by Andy McNab
He could feel the blades grabbing at the air, ready to fly. Dima pulled on the collective, depressing the right pedal to counteract the torque generated by increasing the pitch of the blades. Just like riding a bicycle — except so not. Nonetheless, he gave himself a mental pat on the back for remembering. He kept pulling on the collective until the chopper started to feel lighter on its skids and turn. More pedal to keep it straight.
Darwish, his remaining strength gone, slumped against the open door. Kroll helped Amara load him in. Come on, Vladimir. Out from beside the hangar, a limping figure approached. Dima prodded Kroll.
‘Help him.’
Vladimir was dragging an injured left foot. Kroll dropped back on to the ground and with difficulty scooped him into the chopper. As soon as they were airborne, Dima shoved the stick forward — too much — so the nose tipped as if it had tripped on its own skids. He pulled back again — too much — and they lurched back. Fly with pressures not movements, he remembered his instructor shouting. He found level but then they lurched to the left. As the broken door swung open there was one of the masked men gripping the skid.
‘Got a message for your commander, when you’ve scraped him off the ground. Hands are very delicate things, and thumbs indispensable.’
Gripping the stick between his knees (definitely not in the manual) Dima lifted the PP-2000 and fired a round into the man’s left hand. The hand vanished. But he was still there. Dima fired into his right hand and he was gone.
At fifteen knots he felt the shudder that told him they had passed through ETL into full forward flight. Time to ease off the collective and lose pedal pressure but force the cyclic forward. Dima felt a surge of relief as the chopper powered forward and climbed into the sky.
‘Now: which way’s Russia?’
59
Iran Airspace
The Osprey back to Spartacus smelled of aviation fuel, medicine and vomit. The casualties were strapped down on stretchers, slotted into the framework of the hold to form bunks. The walls were draped with tubes. The medics were in the small folding jump seats that lined the sides of the hold, where they could check on their patients and adjust the drips hooked up to the overhead bars. Once in the air they paced the aisle in their beige overalls and blue plastic gloves, like mechanics with unusually gentle hands. One or two of those men weren’t going to make it. Blackburn thought of Cole, under the rubble, with his bullet in him. This wasn’t even friendly fire, it was vengeance.
Blackburn was on a jump seat at the back beside Ableson, a young staff officer on Major Johnson’s team. Ableson was one of those thin, clever ones who fought their war from behind a laptop screen. He said nothing at all to Blackburn the whole two hour flight, which was fine with Blackburn. Eventually he noticed a spare stretcher and asked Ableson if he could use it.
He went straight to sleep, and dreamed that he was a kid again in his own bed, sick and hot but feeling safe, his mother smiling, coming in with French toast and hot milk. ‘There’s a nuke headed for New York, Mom,’ he said. ‘We gotta stop it.’ She put a finger to her lips, still smiling. ‘Hush now. Eat.’
When they landed at Spartacus it was night. He offered to help unload the casualties, but Ableson hustled him away. After the camp outside Tehran, Spartacus felt like a giant military city teeming with personnel and kit. A place that a week ago had been almost like home was a hostile environment now.
‘I need to get cleaned up,’ he said to Ableson.
‘Later: they’re waiting for you. Need something to eat?’
Blackburn instinctively turned towards the canteen but Abelson steered him away.
‘I’ll bring you something.’
He escorted Blackburn to an unmarked Portakabin.
Somehow he needed to get the message across about Solomon.
Inside, waiting for him: Dershowitz and Andrews. Blackburn’s heart couldn’t sink much further but it managed a few more inches. Dershowitz was peering at his laptop and Andrews had a cell phone pressed to his ear. They were as he had left them, as if they had been waiting there for him the whole time, waiting to take him down. His own private apocalypse.
60
FOB Spartacus, Iraqi Kurdistan
Dershowitz glanced up at him and frowned.
‘You look like you need to clean up a little, kid.’
‘I was told to come straight here. And if it’s all the same to you, Sir, could you refer to me by name? I’m Sergeant Blackburn.’
‘Sure, kid,’ he smirked.
Andrews pocketed his cell.
‘Okay. So talk us through your day.’
‘Bad day at Black Rock, huh?’ said Dershowitz.
‘What?’
Blackburn wasn’t sure what that was a reference to, but it wasn’t good.
‘And if it’s all the same to you, kid, you can call me Sir, when you answer.’ Dershowitz slammed the table hard with the flat of his hand as he said ‘Sir’.
‘Yes, Sir. Sorry, Sir.’
Andrews looked as though he was suppressing a bad case of wind.
‘Just go from the top.’
He described the scene when he got out of the Osprey, climbing the avalanche of rubble from the shelled chalet and finding the door that led into the rear bunker.
‘Whoa. Hold up,’ said Andrews, making a stop sign with his hand. ‘Need to get a handle on your motivations. You took yourself off pretty fast into that wrecked building. That not a little reckless?’
He looked down and began typing furiously.
‘The conditions were such that it appeared the building might have contained an HVT and was liable to cave in.’
‘So in you went.’ Andrews with his smile again. ‘And was anybody home?’
They wanted detail. He gave it to them.
‘Sir, there were three fatalities. All recently deceased. One on the first floor of the house and two in the bunker, one of whom was in the pool, the other at the side. I concluded they had been struck by falling masonry during the bombardment.’
Dershowitz spoke without looking up.
‘So now you’re a pathologist. Lot of strings to your bow, Blackburn.’
‘Let’s talk about Lieutenant Cole. What happened?’ asked Andrews.
He looked from one to the other.
‘It’s a simple question.’
He decided to focus on Dershowitz, the more aggressive of the two. These men listened to liars for a living. Simple question. Simple answer.
‘I don’t know what happened to him, Sir. There was a further collapse. I figured my best chance was to find the escape passage I had seen on the plans.’
Dershowitz smiled. Blackburn didn’t know which was worse, his smile or his stony silence. The smile with the silence wasn’t much fun either.
Ableson knocked and entered without waiting. He was carrying a Coke and a burger wrapped in waxed paper.
‘Get the fuck out. Can’t you see we’re busy here?’
Blackburn almost felt relieved that he wasn’t the only focus of Dershowitz’s ire.
‘Tell me about Cole.’
‘What about him, Sir?’
Dershowitz frowned.
‘What’s that supposed to mean, “What about him”? He’s your CO for fuck’s sake. Don’t you give a shit?’
He picked up a waste bin and swept the Coke and burger into it.
Blackburn could feel the anger exploding inside him. He refused to give them the satisfaction of showing it. He had to stay in control. His head was pulsing with pain. He was by nature a truth teller. His mother always praised him for this, regardless of the misdemeanour. ‘Well, Henry, I’m not pleased with what you’ve done but it’s good that you have owned up.’
‘Your buddy Campo says he lost radio contact with you after you entered the bunker. He says he reported it to your commanding officer and that he, Lieutenant Cole, bravely decided to attempt to rescue you.’
‘There was a fall in the front of the chalet shortly after I lost contact with Ca
mpo, Sir. It was at that point that I decided that it was neither safe nor possible for me to go back the way I came and so I resolved to find an alternative exit, based on my reading of the plans we were supplied with.’
They stared at him blankly. Blackburn gave a shrug.
‘I had found the WMD in the bank in Tehran along with evidence suggesting two more. We had intel suggesting the chalet was a possible location — I wanted to finish the job I started in the bank.’
‘This isn’t a job interview, kid. Enough with the self-regarding rhetoric. Your CO died trying to rescue you.’
Rescue you. . Like fuck. But what could he say?
None of them said anything for several seconds.
Why are you so suspicious of me? Blackburn wanted to ask. What have I done that is so wrong? And the answer came straight back. You have killed your superior officer. That’s about as bad as it gets.
‘Sir, the last time we spoke I told you about Solomon. That was the name on Bashir’s lips when he died. And as it’s the only clue we have about the remaining two nukes, I have reason to believe that we should take that name very seriously. May I remind you about the maps I found in the bank vault, of Paris, and New York?’
Neither of them were listening. Andrews had been studying his laptop. He gestured at Dershowitz and they both stared at the screen. Suddenly his face brightened.
‘Ah, there you go.’
He angled it in Dershowitz’s direction, whose eyes widened so much they looked as if they were about to pop out of their sockets.
‘Blackburn, you are so fucked.’
61
Northern Iran Airspace
Kroll sat up front beside Dima. In the back, Vladimir raided the police helicopter’s first aid kit and set about attending to Darwish, who was laid out on the floor of the rear compartment.
‘We could really do with some blood. Anyone?’
He crashed against the bulkhead as Dima threw the chopper into a tight left.
‘Sorry everyone. Power lines.’
Kroll gripped the sides of his seat with white knuckles.
‘When did you last fly one of these?’
‘You want to drive?’
‘You know I hate these things.’
‘Do something useful. I want to talk to Omorova.’
‘Well, if you’ve got a hard on, it’ll have to wait.’
Dima dictated the private number she had used last time they spoke. When Kroll got a line he patched her into Dima’s headset.
Her voice had the same sleepy quality as last time.
‘Do you always have to call in the middle of the night? It’s getting to be a habit.’
‘It’s when I seem to miss you most. I’ll work on it.’
‘What’s all that noise?’
‘A helicopter I borrowed.’
‘You’re going up in the world. How’s the mission going?’
‘Terrible. Kaffarov’s dead. The nukes are AWOL. Some goons tried to ambush us.’
‘There’s an alert out for you. You’ll enjoy this — “wanted in connection with the trafficking of nuclear weapons”.’
He heaved on the stick to clear another power line, his brain trying to compute what he was hearing.
‘So why are you talking to me? Doesn’t sound like a good career move.’
She sighed rather attractively.
‘My career’s going nowhere. Everyone on the operation’s been sidelined.’
‘I have to see Paliov.’
‘He’s been put under house arrest. I’d stay out of Moscow airspace if I were you.’
‘Just tell me where he is. And I need as much as you can glean on an ex-Spetsnaz CIA asset lately allied to the PLR, name Solomon aka Suleiman. Please?’
‘I need to get back to sleep.’
‘Would you believe me if I said the future of the world depends on it?’
‘Okay, okay. Call me later.’
She hung up.
Vladimir leaned over Dima’s seat and lifted one of his cans.
‘Darwish has gone. I’m sorry.’
How in God’s name do we tell Amara, thought Dima, but he followed Vladimir’s gaze: she was bent over her father’s body, silently weeping.
62
As well as keeping clear of power lines, Dima had a lot on his mind as he flew north. The thrill of lifting the goons’ own chopper had ebbed away as he digested the news about Darwish. His death rekindled his determination for some kind of payback. Darwish must not have died in vain: that much at least he owed his old friend. What Omorova had told him meant that the sense of freedom the helicopter offered was temporary. In the air he was a target. He needed to get out of the sky, and into something else that would get him back into Moscow unnoticed. Kroll had overheard the conversation on his headset. He knew what they were up against.
‘So now we’re outlaws. Guess we can say bye-bye to any remuneration for this jaunt.’
Dima braced himself for a volley of Kroll moaning.
‘I never said it would be straightforward.’
‘I was hoping to take the kids to Eurodisney.’
‘Yeah, right. Their mothers won’t even open the door to you.’
‘They could have come too. I had it all worked out.’
The slow motion car crash that was Kroll’s personal life was the last thing Dima needed to hear about right now.
‘When you quit moaning, got any ideas?’
Kroll’s face brightened.
‘Well, this chopper’s worth a bit. We could trade it.’
‘Hilarious.’
‘I’m serious. Bilasuvar. Its only fifty odd ks across the Azeri border. By the time anyone’s noticed us we’ll be out of the sky.’
That’s what Dima loved about Kroll. Always ready with the least likely solution to a problem.
Bilasuvar. In Soviet times it had been a graveyard for air force hardware so old, useless or obsolete it couldn’t be persuaded to stay in the sky. Since Azerbaijan had got its independence, it had become a major centre for spare parts and aluminium recycling. It also did a roaring trade in aircraft of dubious provenance.
It was a long shot, but it was all they had.
The sky was lightening in the east as they crossed the border. Dima stayed low to keep off anyone’s radar. His mind wandered to Blackburn. The US Military were bound to want to know what happened to Cole. How much would he tell them? How much would they believe? Would he be handed over to the CIA? For Darwish, for Blackburn and for himself, stopping Solomon was the only option, if it wasn’t already too late.
‘Will you look at that?’
Kroll was suddenly a kid again, revitalised by the sight of a cornucopia of Cold War hardware. Surrounded by a flock of Mil helicopters of all types were half a dozen Tupolev-95 ‘Bears’, that would have spent their lives annoying NATO up and down the North Sea, and maybe as many as twenty MiG-15s, the first Soviet jet fighter with Rolls Royce-inspired engines. How considerate of the Brits to share their knowhow. Dima felt the mixed messages of Soviet nostalgia. In retrospect he knew the Soviet Union was fucked, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.
‘Surely with that lot we really ought to have won the Cold War,’ said Kroll, peering at the graveyard below.
‘We did: it was just the wrong “we”.’
‘Well, let’s hope they’ve got some decent wheels down there.’
Dima put the Kamov down in a gap between some corrugated iron sheds and a giant wingless Ilyushin II-76 transporter. A gang of labourers were slicing at the fuselage with chainsaws, like ants consuming some huge prey. Three men wearing tattoos and oil-stained overalls emerged from the sheds, with AKs at the ready, one prominently out in front.
‘Jesus,’ said Kroll. ‘Get a load of this.’
‘I’ve had warmer welcomes.’
Devoid of government markings and battle scarred as it was, the shiny new Kamov still reeked of officialdom.
‘Turn round and fuck off back to Moscow unless you w
ant a bullet in the bollocks!’ yelled the largest of the three, an unlit cheroot flapping between his brown teeth.
‘Maybe Mad Max here thinks we’re from the tax office.’
Dima and Kroll lowered themselves slowly on to the ground, hands raised. A cocktail of rust, engine oil and unwashed bodies wafted in through the gap where Dima had shot off the door.
‘Mmm-hmh!’ Kroll inhaled appreciatively.
‘It smells a lot better than that car you live in,’ said Dima.
‘We’re just passing through,’ said Kroll, ‘and we wondered if—.’
‘Shut up and stand over there.’
Dima nudged Kroll as they went.
‘They don’t call it the Wild East for nothing’.
63
Azerbaijan
Mad Max looked them up and down, taking in Dima’s torn and blood-spattered shirt.
‘Who the fuck are you?’
‘Doesn’t matter. We’re looking for a trade,’ said Dima neutrally.
Surrounded by the rusting hulks in various stages of dismemberment, the shiny Kamov looked entirely alien. Some of the crew chipping away at the Ilyushin switched off their chainsaws.
‘Very funny. Do we look like a street market?’
But Max was leering at the chopper as if it was a lapdancer. For all the bluster, his eyes were saying ‘Come to me, baby.’
‘We need a change of transport. Something more — grounded. Two fast, reliable vehicles and the Kamov’s yours. You’ll never get another deal like it.’
At this, one of the others started towards the chopper. Kroll waved a finger.
‘Ah-ah. Look, don’t touch.’
Max had caught sight of Amara sitting in the rear, looking blank. His eyes widened even further. He circled the chopper, not sure whether he was believing what he was seeing, then took the cheroot out of his mouth and rolled it ruminatively between two oily orange fingers.
Dima glanced at Kroll, who said: ‘My sister.’
Max laughed. ‘A man can look, can’t he?’
‘She’s very shy: doesn’t like to be stared at.’
‘It’s a hell of a deal,’ said Dima. ‘You could retire. Get a nice villa somewhere.’