Assassin (John Stratton)

by Falconer, Duncan

  He heard few other sounds after that. No birds or flies. It was peaceful.

  19

  Stratton opened his eyes and looked at the ceiling of the Hilux cab. It was dark.

  Hetta had gone.

  He sat up, surprised that he’d fallen asleep deeply enough not to feel or hear her leave. He looked around outside through the windows. The stuff in the back looked undisturbed, in particular the device box secured beneath the rug. He saw her silhouetted by the security lights on the airfield perimeter, standing near the razor wire, hands in her pockets, looking into the distance.

  He climbed out and stretched his legs as he looked around. The camp was well lit by street lamps and every compound seemed to have security lights on its perimeter, as well as internally to illuminate entrances and walkways. The camp veritably glowed in most places.

  ‘It’s time,’ he said.

  ‘So you do you have a plan?’

  ‘Kind of.’

  They drove straight to the CAMCO compound and past the main entrance. The large gate was drawn across it, secured by a heavy chain and, like everywhere else, the place was well lit. But they saw no sign of any security. They continued around the corner and into the machinery park, itself illuminated by the security spotlights along the top of the CAMCO perimeter fence. But the trucks and plant provided many dark areas.

  Stratton steered the Hilux between a pair of flatbeds and stopped alongside a mobile crane. He shut off the lights and engine and wound down his window. Several large generators were thundering away, powering CAMCO’s facility. Another line of generators across the road kept the location extremely noisy. While they waited, a truck passed by on the main road, its headlights bathing the machinery park.

  The CAMCO compound perimeter was constructed of solid metal fencing three metres tall and topped with a triple spool configuration of razor wire that stretched along its entire length.

  Stratton climbed out of the Toyota and went to the fence to give it a closer inspection. Hetta got out and looked around.

  ‘Why don’t I take a look inside the compound and you wait here,’ he said to her, loud enough to compete with the generators. ‘It’ll be easier for one person alone.’

  ‘Go ahead,’ she said.

  The compounds tended to rely on the military units within the base for security and therefore didn’t always employ guards. And if any Taliban did manage to sneak into the base with a bomb of some kind, there were far more important military targets to hit than a civilian contractor like CAMCO. He followed the line of the fence in the opposite direction to the main entrance.

  When Stratton reached the corner where the minor road followed the length of CAMCO’s perimeter fence on that side, he turned with it and followed the fence. The noise from the generators was greatly reduced. After about forty metres he came to a broad gate chained and locked to its post, made of robust alloy bars and chain-link fencing. He could see inside the compound.

  He caught a strong smell of sewage and he could see why. A row of collection tanks stood on the other side of the internal road. That was the purpose of this particular entrance. These compounds tended to have their sewage emptied at least once a day and had a gateway purely for that purpose. It had been banged about by the heavy vehicles that came in and out and when Stratton gently pulled at the gate it twisted on one of its hinges, which was broken. The gate would have to be lifted to open it once it was unchained. He pushed against one end and a gap opened up at the support post, large enough for him to squeeze through.

  He eased his way inside, stepping into the shadows to assess things. Sounds came from every direction. A toilet flushed and music drifted from a prefab behind the sewage containers. He headed along the inside of the same fence he had just come up on the outside. As he reached the corner a door opened in the prefab a few metres away and light shone across his front. He stopped dead.

  A man stepped out of the door and tossed a bucket of water onto the ground. He was wearing a white jacket and hat. A cook. Inside the room behind him, Stratton glimpsed lines of steel racks filled with tin cans and vegetable racks. The cook went back inside and it went dark again.

  Stratton passed through a narrow gap between the fence and a prefab building and when he emerged the other end found himself in a large parking area, looking at a line of pick-up trucks with their rears to the fence. The main buildings had to be fifty or sixty metres away. The sound of the generators seemed to have got louder again. Someone left one of the buildings, and a broad shaft of light shone through the open door into the car park. Stratton heard the door close and the man’s feet crunching on gravel. Then the creak of another door opening and closing.

  Stratton studied the pick-up trucks. Two of them were laden with shipping crates. When he got to the first he could read the cargo labels: ‘Destination: CAMCO Houston’. But the crates looked a little small. He had better luck with the second pick-up, where he found one more than big enough for the warhead. He took hold of the side and tried to move it. It wouldn’t budge even a fraction. He wouldn’t be able to lift it even with Hetta’s help.

  Another door opened beyond the car park and someone stepped outside. Stratton kept still and watched the person, confident he couldn’t be seen in the darkness from that distance. Footsteps on the gravel indicated the person was heading away from him. He heard a door close and all went quiet again. He could detect no signs of sentry activity, which was good. But the main gates were still locked. Contractors had very regulated lives in camps like this. They worked long hours during the day and rarely worked at night, when everything was usually locked up. If they weren’t working or eating meals, most would confine themselves to their rooms, where they had satellite TV, DVD and game players, and internet connections. So there would rarely be movement within the compound during the small hours.

  The obvious solution was to drive the CAMCO pick-up with the larger crate on it out, place the nuclear device in the crate and then drive it right back to its start point in the compound. But that would require a lot of movement and opening and closing of gates. He doubted he’d get away with it without disturbing someone. Another option would be to remove a panel in the fence perhaps, but that was too big a job. Cutting a hole was another possibility.

  He saw a length of plastic cable on the ground by his feet. He picked it up and tossed it up onto the razor wire directly above him. It would mark the spot at least while he tried to figure out a solution.

  When he got back to Hetta she was leaning against the Hilux waiting for him. He stopped in front of her, looking at her but deep in thought. He looked beyond her, then above her. He walked past her to inspect the crane, climbed up onto the platform and looked inside the cab. Several heavy trucks went past along the main road, bathing him in light. He ignored them. No one except the owner of the crane would question his interest in it, and he expected the odds of that person showing up to be slim.

  The cab was open and he checked the controls, which looked simple enough. He set about pulling the wires out from beneath the dashboard. Stratton wasn’t experienced in hot-wiring vehicles but an MI6 course he’d taken on the subject a year before had explained the theory. It took several experiments before the dashboard lights came on. He pushed the starter button and the engine turned over and burst into life.

  Now he looked through the window at the fence and the cable he’d thrown up that was hanging over the razor wire, about ten metres away. He applied the clutch, crunched the mobile crane into gear and pressed down the accelerator, and the engine stalled. ‘Handbrake, idiot,’ he said to himself. He released the brakes and fired up the engine again and this time the heavy vehicle moved forwards.

  He carefully moved the crane to within a few metres of the fence, leaving the engine running as he climbed out. He took a moment to assess the noise. He could hardly hear the crane over the racket coming from the generators around them, so he went to the arm controls at the back. A period of study and experimentation was required to opera
te the various controls.

  Hetta came over to look at what he was doing.

  ‘You know how to operate one of these?’ he asked her.

  She shook her head.

  ‘Well, pay attention. You’re going to be operating this one in a minute.’

  He pulled a lever and studied the steel arm above him. The main arm started to rise up. He kept it going until it was at what he judged to be a good angle. He pulled another toggle and the arm turned. He stopped the move as it wasn’t what he wanted at that moment. It would come in handy shortly.

  He pulled another lever and the main arm began to extend like a telescope. He activated the winch and the hook descended. He halted it a metre off the ground and went around to the side of the truck where the strops were stored. He found a canvas one with loops on both ends, carried it to the hook and draped it over the crescent.

  ‘OK,’ he said loudly. ‘I need you to raise me over the fence. That piece of cable hanging on the wire is the marker.’

  She looked at him and then at the controls. After a brief study, she pulled on one of them and the arm started to rise up, the strop along with it. Stratton hurried over to the hook and placed his feet in the strop’s loops as it came off the ground.

  He ascended majestically. As the inside of the compound came into view he had a good look around it. He couldn’t see anyone and he felt pretty sure the contractors wouldn’t hear the sound of the crane’s engine. He only needed to avoid being seen.

  Hetta was a quick learner and yanked the correct lever and he moved towards the fence. She extended the main arm and the pick-ups came into view and he indicated her to move him to the right a little. He watched the top of the razor wire as he moved over it with inches to spare. When he was the other side, he held up his hand. The crane arm came to a halt. He was directly above the pick-up with the larger crate in it.

  The buildings and pathways were so much more visible from his vantage point. Stratton signalled Hetta to lower him, and he descended. She watched and as he was almost out of sight his hand went up. She stopped him. He stepped off the strop onto the crate, removed the looped ends from the hook, threaded them through the crate’s lifting strops and returned them to the hook.

  He waved above the fence and the crane’s engine revved a little as the hook began to rise. It rose up off the pick-up and once again he focused his attention on the compound. He could only pray no one came outside. It would greatly upset his plans.

  And then, as if the gods had heard and decided to play with him, a door opened in one of the prefabs and a broad shaft of white light spread deep into the car park. Stratton watched the man walk out of the building, down the side of the structure and in through another. He appeared to have no interest in looking anywhere other than where he was going.

  Stratton breathed a sigh of relief and Hetta swung the crate over the fence and brought him down to the ground. As the crate made contact, the strops slackened and he unhooked them. He unfastened the latches on the side of the crate and removed the lid. Inside was a piece of machinery he didn’t recognise.

  Stratton attached the lifting strops to a strong point on the machinery and signalled for her to raise it. The part rose out of the crate and Hetta swung it to one side and lowered it to the ground. Meanwhile Stratton removed the blanket covering the box on the Hilux. She was quickly repositioning the hook above him and he secured the black box to the strops and she raised it up, swung it around and positioned it above the empty crate.

  He guided it down into the crate, which it fitted with room to spare, so Stratton removed the strops and replaced the lid. Then she swung him and the crate up and onto the back of the pick-up in the CAMCO compound. He removed the strop, took a moment to check everything was in place and nothing was left to indicate any disturbance, then he reached up an arm and was quickly sailing back over the fence.

  ‘A tidy job,’ he said, once they were back in the Hilux. ‘Are you sure crane operating wasn’t your true calling?’

  She said nothing so he started the engine and drove them out of the lot, onto the main road that paralleled the runway, towards the opposite end of the airfield from where they’d waited earlier in the day.

  It didn’t take long to hit a military checkpoint – a small guardhouse beyond two vehicle dam systems built into the two road lanes and big enough to present a serious obstacle to all but the largest tanks. Five American soldiers dressed in defence of the cold, on top of full combat gear including helmets, stood around a coal fire in an oil drum.

  One of the men put out a cigarette and walked over to the Hilux, cradling an M4 in one arm. Stratton turned on the cab light so that the soldier could see him and the vehicle’s interior. The young man’s expression hardened on seeing Stratton’s unshaven face.

  ‘This is a military checkpoint, sir. You need to back out of here and head around that way.’

  Stratton held out his ID card. ‘Excuse the scruffy appearance. I’m military,’ he said.

  The soldier took the card, inspected it and looked at Hetta. His expression changed on seeing her. ‘Weren’t you in the mess hall this afternoon?’ he asked her.

  She didn’t respond, giving him the same silent treatment she gave everyone else as she handed him her ID.

  ‘I need to put these through verification,’ the soldier said. ‘One minute please.’

  He walked to the guard house, saying something to the others as he went inside the shack. They looked in the direction of the Hilux. The soldier came back out of the guard hut carrying a small device. He placed one of the cards into a slot and offered it to Stratton. ‘Put in your pin code, please sir,’ he said.

  It looked like a credit card machine. Stratton punched in his code and thought he saw the clearance come up as he handed it back to the soldier. The soldier removed the card and handed it back to him. ‘Thank you, sir. Ma’am,’ he said, handing her the device after placing her card in it.

  Hetta keyed in a number. The other soldiers had gradually closed in to get a better look at the ‘specials’, in particular Hetta.

  The soldier studying the device looked surprised as it completed Hetta’s verification. ‘Wow. I’ve never seen a clearance that high before out here,’ he said, removing the card and handing it back to her. ‘You have a good day, ma’am. Sir.’ He stepped back and saluted.

  The vehicle dam slowly sank into the road and they drove through, watched by the soldiers. They went along the edge of the airfield, passing rows of US military aircraft: rotor wings, FA-18 jets, a squadron of Apache helicopters and several Predator drones in an open hangar. Stratton turned a tight corner to cut across the airfield on the designated vehicle route and they waited for the green signal light.

  As they drove across the main runway to the other side of the airfield, they went past the row of hangars and warehouses they’d passed earlier on the road. Several large civilian aircraft were parked up on the broad skirt for the night. Stratton pulled the Hilux into a civilian car park and brought it to a stop nose-to the lot fence, the headlights illuminating pallets on the other side packed high with crates, all secured beneath large rope nets.

  ‘This is where the civvy cargo gets processed,’ he said, looking at a jet parked a few hundred metres away with the CAMCO logo on its tail. ‘And that’s our plane.’

  He turned off the engine and lights, reclined his seat and made himself comfortable. ‘We’ve got a few hours before this place comes to life.’

  She sat still, looking at nothing in particular. He mulled over the next phase. If all went well, they’d be out of Afghanistan in a matter of hours.

  ‘Where are you based?’ she asked.

  ‘Poole, in Dorset. You know where that is?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He wondered how. ‘Where’re you from?’ he asked, doubting she’d answer.

  She didn’t speak right away. Stratton took it as her usual closed door. ‘I like Switzerland,’ she said.

  It was a surprise that she answered. �
��What’s your favourite part?’ he asked.

  ‘There are many. Lake Geneva perhaps. Outside of the city. Towards the Alps.’

  ‘I’ve driven to the French Alps from Geneva a number of times. I take it you like to ski?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I don’t like the resorts. Too crowded. I usually go cross-country.’

  ‘It’s the only way to ski,’ she said, as she lowered her seat. ‘You can sleep if you want. I won’t.’

  He took that as a signal her conversation moment had maxed out. He wouldn’t sleep either, not after the long afternoon nap he’d had. They sat in silence for several hours. She seemed just as able as Stratton at waiting. They watched a single vehicle arrive and a woman in a heavy coat climb out and walk into one of the warehouses.

  The place gradually came to life and by 5 a.m., even though it was still dark, the area was getting pretty busy. Two vehicles, nose to tail, drove into the freight compound in front of them on the other side of the mesh fence. They were CAMCO pick-ups, the logos on the door hard to miss. Stratton was pretty certain they were the two from the compound.

  He watched the drivers climb out, both of them wearing thick coats. He recognised them from the chow hall. The pair had a brief chat with a man who’d joined them. He looked like he worked in the freight yard. They exchanged paperwork and the man walked to a forklift tractor. He gunned it to life and drove it over to the back of the first pick-up.

  They watched the tractor lift the crate holding the nuclear device off the bed and carry it across the yard and deposit it on a large, empty pallet. Then it unloaded the rest of the crates onto the same pallet. The CAMCO men did some more paperwork before they climbed back into the pick-ups and drove off the compound.

  The freight man secured a heavy net over the pallet then went back to the lifter, picked the pallet up and eased out of the yard with it, out of sight beyond several containers. Stratton and Hetta climbed out of the Toyota to watch the tractor go to the back of the CAMCO cargo aircraft and place the pallet on the rear ramp. A couple of crewmen rolled it into the belly of the aircraft and out of sight.