Alistair Raven and the Stormtrooper in Stilettos (Book 1)

Part 3 - Chatter 15

Alistair cradled Balderick and felt sick to the stomach.

Robert stood gingerly, swaying groggily and found his sidearm.

"What did you say? Ravenmaster?" he scowled, unsure if he had heard right.

"My dear Robert, I don't why I ever bothered keeping you on the payroll."

Robert rolled his tongue around his mouth and realised half his teeth had been loosened; he raised his gun in Alice's direction, and in retaliation, Alice responded in kind.

"Alistair here, his grandfather is the Ravenmaster," she revealed. Then it twigged. "Oh...you didn't know? Was young Alistair here keeping secrets from you?"

Robert spat blood on the tiles.

"Is this true?" Robert enquired of Alistair; the boy nodded in the affirmative.

"They've found him?" Robert cheered wanly. "My oh my!"

Alice spoke scathingly.

"Then my doubts in you are well founded. Pitiful really, my dear Robert, you're so conflicted you don't even know whose side you are on anymore. So what's it to be today Robert? A double-double agent? Go ahead; tell me now you're still playing for the Loyalists. Did you think I wouldn't guess? Did you think I wouldn't find out? Did you think you could serve two masters?"

"I'm my own man," Robert fired back.

"Don't make me laugh," Alice sneered.

"All that digging in the dirt, it took a boy to find the Crown of England. Some archaeologist you turned out to be."

"The crown's useless," Robert countered. "By next week, people will be emboldened by these Loyalists spoiling the Chancellor's soiree. So, permit this boy and I to walk out of here and I'll let you live."

"Pardon me?" Alice bristled. "You'll let me live? You deign to issue me an ultimatum?"

"You don't frighten me," Robert asserted, squaring his shoulders. "Ich bin ein Englander!"

Alice cracked a grin.

"That's quite tragic."

"Pah! I've been undercover so long I no longer know who I really am anymore," Robert confessed. "But my dear Alice Mould, there is one thing I do know...you are a soulless bitch!"

"Oh Robert, no need for compliments."

"As I said, it's all over," Robert reiterated as the floor rumbled and explosive force could be felt under their feet, deep below.

"They've lit the fuse," Robert chuckled. "Welcome to the new world."

"Your histrionics are laughable. I decide when this over," Alice roared. Robert squinted through his puffy eye and tightened his grip around the trigger, steadfastly defiant.

"Alice, have you ever played Russian Roulette?" Robert asked. "Because I know I have a full clip and you have a one in six chance."

Never once shifting his gaze he issued an instruction to the boy.

"Alistair, use the Emergency Exit back there and scoot to the roof...fly as fast as you can and wait for me there, I will collect you. Allow me a minute to take out this trash."

Alice tracked both targets, number crunching the survivability permutations of this irksome truel.

"Alice, I beg you, don't waste your shot," Robert smirked.

"Robert, should I stay or should I go?" Alistair pleaded as the pistol was refocussed at his beating heart.

"GO!" Robert ordered sternly, cocking his weapon. "And don't look back!"

Alistair needed no second invitation and he put his foot on the thruster and zipped a retreat to the exit where he yanked the door back, found the stairs and began HyperBoarding up them at a great rate of knots. All the while the emergency alarms chimed and a vacant voice encouraged all to evacuate immediately if not sooner.

"That boy, like you, is a traitor, you erring idiot," Alice seethed.

"To err is to be human, you moron," Robert confessed. "But clarity, just like payback, is a bitch!" Robert held his nerve, flared his nostrils as Alice's eyes fired with infernal glee.

"Ready when you are Robert," Alice smiled. "Count to three?"

Robert nodded.

"One..." they counted off in unison.

BANG!

Alice's bullet nestled itself into Robert's chest. He gasped, his eyes betraying such shock and surprise. Alice parted her leather jacket and returned the revolver to its holster. Robert clutched his heart and fell to his side with a thump.

Alice placed her hands on her hips and stood over Robert without a skerrick of pity or remorse.

"I reloaded, you idiot.  Try not to stain the marble as your life flashes by," Alice appealed callously as she stepped over him and began to pursue the boy.