CHAPTER 32
I SWUNG THE door outwards onto a narrow corridor, a rough brick wall straight ahead, a pallid strip light in the ceiling. We were on B1, a service floor filled with maintenance rooms, storage areas and loading bays where the supplies for the terminals arrived throughout the day and night. I hung a right and glanced back. Chaz was a yard behind the group of three. Jess swayed and closed her eyes. I stopped and caught her as she started to fall.
Chaz dashed up to us. ‘Looks like she’s lost a lot of blood,’ he said, inspecting the damage to the girl’s leg.
Linda stumbled forward. ‘Jess . . .’
Chaz turned to her. ‘She’s hurt bad.’
Linda crouched on all fours again and ran a hand through her sister’s hair.
I checked my watch. Ninety seconds to the rendezvous. The SAS team would be on its way. I snatched up the smart radio and switched it on. A burst of static and some muffled sounds came from the other end. Chaz took it from my hands and fiddled with two small controls on the front.
‘Bates?’ It was General Deering. Chaz handed the radio back to me. ‘Our men have left,’ the general said. ‘What’s your status?’
‘We’ve found three civilians, including a very pregnant woman.’ I glanced at Linda. She looked up. I could see in the dull light that she was sweating profusely, her face pale. ‘We also have an injured woman who’s lost a lot of blood. She needs urgent medical attention.’
‘Consider it done.’ I heard more muffled sounds. ‘Are you in position?’
‘We’re close.’ I heard a double click down the line. ‘Sir, was that you?’
The line was dead.
‘Shit!’ I hissed.
‘What?’ Chaz said. I could hear the anxiety in his voice.
‘Lost connection.’
‘Let’s go.’
Chaz bent down and lifted Jess into his arms. She was barely aware of what was going on, her eyes rolling. ‘Medics are on their way,’ Chaz said softly, but I don’t think the girl heard him.
‘This way.’ I took the lead again.
We reached the end of the corridor. It branched left and right. I knew the way, the schematic etched indelibly into my mind. I swung left. Jerry was immediately behind me, panting heavily. Then came Linda, half-stumbling, and Chaz carrying the girl. I was worried about a lot of things: what we would do once we reached the rendezvous, the loss of our comms, and how the hell we were supposed to disarm the bomb in time. It also unnerved me that Chaz was carrying Jess, our flank exposed. But I could do nothing about any of it.
‘Come on,’ I said and turned round as I ran. ‘Not far now.’
There was a tight corner ahead, a left turn, and then, five metres on, the floor gave way to a steel mesh bridge, a mezzanine some twenty metres long. We stopped and I eased forward. Seven or eight metres below us stretched B2, an open expanse that looked like a lightly stocked warehouse. Fifteen metres in a straight line from the mezzanine lay the ramp down from Ground. I could hear nothing coming from there but knew the SAS team would be creeping down almost silently. They would be visible any moment. I checked the time. Almost 10.13. Ten seconds to rendezvous.
CHAPTER 33
I SAW THE leader of the five-man team at the edge of a puddle of dull light and felt a surge of relief. But it lasted only a second – gunfire screamed out from directly beneath us. I saw one of the SAS group shudder as he was strafed by bullets. Two of the other four hit the ground to return fire; two of the remaining four covered their flank.
‘Back!’ I screamed. ‘They’ve been ambushed.’
Chaz lowered Jess gently to the floor. Linda and Jerry didn’t need a second warning; they pulled back into the corridor.
An explosion ripped across B2 as a grenade landed at the feet of the British soldiers. I saw one of them blown apart, but the two on the floor were fast enough to pull up and dive to the side. I shoved myself back against the wall, one foot on the steel mesh bridge. Chaz took up position across from me.
‘They must have broken through the scrambler – heard me talking to Deering. Fuck!’ I hissed.
Chaz peered over the edge of the railings that ran each side of the mezzanine. Four men in black fatigues and balaclavas rushed under the metal bridge, machine guns blazing. The SAS guys returned fire. One of the attackers fell. The other three pressed on, sprinting and firing.
I signalled to Chaz and we rushed forwards across the bridge, P90s on the rails, torrents of shells slamming into the three remaining jihadists. Now it was us who had the element of surprise on our side.
‘Wait here. Just a minute,’ I yelled back to the three in the corridor. ‘Keep down.’
Chaz led the way down the metal steps. I surveyed the route the gunmen had taken from deep inside B2, directly under the main halls of Terminal 3. There were no more of them. We reached the floor of the basement. I ran on to the soldiers, while Chaz checked the terrorists. Two of the SAS men were pretty smashed up. The other three were dead.
I crouched beside one of the injured men and saw the name on his jacket: STEWART. ‘Medics on their way,’ I said.
Chaz ran over. I looked up at him. ‘Fuckers are dead,’ he said.
I glanced at the time. 10.14. We had three minutes.
A noise from up ahead. Chaz swept the ramp with his P90. I was down on one knee and brought my gun round. Then we saw the red crosses on the helmets and lowered our weapons.
Four medics, each armed to the teeth, dashed forward.
‘Bloody good to see you guys,’ I said.
‘Your buddies were ambushed,’ Chaz added, spitting out the words. ‘Didn’t stand a chance. But we were on the bridge.’ He pointed back the way we had come. ‘Gave ’em a dose. Bastards are all dead.’
I stood and paced over to one of the medics, a major, the group’s commander. ‘Matt Bates,’ I said.
‘Major Brennan.’
‘Listen, Major, I’ve gotta go.’ I looked at my watch again involuntarily. ‘Three of these guys are dead. Two badly injured. We have three civilians with us. Up there.’ I pointed to the mezzanine gantry. ‘Two women and a man. One of the women has lost a lot of blood, a nasty laceration to her thigh. The other woman is more than eight months pregnant.’
He nodded, shouted instructions to the other three, and ran for the metal steps up to the bridge.
I hitched the knapsack that held the flash bombs. ‘Ready?’ I asked Chaz.
‘Line ’em up,’ he replied.
CHAPTER 34
IT WAS HOT. I only really noticed it as we started running along the corridors in B2; obviously heat from the boiler room seeping up. Now that our cover was blown and Essa would know we were down here, we might have to contend with more terrorists following those sent down earlier. I voiced my fears to Chaz as we slunk along the winding passages.
‘Not so sure about that, Matt,’ he said. ‘Remember, Deering was gonna cause a distraction. Also, Essa’s men must be pretty overstretched by now. Her biggest headache will be keeping the hostages together and fighting off the inevitable assault on the building.’
‘Hope you’re right,’ I said.
We saw no one. B2 was another storage area. Big stuff – heavy machinery, spare conveyors, generators, large office equipment. I clocked a room filled with cabinets, shelves stacked with boxes. I took little notice; they just flashed past. Checking my watch had now become a compulsion – understandable, really: one minute fifty seconds.
‘Come on, Chaz, gotta move faster.’
‘Where’s the nearest way down?’
We turned onto a broad causeway, large rooms off to our left. ‘Up ahead, to the right. A staircase.’
We reached the door opening onto a stairwell. I scanned the space beyond through a small window. Nothing. Chaz kicked the door and it slammed against the wall. I ran in swinging my P90, Chaz half a second behind me. He leaned over the railing, peering down to the lowest level, B3. He pulled back: ‘Clear.’
I sped down the stairs. Chaz
came up behind, then he ran ahead to the foot of the last flight. The stairwell on B3 was empty.
I stopped for a second and unlatched Linda’s knapsack, took out three of the water bottles and handed them to Chaz. He stuffed them into his belt. I followed suit and tossed the bag. Easing the door outwards, I covered the corridor with my assault rifle. Empty. I swung right. Chaz pulled over to the other side of the corridor and we crept on.
The noise was a surprise, a pounding from the boilers you could feel in your chest, in your guts. The air seemed to crackle with energy and there was a strong smell – oil, ozone.
We pulled up at a point where the corridor veered hard left and I risked a peep around the corner. There was a dead man slumped against the left wall, his chest blown open. The boiler room lay straight ahead. Two men stood at the midpoint between us and it. I nodded to Chaz and we rushed out, cutting down the two men. Reaching the door to the boiler room, we held back. It was so noisy there was every chance no one inside would have heard the gunfire, but we weren’t betting on it.
We sneaked inside, the sound pounding around us. The stink seemed to seep into my skin. Chaz moved behind a large oil tank. He knew as well as me that we had to be precise with our weapons. A few shells in a boiler or a tank of oil would be a disaster. We also had to make sure the jihadists had no time to fire back. They might not be so careful.
Two more men in fatigues stood with Radi. One of them had his back to us and stood close to the box attached to the pillar we’d seen on the security cam. Radi said something to the guy which was drowned out by the noise.
I removed a flash bomb and saw Chaz do the same. I shook mine vigorously and felt the pressure inside it increase. The blend of vinegar and baking soda began to harden under the plastic as carbon dioxide built up inside the bottle. I tightened the top and saw Chaz copy me. Then I pulled out the remaining two bottles in my belt and started to shake them. Timing was everything.
Lifting the first bottle, I held up three fingers and pulled them down – three, two, one . . . and I tossed the bottle in a low arc towards the group around the bomb. Chaz’s followed mine. They landed with a heavy smack and exploded. A chemical mixture of salt and gas burst from the neck of each bottle, and with it, a burst of light and a bang that pierced its way over the thud of the boilers. I grabbed my other two bottles and watched as Chaz’s almost collided with them in mid-air. All four landed together on the concrete at the feet of the terrorists. One failed to go off, but the other three didn’t disappoint. They boomed and sprayed blazing chemicals everywhere.
We didn’t give the men a second to react, just charged out from our hiding places, each of us pulling back on triggers. Chaz had switched to his M16. He shot the jihadist nearest the box in the kneecaps. The man collapsed forward and I landed a stream of P90 shells along his back. Chaz took out the other guy with a precise burst between the eyes. I swung to shoot Radi, but he had been furthest from the flash bombs and had reacted with impressive reflexes, spinning to his left and ducking behind a boiler.
We dashed across the five metres to the bomb. I caught a glimpse of the timer: thirty-two seconds.
CHAPTER 35
CHAZ WAS THE expert and he grabbed the sides of the box to peer inside. Then came the phat, phat, phat of shells slamming into concrete. It cut over the horrendous noise. I swung right and saw Radi. Lifting my P90, I squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened.
I had to make a snap decision – go for the Colt, or rush the fucker? There was really only one choice. I flew at the man, vaguely aware of Chaz swearing and tapping keys on a control pad. I knew I was quite literally leaping into the void, and a large part of me expected a very quick death. Any moment, I was thinking. Any moment I’ll be cut down by Kalashnikov shells at close range.
But that moment didn’t come. I was fifteen centimetres away from Radi, his body odour filling my lungs and obliterating the stench of oil and fumes. I grabbed his gun, twisted the barrel and snapped his finger on the trigger. He screamed in my ear and I felt the gun vibrate as he let off a stream of shells.
I knew Chaz was safe because I had pushed Radi off balance and he’d swung to his left, but I was worried about the boilers. I yanked up the weapon, its muzzle pointed towards the low ceiling, and gained control of it.
With my arms raised, Radi drew a knife and slashed it across my abdomen. I felt a sharp pain that shot through me like lightning in a bottle. But I was raging now, pumped and bursting with killer energy. I slammed the butt of the gun into Radi’s face – once, twice. He staggered back and I had my commando knife out. I half-tripped, half-jumped onto him, yelling at the top of my voice, pain throbbing through me and down each leg. My knife hand flew out and I saw the blade sink into Radi’s left eye. It just kept going up to the hilt, and I felt his body slither out from under me. Pulling up, I realised I was still yelling.
‘Matt! That lever!’ Chaz was screaming at me. ‘Get it! Pull it up!’
For a second, I felt as though I was going to pass out. The room seemed to revolve. Lights cascaded across my vision, over the boilers, the tanks, Chaz, the bomb. They swam around and bristled sparkling light. I was a kid again and Dad had just lit a Roman candle. I gazed on in wonder at the rising sparks and smoke.
‘Matt!’
I staggered forward. At the edge of my vision I could just see the counter. It said ‘4’. I lifted my hand. I was swimming through mercury. I felt the metal of the lever under my fingertips, moved my hand around it and pulled up. I saw a ‘3’. The lever slotted into place. The clock flicked over to ‘2’. Then . . .
CHAPTER 36
IT STOPPED.
‘Holy fucking Christ!’ Chaz gasped and turned to me wearing a big grin. Then his eyes looked down at my front and his face dropped. I fell to my knees and Chaz caught me, squeezing my blood-soaked shirt between us.
‘It’s all right,’ I managed to gasp.
‘Yeah, sure, buddy. It’s all fine and dandy.’
‘We did it, Chaz. We fuckin’ did it.’
I saw his grin return as he hauled me up.
The sound of heavy boots on concrete broke over the thudding in the boiler room. We looked up together and saw six British soldiers, assault weapons swinging left and right before them as they charged into the room; and for one horrible moment, I thought they might mistake us for Islamic extremists. But the front runner lowered his gun as he stopped thirty centimetres in front of us.
‘Here, let me help,’ he said and supported my left shoulder as Chaz took the right. I saw his men fan out and make sure the jihadists were dead. I was pretty sure that would check out.
As we reached the corridor, a team of medics arrived. I was handed over. Chaz ran alongside the men as they carried me away, and the guy who had helped drag me from the boiler room spun round and dashed back the way we’d come.
As we emerged onto the loading area on B2, it was sheer pandemonium. Noises came from every direction; there was an explosion and heavy gunfire.
‘Fuck! They’ve stormed the building,’ I groaned as I was laid on a stretcher and lifted by two medics. Chaz was leaning over me.
‘What did you expect, buddy?’
Another explosion, nearer this time, louder. The sound of shattering glass. I had an oxygen mask placed over my mouth and looked up to see the lights of the ceiling stream past. Chaz was panting, his face smeared with grease, the whites of his eyes exaggerated by the mess. I felt his hand on my arm and then it was shoved away roughly as one of the medics got a line into me as she ran.
I’d been somewhere similar before, but knew instinctively that this was nothing in comparison. Chaz had been there then too. He had dragged me from the armoured car near Basra. All my men had died in that vehicle and I had never really got over the survivor’s guilt. My behaviour after that had reflected my inner pain and guilt. Never far from my mind was the thought: I should have died with them. I’d been back on active duty a year later, but I was no longer the pliant career soldier who had been fast
-tracked since university.
We were out in the air and I could smell sulphur, the stench of explosives. We ran through a great cloud of smoke. Shouts. Another, smaller explosion further away; I guessed it had come from the far side of the terminal. Hopefully that bitch Hubab Essa has chewed on a few bullets, I thought.
CHAPTER 37
HUBAB ESSA WAS approaching the endgame, and she knew it. Knew it and didn’t care. She would soon be in paradise. Ilham would be there and they would be together for all eternity. She didn’t like to think too much about his seventy-two virgins.
The hundreds of hostages were still at her mercy. She watched their terrified, pathetic faces and felt nothing but contempt. She was sick of the stink of them. They all deserved to die; all the Infidels deserved to die and the Caliphate would rule supreme as foretold, as Allah had intended it to be.
And that’s when it began. A blast from the south, a boom and the sound of tonnes of glass crashing to the terminal floor followed by screams and yells from the mass of petrified human beings gathered together in the check-in hall.
Another boom. A flash of light. A smoke grenade landed at the far side of the hall and started to plume. Then a flash bomb went off and Essa turned away. Clutching at her radio, she clicked it to ‘on’, threw a switch and feedback screeched from the airport’s PA.
‘Allahu Akbar!’ she bellowed into the radio and the two dread words resonated around the huge public area above the screams and the cries, the shells splattering into walls and flash grenades slamming to the floor.
At the exits, the suicide bombers heard the words and said their final prayers. A second later, six explosions rang out almost simultaneously as the men pushed thumbs down onto red buttons and their vests exploded.
Hubab Essa started to run and grabbed a girl who was crouching behind a pillar. She was about sixteen, tall and skinny with a blonde bob. Essa pulled her close, brought her left hand round the front of the girl’s neck and pulled the edge of her knife up so hard it cut into the kid’s skin, allowing a line of blood to trickle down her throat. The girl screamed.
Airport - Code Red: BookShots Page 7