Soft Target 04 - The 18th Brigade

by Conrad Jones

  He placed both hands on the door frame and heaved himself out of the car. His strong muscular arms pulled him forward onto his legs, and he steadied himself for a moment. He reached back inside the Volkswagen and picked up a joke-shop mask. He stretched the rubber old man mask over his big bald head, wrestling the eye holes into place. He placed a floppy old felt trilby hat on top, and a pair of spectacles finished the homeless man disguise. He walked briskly, if not a little unsteadily, toward the side of the derelict supermarket, what little light there was, completely diminished the further he progressed, and he stopped to peer into the inky blackness. As he walked he counted his steps in his head, one, two, three, four and five. He reached out and blindly felt around, until his hand touched the cold metal mesh of an abandoned shopping trolley, which he had left there the previous evening. His fingers moved swiftly along the metal until he found the plastic handle. He pushed the trolley toward the back of the estate car, with the wheels squeaking and the metal basket rattling as he went. Anyone watching would see a smelly old homeless man carrying his entire life in a discarded shopping trolley.

  He fumbled for the boot lock and pressed the button in, the lock clicked open. Quickly he reached inside and grabbed a camping gas cylinder. It was full and the weight took him off balance slightly. He placed the gas bottle into the trolley and then steadied himself, before reaching in for a second cylinder and repeated the process. Next he lifted three, five litre petrol cans out, and placed them in the trolley with the gas canisters. There was a cardboard box containing the rest of his components, which he placed on top of the trolley before covering them all with a grubby old quilt.

  Finally he grabbed a large stuffed toy rabbit from the boot, one of the ears was missing, and he plonked it, sat upright in the trolley. He was ready to proceed, but he had to destroy any evidence that he may have left behind. From his pocket he retrieved a book of matches, and a cigar, which he lit. He pulled the soothing smoke into his lungs, and stared at the glowing tip until he was happy that it was lit properly. Then he opened the match book and placed the burning cigar inside, before folding the cardboard flap over it; he then placed a paper clip over the match book to hold the burning cigar in place. He leaned into the boot and his knee clicked loudly as it buckled slightly, throwing him off balance again. Like lightening his left arm shot forward and gripped the roof of the car, powerful muscles and sinews held his weight, while he regained his composure. He placed the smoking improvised fuse on the wheel arch, and then turned on the valve of another camping gas cylinder. It hissed loudly as the highly flammable gas began to pour into the rusty old estate.

  He closed the boot and it clicked audibly as it locked. Then he turned and pushed his wobbly shopping trolley out of the shadows and into the fluorescent glare of the town centre streetlights. The metal basket rattled as it bounced over the uneven tarmac of the deserted supermarket. He reached the kerb, and stopped to allow a bus to continue its journey toward the newly built terminus, which was five hundred yards to his right. The bus driver, who was massively overweight, was wearing a regulation salmon pink shirt, which made him look like a human space-hopper behind the wheel. The bus was completely empty of passengers as it cruised by him.

  The bouncers` gaze followed the path of the bus as it passed by them, but they didn’t give any more than a cursory glance to the scruffy tramp crossing the road, with his shopping trolley. He reached the other side and bounced the trolley up the kerb, it rattled loudly and then settled back down as he pushed it toward a small shopping precinct. The precinct was also known as Times Square, like the bar built on its periphery. It was late, and it was freezing cold, no one was around. He looked up and down the deserted streets. Behind him the town centre monitors were situated on top of the streetlights, and he was beyond their viewing range now. In front of him was the entrance to the precinct. The pavement was made from shiny red house bricks, set into the ground like tiles. There were two low brick walls, one on either side of the wide pathway, built in a funnel shape, narrowing as you reached the entrance.

  On the left was a set of double glass doors, which led up a set of stairs to a bank, and some offices. The office suite was on the first floor and it extended over the precinct entrance, creating a tunnel beneath it, through which the shoppers had to pass. On the right was a health food shop, which occupied the length of the entrance tunnel, before it opened out into the square plaza beyond. The plaza would be covered by cameras, but he wasn’t going that far. He had business with the people that ran the bank and their associates in the offices next door. He had exactly five and a half minutes before the cigar ignited the matches, which would in turn ignite the propane and blow the car to bits.

  The double doors had aluminium frames, and double glazed units fitted into them. He took a hand held power drill, and placed it into the keyhole. The tungsten drill bit made short work of it, and in less than six seconds the latch was detached. It clattered onto the floor inside the porch. Quickly he pushed the door open. The porch area was twelve feet by eight feet, and a wide hessian door mat covered the floor, spotted with discarded chewing gum. At the end of the entrance area was another set of thick glass doors, and the staircase was beyond them. He reached under the stuffed rabbit and grabbed a canister of petrol. Then he unscrewed the top and threw the canister against the doors at the far end. He repeated the process with the other fuel cans, before placing the propane cylinders near the door, and switching on the valves. The gas hissed loudly and he kicked the bottles over rolling them down the narrow entrance hall. There was less than two minutes left.

  He grabbed the cardboard box and took out a thick wax church candle, which he lit outside in the fresh air, away from the spreading flammable fumes. He glued the candle to the inside of the box; it was still burning as he folded the lid loosely closed. Then he pushed open the glass doors again and placed the box on the floor inside. The box stopped the gas coming into contact with the naked flames just long enough for him to escape. He calculated that he had about forty seconds.

  The shopping trolley rattled loudly as he pushed it away from the precinct, not that anyone was around to notice. He had just reached the bus terminus when the Volkswagen exploded in a ball of flames.

  Chapter Four

  Locking Stumps

  Terry Nick was the leader of the 18th Brigade. The Brigade had begun life as an extreme right wing organisation, with a penchant for violent racist assaults, destroying immigrant owned businesses, and a string of homophobic attacks. The Brigade and organisations like it had been formed as offspring from an organisation known as the National Front in the seventies. Initially the NF had been formed as the medium for Britain`s racists to vent their fury at the tide of immigration which swamped the country in that decade. Years later the leaders of the NF realised that mainstream politics was the way forward, and they distanced themselves from violent extremist right wing factions of the organisation, which led to the birth of groups like the Brigade.

  The Brigade realised that their organisation was attracting a lot of ex-military personnel into its ranks, and they used their members to operate a large security firm which controlled the door security in over ninety percent of the bars and nightclubs in the North West of England. Control over the doors gave them ultimate control over the sale of drugs within. The Brigade employed over three hundred of its hardcore members, as door security guards, bouncers, and general muscle. Each man was hired out at eighty pounds sterling, per night shift. That equates to a legitimate turnover of one hundred and sixty eight thousand pounds per week, or close to nine million pounds a year. Not bad money for a bunch of racist, Nazi loving thugs. Of course the profit from the sale of drugs, and the protection money they charged the drug dealers, was worth ten times that figure.

  In recent years Terry had orchestrated Brigade Security and expanded its security business on an international scale. They placed tenders for the contracts to police stadium pop concerts and music festivals all over Europe. Their ranks h
ad been swelled by dozens of ex-service men, veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. Terry Nick had seen the potential of using highly skilled ex-soldiers as personal body guards, and he touted them for extremely lucrative contracts to protect visiting rock stars and celebrities, along with several high profile politicians. He had opened communications with American mercenary companies, who provided protection for high ranking officials in war zones. There were hundreds of contracts for mercenary security firms worth billions of pounds. Terry wanted to steer the Brigade away from its drug business, and turn it into a professional mercenary outfit. He had been successful at keeping the two parts of the business very separate, and few of the hired muscle who worked on the doors knew anything about the international close personnel protection business.

  The Brigade owned the empty first floor of a pub on the outskirts of Warrington town centre, called The Turf and Feather. Terry Nick used it as his administrative base, somewhere where everyone knew that they could find him, his office. Many of the Brigade members used it to socialise, as well as their employer`s base, much to the detriment of the pub`s regular customers. The Turf was an unusual building. The ground floor was built from dark house brick, but the upper living quarters and the roof were clad with olive green corrugated metal sheets, which joined at odd steep angles. The architects dream was an optical nightmare. Despite its odd design it was once a busy pub, always packed with the local residents, who lived nearby. Situated in the centre of a private housing estate it had a captive audience to service. Unfortunately, since the arrival of dozens of shaven headed bouncers, most of whom sported swastika tattoos beneath their ears, the locals had become intimidated, and voted with their feet. Only a hard core of serious drinkers still frequented the pub, and they were always on their best behaviour when Brigade men were in close proximity.

  Terry Nick was sitting outside the pub on a wooden picnic bench, smoking a menthol cigarette. He had a habit of playing with the gold loop, which pierced his left ear, and he was unconsciously twisting it through his fingers as he talked. A miniature gold boxing glove hung from the earring, both decoration and a warning. Terry was duly elected leader several years earlier, after the untimely demise of his predecessor. Just turned fifty, he was old enough to be respected for his experience, but still young enough to be feared as a fighter by his younger colleagues. He was six two, lean, wide at the shoulders and narrow at the hip. His big hands were marked with a mosaic of scar tissue, war wounds from decades of bouncing in pubs and clubs.

  He hadn’t always been a racist it just sort of crept up on him as he got older. When he left school he had started up a small market stall business selling fake sports branded tee shirts and tracksuits. In the seventies and eighties people loved to walk round open air markets. Bargains of every description could be obtained, from tomatoes to tumble driers. At the time a wave of Pakistani immigrants entered the United Kingdom, and seemed that they all wanted to become market traders. They were very shrewd businessmen, and suddenly nothing was priced at ten pounds or five pounds anymore. They became nine pound and ninety nine pence, and four pounds and ninety nine pence respectively. The pricing culture of the whole country changed almost overnight. Working closely alongside the influx of ruthless foreign traders had a twofold effect on Terry Nick, firstly it made him bankrupt, and secondly it turned him into a racist bigot. Recent years had allowed him to revisit his entrepreneurial side, as he nurtured their international protection business, and tendered for more and more lucrative contracts. His links with Blackwater in America had been the making of him, launching him and the 18th Brigade from small time security firm with criminal activities into an international multi-million pound operation.

  It was late, dark and cold, but since the introduction of the smoking ban in July 2007, you either smoked outside or didn`t smoke at all. His faded denim jeans were offering little protection from the cold, and he pulled his leather bomber jacket closed, and zipped it up to the chest. There was an electric heat lamp attached to the wall above the benches, a feeble attempt by the stingy landlord to pacify his smoking clientele. It was having no effect at all.

  Three Brigade Lieutenants sat with him; all of them dwarfed Terry Nick. His much younger companions swallowed dianabol tablets like candy, and stacked them with daily nandrelone injections. The combined effect increased their muscle mass to frightening proportions. The majority of the 18th Brigade`s membership looked exactly the same, pumped up skinheads, covered in tribal tattoos and Nazi insignia. Their appearance was incredibly intimidating to those outside of the organisation. FBI investigations into Nisour Square exposed that most of the Blackwater soldiers habitually used anabolic steroids.

  “It`s last orders Terry,” a tiny barmaid appeared, barely five foot five in her shoes, a short dark bob framed her pretty face. Despite her petite frame, she took no messing about from the regulars, Brigade men or not. She was a second set of ears and eyes for Terry Nick, and she reported any shenanigans that she heard behind the bar to him. Terry and his colleagues couldn’t hear the bell outside, which signalled closing time, so she always ventured out into the cold to tell them.

  “Thanks darling, bring us another round out please,” Terry replied. His voice was deep and gruff, like he had gravel in his throat. He was a very dangerous man, but a very charming one too. Terry wouldn’t tolerate any of his affiliates swearing in the vicinity of the pub barmaids, and if they didn’t use their manners, please and thank you, then there was hell to pay.

  “Are any of my lads still in there?” he asked. He made the point of buying his employees the last drink of the night, if they were still in at closing time.

  “No Terry, Dave and Norman were the last ones out, and they left half an hour ago, both absolutely skittled, as usual,” she replied laughing as she went. The tiny barmaid scurried off back inside the pub to get the drinks. The four skinheads watched her walk away; tight black ski pants accentuated her slender frame. She seemed to know that they were staring, and she wiggled her hips as she walked.

  “Those two are always pissed,” said one of the Lieutenants, breaking the silence.

  “Why do you think we call them Dithering and Headbutt, one can`t walk straight and the other one has crashed into more walls than Mr Bump.”

  The group started to laugh, and they picked up their pint glasses and finished their beer. The road which ran past the pub was deadly quiet. Only distant traffic noises could be heard, drifting several miles on the breeze.

  The sound of two car engines racing toward the pub became apparent. The roads were quiet at this time of night, and apart from the pub and the housing estate, there was nothing else around. The car park at the front of the pub was hidden from the main road by thick hedgerows, but the beam of two sets of headlights shone, lighting up the trees that surrounded the pub. The engine noises growled as they approached, and wide bore exhausts exaggerated the throttle sound. There was a deep thudding sound as the bass lines of a car stereo were amplified through a boom box. The vehicles were hidden from view by the tall hedgerow which grew around the perimeter of the car park. They heard the cars screech to a halt, beyond the bushes, and then loud voices could be heard over the booming music. Then the cars screeched off again.

  “That sounds like trouble to me,” Terry said, standing up from the bench. His colleagues followed suit, and they walked away from the smoking area, four pairs of high combat boots stomped in unison toward the car park.

  Terry Nick walked toward the front door of the pub. A white framed, hexagonal conservatory acted as the pub`s foyer. As he reached it the tiny barmaid was bringing their pints of beer out to them. He raised his hand, signalling her to stop, and pulled the front door closed tight, without saying a word. The barmaid looked at the swastika tattoo on his hand, and although she had seen it a thousand times, she still wondered why a nice bloke like Terry Nick had marked himself with such an offensive emblem. Through the conservatory window he pointed to the lock with his finger. The tiny barmaid did as she was
told and locked herself in the pub. Then she ran inside, and peered through the window, curious as to what was going on. Terry Nick didn’t frighten easily.

  Chapter Five

  Dithering Dave & Headbutt Norman

  Dave and Norman were two of the oldest and smallest Brigade members. They were both in their fifties, and they were both habitual heavy drinkers. In the early seventies they were part of the first British hardcore racist group, The National Front. The group was set up predominantly by right wing conservatives, who had had enough of the tide of black and Asian immigrants that had entered the country. At that time, Britain was in the throes of a severe recession, over three million were unemployed, and every year a new batch of school leavers joined the back of the dole queues. There was an atmosphere of desperation all over the country, but especially so in the inner cities. Racial tensions exploded across the country, and some of the worst race riots ever witnessed erupted in London, Liverpool and Birmingham. The riots spread through towns and cities all over the United Kingdom. Dave and Norman affiliated themselves with the right wing Nazi skinhead groups that sprung up out of the riots. When they first joined up they dressed in the stereotypical skinhead clobber. Bovver boots, drainpipe faded denim jeans, Ben Sherman shirts, and short Harrington jackets. Twenty years on they were still dressed the same way.