Max Arena Read online

  The sirens stopped blaring and the commotion settled down somewhat as most of the soldiers finished streaming past them. The noise of the speeding jeeps progressed a little further away down the road and in just a few seconds, the group seemed alone at the house. The gun fire and shouting still raged down towards the gate, but right now, they were the only ones left by the mansion.

  ‘How much further?’ Kris asked.

  ‘Round the corner of the house and then one hundred metres out onto the eastern lawn,’ Peter replied without looking at her. ‘Six Black Hawks. The nearest one is our’s.’

  ‘Are they...shooting at ordinary people up at the gate?’ Elsa asked quietly, so as the children didn’t hear her.’

  ‘Rubber bullets,’ Peter returned. ‘The Prime Minister wouldn’t let us load anything else. He didn’t want the army shooting our own civilians. Breaks every military principle.’

  Elsa nodded silently. Then she gasped, holding her left hand up in front of her face.

  ‘What?’ Peter asked, snapping around to look at her.

  ‘My wedding ring,’ Elsa said. ‘I took it off before training with Kris. It’s on the dresser in the bedroom.’

  Peter just looked at her. He then shifted his gaze sideways to Max, who looked imperviously back. Peter opened his mouth to speak, but Elsa cut him off.

  ‘I’m not spending what could be the last few months of my life without my wedding ring, Peter,’ Elsa said. ‘I’ll happily leave everything else behind, but not my wedding ring.’

  ‘What about Jo Jo?’ Millie asked from within Max’s clutches. ‘We can’t leave Jo Jo behind.’

  ‘What’s Jo Jo?’ Peter asked evenly.

  Elsa sighed. ‘She’s Millie’s bed time stuffed toy.’

  ‘And Jay Jay!’ Millie squealed.

  ‘Jay Jay!’ Jason joined in. ‘Got to get Jay Jay!’

  Elsa tightened her lips.

  ‘And Jay Jay is Jason’s toy?’ Peter asked.

  Elsa nodded. Peter closed his eyes and took deep breath in through his nose as he did a mental assessment of the situation.

  ‘We’re going back into the house, mate,’ Max said. Peter snapped his eyes open and Max continued. ‘It’ll take five minutes. In and out.’

  Peter held Max in a steely stare for a few moments and then nodded. ‘Okay,’ he relented. ‘In and out. Two toys and a wedding ring. You know exactly where they are?’

  ‘Yep. They’re all in the main bedroom. The kids dumped their toys on our bed this morning.’

  ‘Good,’ Peter said and then turned to one of his team members. ‘Get everyone straight to the birds and strap them in. We’ll be there in five minutes with wheels up as soon as we board. Give me continuous reports while we’re apart.’ Peter tapped his ear microphone to emphasise the point.

  His team member nodded and Peter turned back to Max.

  ‘Let’s go,’ he said. ‘Stay behind me and this time, I really mean behind me.’

  Max nodded and let the kids down, allowing Elsa to take them both in to her. He then stepped forward and kissed Elsa sharply on the lips. ‘See you in five,’ he said.

  Elsa nodded and Max was gone.

  Peter led the way through the main entry under the portico, his gun lowered in a two handed grip, his eyes scanning every inch of the floor plan as they moved. Max hustled along behind, his own eyes smoothly registering everything in sight.

  Across the broad marble floor they rushed and then up the wide, open staircase to the first floor. Turning left, Max followed Peter along the landing and into a hallway that turned twice more to lead to the rear of the west wing where the main retreat was located, including the main bedrooms.

  At the very end of the corridor, the space widened and a massive set of wooden doors stood open, revealing Max and Elsa’s bedroom. Pausing at the threshold, Peter scanned the room and listened. Nothing.

  ‘Grab the stuff,’ Peter said crisply.

  Max hustled past to the dresser where he plucked Elsa’s wedding ring off the polished surface. Slipping it into a pocket, he turned to the enormous, super king size bed and surveyed the space. There they were. Jo Jo and Jay Jay, a stuffed elephant and a stuffed frog, resting atop the mass of pillows and cushions at the head of the bed. Dashing around to the side of the bed, Max grabbed both toys and shoved them under an arm.

  ‘Done,’ he said. ‘Let’s roll.’

  Peter silently nodded and said into his wrist microphone, ‘Got the goods. We’re coming out.’ Then after pausing to listen to the reply in his earpiece, he said, ‘They’re at the chopper. All they need is us.’

  ‘Right behind you,’ Max replied.

  Without another word, Peter turned back to the doors, gun lowered, but ready to use. Max followed him out and back down the corridor. Quickly, they made their way towards the landing above the main entry, their senses still firing. Then suddenly Max reached out and grabbed Peter’s shoulder. Peter flinched, but halted as Max forcibly pulled him up.

  ‘Wait,’ Max hissed.

  Peter shot a look back over his shoulder. ‘What?’

  ‘There’s someone in the foyer.’

  Peter squinted back. ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I just do.’

  Peter held Max in his steady gaze for a few moments and then slowly nodded. ‘Okay. Let’s do this real careful. Stay here and I’ll have a sneak peek. If there are any bad guys, we back track to another exit. Got it?’

  ‘Got it.’

  Turning back to the landing, Peter stepped carefully up to the threshold and then pressing up against the wall, he snuck an eye out for a look. There was no one in sight, but this was no time to be rash. If Max’s instincts were squirly, that deserved respect. Peter paused and kept looking. Then he saw it.

  The khaki coloured and oval shaped object sailed up from below the landing and arced gracefully over the wrought-iron railing to drop onto the carpeted floor in front of Peter. It took exactly that long for him to realise what it was. A grenade.

  ‘Go!’ Peter yelled as he turned and started to run back in towards Max. Max took only a split second to take it all in, but instead of running, he reached forward and grabbed Peter by the front of his shirt to pull him even faster into the hallway and hurl him down the corridor.

  A moment later, the world erupted as the blast ripped into the hallway, stripping wood and plasterboard from the walls. The ensuing shockwave lifted both men off their feet and hurled them even further down the corridor. Dust filled the air as the noise ricocheted around.

  Silence settled and Max popped his head up. He had a slight ring in his ears, but otherwise his senses all seemed fine. Snapping his head sideways, he found Peter face down and groaning. Rising to his haunches, Max checked the hallway behind them and found a mess.

  Splintered wood and broken plasterboard lined the walls, while the floor had been completely blown away at the threshold to the landing where the full force of the blast had centred. The space literally looked like a bomb had gone off and now, Max could hear voices.

  ‘Get up there and finish them off!’ a voice shouted.

  ‘But we blew them to...’ a second voice started.

  ‘Just get up there!’ the first voice cut-in. ‘They’re all military in here, so they might have survived that. Finish them off and hurry up!’

  ‘Ahhh,’ Peter moaned as started to rise up on all fours.

  Max looked at him and in that split second, made his decision. They were going out the same way they had come in and that meant going straight through whoever it was coming up the stairs to kill them.

  Standing up, Max scanned the remains of the hallway and quickly judged the distance between himself and the hole in the floor and the width of the hole.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Peter asked, his voice hoarse and heavy.

  ‘Getting us out of here.’

  Peter looked up and immediately saw that Max’s expression had hardened into steel, his clenched fists clearly broadcasting his intent. Footsteps
sounded on the staircase outside. Max took a step forward.

  ‘No,’ Peter croaked out. ‘We need to double back.’

  Max ignored the comment and kept moving forwards, his pace increasing with every step. Peter pushed uncertainly to his feet. The figure of a man appeared on the landing at the top of the staircase, a soldier’s rifle in his grasp. Max was now virtually sprinting. Peter remembered his gun, but then realised he was no longer holding it. The intruder with the gun froze as he took in the vision of Max charging at him. Max was at full pelt now and without slowing down, he ripped off a chunk of splintered wood from the wall and a split second later, launched himself out over the ragged hole in the floor.

  The intruder’s eyes grew wide as Max filled his sight. In mid flight, Max pegged the lump of wood at the man, hitting him squarely between the eyes. Continuing his flight, Max forward somersaulted and cleared the hole in the floor to land on his feet on the far side on the main landing.

  Gunfire tore through the air, forcing Max to dive onto his stomach and lie flat. Bullets strafed the edge of the landing next to him, sending wooden shards spinning past his face. In the fraction of a second view Max had gained of the foyer, he had located the second man to be near the main doors leading out to the portico. All Max had to do was get off this landing, cross the ten metres to the doors and take the man out. More gunfire ripped up the landing in front of him. Max squinted. He knew what he had to do, but how?

  Glancing around, Max made a decision. The unconscious man next to him had dropped his rifle. Rolling onto his back, Max grabbed the gun and tossed it back through the hole in the floor the grenade had blasted. Hoping for it to cause a diversion, Max jumped up as fast as he could and bounded up onto the landing railing to launch himself out into thin air, four metres off the unforgiving marble floor below.

  Fortunately, the falling rifle had diverted the gunman’s attention and he did not react immediately to Max’s ploy. The gunman watched the rifle tumble harmlessly to the ground, just as Max went airborne. Two seconds later, the rifle clattered to the marble floor and the gunman started to return his aim back to Max, who was now somersaulting towards the ground.

  Max’s feet planted firmly onto the marble just as the gunman was brining the muzzle of his rifle round to fix onto Max’s torso. Max used his momentum to instantly bound forwards and close the gap, his right fist raised to deliver a killing blow. The gunman arced his barrel up and pulled the trigger. Max’s eyes zeroed in on the target, every ounce of his being set to pummel the life out of this man.

  The sound of the single shot filled the foyer, but Max did not hear it as he focused on landing his blow. In that split second, Max saw the gunman recoil backwards, forcing his fist to go wide of the mark. Landing on his feet, Max watched his foe crumple backwards out the main doors to land in a heap on the steps of the front entry. With his fist still half raised, Max looked down on his now dead enemy. He then turned and looked back up at the landing.

  There was Peter, perched on the edge of the hole in the landing floor, his gun still in both hands, arms outstretched and barrel pointing down at where the intruder had been. Looking directly at him, Max could tell Peter’s dazed wits had been replaced by honed steel, his single shot having taken the man out.

  Max nodded once and Peter reciprocated. No words were spoken.

  One minute later, both men were outside and running across the eastern lawn towards the Black Hawks. All of the choppers squatted lightly on the broad, green turf with their rotors whining overhead, ready for lift off. Soldiers kneeled at regular spacings around all of the aircraft, guarding the perimeter. None of them turned to look at Peter and Max as they sprinted past, plasterboard dust smeared over their clothes and faces.

  Through the open door of the nearest Black Hawk, Max could see his family, Kris and Peter’s team, all strapped in to their seats. As they ran up, Peter’s team hauled them aboard.

  ‘Go!’ Peter yelled.

  The pilot acknowledged the command by lifting the chopper’s wheels off the ground. Peter quickly helped strap Max in next to Elsa as they rose upwards. Then after strapping himself in, he looked out the side door just as the aircraft powered forwards to bank over the mansion.

  From the air, Peter gained a much wider view of the state of play all around the estate. Intruders were running rampant, climbing over the boundary fence at multiple places. Meanwhile, the military detail were reforming near the main gate and beginning to move in an orderly fashion back towards the remaining Black Hawks, cutting down intruders as they went. Peter suspected they were no longer using rubber bullets. The situation demanded lethal action. They were now shooting the very citizens they were meant to protect.

  Peter turned to look across at Elsa who had covered Millie’s and Jason’s eyes, while Max had wrapped an arm around her shoulders, still protecting his family. The man was unstoppable. Sure, Peter had just saved Max’s life, but Max’s athleticism was unbelievable. The way he had fearlessly launched himself off that landing and then in the blink of an eye, got on top of that guy and almost killed him? That had been nothing short of superhuman.

  Fortunately, Peter’s own aim had held true, otherwise right now Max might be dead and all of them doomed. Then, as if Max had been reading Peter’s mind, he looked around and nodded to him.

  Peter nodded back and after a few brief moments of holding each others’ gaze, Peter looked back out the open door to watch the bush pass underneath them in a speed blur.

  5pm, 2nd August (later that same day). Dread

  Max walked into the living room to find Elsa awake and seated on the couch in the growing gloom of the late winter’s afternoon. Both Millie and Jason lay asleep on either side of her, their heads nestled in her lap. While peace adorned the children’s faces, weariness dragged at Elsa’s features. Fighting fatigue to keep her bloodshot eyes open, she had no intention of letting her guard slip following their escape.

  Elsa had not noticed Max standing there, so he stayed in the doorway and watched his family, letting his mind’s eye play back the afternoon’s flight from the estate to their arrival here in their new refuge.

  It had taken two hours to fly to their new base, the journey completed entirely in silence, everyone’s’ thoughts all consuming. Elsa and Max had cuddled the kids the whole way, sharing a few brief glances at each other, but nothing more. Kris however, had remained frozen in her seat from the moment they lifted off. During the trip, Elsa had tried several times to stir her, but failed, Kris’ gaze stuck unseeing out the side door.

  After flying over Brisbane and reaching the coast, the Black Hawk had turned north and hugged the seaboard. Steadily, the pilot veered the Black Hawk out to sea until all they could see beneath them was the endless expanse of the Pacific Ocean, embroidered with a generous smattering of mid afternoon whitecaps.

  Then, an island appeared and the helicopter banked to circumnavigate it, revealing the land mass to be essentially a low relief, oval-shaped dome with fringing palm trees and open, grassed slopes rising on all sides. On the very crest of the hill a sizeable mansion lay with broad, open lawns surrounding it.

  A few minutes later the pilot had put the Black Hawk down on the southern lawn and they all disembarked, a golf cart waiting to transport them up to the house. Kris had needed to be forcibly carried out of the aircraft and seated in the cart, her silence escalating to effective paralysis. Clearly in the advanced stages of shock, Peter had immediately called the medical staff to get an emergency room ready for Kris inside the house.

  To call the residence a house was a gross understatement. It was another mansion, very different in design from the previous one, but probably even more palatial. The building was three storeys in places with contemporary architecture comprising a blend of rendered masonry, glass, steel and exposed timber. Seated atop the hill, it commanded the island like a fortress in the ocean.

  Inside, the mansion’s massive size was well accompanied by huge rooms and expansive views over the ocean w
orthy of any billionaire’s dollar. Again, how Joseph had laid his hands on this place was not a question anyone wanted to ask and to be fair right now, was not really food for thought anyway considering their plight to get to it.

  Since landing, the whole group had introverted. Kris had been immediately whisked away into one of the bedroom suites upstairs with a team of paramedics, while Elsa had brought the kids into this living room, seeking quiet and solace for her and the kids to rest. Peter had also disappeared indicating he had to finalise the security details for their stay.

  That had left Max all alone and with nothing else to do, he had walked the grounds. He had very much wanted to talk to Joseph and Abdullah, but that would have to wait, until tonight. He did briefly run into one of Peter’s team though, who gave him a run down on the estate and its security, indicating their new location was much safer than the last. Foot, air and sea patrols protected the island. No one was getting in here unless they wanted to start a war, so with the sun starting its descent into the dim, winter horizon, Max had made his way upstairs to find Elsa and the children.

  In the upstairs living room, Elsa stirred and her eyes blearily found Max across the room. Max moved to turn on the light, but Elsa’s voice stopped him.

  ‘Don’t,’ she said. ‘You’ll wake the kids.’

  Max nodded and withdrew his hand. Gently, Elsa extracted both children from her lap and left them in peace on the couch. She then led Max out of the room and into an adjacent sitting room, where she did turn on the light. A sumptuous square of couches surrounded a huge, carved coffee table resting on a plush, pile rug. Elsa lowered herself onto one of the couches and rubbed her face. She then looked up at Max who looked no different to how he normally did, calm, but alert.

  ‘I know you’re half alien,’ Elsa started, ‘but doesn’t the human half ever get tired?’

  Max curled a corner of his mouth and sidled in next to her.