Battle Lines

by Andy McNab

  ‘You fucking wankers!’ Finny roared at the men buzzing around the Mastiffs. ‘You opened fire on us! You could see we were running away from the Taliban, we had SA80s, Dave was waving a British First Field Dressing, and you fucking, fucking idiots shot Angus McCall! You killed him! You killed Angry!’

  Dave and Finny, on either side of Doc, followed Angus’s body as it was carried across the cotton towards the track.

  ‘Stupid, stupid tossers! Who don’t use their brains before they fire. You fucking killed my mate.’

  Finny’s voice was cracking he was throwing it so hard across the cotton, across the desert, across the world to a small newsagent’s in Kent where Angus’s father would soon be up, counting newspapers, laying them out for his customers, his hands grubby with newsprint, unaware that tomorrow his own son would feature in those newspapers.

  ‘You stupid, stupid fucking bastards!’ roared Finny.

  ‘That’s enough,’ Dave told him.

  ‘They shot Angus. They shot Angus McCall.’

  The big man was dead. It was unthinkable. It was impossible that someone whose voice could fill whole NAAFIs, who occupied so much space in this world, could just disappear from it.

  They walked up the blue lane as MERT arrived. The helicopter landed on the track behind the line of Mastiffs.

  Finny ran up to the stretcher before the lads carried it away. He was crying.

  ‘Fuck it, Angry McCall,’ he shouted at Angus’s body, tears streaming down his face. ‘You were big and often stupid but you were so fucking brave and a fucking good mate and you were always doing the wrong thing for the right reason. I was lying in a cave worrying about what you were going to do to someone all fucking night and now I don’t have to worry any more and I wish I did! How could you get yourself shot now after all we went through? I know what you want me to do. You want me to kill the geezer who did it? Don’t you? Don’t you, Angry?’

  Dave and Doc joined him by the body. Dave, for reasons he didn’t understand, took Angus’s hand. Another dead hand. It felt like the last one. Rubbery, inhuman.

  ‘Angus. You were a good soldier, the best. Goodbye, mate.’

  He would have said more but he felt his throat constrict. It was the wrong ending to one helluva night’s soldiering.

  He looked up and saw Aaron Baker standing right by him, his face twisted in pain.

  ‘Shit, Sarge, shit,’ was all he said.

  ‘Who shot him?’ roared Finny, looking around him. ‘Who killed my mate?’

  Jason Swift was there, his face tired and pale. ‘Stop, Billy Finn, or I’ll have to take that rifle off you.’

  Finny stared at him. ‘Take my rifle? Off me? There’s some bugger around here should have the rifle taken off him. Because he killed my mate …’

  ‘Stop, Finny,’ said Dave, finding his voice again. ‘That won’t do any good. Angus is dead. We’ve got to deal with the living now.’

  ‘We’re not going to let someone get away with this?’

  ‘We’ve got RMP to fill in forms and ask questions.’

  They were forced to stand aside for a stretcher. On it was Gerry McKinley.

  ‘Oh shiiiiit,’ said Finn.

  ‘There goes my patient,’ murmured Doc. He signalled for the stretcher-bearers to pause. He pulled back the bloodstained sheet which was covering McKinley’s lower leg, looked at the mess, and pulled it back again, rolling his eyes.

  ‘Tell me this man’s still alive,’ said Dave faintly.

  ‘Yeah. Well, he was a few minutes ago,’ said one of the bearers. On another corner of the stretcher was Andy Kirk, McKinley’s best mate, his face hollow.

  ‘We’ve just about kept him alive. He’s had so much fucking morphine that …’ They did not hear the end of his sentence. The bearers were already running towards the Chinook.

  ‘Finny, I want you on that helicopter, too,’ said Dave.

  ‘Good idea,’ agreed Doc.

  ‘No, Sarge!’ yelled Finny.

  ‘Please. Go with Angus’s body. He’d appreciate that.’

  Finny considered for a moment and then ran after the stretcher.

  ‘We came a fucking long way to help McKinley,’ said Doc, ‘and MERT gets here first.’

  Danny Jones shrugged. ‘Well, it’s only two kilometres,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why it took you so long.’

  Dave and Doc looked at each other.

  ‘Oh. Yeah. It’s only two kilometres,’ said Doc. ‘What took us so long?’

  Dave said: ‘You should get on the Chinook, too, Doc.’

  ‘I’m not going on any fucking Chinook,’ growled Doc. ‘I want to get back to Red Sox and make sure the boys are OK.’

  Dave said: ‘I didn’t get you through last night alive to have you arguing with me now.’

  Doc threw him a filthy look and then, to Dave’s surprise, gave him a bear hug.

  ‘You are the best, Dave Henley,’ he said. ‘If anyone tries to give you shit over what happened out there, they’ll have me to answer to.’

  He turned and limped towards the Chinook.

  Dave looked around for Chalfont-Prick. But the idiot was busy talking to another officer in the rescue party. Dave turned to the nearest platoon commander, someone else’s commander. ‘Sir, as soon as we can move forward, we should urgently head towards PB Red Sox. They’ve got few men and they’ve been under very heavy fire. Just outside the PB there’s a wrecked Mastiff with a T4 in it.’

  The commander looked at him uneasily. Dave realized that with the Afghan cloth still wound around his head, dishdash stretched over Osprey, no boots on his feet and a hellish night behind him, he might not look like an army recruitment ad.

  ‘Are you all right?’ the commander asked. ‘Are you sure you shouldn’t go to Bastion too?’

  A man approached with a small golden cross on his uniform.

  ‘Can I help anyone?’ he asked, looking directly at Dave.

  Dave recognized him. Here was a man he always ignored but who had his uses. ‘I’m OK, thanks, padre,’ he said. ‘But I may need your help when we get to PB Red Sox. I have to see how my men did last night. Then I’ve got to break some very bad news to them.’

  When the gates opened at PB Boston Red Sox and the convoy rolled into the courtyard, Dave had a strange feeling that he’d come home, even though he had actually spent less than twelve hours in the fucking shithole.

  His heart thumped as he counted men. Lancer Reed sat on the ground by the compound door, his back against the wall, smoking. He would already know about the death of Lancer Dawson. And, thank God, there were the lads standing near him. Sol, Mal, Binns and Bacon. They were holding their weapons in a way that suggested they had abandoned their firing positions for the arrival of the convoy.

  When they saw him, smiles split their faces. Dave could not smile yet. Because he could see only five men. Then he looked over to the tower and there was Tiny Hemmings. Good. Six men, thank God, but there should be seven. Who was missing? Shit. Someone dead. Someone injured. Who was left after Reed, Sol, Mal, Binman, Bacon and Tiny? Dave’s brain was too tired to work that one out.

  He leaped out of the Mastiff the moment it stopped, the padre right behind him. He went straight to Sol.

  ‘Any down?’ he said.

  ‘No, Sarge.’

  Relief. It started in your head but worked its way through your body, softening your blood vessels, weakening your skeleton so that sometimes it was hard to stand up. At that moment, he saw Slindon firing from the compound wall. The seventh man.

  ‘Oh Sarge, we had one fucking awful night!’ said Streaky. ‘First your crash and we knew Dawson was dead and then we nearly ran out of ammo and we had them swarming all over the Mastiff out there like a bunch of flies and we was so short that we couldn’t do much about it except I did a bit of sharpshooting and got two of them and Binman got one and we was scared, so scared, man, that they was going to come swarming all over this compound next and Tiny got shot in the arm but Mal bandaged it and
it’s only on the edge, like, the very edge of his arm and—’

  Sol was still grinning from ear to ear.

  ‘Enough, Streaky,’ he said. ‘We’re all here. That’s the main thing. And Dave and the boys made it …’

  Sol Kasanita. The optimist. The believer in a merciful, bountiful God, whom he worshipped daily and especially on Sundays. He stopped speaking suddenly when he saw Dave’s face. Instantly Dave’s expression was mirrored by Sol. Eyes sad. Mouth drooping.

  ‘Oh shit, Sarge. Where’re the others? I thought maybe they’d gone to the FOB or Bastion or …’

  His voice trailed away. The men’s eyes slipped from Dave for the first time to the man who stood behind him. Sober-faced, quiet. The padre. Bearer of bad news; bringer of comfort. Their faces dropped. Dave swallowed.

  ‘Lads. I’m really sorry. Prepare yourselves. I have to tell you that …’ His throat closed and wouldn’t release the words. He had to fight with all the fibres and muscle and flesh there for his voice to escape. The words finally came out strangled. But they were clear enough for the boys to understand.

  ‘I’m sorry that I have to tell you Angus McCall is dead.’

  He looked from eye to eye, face to face, as the men received the news. Over the last twelve hours each of them had certainly become acquainted with both terror and hopelessness. But each remained young, strong, bright-eyed. The death of Angus was another blow and it would cut some of them deeply. But they would weather it and recover. Their lives would continue, gathering years, passing milestones. And as the years went by they would have reunions, noticing the small changes in each other, the extra kilos, the grey hairs, the joys and disappointments etched on one another’s faces. Jamie Dermott and Angus McCall would not be at the reunions. Their faces in fading photos would start to look young and empty of the many experiences life would bring those who were left. They would always remain the Jamie and the Angus whom 1 Section had known here in Afghanistan.

  There was a moment of disbelief. Then Mal’s face became a mask, a caricature of horror. He swayed and leaned on Sol, who stared back at Dave. Slindon’s mouth hung open. Binns put his hands to his head as if warding off a blow. Bacon looked at the ground, chewing his lip.

  Quietly, like a voice speaking from far away across the desert, haunting as the call to prayer, the padre recited the old words they knew so well:

  ‘They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

  Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

  At the going down of the sun and in the morning

  We will remember them.’

  Chapter Forty-one

  THE PLANE WITH 1 platoon on board left camp Bastion three days later. Dave’s hands had been full those three days, answering questions, making statements, speaking to the bereaved men, visiting the wounded, talking to Rose McKinley on the phone.

  Kila had told him about Jenny. There had been no details until he made a call home and found his mother and mother-in-law caring for the kids because Jenny was in hospital having surgery to her jaw. She was not expected to be discharged for a few more days. She found speech difficult.

  He rang Leanne.

  ‘Shit, Dave. Shit. I don’t know what to say. Steve just went AWOL. Shit. See, the psychiatrist gave him this medication and I checked that he’d taken it every morning but it turned out he was flushing it away …’

  ‘Why? Why?’ asked Dave. ‘Why would he hurt my Jenny?’

  Leanne spoke carefully. ‘Well … he thought he was helping you. See, everyone was so pissed off with Jenny because they thought she was … you know. Having it away with the general. I mean, it was just gossip. Harmless gossip.’

  ‘And you thought that too?’

  ‘I did think it. But I don’t now. See, Eugene’s been really helpful. Really kind. And he’s … not … not that sort of bloke.’

  ‘But you think Jenny’s that sort of woman?’

  Leanne floundered. ‘Well. No.’

  ‘Then why the fuck did you and everyone else spread rumours and gossip and shit about my wife?’ shouted Dave. ‘Look where it’s ended. Someone mentally ill picks up the fucking baton and runs with it and all the so-called harmless gossip ends with Jenny in hospital having plates put in her jaw!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Dave. I’m really sorry about what Steve did.’

  ‘If you were part of the gossip machine, you should accept a bit of responsibility for this yourself!’ yelled Dave. Then he regretted it. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, Leanne. Things are tense enough here. We’ve lost a man and you’ll have heard about Gerry McKinley.’

  ‘Yeah. Seems Rose and me’ve got a lot to talk about.’

  ‘Look, I’ll come and see you as soon as I’m home and I’ll visit Steve too.’

  When the plane touched down at RAF Brize Norton, there was a car waiting for Dave.

  ‘It was my idea. Thought you’d like to get straight over to see Jenny,’ said Iain Kila gruffly. ‘Just leave your platoon to me.’

  The men were still boarding the bus. Some of the lads came over to say goodbye as Dave climbed into the car.

  ‘Good luck, Sarge.’

  ‘Hope she’s all right, Sarge.’

  ‘Give her a big hug from me.’

  ‘Yeah, right, like she wants a hug from a big, ugly, smelly shit like you …’

  ‘Get back to the fucking bus!’ roared Kila. ‘And give her my best, Dave.’

  The car set off. Jenny was in a specialist unit for facial injuries about thirty miles from home and Dave had been told to prepare himself, both for her appearance and for the fact that she couldn’t talk much. He already knew it must be fucking awful if the army had sent him a car.

  He would not relax until he had seen her but it was good to be home. And to know that he would be seeing Jenny at last and that she was going to be all right. The English countryside passed his window. Gentle green hills. Shining grass. Trees laden with their new summer leaves. Afghanistan was a bleak, hostile place: no one coming from this benign country could ever belong there.

  It took Dave a while to discover which ward Jenny was in and when he found it a sign on the door said that he was here outside visiting hours. He ignored it. Another sign told him to use the hand disinfectant on entering the ward. He complied. He walked to the nurse’s station, ready to apologize for arriving at the wrong time, ready to explain, ready to insist.

  But the woman took one look at his uniform and smiled.

  ‘Sergeant Henley? Your wife’s been waiting for you. She’s been told you’re on your way.’

  Dave followed her down a long corridor. He felt stupid in camouflage. It was not fucking effective in a hospital where everything was white.

  The nurse said: ‘Mrs Henley’s just had an operation and she’s still bandaged. Don’t be alarmed. Very soon the bandages will be off, the swelling will go down and the surgeon has assured her that she will be just as she was before.’

  Dave said, unsteadily: ‘Very beautiful then. Very.’

  The nurse turned back to him and smiled. They had reached a door at the end of the corridor now and she opened it quietly and peered around it.

  ‘He’s here!’ she said cheerfully. Then she disappeared and Dave was left standing in the doorway.

  Her face wrapped in white bandages, under white sheets, surrounded by white walls, was a woman. His Jenny. He walked towards her very slowly. She watched him. Tears were welling up in her eyes. They were starting to stream down her bandaged face.

  ‘Oh Jenn,’ he said. They had both travelled long, hard roads and they had endured them apart and not together. ‘I’m here now. I’m back.’

  She reached out for him as he crossed the room, with its drip and patient notes and clipboard and array of buttons and equipment over the bed. He sat down and folded her in his arms. She was crying and she was thin and she was scarcely recognizable but she had that sweet smell of Jenny.

  He said: ‘I don’t ever want to leave you again.’

  He felt
her body sobbing against his.

  ‘You’ve been through too much,’ he said. ‘And I wasn’t here to help you.’

  She pulled back and looked into his eyes.

  He said: ‘Your bandages are all wet.’

  She sort of smiled.

  ‘Can you speak?’

  The jaw might have been broken, the face might have been bruised, but the strength he loved her for was still there. He watched her steel herself against pain. With determination, her mouth half-closed, she said: ‘I love you, Dave. And there’s never been anyone else.’

  He put his arms around her again.

  ‘I know, Jenn. I’ve always known that. I couldn’t believe all the crap people were telling me. But they just kept on saying it and when you’re so far away things get distorted by the distance …’

  He looked into her clear blue eyes. Her real face was discernible under this mask of yellow bruises and bandages but he saw sadness. It had settled on her eyes, as if her tears had deposited it there.

  ‘Jenn, I want to punch out Steve Buckle.’

  Her eyes opened wide.

  ‘I know I’m supposed to be understanding about how ill he is and I’m trying to say all the right things about how he’s been traumatized. But deep down I just want to punch him out. When I look at your face and think of him hitting you …’ Steve. Too big, too loud, too angry, standing over Dave’s Jenny, fists flying. Dave reddened at the thought. His hands became knuckles. One day he would ask Jenny to tell him exactly what had happened. One day, when he could trust himself not to retaliate.

  He looked back at Jenny’s face and saw that she was watching him and had become even sadder. He took her hand and held it firmly in his own.

  ‘No more punching,’ she said slowly.

  ‘OK, love. No more punching. I’ll have a cup of tea with Leanne when I get back to camp and then I’ll go up to Headley Court to see Steve and I won’t punch him or put rat poison in his beer, I promise.’

  She smiled. That sad, bruised smile.

  ‘Is Steve going to get better?’ he asked.

  ‘Eugene visits. Says he’s improving.’

  Eugene. A name Dave had hated for months. ‘I’ll have to thank Eugene,’ he said carefully. ‘For dealing with Steve. When I wasn’t there to take care of you.’