by Alex Scarrow
Paul stopped what he was doing and inhaled. ‘Burning plastic? ’
‘Yes. They’ve started on the front door already. You better hurry.’
‘I’m going as fast as I can,’ he muttered trying key after key in the padlock.
Jenny turned and looked up the narrow, dimly lit passageway, and listened intently to the muted noises that were coming down it. She could hear some of the staff in the main area of the pavilion crying and pleading to be left alone, either in pidgin English or their own tongue. Their voices sounded shrill, taut and wretched with panic and fear. Beyond that she could hear the distant taunting calls and jeers from the people trying to get in.
‘Come on! Which one of you bastards is it?’ Paul hissed with frustration, as he fumbled with the keys.
A thought occurred to Jenny. ‘What if they’re waiting for us just outside this door?’
Paul paused for a moment. ‘Screw it, I don’t know. They probably haven’t thought that far ahead anyway. We’ll just have to hope they’re all around the front.’
Jenny nodded doubtfully; that wasn’t the reassuring answer she’d been hoping for.
The smell of burning plastic was getting stronger and she could now hear some banging; it sounded like someone was kicking at the door panels, testing them to see if the perspex had softened enough to give.
‘Oh Christ, please hurry!’ she cried.
‘I’m going as fast as I can.’
She heard him jangle the keys again and this time after a moment’s frustrated jiggling around, she heard a click.
‘That’s it. Got it!’
He removed the padlock and tossed it aside, then reached for the handle of the sliding delivery door.
‘Please open it quietly,’ she whispered.
Paul nodded and then pulled gently on the handle. The door grated noisily, metal casters scraping in the runners along the top and bottom. He slid the door to the side by only an inch and Jenny saw a hairline vertical crack of deep blue light - a clear night’s sky.
He waited a moment, hoping the scraping sound hadn’t attracted any unwanted attention, and then slowly pushed the delivery door a little further to the side.
There was a thud and the corrugated door rattled, and then with a roar from the little metal castors, the door was yanked to the right, clattering noisily against the frame. Silhouetted against the evening sky, and dimly lit by the red emergency light back up the passageway, she saw about a dozen of them standing outside. From what she could make out they were mostly men, a couple of women, some young, some middle-aged; people from the estate.
‘Please … don’t hurt us!’ she pleaded with them, feeling the cold grasp of fear suck the air from her lungs and the strength from her legs.
One of them stepped forward; a young man with a skinhead, his shirt tied around his waist, exposing a lean, taut and muscular torso, decorated down one side with those popular Celtic swirls. Jenny stared at him, his face hot and blotchy, aggressively thrust forward, close to hers. He looked hard, angry, ready to lash out at her.
He pointed at the bottles of water she held in her arms.
‘Could I ’ave a drink of one of those? I’m fuckin’ parched.’
Jenny was taken aback. ‘Yeah … uh … sure,’ she replied handing him a bottle. He took it and nodded.
‘Thanks.’
‘There’s a load more back there,’ said Paul. ‘A stack of boxes on the right, go help yourself.’
The rest of the group of people surged quickly past the lad, some of them muttering a ‘thank you’ as they stepped by.
Jenny watched the lad gulping the Evian. He was desperately thirsty, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down as he made quick work of it. She turned and jerked her head toward the passageway. ‘You better go after those others and get yourself some of that water before it’s all gone.’
He nodded, handing back the nearly empty plastic bottle and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
‘Yeah. Cheers for that,’ he said and jogged down the narrow walkway after the others, weaving around the stacks of boxes.
Jenny turned to Paul. ‘I thought he was going to tear me to pieces.’
Paul appeared equally surprised. ‘A polite chav,’ he replied shaking his head in disbelief. ‘Come on, let’s get out of here while the going’s good.’
They both stepped outside.
The night was warm still. Under different circumstances, it would have been a lovely evening to sit out. Paul looked both ways up and down the back of the building. He saw the dark forms of another group of people jogging along the back of the building towards them, attracted by the red glow of light spilling out from the open delivery entrance.
Paul grabbed her arm and whispered. ‘These ones might not be so polite. Pretend to be one of them.’
As the group approached them, Paul called out, ‘The delivery door’s open, there’s loads of stuff inside.’
‘Cheers mate,’ a voice called out from the dark.
Another asked, ‘Any water in there?’
‘Yeah, but you want to get in there quick,’ Paul replied.
The group passed by without further comment, and picked their pace up to a jog as they neared the delivery entrance.
Paul and Jenny rounded the corner of the pavilion, and from there they could see the car-park and the bonfire still burning, now all but deserted. Jenny assumed everyone who had been milling around it earlier on, must now be piling inside the service station at the front, helping themselves to whatever they could find. She could hear a lot of noise filtering out from inside; shouting, the clatter of goods being spilled and knocked over, but with an almost overwhelming sense of relief, she could hear no screaming - no sounds of violence, no pleas for mercy.
‘What are we going to do now?’ she whispered.
‘That car,’ he replied, ‘it’s Mr Stewart’s. I grabbed his car keys as well.’
‘Oh right. God I hope they haven’t trashed it.’
‘Come on.’
Paul started across the car-park, walking swiftly towards the staff-reserved area on the far side. Jenny set off after him, looking anxiously over her shoulder at the pavilion. The truck across the front was blocking most of the front to the building, but every now and then she could see the flickering beams of torches playing around the inside of the foyer and the amber glow of flames coming from the revolving door. The fire they’d used to weaken the entrance looked like it had begun to take hold and she was certain by morning the service station would be nothing more than a smouldering ruin.
Paul pulled out the bunch of keys from his pocket, and she heard them jangling again as he went through them.
‘Ah, that feels like a car fob,’ she heard him say in the dark, and a second later the car squawked and the hazard lights on it flashed a couple of times. They both headed for it. It looked like the vehicle had been untouched; no dents, scrapes, the tyres weren’t flat. She allowed herself to hope they were going to get out of this mess.
They jumped in, anxious to take possession of the vehicle and be off before anyone else had noticed. Jenny dumped her armful of Evian bottles on the floor inside the car.
‘Be nice if Mr Stewart thought to fill her up,’ said Paul, jamming the key in the ignition. He turned it, and the lights on the dash came on.
‘Thank fuck,’ he sighed. ‘Half a tank, fair enough. Better than nothing.’
‘I thought you said you couldn’t drive?’
Paul smiled sheepishly as he spun the car round. ‘Okay, I lied - so shoot me.’
Jenny twisted in her seat and studied the pavilion anxiously, half-expecting a swarm of people to suddenly emerge from it and charge them down, hell-bent on pulling them out of the car and ripping their throats out.
My God, doesn’t this feel just like that . . . Like one of those crazy zombie movies?
This whole situation was like some post-apocalyptic scenario; the glimmering firelight from the bonfire, the debris and detritus strewn
across the tarmac, the flickering torchlight and the frantically scrabbling crowd inside the building, the noise, the chaos.
Paul drove across the car-park towards the exit leading on to the slip-road that led out to the motorway and headed south once more.
She watched the service station in the wing mirror until it disappeared from view.
My God, this is how it is after only four days.
Friday
CHAPTER 65
3 a.m. local time Southern Turkey
You’ve got to think they’re all okay. You know they’re okay . . . okay?
Andy fidgeted uncomfortably in the coach seat. It was an old coach and most of the seats were lumpy and uncomfortable, some with springs poking through the tattered and frayed covers. He’d tried sleeping, God knows he needed some. He had been awake since Monday morning; he had possibly managed to steal an hour of sleep here and there, but he wasn’t aware of having been able to do that. During the events of the last few days, in the periods when things had been quiet enough to try for some rest, his mind wouldn’t turn off, wouldn’t stop thinking about the kids and Jenny.
You know they’re okay.
Running the same things over and over; the last two or three telephone conversations . . . he’d given Leona and Jenny an early warning. They’d had time to get in the essentials and get home and lie low. That’s all they had to do now, just lie low and let this thing play out.
Leona was a sensible, clever girl. Even though he’d not had time to put into crystal-clear words why she was in danger, why she couldn’t go home, Andy was sure she’d do as she was told. But the possible pursuit of some shadowy men from God knows where was only half the equation.
He wondered how things were in London; a big city, a lot of people - it didn’t take a genius to work out how nasty things could get if the British authorities had been caught on the hop by the oil cut-off. And knowing how useless the government in his adopted country could be at preparing for anything out of the ordinary - unseasonably heavy rain, too many leaves on the track, a drier than average summer - the prognosis wasn’t great.
He conjured up an image of Jenny and the kids at Jill’s house. Jill, a loudmouth with a big personality - a woman who quite honestly grated on his nerves, would be looking after them. He could visualise them huddled together in front of the radio, or her expensive plasma TV, hanging on every word from the newsreaders, eating tinned peaches and worrying . . . maybe even about him.
They’re fine Andy, ol’ mate. Just you concentrate on getting home.
Private Peters, who was on driving duty, stirred.
‘Headlights up ahead,’ he called out over his shoulder to Andy, spread out across the row of seats behind.
That roused him instantly. His eyes snapped open. He shook away the muddy-headed drowsiness and once more swept thoughts and worries for his family to one side.
‘Kill our lights and stop!’
Peters turned the coach’s lights off, brought the vehicle to a standstill and quickly turned off the engine. It was then that Andy realised he’d made a really stupid call. He was reminded of the first time he and the other engineers had encountered Carter’s platoon, stranded out in the desert - and how lucky they’d been that time, not to have been shot at.
Whoever those lights belonged to had almost certainly seen them as well.
The lights on the road up ahead winked off in response. That wasn’t good.
Shit.
He saw half-a-dozen muzzle flashes, and a moment later the windshield of the coach exploded. Peters jerked violently in the driver’s seat - a pale blizzard of seating foam blew out of the back of his seat and fluttered down like snowflakes. He flopped forward on to the steering-wheel.
He heard Westley’s voice, bellowing coarsely from a seat two rows further back. ‘This is a fuckin’ kill box! Everyone out!’
The firing from up the road continued, shots whistling in through the exploded windshield, down the middle of the coach as the men squeezed out of their seats and converged in the central aisle. The soldier beside Andy, scrambling towards the steps beside the driver’s seat, was thrown off his feet. He heard the exhaled ‘oof’ of the man, winded by the chest impact, the jangle of his equipment and webbing and the crumpled thud as he hit the floor.
‘Shit! They’re covering the exit!’ yelled Westley.
Andy, squatting on his haunches behind the ineffectual cover of the seat in front of him, looked around. They were sitting ducks in the coach.
‘Out of the windows!’ he shouted hoarsely.
Westley picked up on that and echoed the order with a much louder bark as he smashed the nearest window to him with the butt of his rifle.
‘Come on! Fuckin’ move your arses!’
Windows all along the length of the coach shattered, and the men tumbled out of the coach and landed heavily on the road outside.
Andy, being right at the front, just behind the prone form of Peters was trapped. He needed to get to his feet in order to roll out over the open frame of the window beside him, but the shots were still whistling down the coach, every now and then thudding into the head-rest beside him, blasting away another chunk of his meagre cover.
He recognised the deeper chatter of a heavy machine-gun being fired from somewhere ahead, not dissimilar to the Minimi this platoon had used to suppress the mob back in Al-Bayji to great effect. He realised he might as well be cowering behind a wet paper bag. Those high calibre rounds were having no trouble shredding their way through the coach.
He just needed a second’s pause in the firing to stand half a chance.
Outside on the road, he heard the lighter clatter of the platoon’s SA80s, zeroing in on the muzzle flashes up the road.
And that bought him his pause.
Shit, here we go.
Andy stood up and hurled himself out of the open frame into the darkness of the night outside. He covered his head and neck with his arms, suspecting that if a single high calibre round didn’t tear the top of his head off, he would undoubtedly smash his skull out on the concrete below.
He landed on his back, instantly winded, and stunned by the impact. The flickering lights, and tracer streaks in the air just above his face, were a blurred and beautiful kaleidoscope. If his lungs hadn’t been struggling so desperately to get some air back in them, this would have been a beautiful moment. He felt a hand fumble clumsily across his face and chin until it found the collar of his jacket and began to pull on it, dragging him roughly across the pitted and jagged surface of the road. By the flickering light of the muzzle flashes coming from the lads, he looked up and saw the bearded face of Mike, grimacing with the exertion, and beside him, Lance Corporal Westley calmly squirting short bursts of covering fire.
In that dreamy, stoned moment he felt like drunkenly announcing to both of them they were his bestest bloody mates ever . . . no really, you guys are just the best.
Another of the lads tumbled out from the coach above him, almost landing right on top of him.
‘For fuck’s sake Warren, you fucking clumsy ape!’ shouted Westley, still firing.
Mike continued to drag Andy, and as they rounded the back of the coach, he felt the fog of concussion beginning to clear.
Thud!
Mike’s jacket exploded with a puff of cotton lining. Andy felt a light spray of warmth on his cheeks.
‘Fucking bitch!’ the Texan yelled as he dropped to his knees and clutched his side.
Andy, almost match fit again, scrambled to his feet, and pushed Mike round the corner of the coach. ‘Are you hit?’ he shouted.
Mike looked at him with incredulity. ‘Of course I’m fucking hit!’
Andy squatted down and pulled aside Mike’s jacket, lifted up his ‘Nobody Fucks with Texas’ T-shirt, bloodied and tattered as if a chainsaw had been rammed through it. By the wan light of the moon, he could see nothing.
‘Here, I have torch,’ said Erich leaning against the rear of the coach beside them. He flicked on
a penlight and handed it to him.
Andy studied the wound. There was no entry hole, just a deep gash along the side of his waist. The shot had glanced down his side.
‘Ah, you’re bloody lucky, it’s nothing, Mike.’
Mike’s eyes widened. ‘Nothing? Try being on the goddamned receiving end of nothing.’
They heard Westley bellow an order from around the corner of the coach. ‘Fuck this! Pull back lads! Round the back! Now!’
A moment later, the small area of shelter which Mike, Andy and the soldier all but filled, was inundated with the rest of the platoon, rolling, diving, flopping into the narrow space; a tangle of panting, adrenalin-fried bodies.
‘Jesus-effing-Christ, those cunts up the road have got us cold,’ one of the men grunted between gasps.
The deep rattle of the heavy machine-gun up ahead of them ceased, as did the lighter chatter of several assault rifles.
Silence, except for the sound of laboured breathing all around him.
‘Hell this is fun. We should do it again sometime,’ muttered Mike.
Andy looked at Westley. ‘What will they do now?’
‘Shit, I don’t—’
‘Well, what would you do?’
‘Outflank,’ the Lance Corporal replied quickly, automatically.
Andy nodded. ‘Then that’s why they’ve gone quiet.’ He looked around at them. ‘We’re all jammed together on top of each other. We’re dead if we stay here. We’ve got to make a run for it. How are you fellas for ammo?’
‘I’m out,’ replied a voice in the dark.
‘Me too,’ said another, several more of them echoed that.
‘Just what’s in me clip,’ Westley added.
‘Couple of rounds left,’ said Derry, ‘after that, all I got is colourful language.’
‘Great,’ muttered Andy.
They heard a voice calling out. It was unclear, garbled by the distance and the echo bouncing back off distant rocky peaks either side of the road.
‘Shhh, hear that?’ muttered the Lance Corporal. ‘Anyone hear that?’
Silence, except for a gentle breeze that rustled through the shrivelled, dried trees above them on the slopes. Then they heard the faint voice calling out again, a bit clearer this time.