Fuelling the Fire

by Roland Ladley

  Flashes of things.

  His mother dressed in that summer dress she wore once, when she picked him up from boarding school. She smelt of Imperial Leather.

  His beautiful daughter. Ahh, bless her. No, no—stop that dog! Pleeeease. Somebody kick it off before it rips off her face! Stop it now!

  Then it was calm. The image was gone.

  His MG sports car, British racing green with chromed wire wheels. His pride and joy. His wife. Naked. And now a man, all he could see was his hairy back. She was being held down … no, please no!

  Then Trooper Sandy. All bent and mangled, lying lifeless among the sand, his deep red blood blackening the earth. Surrounded by dogs or hyenas. Stalking, getting closer. Vultures flying overhead . . .

  Splash!

  He came to abruptly. Water was seeping through the hessian bag, a bag he had worn over his head for what seemed like a lifetime. The dampness took away some of the heat, heat that pervaded everywhere. It made him sweat in places he didn’t know had the appropriate glands. He sniffed involuntarily. The smell was repugnant. He knew he was lying in his own urine and faeces. With his hands tied tightly behind his back, he couldn’t even attempt to wipe the vomit and blood that had dribbled from his mouth, congealed since the last time they had beaten him.

  There was a dim light shining through his hood. He was unable to describe his cell even if he had to—he’d always been bagged. But he had worked out that it opened onto the outside world.

  It was light then—sometime during the day. Between six in the morning and six at night. But which day? God only knew. He had tried to keep count since the attack, but when you’ve been beaten into unconsciousness at least three times—or was it four?—it was difficult to rationally conceptualise anything.

  The video had been shot the day after he and Ted had been taken. He’d been beaten once before the video shoot, but they had cleaned him up and dressed them both in the dreaded orange boiler suits in time for the cameras. After that they’d hooded him again and taken him away to beat him. The blows were hard, but mostly delivered by feet. He had lain on the ground, curled up to protect what little dignity he had left.

  They had not used clubs or metal bars, but when a man kicks you as hard as he can, your ribs break, as does your nose. He daren’t think about his testicles. If he ever got out, and he knew he never would, there was little chance that his Zoe would be joined by a baby brother. Not now.

  Halfway through the beatings they had interrogated him. One of the questioners had a very strong southern American accent, which had caught him out to begin with. But now, such was the state of his mind, he wouldn’t be surprised if Mickey Mouse had turned up to ask him who his commanding officer was.

  That was the thing, though. The questions weren’t in depth. They were simple, easy, nonthreatening questions.

  As part of their training they had all been subject to low-level interrogation. The message was pretty clear: If you are captured, your chances of survival are about 5 per cent. Your death, and the ceremony attached to it, is more important to the terrorist than information. Hold out for a while; then tell them everything you know. Give them a sense of victory. None of you know anything that might jeopardise the next mission. Trust me.

  However, he remembered that they had added: if you have chance to destroy your equipment, then do so. During the attack, he hadn’t been able to break any of his kit. He assumed it was now in the hands of these thugs.

  After the third beating—was it the third one?—where he knew they had broken at least a couple of ribs, as breathing hurt like hell, he had told them everything he knew.

  There was nothing left to tell them.

  A heavily Arabicised English accent interrupted his jagged thoughts.

  “You smell like shit.”

  Back to the here and now. Another beating? More inane questions?

  He thought it was probably two men who lifted him at that point. Immediately everything went into spasm. His right leg, which had a bloody big hole in it, ached like the worst toothache you could imagine. His chest, abdomen, and nether regions all cried out in sympathy.

  Somebody grabbed his nose through the hessian and moved it violently from side to side. Tony couldn’t stop himself from screaming as bone and cartilage scraped against each other.

  “Like that, infidel?”

  And then laughter from the men.

  They dragged him outside, one on either arm—it was a short distance—then into another room. He didn’t think he’d been in this room before, but he couldn’t tell. One of the men undid Tony’s hands from behind his back, and they manhandled him onto an almost flat surface, face up. It felt like a wooden table, slightly sloping downward, his head at the bottom. His heart was easily pushing blood downward and out of his newly rebroken nose.

  They tied his hands by his sides with some sort of cloth so that he couldn’t move them. Someone held his feet together. He was trussed on a table, face up like a piece of meat at a butcher’s shop.

  The men in the room—how many were there now?—spoke to each other in Arabic. He thought he heard running water, but he couldn’t be sure.

  Just then, for no particular reason, he thought of Ted. I wonder how Ted is? He had no idea if they were being kept together. He’d seen him at the video shoot, where one of the Arabs had said, “Your friend is almost dead.” And laughed. He thought he’d heard moaning in the middle of the night when the world was at its quietest. One part of him wanted it to be a call from Ted, telling him that he was still alive. But he couldn’t be sure.

  Fuck! His head was slammed back to the table as his hessian hood was pulled tightly round his face, his nose pressed at an angle that sent an excruciating pain to the appropriate receptors in his brain.

  Then it started. He knew as soon as the water hit his face that death would be a much more preferable place than what he was about to endure.

  The water kept coming. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t turn his head. Water, filthy water at that, smothered his mouth and nose. He had to breathe. He had to breathe. But he couldn’t stop the water from filling his mouth and nasal cavity. And then going down his throat. He swallowed. At some point—I have to breathe—he gagged, but the water kept coming. His body flinched and writhed. But the water was incessant.

  He was drowning. Not in the way he thought drowning might take you. You know: You’re underwater; you’re going to die. So you just breathe in water, like you drink it. And quickly oxygen fails to get into your bloodstream, and your mind shuts down. Peacefully.

  Not here. Not now.

  Fuck! Make it stop! He coughed, swallowed water, gagged, cried, scrunched up his face, and then gagged some more. But still it came. More water. More drowning, but worse. Trying to get away to make it stop. Writhing. Gagging. Retching. And still more water.

  Then it did stop. His hood was released.

  He turned his head to one side. He coughed up water. Everything screamed out in pain. He coughed some more, retching as he did. He spat something out of his mouth. It could have been a piece of him. He didn’t care.

  More Arabic. It might have been Swahili—it was all beyond comprehension.

  Then it started again.

  He would have thought his brain would rationalise that there were only two possible outcomes to his predicament: he’d survive and cough up more water at the end of it all, or he’d die. To fight it was futile.

  Unfortunately his mind had other priorities.

  Fuck! I’ve got to make it stop! It was a natural survivalist reaction.

  He wanted to be calm and let it all happen. But something inside him took over and fought and fought. Through the gagging, coughing, crying, gagging some more, and all of the many facets of pain that he felt, still his body tried to escape the torture.

  Water. An essential ingredient for life. You could have fooled me.

  And then it stopped.

  Cough, cough, gag, retch, cough. He felt more pain than was humanly end
urable.

  His breathing was rapid and shallow. He knew he was sobbing. He wished he could stop sobbing. Without the hood he must look pathetic. He felt pathetic. I feel pathetic. He didn’t know what was worse: the waterboarding, the associated pain, or the stripping of all dignity. He had failed on all counts. He was broken beyond repair. They had him now. They could take what they wanted.

  “So, Captain James.” That American accent again. “Tell me how you are assigned your missions.”

  Huh?

  “Or shall we do that again?”

  SIS Headquarters, Vauxhall, London

  Jane checked the time on the bottom corner of her screen. It was 8.46. She had a couple of minutes before the next cabal with David and the Op Glasshouse team. She’d signed off her report to the team at eight o’clock this morning and would have little supplementary information to add to the briefing when they convened. She’d read everyone else’s reports, and it appeared that there was no new intelligence.

  The only positive thing was a confirmation from David that the embassy in Moscow had leaked that its junior staff members were in discussions with the United States and Russia about stopping the bombing in Syria. They knew it was out there because the State Department and the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs were both denying that the meetings were taking place. And David had received a curt call from his oppo in Langley asking for an explanation. It was a small but important result that might buy them some time.

  As things stood, if nothing else came in today, the SAS would drop into Yemen this evening and assault Hajjah at . . . she did some maths, metaphorically using her fingers . . . eleven thirty tonight, UK time, two thirty in Yemen.

  Tim’s report, which she’d just closed, confirmed that they now had an SIS team staking out the Sana’a safe house, and they should be able to keep eyes on all day and overnight. However, they were apparently struggling to get somebody reliable up-country to provide overwatch on the compound in Hajjah. She understood the dilemma—she’d experienced it herself. Finding and tasking the right person took time. Sending the wrong individual in early was easy. But the last thing the SAS needed was a spooked compound, the result of an errant local caught with a pair of binos hanging around his neck.

  The SAS might have to go in blind.

  Jane thought initially that the SIS team would have been better employed in Hajjah, rather than keeping an eye on the safe house in Sana’a. But late yesterday evening Tim had made the point that, no matter how well you disguise yourself, two Westerners arriving in a far-off corner of Yemen would always be two Westerners arriving in a far-off corner of Yemen. No, it had to be a local.

  Sam had sent through her report first thing. They had no new conventional images, and the latest keyhole satellite stuff seemed, to Jane, to show little change. Sam did note that the white twin-cab had moved a few metres. New tracks also seemed to indicate that, since the last overhead, it had been driven out of the compound at some point. And there had been a second vehicle visiting, but she could give no additional details.

  On one of the recent photos, Sam had highlighted a well just outside the compound. The image showed a pipe of some sort leading from the well, over a wall, and into one of the buildings. Sam attached no importance to the find. Jane thought she may have noted it to fill a slow news day.

  Jane wondered how Sam was. She hadn’t found time to give her a call, or drop her an e-mail, since she’d left for the Alps. She’d do something now. With deft hands and a quick glance at the clock, she opened a new mail and started to type.

  She stopped herself midsentence. She had absolutely no idea why she would pry, but just then, Jane decided to access Sam’s account.

  Jane had not had to look over Sam’s e-mails since she’d started working in the building. Sam didn’t know that Jane had the necessary clearance, but Jane and David had agreed that, until they were confident about Sam’s suitability, Jane should have constant access to Sam’s account and “keep an eye.” But she hadn’t. Sam had been working peerlessly, so why should she?

  Until now. Why now? Jane couldn’t explain it.

  Sam’s account opened after a couple of password submissions. Jane scrolled down the e-mail list, latest to last. And what she found surprised her. It really surprised her.

  What the blazes are you up to, Sam?

  Jane double-clicked on the reply from the BfV. And then looked over Sam’s enquiry of Interpol regarding a hire car rented from Geneva.

  She pushed a swirl of hair back over her right ear. And frowned. She glanced up at the location designation on Sam’s screen, a security application that allowed all SIS operators to be tracked via their mobiles: Sam appeared to be on a motorway between Dresden and Berlin.

  What?

  She breathed out heavily through her nose. What was Sam playing at?

  Oops. Look at the time!

  Jane turned off her monitor and gathered her things. She immediately decided not to bother David with this—not yet, anyway. He had too much on his plate. And Jane had to exert some of her own authority. Instead, she’d phone Sam as soon as she had the chance. She’d give her an opportunity to explain herself.

  Tankstelle, Freienhufener Eck, Autobahn, Dresden to Berlin

  “It doesn’t make any sense to me, Wolfgang. Nothing you have told me so far makes any sense.” Sam was trying hard not to raise her voice.

  Last night when they had eventually started talking, and that wasn’t until they were a good twenty clicks outside of Dresden, she’d quickly learned that Wolfgang’s command of English was as good as, if not better than, hers. She knew she didn’t need to raise her voice to aid translation, the typical British mind-set. Sitting opposite Count Wolfgang II of Neuenburg, the change of pitch in her voice was down to exasperation. Not an aid to translation.

  “You’re not giving me enough to add any plausibility to your argument. Help me out here!” She pushed herself back against the red false-leather seat with such force that it gave out a sigh. She looked out of the full-length glass window that provided the outside wall of the service station and practised picking out car makes and models as they plied up and down the motorway.

  Blue BMW 3 Series. Silver Mercedes C Class.

  As she looked, she raised her bandaged fist to her mouth and absently chewed on her exposed knuckles.

  Sam could sense Wolfgang looking at her. He was a cool customer, that was for sure. Last night, without any explanation, he’d got into Bertie’s passenger seat. With both of them staring ahead, Sam’s hands tightly gripping the steering wheel, she had driven away from Pillnitzer Strasse. It was a bizarre half an hour. Two complete strangers thrown together by a series of ridiculous events, with nothing to say to each other. Madness.

  “You’ve hardly been honest yourself, Sam. I have told you what I know about Flight FY378 and given you the bare bones of a conspiracy theory that I’m investigating. And you? All I have is ‘Uncle Pete.’ Not a single believable explanation as to why you followed me to Dresden. Why you went up to my apartment.” His English was faultless and, with an ever so slight German “clip,” a little bit sexy.

  Sexy? What was she thinking? Get real.

  “I don’t know who you work for—I’m sorry, but I’m not going to believe that you are a psychiatric nurse working for your health service. Especially after the way you dealt with that dummkopf in my apartment. I’m not going to say any more until you give me something believable.” He paused. She continued to stare through the glass.

  A blue Mazda 3, followed by a silver Ford Focus—four door. She felt his eyes on her, those enigmatic eyes. Eyes that displayed kindness and steel at the same time.

  Breeding. That was it. It was the way he held himself. His clothes. His look. That unnerving confidence. She hated what he stood for: that upper-class, aristocratic self-satisfied air. Money, which bought time and power—and access. What infuriated her most was he displayed none of those traits—and all of them at the same time.

  She dwelt on
how they’d got to where they were now. They’d stopped at the tankstelle last night after their first exchanged words. She’d said something along the lines of “I’m tired and need to rest. I’m stopping here.” He’d replied, “OK. As you wish.” They’d both used the service’s ablutions, and each of them queued up separately to buy some fast food. They ate in silence at one of the wooden tables in the restaurant.

  “I’m going to get my head down. There’s a bed in the van. You can sleep on the front seats.” His reply had again been curt: “Sure. That’ll be fine.”

  She’d apparently slept like a log and was woken as he closed Bertie’s front door. It was light.

  Amazingly, he looked just as neat, just as well put together first thing as he did when they’d nodded “goodnight” to each other the previous evening—no words. They’d been short on words. She watched him through the window, heading for the restaurant. He glided everywhere, serenely, as if riding on a Segway.

  Sam had checked her watch. It was seven in the morning, German time.

  “Shit!” She scrambled for her tablet, throwing her sleeping bag to one side—she’d slept in her clothes—and quickly logged on to the secure account. With the aid of her passkey and fingertip recognition, it took about twenty seconds to access the cloud.

  The only new photos of Yemen were satellite images. Immediately absorbed in the detail, she spotted that the pickup had been for a run. It was the same vehicle, though. But there were also tracks from a second vehicle. She couldn’t pick out any detail from the tyre prints.

  On further inspection, she noticed that there was a hose leading from a nearby well into the compound, probably through one of the windows. It had not been there before. She collected all of that detail in her memory and put a brief report together for the team.

  There were already one or two reports in from other members of staff. Having read them, it was clear that there was no new intelligence. She’d need to check again in a couple of hours.