A Kitten Called Cat

Chapter Forty Three - The Ambush

Through the rest of that miserable winter, I drove out to the racetrack once a week with Caroline to practice the 'avoidance and evasion' things. They had a funny sort of school on the site too where they taught me all sorts of non-car stuff: lock picking; surviving being kidnapped; escaping through a window without slicing yourself to ribbons; handling guns without accidentally shooting yourself; and smashing your way through a locked door.

Twice a week, I drove up to the gym where she spent a couple of hours beating me up. And, because I still wasn't allowed out of the flat on my own, Elroy had to come with me and he started to help with the lessons. I suppose it made a change to get beaten up by a man... he pulled his punches much more than Caroline. We also used him to play through various 'scenarios' which all seemed to involve somebody capturing me and somebody else releasing me and delaying the attacker as I ran away.

And, when I was completely and utterly pooped, I would collapse in a corner and the two of them would spar. Thanks to the lessons, I could roughly see what was going on... and watching them did more than any words to convince me that I should never even think of trying to fight anyone who actually knew what they were doing. I was getting better... much better... but I still had an awfully long way to go!

A couple of times, Master popped along to join in the fun. He refused to spar with me - he wasn't as good at controlling his blows as the other two - but watching him spar with Caroline and, particularly with Elroy, convinced me that he was one of the ones who knew what they were doing!

All this, combined with my college work, meant that I had plenty to keep me out of mischief.

Life ran on quite smoothly for a while until a sunny morning in mid March when I was driving back home from one of our training sessions. Suddenly my situational awareness training kicked in. A large, black SUV was following us.

"Well spotted," Caroline said when she saw I'd noticed. She was already on the phone, telling 'Enforcement Division' what was going on. "Keep driving normally as if you haven't noticed. From the ring road, switch to 'Alternate Route B'." That was a slightly longer route home that kept mostly to wider and busier roads.

I noticed that she was fiddling with something in the passenger footwell and she suddenly had an enormous handgun on her lap - pointing away from me, of course.

"Keep your eyes on the road. You do your job, I'll do mine." Her voice was calm and controlled but very firm.

I managed to get my brain back on its defensive driving thing and I eased back on the accelerator because my speed had started to nudge up. The SUV was still there but it was staying a couple of cars back so I sank back into the familiar routine, carefully scanning the road, both ahead and behind.

About a mile from home, I rounded a corner onto a quiet suburban street to find a roadblock ahead of me. For a moment I froze but then my practiced instincts just took over.

Time seemed to slow down as I inspected their ambush. Two cars, nose to nose in a chevron pattern, pointing towards us. Four men behind the cars... armed but not pointing their guns at us. They wanted to take me alive.

The person in charge - Slimeball, I guess - would be unhappy with anyone who accidentally shot me. I suppose that was a bit reassuring!

"You know what you're doing," Caroline said calmly. Strangely enough, I did. I'd practiced this so many times it was just happening automatically. As I approached the barrier, I slowed to a crawl, as if I was about to stop, and selected a low gear. The SUV behind us parked sideways across the road to stop me escaping that way and to block off any other cars.

"You have to get us through there or you will be captured and I will be killed trying to protect you," Caroline said. I don't know how she was managing to stay so calm. She was even managing to spread her calm across to me.