Circle of Flight John Marsden

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.I lay there, drifting in and out of something that had a vague resemblance to sleep.I had a series of thoughts, of images, a kind of dream where the bed had fallen apart when Gavin landed on top of me.It was like an old silent movie playing in my head, where he and I and the bed were all in a heap on the floor.Then an electric shock ran through my brain.I sat upright, or at least as upright as Gavin’s head would let me.The bed! Of course! The bed!I wriggled out from under Gavin and started pulling him and the mattress off.I wasn’t too worried about disturbing his slumbers now.Anyway, there was always plenty of time to sleep in our little prison cell.He mumbled and whinged and grunted as I slid him onto the floor, so I turned the light on to let him see what I was doing.Inside two minutes I had disassembled the frame of the bed base.Lying flat on the floor were the two ends, which were not much use to me.Then there was a big heavy panel of chipboard, which wasn’t much use either.But the bed irons, they were what I wanted.I had suddenly realised they were the best weapons we had.Apart from fingernails they were also the only weapons we had.They had real potential though.About two metres long, and probably a bit less than fifteen centimetres wide, solid heavy metal, with a ball at each end which fitted into the crosspiece.They would punch holes in the ceiling, no trouble at all.They would probably knock down the door.If these guys came in with guns to shoot us, we might even do a bit of damage to them before we died.That would be nice.Gavin watched, sulkily at first, then with more interest, and finally with a bit of excitement when I picked up one of the irons and showed him how much force I could get behind it.Apart from beating me at chess, he hadn’t shown much excitement about anything since I’d been caught using the broomstick on the ceiling.I was relieved to see a bit of light back in his eyes.‘When are we going to use it?’ he said.‘You don’t want to get caught again.’‘You got that right,’ I said.‘I don’t know when the best time is.And I don’t know whether we should try to go through the ceiling or the door.’I gazed at the ceiling, considering the options.I thought I could now smash a big hole in it in no time at all, say, thirty seconds.But we’d still have to get up there and through the hole.If we put the base on its end and used it as a ladder we could probably do it, even with one of its irons missing.Assuming we did it in the middle of the night, and assuming the noise woke them, we’d still have a couple of minutes before they came after us.When we got to another room we’d have to find a manhole cover or whatever they’re called, open it, and drop down into what could be a hive of armed terrorists.It could be a long drop too, if it was a high-ceilinged room.The whole thing wasn’t a great proposition.For example, it’s hard to run away when you’ve got four broken ankles between the two of you.The only other option was to go through the door.I figured I could smash it down with half-a-dozen blows, especially if I backed up to the far side of the room and took a run at it.There would be noise, sure, but again the whole thing would be over pretty quickly.Then we’d have to tumble down the ladder and take our chances, making a run for it.The risk was bloodcurdling, but I’d feel more confident running along a corridor than scuttling through a roof.I explained all this to Gavin, using a combination of language and acting.He watched silently.He didn’t seem very happy.I didn’t blame him for that.At his age he was probably hoping for a bit more out of life than this.Hell, at my age I was hoping for a lot more out of life than this.‘I guess the door,’ he said finally, looking like a guy who has to choose between the gas chamber and electric chair.‘OK,’ I said.‘The door it is then.’‘Right now?’ he said, starting to look scared.‘No,’ I said.‘We’ll wait until we find out the time.We have to try to do it in the middle of the night.’Just in case we did have to switch to the ceiling though, I gouged some rough holes into the chipboard, so we could use them as toeholds if we needed a ladder.Then I put the bed together, as quickly as I could.Somehow the discovery of the irons had given us both a great surge of energy.It was a small thing, much too small to pin a lot of hope on, but it gave us the feeling that we were, however slightly, in charge of our own destinies again, or at least able to influence them [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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