Terminal Velocity

by Andy McNab

  Ethan tracked right, Johnny left. With a quick check to make sure he was out of Johnny’s way, Ethan signalled with a wave off to Johnny that he was about to deploy, then went for his ripcord. For a second, he remembered the cut away last time, how close he’d been to bouncing, but he forced the memory away and went for it.

  The loud crack! of the canopy, opening above and inflating as it grabbed air and pulled him from 120 mph to 10 mph in less than ten seconds, filled Ethan with relief. He gripped his torch and swept the beam of light over his head to check the darkness above; the canopy was fine, no lines tangled. Now all he had to do was land safely. And at the DZ.

  The lake Ethan had seen on the map and on the photographs was dead easy to spot; with the rain now little more than spitting, some moonlight was breaking through the drifting clouds and reflecting on the surface of the water. He adjusted his heading to get himself on course.

  Johnny’s voice buzzed the air as he spoke over the chat-net. ‘Everything OK?’

  Ethan squeezed the throat mic. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘That was a bit of a rush, though. Night jumps are just so bloody scary!’

  ‘You’re not going to cry on me now, are you?’

  Ethan laughed. ‘Spotted the farmhouse yet?’

  ‘I’m not blind,’ said Johnny. They could see light spilling from the windows of a building below them; it had to be the farmhouse.

  ‘That’s reassuring.’ Ethan adjusted his canopy again. The DZ was only a few seconds away now.

  ‘You go in first,’ said Johnny. ‘You’re in front of me, anyway.’

  A few moments later Ethan pulled his feet up and touched down gently to the ground. He quickly killed the canopy, to stop it dragging him along with it and into the lake, balling it up into his arms. As he did so, he saw Johnny come in just a few metres away from him. He ran over.

  ‘Nice landing, Eth.’

  ‘Yeah. Where do you reckon we should hide our rigs?’

  Johnny threw Ethan a small package. He unzipped it and unfolded a silk sack large enough to take both rigs. Ethan unclipped himself and bunged his rig in the sack. Johnny did the same.

  ‘Those bushes over there will do,’ nodded Johnny.

  Ethan hid the rigs then looked across the lake to the farmhouse. ‘Pretty lonely place,’ he said.

  ‘I’m guessing the nightlife sucks,’ said Johnny. ‘Come on.’ He immediately broke into a run, heading off to circle the lake and come round to the farmhouse.

  Adrenaline pushing him on, Ethan chased through the dark after Johnny. With what had happened to Natalya and Luke, he knew that the mission had changed drastically. It made him a little nervous, but he knew that was a good thing; exercise or not, being overconfident wasn’t just stupid: it was dangerous.

  7

  ‘How’s it look?’

  Ethan was sitting to the left of Johnny, who had eyes on the farmhouse with the binos. They were crouched behind some old weed-covered oil drums. They could see the farmhouse end-on, the front of the building facing out to their right. The side wall of the house was nothing more than an imposing stone wall, broken only by a black hole where a small first-floor window must have once been, and below it, a door hidden behind a pile of rusting trash.

  ‘Like a farmhouse,’ said Johnny. ‘You know, roof, windows, cows in the bedroom.’

  Ethan took the binos and had a look himself. The place was a wreck. Whatever life it had seen had left long ago.

  Johnny said, ‘If Luke and Nat had been here, we’d probably know the number of x-rays as well as Kat’s location, but them getting caught has screwed the whole thing. We need to take a closer look before we work out what to do next.’

  He slipped across the shadows and ducked in through the open door of one of the outbuildings at the rear of the farmhouse. On Johnny’s signal, Ethan followed. The darkness inside the building felt thicker than outside, he thought. Ethan noticed that, although it was obvious the building hadn’t been used in years, the faint smell of animals still lingered, trapped in the stonework of the walls.

  Johnny pointed out through the door to the farmhouse. They could now see the rear of the house and the end wall they’d been able to see earlier. ‘Light, ground floor. Flicker of one in a room upstairs too.’

  ‘So where’s Kat?’

  Without taking his eyes from the farmhouse, Johnny said, ‘I’m guessing upstairs, with the x-rays on the ground floor.’

  A sound made Ethan look back towards where they’d come from. Then bright lights burst over them and they dropped to the ground.

  ‘What the hell?’

  ‘Don’t move!’ hissed Johnny. ‘Whatever you do, don’t bloody move!’

  The sound of vehicle doors opening and shutting was replaced by footsteps crunching gravel. Ethan didn’t breathe.

  Johnny nodded at Ethan then risked a look through the door. Then he ducked back in and said, ‘It’s Nat and Luke. They’re being taken into the farmhouse. At gunpoint.’

  The lights died, everything went quiet.

  ‘Too close,’ breathed Johnny. ‘They parked right where we’ve just come from!’

  But Ethan wasn’t listening; he was still replaying Johnny’s last sentence.

  ‘Sam said no one would be armed. You sure you saw right?’

  ‘Totally,’ said Johnny. ‘An AK-47 has a very distinctive silhouette. Particularly when it’s being jabbed into the back of a mate.’

  Up until now, Ethan had been running on adrenaline and excitement. It was an exercise; they were all taking it seriously, and Sam was testing them. But to come up against this, to find that they were now facing weapons? That made him nervous.

  Ethan raised himself to his knees to see a van, blue and beaten up, parked next to the oil drums. If they’d stayed there, the job would’ve been over before it had even begun.

  ‘Nice of Sam to make things so interesting, isn’t it?’ said Johnny. ‘Always our best interests at heart.’

  ‘So not only have they got Luke and Nat, as well as Kat,’ said Ethan, ‘but they’re also armed. How are we supposed to deal with that?’

  ‘Like Sam said,’ said Johnny, ‘we adapt. So here’s what we’re going to do.’

  Ethan leaned in. He was happy for Johnny to take the lead in this. Yes, he’d been with the team for a few months now, but in a situation like this, the best, safest thing to do was to follow, listen and learn.

  ‘The whole point of what we do is that we’re proper sneaky bastards,’ explained Johnny. ‘And remember we’ve been taught by Sam, Mr Sneaky Bastard of the Year. So we’re going to creep in there, head upstairs, grab Kat, Nat and Luke, then make sure our exit is clean.’

  ‘We’re going in just like that?’

  ‘Just like that,’ said Johnny. ‘No time to hang around and have a meeting about it.’

  Ethan was quiet, but couldn’t help feeling that sometimes Johnny could do with reining in his just-do-it attitude.

  ‘The x-rays are armed,’ continued Johnny, now in full flow, ‘and we need to avoid all contact. So silence is vital. The lights from the farmhouse are a good indication that the x-rays are downstairs.’

  ‘How can you be sure?’

  ‘Because that’s what I’d do,’ said Johnny. ‘But that doesn’t mean to say they won’t be patrolling now and again, so we need to be careful and bloody quiet. We pile in there, we’ll get our arses shot off.’

  ‘No, we won’t,’ said Ethan. ‘This is just an exercise. And aren’t the x-rays Mal and Reg?’

  Johnny turned to Ethan. ‘A note to the wise,’ he said, voice quiet, serious. ‘If you don’t treat this like it’s the real deal, then when it is, you’ll be slack, make mistakes. And if that happens, you’re not just putting yourself in danger, but the rest of us as well.’

  It was the first time Ethan had ever had Johnny speak to him like that. His instant reaction was to tell him to sod off, but he quickly realized Johnny was right. So he wound his neck in.

  ‘OK?’ said Johnny.


  ‘Yeah,’ said Ethan, and pushed all thoughts that this wasn’t for real from his head.

  ‘And just so you know, I’ve never seen the x-rays before,’ said Johnny. ‘I’ve a feeling Sam’s called in a few more friends of his. Just to keep us on our toes. They look serious. And I doubt they’ll hold back in giving us a good kicking if we just roll in there like none of this is real and it’s all just a game.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘You want to test it, go ahead,’ said Johnny.

  Ethan flicked a nod at his friend. ‘You lead, I’ll follow. That way, if you get caught, I can run for it.’

  ‘You’re learning quick.’

  ‘You taught me well. So how do we get in?’

  Johnny pointed to where the light was visible downstairs. ‘I think there’s a door just to the side of that window.’

  ‘But that’s right next to the x-rays. What if this is a setup?’

  ‘Explain.’

  ‘For all we know,’ said Ethan, ‘the lights are on in the farmhouse to draw us inside. Then, when we slip in, they spring the trap and we’re in the shit because Kat, Luke and Nat are actually being held in another building.’

  ‘But I saw Luke and Nat taken into the farm,’ said Johnny.

  ‘All they had to do was slip them out again,’ said Ethan. ‘I’m just saying we should be careful, that’s all. Not just go in assuming we’ve sussed it right from the off.’

  Johnny looked thoughtful for a moment. ‘So what would you suggest?’

  Ethan pointed at the other outbuildings around the house. ‘First, we check those out. It’ll only take a couple of minutes to do a recce.’

  ‘And if all’s clear?’

  Ethan pointed at the end wall of the farmhouse. ‘It’s not much, I know, but that door has a stone lintel above it. If we can climb on that, I reckon it’s big enough to take us both. Then it’s a bit of a stretch to that hole where a window must’ve been, but I reckon we should be able to pull ourselves in.’

  Johnny looked over at what Ethan was talking about. ‘Doesn’t exactly look easy.’

  ‘Better than creeping past x-rays with AKs,’ said Ethan. ‘And if it doesn’t work, if we can’t reach, then we’ll just do it like you said.’

  Johnny frowned, then grinned. ‘It’s risky … dangerous. I like it!’

  ‘Then let’s get moving,’ said Ethan. ‘I’m seizing up, sitting here like a gnome.’

  Johnny was up and off and Ethan was with him. They quickly checked the rest of the outbuildings and found them all empty. All their attention then turned to the farmhouse.

  Back round at the wall they squeezed into the shadows and looked up. The aging, flaky brickwork was wet and slippery.

  ‘Help me up,’ said Johnny, nodding at the stone lintel above the door.

  Ethan clasped his hands together, Johnny shoved in his boot and with a heave he had his hands on the lintel. Ethan pushed Johnny’s feet as Johnny pulled with his arms. And he was up.

  He then reached down to help Ethan up, pulling him by one hand as Ethan grabbed onto the lintel with his other.

  Now, both standing on the lintel, they looked up at the window above. Johnny went first, reaching to get a good hold, then walking his feet up the wall, finding cracks between the stone as best he could.

  ‘Shit!’

  Ethan instinctively turned away as Johnny held on to stop himself from crashing down. For a few seconds, he hung there, not moving. Then with a heave and a scrabbling of his feet, he was up and at last was through the window.

  All the time Johnny was on the wall Ethan half expected to see someone come round the corner of the house. But no one did and, now inside, Johnny reached out, grabbed him and pulled him through and into the house.

  The room was dark and smelled damp and rotten.

  Johnny signalled to stick close to the walls and edge round to the door at the opposite side of the room. As they started moving, Ethan understood why; this way, they were walking where the floorboards had less flex than if they’d walked straight across the room. Their progress was quick and silent.

  At the door, they both peered out onto a gloomy hallway. A light was visible coming up from the ground floor, dancing and flickering at the bottom of the stairs, which were directly in front of them. Across the hallway, a thin crack of yellow light slipped round the edge of a door.

  Johnny pointed. Ethan nodded.

  Sticking to the walls, they slipped out of the room. Ethan could now just make out the sound of a television downstairs interrupted by the occasional burst of laughter.

  ‘Nice to know someone’s enjoying themselves,’ said Johnny, and peeked into the room. ‘Bingo!’

  Johnny opened the door and Ethan followed him in. Kat and Natalya were on the floor tied back-to-back. Luke was strapped to a chair.

  Ethan went over to Luke as Johnny set to with the girls. They both used their hook knives and soon the rest of the team were all free. Ethan noticed that Luke was rubbing his wrists where the rope had cut into them; they were bleeding.

  Johnny signalled to check everyone was OK.

  Everyone nodded and Johnny led the way, slipping back out into the hallway, sticking to the walls as before.

  With hardly a sound, they were soon all across the hall and in the room with the window where Ethan and Johnny had entered. But the sound of a door clicking open on the ground floor stopped them all dead. And they all then heard someone climbing the stairs.

  Luke immediately turned to Natalya who, without a word, walked back to the door.

  Ethan had no idea what was going on, but he was sure they should be getting out of the window, and fast, rather than hanging around.

  Johnny pulled Ethan against the wall as they all tried to flatten themselves like shadows.

  Natalya was at the door now. With a final look at the team, she coughed loudly. Ethan heard the person on the stairs stop for a moment, then start moving again, now heading directly for the room they were hiding in. He was confused. Why had Natalya given away their position? What was going on?

  Eyes wide, heart thumping, Ethan watched as Natalya slunk away from the door and into the shadows herself. Then the door started to open and he saw the silhouette of a large man, pistol at the ready. A torch flicked on and a bright circle of light started to dance across the wall. It was moving towards them and Ethan knew it would be on them in a second.

  Movement.

  Ethan saw Natalya spring from the shadows at the intruder. In a blur, he saw her somehow grip the hand holding the pistol, twist it and ram it into the intruder’s stomach. Before he even had a chance to respond, she was in at him with a punch that burst his nose. Before he had a chance to yell, Natalya broke the pistol from his hands. Luke came in from behind, grabbing the man round the neck, and leaned backwards, lifting his feet off the ground. The man struggled, but went still very quickly.

  Ethan turned to ask Johnny what the hell had just happened, but Johnny hushed him before he had a chance.

  ‘We need to move quickly and get the hell out of here,’ he whispered.

  In quick succession the team slipped from the room out through the window. With everyone on the ground, Ethan stood by Natalya.

  ‘That was quite something,’ he said. ‘What you did up there – I’ve never seen anything like it.’

  ‘It is called Krav Maga,’ said Natalya. ‘It was developed by the Israeli special forces. Effective, yes? One day I’ll show you, Ethan.’

  Ethan turned as he heard a noise behind him. It seemed to come from the van that had brought Luke and Natalya to the farmhouse. Johnny stood there, holding up some cables.

  ‘What are those?’

  ‘Spark-plug wires,’ grinned Johnny. ‘These guys won’t be going anywhere for a while.’

  Kat said, ‘Sam’ll kill you, you know that, don’t you?’

  ‘I’m simply helping to secure our escape,’ said Johnny. ‘Can’t have them chasing us in a vehicle, can we?’

  With them al
l doing their best to keep their laughter down, the team headed off into the night. They were still smiling when they climbed into Sam’s Defender twenty minutes later at the pick-up point.

  ‘Went well then?’ Sam asked.

  Johnny slipped into the front seat and handed Sam the wires and winked. ‘You could say that …’

  8

  ‘You broke his nose, Natalya! And when I say broke, you nearly smashed it off his sodding face! What the hell were you thinking?’

  Ethan, like the rest of the team, was inside the tent and trying to stop himself yawning. They’d managed to get a few hours sleep after the exercise, but not enough. Sam was standing by a board leaned against the inside of the tent. It outlined their timetable for the day, starting at 0630. He looked as he always did, observed Ethan: hard and serious. Even though he knew Sam wasn’t actually speaking to him, he still felt the heat of Sam’s stare. And he was feeling more than a little awkward; it was clear that Sam had a problem with how the exercise had gone, but Ethan was having real problems seeing how else they could’ve gone about it.

  ‘It was unfortunate,’ said Natalya, and Ethan noticed how she sounded so cool and calm, despite being in Sam’s firing line. Had he ever seen her riled at all? ‘Unavoidable.’

  Sam growled. ‘What’s the point of me training you to go in silent, to do the job and get out unnoticed if the instant I send you in you pummel someone?’

  ‘We didn’t have much choice,’ said Kat, and Ethan could hear in her voice that she was restraining herself. Unlike Natalya, her emotions were much closer to the surface. ‘If Natalya hadn’t taken him down, and Luke knocked him out, then the other x-rays would’ve been on to us. It was clean and quiet. The others didn’t have a clue until it was too late.’

  Johnny backed her up. ‘It had to be hard and fast, Sam. If we’d given that x-ray any chance at all, the op would’ve failed. And, as you’ve told us time and again, failure isn’t an option.’

  ‘And he was armed,’ added Luke. ‘We only had the element of surprise and we took full advantage of it. Natalya was the obvious choice, you know that.’