Free Revenge by Joe Craig Page B

whirring round at the same rate. It was then that he noticed the girl.
    His first sight of her sent a shudder across his skin and something forced him to look for her again. His cup spun on its own axis, faster and faster. Every time Mitchell was facing the right way, there she was: staring at him from the teacup opposite.
    She looked like she was about twelve. Her hair was a sleek auburn and she had wide blue eyes. She wasn’t blinking. Despite being hurled round in a never-ending circle, this girl had an air of stillness, as if she had slowed down time.
    There was a smile on her face, but not the wild enjoyment of the kids around her. They were getting their kicks from the ride. This girl was happy about something else – and Mitchell got the feeling it was something nasty. He couldn’t help staring back, craning his neck to see her every time the ride spun him round the wrong way.
    Then he heard it. At first, he thought it was the wind, the music, the machinery or the screams of the child next to him.
    It flew into his ears as a whisper: “Mitchell.”
    He looked for the girl. She was still staring at him. It sent blades into Mitchell’s chest. His programming whirred round his belly. This girl was bad news. At last he saw her move.
    She took in a deep breath and yelled at him over the din of the ride: “I know about you, Mitchell.” Her voice was high, piercing the racket. She had a very faint French accent. “I know what you’re looking for. I’ve seen your agents investigating at the DGSE.”
    She grinned at him. Her teeth glinted in the neon light. In his shock, Mitchell tried to stand up before he realised that the safety restraint was locked in place. Mitchell pumped that extra strength into his arms and there was a click as the hinges snapped.
    Mitchell’s head was spinning as fast as the teacup he was sitting in. He looked around, frantic. Surely everybody in the fairground could hear the secrets this girl was shrieking at the top of her voice. But nobody else seemed interested. If they could hear at all, they probably didn’t speak English.
    “Who are you?” Mitchell shouted.
    Slowly, he raised the restraint off his shoulders. The boy next to him stopped screaming and tried to raise his restraint as well. When he couldn’t, he took up screaming again, with even more vigour.
    Mitchell twisted, trying to keep his eyes on the girl, but now her seat was empty. He scanned the othercompartments. She wasn’t there. He looked down at the four other teacups, spinning in the opposite direction. They were rising now.
    After a second, Mitchell’s compartment jolted to a halt and immediately started hurling round the circle the other way. He was thrown off his feet and smacked his chin against the floor. The metal scraped off a layer of skin and his jaw jarred into his head.
    When Mitchell staggered to his feet, all the teacups were spinning the same way. He looked round the circle. There she was – in a compartment two along from Mitchell’s. Suddenly, she leapt up, rolled over in mid-air and landed in the next teacup.
    It was only now that the young man in the charge of the ride noticed that something was going on. Panic twisted his face. He waved his arms about, desperate to remember how to stop the ride in an emergency. He hauled on a lever, but the ride sped up. Everybody’s screams went up a notch in intensity. The man’s face went white and he scrabbled for his walkie-talkie.
    “I know what you’re looking for!” the girl shouted again. Then her teacup lifted with three others and changed direction. Mitchell lost sight of her again. He stared at the teacups whizzing around above his head, trying to catch another glimpse of her.
    He was only faintly aware of the ride slowing down and the crowd of funfair staff. The music stopped and the screaming stopped with it. The drone of themachinery gradually came down from its insistent pitch.
    Does she really know what I’m looking for , Mitchell asked