by Kim Hughes
Riley moved as fast as he could ever remember moving, ignoring the pain from Stock’s blows, springing to his feet and grabbing a handful of the EXPO’s clothing just as he was about to fall into the Viper. They stood there for a few moments, breathing hard, aware of what they had almost done. ‘Trembler device,’ said Riley, welcoming the wave of icy calm now washing over him. ‘We fall into that and we’re toast.’
‘Truce?’ rasped Stock, looking over his shoulder at the row of switches.
‘We’d better,’ said Riley, his breath also coming hard. ‘You were going to carry me out over your shoulder?’
‘I hadn’t thought that far.’
Riley made sure Stock was standing properly on his own two feet before he let go of him. Gingerly, they moved away from the machine and caught their breath for a moment.
‘Shall we try moving your wooden piece of Meccano together?’ asked Stock eventually. ‘We might get a more even pressure that way.’
Riley nodded. ‘If you insist. I’d rather it was just me testing my theory, though.’
Stock smiled. ‘And let you get all the credit?’
Riley blew out his cheeks and released a stream of air. ‘Okay. No more tricks, eh?’ Stock shook his head. ‘Right. I’ll see you on the other side.’
They took their time positioning themselves. Riley knew the clocks around the ground were clicking towards the end of the theoretical first forty-five minutes’ playing period. Half-time. There couldn’t be long left before he discovered the hard way that he had been right.
Stock and Riley put their hands on either side of the jig. The Viper was against a wall, so they couldn’t stand either side of it, which would have been the ideal placement. Instead it was like a four-handed piano piece: the trick was not to collide with each other.
Riley felt his confidence drain away. What if he was wrong? What if the bomber had anticipated this sort of move? Well, Riley probably wouldn’t live to know much about it. Oblivion would be instantaneous. He began to sweat, as if he were back under the Afghan sun. He could smell the drains, the dust. Riley snorted a little to clear his sinuses.
‘You okay?’ Stock asked.
‘You don’t have to stay, Alex. It’s death or glory and I’m not sure which one is waiting for us.’
Stock glanced at Riley and winked. ‘Now he tells me.’
Riley looked at the jerry-rigged contraption he was gambling his life on. It was far from reassuring.
Fine time to get the yips, man.
Riley laughed to himself. He didn’t have the yips, that sudden doubt in your own ability that blights sportspeople’s performance. It was just that he was out of his comfort zone, beyond the usual drills and skills. He looked over his shoulder to one of the clocks. Half-time was a heartbeat away. Maybe oblivion, too.
‘Ready?’ Stock asked, worry creeping into his voice at Riley’s hesitation.
Riley could hear his heart thumping in his ears, mixed with the sound of Stock’s laboured breathing. Alex, too, must be wondering what the fuck they were doing there.
‘You?’ Riley asked.
‘Right now? I’d rather get it over with.’
Riley felt his fears recede. It either worked or it didn’t, and it was too late to stop now. ‘On three, yes?’
‘If you say so, boss.’
Riley made sure there was saliva in his mouth and coughed a little to clear his throat. ‘Okay. One… two…THREE.’
As they pulled down on the makeshift rig, the switches all flicked position simultaneously. Each man closed their eyes and held their breath.
FORTY-EIGHT
The throwing of the switches initiated a powerful militarygrade mobile communication device within the Viper, designed to dial a number using multiple frequencies until it was put through. The relay phone, located outside the ground beyond the reach of the electronic counter-measures, then made another call. This one activated a second device containing Semtex.
The resulting explosion caused a plume of smoke that stretched into the night sky until it was invisible, carrying with it fragments of steel, glass, wood, and, of course, people. Mixed in with the human remains were large fragments of furniture, portraits and carpets.
The detonation, which could be heard clearly from five miles away, punched an enormous hole through the upper floors, puncturing the roof. A fire started immediately, growing greedily as it was fed by a surfeit of inflammable materials. The sky above the scene began to glow a devilish red.
A second, smaller, explosion wracked the frame of the fatally damaged building. A section of the gable roof creaked and gave way with a hideous crash, sending sparks to the heavens, like fireflies seeking paradise. Windows splintered with the sound of a gunshot. The trees nearby crackled as their new leaves shrivelled in the heat before some smaller twigs and branches caught fire. Soon, whole trees were engulfed, their skeletal forms consumed by flames, like victims of some arboreal witch trial. The heat ignited the fuel in the cars standing on the driveway and their plume of toxins coiled into the motherlode of smoke.
Within twenty minutes, before even the first of the fire engines arrived, the east wing of Dunston Hall, home to the Russian Vasily Kutsik, was no more and the west was just beginning its journey to ashes.
FORTY-NINE
They had screwed their eyes shut as the switches flipped. Now, slowly, they dared to open them. Their hands were still on the trellis, gripping it so hard their knuckles were white. ‘We can probably let go now,’ said Riley quietly.
They did so, backing cautiously away from the machine before looking at each other as if they had just found a winning lottery ticket. Riley realised he had been holding his breath so he sucked in a good lungful of air. Then they both gave a nervous laugh that was only a few steps away from hysteria.
‘Fuck,’ said Stock. ‘We still alive?’
Riley ran a hand through his hair. It was sticky with dried sweat. He desperately needed a shower. But, Jesus, he was alive. ‘Either that or heaven is really shite.’
‘Jesus, I didn’t think that would work.’
‘Neither did I,’ admitted Riley. ‘But we’ve got to get out of here. Just in case. We’ll let it soak for an hour or two, eh?’
Stock put an arm around Riley’s shoulders. ‘Fine with me, you mad fucker.’
A figure appeared at the glass and stepped inside. It was Kate Muraski, pistol at the ready, not quite believing what she was seeing.
‘What are you two laughing at?’ she asked, unable to keep the irritation from her voice. That caused hysteria in the pair, which annoyed her even more. ‘Oh, grow up.’
Riley gulped back his laughter. ‘Said the woman who has, apparently, come to shoot us.’ He pointed to the pistol in her hand.
‘I thought I might have to fire in the air to make you pay attention. Instead you’ve gone all Women in Love on me.’
Riley looked blankly at her.
‘Is it safe?’ she asked, pointing at the Viper.
‘Yup,’ said Stock. ‘We did it. We beat the Kobayashi Maru.’
As if to give a lie to the ATO’s premature boast, Riley heard the soft plop of a panel falling from the bottom of the Viper onto the carpet. Then, the whirr of an electrical motor, followed by the hiss of escaping gas, which all three of them registered.
‘Jesus, fuck,’ said Stock, taking a step towards the machine. ‘What’s that?’
‘Gas! Get the fuck away from there, Alex.’
Muraski remained rooted to the spot, her jaw slack.
‘Get out!’ Riley yelled. ‘Hold your breath.’
He grabbed Stock by the collar and pulled him away, using him to careen into Muraski, who let out a cry. She dropped her pistol as Riley gathered them together and propelled them with all the driving power of a tighthead prop towards the partition. With a final heave he pushed them out onto the terrace and stepped back inside.
Before they could recover, Riley had slammed the doors shut and wrapped a length of det cord from
his pocket around the handles, so that when Stock tried to prise them apart, they held firm. ‘Dom, don’t be stupid!’
‘Get help. Now. You’ve been exposed.’ Although God alone knew to what.
‘No! Let me—’ Stock began.
The sound was muffled because of the glass panels, but Riley clearly heard the splatter as Muraski was sick over the plastic seats. She gripped the back of one of them and dry-heaved several times. That answered one question: it was most likely a nerve agent.
‘Shit!’ yelled Stock. He stared through the partition at Riley, desperation etched on his face.
‘Get her to the Met,’ Riley shouted through the glass. ‘They’ll have antidotes.’ Stock would know, but might have forgotten in his panic, that SO15 routinely carried syringes of atropine and pralidoxime, which helped mitigate the effects of the majority of nerve agents. ‘Now, Alex.’
Alex hesitated, as if considering a solution to save Riley. But they’d had their one lucky break for the day.
‘Move it, Alex. Or she’ll die,’ he pointed out grimly, feeling reality hit home: he might well have killed them all. ‘And maybe you, too.’
Reluctantly, Stock put his arm around Muraski and half carried, half dragged her over the dividing wall. Riley took off his headset and killed the camera and microphone. He didn’t want anyone witnessing what was about to happen.
Riley turned back to the Viper. He could feel his eyes smarting. Holding his breath was probably a waste of time, as whatever it was might well be absorbed through the skin and mucous membranes. Still, he took in a lungful close to the small gap where the two doors mated and strode across to the steel box. His eyes fell on the hose, curled next to the machine.
The hose.
Now he knew how this device worked. After all, gases like sarin were floor-huggers. Introduced from above, via a hose, the lethal fumes would quickly sink down through the hospitality space and kill anyone down there within minutes. Safi had built a different kind of Viper altogether, but Riley had called it in, and the Met had evacuated and sealed off the stadium, before they had had a chance to fully deploy it.
It took him several precious seconds to locate the conduit to the VIP on the floor box in the right-hand corner of the room, beneath the carpet. He ripped it back to give him full access. He was going to have to take a breath soon. His eyes were watering now, blurring his vision. He removed the various pieces of kit from his jacket, placed them next to the machine – even though his lungs were burning, it was important he was calm and steady, not panicked and fumbling – took off his jacket and shoved the sleeve down the hole, then ran gaffer tape over it. Better one room was contaminated than two.
Riley lay down, putting his left hand in to the bottom of the Viper to examine by touch what was sitting above the opening. There was a small prayer he kept repeating, although he doubted there was anyone to hear him. Please God, let there not be an anti-handling device up there.
Riley closed his eyes and imagined the 3-D layout of what he could feel in there, changing the neural messages from his sense of touch into images of wires, pipes and junction boxes. His brain was screaming for him to let some air into his lungs and, overriding all his conscious instructions, he let out a little puff of breath and sucked in poison in return.
Concentrate, pal.
His fingertips found the single nozzle that was issuing the gas. He followed it back to a flexible tube. He rolled back, grabbed the pliers where he had left them, and reached in and bent the tube back on itself, squeezing as hard as he could to crimp it. He used a cable tie to secure it in place. He hadn’t stopped the flow – he could hear an electric motor protesting with a whine as it tried to push the gas past the obstruction – but he had severely reduced it. The lower half of the room, though, was still full of whatever the agent was. And he had taken in some of it when he could no longer hold his breath. Already he could feel a burning corrosion deep in his bronchi.
Riley knew he didn’t have time to dwell on what was happening to his body. Instead, drills and skills on biohazards kicked in. He had to locate the pump and the valves that were involved in mixing what was very likely to be a binary system. He went back in.
Another small exhalation. More toxin taken in. The alternative was to pass out from lack of oxygen. No choice.
His fingers found the little cluster of leads that fed to the pump. There was no time for the pliers, or to worry about a secondary bomb linked to a collapsing circuit. He gripped and yanked at the wires, until he felt several come free. Waited.
The struggling motor stopped its whining. Done.
Riley rolled away from the machine and stood on wobbly legs. His stomach spasmed and he threw up the meagre amount of food inside it over the carpet. The specialist officers would be here soon in their… in their… what? What were they called? His mind was fogging up. Totally-Encapsulating Chemical Protective Suits, that was it. They should keep them safe.
But Riley, he was fucked.
His vision was tunnelling but his eyes fell on the Glock that Kate Muraski had dropped. He hoped she was okay. She couldn’t have had that much exposure. And Alex, of course. He’d probably had about the same dose as her, maybe a little more of it, because he had been closer to the venting gas. They had a decent chance of survival. He blinked the pistol back into some sort of focus.
He remembered Nick, out in that culvert in Afghan after the IED had detonated, his body blown to shit, and the decision he made to end it before the suffering got any worse. Brave man. Riley’s stomach cramped again, but there was nothing left to bring up. His mouth tasted of metal, as if he had been sucking coins. What was it? Sarin? Tabun? Some new neuro-crap created in a lab out in the Urals?
You’ll never know, pal.
Riley stumbled over, picked up the gun, raised it and, without a moment’s hesitation, pulled the trigger.
FIFTY
After being inoculated with a cocktail of drugs, Stock and Muraski were taken to a brace of directors’ suites, where each was instructed to have a long, hot soapy shower. Specialist medics from the Defence Science Laboratory at Porton Down were on the way by helicopter to examine them. Sterile isolation rooms were being prepared at the Whittington Hospital, just in case.
Meanwhile, the VIP levels of Arsenal were in full decontamination mode. Techs from the Terrorism Command in high-spec haz-chem suits had forced their way into the box where Riley had decommissioned the weapon. Riley had been rushed to the Whittington, so they had been told, but there had been no word since.
It was only after an hour or so that they had discovered that there had been a secondary device after all. It had demolished the east wing of Dunston Hall, killing thirteen individuals, including Vasily Kutsik.
Muraski took another lengthy shower – the second since her exposure. Had the idea been to gas the dissident Russians in their box, with an explosion at the house as a back-up in case things went wrong at Arsenal? It was a WAG, but a decent one. Already Russia Today was reporting that terrorism in the UK had moved into a new phase. Russia was even offering specialists in chemical warfare and explosives to try and get to the bottom of the incidents. The cheeky fuckers.
Jamal dead and now Riley was either fighting for his life or dead as well. OCD. Operation Certain Death. No longer funny. It probably never had been.
She stepped out of the shower and towelled herself until her skin glowed red. Then she slipped on the robe and walked through to the living area, looking for the remote to turn on the gargantuan TV.
While she was searching, the phone on the writing desk rang. She hesitated for a moment and then crossed and picked it up with a shaking hand, knowing it would be about Riley.
* * *
When Kate Muraski knocked and entered his suite, Alex Stock was sitting on a lilac leather sofa, wrapped in a quilted silk dressing gown that made him look like Michael Douglas in that Liberace film. Like hers, his clothes had been bagged and removed by one of the suited haz-chem lads. He had reassured them
both that if they had been fully contaminated, they would be dead by now.
Kate was holding a wooden tray with several objects wrapped in plastic bags on it. ‘Your phones and wallet have been given the all clear,’ she said, nodding at the collection she was holding.
‘Great. Any news?’ he asked.
Muraski looked as if she was trying to eat her own lips before she spoke. ‘He’s pretty bad. He shot out the fire suppression system and got drenched with water. That helped, apparently. But he still got a high level of exposure.’
Stock closed his eyes and thumped the cushion next to him. ‘Idiot.’
‘That idiot saved our lives.’
‘That’s why I am so pissed off with him. Had to play the big man.’ He sounded angry, but there was moisture in his eyes. ‘Fuck. He should have just let the gas bloody run.’
‘He couldn’t do that, could he? That’s not what you blokes are trained for. Walking away. Is it?’ she demanded.
‘No.’ He gave a small cough, pulled a face and spat into a tissue. He examined it, but there was no blood. ‘Something tastes off.’
Kate put a hand on his forehead. It seemed unnaturally hot.
‘You okay?’ she asked. ‘You’re a little flushed.’
‘Yeah. Just a little nauseous. It could be the drugs. I could just be hungry.’ They had been advised not to eat until the Porton Down specialists had finished with them.
‘How come the Skripals survived bloody Novichok? But Dom’s at death’s door?’
‘Nobody knows what the gas was. The trolley is still awaiting proper forensic dissection.’
‘And Dunston Hall?’
‘The real target, maybe,’ she said. ‘Maybe the whole bombing campaign was an act of obfuscation. You know there is a theory in my outfit that Salisbury was deliberately blatant to detract attention from several other assassinations of dissidents which received almost no publicity.’
