"You can identify your primary target easily. We have all seen the Demon Prince boasting of his exploits against our Muslim Brothers in Afghanistan on the television news. His bright ginger hair will make a fine target to aim at. You all must press your initial onslaught onto him. Press it hard until there is no conceivable doubt that he is dead, blasted out of his sorrowful existence.
"Only then can you turn your weapons on the others, particularly his older brother, your second priority. I believe that their father, the Heir Apparent could also be present. Kill him also and you will have cut off the head of the Imperialist snake
"There may be armed police, close protection officers who will pose a more effective response. But they have only handguns, so concentrate on them next. .
"The others will all be armed with sporting shotguns. Good for killing dumb birds. Most of them will have never shot at a human target and you will have automatic assault rifles, grenades and a shoulder-fired rocket launcher. Do not leave a single man there standing. If you are spread out and well concealed, most of you should survive any fire-fight. Do not run away after like frightened schoolgirls. When your task is done, take time to remove the main target's head with its red hair. Bring it back to me.
"Use their own Landrovers to reach the rendezvous at the A149 - A148 intersection. Fast cars will be waiting to bring you home with your Royal prize.
"You will all be celebrated forever in our history as great heroes. The Islamic Tiger will have unsheathed its claws and drawn blue blood from this bloated and corrupt beast of England.
"Allahu Akbar!"
***
"Ashik." Ifzal had sidled up alongside him, unnoticed in his reverie, in the darkened wheelhouse, causing him to jump with fright. "You have reduced speed. Are we there, everybody is ready to go."
Ashik grunted an affirmative, tense and irritable, his exhaustion and stress peaking now that the great moment was at hand. Ifzal pointed a slender finger at the GPS receiver, a touch of concern in his whispered question.
"There does not seem to be much depth of water under our hull Ashik. If we were a container ship we would have run aground long ago."
Ashik bit back an angry retort, resisted an urge to strike the smaller man. "This channel is regularly dredged, high tide should raise the sea level at least eight metres."
Ifzal peered worriedly through the glass before them into early morning darkness. "I have the men and weapons already in the dinghies, towing along side of us." He glanced back at the GPS for a second. "There is no way we can make shore without the tide coming in more is there?
"What has happened Ashik, you said yourself that precise timing is crucial?"
Ashik rubbed furiously at his tired face, his fingers entwining in his beard briefly with frustration. He'd had damn all sleep since when? Ifzal had stood in on occasion but he could not relinquish control of the boat or responsibility for the mission for too long or too often. Without answering he pulled the tide tables out from under the bulkhead, perusing the columns of figures quickly, regretted not doing the math on paper like a good engineer should, too bloody security conscious. He saw his mistake immediately.
"Shit! Shit! Shit!" He wailed, thumping the wheel with his bunched fist, frustration and self blame pouring from him. "I am so tired and confused. These columns and figures are so small that somehow I am working on the wrong date. I have calculated the tide times as they would have been the day after we left Whitby. Twelve hours later, not thirty-six as I should have done." He turned anguished eyes toward Ifzal, shame and fear on his haggard face. "We are at least an hour and a half too early."
"Can we not wait a while?" Ifzal asked, eyes wide with concern.
"Not for one minute! We cannot be seen loitering in the channel, it is a through route for many other vessels, and would raise concerns about us, particularly given the proximity of our target area." Despondently Ashik checked his watch, the luminous figures a damning testimony to his incompetence. "It has gone 5 am. Daylight is not so far away."
Ifzal maintained a diplomatic silence, realising the intractable position they were in, uneasy as Ashik looked increasingly overwrought. His mood also, was not helped by their fellow 'Invaders' singing overloud war songs they had learnt by rote at the Holtingham mosque madrassa. Both men privately suspected that some of them had sampled the illicit white powder left down below.
Wearily, physically depleted, Ashik unclipped the GPS from its mounting. "We are committed now to joining those donkeys in the boats immediately. I will leave this trawler on half power which should get her far from our place of abandonment. Perhaps all will not be lost. Our next co-ordinates take us to a small water channel that cuts through the salt marshes from our point of landing. Maybe our inflatables can negotiate their way through it. Do not mention our, - my mistake to the others, it may spook them. They need strong hearts and clear heads to carry this task through.
"Come Ifzal, come!"
They left the wheelhouse and Ashik waited for his companion to descend the 'Jacob's ladder' before following him into the mass of inflated black rubber being dragged through dark waters below. Quickly untying the rope painter he let it trail away through his fingers, its end dropping into the widening expanse of water between them and the pilotless trawler as it swung away from them into the dark, borne along on the currents towards Kings Lynn.
With bitter self recrimination hissing quietly through his beard, he consulted the GPs again, pointed at an oblique angle to their landward port side and called softly to the six men in the other boat.
"Follow us in this direction and stay close. I will check and correct our course as we go. Do not splash the paddles, keep them wrapped in the cloth. Noise carries far across open water. Synchronise your efforts or we'll just go round in circles. May Allah be our guide."
Bracing himself on the tiny board seat, Ashik plunged his own oar deep into the water that seemed determined to slop over the sides of their overloaded, flimsy craft and sink them.
Laboriously the rounded rubber stern swung around and began to move clumsily through heaving swells of Tidal Surge. To a man they feared this demonstration that nature, always, was in charge.
***
They were spaced apart, at equal intervals, along the banked earth sea wall, encompassing the best part of a half mile of the bleak coast of North Norfolk; an estimated ideal secret landing point for unholy mischief.
Hours had passed by slowly, the bitterly cold wind whipping off of the North Sea and racing across the intervening marshland and sand-dunes like chill razor blades, harrying the wild rye grass in which they lay. The extreme discomfort was as nothing to these men who had been trained to endure discomfort, hone the craft of concealment, commit sudden, explosive violence.
The figure at the centre of the stake-out felt the soft vibration of the mobile phone inside an oilskin pouch on his belt. He withdrew it quickly, numb fingers readily finding the right button in the dark.
"Tell me … " He nodded. "As I'd have thought … Bit premature aye? … No, I'll memorise them, already have … Definitely the drop-off spot you think … Good enough, we'll take it from here … No need to make it an open invitation, we 'd prefer to party on our own, leave others to clear up the mess in the morning … Be lucky my friend. Bye."
Tucking the mobile back into its weatherproof bag, he withdrew a small shortwave radio from the same pouch, flicked the switch, rattled of two map co-ordinates.
"They are moving towards us. If they maintain a straight line more or less, they should arrive at that location in less than thirty. Looks like they've fucked up on tide times. Will probably try to use the creek to get ashore now.
"Rendezvous one hundred yards this side from there. Let's go shark fishing lads?"
He replaced the transmitter then pulled a walker's GPS from the webbing harness strapped to his upper body that supported also the long, thin, oilskin case across his back, tapped in the required data. Pulling down night vision goggles over his blacke
ned camouflaged face, he slid down the wet grassy, seaward slope of the sea-wall.
Carefully he began to pick his way through the slithering, sucking bogs of black mud and green trailing sea-bed vegetation of the treacherous sands and marshes of the exposed Wash. An area reaching out a mile and more to the open sea that even now was building momentum as the Tidal Surge raced forward.
To either side of him, out of sight and earshot, four other dark figures in identical shiny black wet-suits, moved steadily forward across that inhospitable, unpredictable terrain that would soon be submerged under metres of broiling sea-water, converging with grim resolve to a final reckoning.
***
Though he had felt nervous of chugging about the North sea in a small fishing boat, bobbing about in a rubber dinghy that seemed just inches above certain disaster, guided only by a small luminous green square of technology terrified Ashik.
Even the inane chatter and boasts of impending valour and glory from his fellow Jihadists had dwindled away into introspective musings and regret. The physical effort of paddling their ungainly craft, combined with fearful imaginations in the pitch dark, bore down on the group like a restraining hug.
After what had felt like the eternal labours of Hercules, the continuous heave and roll of ocean waves began to dissipate into white topped breakers onto the lumpy outline of sandbanks that loomed menacingly through the dark ahead of them. A sight both comforting and ominous.
Ashik whispered instructions to stop paddling as he felt their underneath scrape on sand and mud, concerned now of tearing the vulnerable rubber fabric. He peered anxiously into the darkness in both directions, fervently hoping that the GPS had accurately delivered them to within a few yards of their way marker. As his tired strained eyes adjusted to solid shapes and alternating faint tones of light and colour, an almost imperceptive tall thin shape, a timber stave, stood out against the irregular mass about it. Then another further in, and another.
Silently praising Allah, he motioned that they begin to paddle forward again, using his own oar to lever them away from the terra-not-so firma. As claimed the series of wooden marker posts denoted a course of clear water that meandered through the expanse of treacherous land spreading glutinously to either side of them. Looking back over his shoulder he shivered, with both the cold wind and at the spectacle of a great bank of Fret, dense sea mist that those fishermen of the north call Haar, rolling purposefully towards them, riding on the incoming tide.
Somewhere further out on the open water, a long sonorous blast of a ship's horn, a Russian timber ship, announced its presence to other vessels as it waited patiently for enough depth of water to rise in the Kings Lynn Channel for it to come into port and unload its cargo.
Entering the narrow creek, though with much awkward manoeuvring, gave a measure of comfort to those twelve men crammed into the two frail craft. Not that the unstable ground about them looked too safe or welcoming.
"Keep paddling my brothers." Ashik urged, a measure of relief creeping into his hoarse whisper. "We have but two kilometres between us and eternal greatness."
They progressed at a slow steady pace, sea water gurgling either side of them as it drained in swift rivulets into the channel from dark gullies, swelling its depth and width. Was it imagination that the swirl of incoming tide had increased its energy? Indeed, the visible portion of the wooden staves stretching before them looked to have reduced already. Ifzal sat alongside him, dipping his oar into the water with increased fervour born of excited anticipation, grinned broadly, the first time Ashik had seen him show any lightness of spirit or good cheer.
A piercing white flash to their left and an immediate loud 'phut' sound, caused every man in the lead boat to jump with sudden fright. The rubber inflatable beneath them gave something like a tremble and a continuous sigh, like a wounded sea mammal. In rising panic Ashik stared disbelievingly at the neat round hole that had appeared in the rapidly deflating craft, as their progress stuttered to a sluggish wallow.
Before he could even call out in surprise, another flash to their right and a strange popping noise, caused the dinghy behind his to shudder and the hiss of escaping air was unmistakeable.
"We are being shot at!" One of the paddlers screamed out.
"Not us, the boats." Ashik growled. "Someone is trying to sink us."
Third and fourth silenced shots hit the boats which were already refusing to respond to the frantic efforts of those few with the presence of mind to keep paddling. They settled further down in the water which now began to seep over the sides at an ever increasing flow, swirling about their feet, then knees and buttocks. Panic set in, causing them to try to stand, slopping the water from side to side, as one by one they scrabbled about snatching at their weapons with befuddled intent to fight back.
One young lad, balanced in his wallowing boat, an AK- 47 at his shoulder, screaming fearful defiance at an unseen enemy. His first spray of bullets flew harmlessly into the night as the resultant kick-back of the weapon knocked him completely overboard. In just moments, both dinghies had given up the struggle to stay afloat and all the twelve 'Invaders' fought to keep their heads above the freezing, fast flowing waters. Some had retained hold of their guns, but the immediate concern was to escape from the rapidly deepening creek to the relative safety of the soft ground to either side of them.
Ashik himself crawled out of the water on hands and knees, salt water running out through his nose, having swallowed a copious amount whilst shouting unheard instruction to his terrified comrades. Rising unsteadily to his feet, still knee deep in coursing dark water, he realised with dismay that their number had been divided to either side of the ever widening creek, spread out along its slippery sides wherever they had managed to claw themselves out of the water.
Only a handful had managed to retain their automatic rifles; the grenades, the rocket launcher and spare ammunition as irretrievably lost in the sands of the Wash as King John's treasure. At least the GPS had been meant to be caste into the waters. Everybody it seemed were shouting in terror, confusion and blind anger. Two of the youngest sprayed the thickening mist that was advancing on them, mindlessly screaming out that Allah would slay his enemies. Right. Too soon their ammunition ran out, leaving them with hot, useless weapons which they slung aside with rage. Now it was all down to Allah.
Unbelievably, at that moment, a dark figure arose from the very earth itself in their startled midst. Wordlessly it seized one of the shooters, dragging him down behind a sandbank. In the frozen silence following the shock appearance, just the sound of gurgling water reached their ears; or, maybe, the sound of someone drowning.
Four more dark figures appeared simultaneously as if from hell itself, seizing the remaining 'Invaders' still with weapons in their frozen hands, pulling them too back down into their watery underworld.
Ifzal, the last to be standing now on the far bank to the horrified Ashik, screamed out with pitiful, primeval fear, a lifetime's education and modern sophistication stripped away by deep rooted superstition.
"The djinn are upon us! They have come to steal our souls, deliver us to Shaytun. Oh Allah, save your children!"
The raising of the Islamic Devil and genies, the evil spirits of another dimension that travel at speed and can assume human form or orbs of scorching fire, spread unreasoning dread and panic in those that remained. Despite Ashik's screams for reason, the survivors all turned and fled in different directions, into the all enveloping Fret, desperately seeking its concealment. Blindly, without thought of destination, they stumbled away through deepening rivulets and swelling ponds into sucking mud and bogs. In mindless frenzy, the Warriors of Islam fled like stampeding goats into the white-out of a freezing November morning, the hungry, merciless Tidal Surge of chasing waters hard on their heels.
Ashik remained rooted to the spot, literally, slowly sinking up to his thighs in soft quick-sand, watching dumbly in shock as Ifzal was seized too by the shiny black being that erupted yet again from the wa
ters of the creek tugging him down under foaming water as a thick bank of Fret rolled over and obliterated the sickening sight.
In a state of detachment from the ugly world he now inhabited, Ashik barely heard the rustle of wet movement behind him, barely felt the iron grip of the dreadful djinn as he also was pulled firmly onto his back anchored by his lower legs. Below the rising seawater that sought out his facial orifices, his wide eyes stared uncomprehendingly straight up at the black figure with protruding goggle-eyes holding him fast and firm, as he slowly, painlessly drowned.
******
TWENTY-SIX
Despite their ferocious words and heartfelt intent earlier in the day, the assembled members of the EFL each privately baulked at the plan of retaliatory action agreed. Grievous Bodily Harm and arson were not natural traits that ran through their collective psyche. All were hard working, everyday young men with family and home to consider. Except for Chris Carter of course, but then bitter twists of fate had indiscriminately singled him out for rough treatment.
Yet amongst this grim gathering of good souls was a general consensus that something had to be done, a stand made; a need to step over to that wild side of harsh reality that failed to reach most decent lives. But these men had watched that DVD of horror, spent the rest of that afternoon and evening in a jumbled state of shock and numbed acceptance that shit was going to happen tonight.
As the church clock chimed a midnight call to arms, they quietly drained their glasses in the sombre bar at the Rugby club. Nothing wrong in a bit of Dutch Courage. Outright heroes throughout history had downed their noggin of rum before engaging in bloody war, screaming battle cries as they went over the top or swung across to the other ship's decks, cutlass in hand.
Chris moved away first, gravely surveying his dozen or so friends with him that night. "I'm going out this door alone and will wait for one minute exactly in the War Horse. Anybody has second thoughts about this and wants to stay here, I have absolutely no beef with that. There's a score note on the bar. Get yourselves another drink then go home to your beds. Coming along with me now could be a one way ticket to the slammer. I'm heading back there regardless without any say in the matter, so I have nothing more to lose personally."