Scorpia Rising

went after him. He wasn’t even trying to hide his own gun. The police and security men might be looking for a would-be assassin, but they would barely glance twice at a teenager in school uniform. Julius was getting close to the gate, burrowing through the crowd, using his elbow and fist to strike out at anyone who got in his way. Alex seemed to be moving more slowly, taking his time. But the distance between them remained the same and he knew, with a cold certainty, that he wasn’t going to let the other boy slip out of his sight.
    Julius was through. On the other side of the gates there was a wide, circular parking area with dozens of hawkers, taxi drivers, more policemen, and soldiers, some of whom still seemed unsure what exactly had taken place. A long avenue with fountains and statues led down to the main road, but the traffic had tied itself into an impossible knot with everyone trying to get away. As Alex reached the gate, he felt something hard hit him on the shoulder and wondered if someone had struck him from behind. He turned briefly but there was no one there. Behind him, the Assembly Hall was lit by huge spotlights, bathed in a brilliant white glow. There were still people pouring out between the great pillars, surging toward him.
    He was hit again, this time on the head, and felt water trickling down the side of his face. Now he understood. The storm was finally breaking. The first raindrops—as big as bullets—were already falling. He looked up in time to see a flash of lightning with all the power of the universe come scorching across the Cairo skyline. At the same moment, there was a roll of thunder so loud, it was as if the whole world had split in two. Then the rain came down in earnest.
    It was incredible—a vertical flood. Within five seconds, Alex was completely drenched. The rain washed through his hair, swept over his shoulders and down into his shirt. He felt it coursing over his lips and into his mouth. It half blinded him. But he ignored it. Julius might think that the rain was on his side, that it would help to conceal him. Alex was going to prove him wrong.
    The traffic, which had been barely moving, shuffling forward in fits and starts, had come to a complete halt. The cars were deluged. Windshield wipers that hadn’t been used in months were being pushed into life, sluggishly sweeping curtains of water off the glass. Windows were being wound up, sunroofs desperately fastened. And still the drivers were beeping, as if they could somehow persuade the bad weather to go away. Alex pressed forward, feeling the water surging over his ankles. The roads in Cairo have no drains. Already the cars seemed to be sitting in the middle of a river. There was a second blinding burst of lightning. The rain hammered down.
    Julius was weaving between the stationary cars. Where was he going? Gunter had said that he was returning to the OBU. He had wanted to be there when Alex died. That plan was no longer open to him, but maybe there was a second getaway car out there, a driver waiting to take him to the helicopter. Alex quickened his pace. He had reached the line of traffic himself now. He moved past the cars, glimpsing the figures inside, almost invisible on the other side of the rain-soaked glass.
    A gunshot. Alex wasn’t even aware that Julius had fired, but he heard the bullet twang into the side of a gray Peugeot and saw the dent appear in the bodywork. Inside, the driver and two passengers screamed and threw themselves down. God knows what it must have sounded like for them, with the rain already pounding down on the roof. Perhaps they thought they’d just been struck by lightning. There was another shot and the side mirror of the car next to Alex exploded. Alex didn’t even try to dodge the bullets. He lifted his own weapon, water dripping off the muzzle and the back of his hand. It occurred to him that from the day he had first joined MI6, he had wanted a gun, but he had never been allowed to have one. Well, that had all changed now. Blunt and Mrs. Jones were nowhere near. This was between him and Julius Grief.
    Julius had ducked out of sight, but suddenly he reappeared, running from one side of the road to the other, firing twice more. The windshield of a white van shattered and the driver must have panicked with his foot on the accelerator, because the vehicle shot forward, smashing into the car in front. A man got out of the second car, rising into the rain in front of Alex, already