Natural Selection (A Free Spider Shepherd Short Story)

by Stephen Leather

twenty years ago - if then - and now all he’s interested in is protecting his pension. Here’s the lesson for today - always question authority; if they want the mission to be done a certain way then let them do it. If it is not your plan it will fail. Nine times out of ten officers haven’t a clue what they’re doing.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Right, you four are going to form the patrol with me.’ He paused, checking their expressions. ‘Assuming that you’re all up for it, because it’s a volunteer operation.’

  Shepherd was already nodding and the other three quickly followed his lead.

  ‘You guys seem to rub along all right together,’ Pilgrim said. ‘But just between ourselves, it’s not necessary to be friends with the rest of a patrol to do the job, though you must have respect for them and no one can force you to work with somebody you don’t respect. But if you want to pull out, now is the time to do it. If you agree to go, then you must give it one hundred per cent, and you must input any ideas you have. One unbreakable rule in the Regiment is that if you have something to say, you say it before the mission. If it goes tits up and you haven’t said anything beforehand, you don’t get to criticise the plan afterwards. Understood?

  The four men nodded enthusiastically.

  ‘Now, you all have experience from other units which I don’t have, so let’s hear it,’ said Pilgrim. ‘The mission plan has got to be the patrol plan or it will not succeed. And just so you know, although we operate in areas under the command of officers from the Green Army, the CO of 22 SAS always retains command. He alone makes the strategic decisions affecting the deployment of SAS troops and he cannot be countermanded, not even by the Director of Special Forces. So if the MOD thinks the CO is getting it wrong, the only course of action is to sack him and the implications of that are so serious that it has never happened in the entire history of the regiment. So although the Chief of Staff can brief the patrol, the mission is always referred to Hereford for approval. And if the patrol commander - me in this case - doesn’t agree with the mission he’ll refer it to Hereford knowing that he will be supported without question and the mission blackballed. It happens quite a lot and as a consequence, senior officers treat SAS senior NCO’s with great deference. The downside is that, to keep things under their control, they will often try to use ordinary infantry to do tasks that are beyond their skill set, sometimes with disastrous consequences. Okay, we have twenty-four hours to prepare for the op, make the most of it.’

  He walked away. ‘I’m hungry,’ said Liam almost immediately.

  ‘You’re always hungry,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Hungry enough to eat one of those bugs?’ asked Jimbo.

  Liam pulled a face and Shepherd laughed. ‘If you’re that hungry, ask that trainer for one of his tarantulas,’ Shepherd said. ‘They’re delicious apparently.’

  One of the “big time” trainers had a sideline mounting tarantulas, rearing up as if they were attacking, on little wooden shields like hunting trophies. He caught them with an improvised net, made from an old mosquito net, and kept them in glass jars before injecting them with formalin - which both killed and preserved them - and then sold them to squaddies as souvenirs.

  ‘Are you off your head?’ Liam said, suppressing a shudder. ‘Nobody in their right minds would eat one of those things. They’re worse than the bugs.’

  ‘I would,’ Shepherd said. ‘If the money was right.’

  ‘A bet?’ said Liam.

  ‘If you think I won’t do it, put your money where your mouth is.’

  There was a moment’s stunned silence. ‘Go on then,’ Geordie said. ‘Twenty quid.’

  ‘I’ll match that,’ said Liam.

  ‘Bloody hell, yeah, I’d pay twenty quid to see that,’ said Geordie. He strode off towards the trainer’s basha and returned a few minutes later with a jar containing a live tarantula. ‘Cost me £50,’ he said. ‘But it’ll be money well spent, if you’ve got balls enough to eat it.’

  ‘I’ve got the balls,’ Shepherd said, ‘but I’m not doing it for £60. Make it £150. Fifty quid each.’

  The three men agreed.

  Shepherd gave a slow smile. ‘All right, bring it on.’

  ‘Would you look at those fangs,’ said Liam, peering into the jar. ‘It’ll bite you before you can bite it.’

  ‘I doubt it.’ Shepherd opened the jar, tipped the spider onto the ground and hit it on the head with his rifle butt as it tried to scuttle away. ‘That’s the mercy killing done.’ He took a disposable lighter out of his pocket and blowtorched the spider with the flame.

  ‘You won’t cook it that way,’ Jimbo said.

  ‘I’m not trying to, I’m just singeing off the hairs, they’re an irritant.’

  ‘Bit like you,’ Geordie said. ‘Get on with it, will you?’

  Shepherd pretended to hesitate, then popped the spider in his mouth, letting the legs drape over his chin for a moment, before crunching it up in a couple of bites and swallowing it.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ Liam said, grimacing ‘Now I’ve seen everything.’

  Shepherd opened his mouth to show it was empty and gave a big smile. ‘Easiest hundred and fifty quid I ever made. Some of the local tribes eat them. I read about it before we came out here.’

  ‘You sly sod,’ Geordie said. ‘You set us up, didn’t you?’ He paused. ‘So what do they taste like?’

  ‘Chicken,’ Shepherd said reaching for his water bottle. He grinned. ‘To be honest, more like chicken shit.’

  Jimbo gave a slow smile. ‘I think we’ve found your nickname: “Spider”. What do we think guys?’

  Geordie and Liam nodded. ‘Spider it is,’ said Geordie.

  Shepherd insisted that the three handed over the money as Pilgrim returned with five ration packs which he distributed before they sat down and began their first “Chinese Parliament”, throwing ideas and suggestions for the patrol into the mix, which were then argued over, disputed, and accepted or rejected. Pilgrim controlled the discussion and had the final say, but he was careful to let everyone have their input.

  Shepherd, Geordie and Jimbo had been in the Paras, where a limited amount of opinion from the ranks was permitted, but it was a very new experience for Liam, who had been an infantryman – ‘a crap-hat’ to the ex-Paras, since he wore a black beret rather than their maroon one. During Liam‘s previous military career he had been expected to follow orders without question and if he had any opinions, his wisest course was to keep them to himself. All that had changed now that he was with the SAS. Now everyone’s opinion was at least listened to.

  ‘So,’ Pilgrim said. ‘We need to give the Guatemalan Army a couple of good reasons not to come across the border again, but as the Colonel told us, if we get into another contact with them, we don’t want to kill too many because it’ll create an international shit-storm. So we just want to do enough damage to discourage them, and that means we’re going to be selective. As we’ve just discussed, the only way we will relieve the pressure on Belize is to go deep into enemy territory, find a military base staffed by senior officers and take one or two of them out. The junta won’t care if a few other ranks get killed in cross-border ops, but if we give some senior officers the good news, they’ll soon go off the idea.’

  ‘How will we locate the base?’ Jimbo said.

  ‘We’ll track the course of this river,’ Pilgrim said, pointing at his map. ‘Jungle villages are always close to rivers - the source of food and the only communications route - and soldiers locate next to civilians if they can for administrative reasons: they can get food cooked and laundry washed... and possibly other services that soldiers often seem to want. OK. That’s the plan. All agreed? Then let’s get the preparation done.

  ‘Personal equipment: escape and navigation kit should either hidden or tied to the body. Each of you should be carrying an escape button compass with a wire diamond-tip file hidden in the seam of your clothing to help you escape. You must also carry your personal medical kit and your compass on your body
. Wear your ID tags, watch and morphine around your neck tied with para cord and masking tape. The relevant map must always be in your pocket.’

  He waited for a nod of confirmation from each of them before continuing. ‘Belt kit: ammunition, survival kit, survival rations and water bottles. Third, your personal grab bag. Between them they contain the patrol operational equipment, medical pack, radio, demolitions kit and more rations. If the patrol is hit, you just take your grab bag and run.

  ‘Your bergen should contain your cooking kit, spare clothes and sleeping bag - all of which should be made from lightweight nylon parachute material - candles, a hammock and any other thing you feel you might take to make life in the jungle a little bit more comfortable. Each individual SAS guy makes most of the equipment he uses in jungle warfare conditions himself. There’s no shortage of parachutes, so tailor your own kit so you’re comfortable with it. The rationale is simple: if you make it yourself, it’ll be fit for purpose. Lastly we will all wear jungle hats with a piece of yellow ribbon around the rim for identification. If we get into a contact in jungle conditions with minimal visibility, we don’t want any uncertainty about who’s friend and who’s foe.’

  The four men nodded earnestly.

  ‘Okay, it’s your first operational patrol - though as it turned out, your practice patrol wasn’t exactly incident-free - so I’ll