by A P Bateman
He sighted the nearest gunman and fired. He kept firing until the man fell. MacPherson was pushing in with his pistol blazing and the other trooper was engaging with a gunman to his right.
“X-ray right down!” The trooper shouted.
“X-ray front down!” Peters copied.
MacPherson had hit both too, the second as he was falling, but he didn’t respond. He ran over to a man on the ground in the middle of a cluster of five hostages. The man looked up at him. He had a hood partially covering his eyes and his hands were behind his back.
“Hands! Let me see your hands!”
The man reached around and showed them and MacPherson shot him once in the forehead, snapping back his head and spraying the deck and hostages around him with a crimson smatter.
“Shit!” Peters screamed.
“Count them, now!” MacPherson shouted back. There was a surge in gunfire towards the prow. He looked at the trooper. “Get up there!” The soldier ran and MacPherson rolled the body over onto its front. The grip of a 9mm Browning HP-35 pistol poked out of the waistband. The SAS captain took it out and tossed it a few feet away.
“Twelve Scott, all accounted for.”
“The bastards put a sleeper in,” MacPherson said. “Stay and guard the hostages Dave, I’ll go and get this last bastard out of his hole.”
“Here, take this then,” Peters handed him his UMP and took out his own pistol. He kept the weapon aimed at the hooded forms on the deck. “Stay exactly where you are. Do not move or I will not hesitate in shooting you. It will all be over shortly.”
***
The AK47 was empty. He had used all three thirty-round magazines and he had hit one of the SAS soldiers. He was confident that the soldier was either dead already or soon would be. He had pinned the elite soldiers down, but he could hear them communicating and was aware they were getting ever-closer. He had the Makarov pistol in his hand now and had used all but three of the punchy little 9x18mm bullets. He was an experienced soldier and had served in the Russian army for twelve years and he had fought terrorists in Chechnya. He knew what was about to come. They would lob grenades soon, now that he no longer had them pinned down with the AK47. Then, when he was shielding his eyes and deafened by the explosion they would make their move.
Marvin cursed. He had wanted this. He had wanted to be part of the operation that did not keep him in London and near the risk of the nuclear device. He wanted to be back in his beloved Russia. He wanted to be back among his people, eat, drink and breath its air. He could hang on, maybe if he could charge at them, use his three shots and get a weapon from one of them and keep fighting… He cursed again. This wasn’t the movies, he’d seen mightier men than him fall and he knew he was outnumbered at least five to one, simply by the arcs of fire slamming into the lobster pots and fish crates he had taken refuge behind. He knew he was done. Thoughts raced around his head. How could they have found them? Had somebody talked? Was Zukovsky dead, the operation finished? He would never know. Marvin took a deep breath, placed the muzzle of the Makarov under his chin and closed his eyes.
***
The hostages were checked over, unhooded and untied. They were drinking from mugs of hot, sweet tea; sharing a cup between three. There was plenty more being prepared. The SAS soldier who had been hit had been stabilised. The wound was a nasty gash, slicing through the meaty part of his upper arm about six inches long, and because of muscle contraction, about as wide. It looked horrendous, but the medic had given him morphine, doused the wound in antiseptic powder and closed the wound with two-dozen sutures and a whole load of adhesive stitches. A gauze pad was placed over the wound and then bandaged. He was nursing a mug of steaming hot tea. No doubt he would be out of action for a month, but such was the medic’s training and experience in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was unlikely to require follow up treatment, although it would be inspected by a doctor upon his return to Stirling Lines base in Hereford.
The Geminis were pulled on board and their equipment stowed inside of them. A detailed and thorough search of the Ebony proved to be clear and the coded call to report operation success was made on the ship-to-shore radio on the designated channel.
Finally, the bodies had been laid out, herringboned on the deck and covered with a tarpaulin.
“Well done lads,” McPherson said, sipping tea and taking a bite of a digestive biscuit. They were in the wheelhouse and someone had plugged in a fan heater. Now they had cooled down, their nerves and adrenalin subsided, they all realised they were cold, wet and tired.
“Duff round in your UMP, Boss,” Peters said. “Didn’t have enough powder to work the blowback. The case wouldn’t eject.” He had checked the weapon and nodded to the pile of UMP carbines in the corner of the cabin.
“We’ll dump the ammo back at the quartermaster and do some more testing at the killing house when we get back.” MacPherson put his mug of tea down and patted the wheel. “Now, who knows how to drive a bloody fishing boat?”
66
Caroline kept her eyes on the reception area and foyer through the security mirror from the manager’s office. She had dispatched Frank to park the car in a more discreet spot while she called in a surveillance team from Thames House. The team leader walked into the foyer and straight behind the reception desk via the dedicated door. He entered the manager’s office like he worked the desk every day for the past five years. Caroline had described the reception in detail so he would make it look natural.
“Brannan. Surveillance,” he said. He eyed her carefully. “You’re Forester’s girl.”
“Not anymore.”
“Sorry. Tactless.”
She could tell Brannan was not big on small talk so she went straight to the brief. “Suspect of extreme importance in room five-fourteen. He has a car being delivered at zero-eight-hundred. Firstly, I want to ascertain he is in fact still in his room. Secondly, I want to find out where he goes.”
“Thirdly?”
“Lose him and there is the very real chance of a nuclear weapon being detonated on British soil. Fact.”
Brannan nodded. “Don’t fuck this up, then.”
“Correct.”
“Right. Firstly, we can put a call up from reception, ask him something about his room. Is he happy? Or housekeeping is not sure they replaced his towels. But we risk spooking him. This is a Holiday Inn. Functional and well-appointed, but not the sort of place to chase opportunities to provide service. So we need an eyes on. Micro-fibre-optic camera under the door, two-forty-degree aperture. In, visual, out. Job done.”
“What if he sees it?”
“He won’t. Rotten luck if he does.”
“Rotten luck won’t cut it. What about a lens from across the street?”
“We can do the micro-fibre. I’ll do it personally; he won’t see it.”
“Let’s come back to that,” Caroline said. “The car. It’s a concierge service from Hertz. We need a tracker on it.”
“What if he’s canny? What if he gives the car a thorough counter-surveillance check?”
“We need to be cannier,” Caroline countered.
“If we can have the car for an hour we can make the tracker invisible.”
“We can use the records here, go direct to Hertz and commandeer the vehicle.”
“Good. If we can do that we can get audio and visual inside the vehicle as well. But you’ll need an order, the Official Secrets Act, on the staff in the chain at Hertz. We can’t afford to have a tip-off. I’m sure they would be clean, but one never knows.”
“Perfect.”
“We can hook it up to our receiver vehicle. It’s down the street with a full tank. Land Rover Discovery. A big cruiser that copes with everything we may come up against. We have a GPS system that uses a cell phone frequency and if we have an hour with the target vehicle we rig it to the wiring and it has indefinite power. It’s coupled to a rechargeable battery with an additional seventy-two hours’ life.”
“If he moves I’ll be foll
owing in another vehicle. Can you relay the tracker? And the visual and audio.”
“Yes. Easily,” Brannan said. “We’ll hook you up with a dedicated receiver and a laptop.”
“Right. Well let’s get on it.”
Brannan nodded. “And about the eyes on. He won’t see the micro-fibre. Trust me.”
Caroline smiled. “Well if he does, don’t bother coming in tomorrow.”
The team moved swiftly, taking up a vacant room at the end of the corridor on the fifth floor. Room five-zero-two. A laptop and dedicated receiver were hooked up. The dedicated receiver prevented the frequency being interrupted and tapped into. Wireless broadband systems were easily corrupted.
Brannan changed out of his suit and into a fleece tracksuit and soft-soled basketball trainers. Caroline tried not to laugh. It was the sort of fleece worn by people who frequent pound shops.
“Smirk all you like,” he said seriously. “But there’s no rustle, no rattle and if I get compromised I just jog off down the corridor and do a few lunges while I wait for the lift.”
“A fitness freak would take the stairs,” she commented dryly. “But then again, a fitness freak wouldn’t be seen dead in those.”
“Maybe you’re right. But nonetheless, these clothes are silent. And silent is vital.”
“If you say so Mister Bond,” Caroline smiled. “Just don’t get caught.”
Brannan turned to a man and a woman perched on the edge of the bed. “Right, walk past the room and be casual, but don’t be too quiet. Don’t be too noisy either.”
“So, normal then boss?” The man said.
“Yes.”
“And we walk to room five-thirty and open the door,” the woman said.
“Yes. But give it ten minutes and come back out. Have a giggle and walk past the room. Again, act normal.”
The pair nodded. Caroline looked on, slightly bemused. Brannan had the fibre-optic camera out and was testing the picture, which could be viewed on the laptop. The wire was stiff and pliable with the camera and inbuilt infra-red light about the size of a quarter carat diamond. He tested it sliding it along the floor. It picked up the aspect of most of the room.
Brannan nodded to the couple and they picked up an overnight bag and left. Brannan held his finger to his lips and everyone was silent as the pair walked down the corridor. Caroline heard the woman giggle and the man laugh heartily, a little lecherously. They were a couple and couples going into a hotel room usually had one thing on their mind. “So far, so good,” Brannan said. He started flexing himself and stretching. “Ten minutes and it’s a go.”
Caroline walked over to the technician hovering over the laptop. Brannan seemed somewhat comical. She was worried she’d made the wrong call. But it was too late now, too late to abort.
Brannan was stretching his hamstrings and touching his toes. He held the micro-fibre-optic down by his side and kept the transmitter in his left hand. He nodded to Caroline, “Get the door please,” he asked. “Leave it off the latch.” Caroline did as she was asked and stood back next to the coat rail. The two MI5 watchers left room five-thirty and chatted and giggled their way down the corridor towards them. Brannan walked out into the corridor and Caroline let the door close.
“He’s a complete dickhead,” the technician commented from behind the laptop. “But he is one hell of an operative. Nobody better in surveillance, that’s for sure.”
Caroline nodded, a little relieved, and studied the laptop display. She could see the two operatives walking towards the camera. Brannan arrived at the door moments before them. The camera went low and dark for a moment, then picked up the view behind the door.
“Oh Christ! He’s there!” Caroline gasped.
The man they knew as Droznedov was leaning towards the door with his eye against the peephole. He was wearing trousers and a shirt, and was barefoot. His eye was a few inches from the door staring through the peephole. The camera pulled back and the corridor came back into view. The couple were near; Caroline could hear their approaching chatter.
“But he wasn’t looking at the floor,” the technician said. “Brannan and his belly shuffle. He was lower than a dead snake at the point they crossed paths and the target would not hear him because of the diversion, nor be far enough back to see the camera. The target is edgy though, hence the spying through the peephole.”
The technician was already packing up his equipment when Brannan came back in. The couple did not return and Brannan started to change swiftly back into his suit.
“I take it we got him?” he asked.
“Perfectly,” Caroline said. “I’m impressed. And relieved.”
“Now we’ll work on the car. The operative I sent ahead to Hertz will have smoothed the way by now. I’ll stay in reception with you, make sure the target doesn’t leave. The rest of my team will go and work their magic,” Brannan looked at the technician. “You okay with that?”
“Absolutely boss.”
67
The basement was cold and dark. The lighting, however, when it illuminated the room, was complete and soft, with no shadows cast up the walls or upon the ceiling. The reason for this became evident as King’s eyes adjusted to the light. The reflector screens were positioned to cast pure light onto the wall behind the bank of cameras.
The large man smiled as he saw King looking at the camera equipment. “Impressed?”
King turned and looked at him. “At what?”
The man bent down and opened a laptop on the table. He switched it on and after a few seconds he tapped on the keyboard. A series of primary coloured bulbs shone on the wall, where a thin, slightly curved interactive television screen was sliding slowly down on silent electric motors. “This is fifty grand’s worth of equipment,” he said. “But wait and see why.”
Two men entered the room ahead of Iman Mullah Al-Shaqqaf. They were all big and hard looking. They looked like they spent a lot of time in the gym lifting weights. More bodyguards. Along with the small man who had opened the door to them, the big man at the laptop and Al-Shaqqaf that made five.
Al-Shaqqaf looked at Rashid for a long time before saying anything. “I am pleased to see you again. We shall make up for lost time soon.” He turned to King. “I am surprised Zukovsky made no mention of you.”
“We operate a cell system,” King replied. He edged nearer to Rashid, but stopped when the bodyguard nearest pulled out a sawn-off shotgun out from under his long leather jacket. “What’s this?” King protested vehemently. “I’ve brought you the traitor! Do what you want with him and let me out. I’ve got things to do before Zukovsky gets back with the warhead.”
Al-Shaqqaf laughed. “Zukovsky is not the only one to operate a cell system! Your information is old news!” He looked at Rashid and smiled. “There’s no bomb going to go off in London! Fellow Muslims dying for Islam? For retaliation to the west? Fool!”
The guard with the shotgun stepped closer and the other two men stepped around and each caught hold of King’s shoulders. King did not try anything, he knew what the sawn-off shotgun would do at close range. He had seen people cut in half with them.
Al-Shaqqaf walked up to Rashid and swiped him across the face. Rashid recoiled, then smiled. “Pussy,” he said. The Iman punched him hard. Rashid fell back against the wall, righted himself then spat a glob of spit and blood into his face. “Like I said, pussy.”
“We will see,” smiled Al-Shaqqaf, wiping it away with his sleeve. “We will see.” He looked at the largest of the four bodyguards, the man who had shown them down to the basement and nodded towards Rashid.
The big man came at Rashid and grabbed him around the throat. He pulled him in front of the screen and pushed him onto his knees. He went to a shelf opposite and pulled out some cable ties. He stood in front of King and without a word punched him in the face. King fell backwards, but the two men held him firm, pushed him downwards and the big man walked behind him and fastened his wrists tightly. All the while, the shotgun remained just inches
from his face.
Al-Shaqqaf went to the laptop and the screen behind switched seamlessly to a scene of the desert. It was a moving image with clouds, a vehicle in the distance traveling on a dirt road some two miles or so away. “We use this one for Syria,” he said. He nodded to the guards and one of them twisted King’s head around to see. “We had the CIA and MI6 looking for preachers of our faith out there for months, years in fact. They were here right under MI5’s nose.” He flicked the mouse on the laptop and the scene changed to film of a bombed-out city. Our ISIS brothers film as they conquer, send the footage back digitally and we use it for our films of spiritual enlightenment.”
“For propaganda,” King corrected him.
“Depends,” Al-Shaqqaf said. “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. Your ITV, BBC or Sky News play propaganda every minute of every day.”
King watched as the man with the shotgun took a step backwards and lowered the barrels to the floor. King turned to look back at the screen again but one of the men behind him slapped his face. He looked back at Al-Shaqqaf, blinking as his eye watered from the blow. “MI5 are outside. Across the street in a van.”
“Yes. Sometimes a van, sometimes an SUV. It’s also been a removal lorry and a broken down mini-bus,” the Iman smirked. “I expect it will be an ice cream van one day,” he laughed. “We have our own parabolic microphones on them. We know their every move. They were concerned when they saw you hurrying over. They haven’t called the police. They were in discussions with their team leader on what to do. But I understand MI5 is a little busy this evening. Let it play out was the last instruction I heard over the airwaves.” He pulled a vicious-looking knife out from a belt sheath underneath his robes. “We are planning to hold executions down here. They can be filmed and sent digitally to our brothers in Syria and Iraq. It will keep the British and American intelligence agencies busy hunting for people to martyr. You two can be the first.” He looked at the knife, gave it a little flick in his hand. “This is a halal slaughter-man’s knife. You will not receive the Shahadah our ritual prayers before killing an animal. You are not worthy. You will be spat on as the pigs you are, as you bleed and choke on the ground.”