Apex (Ben Bracken 2) Read online

  I need to make contact with Jeremiah at some point, but I need to pick my moment for that one. I need reception, for a start. If I start wasting phone battery now, I am on a perilous downward swing to being stranded from my orders. I must place that call when the time is right. It’s a difficult toss up. Such is the nature of the terrain, and its proximity to the sea, solid phone reception is something that is hard to find. I know that Woolacombe had none. Neither did Morte Point. I’m not expecting any until I get further inland. But I can’t very well turn my phone on and wander around the countryside with my phone over my head, hoping for a bar or two.

  Rolling up the newspaper, I walk through what emerges as a farmer’s yard, and am churned out onto a road again. Left is north-east, while right is south-west. The decision is easy. Left it is. I know my geography. I know if I keep pressing in a north-easterly direction, I can keep following the coastline to Bristol. Once in Bristol, there is enough urban cover and amenities to make proper contact with Jeremiah, not to mention excellent transport links to the north and south-east. It is a cross-country walk of about 100 miles, right through Exmoor National Park - a wilderness of rolling moors and dense woodland, punctuated by the occasional small village. I can do that in about 30 hours straight walking, or, far more realistically, two long days with a break to camp and rest. I’ll need to keep hydrated, and fueled with food if I’m to make that. But it is a realistic goal, not to mention the safest. If whatever authorities were chasing me last night expand their search, they will start with roads to the east. And that includes the very one I’m walking along.

  I break into the next field that seems open and surrounded by thick, towering hedgerows, and walk at a pace, after organizing my Lucozade and turkey jerky into my pockets. I walk, munch and sip for the next hour, while thumbing through the paper, as the dawn mists are burnt from the patchwork countryside by an ever-rising sun. It looks like it will be a pleasant day, weather-wise. A lot of these fields I’m passing through seem to be left in the fallow portion of the arable rotation, so the terrain is easy to navigate, quiet and thick enough with cover. It soothes me.

  Reading the paper in snippets, I am amazed at what I see and read. This newspaper is the South-West Gazette, which I guess covers this corner of the country, but with this being a national incident, the coverage of the plane crash is near cover to cover, with the features and articles ranging from straight reports, editorial comments, appeals for information, stock photographs and even the comments of a local psychic. It becomes immediately apparent that the public is being misinformed as to what actually happened off Morte Point, which, I must say, I’m not all too surprised about. That’s not to say that the newspaper is a part of any conspiracy, but whoever is their principal source has given them a lot of falsehoods, and I am shocked by how brazen the deception is, and who the key players clearly are.

  Whoever is behind it, is very happy for the readership to believe that approximately 260 people have perished in the sea off Morte Point, and that no survivors are expected to be found. They have some quotes from the local MP, Lloyd Weathers, who declares today as a day of mourning for those lost at sea. He talks of the efforts of the emergency services, and the assistance of the search and rescue teams from RMB Chivenor in Barnstable. It’s only when I get to the bottom of the article, that I see the picture captioned Lloyd Weathers, that I see the duplicities fold more intricately. Lloyd Weathers, Member of Parliament is very clearly the bald besuited man on the rocks. The stock image shows him smiling and composed, and even though the visage is far removed from the stressed ball of agitation I witnessed on the rocks, the likeness is indelible. It is a positive identification.

  I keep reading.

  The cause of the crash is listed as unknown, but engine failure is presumed. I snort, knowing that I did not witness engine failure. I saw sabotage, plain and simple. They state that the plane was a commercial jet on its way to London Heathrow, but, while experiencing difficulties, was ready to attempt an emergency landing at the marine base in Barnstaple, only that it never made it that far. I know for a fact, that there were minimal casualties, but the way that mass loss of life is bandied about here is really shocking. The true facts and inconsistencies of this event are lost in the moroseness of the supposed tragic disaster, so much so that this area will never forget what happened. It will be often thought about, memorials will be erected, candles will be lit on this day here every day for years to come. This area and environment is being stigmatized with grief as part of a cover up. And God knows how everyone loves to read about grief.

  The public is being manipulated for nefarious means. Of that there is no doubt. And it makes my blood temperature spike. There is corruption at hand here. An elected official is spinning lies to the public. Well, this isn’t the first time that that has happened, and it damn well won’t be the last. But having seen that weasel lose his rag on the Point last night, only to read his two-faced quotes in the paper this morning gets under my skin something chronic. I can feel my emotional investment in this situation swell again. I want that fat bastard to pay for duping his constituents, and if he won’t, I want to make him.

  Then I read a single line that I had missed on page three, which flips the game all ends up yet again.

  ‘The authorities are looking to question a man who was seen at the scene, looting the wreckage before the emergency services could arrive. He is described as approximately six feet tall, with dark brown short hair, unshaven, carrying a black backpack. If anyone has any information on such a suspect, or has seen anyone matching this description please call the following number immediately:’

  I feel outraged. A fucking looter! They are framing me, dragging the public into a hunt for me, happy to skew even more facts to their own ends. I am used to being called all manner of things. ‘Traitor’ is the one I heard most, which stung the fiercest, and was a label around my neck when I was kicked out of the army. I killed a colleague, to end his suffering. It wasn’t out of malice, and it haunts me to this day. But it saw me discarded and branded a traitor. I have fought to clear my name ever since.

  Fresh cinders of ire waft across the landscape of my mind, and my hackles rise. They are still looking for me. And they are happy to drag the public in to help their search.

  I am concerned and pick up pace. A batch of these newspapers were delivered to that campsite, where a great number of people will have seen a man ‘approximately six feet tall, with dark brown short hair, unshaven, carrying a black backpack’ out of a neighboring field less than two miles from the crash site. If 2 and 2 have been put together at any point, I am treading very dangerously.

  And that’s when I hear it, behind me, in the distance, carried on the light breeze and amplified by the crystal clear morning air. It is the unmistakable sound of dogs barking.

  6

  I am running now. I think of who may have given me away, and immediately forgive them. If I thought I’d seen that swine who was looting the wreckage of an air disaster, I’d want him to meet justice too. If only they knew the truth.

  The dogs still sound a way off, and if, by keeping a steady pace on this course, I can keep the volume of their howls about the same, then I know they are no closer to me.

  They must have a scent on me. I have travelled about 6 or 7 miles from the campsite, so to be so close they must have got a scent-tag on me. Dammit. Seawater acts well in terms of masking the smells of natural human oils, but obviously my exertions and resulting perspiration have erased their effect somewhat. I need to throw them off.

  I pass over a rise, and begin to head down into a valley, which has a wooded glade at the bottom. As I begin to head for the tree line, I notice on the horizon the cliffs of Ilfracombe, with its structures and houses peppering the hillside surrounding the valley. I know Ilfracombe. It is much bigger than Woolacombe, more dense. It will create an olfactory Rubik’s Cube which those dogs must solve if they are to find me, and if I jet straight through town, and out the other side, their
confusion can put more distance between us by the time I exit into the wilderness of the National Park.

  I must roll with these punches, and this roll seems like a good way to ditch my pursuers, who are dogged and resourceful. They have the means, it seems, to throw whatever is necessary to capture me. Not to mention apparent government backing.

  I head in the direction of the cliffs, and before long I am running out of fields and the terrain is becoming more hilly. As I exit the final field, I am placed on a winding road, which I cross. I intend to keep my course as steady as possible, to keep the dogs with me until I find a way to elude them in the centre of town. I check my watch to see that it is 7.45am. Here in the town, things are only just getting going, but I feel like I have been at my task and on the move for ages. On the other side of the street, I scramble down a scrub embankment onto another road, which is as empty as the last. I cross again, and the land becomes flatter, more concrete. There are houses appearing in the layout of a small estate possibly from the 50s or 60s. Perfect place to start losing the tracker dogs in a mulch of differing smells waging for their attention. I pop through a moldy back alley, then emerge into the estate. It is Britain as I remember growing up, distinctly untouched and unaltered since then. The houses have the chipped, bobbling gravel effect up all the walls, which ages them immediately, placing them generations before.

  The town is on the other end of the estate, or so my instincts suggest. I adopt a jog as opposed to a lung-busting sprint. Sprinting through here will only cause alarm, while jogging gives the impression of nothing more sinister than I’m making sure I reach the bus stop in time. As I move through the estate, it reveals itself to be three intersecting, house-lined streets bottlenecking at a roundabout, which connects to what could be the principal road into town. I’m not expecting this sojourn into the estate to slow them down for long but, so far so good.

  Now to follow the road in, at a safe distance. The trees close in again briefly, and that will give me all that I need to maintain that urgent cover necessary.

  Suddenly, without any warning whatsoever, the yellow rescue helicopter bursts into the valley, over the trees before the estate - exactly where I was moments earlier. Jesus, they know I’m here. Again.

  I sprint, as fast as I can. Forget caution, I need to get out of sight right now. The chopper booms low across the estate and I can almost feel it right behind me, a giant bee on the nape of my neck and I dive into the trees.

  I land hard, and try to roll through it. It’s not a move blessed with finesse, but it gets the job done and sees me coming to a stop on my back in the dirt. The helicopter blasts right over head, and I watch its flashes of yellow through gaps in the trees. What’s happening here is nothing short of crazy.

  And now I can hear sirens. This is a descent into nothing short of pandemonium.

  It’s time to man up. This is one of those near impossible situations you have faced in the past, Ben, and you need to adapt to prosper. Get to it.

  The siren comes closer, and I can hear the sound snaking along the roads getting slightly louder and quieter with every turn. Then, suddenly, it screams into the road next to the trees, blazing a trail directly into the centre of town. I lie flat and wait. As the siren dissipates, I notice the dogs again, presumably marauding through the estate.

  I am right in the hornets nest. Best make it a quick visit.

  I leap up and run through the trees in a crouch, keeping as low as possible. The trees open into the car park of an industrial facility, which I career through. The car park is surrounded by a wrought iron, spike-topped fence, apart from on the side I have just come from, and the left hand side which is a tall brick wall. Brick wall it is.

  Maintaining speed, I jump at the wall, digging my toes in and pushing up like I am stepping up its face. I grab the top of the wall with both hands, and hoist myself up. A back garden is on the other side, and, having quickly checked that there is nobody watching from the rear windows of whoever’s house it is, I drop into it.

  It’s a small garden, about 12 foot squared, with low fences which lead to the next garden, and the next garden, and the one after that. Brilliant. So I start hurdling the fences, crossing through each garden one at a time. This will really throw them off, while I dodge kids toys and plant pots and - wait a second.

  Perfect.

  This garden, the fourth, has an old Christmas tree in it, standing in an old white pot. It doesn’t look too well, but it’s ideal for my needs. Without delay, and with gay abandon as to who might see, I bear-hug the tree, rubbing my face and hair in its branches. I turn around, and rub my back all up against it. I wipe my legs up and down it, my arms, and even rub my groin and arse against it. With more than a hint of pride and pleasure at my good fortune, I travel through the remaining gardens until I am churned out into another side street.

  Pine sap, is brilliant at masking smells. It is completely natural too, so will serve as excellent cover when I re-enter the woods. That pine sap will have masked all my olfactory giveaways. The dogs will have no choice but to lose me, since effectively, I have just ended their trail.

  In the alleyway, I take a left turn and it becomes very apparent by the sounds and smells that I am right on the cusp of the centre of town. Reaching a road, I slow right down to a normal walk, and try to saunter along the pavements. The roads have cars on them now, but none seem to be paying any attention to me. I walk around the shadow of a church, while keeping an eye out either side of its towering spire for the helicopter, but I can’t get a fix on it, even though I hear its steady rumble.

  After the church, the buildings close in again, and I am by a row of brickabrack shops that offer all manner of seaside gifts and goods, from sunken ship trinkets to inflatable boobs. I fancy getting some supplies but I can’t risk recognition - even the slightest report might help put whoever is chasing me on the right path to tracking me down. Last thing I want is word reaching my pursuers of some smelly pine man who fits the suspect description seen buying a bunch of outdoor supplies.

  If I need something, tonight or this afternoon, I’ll need to procure my requirements direct from Mother Nature. Survival skills back to the fore.

  The road begins to incline softly, heralded by a tingle high on the back of my calves. Up ahead, I see the road, peppered with traffic lights, lead up to the hillside and what looks an expansive golf course. If I can get up there, I’m on my way out of here.

  The chopper sounds close, getting nearer all the time, but I can’t see it. I can’t hear the dogs anymore, but they may just be drowned out by the soft murmur of traffic. Either that or my plan is already working.

  Rather than take a steady predictable course, I hang the next left, which seems to lead down to the boatyards. There is also a sign for the seafront museums. There are a few groups of people in the distance, blatant tourists with daypacks and floppy hats, waiting in unlikely groups by the entrance to the boatyard. Fishing trips, I imagine. I turn right again, eager to avoid any such large groups, and now I am in another back alley that could well smell better, but it will prove very good at confusing the tracker dogs even more. Following a scent trail is like listening to a solitary conversation amongst many of varying volume. Once you have isolated the source, it can prove easy to focus on, and filter out. But if you keep pouring more noise on there, it becomes ever harder to pinpoint, and much easier to lose altogether. That is what I’m going for.

  I can tell now, even though my hood is up, that the helicopter is somewhere behind me, but not in the immediate proximity. Perhaps it has turned back to the estate, where the search party last got a decent fix on me. That would make sense if they are in radio communication with each other. It’s the whereabouts of the police car that is becoming an immediate concern, as my mind starts to wander to one outcome - roadblocks. I think they will put the town on lockdown.

  At the end of the alleyway, a junction gives me the option of left, down another alley, or right, back towards the main road I was on earli
er. Keeping hidden in the side streets again appears to be the better of the two options, since the main road out of here may well be cut off by now. But, having said that, I can’t hear the sirens, so the police may well have already stopped. If that means a roadblock at the western entrance to town, they are too late, and I’m more than happy for them to waste their efforts.

  And just as I think that, a cacophonous streak of flashing red and blue screams along the visible section of the main road behind me. Dammit, they are blocking off the eastern end of town as well. I am too late to get out the easy way, and they have the principal thoroughfares to Ilfracombe surrounded and guarded. I’ll have to think smart again.

  Now approaching the end of the alleyway, I see that I am now on the other side of the boatyard. Across the water are those same disparate groups of day-trippers as moments earlier. And much to my concern, the tarmac I am following seems to lead now only directly into the sea itself, down a concrete boat launch. On the left of track is the water of the boatyard, and the right is a cliff face.