy didn’t give me much time to read through your personal file, but I quickly realised you were going to match or exceed all the physical requirements for joining CHERUB.
‘However, I was less certain about your suitability for working undercover. You have a history of discipline problems, in terms of following instructions, being disruptive and getting expelled from schools. So, I arranged the tests to make you uncomfortable, to stress you mentally, try and irritate you, or make you blow up and quit.’
‘I did kind of lose it with Carlos at the end,’ Ning said.
Zara laughed as she pressed a button on her intercom. ‘You can all come in now.’
Carlos led the way, holding out a leather cushion with a carefully folded blue CHERUB training T-shirt resting on it. He was followed by Ryan and Amy and Connor.
‘Welcome to CHERUB,’ Zara said. ‘You did really, really well today. I was especially impressed with the rabbit, and the way you didn’t let me bully you into seriously hurting Carlos in the dojo.’
Ning smiled, but didn’t fully understand. Had Carlos also been accepted? Then she realised he was wearing a grey CHERUB T-shirt which meant …
‘You’re not a recruit,’ Ning blurted.
‘Carlos is small for his age,’ Zara explained, as Carlos, Amy and Ryan all laughed. ‘He qualified as a CHERUB agent last year. I asked him to find every possible way to irritate you: taking the Mickey out of your accent, taking credit when he didn’t deserve it, puking on you, humming during
the exam, dropping your pencil from his eighth-floor balcony so that the lead inside kept breaking.’
Ning shrieked and put her hands over her face. ‘AAARGH!’ she yelled. ‘You have no idea how much I wanted to beat the crap out of you.’
‘I got a silver in the last campus kickboxing tournament,’ Carlos said, as he held out the blue training shirt. ‘You might have a harder time if we ever do fight again. So are you expecting me to hold this thing up all day, or what?’
Ning didn’t want to strip in front of everyone, so she pulled the blue shirt over her orange one.
‘Don’t give Carlos all the credit though,’ Amy said. ‘The zip wire was Ryan’s idea.’
Ning looked confused again. ‘What did you do?’
‘There’s two different kinds of handles,’ Connor explained. ‘Some have special gears so that you go down more slowly. We usually use slow handles for little kids so that they get used to the jump. But today we all used the slow ones, and you had a normal one. We figured there was at least an eighty per cent chance you’d get the timing wrong and end up in the shit.’
‘You’re evil,’ Ning screamed, then burst out laughing. ‘I can’t believe you all knew about this. I hate all of you!’
‘The good news is you’re not gonna catch E. coli or something from the crap either,’ Ryan said. ‘It’s actually mud and clay, mixed with fruit peel and a few chemicals to give it that authentic farmyard pong. But don’t tell any red-shirts that, we like to throw them in once in a while.’
‘The puke was fake too,’ Carlos explained. ‘Mashed potato, sour milk, carrot and apple juice. I had it in a little squeezy bag and squirted it over your back.’
‘Damn, I feel stupid now,’ Ning said, but she was grinning and had tears of happiness streaking down her face.
‘It’s Saturday night,’ Ryan said, as he patted Ning on the back. ‘I’ll introduce you to everyone, and we’ll have a laugh, yeah?’
Ning bounced on her toes as she went around hugging everyone in turn, leaving Zara until last.
‘Thank you so much for letting me join,’ Ning said. ‘I was starting to hate my life.’
‘Can you give Ning and me a few moments?’ Zara said.
Ryan was last out and spoke to Ning as he stood in the doorway. ‘When you’re done, come up to my room and I’ll introduce you to a couple of the girls.’
Ning nodded. ‘Great, but I don’t know how long I’ll be.’
‘Only a few minutes,’ Zara said, before telling Ning to sit back down.
‘I was sitting upstairs, worried sick,’ Ning confessed.
‘I’ve got a few things to explain,’ Zara said. ‘Basic training lasts a hundred days and the next session begins in just under a month. I’ll set up a meeting with a handler, who’ll sort out your education program and run you through the rules for life on campus. The athletics department will give you a training program, so that you’re close to peak fitness when basic training begins.
‘I’ll also arrange for a dental check-up, some money and a shopping trip to buy new clothes and personal items. Amy’s going to be doing your Kyrgyzstan debriefings and finally I’ll arrange some sessions with a speech therapist, because that accent will stick out a mile on undercover missions.’
‘Thank God,’ Ning said. ‘Ever since I got to Britain I feel like everyone’s sniggering every time I open my gob.’
‘We’ve corrected strong accents before,’ Zara said. ‘There’s absolutely nothing to worry about. Any questions?’
‘Not that I can think of right now.’
‘Well, you know where I am if you think of any. You’re going to be a busy girl over the next few weeks, but there’s usually corridor parties and things around here on Saturday nights. So let your hair down and have fun. It’s what you need after all you’ve been through.’
49. CHESS
The beds on CHERUB campus were really comfy and Ning didn’t wake up until half ten, when Amy knocked on her door.
‘You have fun last night?’
Ning rubbed her eyes and smiled slightly, as Amy eyed a white mini dress on the floor.
‘We didn’t really do much,’ Ning said. ‘Hanging around, playing music and stuff. I met some nice people. I’m not exactly sure about that dress.’
‘Did someone lend it to you?’
Ning nodded. ‘People said I looked nice, but it’s so not me.’
‘It’s good to doll yourself up once in a while,’ Amy said. ‘I’ve been working on the information you gave under hypnosis and I’ve got some pictures I’d like you to look at.’
Amy pulled them from a plastic wallet. Ning instantly recognised the logo in the first one.
‘Nantong Bakery,’ Ning read. ‘That’s definitely the logo I saw on those football shirts.’
‘Hoped you’d recognise it,’ Amy said, as she tucked it back in the file wallet and handed over three pictures printed from Google Street View. ‘Now take a look at these. These premises are all owned or rented by Nantong Bakery, and are within an hour’s drive of the spot where you escaped from Leo.’
The first picture was of a modern aluminium-sided building, surrounded by car parking with a giant Nantong logo on the side.
‘That’s nothing like it,’ Ning said, but her eyes lit up as she flipped to the second image. It was taken from the road and slightly blurry, but she instantly recognised the grubby brickwork and boarded windows on the upper floor. ‘That’s it.’
‘You’re sure?’
Ning nodded. ‘Hundred per cent. I even recognise the battered van parked in the courtyard. How did you find it?’
‘Me, Ryan, Max and Alfie did some detective work yesterday, while you were doing your recruitment tests.’
Ning had a sudden thought and felt anxious. ‘Does this mean you’ll send the cops in to raid the factory and deport all the women? My friend Mei already got sent home once, but if you owe the gangsters money they force you to go back.’
‘CHERUB and TFU don’t mount operations just to send a few illegal immigrants home,’ Amy said. ‘Our goal is to bring down major criminal networks like the Aramov Clan and the people smugglers. I’ve already spoken to a senior police officer with SOCA and they’ll take the people smuggling investigation forward.’
‘SOCA?’ Ning asked.
Amy smiled. ‘That’s the Serious Organised Crime Agency. Their first step will be to mount a surveillance operation on the factory. It shouldn’t be too hard to trace the vans going backwards and forward to the houses. Hopefully they’ll track down people like Leo and Ben. And who knows where the investigation will take us after that?’
‘How long will it take?’ Ning asked.
‘Months,’ Amy said.
‘Will CHERUB be involved?’
‘Possibly.’
‘And what about the bastards who killed Ingrid?’
‘Leonid Aramov sits at the top of the tree,’ Amy explained. ‘His family are rich and powerful, and nobody has touched them in two decades. I can’t promise we’ll get them, but I can promise TFU will do everything we possibly can.’
‘Cool,’ Ning said, smiling slightly. ‘So will you start debriefing me today on what happened in Kyrgyzstan?’
‘It’s a Sunday,’ Amy said. ‘Go hang out with your new friends. We’ll start on that tomorrow.’
*
Ning found her own way to the campus dining-room. She got cereal and yoghurt and was pleased when Ryan came up behind and started dishing himself a full English.
‘So, how you doing?’ Ryan asked. ‘Sleep well?’
‘Beautifully,’ Ning said.
‘Enjoy yourself last night?’
‘Sure,’ Ning said, as she grabbed a glass of fruit juice and followed Ryan to a table by the window. ‘Everyone kept trying to wind me up about basic training. It can’t be as bad as everyone’s making out.’
Ryan laughed. ‘We’ll see if you agree with that statement in a hundred and twenty-six days’ time. I think you’ll be doing basi
c with my twin brothers, Leon and Daniel. They turn ten next week.’
‘Is that good or bad?’ Ning asked.
‘Let’s just say rather you than me.’
‘Don’t you get on with your brothers?’
‘Theo, the little guy, is OK,’ Ryan said. ‘He sleeps over in my room sometimes and stuff. I’ve got nothing against the twins, they’re just a pain like most brothers.’
‘Theo’s cute,’ Ning said. ‘I always wanted a brother or sister.’
‘I don’t reckon you should worry about basic training,’ Ryan said, as a fork load of scrambled egg tumbled down his sweatshirt. ‘You’ve got the physique for it. The only thing that could floor you is some random injury and there’s not much you can do to prevent that.’
Chloe and Grace came towards the table as Ryan shook the egg off his sweatshirt.
‘Mucky pup,’ Grace said, as she gave Ryan’s ear a gentle flick. ‘So, Ning, the shops in town open at noon today. You want to come with us and spend some of that fat clothing grant Zara’s giving you? We know all the best places.’
Ning wasn’t massively into clothes, but the limited selection she’d taken out of China reminded her of unhappy times and she could have happily burned the lot.
‘I’d like to,’ Ning said, as she looked at Ryan. ‘But aren’t we paintballing, or something?’
‘That’s this evening,’ Ryan said. ‘You can do both.’
‘In which case I’d love to come shopping,’ Ning said.
‘Oooh, paintballing rocks,’ Chloe said. ‘What time’s that?’
Ryan shook his head. ‘That’s with me, Max and Alfie. And it has to be an even number.’
‘No problem,’ Grace said. ‘Three against three.’
‘You’ll have to ask Max,’ Ryan said. ‘He’s trying out his new guns.’
Grace laughed and spoke quite loudly. ‘Do you mean the guns he bought with money he’s not supposed to have? The ones he’d be in lots and lots of trouble for if any senior staff happened to find out that he had them?’