Stormbreaker: Chapters 7–9

He opened his eyes and saw a fishing village, the blue sea beyond, a swath of rolling green hills, and a cloudless sky.

An old tugboat—tangled nets, smoke, and flaking paint—pulled into the quay.

It was Victorian, redbrick topped with copper domes and spires that had long ago turned green.

And then something moved in the turquoise shadows and Alex gasped with a mixture of horror and wonderment as the biggest jellyfish he had ever seen drifted into view. The main body of the creature was a shimmering, pulsating mass of white and mauve, shaped roughly like a cone.

As the jellyfish moved, or drifted in the artificial current, its tentacles writhed against the glass so that it looked almost as if it was trying to break out. It was the single most awesome and repulsive thing Alex had ever seen.

As the jellyfish moved, or drifted in the artificial current, its tentacles writhed against the glass so that it looked almost as if it was trying to break out. It was the single most awesome and repulsive thing Alex had ever seen.

He was so short that Alex’s first impression was that he was looking at a reflection that had somehow been distorted.

In his immaculate and expensive black suit with gold signet ring and brightly polished black shoes, he looked like a scaled-down model of a multimillionaire businessman.

Sayle gestured at a glass display case and Alex noticed three harpoon guns and a collection of knives resting in velvet slots.

“But when I saw this specimen of Physalia physalia, I knew I had to capture it and keep it. You see, it reminds me of myself.”

Alex had dredged up the facts from somewhere and spoken them before he knew what he was doing.

But he had been thrown by the way Sayle had appeared and by the slow, hypnotic dance of the jellyfish.

As he had talked, Sayle had become more and more animated, carried away by his own enthusiasm.

The man had two horrendous scars, one on each side of his mouth, twisting up all the way to his ears.

Mr. Grin used to work in a circus. It was a novelty knife-throwing act. For the climax he used to catch a spinning knife between his teeth.

“Oh? Why was that?” Alex asked, casually.
“I have no idea. One moment he was here, the next he was gone.” Sayle smiled again. “I hope you won’t do the same, Alex.”

Darkness had fallen and the water, cascading ten feet into the air over a semi-naked statue that looked remarkably like Herod Sayle, was eerily illuminated by a dozen concealed lights.

Everything was exactly as it had been when he had packed, but he was certain that the sports bag had been expertly and methodically searched.

He felt relieved to be out in the air, away from all the oppressive artworks.

Mac might have been the first computer with a real sense of design, but the Stormbreaker had far surpassed it.

It was black apart from the white lightning bolt down the side—and the screen could have been a porthole into outer space.

How to extract oxygen from water? The science program did it in front of his eyes.

A murmur of voices reached him and he quickly stepped into an alcove, squatting beside a drinking fountain as two men and a woman walked past, all wearing white coats, arguing about Web servers.

To his amazement, the screen flickered into life, a tiny, almost opaque window through the metal door.

There seemed to be a desk to one side, piled with apparatus that he couldn’t make out.

Sayle laughed briefly and followed the butler around, already sizing up the next shot, a fairly tricky black into the corner.

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” Saliva flecked Sayle’s lips. He was staring at the table as if he couldn’t believe what had happened.

He went over to the wall and pressed a button. Part of the floor slid back and the entire pool table disappeared into it, carried down by a hydraulic lift.

He threw his billiard cue over to Mr. Grin, hurling it almost like a javelin.

He still found it hard to believe that this ridiculous man could have created anything so sleek and powerful.

He was tall and gangly, silhouetted against the lights, a black cutout.

He was tall and gangly, silhouetted against the lights, a black cutout.

It was similar to the trucks that he had seen at the SAS camp—it could have been army surplus. The back was tall and square, with a tarpaulin hanging loose to conceal whatever might be inside.

In all, a convoy of five vehicles left Sayle Enterprises.

The boxes were being repacked now into the back of the truck that Alex had vacated.