Recoiling at the shrill clanging in my ears, I forced my lids to open, my breathing shallow and slow. The first image that returned was my limp legs sprawled along the floor in front of me as I slouched in a chair, arms bound behind me by tight ropes. I tugged my arms inwards, groaning at the excessive energy it took to do that, and squinted at the blinding light at the ceiling.
A figure stepped into the stepped in front of the blare, blocking it like an unwarranted eclipse.
"You're just in time, Miss Knight. The fireworks are about the start."
Mika. I sighed. "Of all the voices I could wake up to..."
"Would you prefer it was Agent Barnes?" he mocked.
I would have rolled my eyes if I had the strength. All I could manage was to let my head fall to one side. "Go to hell."
Mika laughed gravely and grabbed my chin, turning me to face him. I scowled, hoping I could somehow make him bleed with my eyes. His smile only grew – as did his grip, nails piercing my skin.
"You've been a nightmare for us, Knight. If it was not for your childish crush on Barnes, you would have joined us."
I laughed.
"I'm serious. You followed Alistair like a dog. I'm sure it would not have taken much to sway you."
Childish crush. I said nothing as he squeezed my chin and let go, only maintaining my sharp stare to curse him without uttering a word. He laughed again and swaggered for the door.
"Jameson, wipe that glare off her face, would you?"
His fist crunched against my cheek, knocking my head to the other side. I gagged and spit blood, clenching my jaw at the buzz of forming bruises.
"Is this really worth it?" I choked wetly. "Killing dozens just to avenge your wife!"
Mika froze in the doorway, his back stiff.
"Don't pretend to know her," he said, his voice stone cold.
He shut the door behind him, leaving Jameson and I alone in the windowless box of a room with nothing but a container in the corner.
It was entirely metallic, only a metre in length and width, with a digital pad covering the front, numbers dangerously red as they counted down from 29:09, 08, 07...
The bomb.
"Amber!"
I jolted at the sound of Scotty's accent ringing in my ear. Jameson fired a glare my way but I remained calm, passing off the reaction as a pain in my skull.
"Amber," Scotty repeated. The radio crackled and spit – it had been damaged and pricked my eardrum. "I haven't heard from you in ages. Alistair's just walked from the building with a few politicians. Is everything okay? Have you found the bomb?"
I could not reply to him directly with Jameson watching over me. I needed a different strategy.
"What did you do to get guard duty?" I asked him.
"Huh?" both Scotty and Jameson replied, audibly confused.
"You have to watch me, locked in a room, and why? Because Mika ordered you to."
Scotty was silent – he understood.
"Will Mika let you leave by the time that bomb goes off in twenty minutes? You'll have to run fast considering it's in the room with us."
"I ain't talking to you," Jameson spat.
"Amber, I-I don't know what I can do for you from here," Scotty gasped.
Panicked, I added, "Do you think that some help will be sent to get you out? I mean, any sort of help. Anything?"
"You're talking weird," Jameson said, his face twisting. "Why?"
"No, we don't have... Wait. Wait! Oh my god. I think you have a way out!" Scotty cried.
Jameson snarled and charged towards me. "Answer me!" he snapped.
"What?" I asked Scotty.
"I can—"
Jameson snatched me by the hair and ripped out the earpiece. He brandished it in the light, callously laughed to himself before shoving it in my face, almost in my mouth.
"You think you can outsmart me, is that it?"
He threw it to the ground and stamped on it, making sure every wire tore by rubbing it into the concrete.
Before I could react, his balled fist struck me across the face, knuckles busting my nose.
I gasped as the pain hit, veins burning as a streak of blood dripped down my nose, marking my lips and chin. My throat gargled, making me gag at the taste of metal.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Did that hurt?" He laughed but I only hissed through my teeth, biting back an insult to avoid another beating as the throbbing in my nose transformed into a mild headache.
I looked at the bomb: 28:02.
Scotty claimed to have a solution, but what could he do now? I adored him, but he could not have stormed the building, fought Jameson and diffused the bomb in time.
I glanced around the room. It was so cold, so lonely and dark with its shadowed corners cut by the sterile light hanging over me. I was powerless, left to bleed on my own as my doomsday clock counted down before me, my pride and dignity diminishing with every tick of the digits. Just as the Doctor once said, I was staying in the dark – underground – where I belonged.
There was hope for me once. When I met Scotty, I found a friend where I least expected to. While others rejected my company, Scotty embraced it, not an ounce of judgement from any of his words or actions regarding my past and present. Collins was always at my defence when I needed him. From the moment I signed onto the agency, he respected my introverted nature, understanding that silence often spoke a thousand words, while sharing a connection to Alistair. And Gabby had been an angel since the moment she strolled through the office doors for the first time, lighting up the office with her smiles and words of faith of optimism.
Then there was Derek Barnes. That man crashed into my life like a wild comet, and somehow I found myself basking in its wake. If I had opened that door again, or if he ran after me on the rooftop, he would have fit into my life so well.
The short time we held together managed to form a bond stronger than what I was ready for. Spending every moment of every day with one individual for weeks, constantly battling life and death, created a stubborn link. We learned so much about each other through our actions rather than words, becoming closer than any average pair would in months.
And I had thrown that all away. All that trust tossed aside for the sake of being right.
I groaned and let my head fall, hair blanketing the rest of the room. He was gone, now, likely propped up against the bar on that cruise ship, chatting up another girl as I was nothing. Perhaps I was not as important to him as he was to me. I was just a bit of fun after a tense night of fighting; a girl that was... there. His name had been carried around the office before, labelling him as a flirt, and I was another addition to the collection.
Knowing that, I still cared. I still latched onto the hope that I was catastrophising his nature and his words were true. I was not another notch on his belt, nor a girl that happened to be there, but a woman he felt something for because she felt it too.
If I died believing the only recent happiness in my life was fake, my past won.
I looked up at a stumbling crash, finding that Jameson had tripped over the bomb, barely steading himself. His eyes widened in terror, silently praying he would not trigger it so early.
I snickered. Jameson was not too pleased about it.
He stormed over, burning with rage, and whacked me over the head.
I hung low, vision going dark as the deadly ticks repeated their sound.
Over... and over again.
***
I startled awake to a raucous across the room, tensing at the sound of a cry of pain and a thud.
My breathing turned shallow, my neck aching far too much to raise my head. Footsteps quickened and scuffled to a stop before me.
A familiar warmth at the top of my back radiated through me, a hand raising my chin. Hair was brushed away from my face.
"Amber?" It couldn't be... "Amber!"
I forced my eyes to open, mouth falling as the realisation dawned on me of who was crouching in front of me, worry written into his face.
Derek.
He sighed at my opening eyes, holding my face in his hands. Wiping blood from my mouth, he planted an unexpected rough kiss on my lips, energy firing through me.
"What happened?" he asked, nervously eyeing up my bloody nose.
"That—" I cleared my throat, waking up. "That doesn't matter. Why are you here? I thought you said—"
"You're right."
I blinked. "I'm... what?"
"You're right. I stayed in the room for a few minutes thinking about what you said. I chased after you but you were gone. Had to steal the captain's helicopter from the roof of the ship."
That was Derek in a nutshell. "You know how to fly a helicopter?"
"More or less. Just don't ask me to do it again!"
I looked passed his shoulders, finding Jameson on the floor and no-one else to be seen. "What about everyone else? The politicians, Alistair, Mika—"
"Calm down," he soothed. "As far as I know, the building is empty apart from us and Mika's unconscious followers. Scotty caught up to Alistair but I haven't seen Mika."
My lips parted. He got them out. He risked his life for others.
I had been a fool, but I was ecstatic to have been proven wrong about him.
"Derek, I'm... I am so sorry for what I said about your father. I shouldn't have said it."
"No, you should have." He let out a sigh and walked behind me to undo the knots around my arms. "I was a selfish idiot. My father would have said exactly what I said to you. God, I sounded just like him."
"But your father wouldn't have come back."
He paused, a smile tugging at his lips. "No, he wouldn't have."
I mirrored his expression, smile soon waring off as I caught sight of the bomb.
13:09.
I gulped. "Not to rush you, but we're about to be scattered along the Scottish wilderness if we don't leave this house in thirteen minutes."
"Thirteen—! Okay... okay." He took a few calming breaths, fumbling with the ropes. "Oh, come on you little – argh!" He shoved them away and huffed, pursing his lip at me.
He craned his neck over the chair. "How would you feel about taking one for the team?"
"Derek!"
"I'm joking!" With a chuckle, he started playing with the ropes again, more forceful as stress began to accumulate. "But these knots..."
"Maybe one of the bodies has a knife to cut them," I suggested.
"Good idea," he replied. "I won't be long."
He checked Jameson's body first, confirming it to be empty, before rushing out the door, his footsteps battering the concrete corridor as he left me behind.
***
I was useless.
Sitting idle, bound to a chair with no means of helping myself was infuriating. All I could do was tap my foot and wait... and wait... and wait.
Or make an attempt at diffusing the bomb. Then I did not have to wait to be saved.
I pushed my feet off the floor and jerked my body forward, shuffling the chair across the room and closer to the bomb. The wooden legs squeaked as they rubbed against the concrete. The chair rocked slightly, a sudden weightlessness making me worry, but I regained balance.
Almost there. Just a little further...
"What are you doing?"
I paused. Derek was standing in the doorway, clutching a pocketknife at his side.
"Defusing the bomb." As if it wasn't obvious.
He arched a brow. "With no hands?"
"You haven't even tried!"
"Darling if I tried to defuse that thing, the whole solar system would light up like a Christmas tree."
It was impossible, but I had learned not to use that word around Derek. "Fair enough."
"Then let's get you out of there."
He clambered to the back of the chair and sawed at the ropes with the flimsy pocket knife. My eyes trailed to the bomb: 5:03.
"Five minutes," I said.
"Five minutes. That's fine... okay," he muttered to himself. The ropes sliced open strand by strand.
Until, with four and a half minutes left, they snapped.
I wriggled my hands from the ropes. Before I could stand, Derek snatched my hand and more or less dragged me from the room.
I took one final look at the timer: four minutes left exactly.
We could do this.
The two of us stumbled over one another as we charged around a corner. I made off to run forwards, towards the way I entered, but Derek yanked me back by my collar, pushing me up the nearby set of stairs.
"They've blocked it off. Front door!"
All energy was focussed on running and counting down the seconds we had left.
Three and a half minutes.
The cellar had been positioned as far back from the manor as possible, making it so that we had to barge through doors and sprint down corridors in a frantic attempt at finding the main door of the house.
The double mahogany doors were in sight. Derek sped up, reaching it first, and almost tore the handle off, only for the lock to jam.
"No!" he cried, voice breaking with fury.
Air hitched in my throat. Who had locked us inside? I wanted to curse but no words came out.
Derek threw his body against the door, growling in frustration, before backing away to take a run up for a stronger second attempt.
He let out a cry of pain, biting his lip as if to seal in his anger. I looked around for any possible escape.
"The window!" I said. "Come on."
With less than three minutes left, I tried the handle of the front right window, groaning as I received the same amount of luck as the door. The window on the front left of the house was also locked, Derek shaking his head.
I bit my cheek, glancing around to spot an armchair. Storming towards it, fuelled by adrenaline and anger, I heaved it up with both hands. Running back to the window, I threw it at full force, the glass exploding into a thousand fragments and trickling to the floor.
That was our way out.
Brushing away the excess glass, I called Derek over. I heard his hurried footsteps as I wiped my sleeve, but spun around as a second set accompanied him.
"Derek, there's—!"
A crunch and a grunt had been sprinting to the other room.
Mika had Derek on his knees, arms wrapped around him in a headlock so tight his neck could have been broken in a single twist.
All I had were my fists, feet, and two minutes of action left to spare. A shimmer of crimson glistened beneath Derek's head of dark hair, and a wheeze escaped his lips as Mika choked him.
I held up my hands, showing I was unarmed. "Mika," I said. "Please. It's over now, just let him go."
He squeezed Derek harder, making both of us gasp. "No!" he snapped. "It wasn't supposed to go like this. They were all supposed to burn... burn with the memories of this house." His voice cracked. "He wasn't supposed to be here." Mika adjusted his hold on Derek, making him flinch. "But it's his fault all this happened. So he can take their place. I'll stay with him. Alistair will only kill me anyway."
"Listen to me now," I said, lowering my voice to keep him calm. "Derek Barnes did not kill your wife."
"He ordered her to—"
"Those were Alistair's orders. Not his." Mika's expression faltered as his lip quivered. He was a tormented man. His life had been consumed by revenge and Alistair fed into it even more. "You don't really want this. You don't want people to die for Alistair – for someone else prepared to order innocents to—"
"Don't pretend to understand me!"
I fell back on my heel, watching his grip close in around Derek as his voice echoed around the hall. His brown eyes flitted to the window as he mouthed 'go.'
I shook my head. 'Never.'
Mika cried, "Don't pretend to know the grief I feel. Alistair understood me. He lost his wife, his child to this system!"
"Would your wife really want this, Mika?" I yelled. "Would Sarah want this?"
His eyes flooded with a multitude of emotion, his words vanishing from his lips.
"I understand why you're angry, I do. Her death could have been avoided and those responsible should be held accountable for that. But this? Would she really want so many more lives to be lost in her name?" I swallowed. "Only you can answer that, Mika. It's all on you now."
Mika frowned, focussed on the chips in the floorboards with deafening silence. His hold on Derek loosened.
With just over a minute left to escape, I sent a nod in his direction. He knew what to do, and grabbed Mika's arm to flip him over, his head hitting the ground with a reverberating crack.
"Go!" Derek yelled. He clambered to his feet and chased after me as I ran for the window.
"Barnes!" Mika bellowed. "You get back here you arrogant—"
We ignored his demands and kept running. I was halfway out the window when Mika dropped to his knees, crying.
"I would have succeeded. I would have saved us all..."
Derek shook his head and ushered me outside. "Quickly!"
I launched outside and onto the muddy ground below, taking no time to recover as I scrambled and hopped to my feet, Derek closely behind.
He pushed me onwards, shouting to hurry up as if my limbs were not already burning, charging ahead of him as he panted.
We kept running, not risking a fraction of a second to glance back at the house to see if Mika made it out. Adrenaline kept me going, numbing me to all the pain in my skull and back.
I almost tripped over an uneven patch, but Derek held me up. The sound of his wheezing pants tugged at my nerves, and I seized his hand to pull him forwards. If he was caught in the fire, I would burn with him.
Then a blistering roar burst through the hills.
Derek's hand knocked me to the ground as a rush of hot air charged across the grass, passing over us in a plethora of heat and smoke, holding onto each other with unrelenting strength with our eyes shut.
When the hot air passed, we turned on our sides to look back at the house.
It burned in a mountain of scarlet and amber flames, black clouds billowing from the summit and submerging into the afternoon sky. The fire crackled and roared, warning us to leave. We took the threat seriously, and helped each other stand.
A helicopter passed overheard, its propellers waving at us.
"Do you see us?" Derek pressed a hand to his ear. "Okay."
I frowned. "Scotty?"
"Scotty. Alistair's been restrained in the helicopter."
"To have seen his face when Scotty caught him..."
"I saw it when I caught up with him," Derek replied. "Never seen the man so shocked."
I could not help but laugh, my smile fading as I turned back to look at the fire, witnessing what Alistair had done while knowing it could have been so much worse. If we had not intervened – if I had not met Derek – he could have succeeded. I could have been sitting at the agency, ready to receive a call that Alistair had been awarded emergency powers and drastic actions were being set in motion.
Perhaps Mika was correct in his assumption I would have been working with them if it wasn't for Derek. And that frightened me more than the fire roaring in my eyes.
"It's finally over," Derek sighed.
"It is," I said.
"Everything feels so... slow now, doesn't it?"
A whoosh of cold air made us turn our backs on the fire. The second the helicopter touched down, the doors swung open and Scotty threw himself from the aircraft, hugging me tightly.
"I got him, Ambi. I actually got him!"
"I know you did." I returned the hug, hiding my smile in his shoulder.
"But what now?" Scotty asked. "What do we do?"
Beyond Scotty, within the aircraft, I could see a solemn grey figure in the hangar, hands bound by secure handcuffs with his silver hair dishevelled, his blazer lopsided. He raised his chin when he caught me looking at him, his countenance not resembling anger, but disappointment.
And I looked back at him in the exact same way.
I turned from Alistair and reluctantly let go of Scotty, looking between him and Derek.
After taking another brief glance at my old mentor – a once-called hero – and a man I called a father in anything but a name, I tore my eyes away, focussing on the two young men I trusted with my life; a life I would have gladly given for theirs.
"We go home."