Lost

The Jackal had then been awoken at four am to the sound of alarms blaring and the smell of burning flesh and metal.

The situation was obvious. Looking back on it now, Karvos wondered why he’d thought he could possibly detain The MDK when they were so infamous in the circles he moved in. If they’d never escaped from anyone, how could their reputation have gone so far? He’d felt like an idiot.

He ran down to the rooms he’d had them locked in. Sure enough, they’d escaped meaning they were all adrift together in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea.

Karvos was extremely annoyed. His ship had somehow lost power and his engine room was completely destroyed. The crew had all abandoned ship and The Jackal, venting his frustration, had shot as many of the fleeing crew as he could while they tried to row away from a ship that was clearly close to going down.

It didn’t take too long to find out what had happened to Viktor. He had been in the kitchens, diced and blown out through the extraction system.

Now he was alone on this huge ship with no power and three enemies aboard. It was time to leave. He liberated the Uranium from the hold and slowly made his way up on deck.

The MDK clearly deserved their reputation. But where the hell were they now?

Karvos tried to reassure himself as he made his way to the rear of the vessel. At least he still had the Uranium. He could still get it to the extremists, if he could just make it to the port side where the remaining lifeboats were. He could escape and set the self-destruct system off via the remote link on his watch and kill these three idiots.

He looked around from his hiding place. There was no one to be seen. It had all gone very quiet. He leant down and picked up the package containing the Uranium and made a break for it. He slid along the wet deck and made it to the lifeboats. There was still no sign of anyone. Where had they gone? He looked over his shoulder as he ripped back the tarpaulin cover off the nearest lifeboat.

‘All right, Bitch?’

A gun was pointing straight into Karvos’ face, with Kevin Homes at the other end of it, where he’d been hiding under the boat cover. Automatically, Karvos pointed his pistol back at him. Kev just laughed. ‘Kill me and two other men shoot you down like the dog you claim to be!’

At that moment, Mark Hews and Dave Hobbs appeared from nowhere at either side of Karvos.

There was a moment of silence and deep thought as Kev’s concentrated look told Karvos that he couldn’t win. He was outnumbered and out of ammunition after using it on the fleeing crew, anyway.

‘It’s The Jackal, actually.’ He said, slowly handing over his gun.

‘Jackal, dog, whatever!’ grinned Kev, ‘They all piss up trees and lamp posts!’

‘I’ll take that!’ said Dave, removing the Uranium package from Steve’s grip. As he did so, Karvos’ watch dropped off his wrist. He leant down toward it.

‘Ah! No you don’t!’ said Dave, picking it up and placing it in his pocket.

‘You’ve been a bad boy.’ said Mark, ‘Do you know what we do to bad boys?’

‘No.’

‘Do the honours, lads.’

‘With pleasure!’

Kev shot Steve once in the right shin. Karvos dropped to the deck in silent agony. Dave then handcuffed him to the handrail of the ship.

Mark leant down and looked The Jackal in the face. ‘It seems to me that Jackals are scavengers, right? Real scum of the earth types who move in when the hard work has been done. So we’re letting you know just how it feels. We immobilise you and send in the pick up team. Scavenge you out from the submerged wreck. Then, if you’re still alive, you get your sorry arse dragged off to justice with your tail between your legs.’

‘Murderers!’ Karvos yelled as The MDK climbed into a lifeboat.

‘We’re not murderers.' Mark yelled back, 'We’re giving you a fair chance,’