The New Recruit

by Andy McNab

  Having been told of the terror of IEDs, and trained in how to deal with them, Liam was pleased that so far Jason had found only two. And with each device found the counter-IED team had been flown out from Camp Bastion to deal with them. This extended the foot patrols by hours, but he didn’t care. All that mattered was that they got back to their compound with everyone intact.

  For Liam, though, the one thing bothering him above all was that Mike was still messing with him. At least, he assumed it was Mike. He’d find bits of his kit had gone missing and would turn up randomly in another part of the compound. Or stuff would simply move, such as his wash kit. It was never dangerous stuff, like his magazines or grab bag filled with his first-aid kit – he guessed that Mike was too professional a soldier to do anything that could compromise operational duties – but it was enough to get on his nerves. He still had no proof that it was Mike, and until he did, all he could do was keep his mouth shut and just focus on the job in hand.

  With their time eventually over at Checkpoint 2, Liam and the rest of the multiple rotated to Checkpoint 3.

  ‘It’s worse than CP2,’ said Liam as he walked into the compound, the rest of the multiple filing in behind him. ‘How can that be in any way fucking possible?’

  His heart sank into his already worn boots, the soles of which were starting to come away thanks to the battering they were getting. The walls of Checkpoint 3 were in even more of a dilapidated state than those back at Checkpoint 2, and he wondered just how much protection they would afford in an enemy crossfire.

  ‘Massive understatement,’ said Cameron and turned to Sergeant Reynolds. ‘Sure this is the right place, boss? Looks like it’s been abandoned for weeks. And I’m sure I phoned ahead asking for the five-star treatment. You know – spa, room service, white dressing gown, bath oils . . . a bit of luxury, right?’

  ‘It’s the right place, I’m afraid,’ said Reynolds who, Liam noticed, had continued to grow more human since being out in Afghanistan. Back in the UK he’d thought him a complete tosser, just a grumpy sod who liked picking soldiers up on what they were doing wrong just for the hell of it. Out here, though, on the front line, he was a good soldier and a strong leader. And Liam had learned a lot just from watching him. He trusted him too, which was a good thing.

  ‘Least they could’ve done is leave us some flowers,’ said Jason, heading over to where they would be sleeping. ‘Not even a chocolate on the bed. Rubbish.’

  ‘And it stinks too,’ said White.

  ‘Sure that’s not you, Gandalf?’ said John Allan, a soldier from the Territorials who was covered in tattoos and whose job back home was working for a tyre-fitting company. Out here he was responsible for the radio.

  Paul White was the oldest in the group, but the nickname had come from the fact that he was almost totally grey, and in the morning his stubble was thick enough to be a beard. He was also a medic.

  Paul punched John on the arm, then strode over to a bed and sat down. ‘It’s like Room 101,’ he said.

  Liam asked, ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘It’s a room that contains everyone’s worst nightmare,’ said Paul. ‘And if you ask me, that’s this place. What a shit hole.’

  A few days into life at Checkpoint 3, and Liam and the rest had all settled into the same routine of foot patrols, meetings with locals to gather intelligence, manning the checkpoint, personal admin, and all the other mundane stuff that came with living out in the field. Though increasingly aware of just how good his training had been – the days spent at the Afghan village in Norfolk, as well as the days out on the range – Liam had soon found that the excitement of all that Boy Scout stuff, eating off stoves and living under the stars, quickly faded. He wanted a comfy bed, good food and a beer. Jason, he realized, had been right.

  What made it worse was that since arriving at Checkpoint 3 there hadn’t been a single contact with any Taliban, which seemed odd: life at Checkpoint 2 had been a case of constant, if not overly accurate or violent, contact. Liam could tell that everyone was getting edgy, including himself. It wasn’t that he wanted to be shot at. It was just that it seemed strange that no one was even coming to try and have a go.

  ‘Like the rest of you,’ said Sergeant Reynolds, with the others from the multiple gathered around him, ‘I don’t like it here. The place is a dump and the sooner we’re out of it, the better. But until then, we have to stick to task.’

  A murmur of agreement shuffled through Liam and the others.

  ‘Above all, though, what’s bothering me is how quiet it is. I don’t like it. None of us do.’

  ‘Something’s brewing, boss,’ said Jason. ‘I can smell it.’

  ‘That’s Dinsdale’s cooking,’ said Paul. ‘Burns everything.’

  Sergeant Reynolds raised a hand to still the laughter. ‘I’m with you on this, Finch,’ he said. ‘Something’s definitely brewing. So we need to be even more switched on than usual, OK? I don’t want the Taliban thinking we’ve slackened off because they’ve gone quiet.’

  Evening was drawing in and a bright moon was now visible in the sky.

  ‘We’ve got nothing from the locals,’ said Cameron. ‘Whatever the Taliban are up to, they’re keeping it quiet.’

  ‘Well, we’ll just have to stay alert, won’t we, Dinsdale?’ said Sergeant Reynolds. ‘If and when it kicks off, I don’t want any of us making stupid errors, got me?’

  Everyone nodded agreement.

  The following morning, after another night of absolutely nothing happening, Liam was up in one of the sangars manning a GPMG with Cameron, who was staring through the binoculars. As usual, nothing was happening and they were bored.

  ‘It’s dead out there,’ said Cameron, scanning the ground around the compound. ‘Where the hell are they?’

  Liam turned to reply when the familiar sound of a round coming in snapped the moment in two and a bullet thunked into a plank of wood behind him.

  17

  ‘MUZZLE FLASH!’ yelled Cameron. ‘Ten o’clock!’

  Liam had seen it too and he swung the GPMG round to return fire on the position. The weapon jumped a little, but it was easy to keep under control. With each squeeze of the trigger, he sent out a hail of rounds to where both he and Cameron had seen the flash of a weapon being fired. The ground exploded in a cloud of dust as the rounds slammed into the dirt, ripping it apart in moments.

  Liam eased off.

  ‘Dinsdale, you see anything?’

  ‘Nothing,’ said Cameron, when another round came in, this time sending up a hail of dirt from the compound wall right in front of the binoculars.

  ‘The sod’s moved!’ shouted Liam, pointing out into the countryside in front of them. ‘That came from out to the right!’

  Cameron swung the binoculars round.

  ‘You see him?’ asked Liam.

  Cameron was silent, then called out, ‘Sighted! He’s behind that hut at one o’clock!’

  The rest of the lads were now up and looking over the wall of the compound, with Sergeant Reynolds at the other lookout.

  ‘Got him!’ shouted the sergeant. ‘Contact confirmed! Come on, lads! We’re on! Have it!’

  Everyone opened fire, pasting the spot with bullets. The hut, which as Liam had seen from numerous patrols was a simple structure of thin, crumbling mud walls with a wooden roof balanced precariously on top, shuddered violently as it was peppered with rounds. A bit of the roof fell in like it had simply had enough and given up.

  ‘Stop!’ shouted Sergeant Reynolds.

  Checkpoint 3 fell silent.

  ‘Dinsdale, any movement?’

  ‘He’s either down or gone,’ Cameron called back. He then looked up at Liam. ‘That was too close,’ he said. ‘That bastard nearly slotted us both!’

  Sergeant Reynolds called the multiple together. ‘Right, we need to get a foot patrol out there now, either to confirm a kill, or bring the injured shooter back and get him medevac’d to Camp Bastion. At which point his life will become a hell
of a lot more fucking complicated.’ Reynolds nodded at Corporal Jackson. ‘You, get up there with Dinsdale,’ he ordered, pointing up to one of the sangars, then looked to Macdonald and Pearce. ‘And you two, in the other. I want eyes on that hut and I don’t want you to even blink in case you fucking well miss them! Any movement, I want to know. And be ready for me calling in for fire support.’

  As Corporal Jackson and Cameron went back up to the sangar, Liam and the rest went into autopilot and were soon kitted up and ready at the gate to move out. Every patrol since arriving at Checkpoint 3 had been a wasted journey and Liam had started to get bored. Not complacent; just tired of walking out and finding nothing. He wasn’t looking for a fight, or to get shot at, but he could tell that they had all started to feel the tension building. Now though, knowing they were going out to actively track down an enemy combatant? He was nervous, but he was also excited. This is what they had all trained for.

  Jason was once again point man and led the way out slowly, carefully, through the gate. Liam, who was behind Mike, pushed his nerves down and kept his eyes on the hut, fully expecting incoming rounds at any moment.

  After a slow, uneventful walk, they arrived at the hut.

  A call came from Jason: ‘Nothing here. Terry’s scarpered!’

  Then the familiar sound of a round coming in cracked the air.

  Jason hit the deck, then yelled back to Sergeant Reynolds, ‘Where the hell did that come from?’

  Liam and the others scanned the surrounding area, Liam using his SUSAT to get a better look and hopefully spot something.

  Another round came in, this one whistling over Liam’s head like a jet-propelled wasp.

  ‘Over there!’ shouted Paul, pointing to a small compound about a hundred metres further on behind the hut.

  As far as Liam knew, the place had until a few weeks ago been occupied by an old farmer. They’d searched it and found nothing of importance, no hint of activity by the Taliban. It was, as far as they could tell, just abandoned. Now, though, things had clearly changed. And Liam knew there was no way they were just going to let the shooter get away to come back again and have another go at them. That wasn’t the way this worked.

  Sergeant Reynolds called over: ‘Dinsdale! Suppressing fire! Keep that fucker’s head down! And if it does show, then just knock it off his fucking shoulders!’

  The thick, rapid rattle of the GPMG brought to life by Cameron soon echoed around Liam and the others. With the sniper now pinned down, they moved on. Liam’s senses seemed more alert as they made their slow way forwards. He was aware of smells in the air that he usually didn’t notice or just took for granted or had grown used to: the hay-like smell of the dry shrubs and grass they were moving through, gun oil from his weapon, the acrid smell of spent rounds in the air, his own sweat. It was as if all the little bits of the world around him had become more obvious, shouting out to him to be noticed. Even the tread of the boots of John, who was now in front of him, seemed clearer, more precise, and as they drew up to the compound he could hear his heart, but it was a controlled beat, strong and sure, not rapid and panicked.

  A few moments later, Liam was crouched with the others in a ditch, all of them spaced out about ten to fifteen paces apart. It was dusty, more so than out in the open, and the ditch was filled with roots and twigs that seemed to just spring out and hook into him no matter how or where he crouched.

  Readying himself for the advance on the compound, Liam made to get up on his feet when heavy machine-gun fire exploded from all directions. The ground around the patrol was stitched by bullets, the air filled with the whine of rounds speeding by and all too close.

  The ground shuddered under Liam, a sign that the bullets were landing within a metre of where he was now squatting. And that wasn’t good. These weren’t shots sent out in a random spray in the hope that they might hit something. Whoever was firing knew exactly where they were and was closing in for a kill.

  ‘Where the hell is that coming from?’ shouted Sergeant Reynolds.

  Liam quickly scanned the area, then ducked back down. Muzzle flash was coming from everywhere but the compound ahead. And he knew that they all had a fair idea what that meant: they’d been drawn out into an ambush. And now here they were, in the kill zone.

  ‘We need to get to cover fast,’ ordered the sergeant, pointing at the compound. ‘We go in twos, fire and manoeuvre, you know the drill. Hacker, Scott? Shift it!’

  It was simple, but it worked and could be used in advance or retreat. One of them would provide suppressing fire, to keep the enemy’s heads down, and the other would move. Then they’d switch until their objective was achieved, be that either killing the enemy, or escape. They’d all practised it enough but now, Liam realized, it was probably going to save his life.

  ‘Scott! Go!’

  It was Mike shouting, and Liam, aware now that for the first time since arriving in Afghanistan he was fighting alongside a man he thought was looking for a chance to kill him, was up on his feet and running, rifle at the ready and firing short bursts from his SA80. He knew it was against everything in the book to fire while moving but at that moment he didn’t care. If it stopped him getting shot, it was worth the bollocking from Reynolds later.

  Grabbing cover behind a smashed tree, Liam dropped to his knee and opened fire. A couple of seconds later, Mike raced past and a few paces later did the same. Liam was up, running, firing; dropped down, kept firing. He changed magazines but didn’t miss a beat. Then they were inside the compound, out of breath, adrenaline racing, and wired to getting back to the checkpoint.

  ‘It’s a fucking trap,’ said Mike, hissing the words through his teeth, voicing exactly what Liam had been thinking. ‘They lured us here. A bloody ambush!’

  Liam flicked his eyes around the compound. The place was little more than a crude set of walls made up of two main areas divided by another wall, through which a rough door gave access from one to the other. There was no roof. However, a mud-walled shelter lay in the area they were currently standing in, little larger than a garden shed. A fire was still smouldering in a pit dug into the rough ground.

  Paul and Jason arrived, their eyes wide and alert, like wolves on the hunt.

  ‘They’re all around us,’ said Jason, breathing hard. ‘I think Gandalf slotted one, but we didn’t bother checking. Only way we’re getting out of this is if we fight our way out.’

  The sound of gunfire continued as Sergeant Reynolds and John, who was carrying the radio, sprinted in.

  ‘Right, all of you, get up on that wall and return fire!’ ordered the sergeant. ‘And get eyes on where the Taliban are. Find out where those fuckers are holed up! If I have to, I’ll call in air support.’

  Liam legged it and heaved himself up onto a pile of junk in the corner of the compound; Mike was doing the same further down. Rifle at the ready, he raised himself above the wall and opened fire. But instead of seeing muzzle flash, Liam saw someone leap out from behind a far-off tree with something slung over his shoulder pointing directly at him. It was an RPG, a silhouette any of them would recognize anywhere.

  The world stopped. All Liam was aware of was that deadly weapon now pointing right at him. Nothing else mattered.

  He dropped from where he was standing like his legs had snapped.

  ‘RPG! RPG! Incoming! INCOMING!’

  Everyone hit the deck. Dust kicked up into Liam’s mouth, his eyes, as he tried desperately to get as low as possible, to make like the ground.

  The RPG slammed into the wall and the dull thump of the explosion lifted him off the ground and sucked the air from his lungs. Mud rained down all around and he could see nothing but dust, his ears ringing from the blast, as he choked to get a breath. Then another round came in, crashing into the same section of the wall, and Liam choked on even more dust as rubble and dirt blasted outwards.

  Blinking away the sand and grit in the air, Liam scrambled to his feet. Not only could he hardly see, but the area around him was also unre
cognizable. Rock and rubble were strewn everywhere, dust filled the air and he couldn’t see more than a metre or so in front of him. He stumbled as he tried to move, tripped over a rock and slammed into the ground, a sharp pebble stabbing hard into his knee. He had no idea which way to run to get out of trouble.

  Rounds thwacked into the ground close by and Liam quickly got himself out of the way. He couldn’t stay where he was, of that he was sure, but he had no idea where to go to get himself out of the way and stop himself getting shot to pieces. He was pinned down.

  He tried shouting for Mike, his backup, but his voice caught in his throat, bone-dry and choked with the dust. Panic twisted his gut. What if he was cut off from the others? What if they’d gone off and, in the confusion, left him behind? What if they couldn’t see him and he got caught in the crossfire? What if he was captured by the Taliban, tortured . . . he’d heard the rumours that the Taliban were actively looking to get themselves a British soldier. And everyone knew where that would lead – a starring role in a movie of your own death, probably involving a sharp knife sawing away at your neck.

  Liam pushed the horror of that image away and forced himself to calm down. The only thing panic was going to do was get him killed. No way would the rest of the patrol leave him behind, he knew that for sure. He had to get a grip, remember his drills, and get out fast.

  Liam caught sight of a silhouette coming towards him. When the dust cleared a little he realized who it was.

  ‘Mike . . .’

  For a second, he was relieved – not that it was Mike, but that it was one of the patrol. At least he wasn’t alone. Then he saw what Mike was holding. Not his own SA80, but an AK47, the Taliban’s other weapon of choice, not just because it was accurate, but because it was famously reliable and robust. You could run over one in a tank and it would still empty a magazine without much bother.