Meltdown

by Andy McNab

  The pilot's voice came over the intercom. 'As far I can see, from now on it's only farmland or forest all the way to Russia. I think we could be landing very soon – there's nowhere to refuel for miles. If they go further east, they'll run out.'

  Fergus looked towards Danny, Deveraux and her team, wanting to be sure that everyone had heard and was fully prepared.

  The thrill of a first helicopter flight had long since worn off for Danny. His head was aching from the constant exposure to the aviation fuel fumes, and like everyone else in the Cougar, he just wanted to get on with it.

  He was thinking about Storm, back in Barcelona, wondering if he would ever see her again. She would have discovered hours earlier that he and Fergus and the twins had disappeared. Maybe she was worried; maybe she had tried to contact him. But Danny was glad that Storm was still in Spain. He didn't want her anywhere near the firing when it started.

  Fergus and Deveraux were talking directly to Dudley and had been given the news about the DMP and the SAS CT team.

  Phil's phone was on conference call. He had instant communication with Dudley, Fergus, Deveraux and the CT team commander. Even Mr Monotone, still controlling the Predator as it circled above Manchester, had been patched into the system. All the main players involved in Dudley's complex plan would know what was happening at the airfield as soon as he spoke.

  Ahead of the Cougar, in the Sikorsky, the interior lights were dimmed and both Teddy and Will had finally slipped into a fretful sleep. Storm was dozing too, while Kubara was using a batteryoperated razor to remove the stubble that had sprouted on his face.

  He looked up as one of the crew approached him. They exchanged a few words before the crewman returned to the cockpit, then Kubara gestured to his bodyguard.

  While the bodyguard went back towards the rear of the aircraft and opened a locker, his boss stood up and made his way over to the twins.

  He reached down, laid his huge hands on their shoulders and shook them gently. They woke instantly, and looked up apprehensively at the Bosnian's freshly shaven face.

  'We are almost there,' he said, smiling reassuringly. 'Time to get ready'

  The bodyguard came lumbering up the aircraft, carrying several pairs of brand new Wellington boots. Two pairs were green.

  Kubara took the green boots and gave them to the bemused twins.

  'You will need them. Where we are going is very muddy' He smiled again and nodded at the boots. 'Green for you. I understand the British upper classes always wear green Wellington boots. And I want you to feel at home.'

  41

  The Chinook carrying the CT team had touched down in a field just over a kilometre from the airfield. It was close to the motorway, but none of the drivers passing in the darkness had a clue they were so close to a fully equipped SAS assault team.

  Suddenly Phil's voice came through on the conference call. 'Stand by! Stand by! We may have a problem.'

  Phil could hear the rumble of a heavy diesel engine. It wasn't a good sign. It seemed that at least one of the lorries was preparing to leave. There was no way the CT team could reach the hangar to carry out their attack if the vehicles were already about to roll.

  In Barcelona, Dudley listened; over Germany, Fergus and Deveraux listened; in the field, the CT team commander listened; and in his Portacabin, Mr Monotone listened. They were all waiting for Phil's next words.

  'That's engine on.'

  Mr Monotone came back as calmly as if he were taking an order for a Big Mac.

  'Engine on.'

  Phil pulled on his NVGs and saw the doors to the hangar slide open. Freddie was pushing one of the doors and another guy was pushing the other. It looked as if work was over for the night and everyone was pulling out.

  Phil could see the green shape of one of the trucks. Its sides were up and everything had obviously been packed away.

  'They're leaving. We're about to lose them. Need a decision now.'

  In Barcelona, Dudley knew he had only one option. 'Hit them!'

  From now on, it was all down to Phil and Mr Monotone.

  'First truck moving out of hangar, two up – we can't get them once they leave the estate. Splash it.'

  'Roger that. Splashing now.'

  Phil saw the laser beam shoot down from the sky and hit the truck as it slowly pulled out of the hangar, crunching through the gears as it gradually gained speed.

  It was moving away towards the exit when Phil gave the command.

  'Go! Go! Go!'

  'Roger that. Go.'

  Mr Monotone pressed a button on his console, and instantly a Hellfire rocket motor ignited and the missile pulled away from the Predator's wings. The detector in its nose swished about, trying to locate the laser beam it was to follow. It didn't take long: after a couple of seconds the Hellfire tilted downward and rocketed towards the earth.

  Dudley had known there was no longer any chance of a co-ordinated attack. He had to deploy the Hellfires. The SAS CT team might as well pack up and go home. All Dudley could hope for now was that the attack would be swift and final.

  Phil waited. The Predator was far too high in the sky for anyone on the ground to know that the deadly missile was on its way. The laser beam followed the truck as it moved along the airstrip road, splashing over the sides as it broke up on the roof.

  'That's the second truck now pulling out of the hangar.'

  The missile made contact with the first truck about five seconds after locking on to the laser.

  There was a brilliant flash of light and an earsplitting thud. The shock wave of the detonation made Phil drop to the ground as he saw the trailer end of the truck lift into the air. It dropped back to the ground and the whole vehicle exploded into a fireball.

  'Take the second!' yelled Phil into his phone. The second truck!'

  Mr Monotone didn't go in for long conversations.

  'Roger that'

  Phil looked up to see the laser beam move across to the second truck. The driver had screeched to a standstill just outside the hangar when he saw the first vehicle explode. He was still in the vehicle, obviously panicking, not knowing whether to put his foot down or sit still or get out and run.

  He didn't get a chance to make up his mind. Within seconds the second truck erupted into a fireball and the shock waves knocked Phil back down onto the ground.

  He could feel the heat of the burning trucks against his body and when he looked up, he saw the flames from the second truck licking back into the hangar itself. He had no further need of his NVGs – the whole area was lit up by the flames.

  But there was no sign of Fiery Fred. Maybe he was cowering somewhere inside the hangar.

  Phil picked up his MP5 to finish the job when suddenly the Mini burst from the hangar like a Formula One Ferrari. In the light of the flames, Phil could see that Freddie was driving, clinging onto the steering wheel with one hand and frantically dialling his mobile with the other. The number he dialled didn't even ring. The phone was lying in pieces on a Spanish road.

  Mr Monotone came back.

  'The Mini is getting away. You want that stopped?'

  'Do it!'

  The Mini was already being splashed. It was just passing the first truck when the missile hit and the vehicle jumped into the air, turning into a fireball as it landed on its roof.

  Mr Monotone was as cool as ever when he came back.

  'All targets destroyed. What's that noise?'

  Phil smiled. 'Dogs. They're going ape-shit.'

  42

  The mud was thick and black, exactly as Kubara had warned. It sucked at their Wellington boots as they followed his torch beam through the woods. Finally through the pitch darkness ahead, they saw a light, and as they approached it, they realized that it was shining outside a long, single-storey building at the centre of a clearing.

  Teddy and Will hesitated as Kubara and Storm entered the clearing, but the huge bodyguard pushed them roughly forward.

  A welcoming committee of four more of Kuba
ra's heavies, all holding Russian AK47 assault rifles, stood waiting outside the building. It didn't look like an industrial building; it was more likely a farm building of some sort.

  Kubara glanced back and saw that the twins were shivering, and it wasn't just because of the biting wind that cut through the trees like a knife.

  'Don't worry,' he called back to them. 'It's much warmer inside.'

  The guards stood aside as Kubara pushed open the door and led the way inside.

  It was warmer, and brightly lit. Teddy and Will pulled off the boots, replaced them with their own shoes and looked around. They were in a lobby area; a corridor ran along the front of the building. Another, directly ahead, evidently led to more rooms at the rear.

  The constant throb of a generator, which must have been supplying the light and the warmth, was suddenly drowned out by the noise of the Sikorsky taking off.

  Teddy had lapsed into a listless silence again, but Will was still asking questions. 'Where are we? And what is this place?'

  'We are in Germany, just. And this place? Once it was for chickens – many thousands of chickens.' Kubara sniffed the air. 'We try and try, but we can never quite lose the smell of their shit. Now, it is all for you.'

  'You mean we have to live here?'

  Kubara shrugged. 'Live here and work here. For a little while. There is a house nearby, through the forest, and later perhaps we move you there. If you work hard, as I know you will. But for now you will find this is perfectly comfortable; it has everything you need.'

  Will glanced at his brother and then turned to look at Storm. Her blue eyes were cold and her voice was hard when she spoke. 'I won't be staying to keep you company,' she told him. 'I shall be going home tomorr—' She checked her watch. 'A little later today.'

  'And where is home?'

  Storm smiled. 'A long way away.'

  'My daughter deserves a long holiday,' said Kubara proudly. 'But you must work. In a few hours your new colleagues will arrive, and you will teach them everything. I will show you around and then I think you should rest for a little while.'

  Will glanced towards the door, wondering if even now it would be better to risk trying to make a run for it.

  'Don't even think of it, Will,' Kubara warned him. 'There is nowhere to run to and no one is coming to help you. Not even your friend, Mr Watts.'

  The twins looked at each other hopelessly. They had realized long ago that there was no hope of rescue from Fergus.

  'Of course I knew about him,' said Kubara. 'I was going to kill him, but Storm likes the boy, Danny.' He smiled at his daughter. 'And I can never refuse anything she asks me. Now, you must see your new laboratory. I know you will like it.'

  The Cougar pilot had found a landing place – it was a clearing in a dip in the ground, close to a small river that wound through the forest.

  The target building was around eight hundred metres away. The lower ground and the tall trees would have shielded the noise of the Cougar landing, but the pilot knew it was as close as he could risk going.

  He was giving the team the longitude and latitude of the target, which they were entering in their handheld sat navs. This meant that they could pinpoint the exact location of the target.

  Once the team moved, the sat navs would guide them, giving constant updates on their location as they went. Civilian sat navs only show the position of something to within ten metres; military versions fix it to one metre.

  The Cougar's engines were still running and would remain running, the rotors turning, until the team had completed its mission and was ready to lift off again. Helis rarely close down in the field: failure to restart the engines could put an operation in danger.

  Deveraux's team was ready to move. It had its own commander, who would be giving the orders once the team reached the FAP; even Fergus and Deveraux would follow those orders. The team knew precisely what was required, but it was up to the team commander to make the decisions on how it was carried out.

  But before the doors slid back, Deveraux had a few last words of warning for Fergus and Danny. 'Do not, in any way, interfere with the way the attack is carried out,' she told them. 'You will stay behind the team and myself at all times. If you get in the way, you'll jeopardize the objective of taking out Kubara and put your own lives at risk.'

  Danny smiled. 'Yeah, you'd like that, wouldn't you. Suit you perfectly.'

  Fergus looked at his grandson and shook his head. He knew that Deveraux, technically at least, had every right to say what she was saying. He'd been in these team situations himself many times before. The team works like a machine, with each part depending on the other parts to function efficiently.

  But that didn't mean that Fergus was prepared to allow his own side of the operation to be put at risk. He had a job to finish too. He was there to make sure the twins were killed.

  He nodded at Deveraux. Then the heli's doors slid back and the attack was on.

  43

  As Danny hit the ground and started to run, he felt his legs buckle and almost give way. The long hours of sitting in the heli doing nothing had taken their toll, but he forced himself on, and the strength in his legs soon began to return.

  The team commander had decided that there would be no tactical approach to the target: they would simply run as fast as they could – the attack had to start as quickly as possible if they were to reach Kubara before he found out about the destruction of the DMP. He might well not remain where he was; he might even have a car here. The team had to act fast.

  Each member had their personal communications. They would pick up any orders from their commander in their earpiece once they reached the FAP and got a sighting of exactly what lay ahead of them.

  Danny moved as swiftly as anyone, running upwards through the woods. He had always been a good runner, so keeping pace with the others was not a problem.

  Fergus wasn't finding it so easy. He kept himself very fit, but not only was he a lot older than everyone else; he'd taken two bullets in his right thigh. He simply couldn't run any more.

  The FAP was a shallow drainage ditch on the edge of the wooded area. Directly ahead was open ground and about 200 metres away stood a low building.

  By the time Fergus reached the FAP, the team was already lying in the ditch, looking at the long dark shape of the target through their NVGs. They could hear a generator humming and saw lights shining from a couple of windows at the front of the building. There was no sign of movement outside.

  It was bitterly cold, and the icy wind cutting across the clearing was making the surrounding tall trees sway and rustle. The noise was good; anything that muffled the sound of the approaching team could only help.

  Danny saw that Deveraux was talking to the team commander; they were searching for all possible entry points. The principle of all room combat is to get as many of the team as possible into the target at one time. That way, the team quickly swamps the inside of the building so that the x-rays within do not have time to react.

  The team commander had clocked the two doors at either end of the building. They were closed but he had no idea whether or not they were locked.

  That wouldn't be a problem: each team member had an explosive door-entry charge in the back pouch of their body armour.