Timebomb (Paul Richter)

by James Barrington

  ‘All callsigns, this is Richter,’ he announced. ‘There’s movement in the shop at the very end. It’s a possible escape route. Request assistance. Urgent.’

  There was a brief silence on the net as he released the transmit key, then the commands and reports in German began again. Somebody, he thought, might have heard his call, but whether they understood what he said and, more importantly, could do anything about it, was quite a different matter.

  Richter switched his gaze to the other end of the street, where a cluster of flashing lights showed that numerous police cars and vans, and even a couple of ambulances, had now arrived, though all were keeping well back from the target property. He looked back to his left, to see the shop door opening quietly. As he watched, a single figure stepped out, followed immediately by two others. They glanced along the street towards the activity at the northern end, then began to walk unhurriedly away, heading directly towards the Cherokee Jeep that Richter was using as cover.

  He knew there was a police cordon all around the area, but if the terrorists had prepared an escape route from their safe house, Richter was quite certain they would also have worked out a way of getting clear, maybe by passing through other deserted buildings.

  But they couldn’t afford to have these guys walk away. He was now going to have to stop them himself.

  Chapter Seven

  Wednesday

  Stuttgart, Germany

  Richter watched the approaching men carefully. None appeared to be carrying a weapon – or at least not an assault rifle or anything of that sort – though he guessed they probably had pistols and maybe even grenades in their pockets. But he couldn’t just shoot them, in case they really were unarmed. The events in Onex still fresh in his mind, he didn’t want to find himself under arrest in Germany, so he would at least have to go through the motions.

  When the three terrorists were only about thirty feet away, Richter stood up from behind the Jeep and levelled the SiG at them.

  ‘Halt,’ he yelled, hoping the word meant more or less the same in German as it did in English.

  The instant he showed himself, the three pulled out pistols and loosed off poorly aimed shots at him. Richter ducked back into what little cover there was as 9-millimetre bullets screamed over his head. The three terrorists moved apart, separating so as to create multiple targets, and Richter realized he was both outnumbered and outgunned.

  Moving right, he dodged round the back of the Cherokee, where he risked raising his head for a quick glance. Only one terrorist was in sight but, even as Richter raised his weapon, the man caught sight of him and spun round, bringing his pistol to bear. Richter snapped off two rapid shots. The first of them missed, but his second caught his target in the left shoulder, and the man fell backwards onto the pavement, screaming with pain and letting the pistol tumble from his grasp.

  One was down, but there were still two left, and Richter had no illusions about his chances of survival. He didn’t know exactly where the other two were, but guessed they were probably using darkness and the cover of other cars parked on the street to close in from opposite directions, just waiting to get a clear shot at him. If he stood up, he would immediately become visible to them and a split-second later he’d probably be dead.

  His only way out was down. The Cherokee Jeep right beside him had good ground clearance, so Richter dropped down and rolled under it, now well out of sight. It wouldn’t fool the two remaining terrorists for more than a few seconds, but it might give him an edge, and sometimes that was all that mattered. He crawled right under the midpoint of the vehicle, then eased his way over to the pavement side. Sticking his head out for the briefest of instants, he glanced in both directions but saw nothing. After checking again, he hauled himself out from underneath and stayed in a crouch beside the Jeep, trying to watch in two directions at the same time and keeping the bulk of the vehicle between himself and where he expected the men to be. He then flattened himself on the ground and peered back under the Cherokee, trying desperately to spot a shoe or anything else that might indicate where his opponents were now positioned. Nothing was visible, so they had to be further away.

  Slowly and carefully he eased himself up sufficiently to look through the windows of the stationary vehicle, but ducked again immediately as a figure standing out in the road a few feet beyond the Jeep aimed a pistol and pulled the trigger. The bullet struck the pavement right behind him, ricocheted off the surface and smashed through the window of one of the derelict premises.

  So much for his attempt at gaining an edge. Now they knew exactly where he was.

  Within seconds, Richter guessed, the two men would be coming at him, probably from both sides of the car simultaneously, and then his temporary refuge would become a killing zone. Somehow, he had to get out of there, quickly.

  He checked the SiG, and then ran forward in a crouch, trying to outflank his two opponents.

  It almost worked.

  As he ran, Richter spotted one of them on his left, standing almost in the middle of the road with a pistol in his right hand. He dodged and dived, and snapped off a couple of quick and barely aimed shots in the man’s general direction. The terrorist returned fire straight away, but Richter was too fast for him. Now he had reached the cover of the next parked vehicle, but ultimately that didn’t help him.

  As he paused beside the car, a quick glance back immediately registered another bulky figure standing on the pavement a mere twenty feet or so behind him. Richter instantly swung round to face him fully, but, before he could pull the trigger, three rapid shots rang out, and he felt a sudden searing pain in his left thigh, followed almost immediately by a massive blow to his chest.

  He crashed heavily to the ground and involuntarily clutched at his leg, losing his grip on the P226, which fell uselessly onto the pavement. For a couple of seconds Richter lay still, the breath knocked from his body, but then he forced himself to move. At all costs he knew he had to ignore the pain in his leg and recover his weapon. He twisted his head from side to side, looking for it desperately. The SiG lay only about three feet away, and he dragged himself towards it, grimacing with pain. As he stretched out his hand to grab it, another bullet smacked into the pavement right beside his extended arm.

  He twisted round to look, and saw a figure approaching, only a few feet away, walking slowly towards him, right arm outstretched and pistol held steady. Richter noticed it was unmistakably a Glock, his senses acutely sharpened by the trauma.

  The terrorist smiled slightly, and Richter could actually see his finger taking up the pressure on the trigger.

  Richter knew he had no chance, but he’d never believed in giving up without a fight. He lunged forward again, grabbing for the SiG, his body tensing in anticipation of the bullet he was sure was coming.

  But the shot, when it sounded, was from further away. Richter twisted round, bringing the P226 up to the aim, but he realized his personal battle was over.

  His assailant was still standing, but the smile on his face had been replaced by an expression of shocked surprise. The light-coloured shirt he was wearing was suddenly turning a deep red. As Richter watched, the man’s right arm dropped and, almost in slow motion, he collapsed to the ground. Twenty yards behind him, a GSG 9 trooper was holding an assault rifle to his shoulder.

  ‘Over there,’ Richter shouted, pointing to where he’d last seen the other one. He doubted if the German would understand what he was saying, but his gesture was unambiguous. As the trooper nodded and turned away, Richter saw two other black-clad men running towards him.

  From the road, too, he heard the sound of running feet, then half a dozen more shots, a sudden sharp cry, and then there was silence broken only by the terrorist Richter himself had shot a couple of minutes earlier, as he lay a few yards away, moaning in pain.

  Richter collapsed back on the pavement and waited, the SiG still clutched in his right hand. A few seconds later a GSG 9 trooper jogged across and knelt beside him, firing a sentence at
him in high-speed German. It sounded like a question, but Richter had no idea what he was asking.

  ‘English . . . I’m English,’ he said, still trying to catch his breath.

  ‘OK. How many men came out of the building?’ The GSG 9 man’s English was heavily accented.

  ‘Three,’ Richter gasped. ‘I shot one . . . he’s over there.’

  ‘Good. We have them all, then. Lie still now. The ambulance is on its way.’

  ‘I think I need a tourniquet. I took a bullet in the thigh.’

  The German trooper produced a small but powerful torch and by the light of it examined Richter’s leg. ‘Yes,’ he muttered, ‘you do.’ Whereupon he pulled a small first-aid kit from a pocket and took out a bandage. Working quickly he wrapped it around Richter’s upper thigh and knotted the ends, then looked around for something to apply tension to it.

  ‘Here,’ Richter said, and pressed the magazine release on his SiG. The metal object dropped onto his chest.

  ‘That will do,’ the German said with a slight smile, expertly ejecting the remaining rounds onto the pavement. He slid the empty magazine into the loop he’d formed from the bandage and began twisting it.

  Richter felt the makeshift tourniquet begin to bite around his thigh.

  ‘Hold this,’ the GSG 9 man instructed and guided the magazine, now slippery with blood, into Richter’s left hand. ‘It needs to be as tight as possible.’

  ‘Right.’

  The German picked up the SiG, pulled back the slide to eject the round still in the chamber, and tucked the weapon into his belt. ‘You won’t need this any more?’ he enquired.

  ‘Christ, I hope not,’ Richter muttered. ‘I only came along to watch.’

  A couple of minutes later an ambulance pulled to a stop beside him, and five minutes after that the same vehicle was on its way to the hospital, Richter lying on a stretcher in the rear. His trouser leg had been cut off, and he now had two compresses strapped to his thigh, one covering each wound, both entrance and exit – the bullet, he was pleased to note, had passed straight through his limb and had obviously missed his femur – and a proper medical tourniquet was now in place. The pain had subsided to a dull ache as long as he kept his leg still, but every bump in the road would send a jolt of agony lancing through him.

  The ride to the hospital took only a few minutes, and there Richter was wheeled straight into an examination room, where an alarmingly young-looking doctor cut off the compresses and peered with interest at his bloody thigh, while murmuring in German to the attending nurse. He asked Richter a couple of questions, neither of which meant anything to the Englishman.

  When the door of the room opened, the doctor looked up sharply with an instruction to the nurse.

  Richter glanced round and saw a familiar figure enter the room, his heavy build immediately making it seem too small to accommodate all four of them. ‘Franz,’ he said. ‘I’m glad to see you. I think we need a translator here.’

  Kelle nodded to him and waved a leather folder in the doctor’s face, asking him several rapid questions. Then he looked down at Richter. ‘You’ve been lucky,’ he said. ‘The bullet went straight through your leg and didn’t hit anything vital – neither a bone nor an artery. They’ll X-ray your thigh just to make sure there aren’t any foreign bodies in the wound, then they’ll just pump you full of painkillers, plug the holes and send you home. The medical explanation’s a little more complex, but that’s more or less what the doctor here is saying.’

  He paused and gazed down at Richter. ‘You look like shit,’ he said, ‘but how do you feel?’

  ‘Thanks for that, Franz. My leg aches, and I guess it’s going to be painful for the next few weeks. Otherwise I suppose I’m OK.’

  ‘Good, because Wolff wants you urgently at the debrief back in the police station.’ He glanced up at the wall clock at one end of the room. ‘You’ve got just over ninety minutes.’

  Franz then switched back to German as he spoke to the doctor again. Returning his attention to Richter, he explained, ‘I’ve told him to get a move on. I’ll be waiting just outside while they patch you up. Yell if you need anything.’ Then he turned and left the room.

  The street facing the row of shops was now ablaze with light. About a dozen police cars were parked haphazardly in front of the target premises, headlights on and roof bars flashing. Unmarked white vans stood close to the scene, most with their rear and side doors open. Portable floodlights had been assembled to illuminate both front and rear sides of the property. Meanwhile, police officers and white-coated forensic specialists walked briskly in and out of the building, carrying equipment or items so far recovered from the premises.

  At each end of the street itself, barriers had been erected to block the roadway, and the cordons were reinforced by police officers tasked with keeping unauthorized personnel away from the scene. Despite the lateness of the hour, sizeable crowds had already gathered at both sets of barriers. Most were just interested passers-by on their way home from local bars or restaurants, but here and there long lenses pointed towards the constant activity as newspaper photographers and freelancers tried to get decent pictures of the scene. Reporters and stringers kept shouting questions at the police officers, but such requests for information were being ignored on Karl Wolff’s specific orders.

  In the darkened bedroom of a top-floor apartment located in a building a little over 300 yards away, enjoying an uninterrupted view of the unfolding scene, a bulky middle-aged man who called himself Helmut Kleber sat comfortably in a leather armchair. He was watching the activity through a pair of tripod-mounted binoculars, as he’d been doing for the last three hours, ever since he’d noticed the first of the police vehicles arrive, a now-empty bottle of decent red and a wine glass sitting on the occasional table beside him. He’d worked his way through both the wine and an assortment of cold snacks as he’d watched the preparations for the assault, and then the attack itself. As in Onex, where he had enjoyed a similar vantage point, he’d timed his call more or less perfectly.

  The assault by the black-clad troops had looked every bit as professional as he’d expected, and the violent and uncompromising response by the men inside the besieged building was entirely predictable. He regretted any deaths or injuries among the law-enforcement officers, but his overriding concern was that this terrorist cell should be eliminated and, just as important, all its members killed. He couldn’t afford to have any of them captured and questioned.

  And that was now a problem, because he’d seen three men leave via the empty building at the far end, where they’d subsequently been challenged by a lone police officer. He’d carefully watched the outcome of the fire-fight and realized that one of the terrorists must have only been wounded, because the same man had been driven away from the scene in an ambulance.

  Well, Kleber was going to have to do something about that, and quickly, before the injured terrorist could be interrogated.

  He got up from his seat and walked across the room to a table on which sat a large briefcase. He opened it and took out just three items. One was a small 10 cc syringe with a fine needle protected by a plastic sheath, the second a vial of straw-coloured liquid, and the third a very well-faked Bundesgrenzschutz wallet that purported to identify him as a senior BGS officer.

  But there was something else he needed too, something that would give him a plausible excuse for what he now intended. For a couple of minutes he stood pondering his options, then nodded to himself. That should do it. Taking a mobile phone from his pocket he proceeded to dial a number from memory. The call was answered in seconds, as he knew it would be.

  ‘Ja?’

  ‘It’s Kleber here,’ the man replied in fluent German carrying a slight trace of a Rhineland accent. ‘I need just two more things.’

  ‘What, exactly?’

  Kleber told him briefly, then rang off.

  Thirty minutes later there was a knock on the apartment door. Kleber approached it silently, a Glock 17 held lo
osely in his right hand, and peered through the spyhole. Only when he was sure that his visitor was alone did he open the door and usher him inside.

  ‘Any problems?’ Kleber began.

  ‘No, but this must be returned to the office before the next shift starts, so that means I need to have it back no later than six thirty tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Don’t worry, it will be,’ Kleber said, taking the large dark-blue ring binder held out to him. ‘I only need it for a couple of hours. And the other matter?’

  ‘You were right,’ his visitor handed over a slip of paper. ‘That’s where you’ll find him.’

  Moments later, the apartment door closed and again Kleber was alone. He began making preparations for the job he had to do.

  As Richter sat up on the stretcher and gingerly lowered both feet to the floor, he was pleasantly surprised that he didn’t instantly fall over, his left thigh having been pumped full of anaesthetic. A wide bandage, secured with strips of plaster, covered almost all of his leg from the knee to the groin, but the good news was he could no longer feel any pain from the wound. His whole thigh seemed to be throbbing, but he could live with that. In fact, he was going to have to, because Franz was waiting outside the door of the examination room with a wheelchair.

  ‘Do I really have to get into that thing?’ Richter demanded. ‘I’m hardly an invalid.’

  ‘I’ve had a word with the doctor,’ Franz replied, ‘and he seemed fairly certain you’d be a difficult patient. You have two choices, he told me. You can insist on walking, in which case your leg will take at least twice as long to heal, or you can take his advice and just sit down in this, shut up and let me push you. I really don’t care one way or the other, so you can decide.’