Who Dares Wins

by Vince Vogel

  “Conner, help! Help me!”

  The voice sounded harsh, as though he was being strangled.

  “Conner, help!”

  The second Conner was sure where it was coming from, he put his head down and sprinted off in that direction through the slashing rain.

  “Conner! Please!”

  A tall bush shielded his way. He pushed through it and when he burst out the other side, a great bolt of lightning smashed the ground no more than twenty yards away and illuminated the trees in white. In the middle of the explosion of light, he saw something suspended in the air on the trunk of a plane tree. It was Frank. Dorring had wrapped wire around him and the trunk so that it held him tight to the bark. He was suspended a foot off the ground.

  Conner stood frozen to the spot as he gazed at the despairing face of Frank.

  “Conner! Help!” he cried.

  He was on the other side of a slight bowl in the forest floor. Without thinking, Conner ran to him. But as he reached a large scrub of bracken, something suddenly burst from the bush and the next he knew he was pushed against a tree trunk with a knife to his throat.

  A hand pushed his night vision goggles off his head so that their eyes stared into one another. The snarling face only an inch from him was covered in black so that the gray eyes shone from it like two black holes in space.

  It was Dorring.

  Conner relaxed as the blade pressed into his throat. He was a split-second from death if Dorring wanted it.

  “Who’d you make a deal with, Conner?” Dorring snarled into his face.

  “I’m sorry,” Conner said. He’d wanted to say it for so long. “I didn’t want to end up like all those poor veterans living their last days drinking themselves to death. I wanted something more from life than that. He made me a deal I couldn’t refuse.”

  “Did you know that night in the bar? The night he took her?”

  “No. But I suspected. I tried to tell you, but it was too late. It went crazy after that and then we made the deal.”

  “Who, Conner? Appleby?”

  “Not quite. It was his brother. But we knew him…”

  Dorring jumped back as the bullet hit Conner in the side of the head. More bullets cascaded into the bushes as he crawled through the bracken. He skipped down a bank at its end, tore across to a tree and then sprang up it, moving from branch to branch like a skilled monkey, igniting the pain in his hip where Conner’s bullet had grazed it earlier. When he was ten feet above the ground, he moved along a thick branch and swung the rifle down from his shoulder.

  He had a good view from up there.

  His gray eyes scanned the dark forest. Through the rain, he saw movement. Saw it splashing off someone’s shoulders. He figured its outline from this. Dorring aimed. The figure moved before the bullets could hit, spotting Dorring in the tree as he pulled the trigger.

  He was running off. Dorring jumped down from the branch and went after him. He saw more movement in the bushes ahead. He stopped. Aimed the rifle. Pulled the trigger.

  The figure bent his run at the last second and the bullets flew past.

  Dorring lowered the rifle and went to sprint after him, but the pain in his hip cried out and he felt the leg go weak underneath. He stumbled slightly in the soft earth and had to hold his hands out to stabilize himself. It allowed the figure to open up a distance between them.

  By the time Dorring reached the edge of the forest and came out onto the road, the Toyota was already moving away. He jogged over to one of the other Appleby vehicles that lined the road and got in.

  But as he started the engine, he suddenly remembered something.

  Abigail and Patricia.

  His gray eyes glared out the windscreen and up the road. For a few seconds, he sat watching the brake lights of the Toyota move away up the country lane, zigzagging their way towards town.

  It was no use. He had to check on them. Something inside of him—compassion, you could say—was willing him to make sure they were safe.

  So Dorring got out of the vehicle and went back into the woods and to the house.

  At the bunker, he found the hatch wide open and the underground room empty. He stared across the mud and puddles of the yard towards the tree line.

  “Abigail! Patricia!” he called out.

  All was silent except for the rain thumping the ground and the occasional strike of lightning. In the mud he saw footprints and dog prints filled with puddles. He followed them to the edge of the trees and entered.

  Going in a straight line, he soon encountered the slope they’d gone up. Standing on its ridge, he looked down and saw a sorry sight. It looked like she was glowing white, her apron and dress shining in the darkness. She was lying on her side. Close by was one of her dogs lying motionless too. In the distance, he saw the paw of the other dog poking out of bracken.

  Dorring made his way down to the old woman. When he kneeled beside her, he saw that someone had cut her throat. This is what killed Patricia Johnston.

  Glancing about the empty woods, Dorring began calling Abigail’s name. After the fifth call, he saw movement in the bushes and quickly flipped the rifle over his shoulder and aimed.

  But he dropped it the second he saw Abigail burst from the bracken.

  She was frantic, her face bent into a desolate mask. As Dorring stood up from the dead body of Patricia Johnston, she flung herself at him and gripped him tight, crying into his shoulder.

  “I thought he’d killed you too,” she sobbed. “I had to hide. I couldn’t save her. It was him. I recognized him. He’s the one who killed my parents.”

  “And you still don’t know his name?”

  “No. I haven’t seen him the whole time I’ve been here. But it was him. I know it.”

  “Then it’s about time we found out who him is,” Dorring said.

  33

  Dorring carried the bodies of Patricia Johnston and her dogs back to the house and laid them out in the lounge. Abigail then covered them with sheets. Having done this, they gathered weapons and ammunition from the men lying in the woods before loading it all into one of the abandoned Toyotas and driving off in the direction of town.

  Dorring had no way of knowing where the killer was going, but he did have a destination which might lead him to finding out.

  As they drove along the dark country lane, between fields of Gordon’s Heather, a radio transmitter crackled on the dashboard.

  It was Bruce Appleby.

  “Conner?” he said. “Frank? Are you receiving this?”

  Dorring picked up the receiver and brought it up to his mouth as his steel eyes glared at the road.

  “Conner’s dead,” he said in a blank voice. “So are the others.”

  “Is this Dorring?”

  “Yes, it is. And I’m coming for you, Bruce. For you and your brother. Tell me one thing.”

  “What?”

  “Who is the little bastard?”

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to find that out yourself. There’s no cheating.”

  “I’m coming for you no matter what,” Dorring assured him. “I’m gonna drive a bullet right through your skull and out the other side.”

  “You may be able to protect yourself from ten of my men,” Appleby assured him back, “but you’ll have no hope against the rest. I welcome you coming after me. You hear me, Dorring, I welcome it.”

  The radio went dead. Dorring let the receiver go so that it dangled about the cab.

  They came to a barricade several hundred yards up the road. Dorring narrowed his eyes and put his foot down.

  “Get me the assault rifle from the back seat,” he said.

  Abigail reached into the back and grabbed the weapon. Dorring then signaled with a nod of the head for her to lay it on his lap.

  “Hold the wheel,” he said once she had.

  Her hands reached across and took it, her face concentrating on the roadblock about a hundred and fifty yards in front, the lights of their vehicles glaring hazily in the rain
-cut night. Dorring took the rifle in his hands, leaned out the driver’s window and aimed it at the men in the light.

  One by one, he began taking them out. After the third hit, the rest dived for cover behind the cars. This was where he wanted them. He jumped back inside, took the wheel and pressed the accelerator as far down as it would go, the engine roaring with everything it had.

  “Brace yourself,” he said.

  Abigail held onto the edges of her seat.

  They smashed into the Toyota blocking the road and flipped it over as the men dived into the grass verge. The Toyota landed on its side and they caught up with it, smashing into the front and spinning it around in the road.

  Then they were gone. The roadblock behind them.

  Four miles further on, they stopped and left the vehicle. Smoke and steam were billowing out of the front where the radiator had been smashed and was now leaking water into the engine. It wouldn’t last long and Dorring was sure that it would be easier if they snuck into town on foot.

  “We need to move fast,” he said as they jogged off the road and into a field that led to the edge of town.

  The rain was still pelting down and it hid them well as they stepped through the tall grass. When they were close to the gray stone buildings, they sat tucked behind a wall at the edge of the field and watched.

  The whole place was lit up in bobbing flashlights, people everywhere patrolling the streets.

  “The family live not far from here,” Abigail whispered. “Can we avoid using those?”

  She nodded at the bag of guns they’d brought with them.

  “I’ll try,” was all the assurance Dorring could give her.

  They spotted a gap and took it. Hauling themselves over the wall, they ran across a road and into an alleyway that led between two houses. At the end, it fed into another alley. Dorring stayed on the corner and peeked out.

  Each way, he spotted a bobbing flashlight moving.

  “Which way?” he asked in a hushed voice.

  “The back of their place is there,” she said, pointing to a back gate about ten yards away down the next alley.

  “Okay, wait for my signal.”

  The flashlights never came back to the ends and Dorring gathered that the men were now out on the street patrolling that. Sweeping his hand forward, he signaled for them to leave the corner.

  They made it to the gate. Dorring quickly vaulted himself over and unbolted it from the other side, letting Abigail in and grabbing the bag.

  The back door was unlocked.

  “You wait here,” he whispered. “Just in case.”

  Abigail nodded.

  Quietly, Dorring opened the door and crept into the dark house. It opened into a kitchen. From there, he entered a narrow hallway. He could hear the murmur of a television. A wedge of light slipped out from under a door and lit the threadbare carpet. It must lead to the lounge, Dorring said to himself. It was where the sound of the television was coming from.

  Dorring approached with caution, the Glock 17 gripped in his hand. He listened to the sounds on the other side for a few seconds. They were watching some quiz show. He heard coughing. Then a croaking sound. A woman began speaking in a low, soothing voice.

  “It’s okay, Susie,” the woman said. “It’s okay.”

  “Ma!” the croaking voice said. “Ma! He’s here, ma! He’s here!”

  The voice sounded like an adult, but the way it spoke the words was childlike. Dorring gathered that this must be the mother, Susie. The soothing voice was the grandmother. The cough belonged to the grandfather.

  Good. They’re all together.

  Sharply, Dorring opened the door and burst through. The three sat on a couch facing the door. The curtains were closed so they were hidden from the street. The grandfather and grandmother looked at Dorring with startled faces as he held the gun on them. The daughter merely smiled and clapped her hands.

  Rocking back and forth, she kept repeating, “I told you! I told you!”

  “Quieten her down,” Dorring instructed the old woman who sat closest to her on the couch.

  The grandmother, Dorene, sidled to her daughter and hushed her gently while stroking her shoulders. The daughter, middle-aged with lank gray hair hanging from her bony face, did as asked, covering her own mouth with a hand.

  They were an odd sight. The old couple were at least eighty. They looked carved from an old tree, their faces wrinkled like knotted bark. They gazed up at Dorring with suspicious eyes and he sensed that they had been expecting him.

  “I don’t want to harm you,” Dorring said. “But I will if I have to. I just want to ask some questions.”

  He leaned back from the doorway and gazed along the hall. He could see right the way to the back door. He was looking to signal Abigail. But he couldn’t see her. He was unable to call her either, in case he alerted someone outside the house.

  “Your friend not there?” the grandfather, Hammy, asked in a wry tone of voice.

  Dorring leaned back into the lounge. The old man had a spiteful grin on his withered face. Taking a packet of cable ties he’d gotten earlier from Patricia Johnston’s shed, Dorring threw them at the old man’s feet.

  “Put them on the wrists and feet of your wife and daughter,” he said. “I’ll do you afterwards.”

  “Or what?” Hammy croaked. “You’ll shoot? Gonna make a lot of noise,” he added, tipping his head in the direction of the closed curtains, flashlight beams bobbing about on the other side.

  Dorring poked the pistol into his waistband and took out the knife he’d used to whittle the wood earlier.

  “No,” he said. “I’ll hold one hand over your mouths while I cut your throats with the other.”

  The Adam’s apple on the old man’s thin neck bobbed up and down. His eyes widened at the sight of the blade glinting in the electric light of the room.

  “Turn the television up,” Dorring said.

  The remote control was by the old woman. Dutifully, she picked it up and raised the volume so that the quiz show reverberated around the room.

  The old man got up.

  “Your daughter first,” Dorring said.

  The old man reached her and his wife snatched the cable ties.

  “Better I do it,” she snapped and the husband backed off.

  Dorring watched as Dorene placed the plastic ties over her daughter’s wrists, whispering soothing words to her the whole time. The poor invalid began pulling her hands back.

  “Shhh!” the mother whispered. “It’s okay. We’re playing a game.”

  “A game!” Susie cried.

  “Keep her quiet,” Dorring snapped. Then he leaned back and looked along the hallway again. “Abigail!” he called, trying to hush his voice as much as he could.

  When the daughter’s wrists and ankles were secure, the old man did his wife. Then Dorring did him. With all three lying on their sides on the floor, he spotted a throw on the couch, pulled it off and ripped strips from it. Then he tied them around the family’s mouths.

  With that done, Dorring entered the hallway, the pistol gripped in his hand, and went gingerly through the house to the kitchen. The back door was wide open, flapping on its hinges in the wind and rain. He’d left it closed. Someone must have opened it while he was dealing with the family.

  Lightning illuminated the rain filled air and that’s when he saw her.

  She was at the end of the narrow garden in front of the gate. She looked terrified. Her jade eyes stared at Dorring as though she expected to die. Across her throat, the blade appeared to shine.

  The other face beside Abigail’s, he knew all too well. But he’d not seen it like this. It had been soft all the other times, benevolent and joyful. It had been a long time since he gathered that this was nothing but a mask. Now it wore its true self: a scowling knot that made it evil.

  It was Mo Hamilton holding the knife.

  “Put the gun down or I’ll saw her heed off,” she spat at Dorring.

  Dorring
obeyed and placed the pistol on the path.

  “Who is he, Mo?” Dorring asked her.

  “He’s ma brah,” she said. “Now step over here, but real slow like.”

  Once more he obeyed.

  “So you’re Susie’s daughter too?” he said as he made his way cautiously to her through the beaded curtain of rain, watching Abigail’s terrified face the whole time.

  “Aye,” Mo said. “We’re the Hamiltons. That’s why ma grandpa is called Hammy for short.”

  When Dorring got within a few feet of her, Mo’s other hand suddenly appeared, holding a taser. Dorring had no time to do anything. Especially not without risking Abigail.

  So he merely looked down when the barbed dart of the taser buried itself into his breast. The shock hit him like a thousand small punches all at once. Gritting his teeth, he looked up from the dart and glared into Mo’s eyes.

  “You’re a strong one, obviously,” she said, turning the dial on the gun all the way up.

  For another twenty seconds, Dorring managed to keep himself in consciousness, his whole body rigid, every muscle spasming, clenching and loosening, clenching and loosening, so that it felt like a hundred workouts at once. All the time, he stared at her with evil eyes. She began to get scared as he forced his body to move and started stepping towards her. She couldn’t believe that he’d managed to stay awake. The taser was getting really hot in her hand. She wouldn’t be able to hold it much longer.

  But as he reached his third tentative step forward, Dorring collapsed onto the ground and Mo sighed in relief.

  Then she dropped the taser, pushed Abigail forward, grabbed a second taser from her back pocket and fired it at Abigail, hitting her in the back as she stumbled forward from the push.

  She went down straight away.

  34

  Fourteen years ago in Helmand, Dorring sat in an interview room across from a Royal Military Police detective.

  “You have to find her,” he pleaded.

  “We’re doing all we can,” the MP said.