. . . . of Hope and Glory

  The Home Secretary's hand formed a loose fist, pummelled the stonework softly. "How do you deal with savages like this on a daily basis and not lose your faith in mankind Willard? Cold hearted killers who can snuff out innocent life on a misguided whim. Animals, bloody animals!"

  The MI5 man stubbed the toe of a well polished shoe against the wall. "Wickedness is what gets me out of bed in the morning Roger. If I can't face it, why should anybody else have to?

  "To gauge the depth of callous cruelty here, you have to understand that the date-time on the film indicates that Sergeant Sydique Sahni was killed at the outset of their deadline. The night before we found him. How sick is that?"

  "Sydique Sahni?" The Home Secretary turned back to him in surprise.

  "Correct Roger. Took us a while to suss things out. Though still a serving soldier, Sergeant Sahni was no longer on active service. Was never likely to be either. He is one of our unfortunates who has suffered irreversible injury in Afghanistan.

  "Though I do not think identifying him earlier would have got us there in time as he was plainly already dead. It was an anonymous tip-off on the Terrorist Hot Line that sent us roaring up to Yorkshire yesterday morning. They rather stood out in such a remote setting, to the locals. I'm sure those country bumpkins sleep in the hedgerows, spot everything that moves in the countryside, even if you don't see them.

  "Anyhow, you know what we found when we got there. The young man had just been left there like a pile of trash. My men had the body removed to Middlesbrough Municipal Morgue then cleaned up the mess as best they could. Wouldn't fool a forensic team but it will not come to that hopefully.

  "Our men stayed most of the day to keep a watching brief, but as expected none of the perpetrators returned, just that rag-bag vigilante group from Holtingham. And they went away empty handed, nothing worth our lads breaking cover for. Let them disappear back home, presumably."

  Roger Palmer chewed his bottom lip. "I don't share our venerable leader's obsession with preserving 'ethnic sensitivities', not when atrocities like this have been committed. My sensitivity has been offended, damn others' petty griping. But nevertheless, I agree it is not in the public interest to learn the gruesome facts here."

  Stafford nodded. "The matter is rather delicate I agree. So we moved his body down to Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham overnight in strict secrecy.

  "If you agree Roger, can I request the Ministry of Defence to issue a statement that Sergeant Sydique Sahni has sadly died from wounds sustained in Afghanistan one year ago? Give him a military funeral with full honours of course. Recommend him for a gong perhaps. He deserves that much at least.

  "I know that he was not a practising Muslim so there should not be any issues over the form of his internment."

  "What about family?"

  "None we are aware of. I believe that his mother died in Pakistan some years ago but details are sketchy on that. The authorities there are rather tight lipped on the subject, and the father was never registered. No, the Royal Marines were his family."

  Palmer nodded his approval. "Best not stir up any ethnic issues regarding his origins, let the murdering bastards who did this reap any glory from their warped version of religion.

  "Any clues as to their whereabouts at the moment? It is rather crucial we get our hands on them."

  "Sorry Home Secretary, they seem to have disappeared into the hills. Unlikely they knew we were on their trail so quickly. We threw up an immediate and widespread net to catch them. All major routes; road, rail, even small airfields out of the North Yorkshire area are closely watched. They may be running, but there is nowhere for them to go except to ground."

  "What was to be their next move do you think? Hopefully your hunt will nix that ambition. They certainly seemed to infer something momentous was about to happen amongst all that rhetoric."

  "Sahni's murder was probably part red-herring to divert our attentions and resources. The threat is repeated quite forcefully on that DVD, claiming that tomorrow, Friday is or was, to be their great moment. As you say, great ambition was in play.

  "Yet strangely, we have had no intelligence of any significant arms sales to any Jihadist group within the UK. In the film only two small handguns are apparent. If they had more it's a certainty a bunch of dreamers like that would be waving them about. Some bloody terrorist force this bunch are going to prove."

  "But there are ways they could or will obtain weapons? They have clearly been in training for such an armed assault."

  "There are and yes they have been." Stafford's economical reply caused the lifting of one eyebrow on the Home Secretary's sombre face. "All the more important that we nab them once they do break cover."

  "What is your assessment of that little group of interlopers yesterday?"

  "The EFL? Usual wannabes' that come crawling out of the woodwork. Of no consequence really."

  "No? Well they weren't so far behind your professionals with all of your big budget resources were they? Not to mention the presence of that young Arab lad; their very own Gunga Din by the sounds of it." Palmer asserted curtly.

  Stafford bit back his retort, face reddening behind his turned up collar that shielded him from a brisk, chill breeze. "Nevertheless Roger, these people are a stone in the shoe, crashing in our security operation. Could blast this whole situation wide open publicly."

  "Given your lack of useful data, is it possible that they have useful avenues of information we need to tap into? How can you be sure that DVD was not a little gift courtesy of the 'wannabes'?" The home Secretary's tone had acquired a noticeable cynical edge.

  Willard Stafford blew hot breath into his cupped hands, wishing he hadn't left his gloves in the Daimler behind them. He was really feeling the cold these days, must get his blood circulation checked out.

  "I was coming around to that." He answered with combative snap. "Cambridgeshire police have reported finding the body of a young Arab boy by the side of the A141 heading up to Wisbech at a fairly open and isolated stretch of the road.

  "Initial examination indicates that he's been strangled 'Thuggee' style, whilst being stabbed repeatedly. The interesting thing is, and my men on the spot have confirmed it from the scene of crime photos, he looks very much like the young man that they snapped in the company of those EFL mob at that farmhouse in Yorkshire.

  "We have blown up and enhanced our pic's and sent them up there to Cambridge for close comparison. Also, a motorist rubber-necking past the crime scene at the roadside, stopped to say he saw a similar looking young Arab, being virtually dragged into a Landrover near there the previous morning. Guess who has such a vehicle. Perhaps the well of information ran dry and there was a falling out."

  "Really? Have you brought any of them in for a chat?"

  "No, I thought that in the interests of discretion, it best that the local plods treat it as a common crime but to keep us posted."

  "Can you trust them to take it seriously enough?"

  "Murder, I would hope so. Also the Chief Constable, Oliver Beaumont possesses a great desire to jump on these lads from a great height, particularly a Mr. Christopher Carter their self proclaimed leader. I get the feeling that he is desperate to prove his ethnic friendly credentials, particularly as his newly elected Police and Crime Commissioner is your old friend Yasir Davi, he of the fearsome reputation for shoving it up the local constabulary.

  "Now this utter nonsense of PCC's has placed the top cop's gonads nicely in his grip, I'm sure we could find room to slide in there without introductions once he has Carter housed snugly in a cell."

  "Good. Davi's been on my back over the EFL. Should stay his tongue a while. Make it soon though, without revealing to Mr. Beaumont whom our prime targets are. I want those cut-throats brought to book asap; so whatever information you glean from these Holtingham chaps I want it." His cocked his head closer in to Willard Stafford's face whilst studying the far bank. "Use any means to stop those 'Invaders' Willard. Any means."

  "Don't worr
y sir, the beggars are not going anywhere far, whatever they are up to. We have them well and truly bottled up in Yorkshire. Take my word on that."

  "Worry? We have to be lucky one hundred percent of the time Willard. They need only to be lucky the once."

  ***

  Ashik Naseer, twenty-six years of age, was an engineer by education, born and raised in Bradford. He had never practised at his profession, electing instead to give himself over to a life, and death, in the service of Allah.

  To his parents discomfort, after leaving university Ashik had discarded the trappings of Western culture that he had grown up and thrived within. He now wore only the Pakistani Pashun tribal robes and proudly sported a full, wild, untended beard that hung down to his chest, contrasting with the premature balding at the dome of his round head. His only concession to modern necessity were the rimless eyeglasses that he wore.

  His extremist views and inclinations had been nurtured at his adopted nearby mosque whilst still studying in a Cambridge University for a degree he would never utilise. In the four years since graduating he had attached himself to Kamal Khan's closest circle despite never having fought with the mujahideen in foreign holy wars. Though he had attended terrorist training camps in Pakistan on two occasions, cherishing the handgun awarded him on his last return.

  Now he had been blessed with the honour, by Khan himself, to lead this Holy strike at the hated Infidels' throat. An act that would surely write him into the pages of Islamic history.

  He was fairly confident that his natural practical abilities, would enhance the rudimentary instruction he'd received in sailing this rusty old fishing boat that greedy Kafur had overcharged his Imam for. He had made a solemn promise to himself that one day, Allah willing, he would return and slit that old man's throat.

  Resolutely he had ignored advice not to set sail when he did, a schedule had to be adhered to. Mohammed would guide and protect them. Stoically he had endured the jibes and grins of the perplexed fishermen as he stood in the small wheelhouse, hands tightly gripping the wheel, casting off with the ungainly, unpractised assistance from his crew of ten, watching them stumble over rope and bollards in their panic to get back on the drifting boat, with a fascinated premonition of disaster in which they would run aground at the mouth of the harbour, or ram other vessels preparing to unload their cargo.

  Against all expectations they had made the open sea, the tired old diesel engine battling gamely against the incoming tide; the undulating Yorkshire coastline with the sprinkling of lights in Whitby running down to the water, a thinning smudge behind them in the dusk.

  As instructed he'd maintained their course directly out into the steely waters of the North Sea for some miles before swinging them around on a South-Easterly direction, now running with the Tidal Surge, giving some relief to the hot engine that had thumped on gamely, but perilously close to self-destruction.

  They were now moving at a gentle angle away from the East Coast, further out into one of the world's busiest sea-lanes, en-route to a predetermined rendezvous midway between the flat Norfolk coastline and the Dutch port of Den Helder; a watery unmarked location ninety miles from land in either direction.

  The only means to achieve such a colossal feat of navigation for somebody totally void of any such ability, was a total dependence on the Marine GPS, or Global Positioning System, receiver, clipped onto the bulkhead before him, that would remarkably guide them to within one hundred yards of where they should be, in approximately twenty four hours sailing time. That depending on the miserly five to seven knots aggregate speed this vessel was capable of.

  Ashik could sense the pressure on his rounded shoulders at the knowledge that the success of this glorious enterprise rested squarely upon them. To fail on these wide open waters under an even wider sky would mean they were lost, literally and metaphorically, unable to return to face the dread consequences of letting down the Brotherhood and the undoubtedly grim repercussions.

  Already bedevilled with fraught fears, Ashik Naseer peered out with aching eyes through the spray slashed cabin windscreen, wipers working rhythmically, an enticement to sleep, with the bubbling fear in his gut of running under the crushing bows of a gigantic tanker or container ship, in the incredible darkness of night time North sea.

  After some hours that felt like days, they passed relatively close to an incoming Zeebruger ferry, Grimsby bound. Occasionally he would stiffen with fright as distant lights, looming high over the water level, blinking in the far distance, before assuring himself that these were the harmless, stationary gas or oil installation platforms that littered the thousands of square miles about them.

  His sense of isolation in that dark space, the throb of the engine vibrating up through the wooden boards he stood on and up his legs, was accentuated by the lack of empathy with his Brothers in arms, the eleven young men below deck in their late teens, early twenties, seemingly totally lacking in maturity.

  Impressionable boys, street thugs nothing more, drawn to the fire-brand teaching of their Imam, urging them to blindly kill for Islam. But for Ashik, faith demanded more than unquestioning obedience to a mere man. His was a fundamental belief in Allah and the prophet Mohammed, to wage a bloody war on the Crusaders in their name. Now he, Ashik Naseer, had been the Chosen Man to lead the most dramatic and historic death blow to the hated pale enemy.

  It was that burning commitment that would carry him through the next thirty something hours, fuel his energies, and to tackle whatever adversity they faced.

  ***

  Long hours had sloshed by their bows when a dirty, grey stain in the sky heralded a cold November dawn. Despite fanatical resolve, Ashik could feel the exhaustion begin to creep up on him, knew that a further twenty-four hours at his post without sleep and rest was impossible, would jeopardise the very mission. He would have to share the duty of steering the boat through the bouncing waves, onwards to their glorious endeavour.

  There was just one amongst their number he felt could be entrusted with such a task. Ifzal, a serious young medical student for whom privately, adherence to the Hippocratic oath did not include the Kafur. The choice required no great comparisons. Even now his other companions, after a long night of playing cards and singing the battle songs of the mujahideen in a tongue they didn't fully understand, slumbered fitfully below. Except when one or the other would stumble up onto the deck and vent their stomach contents over the side of the boat, despite there being only a gentle swell in the sea that was a blessed relief. A storm or any particularly bad weather would surely spell disaster, for there was not one sailor in their number.

  At approximately mid-morning he fancied he could see far to their starboard side the great windmill constructions, sprouting up out of the sea-bed off of the Lincolnshire coast, that harvested free electricity from the howling North-Easterlies that scraped over the white tops of the North Sea. It was with a faint pang of a sense of desertion as he watched the man-made engineering recede into the morning mists as he continued on a straight course, assiduously consulting the GPS receiver, their guiding star. In time they would by-pass the East Anglian hump penetrating out into that watery divide between England and mainland Europe.

  Full daylight brought the new worry that their anonymity of another small trawler roaming the sea in search of dwindling fish stocks could evaporate under too close inspection by the UK Border Agency patrol cutters that ploughed up and down the coast, ever vigilant for illegal immigrants. A shabby old boat crewed by young men of Pakistani or Arabic descent, despite English regional accents, would only provoke suspicion and investigation.

  Despite his stalwart resolve to resist exhaustion, Ashik had awoken on more than one fright filled occasion with the realisation that a slumbering man had been piloting the boat. Despite a great relief on consulting with the GPS that they had barely strayed from their plotted line to a fixed point of longitude and latitude, Ashik knew that a time had come to acknowledge that any longer at the wheel was not only foolish but i
mpractical.

  That combined with forceful argument from Ifzal, decided him to relinquish control of the wheel with fervent promises made to awaken Ashik well before they reached their rendezvous. Ifzal clasped the wheel with the suppressed delight of a kid sneaking into Dad's car on the driveway to play with the controls. Not entirely at ease with the arrangement, Ashik refused to leave the cramped little wheelhouse entirely, rolling himself into a dirty blanket stored in a locker, on the floor at Ifzal's sandaled feet. He was asleep seconds after nestling his head into his arm and dreamt of death, destruction and glory.

  Yet it seemed but a nano-second before Ifzal's foot tapped against his ribs, nudging him awake, provoking a rush of doom laden alarm. Struggling free of the stubborn embrace of the blanket, he scrambled agitatedly to his feet peering wildly at the small illuminated screen of the Magellan marine GPS on which a set of co-ordinates glared triumphantly up at him in red.

  "We are here already my friend." Ifzal spoke softly, evidently pleased with himself at his accomplishment at getting them there.

  Ashik merely scowled, poked his head out of the wheelhouse door. A steady drizzle had developed, merging rolling sea and shifting clouds into a grey woollen cape draped all about them.

  "There is no-one here." He muttered accusingly, face wet and twisted with inner turmoil.

  "We are a little early Ashik, and somebody has to be first." Ifzal reasoned, reducing the engine to a lumpy tick-over as the waves bobbed them up and down like nature's plaything.

  "Do we throw an anchor overboard or something?" He enquired.

  Ashik looked blank. "I don't know, I never thought to ask that. Isn't the water too deep? I've never sailed a boat before."

  Ifzal grinned worriedly. "Now you tell us Ashik. We are a hundred miles nearly from the nearest land. Should we not pray to Allah for guidance?" He joked.

  "Shush!" Ashik held up a shaky hand. "Hear that?"

  Above the rumble of their own engine and the gurgle of sea water beneath them, they could now hear the unmistakable growl of powerful outboard motors. Trepidation gripped them, which transmitted to a pair of their companions who had come up on deck to enquire why they had stopped.