The Hostage s-1

by Duncan Falconer

  A troubled feeling rippled through Spinks. Something inside was tapping out a warning on his nervous system. Experience in this deadly game had taught him to make allowances for his imagination, but there was a limit. He tried to stem the trickle of concern, reasoning that there was nothing he could do that would not blow his cover. Since the lid of the boot was locked, his only way out was to push the back seat forward and climb into the car. If he gave into his paranoia and there was nothing nefarious going on outside, he would blow the mission. If his fears were justified his actions would be validated. If he was wrong, the detachment’s bosses would understand but then they would suspect Spinks’s nerve had withered, which was not uncommon in this line of work. He could then say goodbye to the extended tour of duty he was hoping for. His three-year stint in the unit was up in two months and he wanted to stay on for another three years. Hell, he wanted to stay on for ever. There was no way he could go back to the regular military, not now, not after life in the detachment, and the thought of civilian life was unbearable.

  Spinks came from the Air Force, where he was an ordinary airman, a general duties gash-hand. It was hard enough for him then, having to wear a uniform every day, and keep it clean. He had joined the RAF after he left school because he could think of nothing else in the world to do, a lost soul with no ambitions or motivations. He was sent on the detachment selection course only because his boss had received a Ministry of Defence circular asking for volunteers for ‘special duties’ and saw it as a great opportunity to get rid of the disorderly airman. Six months later Spinks was in his new life. To go back to that mundane existence after having been an undercover agent would be impossible. If he had to leave he would go outside and become a civvy, but life would no longer have purpose or meaning for him.

  He decided that if there was something going on outside, if there was danger, he would wait until there was no doubt, even if that made it a bit late to do anything about it. Such was the life he had chosen.

  Spinks was not a top-shelf operative. Not that there was an official ranking or ratings list. But there was an unofficial one, in the opinions of his fellow rank and file. There were many tales of daring deeds but nearly all were of operatives who had passed into history, some stories even mythical. It was the dream of most undercover agents to have at least one great event that would propel them into that exclusive club of superheroes, but few came even close. One had to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and come through it with some kind of positive result other than having just survived.The hero status thrust upon undercover operatives by the rest of the military minions by virtue of their mysterious and dangerous job was not enough for some. To be a superhero amongst heroes was the dizzy and largely unobtainable height many fantasised about.The more direct route to fame was, of course, through a kill. But one kill did not ensure fame, although it was a good start. Real fame came with multiple kills. Lucky kills didn’t count either.

  They might even cause an operative to be ridiculed.

  But Spinks did not share those dreams, not like that anyhow. He knew his limitations. He would not even imagine being up there with the likes of Stratton for instance, who had several kills; four official since he arrived in the province, but everyone knew about at least two others.Then there were the rumoured countless kills from Stratton’s ‘other military employment’, dozens some said, but no one in the detachment would ever learn the truth about them, not from Stratton anyhow. Spinks did dream of fame.What was unusual was that he had a plan to get himself some. He discovered that after volunteering for the first couple of more unpopular assignments, and carrying them out satisfactorily and without complaint his name was being mentioned in operations meetings and team leaders were requesting him for specific tasks, ones that no one else particularly wanted to do. He had made himself the go-to guy for the crap stake-outs. He had found himself a niche. He had carved himself a unique and positive reputation, which was more than could be said for most. Undercover agents came and went but few were remembered and even fewer talked about by later generations. If an operative was required to be up to his neck in shit to do an assignment, literally, then Spinks was your man.

  Spinks suddenly realised he had not given the clear for Ed to come and drive him away. He chastised himself for being so stupid, found the prestel and whispered into his collar.

  ‘One three kilo, this is four two Charlie. O’Farroll is gone mobile towards south. I am clear for pick-up,’ he whispered.

  Aggy pushed the concealed send button wired into the framework of the car just below her seat. ‘One three kilo, roger that. Towards your location now.’

  ‘Four two Charlie,’ Spinks acknowledged, releasing the prestel and trying to relax. He figured Ed should take about seven minutes. Then he sensed something, or perhaps it was more like he felt it. It seemed as if the side of the car had been gently brushed against. He tried to extend his senses to the outside of the car. It happened again, a gentle movement against the shell. Spinks hardly breathed, frozen like a rabbit with a snake peering in through the entrance to its hole.

  Aggy started the car then to her surprise Ed opened his door and climbed out. ‘I’m going to ’ave a piss,’ he declared as he emptied the remnants of his cup of coffee down his throat and shook out any drops.

  ‘Now?’ she asked, irritated with his timing.

  ‘I’d better ’ave a little sprinkle before I pick up old Spinksy. Long drive back to camp,’ he said and casually walked over to the bushes undoing his fly.

  ‘Dick,’ she muttered to herself and left the engine running. Not that there was any rush. It was a low-key, relatively relaxed operation, a Sunday morning job in just about every way. Spinks could wait another few minutes. She was feeling short tempered with Ed simply because he annoyed her. She was impatient to be rid of him. There was nothing else on her agenda for that day. She would do her small amount of washing, clean up her tiny room that was barely large enough to take the single bed, desk and wardrobe, then perhaps fit in an aerobic session although she did not feel in the mood just yet. She could check and see if any new videos had arrived, that’s if no one else was hogging the TV room. Then she remembered, of course, it was Sunday. The blokes would be watching bloody football all afternoon. There was that long overdue letter to her mother she kept putting off. It wasn’t that she had a problem with her mother; it was the letters themselves. They were all lies and getting more and more difficult to write. It was hard for her to think of new things to invent. Aggy’s mother thought she was in Germany attached to a tank regiment but Aggy had never actually been to Germany. She could never tell her mother what she really did, not while she was still in the job. Her mother would go daft with the constant worry.

  She looked at the back of Ed, who was taking his sweet time. ‘Come on, wally,’ she muttered to herself.

  Spinks could now positively identify a sliding metallic noise against the body of the car. A sudden ‘clunk’ made him jerk. His breathing became shallow and rapid. Adrenaline pumped through his veins. His hand moved to his gun and he swallowed as he gripped it. His mouth was open to improve his hearing, analysing every sound as his thumb found the safety-catch.

  Ed finished his pee, did up his fly with a flex of his knees, and headed back to the car. ‘I ’ope Spinsky doesn’t think I’m going to stop up the road and let ’im out of the boot and in the front. He can stay where he is, the smelly bugga.’

  As Ed climbed in Aggy pulled smartly away, throwing him back into his seat and causing his flask to fall off the dash and on to his lap.

  ‘Steady,’ he complained. ‘Where’s the bloody race?’

  In retaliation he produced a tin of tobacco, removed a pre-made roll-up, lit it and puffed on it without inhaling until the car was filled with smoke. She rolled down her window, biting her lip and counting the minutes she had left with him.

  ‘That’s tactically unsound, driving with your window open,’ he said dryly.

  She wondered what she had done to
deserve this.

  Spinks heard another, louder clink.The car definitely moved. Then one of the doors opened. The car dipped a little on one side as if someone had climbed in. Another door opened the other side and the car sunk a little the other way. He knew it wasn’t Ed. Ed would never have gotten into the car or even approached it without warning him over the radio first. Spinks was trying to evaluate precisely what was happening and what he could do about it. His fingers felt the prestel sticking from his sleeve. He realised his hands were shaking. He pushed the button and was about to say something then stopped himself. Whoever was in the car might hear him. He prayed it was just a pair of thugs looking to steal something from it. They would get a shock if they managed to open the boot. He would arrest them even if the mission was blown and it would not be his fault. The bosses would understand that. He held the prestel in one hand and gun in the other, preparing himself to kick the seat in.

  The engine suddenly roared to life, two doors slammed shut and Spinks was thrown back as the car screeched away. It must have driven on the grass verge for several yards because it bounced horrendously, tossing Spinks around inside as if he was shooting rapids in a barrel. The gears changed quickly as the car built up speed, returned to the road and swerved as it accelerated hard along it. Spinks lost his prestel and weapon in the turmoil. He searched around for the gun and had just put his hand on it when the car took a sharp corner, bounced over the verge, and slammed him into the roof of the boot. If the lid opened he would be thrown out for sure. He gave up on the gun and found his prestel by following the wire from his sleeve.

  ‘Four two Charlie . . .’ he managed to say before being flattened once again into the roof as the car hit another bump. ‘Four two Charlie, I’m mobile! The car’s been nicked! I repeat, I am mobile and the car’s been fuckin’ stooooleeeen!’

  Ed and Aggy, driving down the road, were momentarily stunned by the transmission. Both reached to press the send button but were stopped by a voice breaking in ahead of them. It was the duty signaller on watch back in the operations room thirty-five miles away.

  ‘Four two Charlie, this is zero alpha, confirm your car is mobile.’

  ‘I’m mobile awright,’ Spinks managed to say between severely winding bumps. ‘We’re goin’ like the bleedin’ clappers! ’

  ‘Zero alpha, roger that,’ said the signaller, or bleep as they were affectionately called, and continued as if commentating on a bowls match. ‘One three kilo, this is zero alpha.’

  Aggy went for the send button but Ed pushed her hand aside and hit it himself. ‘One three kilo here. We’re still toward four two Charlie’s static location, or previous static location. That’s not me driving.’ The way Ed spoke in his slow, laborious manner, trying to be calm and stating the obvious at such a tense moment added to Aggy’s list of Ed’s irritating habits.

  ‘There it is!’ she suddenly shouted as she recognised Ed’s car heading towards them on the other side of the road. As it tore past at speed they could see only one person in front and possibly another in the back seat.

  Aggy pushed the send button. ‘One three kilo, four two Charlie just passed us from red four to blue seven doing about eighty, possibly two up. I’m in pursuit.’

  She hit the brakes slowing the car just enough to throw it into a ‘J’ turn, which was messy. The driver’s side rear wheel spun mud in the verge as she dropped the gear and put her foot down. The engine roared. The car inched forward, finally made traction and screeched up the road. Ed held on tightly throughout the manoeuvre, one hand gripping the bottom of his seat, the other outstretched against the dashboard. His roll-up dropped out of his mouth as his foot pressed firmly into the floor, trying to push down a brake pedal that was not there.

  Spinks pushed out with his arms and legs in an effort to stop being thrown around but the heavier bumps did whatever they wanted to him. The MPK5 hit him hard on the head as it made its way around the boot. He made another effort to get a hold of his pistol but it was like trying to grab a leaping fish.There was a wrenching sound and Spinks was almost blinded by the sudden light as the back seat was ripped down. A powerful arm reached in, grabbed him by his hair, and brutally dragged him halfway into the car as they drove at top speed.

  ‘Come on, me little Pink,’ the man said in an Irish accent.

  The man moved his hand to Spinks’ throat and leaned his full weight on to it. Spinks’s face swelled as he choked and his eyes filled with liquid and went out of focus as the man kept the weight on him while he searched him. He found the small, flat radio in its harness inside Spinks’s jacket and ripped it away, pulling the wires from it. He stuck a large finger into Spinks’s ear, dug around and pulled out the tiny wireless earpiece. The man seemed to know exactly what he was looking for and where to find it. He ripped open Spinks’s shirt and felt under his armpits and around his body; he undid Spinks’s trouser belt, pulled it out as if trying to start a boat engine, and tossed it to one side; he yanked open Spinks’s trousers, tearing apart the zipper as he pulled them down to his knees.

  ‘Where is it?’ the man shouted as he quickly checked Spinks’s bare legs. He brutally turned Spinks on to his front and ripped up his shirt to expose his back, pushing his hand under it to feel his skin up and over his shoulders. He pulled Spinks’s underpants down far enough to expose his arse then felt around Spinks’s hips. ‘Where is it, Pink?’ he repeated threateningly. He pulled up one foot after the other and ripped Spinks’s shoes and socks off, inspecting each shoe quickly before tossing it away.

  He pulled Spinks over on to his back again and gripped his throat, pressing down hard on it. ‘You know what I’m looking for, Pink, don’t you? Where is it?’

  Spinks gripped the man’s wrist to try and take some pressure off his throat and shook his head in ignorance of the demand. The man shoved the end of a pistol so hard into Spinks’s cheek he shattered a molar. ‘Where is it?’ he said again. Then as an afterthought, he lifted up Spinks’s underpants with the end of his pistol to expose his balls and penis.

  ‘If I focken’ find it on you I’ll blow your focken dick off,’ the man said sticking the gun back in Spinks’s face. ‘Is that clear, boyo?’

  Spinks blinked hard as his eyes came back into focus. It was the stranger who had been outside the church with O’Farroll.

  Chapter 2

  In the ops room Graham the bleep was in top gear. He was short, hyper, anal and had a mind like a razor. His generation of signallers had to be above average intelligence, not only to operate the latest complex communications systems used by the detachment but also to wire them and several other devices such as trackers and cameras into a covert car from scratch in less than twenty-four hours. Above all they had to be calm under pressure. A good duty bleep in a crisis could mean the difference between life and death for a team on the ground. Graham reached for a row of intercom buttons on a wall and pushed one.

  ‘Boss!’ he called out.

  While waiting for an answer he talked into the handset on its coiled flex long enough to reach across the room. ‘Four two Charlie, this is zero alpha?

  The large speakers on the wall remained silent.There was no answer on the intercom either. He hit another button. ‘Boss?’Then into the handset once again, ‘Four two Charlie, zero alpha?’

  The wall speakers remained silent but a refined English accent came over the tinny intercom. ‘Boss here.’

  ‘We have a possible Kuttuc.’

  There was no reply from the boss and Graham never expected or waited for one. The boss would be running at full speed to the ops room. Kuttuc was the codename for the most feared event in an undercover operations room in Northern Ireland. It meant an operative had been kidnapped. Every operation that operative was involved in would have to be cancelled. It also had to be assumed everything that person knew about the unit and its operating procedures was compromised.The political mess would then follow. But that was much later. For the operative it meant something more immediate and much more hor
rific.

  Graham grabbed up the phone and held it under his chin while he punched in a number. ‘Four two Charlie, zero alpha?’ he repeated into the radio handset at the same time. The phone rang in his ear. No answer came over the speakers. Someone picked up the phone the other end and a yawning voice said hello.

  ‘This is Camelot. We have an op Kuttuc in progress. Do you understand what I’m talking about?’

  The army clerk in the Army Air Corps headquarters office half a mile up the road had no idea what Graham was talking about, but he could detect the urgency in Graham’s voice. ‘I don’t think I do,’ he said, adding ‘sir’ just to be on the safe side.

  Graham instantly went up several notches towards ballistic. ‘Then go and get someone who does, preferably your boss, and each second you take is a second off a man’s life and if he dies I am going to come down there and personally rip your fucking throat out!’

  Graham heard the clunk of the phone hitting the desk, then the clerk’s feet as they hurried across the office and out of the door. Graham would do no such thing, of course. He was only a junior non-commission officer, a corporal, but he had learned to sound like he was a Gorgon on the other end of a phone when he needed to.Years of being a signaller, especially in this mystery-shrouded unit, had taught him the power of the anonymous voice shouting down the other end of a communications device. Graham had used the ploy many times and if the person the other end ever asked him to identify himself he would either impersonate his boss, which he could do very well, or simply put down the phone. It was almost impossible to trace a call back to the unit.