Wilco- Lone Wolf 20

by Geoff Wolak

  ‘Yeah,’ Tomo replied.

  ‘Hostage siege in London, we're advising, and maybe shooting.’

  David called back, Puma on its way, and that Puma landed fifteen minutes later, the lads all curious as to what was up. I jumped aboard with the snipers and Graveson and we lifted off.

  I pointed at Nicholson. ‘You have a facemask?’

  He handed it over. ‘Freshly washed. What if they film me?’

  ‘You might get laid,’ I told him, making him smile.

  We sped low level to London, setting down on Horseguards. Mask on, I jumped down, vans waiting, screaming loud sirens blaring as we sped north east and to the hostage scene.

  At the scene, and through the tapes, we were led into an office block and up in a lift – mask off, soon on the roof with many other people, my snipers attracting looks from all sides. I clocked the SAS Duty Officer CT and his sergeant, and we shook.

  He explained, ‘Reports are sketchy, two people made it out, four armed robbers, shotguns and pistols.’

  ‘Amateurs,’ I noted.

  ‘No one killed so far, and they're stuck inside.’

  I peered down at the street, and at the bank, a four storey building, offices above the bank but with no connecting stairway. It looked like one way in and out, the main double doors. ‘This could drag on for ages. I'll go chat to them.’

  ‘What? You can't, police have control.’

  I found the police commander downstairs, in a third floor office. ‘I‘d like to go chat to them, end this.’

  ‘Chat to them?’

  ‘If you're an armed robber and I walk in and chat, would you shoot? Look, these guys read about me in The Sun every day, so let's use that here.’

  ‘What if they shoot you?’

  ‘Shotguns and pistols, I can deal with that, and I'll be at the door not inside.’

  ‘It's not exactly by the book, and if you're hurt it's my head.’

  ‘Look, people try to kill me every day of the fucking week. And this is my choice, made in front of witnesses, and your best bet for a peaceful end. And … you tell them I disobeyed you.’

  I walked out and down, facemask on, jacket off, pistol stuffed down the back of my trousers, puzzled officers watching me advance across the street and right up to the bank. A look inside, and I stepped in, taking off the mask.

  Men peered out from behind the row of cashiers machines.

  ‘I'm Major Wilco, SAS, here to negotiate.’

  They exchanged puzzled looks.

  ‘You really him?’

  ‘You saw the sketch in The Sun.’

  ‘You could be anyone.’

  I walked forwards a little, crying staff and hostages on the floor, and without dislodging my pistol I eased off my shirt. A woman on the floor was even more shocked than being held hostage.

  ‘Fooking hell,’ a gunman let out.

  I loudly stated, ‘You think I'd look like this with a desk job?’ I waited, starting to put my shirt on. ‘So, what will it be today? Option 1, you go to prison for armed robbery, Option 2 you go to prison for armed robbery and murder, Option 3, my men shoot you dead. If you think you have other options you are mistaken. So, what will it be, gentlemen?’

  I waited. Pointing at a man with a pistol, I told him, ‘You need to cock that and take the safety off to fire it.’

  He glanced at his colleague with the shotgun and placed it down. ‘Replica anyhow.’

  ‘Guys, I don't want to see your heads splattered up the wall, so go for the least prison time here; I have some terrorists to deal with.’

  They slowly stood, looks exchanged, weapons down.

  ‘OK, ladies and gentlemen, walk outside with your hands up.’ I waved them on, crying women rushing out, young men and old. I walked forwards.

  Shirt on properly, I stuffed my pistol down the back. ‘Looks like you'll get some time to read a paperback or two, but you will be free one day.’

  ‘I read the book, The Ghost.’

  I sighed. ‘I never got any fucking money for that, nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’

  ‘No. Come on.’ I led them out, mask back on, hands up, the men soon knelt down with hands above heads as the police rushed in.

  The police commander walked over. ‘What did you say to them?’

  ‘I asked them if they read the fucking book,’ I told him as I walked off, someone sent to get my snipers.

  ‘We never shot anyone,’ Tomo complained as we headed to the vans.

  ‘But now we can have some lunch at least.’

  Back at Horseguards we stepped down from the vans, the PM wanting a word, so we walked that way, my snipers not disarmed of their large rifles. Inside No.10 my four got odd looks.

  The PM stepped out with the Home Secretary. ‘Well done, it's on the news already. How did you talk them around?’

  ‘I asked them if they had read the book.’

  ‘Well your fame ended what could have been an ugly situation, so well done, no deaths.’

  He had to rush off, so we were shown out, not so much as a cup of tea and a biscuit, soon in the Puma and heading back. At GL4 we set down in front of the hangar, the pilots thanked.

  In the Intel Room, Harris began, ‘We saw it on the news. How come you never shot them?’

  ‘Not every situation needs me shooting people.’

  ‘Mostly it does,’ he insisted.

  The next day we had a man arrive with a computer from GCHQ, and we found him a desk, plenty of spare offices to use. He was very tall, thin and gangly.

  ‘What do they call you?’

  ‘Name is Nathan Long, but they call me Beanpole.’

  ‘Can't think why.’

  When ready, he showed me the screen, a list of numbers and GPS grids.

  ‘Right, what I want, is some big-brain computer guy to show me my men on a screen in positions relevant to each other.’

  I grabbed a white board as people listened in. ‘Top of the screen is north. Here, two dots with names on, not numbers, and below are two dots with other names on. When they move, the screen is altered, so that if the group north move east and the group south move to where the first group were, they would be side by side, not one above the other.’

  He began, ‘There's a software package that does that, for ships, we use it now with the Admiralty. It has a map in the background.’

  ‘Can it be adapted, men in a forest with GPS positions?’

  ‘Well … yes, same data exactly, similar map, north and south and east and west, it's all the same.’

  ‘And if my men's GPS trackers were put into the ship's system?’

  ‘They'd show up on relevant positions, so one group north of the other.’

  ‘I want that system. Your printout helps, but not when we have contact with the enemy and need to make a choice.’

  ‘I'll call them, get a ship's track computer down here.’

  ‘How often would it be updated?’

  ‘Your sat phone has a ping, but that's different to the GPS trackers. Your sat phone location - we have to go looking for, but your GPS trackers send out a signal directly to us to say: hey, here I am. That can be set at every five minutes I think.’

  ‘Get on with it please, and teach this system to the staff here. Did you get a warning about security here?’

  ‘I watch the news,’ he quipped.

  ‘If you'll be here regular you get some range time in, and a private pistol to carry, and a driver.’

  ‘I've done some legwork for GCHQ, I speak Albanian.’

  ‘Good, so don't let yourself get shot here, that creates paperwork for us.’

  After lunch I knocked out some laps, time on the bars near the barracks, working up a sweat.

  David called at 5pm. ‘You were right about the tox report, an odd drug in his system, similar to an hallucinogenic.’

  ‘I don't think he took it voluntarily.’

  ‘No, so he was fed some, driven to you and sent for a late night walk, and shot.’
>
  ‘Vindictive. The shooter is a nutcase.’

  ‘Or maybe the dead man was a bad character, and deserved what he got.’

  ‘Someone in Deep State wants us to stop Mgolo from taking Liberia. But are we doing their dirty work for them?’

  ‘After the failed attempt with the cruise missile, I guess they have no use for him, and he's an embarrassment, so yes – we clean their house for them. But if he's a threat to Liberia we need to act anyhow.’

  ‘I know Deep State have some good teams, they used them in London against Lord Michaels, but do they not have men suitable for jungle work?’ I posed.

  ‘I'd say no, or we would have seen them before now. Never seen an American mercenary in Africa.’

  The following day another computer arrived, this one with a huge screen. When ready, Rocko handed GPS trackers to the MPs, and they went about their duties. Software settled, signals coming from a server in GCHQ, and we had an image of a green background and several dots with numbers alongside.

  I pointed, ‘Front gate, farm house, hangar. Seems about right.’

  Beanpole zoomed out the image, till we could see the outline of the UK. All the dots were in South Gloucester. ‘This would tell you what country they're in.’

  ‘Can you get a good map of Kosovo?’

  ‘Yes, they can scan them, the people who created the system.’

  ‘I want Kosovo, and the Congo. Sierra Leone and Liberia. And then we'll test it. Oh, and Germany, a particular place.’ I asked Sanderson, and he had an address for the forest. I handed it to Beanpole. ‘We'll run an exercise there, to test this. In a few weeks.’

  ‘I'll send a request in about the maps.’

  ‘Put my name on it,’ I suggested. ‘Maybe they read the damn book.’

  Today we had the CT police in, twenty of them, the rest on duty in London, and they tackled the new range as I observed them, a few of the Echo lads having tried it this week.

  Crab was in the control room with Rocko, bullet-proof glass to protect them, and I observed with the police commanders as their men went over obstacles and fired left, up over the dummy house and fired left, and over barbed wire firing left.

  Grab shouted into the microphone. ‘Rifle stoppage! Switch to pistol!’

  Rifle down, the man advanced, firing at targets within fifty yards, all double taps. He reloaded whilst knelt and finished the course, running back for his rifle. His score was well under Echo.

  ‘That was lame,’ Crab told him. ‘Try and hit the fucking target!’

  I spoke to the police commanders about the London bank job, and about training in general, all of the CT police worked hard today, all having at least three attempts at the course.

  Friday, and I had all of Echo put through the new range, wagers laid off, insults inferred. My snipers would use regular Valmet, but Salome had an M4 she liked.

  I was last up, and when loaded and ready I adopted my war face, my mind back in Bosnia; those targets were Serbs coming at me. At the end of the course I was level with Tomo, joint top, and pleased; I was not getting old and stale.

  Doc Willy was at the bottom, but he was new and no one gave him any shit.

  Cleaned up, I drove with protection to London, but booked in to a better quality hotel, Tiny hidden inside, CT police waiting outside in the cold. Graveson was booked into the old hotel, and I told him to get some food and some sleep - that was an order.

  In my room, paid in cash, I dumped my bag and called Tiny. ‘I'm in 304.’

  ‘I know, dumbass, I followed you.’

  ‘You did?’

  A knock came at the door, so I peered through the eye hole, soon opening it.

  She told me, ‘You need to check over your shoulder more often.’

  ‘You weren't in the lift...’

  ‘There are six lifts, dummy. One is around the corner from reception.’

  ‘So … my lift displayed the floor I went to?’

  ‘Yep, and it was just you in the lift. I go here in time to hear the door shut, you took a minute to find it.’

  ‘Are you training to be a spy or something?’ I teased.

  ‘I'm getting better, and today I won. But they're bad losers.’

  ‘What did you do!’

  ‘I shoved a woman off a bus, and hit a car with a brick.’

  I laughed. ‘Whatever works. And in real life that would be perfectly acceptable.’ I threw her onto the bed, soon licking her pussy, making her moan before begging me to stop.

  Up from the bed, I ordered room service.

  ‘What? No cock for me?’ came from a woman with matted hair in he face.

  ‘Later. And I need a wash first. I can't go offering you a smelly cock.’

  ‘The considerate lover, eh.’

  We ate together, tales of the cat and mouse.

  I told her, ‘When I first went to Panama I had this Petrov back-story all worked out and practised, but when I got there no one gave a shit about it, no one challenged me. It was a real disappointment.’

  ‘I have a fake ID they gave me, passport, and loads of pages of back-story. I'm supposed to memorise it all.’

  ‘Do so, get it all sorted in your head, might need it soon.’

  ‘You were in London, but you never came to see me...’

  I huffed. ‘They keep me busy, I have a base to run and Echo and the Intel Team! The damn phone never stops ringing. Do you want flowers as well?’

  ‘Flowers might be nice.’

  ‘I'll send my police bodyguards to get some, shall I? Or do we keep this quiet. Because if people think I like you they'll try and kill you.’

  ‘OK, mister grumpy, chill.’

  ‘Next week you can fly down to Nice and enjoy some nice French hotels. Meet your new boss.’

  ‘Will he be my boss?’

  ‘Kind of, yes, but I'm his boss.’

  ‘What's he like?’

  ‘Posh, gay, a stickler for detail. He won't like you on a personal level, but he works with killers all the time and judges them on the results. He was Head of Operations for SIS, and he's great at the job. He founded Echo and recruited me. We go way back, to the first Gulf war.’

  ‘And what will I do there?’

  ‘Find your niche, and have some training. What you did in Hamburg, that's what you could be doing for us. Finding people, bugging them, even killing them. The leg work. Some weeks flat-out busy, other weeks nothing to do, plenty of time off, nudist beaches and sun bathing.’

  I could not risk a shopping outing with Tiny in the morning, so I headed back. At GL4 I changed to tracksuit and trainers and knocked out a few laps, a few of the lads running, then I keenly tackled the metal bars again near the barracks.

  It was a pleasant day, and curious about the fishing I jogged that way, finding eight men sat fishing. Two MPs sat away from Crab and Duffy, who were away from an Intel captain. I jogged down to Swifty and Nicholson.

  ‘When did you start fishing?’ I asked Swifty.

  ‘Today, Nicholson had all the kit. First time I stuck a maggot on a hook since I was ten years old.’

  ‘So … it's relaxing, eh.’

  ‘Great fun, and we have a competition going. I got a small Roach so far, in the net. But I've seen some monsters swim by, Tench we think. Where'd you go?’

  ‘London, posh hotel, nice blonde.’

  ‘Yeah, right.’

  I smiled and shook my head; lying about Tiny was easy enough.

  On Monday I sat behind the new computer system, a huge screen showing me a map of the base, MPs highlighted. It worked well enough. I called the MP Captain and had him drive around the outside of the base slowly, stopping for five minutes every 600yards.

  His number moved from the front gate to the north road, then west a mile, down to near the canal, the south woods external road, and back again. It worked well, and they would soon scan maps of the countries I requested.

  After lunch a call came from General Dennet. ‘Major, we were looking to recruit more ethnic mi
norities to the Army, it's mostly white men as you know, and we wondered if your fame could be used somehow.’

  ‘Got a paper and pen, sir?’

  ‘Yes. Fire away.’

  ‘There are two things that make a young man stop and think twice about the Army. One, a long way from home and family. Two, he's stuck and can't get out if he doesn't like it.

  ‘All around the UK you have territorial bases, totally fucking empty Monday to Friday. So you create a Day Regiment. They turn up at 8.30am in the morning, living nearby. They get into uniform, they do the training, they go home at 5pm to their mothers. And you have a fast exit clause for them.

  ‘After a few months you see which ones are any good and pinch them away, using a graduating training process. They don't go anywhere for the first two weeks, then they do a one-day exercise. Following week, an overnight exercise, home to mum.

  ‘After a few months, they do a weekend exercise, three nights out, home to mum. Those who shine, you pinch them away and offer them transfers to regular units.’

  ‘Major, you're a fucking genius.’

  ‘I know. But you'll have to sell the MOD on the idea of the quick release aspect. They won't like it. If anyone is in your way I'll chat to the PM.’

  ‘I'll put your damn name on it. They won't fight it then. Wilco's Day Regiment.’

  ‘Do I … get a little something, sir?’

  ‘No! Talk soon.’ He cut the call.

  ‘You're welcome.’

  Tuesday saw the Marines going at the new firing course, Rocko shouting at them, a few rounds fired into the mud. Tuesday also saw Tiny meeting Bob Staines. I hoped they would not clash.

  He called me at 3pm. ‘No.7 was here, just gone to a hotel.’

  ‘How'd you get along with her?’

  ‘Great, she has similar tastes in food, wine and architecture, speaks French very well.’

  ‘Take care of her for me, but she'll kill anyone who gets in her way. She did the cat and mouse with SIS, got fed up and threw a brick at a tail car.’

  He laughed. ‘Such exercises can be stressful, yes. Oh, got a mercenary who's been close to Mgolo on more than one occasion, and recently. He has quite the small army, well trained and well disciplined, APC.’

  ‘Unless he moves towards Liberia I doubt they'll send me after him, he's in the middle of nowhere playing at toy solders.’