They heard the sound of gunfire - a distant rattling and popping. Mike pulled the gun scope to his eye and aimed up the road. He could see sporadic flickerings of light, and a tracer lancing upwards into the sky. Then he spotted an amorphous glowing blob of light in the middle of the road that undulated like some cellular life form growing and dividing, growing and dividing.
‘Bollocks!’ hissed Westley. ‘There’s the bastards comin’ down this way!’
Dropping his gun down, and looking with his bare eyes, Mike could see a large group cautiously advancing down the road towards them, a dozen beams of torchlight dancing from one side of the road to the other ahead of them. Meanwhile, beyond them in the market area, the fire-fight seemed to have intensified. It looked like the mob had found Zulu, and the poor bastards were having to fight their way out of it.
‘Shit. What now?’ whispered one of the other soldiers.
Westley looked anxiously around. They were walking alongside a long tall, flat wall with no places to hide nearby. Further up ahead of them on the left was another side-street. But that would take them closer to those advancing torch beams, and they were bound to be spotted making a run forward towards it. Opposite, across the wide road, was a garden wall, chest high.
Westley gestured with one gloved hand towards it. ‘Over that wall, now!’
The five British soldiers sprinted desperately across the four lanes of open street, with Mike grabbing Farid’s arm and leading the old man after them. As they stumbled across, he prayed that the approaching torch beams dancing from one side of the thoroughfare to the other, hadn’t picked out the movement.
Mike thudded against the garden wall, catching his breath for a moment before turning to the old man.
‘Get over the wall,’ he said to Farid.
Farid didn’t hesitate, pulling himself up and over. And Mike swiftly followed, dropping down inside the garden where Westley and his four comrades were waiting.
The veil of cloud in the sky was beginning to break, and a full moon shone down between the fleeting gaps.
‘Shit, that doesn’t help matters,’ muttered Westley.
In the undulating moonlight Mike could see them hunched down in a semi-circle; he could hear their chorus of laboured and ragged breathing during the sporadic pauses between distant bursts of gunfire.
CHAPTER 34
7.23 p.m. GMT Between Manchester and Birmingham
Jenny walked silently beside Paul for several hours, trying to digest what she’d recently witnessed on the motorway. They steered away from the main roads, spotting on several occasions in the distance convoys of army trucks and police wagons rumbling along the deserted tarmac, unhindered by traffic.
She found her shoes, with only a modest heel, were impractical for the fields they crossed, and the tufted grass verges they were keeping to. She was beginning to wish she’d packed more practical clothing in her overnight bag. But then yesterday morning, she couldn’t have imagined she’d be travelling cross-country with a man she knew nothing about.
She tried her phone several times as they made their way, roughly heading south she guessed by the position of the waning sun. There was no signal on several attempts, and when she did pick up a signal, she received a message that the service was experiencing difficulties dealing with an abnormally large volume of traffic.
As the warm evening sun was beginning to dip below the tops of the trees ahead of them, Paul steered them towards a small wood.
‘This way,’ he said staring down at the glowing screen of his palm pilot. ‘We’ll be able to rejoin the M6 on the other side of it.’ He had some sort of GPS functionality built into the gadget.
She looked at the woods; densely grouped mature trees that cast an impenetrable shadow on the undergrowth below. She had never been a big fan of that kind of thing - quiet, spooky woods and forests. It was always in places like that, certainly in fairy-tales, that nasty things happened to the carefree and innocent. It didn’t help that Andy had taken her along to see The Blair Witch Project many years ago.
‘Do we have to go through?’ she said. ‘I’m not exactly kitted out for this kind of off-road rambling.’
‘It’s half a mile through it, according to this. Or about five to ten miles to skirt around it. Look, I can see you’re a little spooked, but trust me okay? We’ll be quickly through it.’
Jenny looked at him.
‘I’m knackered, okay?’ he smiled apologetically, ‘I just want to hit some flat, sturdy road as quickly as possible. Just half a mile through this and we’re back to civilisation.’
She looked up at the trees, and the orange sun, bleeding through the leaves at the top, and the shadows lengthening across the field they had just crossed in long forbidding purple strips.
‘The longer we leave it, the darker it’ll get in there.’
‘All right,’ she said unhappily, ‘let’s go through as quickly as we can, okay?’
He smiled, ‘Of course.’
He led the way, stooping through a barbed wire fence. He held the wire up for her as she doubled down and squeezed through the gap. Her blouse caught on the back, somewhere between her shoulder blades.
‘Ouch,’ she whimpered.
‘I’ve got it,’ said Paul, unhooking her deftly.
‘Thanks,’ she muttered.
The ground was overgrown with nettles and brambles, and fallen branches, all apparently competing to snag her skirt, scratch her calves or sting her ankles.
They made very slow progress. Half a mile began to seem like a lot more than she remembered it being. They spent almost as much time fighting through the undergrowth as they did traversing any noticeable distance.
Paul stopped. ‘I need a rest. How about you?’
I’d rather get the hell out of here.
‘No, I’m good,’ she replied.
He sat down on a log anyway. ‘Sorry, need to just catch my breath. We’ve been walking for hours.’
‘Okay.’ She looked around for somewhere else to sit - there was nowhere, so she squatted down against the base of a tree.
They sat in silence for a couple of minutes, he scowling down at his palm pilot, she trying her phone again and again. She was getting a signal, but the service was giving her that damned message. The mobile networks had to be overloaded with anxious people trying to get in touch with loved ones.
It was Paul that broke the silence. ‘So, crazy fucking day or what, eh?’
She nodded. It was that all right.
‘I can’t believe that traffic policeman shot a guy dead,’ he said, shaking his head.
‘No, neither can I.’
‘You just don’t expect that kind of thing, you know, here in good ol’ Britain.’
‘No . . . I suppose not.’
He turned his palm pilot off. ‘I can’t get the GPS signal in here. And the charge is running down.’
Jenny looked up at him urgently. ‘We’re not lost are we?’
He grinned. ‘Nope, I know where we are. Don’t need it now. Like I say, it’s just a little way through the woods, and then we’re right on the M6 again.’
‘Oh, thank God for that. I don’t think I could cope being stuck in here after dark.’
‘You ever camped out in a wood at night?’
‘Never. I don’t ever plan to either.’
‘I did a paintball weekend with my work mates last year. Night-time sessions with those cool night sights and everything. Very hardcore, very intense. As much fun as you can possibly have in a wood at night.’
Jenny nodded unenthusiastically.
‘So, did you say you got kids or something?’ he asked.
She nodded. ‘They’re at home in London, on their own. I just want to get back to them as quickly as possible.’
‘No dad to look after them then?’
Why is he fishing for details?
Jenny felt uncomfortable with that, stuck out here, alone with him. She sure as hell wasn’t going to tell this guy that she ha
d recently split from her husband of eighteen years. He’d probably take that as some sort of encouragement.
That’s not fair. Has he given you any reason to think of him like that?
She looked at him - he hadn’t.
To be honest, there were many other blokes she’d worked alongside in the past, whom she would not trust for a moment in a situation like this. This guy, Paul, so far had kept his eyes, his hands and any sexually charged innuendoes to himself. He’d shown his little gadget more interest than her.
But you never know, do you?
Oh come on, she countered herself, if he was that kind of bloke, right here . . . right now would be the moment he’d start getting just a little bit too familiar, probing the lay of the land, so to speak and . . . and asking questions like ‘no dad to look after them’, perhaps?
Maybe he’s just making conversation?
Yeah? And maybe the next thing he’ll ask is, ‘you got a fella out there worried about you?’, or how about, ‘you’re looking a bit cold, it is getting a little fresh. Come on, why don’t you sit over here next—’
‘Come on,’ said Paul, getting up off the log. ‘I can see this place is giving you the heebie-jeebies. Let’s press on and hit the road whilst we’ve still light to see.’
She smiled gratefully. ‘Yeah, good idea.’
They managed to beat a path through undergrowth that seemed intent on preventing them getting any closer to the motorway. As the sun began to merge with the horizon, dipping behind a row of distant wind-turbines on the brow of a hill, they emerged from the wood and descended down a steep grass bank on to the motorway.
They both surveyed the six empty lanes, stretching as far as the eye could see in both directions, without a single vehicle to be seen.
‘That’s just such a weird sight,’ said Paul.
They turned right, heading southbound, enjoying the firm flat surface beneath their feet.
‘I’m really thirsty,’ said Jenny.
‘Yeah, me too. I bet we’ll find somewhere along here soon. This part of the M6 is loaded with service stations and stopovers. ’
‘You sure? I don’t fancy walking all through the night without something to drink.’
‘Christ, I’ve driven this section enough times to know. Got to admit though, I don’t believe I’ve ever walked it.’
She smiled.
‘If we get really desperate I might even consider going into a Little Chef.’
She managed a small laugh.
It felt good to do that. It wasn’t exactly a funny joke, wasn’t exactly a joke, but it was good to hear a little levity, especially after everything she’d seen and heard today.
‘We’d have to be really desperate though,’ she quipped. ‘I mean, really desperate, and I’m still some way from that yet.’
Paul chuckled and nodded.
CHAPTER 35
10.24 p.m. local time Al-Bayji, Iraq
‘Shit, they’re heading our way,’ hissed Carter.
Andy looked up and down the narrow street. There was nowhere for them to hide, it was no more than four or five feet wide, and cluttered with a few small boxes and bins; nothing large enough to hide behind. Any second now the large group of militia the lieutenant had just spotted would be turning into it, and their flashlights would pick them out in a heartbeat.
Andy spotted a small side-door recessed in the flaking plaster of the wall to their left. ‘Try the door,’ he muttered to Derry, the young soldier next to him.
Lieutenant Carter nodded. ‘Go on.’
The soldier tried the handle of the door and twisted it. It was locked, or stuck. It rattled as he pulled and pushed desperately on it.
‘For fuck’s sake Derry, you girl’s blouse, kick it in!’ growled Sergeant Bolton, leaning waxen-faced against the wall beside it.
Private Derry, took a step back, raised a booted foot, and kicked hard at the rusting metal door. A shower of rusty flakes fell to the ground and it clanged and rattled noisily in its frame, but the lock held. Behind them, out on the main thoroughfare they heard raised voices, and several beams of torchlight fell on the mouth of their side-street, dancing and bobbing as they began to run towards it. They’d heard the noise and were coming to investigate.
Private Derry swung his foot at the door right next to the lock the second time, and on impact, it swung in, with a clattering sound of a lock shattering inside.
‘In, in, in!’ shouted Carter desperately. Derry led the way and Andy followed in his wake. One of the other two privates and Carter hauled Sergeant Bolton up on to his feet and carried him through, whilst the last man fired off a dozen shots of covering fire, then dived in after them.
Inside, the darkness was complete, and once more Andy found himself having to fumble his way whilst the others picked out at least some detail through their weapon scopes. There were concrete stairs leading upwards, and walls that felt like rough breeze-blocks, scraping the skin from his fingertips as he held his hand out for guidance.
They had turned a corner, for a second flight of concrete steps, when it sounded like someone had taken a jackhammer to the rusty metal door. The dark stairwell below, suddenly strobed with sparks as a dozen or so rounds punched jagged holes through the door.
‘Fuck, move it!’ Andy heard one of the squaddies shout behind him.
They sprinted up the second flight of stairs in darkness, and then a door opened up ahead. Andy could see the glow of moonlight through the opening.
Down below, the metal door was kicked open again. He could hear footsteps and see the dancing flash of torchlight coming up the stairwell after them. The soldier behind him, gave Andy a hefty shove forward towards the open door, then turned round to face down the stairs.
The gunfire was deafening in the contained area, piercing, sharp, painful and punctuated by a cry from below as at least one shot found a target.
Andy tumbled forwards up the last few steps and out through the open door, his ears ringing. They were on a long balcony that overlooked a wide road. Andy recognised it as the road they had driven into town on this morning.
Beneath them, only fifteen or twenty feet below, Andy could see several dozen armed men and boys in loose clusters across the broad thoroughfare, torch beams arcing up and down the street, desperately trying to find them.
Oh shit. Please don’t look up.
Ahead, Carter, Bolton, Derry and the other squaddie had dropped down low as they made their way along the balcony - a waist-high wall of breeze-blocks, crumbling, pitted and scarred, was keeping them from being seen. Behind him, through the open door to the stairwell, Andy could hear a concentrated barrage of fire as the last man in their group endeavoured to hold the mob back on the stairs.
Andy kept pace with the others, desperately trying to avoid the clutter of wicker chairs, children’s toys, potted shrubs that were parked in front of a succession of front doors. Small windows looked out on to the balcony, and through several he passed by, grimy and fogged with dust, he could see the frightened faces of women and children cowering inside.
The gunfire in the stairwell suddenly stopped. Andy turned to look back along the balcony, hoping to see their man emerge from the doorway.
A single shot rung out from the stairwell.
One to the head to be certain. Our lad’s down.
They’d be emerging through that doorway in the next few seconds. ‘Fuckin’ move it,’ Andy found himself shouting at the men up ahead, slowed down by trying to drag Bolton along with them. ‘They’re right behind us!’
A second later he heard the door to the balcony swing open and a burst of gunfire behind him. Half-a-dozen shots whistled past him as he dived to the floor, tangling his legs with a discarded wicker chair.
‘Down here!’ Carter shouted back at them.
Andy got to his feet, and sprinted forward to join them. He caught up with Derry, kneeling and firing spurts of two and three rounds back at the doorway, and Carter struggling to manoeuvre Bolton down a narro
w flight of stairs.
‘Gimme a gun,’ said Andy to Lieutenant Carter, ‘I can help Derry slow them down.’
Carter unslung Bolton’s SA80 and chucked it up at Andy. ‘Know how to use it?’
Andy shrugged, ‘Got a vague idea.’
‘God ’elp us,’ drawled Bolton.
Andy shouldered the weapon, feeling its reassuring weight in his hands. He swung the barrel around with his finger on the trigger; both Bolton and Carter cringed.
‘Safety’s off by the way,’ Bolton grunted, pointing at the weapon, as Carter pulled him clumsily down the stairs.
Andy grinned sheepishly. ‘Shit, sorry.’
He turned round, took half-a-dozen steps up to join Derry on the balcony.
Derry fired then ducked, as a long volley chipped, then shattered a large earthen pot beside him. ‘Fucking fuck!’ he yelled as he sprawled to the ground beside Andy. He looked up at him, surprised to see an assault rifle cradled in his hands.
‘Yeah, I get to have one now,’ Andy muttered. He then leaned out and fired a long burst down the length of the balcony, that had the pursuing militia picking their way forwards, needlessly diving for cover as the volley pulled the barrel up and his shots peppered the floor of the balcony above.
Derry used the bought seconds to squeeze past Andy, off the balcony and down on to the stairs. ‘Short bursts,’ he shouted.
‘Right.’
Andy jabbed again at the trigger and fired a short burst, more accurately this time.
‘I’m completely out,’ said Derry, ‘not exactly the world’s greatest fucking rearguard action.’
‘Go then,’ said Andy, ‘I’ll hold here a few more seconds.’
Derry nodded, slapped Andy on the back and staggered down the stairs.
Oh Jesus, what the hell am I doing?
He wondered what Jenny would make of this if she could see him now, doing his best Bruce Willis impersonation.
He fired a few shots into the open doorway, whilst Derry made it down to the bottom. Almost immediately two heads popped out from the darkness, and a couple of AKs fired a volley in response. He felt the puff of displaced air on his cheek as a shot whistled past his head only an inch away, whilst another glanced off the wall just behind his head.