At 17.24 they received an emergency call. It initially went through to the medical emergencies call centre, but was then put through to the police. A man shouted that he was ‘the boat driver out here’ and that he would try to get to his boat. ‘There’s a man going round here, shooting,’ he said. ‘He’s dressed as a policeman.’
It was a call from the captain of the MS Thorbjørn. ‘He’s got a machine gun!’
Jon Olsen had just seen his partner Monica being shot. Now he was looking for his elder daughter. ‘Ring me if you need the ferry,’ he finally got out.
There was a simultaneous call on the other emergency line. A boy blurted out that there was ‘shooting everywhere’, panic and chaos, and that people had run to ‘the edges’ of the island.
Suddenly there were red lights on all the incoming lines.
* * *
At 17.25, Anders Behring Breivik walked back across the campsite, where Gunnar was lying unconscious.
By then Breivik had killed three people at the landing stage, three by the main entrance, one at the campsite and two on the way there. Now he came round the corner of the long, brown wooden building that housed the café and the main hall, and skirted along the wall.
He wondered whether to go in. There was always a risk attached to entering a building. Someone could be standing behind the door and jump him, set a trap, overpower him. In World of Warcraft, the odds always went down if you entered the enemy stronghold.
‘What’s happening?’ an AUF member called to him from a window. Several other heads appeared. This was their first sight of the man in police uniform.
‘Somebody’s shooting, so stay away from the windows!’ the man told them. ‘Lie down on the floor and I’ll come and help you!’
A girl at the window was holding a pink mobile phone. She had just spoken to her father, a lorry driver who often made deliveries in the Oslo area. Luckily he was safe.
‘Let me know if you lot are getting flooded out over there,’ her father had said right before the shooting started, ‘and I’ll come and get you.’
‘I’d rather you dropped off a pair of wellies if you happen to be passing, Dad,’ Elisabeth answered. She had just finished Year 10 and it was her first time on Utøya. Her face was still that of a child.
‘We’ve run out of dry clothes!’ she had laughed.
* * *
Breivik went into the building. The walls were covered with posters of AUF slogans from over the years. In the corridor there were hundreds of shoes and boots, as no outdoor footwear was allowed in the meeting rooms.
He went calmly into the first room, known as the small hall. He paused for a moment in the doorway to get an overview. The youngsters looked at him, awaiting instructions.
He went over to a group and started shooting.
Several fell to the floor.
Ha, they’re faking it, ran through his head. He calmly went round to each of them in turn and ended their lives with a shot to the head.
Some of the youngsters were screaming, standing still as if glued to the floor. They stared at him fixedly, unable to run away, escape, save themselves.
How weird that they’re just standing there, thought Breivik. I’ve never seen that in a movie.
Then he aimed his pistol at them.
Some of them begged for their lives. ‘Please don’t shoot!’
But he always did.
He shot one girl in mid-scream. His pistol was almost touching her face. He fired into her open mouth. Her skull shattered, but her lips remained unharmed.
By the piano at the end of the room a girl was sitting on a piano stool, resting her head on the keyboard as if unconscious. He shot her in the head. Blood poured out and down between the keys. Standing by the piano, he noticed more kids, hiding behind the instrument. He stood over them, raised his arm and fired into the gap between the wall and the piano. Shot after shot, hit after hit.
Many hid their faces in their hands. The bullets splintered their hands before entering their heads. One of those hiding behind the piano was Ina Libak, a friend of Bano and Lara’s from Akershus. A shot went through both her hands and another through the top of her arm. I can survive this, she thought to herself. The next shot got her in the jaw. This was more serious. Eyes closed, she crouched there, trying to hold her jaw in place. She could not see the man who was firing, but she could hear him breathing above them, hear him moving round the piano. Then she felt the impact in her chest. Shots like that kill you, she thought. There was a taste in her mouth she had never had before. Gunpowder. She lost feeling in her arms and thought her hands had been shot off. The taste of bullets mixed with another taste: blood welling in her mouth, over her chin, down over the hands that were holding her jaw in place.
Then the pistol gave a click. The magazine was empty. He had been careful not to fill it right up in case the bullets got stuck. He calmly changed magazines. It took a few seconds, long enough to throw yourself out of a window, get to the door, long enough to escape. Many tried, but there was a crush at the exits.
The bass player of Blondies & Brownies was trapped in the doorway between the small hall and the main hall while Breivik changed his magazine. There the slender, fair-haired girl was hit by one – two – three shots. She slumped to the floor. One of the shots had entered the back of her head on the left side, penetrating her skull and ripping into her brain. Her life ebbed away. There, between the two rooms, Margrethe’s life ended. ‘Before you judge me, try hard to love me. Look within your heart then ask, have you seen my childhood?’ she had sung with Bano at the karaoke the night before.
Breivik stepped over her. He entered the AUF’s largest venue, the main hall, where Bano had been inspired by Gro, where the meeting about Western Sahara had made Mari and Simon want to get involved, where Monica Bøsei had tried to comfort the AUF youngsters with the prospect of lighting all the barbecues.
A boy was hiding behind a loudspeaker. Breivik saw him and opened fire. The boy ducked, several times. Breivik had his work cut out trying to hit him. He fired five or six shots and missed each time.
Frisky type, thought Breivik, then, finally, one of the bullets found its mark. It hit the boy in the head and he fell. To make sure he had finally got the better of his target, he fired twice more.
Elisabeth ran along by the wall; she was calling her father again.
Freddy Lie answered, and heard nothing but screams. His sixteen-year-old daughter was huddled down against the wall, crying into her phone, when Breivik came into the room.
Freddy, who only a few minutes earlier had offered to come and get Elisabeth and her older sister, was in his car. He couldn’t do anything but listen. What was happening? Was she being attacked? Was she being raped?
The line went dead. When he rang his daughter back, he got a message to say the phone was switched off or had no signal.
The bullet had hit Elisabeth’s ear canal, seared through her cranium and gone right into her brain and out the other ear. Only when it got to the pink phone cover did the bullet stop. The girl fell sideways and Breivik shot her twice more. She lay there, no longer moving. Her long, wet blonde hair turned red with blood. Her grey jogging bottoms, her white T-shirt, everything was stained red. Soon her fingers would stiffen in their grip on the pink phone against her head.
Everyone sitting along the wall was shot. The killer used the same method as in the small hall. First he opened fire from a few metres away, then closed in and shot them all down.
I’m wasting ammunition, he told himself. On the other hand, it was an effective method.
The first target was always the head. But as soon as he started shooting, everybody hit the deck. It was difficult to follow what was going on. It wasn’t always easy to hit them where he wanted. But he was getting better all the time. He had made sure to buy the best sighting system on the market for both Gungnir and Mjølnir.
Sometimes it was hard to tell if he had already hit the kids. The rifle made a very small hole, and if a person died ins
tantly the blood stopped pumping, so it was not easy to decide who was dead and who was not. It was better to fire once too often if he was in doubt.
Breivik looked around the main hall. No movement. He went back through the small hall. No movement. He went out.
He had been inside for two to three minutes. It had taken him about a hundred seconds to kill thirteen people. Several were left critically injured. It was 17.29.
The killer crossed the campsite. He shot into a few tents, but it would take far too long to check them one by one, so he moved on.
* * *
The chief of operations at Hønefoss police station had started calling in reinforcements. Five minutes had elapsed since the first telephone call, and further calls were queued up on the line. There was no system to notify her staff in case of a crisis, but the officers all had one another’s mobile numbers stored on their phones, and got in touch with the colleagues who were not away on holiday.
Four officers, two men and two women, ran into the equipment store to prepare for the operation. They put on protective gear, armed themselves and took communication radio equipment with them. A fifth officer, an older woman, stayed to relieve the chief of operations.
There was no plan in place for what the police operation was going to do. It was clear, however, that they would need a boat. The police boat, a red rubber dinghy, should be made ready.
Nobody thought of the MS Thorbjørn. The former military vessel could have taken a large force to the island within minutes. The distance by road from Hønefoss to the Thorbjørn’s jetty is thirteen kilometres. Optimally, the police officers could set foot on the island a little more than a quarter of an hour after leaving the station.
But the ferry, which had transported six hundred youngsters to the island in the last few days, was forgotten. The ferry that spent every summer shuttling between the island and the mainland was overlooked in all the hectic preparations.
* * *
After Jon Olsen had rung the police, he started searching for his daughter. A thought struck him: Colonel Gaddafi had announced that same week that he would send terrorists to the countries that had bombed Libya. That must be what was happening! They were bound to take hostages. He and Monica had talked between themselves several times about how perfect the island would be for holding hostages.
He did a hasty circuit of the island and then came back to the landing stage where the ferry was tied up. He dashed on board.
In the wheelhouse he found the crewman and a couple of other youngsters, hiding. Some others came running. Someone on the boat was ringing the AUF leader, who had been in the admin building near the landing stage when Breivik came ashore. Someone hammering, Eskil Pedersen had thought when he heard the bangs over the sound of the TV. Two of the AUF counsellors went down to check and one of them came straight back. ‘There’s someone shooting,’ he cried. They locked the door and opened the veranda door on the first floor to look out, but could see nothing.
The other counsellor ran down to the boat, and he was the one ringing now. ‘Get down here as fast as you can!’
‘What’s happened?’ asked Eskil.
‘Just run!’ answered the counsellor.
Apart from the AUF leader, the captain and the crewman, six people saved themselves by getting onto the boat. They were terrified. They had heard shots and screams. In his panic, the captain reversed at full speed. He asked everybody to lie down, because the gunman had telescopic sights, he had seen that much. The time was 17.30.
When they were halfway across, the captain straightened up and wanted to turn round. He wanted to rescue more people – there was room for far more than nine. Some youngsters had already jumped into the cold water, trying to swim away from the island.
Monica was dead and their daughter was still on Utøya. The captain started thinking about a friend who lived near by and had been in Afghanistan. He kept weapons at home. Perhaps they could get some guns from him. Jon’s thoughts were in turmoil, but the boat held its usual course for the mooring point on the mainland. Then the crewman remembered that the policeman had said he was expecting two others. That meant the ferry landing stage was not safe. The captain was also afraid there could be terrorists there, and that they might seize the boat. They would have to dock somewhere else. The MS Thorbjørn changed direction, away from the jetty and out into the fjord.
Meanwhile, people were hiding down at the water’s edge around the island. They saw the boat disappear from view. Eskil Pedersen received desperate texts from those still on the island and replied: ‘Get away! Hide or swim!’
Then he rang the Labour Party leadership to alert them.
* * *
Lara was lying behind some rocks down at the shoreline, thinking about the chainsaw Bano had found the day before. That would have been good to attack and to defend oneself with, she thought. She had left her phone behind when she ran, and she so much wanted to talk to Bano. Bano was bound to have found a good place to hide. Maybe she was hiding in the cellar where the chainsaw was kept. That would be a great hideaway: the door could be bolted from the inside, and then you could pile things up against it so no one could get it open.
But Bano was not hiding indoors. She had been on the edge of the woods by the campsite when Breivik approached the café building. She was with some girls she did not know. Their names were Marte and Maria.
‘If there really is a person shooting, then somebody’s got to talk to him,’ said one of them. ‘We’ve got to ask him to stop,’ said the other.
As AUF members they had grown up in a culture of words. The debate must be won. It is the strength of your argument that gives you power. The young people on Utøya this Friday were used to being heard.
‘We won’t die today, girls. We won’t die today!’ said Bano as they stood there by the trees. They could hear the shots, but did not know where they were coming from. It was only when they saw a boy being shot down by the café that they ran. Up the hill behind the campsite. Over harebells and yellow bird’s-foot trefoil, over heather and wild strawberries. They ran until they reached Lovers’ Path.
On the path they met Anders Kristiansen. He was used to the sound of gunfire from the firing ranges at Bardufoss, where his father worked.
Now he was desperately ringing 112 for the emergency services. But they seemed permanently engaged. Finally he got through.
‘There’s shooting on Utøya!’ he said. But because the local emergency switchboards were jammed, his call was put through to a police district where they still had not heard what was happening on the island. The eighteen-year-old was told he was mistaken. It wasn’t shooting on Utøya, it was a bomb in Oslo.
Futile. Anders hung up.
They went further along the path. There were lots of them. They squatted down, poised to run. Beneath them, a long way below, the Tyrifjord lapped against the rocks. Some people were running by barefoot or in their stockinged feet.
On the path they were discussing whether it was genuine, or just some kind of joke.
‘It just isn’t funny to fool around like that,’ said one girl.
‘Maybe it’s some sort of PR stunt,’ a boy suggested.
The young people huddled down behind a slight rise in the ground. Sitting there, they could no longer see the café building where the last shots had gone off. That must mean that those firing could not see them either.
Then they heard heavy footsteps in the heather.
One boy suggested lying down in strange positions and pretending to be dead. It was too late to run away, after all.
Bano lay down on her side with one arm under her and the other thrown out at an angle. She had pulled the fluorescent yellow hood of the red sailing jacket half over her hair. On her feet she had the size 38 wellington boots.
Anders bent down beside her. He, who from his earliest years had always liked to have an overview, lay down on the ground. He who had learned rhetoric from Obama and was passionate about parliamentary debate found no more words
. This eighteen-year-old who had fought wars in the forest with a gun carved out of wood now lay down to play dead. He put his arm around Bano.
The uniformed man had reached the slight rise, a few metres from them.
‘Where the hell is he?’ he asked.
Nobody answered.
He started at the right-hand end.
First he shot a boy.
Then he shot Bano.
Then he shot Anders.
The shots were fired at intervals of just a few seconds.
Our dear little moon, shines down on those
Who have no bed and have no home
The two girls who had been with Bano on the edge of the woods when it all started were near the end of the row. They were holding hands. A bedtime song was going round in Marte’s head. It had come to her as she lay, listening as shot followed shot.
May all the world’s little ones sleep tonight
May none of us cry, may none be forsaken
The song had soothed her when she was little and it soothed her now. She lay quite still, eyes closed.
Marte and Maria had only just joined the youth organisation and were on Utøya for the first time, to see whether it was the sort of thing for them. Their faces were turned to each other. They were wearing their new AUF sweatshirts. The flame logos on the chest were turned to the ground.
Marte stole an upward glance and saw a pair of muddy black army boots, and above them a chequered reflective band.
Then a bullet hit her best friend in the head. Maria’s body jerked, and the twitching ran down into her hand.
Her grip slackened.
Seventeen years is not a long life, thought Marte.
Another shot rang out. It was as if a current ran through her body, as if someone was playing drums in her head. There was a glitter in front of her eyes.
Then everything faded out. The ground beneath her disappeared, and then all sound.
Blood ran down her face and covered the hands her head was resting on. So much blood. I’m dying now, she thought.
The boy beside her was shot several times; he reached out his hand and said, ‘I’m dying.’
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