by Greg Barron
‘A Catholic, then. I won’t hold it against you, of course.’
‘Thank Christ for that.’ Matt rubs his hands together as if with controlled excitement. ‘Now, let’s start right down the arse end, will we? Work our way along?’
‘Whatever you like.’ Simon smiles to himself. Guildford, eh? Small world.
Apart from a cramped quarterdeck, the flight deck is the most aft section of the ship. ‘Normally we’ve got a Lynx or a Sea King chopper there but they took it away after the last tour. We only get one now on a needs basis.’
‘Budget cutbacks?’
‘Something like that. That’s what happens when you work for a government that’s flat stony broke. I don’t think the brass have too high an expectation of us doing anything too useful. Waiting to sell us off for scrap.’
They amble along the walkway for the length of the ship, while Matt points out the various turret guns, the quick-firing Oerlikons, up high on the B gun deck for the best field of fire.
‘I’d tread softly here if I were you,’ Matt warns.
‘Why?’
‘Because the ammo room’s down beneath us.’
Simon’s face falls. ‘Could it actually —’
‘Nah, just messing with you.’
Simon struggles to remember the name and purpose of each radar array, antenna, and item of weaponry. Each has an official designation, and a nickname. ‘What’s that one that looks like a screen?’
‘Oh, that’s the Early Warning Navigation System, but we call it the flycatcher.’
‘Those spheres, what are they for?’
‘Radcoms,’ Matt explains, ‘gunnery control. Look cool, don’t they?’
The most intriguing are the rounded radomes over protruding gun barrels that resemble futuristic armed robots. ‘Yeah, we call that one R2D2,’ Matt explains. ‘The Phalanx weapon system. You know those Gatling guns they have on choppers?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Well, same thing, but this one fires 20mm cannon rounds, radar guided. Spits out four and a half thousand rounds per minute.’
‘Hell.’
‘It’ll destroy an incoming missile in midair, or take out a small boat in the blink of an eye.’
Once they have covered the exterior, Matt takes him inside, moving fore to aft this time. ‘You’ve already been on the bridge so we won’t worry about that.’ They climb down an iron companionway. ‘The captain’s cabin is that way, but I won’t take you there. Place is always a bloody mess anyway. These are the officers’ quarters, along the corridor here.’ He drops his voice. ‘If you listen closely you’ll hear them wanking from here.’
Simon is still laughing to himself as they descend another level. The hum of the engines grows louder, vibrating through the wall. ‘How do people sleep with that going on?’
‘Oh, you get used to it. One of those things, you know.’ Matt opens a door, showing a cabin with three bunks, one of which is occupied by a man, blanket pulled up and face jammed against the bulkhead. Matt makes no effort to moderate the volume of his voice. ‘This is my cabin. You’re staying in here too. That bottom bunk is empty. It’s yours while you’re on board.’
There is a neat stack of long-sleeved workwear, along with a towel on the bed. His flight case sits on the deck.
‘There’s your number eights,’ Matt says. ‘You’re to have a shower and change. The captain says that you’re making everyone nervous getting around like Lawrence of Arabia.’
‘I’d be happy to.’ Simon continues to study the cabin. A poster of Miss June or her equivalent, bare breasted, pouts from pride of place on the wall.
‘That’s Elsie — I hope she doesn’t offend you,’ Matt said.
‘Not at all. Er, she’s very nice.’
A quarter-hour later, inconspicuously dressed, his face bright red from the hottest water he has encountered for some time, Simon’s tour continues. Mess rooms; kitchen; laundry. Always the crew are polite and friendly, almost as many women as men, looking up from their tasks to smile and say hello.
Even so, Simon is pleased to reach deck level once more, feeling as if he’s just spent half an hour down a mine shaft. Before he has adjusted, however, Matt leads him back down, through a wardroom and into the ops room.
‘This is the heart of the ship, or the brain, more like. It’s where I work. Pretend to, anyway.’
This room, lit by red overhead lights, is crowded with personnel and equipment. Marshall occupies a central seat much like the officer of the watch on the bridge. Beside him stands a man Matt describes as a principal warfare officer, on board to discuss possible strategic courses of action with the captain.
A plotting table dominates the foremost quarter of the room, used for marking known positions of other ships, aircraft and land masses in the area. Radar displays occupy the corners of the room, with circular screens mounted on giant hinges so they can be moved to suit the viewing angle. A large LCD screen is mounted above the plotting table, showing a scrolling text of operational updates.
With a word to the operator, whose blonde hair is braided close to the back of her head, Matt takes over one of the radar units for a moment. ‘This one is my baby, the surface scanner. Have a look.’
Simon does so, struggling to interpret the greenish tinges on the screen.
‘The captain authorised me to tell you that we have orders to check out a particular island,’ Matt says.
‘What for?’ Simon feels the slow germination of excitement.
‘Atypical activity is the official term.’ He thrusts a long narrow forefinger at the screen. ‘You can see the peaks, there, and the general outline. All this clutter here — they’re seabirds.’
‘You can pick up birds?’
‘Sure we can — we can pick up a lolly wrapper blowing in the wind if we want to.’
Simon’s mind races ahead. ‘So what else can you tell about the island? Are there any boats?’
‘Not that we can see — there’s too much clutter down low. Maybe if there’s something moving around we’d have a chance, but everything on screen is stationary, apart from them birds.’ He points across at the other units. ‘We have state-of-the-art long range capability, mainly for weather forecasting. For instance, we know that there is one hell of a hurricane a thousand miles east of here. Interesting one: started out in the South China Sea as a tropical storm, now in the Bay of Bengal. Ever seen one on a plotter?’
‘Not for a while.’
‘Come over and have a look.’
The cyclone has the typical spiral shape, with long tendrils of cloud reaching out hundreds of kilometres from the eye, occupying a chunk of sea between India and Pakistan. The image is overlaid by a trace of the southern Indian coastline and the Andaman Islands, an Indian possession on the south eastern quadrant of the Bay.
‘Hit that area just a few hours ago,’ the operator says. ‘Getting quite a battering, by all reports.’
‘Poor bastards,’ Simon says, then follows Matt as he walks back out onto the deck.
The mountains begin with a beguiling rise, becoming a dramatic backdrop of silver and yellow. Few plants larger than the ubiquitous whistling thorn bushes grow here. Nothing green to soften the harshness of the landscape.
‘Any trees would have been felled for firewood centuries ago,’ Madoowbe explains, ‘if ever there were any at all.’
‘It looks stark — empty.’
By noon, despite the bike’s slipstream, Marika is sweating from armpits to thighs. Heat dances in vaporous waves from the road. The mountains vary from plateaux to jagged passes surrounded on both sides with towering cliffs of stone. Generations of camels have nibbled the grasses down to a network of roots that scarcely bind the soil. Here and there are reminders of civilisation, such as a burned out car and even, once, the ruined shell of a battle tank, turret gun pointing westwards at some long gone enemy.
‘From the war with Ethiopia,’ Madoowbe comments, ‘a long time ago.’
‘Were you in it?’
‘No. It was before my time. But some older men of my clan had burns and missing limbs. Others had lost fathers and brothers.’
Marika glares at the back of his head. ‘You don’t ever mention the women.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You always talk about the men. What about the women? Didn’t they lose husbands, sons, and brothers?’
Madoowbe looks at her as if she is crazy. ‘Of course they did.’
‘Well, why didn’t you say so?’
‘Because there is no need to state the obvious.’ He shakes his head and concentrates on operating the bike. ‘Why do you ask such pointless questions?’
‘To me, and anyone who lives in the modern world, they are not pointless at all, but quite sensible. You come from a sexist society, and see no reason to change your views. Forgive me if I have the gall to challenge you on that.’
Madoowbe half turns and rolls his eyes as if to indicate that she is crazy, then concentrates rigorously on operating the machine, intent on avoiding conversation.
This silence remains unbroken until the mid-afternoon when, crossing a stony plain, the motorbike slows.
‘We may be in for some trouble,’ Madoowbe warns.
Peering ahead, slitting her eyes against the slipstream, Marika sees three figures on the road. Each is dressed in military-style clothing, most with a black shemagh wrapped tightly around the face. Dark sunglasses over the eyes. Each man also holds an AK47 with its long, curved magazine. Most have another mag taped upside down to the other — a trick used to facilitate a quick changeover. One individual, she notices, has a half-healed scar on his arms, pink and ugly.
Madoowbe’s body tenses. ‘I hope you’ve got a round in that chamber.’
In response she pumps the bolt and shifts the weapon so the butt rests on her thigh. ‘Who are they?’
‘Shifta — bandits.’
‘Why are you stopping to talk to them?’
‘Because if I don’t they will kill us. Good enough reason?’
‘I suppose. Can’t you go around them?’
‘They are not stupid. We are surrounded by a minefield. Probably left over from the war.’
Marika scans the roadsides, noting the rusted, mangled vehicle shells, blown apart by mines while attempting to skirt the ambush.
‘A minefield? Jesus Christ.’
‘Stop saying that please.’
‘Sorry.’
‘The road is clear, of course; we are safe provided we do not leave it. Now cover your face or you may upset them.’
Marika takes the hijab from her pocket and ties it around her head, letting it fall over her face and neck. As the motorbike slides to a stop all three of the shifta raise their weapons.
‘Assalam alaikum. Peace be upon you,’ the leader says.
‘And upon you also be peace.’
Marika has to stifle a laugh — the shifta leader and his comrades are holding them up with automatic rifles while also wishing them peace.
The incongruity, it seems, has not struck the man, as he goes on, ‘What is your clan?’
Madoowbe seems at ease as he first translates for Marika, then lifts his sunglasses, removes them and wipes the sweat from his eyes. ‘My clan is the Leelkase of the Darod.’
The man narrows his eyelids in suspicion. ‘You speak in an unusual manner for a Leelkase.’
‘I have been abroad.’
‘America?’
Madoowbe shakes his head vehemently. ‘No. The Arab Emirates.’
‘Dubai?’
‘Yes.’
The man eases back on his hips and scratches his beard with his free hand. ‘Ah. Where God’s faithful are making the kufr leaders look like fools, and will butcher them like goats before the eyes of the world?’
‘Yes.’
‘Praise be to God that it is possible for a man to travel so far in this dangerous world. What is your name?’
Marika scarcely dares to breathe; the atmosphere remains tense. It will, she decides, be possible to take out one, perhaps two of the shifta. Surreptitiously she shifts the gun’s selector from semi to full auto, before again squinting out at the bandits.
‘Muyassar Namir Qutb.’
‘So your father was Namir. Of what subclan?’
The third man is the problem, Marika decides — weapon held casually, yet his hand already curled on the grip, finger on the trigger … like so many of these men, he has a gun and wants to use it.
‘My father is of the Fiqi Ismail subclan,’ Madoowbe says, ‘and his father Qutb was a well-known Sheikh.’ In Somali culture, Marika knows from a briefing on the region, a Sheikh is not a political leader so much as a holy man, a healer and shaman.
The leading bandit lifts his weapon so fast it surprises Marika, and by the time she lowers her own barrel in response, ready to fire, she realises that the other man’s rifle is not aimed at her. Instead he fires a long burst into the air. Confused, she stops short of pulling the trigger, watching as the bandit half empties his magazine skywards. ‘You,’ he cries, stepping forwards to clap Madoowbe on the shoulder, ‘are my second cousin’s cousin. Allahu akbar. Here, bring your motorcycle and woman. Break your journey with us.’
The shifta camp, two or three miles from the road, is hidden by a ravine, and must have once been a charming oasis. Here Marika sees the first real trees in a while — palms, acacias and moss-draped tree heather in clusters beside tents and lean-to shelters made of an eclectic variety of materials. The dwellings are enhanced by fireside chairs fashioned from seats taken from vehicles. Some have dark bloody stains on the upholstery.
Marika is still trying to make sense of the exchange with the shifta. ‘Isn’t your name Madoowbe?’
‘Madoowbe is what we call a naanays, a nickname. I was telling him my full name. Now shush, they might hear us talk in English, and we do not want to alarm them.’
The group of twenty or more shifta travel ahead, discharging their weapons into the air to announce their arrival, just as troops from other cultures might blow bagpipes or bugles. Madoowbe slows the bike to walking pace, struggling to maintain a line on the sandy track, the front wheel wandering into ruts and dustbowls.
Women in hijab and kikoi scoop up running children as they pass. Older boys — bare chests, running noses — pause in their games and stare. Marika’s heart melts at the round, brown eyes full of curiosity. A dozen or more mottled hens, undersized by Western standards, squabble out of the way while their rooster glares aggressively at the newcomers.
Madoowbe stops the engine and kicks the motorbike stand down beside tethered camels and vehicles in various stages of repair and disrepair, everything from quad bikes to an ancient Allison dozer with broken tracks lying like iron plates, half covered with sand. From here they proceed on foot, and the smells intensify, so many competing scents that Marika struggles to identify them all — spicy food; camel dung; firesmoke; human and animal excreta.
In a clearing below an inward-leaning cliff face they enter a busy compound with a rusted shipping container sitting drunkenly on the earth, a giant, faded logo painted in black on the side. Marika can only imagine the size of the truck they must have hijacked to get it. Up to now the encampment seemed almost friendly, yet she feels a heightened sense of danger, for all these men either carry weapons or have them leaning close at hand.
The bandit who met them on the road shouts his relationship to Madoowbe, but it is Marika who first captures the interest of the party, drawing hungry male stares — the lure of the unusual — for surely they must have noticed her light skin. Their thoughts are plain in their eyes: Is she the same as my woman? What does she have underneath those clothes?
‘I don’t like this,’ she hisses at Madoowbe. ‘We’ve gone from one lot of lowlifes to another. These ones are just a bit less sophisticated.’
‘Be thankful that you are alive.’
‘For the moment. Are you really related to this lot?’
‘No, but please! You never know
where you will find English speakers — at least to some degree.’
Marika feels a jolt of fear. ‘You lied to them? What are they going to do to us if they work out the truth?’
‘Quiet, please, unless you wish to find out.’
Marika bites her lip and turns her attention to a central hearth fire surrounded by more vehicle seats. A cast-iron cauldron hangs over the fire from a tripod that may have once been a gun mounting.
The emir, a squat, barrel-chested specimen with spiky whiskers and a whining voice, waves Madoowbe to a seat beside the fire. When Marika follows he shakes his head — Mia, mia — then leads her a short distance away to an iron bench.
‘Sexual discrimination is alive and well in the wilderness,’ she mutters to herself, watching as man after man comes to greet Madoowbe, offering long compliments and reminisces of childhood events — fights, droughts and milestones such as a particular individual completing the Hajj.
A woman appears, giving Marika a cup of hot cha and two cakes set on a bowl made of plastic sheet that she suspects might once have been a section of fender from a car. The woman says nothing, but moves away and out of sight. Marika eats hungrily while never taking her eyes off the shifta. The cakes are spicy with cinnamon, yet very dry, and the cha rougher and sweeter than that served by Dalmar Asad.
Almost as soon as she finishes she looks across at Madoowbe, trying to catch his eye. He smiles back as if in an effort to reassure her, then resumes his conversation.
Just as the afternoon seems as if it might stretch on forever without incident, the emir issues a shouted command, and the camp snaps to attention. A space is cleared beside the hearth, and a small team of men get to work, each to pre-arranged tasks.
At first Marika assumes that she is witnessing some quasi-religious ritual. Two men carry a wooden table into the cleared space. Two others disappear, then return with a portable generator, faded Chinese lettering on the sides. This machine they set up twenty or so metres away, then run a heavy-duty power lead across to the table.
Meanwhile, two others carry a battered cardboard box from the shipping container. The word SONY is printed on the sides. Watching them unpack the box Marika shakes her head in disbelief as first speakers, then the separate components of an archaic compact disc player and amplifier, are lifted onto the table and wired up.