Truly Deadly
The Complete Series: Books 1-5
Rob Aspinall
Contents
BOOK 1: TRULY DEADLY
Prologue
1. The Cut
2. Operations
3. Side Effects
4. Cleaver
5. Scar Tissue
6. Morning Jog
7. Under Scrutiny
8. Back To Life
9. What Happens In Manchester
10. The Hair Dryer
11. An Evening In Paris
12. Cherry Pop
13. Research
14. Red Flag Protocol
15. Q&A
16. How To Catch A Bullet
17. Uncertainty Principles
18. Ooh La La
19. No Going Back
20. London, Bitches
21. Brown-Eyed Girl
22. Bad Hair Night
23. Second Opinion
24. Consulting Room B
25. Driving Lessons
26. Hold On Tight
27. Tipping Point
28. 'Til You Drop
29. Identity Theft
30. Bonny Scotland
31. The Weatherman
32. Storm Warning
33. A New Woman
34. Hurricane Lorna
35. How We Roll
36. The Food In Norway
37. Welcome To Oslo
38. Barn Animals
39. Peaks & Troughs
40. Donuts & Dust
41. Hey, I'm Dead! What Next?
BOOK 2: INFINITE KILL
Prologue
1. Aid International
2. Agnes Holgersson
3. The House On The Hill
4. Steak And Eggs
5. Park & Ride
6. Night Raid
7. Spring Clean
8. No Way Out
9. Cold Storage
10. Mobutu's Eyes
11. Hidden Treasures
12. Border Crossing
13. Safe House
14. Raining Bullets
15. Chicken Stew
16. Zum Wohl
17. Facepalm
18. Emergency Exit
19. The Hammer And The Nail
20. Woof Woof
21. Tip Of The Spear
22. Takedown
23. Duty Free
24. Ghost Train
25. Change Of Plan
26. Buckle Up
27. Baggage
28. A Different Girl
29. The Exchange
30. Ghosts Of Berlin
31. Bunkmates
32. Back In Uniform
33. Ticker
34. Zip Cord
35. Surrounded
36. A Walk In The Park
37. U-Turn
38. The Hard Way
39. Going Underground
40. Fine Dining
41. Fake Plastic Guitars
42. The Bridge
BOOK 3: WORLD WILL FALL
1. Deep Waters
2. Killing Spree
3. Overboard
4. Dry Land
5. Daddy's Girl
6. Basic
7. Survival
8. Incursion
9. Demons Out
10. Tradecraft
11. Financial Crisis
12. Party Dress
13. Little White Lines
14. Lifestyles Of The Rich And Dangerous
15. The Heist
16. Working Girl
17. Three-Way
18. Caught Blue-Handed
19. Escape Hole
20. Gummy Bears
21. A Drive In The Country
22. Out Of Control
23. Chicken Noodles
24. Don't Look Down
25. Shadow Team
26. Peeing In Public
27. Spider's Web
28. Meet Teddy Tucker
29. Cold Shower
30. Cheesy Garlic Balls
31. Command & Control
32. Burn Baby Burn
33. Cat & Mouse
34. Abandon All Hope
35. Killr1
36. Critical Mass
37. The Wrong Flight
38. Out Of The Blue
39. Back In Manchester
40. Naughty Boy
41. Dear Jpac
BOOK 4: MADE OF FIRE
Prologue
1. Electricity
2. Tight Spaces
3. Data Cleanse
4. Happy Birthday
5. Fifth Avenue
6. Spring Fashions
7. Snatch & Grab
8. No Ties
9. Afternoon Tea
10. The Mexico Job
11. Easy Peasy
12. Upside-Down
13. Dead End
14. Hide & Seek
15. Emergency Call
16. Behind The Door
17. The Procedure
18. Ready To Rumble
19. Red & Green
20. Lorna Liar
21. Black Market
22. Drinking With The Dead
23. Pirate Video
24. Hot Tin Roofs
25. Run Or Die
26. Pablo & Jenny
27. The Ladder
28. Rat Attack
29. The Kiss Of Steel
30. In Stitches
31. I.O.U
32. Tooled Up
33. Cocktail Hour
34. Night Strike
35. Found Out
36. Light A Fire
37. The Beast
38. The Last Perimeter
39. Brace Yourself
40. Surrounded
41. Time To Die
42. Ka-Boom
43. Spewage
44. Out Of Time
45. Now Boarding
46. The Turnaround
47. Exit Wounds
48. Yellow & Black
49. Epilogue Part I
50. Epilogue Part II
BOOK 5: SLAVE NATION
1. Sun Trap
2. Lock And Load
3. Beards & Tatts
4. Blood & Beer
5. Piece Of Cake
6. Ladies That Laundry
7. Daylight Robbery
8. Meet N Greet
9. Revelations
10. Train Of Thought
11. Crap Fashion
12. Small Talk
13. Adrenaline
14. Fake Id
15. Reunion
16. Roll With It
17. Animal Welfare
18. Wheels Up
19. Juvenile
20. Dr Dahl
21. End Of The Line
22. Turn For The Worse
23. Frenzy
24. A Trip To The Movies
25. While The World Burns
26. Pool Party
27. The Thing
28. Second Chance
29. The Hidden Fortress
30. Outgunned
31. Eye Contact
32. Phase Two
33. Weather Warning
34. Emergency Meeting
35. Things To Do In Denver
36. Ling’s Mission Journal: Part I
37. Another World
38. The Mainframe
39. Ling’s Mission Journal: Part II
40. Spanner In The Works
41. Ling’s Mission Journal: Part III
42. The Truth & Anything But
43. Machine Death Posse
44. No Way To Win
45. Ling’s Mission Journal: Part IV
46. Death Of An Assassin
47. Deathstalker
48. The Deal
49. Ling’s Mission Journal: Part V
50. Type A
51. Crumbs Of Comfort
52. Full Circle
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BOOK 1: TRULY DEADLY
Prologue
Sixteen and my life was basically over. And, no, I’m not being dramatic.
I kept the accelerator planted to the floor, doing over a hundred, with the grille of a Range Rover twisted in a tangle of metal to the rear bumper of the ambulance, driven by a grim-faced bitch doing her best to run us both off the road.
Two police cars tried their best to box us in and slow us down. A sniper leaned out of a black helicopter, keeping pace on the other side of the motorway, taking potshots at my head.
Meanwhile, the old man strapped down in the back of the ambulance was laying down super-gabba beats through a heart monitor, while one of the guys from the grab team, kill squad, whoever they were, lolled forward in the passenger seat, long strands of gloopy blood dripping slowly from his mashed-in face.
I didn’t know who was after me or why they thought I was worth all this effort, other than I’d seen something I really shouldn’t.
It can’t have been because of anything I actually knew. Because I knew less than squat.
All I did know for sure was that if I slowed down and stopped, I was dead.
If the sniper got his aim together, I was dead.
And if the traffic got any thicker as we sped up the bridge running dangerously high over the deep and dirty Manchester ship canal … yup, I was pretty much worm food.
Sprinkle in a complete lack of driving lessons and my long, illustrious history of blacking out at all the wrong moments and you’ve got the perfect recipe for underpant brownies.
Of course, a few weeks ago, it was all so different.
Still shit. But a different kind.
Different shade. Different stink.
Rainbows and unicorns compared to this.
Then almost overnight, everything changed.
I changed.
Things got really weird and totally out of hand.
And now you’ve stepped right into the middle of my nightmare. And, like me, you’re probably wondering what in God’s gonads is going on.
So … how does a girl get herself in a pickle like this?
Well, before I catch a bullet, crash off the road or collapse at the wheel, let’s rewind a little.
It all started with a change of heart.
1
The Cut
First, I should really introduce myself.
My name is Lorna Walker and I had two choices.
a) Stick to the meds and die within the year.
b) Have the surgery and risk dying during the op.
If neither of those got me, the Death Squeeze 2000 (aka Auntie Claire) would surely hug the life out of me in the meantime.
I’d gone for Option B, of course. And there I lay on the operating table, trembling so much that the whole team had to hold me still while the anaesthetist stuck me with a needle. I stared at the circular bone saw, the bright theatre lights dancing off the blade.
Please don’t slip and chop my nipples off.
The head surgeon, a lanky grey-haired man with an accent posher than the queen’s asked his hairy-armed assistant how long the organ had been on ice.
“Four hours,” Arm Hair said. “DOA came in carrying a bullet and a donor card.”
The anaesthetist smiled down at me through pretty Indian eyes. “Lucky you,” she said, prepping me for the big sleep.
They usually didn’t give you the anaesthetic on the operating table, but they’d had to fly in the new heart against the clock, so there was no time to deliver it in another room – where I couldn’t see all those scary surgical tools.
My consultant, Dr Jennings, had already laid out the realities of the surgery, subtle as a double-D boob job.
“You’ll have a scar. Quite a prominent one extending from the centre of your collarbone to the sternum … the bony bit between your breasts.”
“That’s assuming you survive the surgery,” Dr J had said, “and your body doesn’t reject the donor’s organ. You’ll be on immunosuppressants for the rest of your natural life.”
Was there such a thing as an unnatural life? When this one was over, did they turn you into a robot sex dancer? This was the kind of pointless, random shit that ravaged my mind in the days and weeks I spent hanging around hospital wards with my life on hold.
In fact, I’d started writing it all down in a journal called Thoughts N Shit. Kind of a posthumous thing in case I didn’t make it. A sign I’d been here. That my sixteen years on Earth had counted for something. It would need a good safety edit of course; especially the bit about starting my own penis museum.
As the surgeons compared notes on golf swings, the anaesthetist gave me the gas. I felt the weak, jerky rhythm of my heart. Did it know what was in store? Was it saying one last goodbye? Suddenly I felt really sad for my heart. I didn’t want it to die.
Weird when you think about it. Imagine waiting two years for THE phone call, wondering if you’d ever get to use that transplant bag, packed and ready to rock in the bottom of the wardrobe. Then, when you finally get what you want, all you feel is sad. Someone had to die for me to live. And three people in the UK died every year waiting for an organ. Why couldn’t I just be happy and grateful? Before I could spin through it any more, the drugs kicked in and I felt light-headed, my vision beginning to split and blur.
Then I felt nothing at all.
2
Operations
I lay belly down on a dune, overlooking a desert highway. Early morning, the sun rising, already oven-hot. What the hell was I doing here? Scanning the long, straight road through the crosshairs of a rifle, I guessed it wasn’t sightseeing.
Oh no, I thought. The operation had been a con all along. They’d turned me into a drone soldier instead. A drone soldier with big, dry man hands.
I certainly wasn’t the one in control of the decisions, but I’ll use the royal “I” and “my”, because every action felt like my own.
I ran the rifle sighting over to my far left, where a procession of liquid cars turned solid, breaking the heat haze. A black Merc limo rode in the centre, a pair of Range Rovers either side. The limo had a couple of small, red, green and white flags stuck on the front, flapping in the wind. The convoy moved fast and tight. Leaving a finger on the rifle trigger, I took out a push-button phone. Some ancient piece of crap. There was a number punched in ready to dial. I held a finger over the call button and tracked the movement of the cars again through the crosshairs.
The train of cars passed below my position. I pulled my head away from the rifle and hit call. Before you could say boomshakalaka, the road beneath the lead Range Rover erupted in an almighty crack and blast, shaking some of the sand loose on the dune, flipping the vehicle up and back onto the one behind.