Crisis Four ns-2

by Andy McNab

  Houses and small industrial units dotted the route, alongside open barns filled with tractors and other agricultural gear, and every few miles, in case people needed reminding that they were in the boonies, I came across a road kill, a mess of blood and fur as flat as a pancake in the middle of the blacktop.

  I knew I was getting near when I hit the Cape Fear river. The water was about 300 meters across at this point, getting wider as it got closer to the sea, and sure enough I passed the "City of Fayetteville" sign before long and kept my eyes peeled for anything directing me to Fort Bragg.

  Bragg Boulevard was a wide dual carriage way with a grass central reservation, but as I passed rows of car showrooms with new 4x4s and sports cars under miles of red, white and blue bunting, it changed back to two lanes. The buildings on either side were mainly one-story cinder block warehouses behind a shop front. Korean pawnshops and tailors jostled with Vietnamese restaurants and takeaways, representing a weird chronicle of all the conflicts the U.S.A. had ever been involved in. They just needed an Iraqi kebab stall to complete the set.

  I was beginning to see the kind of outlet I'd come here to find. Neon signs and posters announced boot-shining specialists, tattoo artists and gun shops--"Test fire before you buy--we have our own range." On every sidewalk, young men and women strode around in smartly pressed BDUs (combat uniform) and very short haircuts--the men usually had a "whitewall" with a little lump on top. It felt very strange to see uniformed soldiers on the streets without a weapon and not on patrol; the terrorist situation in Europe meant that off-duty soldiers were forbidden to walk around in uniform; they'd just be ready-made targets.

  I drove on base and got my bearings. American military installations aren't like European ones, which resemble World War Two prisoner-of war camps, again because of the terrorist threat. This place was open and sprawling, with vehicle pools and groups of men and women on route marches, singing cadence, their unit flag carried proudly at the head of the column.

  I couldn't remember the name of the road I wanted, but I followed my nose, driving along roads with buildings on each side that looked more like smart apartments than barrack rooms. I found it--Yadkin, a long road that came out of the base and moved into the city area. There had been quite a bit of building since my last visit in the late Eighties. Roads coming off the main drag had names like Desert Storm Boulevard, or Just Cause Road. I wondered if the Firm would ever get around to naming thoroughfares after its operations--if so, they'd have to be called things like Blackmail Lane, or Stitch Them Up Big Time Street.

  I carried on along Yadkin until it took me off base, past Kim's No. I Sewing, Susie J's (I wasn't too sure what service she was offering) and whole blocks of military supply shops. There was one I remembered, called U.S. Cavalry. It had been a complete department store for the start your-own-war nut, glass counters displaying sharp, pointy things, racks of BDUs, military T-shirts and combat helmets, rows and rows of boots, and shelves of posters and books with such politically correct titles as Ragnar s Big Book of Homemade Weapons and The Advanced Anarchist Arsenal: Recipes for Improvised Incendiaries and Explosives--always good for that last-minute Christmas present.

  I drove past shop fronts displaying murals of airborne assaults. One had a giant poster of John Wayne in uniform in the window. After another mile I saw the store I wanted and drove into the car park. Jim's was the same size as a small super store; the front had a wooden ranch look about it, but the rest was whitewashed cinder block. The front windows looked almost cottagey from a distance, with lots of little square panes, but as you got nearer you could see the panes were just white painted bars behind the thick plate glass. And the anti-ram barriers one third of the way up the windows weren't there to tie your horse up to either. Through the foyer I could see keyboards, VCRs and rows of TV screens all showing Jerry Springer. It was to the left of all that, however, a place where there were no windows at all, that they kept what I'd come here for.

  I walked onto a small verandah where a large red sign warned me, "Before entry weapons will be unloaded, actions opened and thank you for not smoking."

  The inside of Jim's Gunnery was L-shaped. To my right was a pawnshop;

  the rest disappeared around the corner to my left, past a counter selling magazines and sweets. Opposite was a small shop within a shop, selling jewelry. The place smelled more like a department store than a pawnshop.

  It was very clean, with a polished, tiled floor.

  I turned left toward a series of glass display cases, all containing pistols hundreds of them and behind them, in wall racks, rifles, with something to suit every taste, from bolt action to assault. After I picked up a wire basket, I was greeted by a very well-fed white guy in his mid-thirties, wearing a green polo shirt with Jim's logo on it, a Glock .45 in a pancake holster on his belt and a big smile.

  "Hi, how are you today?"

  In my bad American I replied, "I'm good, how are you?"

  I wasn't worried; the transient military population made it a lot easier to get away with a dodgy accent. Besides, they'd only think I was Australian Americans always do.

  "I'm good, sir. Is there anything I can do for you today?"

  "Just having a look around, thanks."

  He beamed.

  "If you need anything, just holler."

  Heading toward the weapons counter, I passed shelves stacked supermarket fashion with boxes of ammunition and everything for the hunting man, even down to Barbour jackets and shooting sticks, which surprisingly didn't look out of place.

  Antimugging sprays hung from racks. I couldn't decide whether to have the CS gas or the pepper spray, so in the end I put both in my basket.

  The footwear section sold camouflaged Gore-Tex boots and an assortment of Wellingtons and leather footgear. What I wanted, and eventually found, was a normal pair of high-leg assault boots, a mixture of cross trainer and boot. The Gore-Tex and go-faster boots were all well and good, but I could never really be bothered with trying to keep my feet dry. Once they were wet, which they would be tonight, that was it, I just got on with it. I didn't bother to try the boots on; it wasn't as if I were going to be tabbing for six days across the Appalachians. I got them in a size ten; I was size nine, but remembered from a very painful few days in a pair of new U.S. trainers that their sizes are one up from those in the U.K.

  I went over and had a look in the weapon cabinets. There were hundreds of revolvers and semiautomatics to choose from. I could see what I wanted and waited my turn to be served.

  Next to me, a woman in her early thirties had a two-year-old in a carry-rig on her back. She was being helped by one of the assistants to choose a new nylon holster for her Smith & Wesson .45 CQB, and they were also chattily discussing the pros and cons of various models. The one she was carrying was the stainless-steel version. As she was saying to the assistant, the matte-black, alloy version was lighter, but the steel one was more noticeable and therefore a better deterrent. It was a fantastic weapon, and would always have been my weapon of choice were it not for the fact that I preferred 9mm because the magazines carried more rounds. Mind you, if she needed more than the seven in the mag plus one in the chamber, she was in the shit anyway. The conversation moved back to the new holster as opposed to keeping it in her handbag.

  A bit farther along, a young black guy in a blue tracksuit was being briefed on the merits of a .38 revolver over a semiautomatic.

  "With this baby y'all don't even have to aim," the sales pitch went.

  "Especially at the range y'all be using it at. Just point it like your finger at the center mass and it will take them down." The customer liked that; he was going to take it.

  The woman had gone and the assistant came over to me.

  "Hi, how can I help you today?"

  It was bad accent time again.

  "Can I have a look at your Tazers on the bottom shelf there?"

  "Sure, no problem." The assistant was black, in his mid-twenties, and dressed in the house green shirt. H
e was also "carrying." It was a Sig 9mm, held in the same sort of nylon pancake holster the woman had been interested in. He bent down and pulled out the tray of Tazers.

  They were selling all different types, from little handheld ones, to the sort that fire out prongs on a wire that you can use to attack someone from a five-meter range, right up to big ones that resembled police truncheons.

  I was tempted by a handheld one called "Zap-Ziller the monster of stun guns!" mainly because of the slogan. There was even a picture of a dinosaur on the box that told me it packed 100,000 volts of stopping power.

  I read the packaging to make sure it suited my needs: "A short blast of a quarter-second duration will startle an attacker, cause minor muscle contractions and have a repelling effect. A moderate length blast of one to four seconds can cause an attacker to fall to the ground and result in some mental confusion. It may make an assailant unwilling to continue an attack, but he will be able to get up almost immediately.

  "A full charge of five seconds can immobilize an attacker, cause disorientation, loss of balance, falling to the ground and leave them weak and dazed for some minutes afterward. Note: Any blast lasting over one second is likely to cause your assailant to fall. If you do not help them down, gravity may injure them." I hoped so. They'd certainly done the business in Syria.

  In the clothing area I picked out a set of woodland camo Gore-Tex, choosing one two sizes too big so it was nice and baggy. Gore-Tex had changed a lot since it was first invented by God in answer to every infantryman's prayers. In the early days it had made a rustling noise as you moved, which wasn't good if you were moving on target, and as a result we'd had to wear it under our combat clothing. But nowadays it was much more like textile than plastic.

  I cruised around the aisles and filled my trolley with a few other bits and pieces I thought I'd be needing. I didn't think I'd need a weapon, but seeing them all made me feel strange about being on a job without one. It would take too long to apply for a gun legally. The U.S. laws aren't as crazy as people in Europe imagine, and I didn't want to take the risk of stealing or buying one illegally. Normally, if I knew I was going to need one, I would plan to obtain it in-country, because that meant I wouldn't have to worry when traveling on commercial flights.

  If that wasn't possible, I'd put one in the diplomatic bag, along with any other special kit I needed, and then pick it up at the embassy. This wasn't happening on this job, however; the timings hadn't allowed it.

  Besides, I was carrying out a PV review; what would I need a weapon for?

  The hunting-bow section at the rear of the store caught my eye. Three customers in their early fifties, baseball caps on their heads and beer bellies hanging over their belts, were trying to outdo each other with their war stories. I overheard, "When I was in Da Nang there was a whole week I thought the good Lord was going to take me away ..."

  I saw some crossbows that took my fancy. They were small, but I knew they were powerful. Since the U.K. government had banned handguns, the pistol clubs had had to find another sport, and many now used their ranges to fire crossbow bolts instead of pistol rounds. The club where I'd been shown how to use one was in Vauxhall, just across from the Firm's HQ.

  I picked up one model and examined the optic sight and the attachment to keep spare bolts. The price tag said $340, which was all right, but the other side was disappointing: a label told me it needed a North Carolina weapons license.

  The only option left to me was an ordinary bow, and I wasn't short on choice. There were racks of them to choose from, with names like Beast 4x4, Black Max and Conquest Pro. Made of carbon fiber, aluminium or composite resin, with cams that worked like gears at the end of the bow to give the bow cable more power, these modern versions of the longbow would have had Robin Hood creaming his Lincoln green.

  I found one I liked the look of, the Spyder Synergy 4, proudly boasting thirty-two inches of throbbing manhood end to end, cammed and cabled up, ready to go as long as I had some arrows. I wanted the smallest ones I could find, just like the bow. Looking along the racks I worked out it was the two-footers I was after, and picked up a box of six. But that wasn't the end of it. I then had to choose the arrowhead. I went for the Rocky Mountain Assassin; it looked like Thunderbird Three with its tail fins, which were in fact razors. It also seemed to be the only one that came with ready-assembled fins.

  I was quite enjoying myself at the bow mix 'n' match counter, and the next item I needed was a quiver. These, too, were cammed up and fixed onto the bow, so that everything was secure and close to hand.

  I carried on and got the rest of the stuff on my mental shopping list, and with enough kit to bow-hunt until Christmas I went to the checkout. The woman with the baby was examining a necklace in the jewelry department.

  She obviously hadn't liked the holster, because the stainless steel45 CQB still gleamed from her open bag on the counter.

  Behind the checkout a woman in her early twenties sat bored out of her skull, apparently not that interested in the latest style of handgun or waterproofs.

  Her hair was gelled to her forehead, and she didn't even look at me as she said, "Card or cash?" I couldn't keep my eyes off her fingernails.

  They were two inches long and nearly curling, like Fu Manchu's, and were painted with an intricate, black and white checkerboard pattern.

  I couldn't wait to describe them to Kelly.

  I replied, "Cash," did the transaction, lifted my bags, put my twenty cents change into the "Candy for Kids" box and left. While I was loading the trunk of my car, the woman with the baby came out and got into a people carrier. I couldn't help but smile as I saw the stickers plastered across the back:

  "This vehicle insured by Smith and Wesson."

  "A proud parent of a terrific kid, sponsored by Burger King."

  And, best of all: "The driver carries only $50 ... OF AMMO!"

  In amongst all of these was a large silver Born-Again Christian fish sign with the word Jesus in the middle. It was just like old times, part of the crazy kaleidoscope of contradictions that made me love America so much. It was a good job I hadn't made a mistake the last time I was looking for a wagon with a fish sign on it, and climbed into this woman's vehicle.

  No doubt the vehicle's insurers would have given me a greeting to remember.

  There were still a few other odds and ends I needed, so I drove away from Yadkin and toward the city center--or what I thought was the center.

  After ten minutes I had to stop, open the trunk and get the maps out, hoping that on one of them there might be a town plan. I worked out where I was and where I was going to: a shopping mall, the nearest one I could see. It was about a mile away.

  It turned out not to be the single, contained area I'd been expecting. The main mall building looked more like the Pentagon, but clad in something like York stone, and the remaining outside shopping areas and car parks must have straddled an area of more than eight square kilometers, with traffic jams to match. The big blue sign for Wal-Mart was exactly what I wanted, and the store was part of the outer shopping area. I waited at the lights, peeled off right, and went into the car park. There was the usual lineup of stores--Hallmark Cards, post office, shoe super stores, a Lone Star steak house, then my mate, Wal-Mart.

  As I got a trolley I was greeted by an elderly male welcomer with his happy face on.

  "Hi, how are you today?"

  I smiled back at him. He had a Wal-Mart baseball cap on that was a size too big for his head, and a T-shirt over his long-sleeved shirt that told me how happy Wal-Mart was to see me. There was an ATM machine just past the turnstile. I took the opportunity to get some more cash out on my card and off I went. The place was full of Airborne soldiers, screaming kids and stressed-out mothers.

  I selected food that was both ready, and quiet, to eat. No chips or cans of fizzy drink; instead, I picked up four big tins of Spam, four large bottles of still mineral water and a bumper pack of Mars bars. Then a couple of laps around the gardening sectio
n, and I was done.

  There was a little self-service cafe that I'd missed as I entered, maybe in the excitement of my welcome to Wal-Mart. After paying, I left my trolley with my new friend--it was also his job to keep an eye on them when people went to the cafe. I picked up a tray and got myself two large slices of pizza and a Coke.

  As I ate I ran through my mental checklist, because I didn't have that much time left to mince around. Deciding I had everything I'd need, I finished the pizza and Coke and headed for the exit. I felt a stirring in my bowels; I couldn't find the toilet, but no matter, I'd go to a coffee shop.

  However, the pangs made me think about something I'd forgotten: I went back to the pharmacy section and picked up a couple of party-size packs of Amodium.

  Thinking about it, the pizza hadn't been too bad, so I went back in and bought two full-sized Four Seasons.

  As always, I'd chosen the trolley with one dodgy wheel, so as soon as I was outside on the concrete I was all over the place, pushing it at a crazy angle in order to go forward. When it came to supermarket trolleys, my lucky number was zero.

  I threw everything into the trunk; I'd sort it all out later. As I got behind the wheel, I got the phone out, turned it on and checked the battery level.

  It was fine. All the same, I fished out the spare battery, swapped it for the one I'd just checked and then plugged it into the recharger. I was going to need both batteries full up and ready to go.

  One last check of the map and I nosed out into the solid traffic.

  drove out of town and back toward the lake. It had started to rain a little and I had to put the wipers on intermittent, turning them off again just before Raleigh when they started to rub on the dry windshield. Soon afterward I spotted a rest area, pulled in and got sorting.

  Bending into the trunk I started to pull off the sticky-back price tags from the Gore-Tex and my other purchases, stuck two on my hand, then packed all the stuff into the hunting bergen. I made a point of putting the pruning shears in one of the little pouches on the outside, together with the string and gardening gloves, as I'd be needing them first. The gloves were a bit embarrassing as they were like dishwashing gloves with lots of little lumps on the fingers for grip, and worst of all they were yellow. I should have opened them up and checked the color. It was too late now to do anything about it; I needed to get back to the lake. All the other items, including the plastic gas container, went in the main compartment of the bergen.