The Power of Five Oblivion

the cover of darkness. Of course there were guards at the gate and in the observation posts, but they had their backs to him, for if there was going to be an attack, it would come from outside and that was the direction they were facing. He saw the guard disappear into the building, waited a few seconds, then went in himself. The guard had gone upstairs. Richard heard his feet tramping on the concrete. He was alone in the wide corridor that he had followed just two days before. As in the accommodation block, a few light bulbs, barely glowing, lit the way ahead. He knew he had little time before Samir and the others were alerted, but still gambled on the fact that they would be so worried about Scarlett that they would forget about him. He hurried forward.
    Once again he went through the doors and into the ward where the injured children lay in their two straight lines. Richard had been afraid that there would be a nurse or a doctor in attendance, but they were alone. Walking more slowly now, he moved between the beds. All the children seemed to be asleep but one or two of them were whimpering, unable to escape their pain. Richard hated being here. He felt nothing but pity for them. But there was something he had to know.
    The cupboards. Each one of them was identical, with exactly the same space between them. That was what had puzzled him about the place. It all just seemed too uniform. And there had been something else. They were all boys. He hadn’t registered it at the time but he saw it now and it made no sense at all. If, as Tarik had said, these had been innocent children caught up in the fighting, surely there would have been some girls among them. And where were their parents? Where were their relatives and friends? How could you have a children’s ward without at least a few visitors?
    He stopped between two beds and tiptoed between them. He opened the cupboard. And there it was, exactly as he had expected. A set of miniature desert khakis hung on a peg with the military red ribbon attached to the pocket. A rifle had been propped against the corner. He tried a second cupboard and found exactly the same thing, except that this time the weapon was a pistol.
    These weren’t innocent bystanders. They were child soldiers, part of Tarik’s army. He had been using them to fight the government forces. Richard wasn’t sure what shocked him more. The fact that Tarik had lied to them, using these terribly injured children to make Scarlett come round to his way of thinking. Or the fact that he had been prepared to use children in the first place. There were boys here as young as eight. What had been the point in sending them into battle? They would have been cut down where they stood.
    Somewhere in the building, he heard raised voices and the stamp of feet as Samir and the others hurried over to examine Scarlett. Richard planned to fall in behind them. He would reappear and hopefully nobody would notice that he had ever been away.
    But as he stepped outside, he noticed brighter lights at the other side of the compound. This was where the vehicles were stored overnight, a garage that was built into the corner but was actually open on two sides. Richard heard the slam of metal against metal, the bonnet of a car being closed. The main lights were turned off. Then three men walked out, two of them carrying torches. Richard recognized the one in the middle. It was Tarik.
    They hadn’t seen him. The three of them walked across the compound and went into the military wing. There was a part of Richard that didn’t want to know what they had been up to. After all, he had been told that they were planning a journey at six o’clock the next morning. What could be more natural, or more sensible, than to make sure the vehicles were well maintained?
    Except that they hadn’t even turned over the engines.
    And Samir had told them that Tarik was coming the next day. Why would the leader of the rebellion be involving himself with the maintenance of the jeeps?
    Richard glanced at the accommodation block and tried to imagine Scarlett playing her part, writhing on the bed, surrounded by soldiers and doctors. How long did he have? It didn’t matter. He had to know. Staying close to the walls, he edged round the compound then ran across, making as little noise as possible. Nobody saw him enter the garage. Everything here was silent.
    There were two jeeps parked next to each other, the same vehicles that had brought them here on the