Capture or Kill

by Tom Marcus

  Suddenly there’s a loud rapping on the lid of the coffin, right over my head. I jolt upwards and bang my head on the wood. The knocking continues – bang! bang! bang! – and now I can hear a voice, pleading from the other side.

  ‘Logan! Logan! Open up!’

  It’s Sarah.

  Of course! How could I have been such an idiot? That’s what my sense of unease was all about. Sarah and Joseph are outside. They need to be in here with me; we need to be buried together, as a family. I raise my hands awkwardly and push against the coffin lid as hard as I can but it doesn’t budge, and the knocking’s getting louder and Sarah’s sounding even more desperate.

  ‘Logan! Come on, it’s time!’

  I make another huge effort to push my way out, but my arms somehow get tangled up in the lining, and then suddenly I’m free and falling and I land on something hard with a crunching sound. I feel a stab of pain in my hand, and as I open my eyes a wave of nausea wells up inside me and the light coming through the partially opened curtains stabs into my retinas. I’m lying on the floor, next to the bed. I’ve smashed an empty bottle of vodka, and blood is running through my fingers and into the carpet.

  My brain finally registers the bad news.

  I’m not dead. It’s Monday morning. Sarah and Joseph’s funeral is tomorrow.

  So who the hell is banging on the front door? As if in answer to my question, the knocking starts up again.

  ‘Come on Logan, open up!’

  I recognize Alex’s voice. Tough, no nonsense, but with a layer of tenderness behind it. I haul myself to my feet, sending another empty bottle skittering under the bed. My jeans are in a crumpled heap on the floor and I put them on, despite the mingled smell of piss and vodka they’re giving off. I grab a tissue from the bedside table, which is at a slight angle – that must have been what I hit my head on. I close my fist around the tissue to stop the blood dripping as I stumble down the stairs and open the door.

  Alex is wearing a dark skirt and jacket over a white blouse. Her blonde hair is pulled back into a tight ponytail and her eyes are hidden by dark glasses. Her right hand is raised as if I caught her just as she was about to start another round of knocking. She drops it to her side.

  ‘Christ, Logan. You look like shit. What’ve you done to your hand?’

  ‘I . . . I don’t . . .’ I can’t think; don’t know what to say. I’m still half in the dream, the other half numb with the realization that another day has dawned, another day I have to somehow get through, and my head feels as if someone’s buried a hatchet in the back of my skull.

  ‘Right.’ Alex pushes past me and turns to slam the door. It’s like she’s gone into operator mode: all business. ‘I’ll put the coffee on. You’re going to need gallons. Get into the shower. Can you do that on your own? No, let me look at that hand first. Where’s your first aid kit?’

  As she starts pushing me back up the stairs, I finally find my voice.

  ‘What are you doing here? I know it’s all a fucking mess, but the funeral’s not until Tuesday.’

  The disappointed half-noise she makes says it all. ‘It is Tuesday, Logan. The car’s coming to pick you up in an hour.’

  Jesus. I’ve lost a day. If it wasn’t for Alex I’d have missed the funeral. The thought makes me feel even sicker than I already am. Sick and ashamed. It’s been six – no, seven – days since Sarah and Joseph died, since they were killed. At first there were things to do: death certificates, paperwork, organizing the funeral, deciding on the coffins, what Sarah and Joseph should be wearing, what flowers would she like? I stumbled through it like a zombie and every decision seemed to take forever, but focusing on all the different tasks kept me from falling into the abyss. Once it was all done I had nothing to block off the pain, nothing to keep the memories, the regrets, the guilt from overwhelming me.

  So I hit the bottle. I didn’t want to sleep, because then the dreams would come. Sarah and Joseph holding out their arms, covered in blood and crying, ‘Help me! Please, why won’t you help me?’ And I didn’t want to be conscious either, because everything in the house, everything I saw and touched and smelled, had the power to stab me through the heart, from the bed Sarah and I shared, to the rows of baby food lined up in the kitchen cupboard. Only when I was so smashed that I couldn’t think or feel was there any relief from the pain. My dad was an alcoholic. Which is probably why I never drank as a teenager, and had contempt for people who did. But maybe the craving was in my blood all along, just waiting for the right trigger to bring it to the surface. In a matter of days, I’d become someone who couldn’t imagine how it was possible to get through the day without a bottle by his side, how to even get out of bed in the morning – that’s if I’d managed to get to bed before passing out – without a couple of stiff ones.

  And right now, despite the hammering in my head and the sickness in my guts, what I really want is a drink. As if she can read my thoughts, Alex steers me away from the bedroom and into the bathroom, where she sits me down on the toilet seat and uncurls my right hand, still clutching the blood-soaked wad of tissues.

  ‘OK, not too bad. I reckon if we can just get the bits of glass out you’ll be fine with a bandage – no need for stitches.’ She rummages in the cabinet above the sink until she finds a pair of tweezers – Sarah’s, of course – puts my hand under the tap to wash the blood off and starts to pick shards of glass out of my palm. ‘Right, that’s most of it anyway. Get in the shower. I’ll sort out your clothes and get this place tidied up.’ I don’t move. I’m mesmerized by the blood spatters against the whiteness of the sink. ‘Logan.’

  ‘Yeah, right. Thanks, Alex. I don’t know what I . . . I’m sorry about all this.’

  She waves that off, points at the shower cubicle and leaves me to it. As I stand under the scalding hot spray, I can hear her in the kitchen, dropping empty bottles into a bin bag.

  Thirty minutes later I’m shaved, dressed and looking as human as I’m going to after several days of non-stop drinking, with my hand discreetly bandaged so you wouldn’t notice anything if I kept my fist clenched. We sit at the kitchen table, a pot of coffee and two full, steaming mugs between us. I’m not going to risk a sip until I’m sure the handful of painkillers I’d taken with a gulp of water aren’t going to come back up, but at least I’m starting to feel that I can get through the funeral without pissing myself or having a shaking fit. Two bulging black refuse sacks stand accusingly by the back door.

  ‘Look, Alex—’

  ‘Fuck sake, Logan, stop saying sorry, all right? I can’t imagine what sort of a state I’d be in if . . . you know. And I know today is going to be probably the hardest day yet. But you’re going to get through it, and then Sarah and Joseph will be at rest.’

  I nod. Yes, I need to do this for them. I can’t be at their funeral looking like a wreck, however destroyed I am inside. And I can’t go with them on their last journey, as much as I’d wanted to. I’ve already made that promise. I need to stay alive. I need to be strong. I have work to do.

  There’s a knock on the door, a tentative rat-a-tat-tat unlike the furious banging of earlier.

  I stand up, take a gulp of coffee, straighten my tie and close my hand over my injured palm.

  ‘OK, I’m good to go. Let’s do this.’

  Outside, two gleaming black vehicles are waiting, and we drive slowly down to the end of the road before turning right towards the local golf club. The road is slick with rain, but the sun is just emerging from behind the clouds and the fields are a sparkling green. Planes are coming into land at Luton Airport in the distance, as we weave our way through winding roads in the direction of the crematorium. With Alex beside me, gripping my good hand tightly, all I can see is the hearse in front, with its two pale coffins, one normal size and one just big enough for a child. I feel a surge of irrational anger: why is someone else driving Sarah and Joseph? Why am I not behind the wheel, looking after them? What if there’s an accident? What if some crazy Porsche driver comes ro
und the next bend and loses control on the wet road? The driver of the hearse won’t know how to take evasive action. He won’t have the training. Or what if there’s a petrol tanker jackknifed across the road over the next hill and the hearse smashes into it and there’s an explosion, and Sarah and Joseph—

  Jesus, I might be sober, but I am definitely not in my right mind. I shake my head, like a dog shaking the rain from its fur, trying to rid myself of these crazy thoughts. Here we are, on the way to the crematorium, where Sarah and Joseph’s bodies will be put in a furnace and burned to ashes, and I’m worried we might have an accident on the way. Well, I’d had my chance to look after them, and I’d blown it. Today, I suddenly realized, was all about finally facing up to that. I relax my fingers and open my injured hand. Today is about letting go.

  By the time we arrive at the crematorium I feel steadier, confident that I won’t break down and throw myself on the coffins or start smashing the place up in a fit of rage. I almost lose it when the hearse is opened and the coffins are brought out. Six of Sarah’s friends shoulder her coffin, but before anyone can touch the other, I reach in and gently pull out Joseph’s smaller coffin and cradle it in my arms. No one else is going to take my little boy. It feels as if I’m carrying him up to bed as I walk slowly towards the group of people gathered round the entrance to the crematorium. I don’t know if this is the way you’re supposed to do it, but I don’t care.

  I look straight ahead, avoiding eye contact. I don’t want to see those desperate looks of sympathy. But in my peripheral vision I recognize a couple of team members, discreetly positioned on the fringes of the main group. Instinct makes me glance to my left and I spot Graeme, parked up in a highway maintenance van. Despite acting on his own, my team are obviously taking no chances. I shake my head, almost laughing at the absurdity of it. Sarah and Joseph are dead. What could another terrorist attack possibly achieve? What could anyone do to make it any worse? But the presence of the team reminds me that there is a world outside of my all-consuming grief, that the terrorists are still out there, and if they aren’t planning to attack this little funeral, they’re planning to attack somewhere else. Threat levels might go up and down, but that was just for public consumption. For us, the threat level was always the same, and you could never afford to relax.

  I get through the service somehow. I sit in the front row of the little chapel, my eyes fixed on the two coffins, each with a wreath of white flowers resting on top. I try to stop thinking about Sarah and Joseph’s mangled bodies lying just feet away from me, and remember them as my living, laughing, loving family. While the priest says some consoling words about two people he’s never met, my head fills with memories: Sarah and I walking on a beach at sunrise on our first holiday together; the look on her face when she walked down the aisle at our wedding and I turned and caught her eye; the whoops of joy as she waved the pregnancy test in front of me; Joseph’s birth – all that pain, all that joy; his first cry; his first laugh; rocking him to sleep in my arms.

  ‘Goodbye, sweetheart. Goodbye, my son,’ I whisper.

  And for me it was over. There are some readings. The Bible. Some poems I’ve never heard of. People crying. But I don’t take any of it in. They are gone. I don’t stay to watch the coffins on their conveyer belt, passing through the curtains. Sarah and Joseph’s remains – their real remains – are tucked away safely in my heart where the fire can’t touch them.

  I walk out into the day. As the rest of the mourners file out too, they make space around me, nobody quite knowing what to do, what to say. I take advantage of the moment, before anybody plucks up the courage to talk to me, and carry on walking, out of the gates and down the road, towards the sun. I can’t remember if there is some sort of wake organized, or where it is. It doesn’t matter: they are better off without me; I’d only make people feel more awkward.

  I don’t know where I’m going, only that I’m not going home. I can’t face that empty house. I’ve had my last drink. That is finished. When I do go home, it will be to pack things away, decide what to keep, what I can bear to put in the bin. But not yet.

  I don’t know how long I’ve been walking for but I’m starting to notice pain in my feet where my smart shoes are pinching my toes. I’m so used to wearing scruffy trainers that my feet don’t fit into proper shoes anymore. I take them off. I’m thinking about throwing them over a hedge into someone’s garden and carrying on barefoot, when I remember the last – the only – time I’d worn them. At our wedding.

  I’m still standing there with my shoes in my hand when a black Volvo S60 pulls up next to me. It’s come from nowhere, so must have been driving fast, but there’s no screech of tyres as it comes to a halt. Without looking at the driver, I know it’s one of my team.

  The passenger window lowers, and Alex leans across from the driver’s seat. I open the door and get in. As soon as my door closes she drives away without saying a word. She turns the car back towards town, and a few minutes go by as her progressive driving cuts through the traffic, before she breaks the silence.

  ‘You OK?’

  I nod. ‘Yeah. That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but yeah.’

  Alex glances over at me. ‘What people said, about Sarah – and Joseph. It was beautiful.’

  ‘Good.’

  I let her drive some more. Usually I’m a terrible passenger. I always need to be in the driving seat. But being driven by a real professional like Alex, fast but with total control, feels oddly calming. For once I am letting someone take charge, and I feel some of the tension of the last six days easing. We are back in open country now, leaving other drivers in our wake on an A road, heading north.

  ‘Where’re we going?’

  ‘I thought you wouldn’t want to go back home just yet.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks. But what about—?’

  She nods towards the back seat. ‘I’ve got your grab bag in the boot and some extra clothes and other bits I thought you’d need.’

  I turn and look at her with a puzzled expression. ‘Need for what?’

  ‘For when you meet the rest of the team.’

  ‘I’m not with you. What team?’

  She drops a gear and powers past a lorry, smoothly tucking back into the left-hand lane before a Mercedes shoots past us heading the other way.

  ‘You got a call from the DG, didn’t you? Secret meeting, secure location, no driver, no bodyguard.’

  ‘Yes, but how did you know?’

  Alex doesn’t say anything. But there’s a hint of a smile. Then the penny drops.

  ‘You got a call too. He asked you to join.’ She nods. ‘So . . . what did you tell him?’

  ‘What do you think, Logan? We’ve been working with one hand tied behind our backs for years. Losing the brothers in Birmingham wasn’t a one-off. We need to get back in front of this thing. The DG is saying we can have free rein. Do it our way. What do you think I fucking told him?’

  I let go half a laugh and a smile breaks briefly on my face. The first time I’ve laughed in days. It’s so refreshing to hear someone speaking bluntly to me instead of mewing like a kitten, so afraid of saying the wrong thing to the grieving husband and father.

  ‘That’s awesome. He couldn’t have picked anyone better. I really mean that. But you didn’t answer my question. Where are we going?’

  ‘There’s an RAF base. Totally secure. And we’ve got our own little corner. No one will question us coming and going. And no one will know what we’re really doing. It sounds perfect.’

  It does sound perfect. And the thought of it sends a surge of adrenaline through my veins. Suddenly I can’t wait to get there.

  ‘OK, sounds good. So, who else is on the team?’

  She shrugs. ‘I guess that’s what we’re about to find out.’

  6

  Eventually, Alex turns down a narrow road with fields on either side, and a mass of dark buildings come into view behind an intimidating razor-wire perimeter; the only things discernible from th
is distance are the huge radar dishes. I’ve never been to this particular base, but I know what it is. Everything about it is low-key – just another RAF barracks – but in fact it’s one of the key defence installations in the country, the base used for the early warning systems against missile attacks. If a country went rogue and launched an attack on us from the other side of the planet, this anonymous-looking place is where the threat would be identified and the necessary counter-measures launched. Not only will security be as good as it gets in the UK, but most of the defence-systems personnel will hold top-level military clearance, meaning everyone on camp is used to not asking questions. In a nutshell, it is the perfect hiding place for an intelligence unit that’s not supposed to exist. Smart move.

  As we pull up to the gates, armed guards approach the car. We slow to a stop. From the passenger seat, I admire the guards’ professionalism. As one eyes our number plate and walks towards Alex’s side, the other provides overwatch, his rifle butt secure against his right shoulder, index finger running alongside the trigger guard, keeping both me and Alex in his natural firing line without pointing his weapon directly at us. Staying natural, we both have a role to play even at these gates; you can’t role into places like this as if you’re big time, bragging about who you are, making it mega obvious you’re not regular military or even normal civilians. That would defeat the object of the place, and the point of being a highly sensitive counterterrorism unit. A covert operator operates for life. It’s clear the people protecting this camp are switched on without being twitchy. This is another good sign our new team is in the right place.