Helix Nexus by Chris Lofts (read e books online free .TXT) 📕

mocked, the subject of stand-up routines in comedy clubs: ‘What do you call a digger with a shovel? Doug!’ Cue canned laughter. ‘What about a digger who’s lost his shovel. Douglas!’ Wankers.

He downed the last of his water. Tossing the empty cup into a bin, he crossed to the bench where Mace was laying out the kit. His eyes fell upon each item hoping to find something that Sofi had missed. Disappointed, he dropped his trousers. Mace blew out a long low whistle and bent down, pulling up his white socks to just below the knee.

Sitting on the stool, Helix lifted the flap of false skin at the back of his right calf and inserted the PCM. Closing his left eye, he observed the boot sequence in his right and got to his feet, pulling his trousers back up.

Holding his forearm horizontal away from his body, he squeezed his fist releasing a pair of ten inch ceramic blades: one from between the second and third knuckles of his hand and the second from his elbow in the opposite direction. He relaxed. The blades retracted. Squeezing again he cycled them three more times.

‘Wolverine, grrrrr,’ Mace growled.

Helix parted his feet, turning his right boot out a few extra degrees. A third, shorter blade, sprung from the toe of his boot, retracted and sprung out again. He nodded his approval.

Sofi inserted a clip into each of the P226s, handed one to him and stepped back. He activated the targeting system on the weapon, noted the green status icon in the reticle overlay in his right eye. He welcomed the renewed ease with which he was moving as he strode to an arch in the wall beyond which lay a single lane shooting gallery with a target in the distance. With the centre of the reticle on the middle of the target he pointed the P226 down the alley and pulled the trigger. The smart round found the centre of the target, confirmed as he zoomed in also checking the range finder overlay. ‘Yards or metres, Mace?’

‘One hundred yards, darling. Call me old-fashioned if you must.’

He nodded. ‘Can you kill the lights?’

Two more rounds hit the centre of the target as he cycled through the night vision and thermal imaging functions. ‘Looking good.’

Sofi lifted the AX50 sniper rifle and stepped over to the gallery. ‘Scope settings?’ she said. ‘Ballistic coefficient, drop, wind drift, altitude, coriolic correction?’

‘No need to worry your pretty little head with such trivia,’ Mace replied. ‘Preselected by the scope and automatically adjusted for all conditions based on GPS location. But you have to point it in the right direction.’

She extended the fitted bipod, unfolded the stock, dropped to the floor behind the rifle and cycled the heavy bolt. Mace reset Helix’s target to 500 yards. Fine grey dust erupted from the cement ceiling and floor as Sofi took the shot. ‘Close enough,’ she reported, springing back to her feet, brushing the dust blown back by the muzzle brake from her sleeves.

Helix ranged the target. A single hole remained in the centre. What had been 9mm in diameter had been widened to just under 13mm. He nodded his silent approval. ‘We’ll take a box of Raufoss Mk 211s to go with that, Mace,’ he added as Sofi folded the bipod and stock, before stowing it in the carry bag.

‘Nasty. I might just have the last box to be found outside a museum somewhere.’

‘Many a fine tune played with an old fiddle, mate.’

Mace raised his thickly drawn eyebrows and mumbled. ‘Just like you, honey.’

Helix laughed. ‘Heard that.’ He folded back the flap over the graphene screen in his jacket sleeve. He set a timer ending Thursday 11th November, 11AM and pressed start. Forty-six hours, eleven minutes and twelve seconds. He stared at the display, watching the seconds slipping past.

‘Whose account is this little lot going on?’ the Quartermaster asked, tossing the box of high explosive armour piercing rounds to Sofi.

‘Nobody’s. It’s a private transaction between us,’ Helix said, looking at Sofi.

‘What?’ She shrugged.

‘If you’re going to be here, you may as well make yourself useful and pay the lady.’

Fifteen valuable minutes later, Helix led the way up an identical spiral staircase from the bottom of the fifty metre deep Victoria embankment shaft. ‘Any activity on the surface we need to know about?’ he said, turning to Sofi.

She blinked into the distance. ‘Two police vehicles operating on a routine patrol pattern along the embankment. No air cover. No chatter. What have you got in mind?’

‘Cab west to the perimeter. Rendezvous with the transport and take it from there.’

‘A cab?’

‘Yep. You’ll be paying this time. And seeing as you don’t exist, it’ll be untraceable. Ready?’

Sofi tightened the straps of her bergen and nodded.

Helix cracked the door open, peered through the narrow gap. Snow compacted in their footprints as they crossed the grass, each scanning in opposite directions. Short-lived wisps of steam from dying flakes of snow rose from the pavements and roadways. They paused under the wet leafless trees that stood like bronze sentinels guarding the road. The embankment’s buildings glowed in the gloom, like a perpetual dawn.

Helix craned over the silent lines of slow-snaking vehicles, looking for a taxi while scanning for the two police patrols Sofi had mentioned. ‘Taxi on the opposite side, seven vehicles back,’ he said. ‘Shit. Police vehicle two behind that.’ With nothing approaching from the opposite direction he moved off . ‘We might have more luck at the junction with the bridge,’ he said, heading towards Westminster.

Keeping the trees between them and the traffic, they bobbed and weaved between pedestrians and holo-ads, keeping their eyes downcast to avoid being called out with an exclusive offer for something they didn’t need. ‘There’s a cab coming over the bridge,’ he said, turning to Sofi a few steps behind him. ‘We should be able to nab it at the junction.’ As he turned back, Helix bounced off a dark-suited figure grinning back at him. ‘Finch. Where the fuck did you come from?’

‘Behind