Soft Target 04 - The 18th Brigade

by Conrad Jones

  “What the fuck are you on about Brendon,” Dano asked incredulously.

  “You have to think outside the box in the military,” Brendon repeated his brother`s favourite saying.

  “I think he`s off his box, never mind outside it,” Dano was becoming frustrated.

  “Look, you`re all stumped because the Yardie has told us that the door is reinforced. Do you think that would stop the SAS?”

  “I`m going to shoot him in a minute,” Jay said quietly.

  “The front door is not the only way into the flat, but it is the only way, that they will expect you to come in.....you see?” Brendon became animated as he tried to explain.

  “It`s four floors up Brendon.”

  “So how do they wash the windows then smart arse?”

  Jay was shocked and stunned, but also pleasantly surprised.

  “What have you got in mind Brendon?” Dano was catching up with him slowly.

  “There will be a window maintenance cradle on the roof, so you go to the front door, and draw their attention, while I toss a couple of grenades through the windows. Simple, you don’t even have to go in,” Brendon was giddy with excitement.

  “I think I like this thinking outside the box idea,” Jay said. He liked it a lot, as he could kill two birds with one stone, literally.

  Chapter Twenty Five

  `Tank`

  John Tankersley woke up and stretched his huge arms, trying to loosen his shoulder joints. He was incredibly muscular in build, which meant that he often woke up with cramp and dead arms, due to his weight squashing his limbs as he slept. The telephone was ringing on the bedside table next to him, and he knew that it must be work. He felt a sharp dig in the ribs, prompting him to answer the ringing phone.

  “Answer it you lazy oaf,” Grace Farrington always sounded husky when she awoke, and it turned him on. That and her well toned body too.

  “Agent Tankersley,” he said gruffly, sounding like he had just woken up.

  “Morning John,” Major Stanley Timms sounded as perky as only he could in the middle of the night. The Major was responsible for the Terrorist Task Force, and the only person that Tank answered to. He was an ex-Royal Marine, Green Beret officer with a war record that would make Rambo blush.

  “Morning Major.”

  “I`ve had the results on the roadside bomb back from forensics.”

  “What do they tell us?” Tank yawned and stretched again.

  “The victim was indeed a member of the Ahmed family, unfortunately it was Mrs Ahmed in the vehicle,” the Major said matter of factly.

  “So, someone has scored a miss,” Tank said.

  “That`s what I thought, if they missed their target then they could be tempted to try again,” explained the Major.

  “Assuming that her husband was the target, does anyone know where he is?”

  “He`s not been traced yet, but we`re pretty certain that he`s in the country somewhere. We have to assume that he was the target,” the Major answered.

  “It doesn’t help us to identify the bombers though does it?”

  “No evidence at all on that front, the bomber was very thorough in removing incriminating DNA, so I suppose we are still faced with the usual suspects,” the Major stated the obvious, as the operation had been too well planned to be tarnished by a simple mistake.

  “I`ve been thinking about when we watched the interviews with the 18th Brigade men, including their leader Terry Nick,” Tank said.

  “What did you make of them?”

  “They have come a long way from the last time we were involved with them, more sophisticated, far more intelligent and legally well protected. They`re far better organised than they ever were, and exceptionally well funded, but...,” Tank left the sentence unfinished.

  “But what?”

  “Their leader didn’t seem to be hiding anything, although he made a no comment interview to most of the amateurish interrogation, I really don’t think he knew anything about it. He almost seemed intrigued by the crime scene photographs and impressed by the operation logistically,” Tank recounted his observations.

  “We have had a very unusual directive from Westminster regarding the Brigade,” the Major spoke cryptically.

  Grace had been lying still and listening to one side of the conversation, but she needed to pee, and she climbed out of the bed and walked across the room naked toward the bathroom beyond. Tank wondered at the muscular curves of her body, accentuated by her black skin.

  “Don`t tell me we can shoot them all?”

  “Unfortunately not, quite the opposite in actual fact,” the Major skirted the details, drawing out the conversation.

  “We have been instructed not to investigate the 18th Brigade unless we have irrefutable evidence that they have been involved in terrorist activities.”

  “I don’t understand, why would anyone protect them?”

  “Does Blackwater Worldwide mean anything to you?”

  “Of course they do. I had to work with some of their cowboy security guards in Iraq. What have they got to do with it?”

  “They are a little after my time really, what do you know about them?” Major Timms hadn’t been operational for many years.

  Grace walked back into the room with two steaming cups of coffee. The cups held a full pint, and were printed with the Disney character Grumpy, a reference to Tank`s demeanour in the morning. She passed one to Tank and then scrambled back into her side of the bed. He looked across at her beautiful black body and remembered how they had become lovers.

  Grace Farrington had beaten all the other female applicants during the selection trials and most of the men too. Whole rafts of men from a myriad of regiments were asked to apply to make the new Terrorist Task Force, along with a handful of women. She had finished third overall after the gruelling physical tests of strength and stamina. Her father had been the first ever black man to reach the rank of Regimental Sergeant Major in the British army, although he fought tooth and nail to prevent Grace from joining up, she stuck to her dream and was now at the ultimate peak for enlisted soldiers. She had become a key member of the elite taskforce, which consisted of the cream of Special Forces. Tank took a sip of his coffee and carried on talking to the major.

  “To cut a long story short, they were formed by an American Navy seal called Erik Prince in the late nineties, initially as a security contractor. They are based in North Carolina where they now have the largest tactical military training facility in the world, training upwards of forty thousand men every year, military offensive training, defensive operations and close personnel protection techniques,” Tank had learned a lot about Blackwater during his last tour of Iraq.

  “Forty thousand men every year, almost a small army.”

  “That is exactly what they have become. At the last count they had hired and trained over one hundred thousand men, all ex-military or ex-security services. The American government has a multi-billion dollar contract with them to provide close personnel protection all over the world, especially in Iraq, the Middle East and Afghanistan,” Tank explained.

  There had been uproar amongst the allied soldiers on Tank`s last posting when Blackwater troops began to arrive in Baghdad. They were earning three times the salary of a normal enlisted British soldier. They also operated with impunity, mercenaries allowed to run amok without consequence. The American government brought them in to relieve the stress on their conventional troops, initially as bodyguards, but as time progressed they were tasked with protecting embassies and government facilities.

  On September 16th, 2007, Blackwater guards opened fire in Nisour Square, Baghdad, killing seventeen civilians. Witnesses said that the mercenaries attacked unprovoked and continued to fire on civilians as they tried to run away. An FBI investigation found that at least fourteen of the dead were killed unjustifiably, and there was no evidence found to corroborate claims that the civilians opened fire on the Blackwater mercenaries. Because of their impunity they could not be prosecuted
by either Iraq or America.

  “It would seem that our government is in negotiations with sixteen large security companies in the British Isles, looking for them to provide a similar role in active battle theatres, releasing our troops for the front line,” the Major explained sounding very concerned.

  “What, and the 18th Brigade are one of those companies?”

  “They are not just one of them. The Brigade are being favoured because of their numbers and military style hierarchy. When that is combined with their apparent success at controlling violence they are on a short list. They have a surprisingly large number of ex-military personnel, policemen and security guards within their ranks,” the Major said.

  “I can`t believe Westminster would want to build a mercenary army.”

  “It`s just for personnel protection apparently.”

  “That`s how Blackwater started, and now they protect facilities as far away as the Philippines and Indonesia. Did you know that they were the first troops to be sent to New Orleans after hurricane Katrina hit?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Within twenty four hours they had shot three alleged looters,” Tank recalled.

  “All that aside do you think the 18th Brigade are involved in this roadside bomb attack?”

  Tank remained silent while the thoughts bounced around inside his bald head. The rise of giant security firms and mercenary armies across the Western world was a frightening concept, but a very real one too.

  “I don’t think that the organisation planned and executed the attack, no,” Tank admitted somewhat reluctantly.

  “Then we leave them alone for now. I`ll speak to you when you get into the office,” the Major sounded reluctant too.

  “I`ll be in shortly Major.”

  “Oh, one more thing John.”

  “What`s that?”

  “Say good morning to Grace for me please,” The Major rarely acknowledged that they were an item, it was against taskforce guidelines, but on the odd occasion he let it be known that he was aware of it.

  “Yes Major, see you later,” Tank smiled and hung up the telephone on its cradle.

  “What did he say?” Grace asked.

  “He said that I had to say good morning to you for him,” He turned to her and pulled her lithe body close to him.

  “How long have we got?” she whispered into his ear, her breath sending shivers down his spine.

  “Long enough.”

  Chapter Twenty Six

  Salford Towers

  Brendon stepped out of the lift on the top floor of the tower block and knelt down in a military defensive position, pointing his Uzi one way, and then the other, down the silent corridor. He pulled his balaclava down over his face and ran toward the roof access door. There was a rusted padlock hanging from a clasp and bracket fitting. Brendon had a small eight inch wrecking bar on his utility belt. He`d stolen the belt from his soldier brother the last time he was home on leave, before he`d been released from active service on mental health grounds. His brother was his hero, and a decorated veteran of three tours of Iraq, but the final tour had taken a heavy toll on the mental health of his older sibling, resulting in him being sectioned for months at a time, as he slipped in and out of severe fits of depression.

  Brendon had aspirations to follow his hero brother into the army, but a long list of minor criminal offences on his youth record had stopped him from joining up. The army refused to take young offenders into their ranks. He had dealt with the disappointment by joining the 18th Brigade, which was the closest thing to a military organisation that he could find, and they utilised his excessive penchant for violence to the full.

  Brendon slipped the bar into the padlock and snapped it down quickly with limited noise, no louder than a door being closed. He paused and waited a moment, listening for the sound of anyone moving behind the closed doors, alerted by his lock breaking.

  He couldn’t hear anything untoward so he opened the heavy door and entered the narrow stairwell beyond it. He closed the door behind him, leaving the access shaft in almost total darkness. There was a light switch next to him, but he was relishing his covert mission, and so he opted for a small penlight from the belt. That`s what his brother would have done, never expose yourself until you`re ready to be seen. As he switched the penlight on, a circle of light appeared on the stairs in front of him. There were six stone steps between him and the next door. He bounded up them in two strides, and then twisted the roof access door handle, which opened without complaint. There was no separate lock attached to it. The block management had assumed that if you had reached the roof door, then you must be an authorised key holder.

  On the roof he immediately spotted the maintenance cradle to his right. He ran toward it and leaned over the lip of the roof wall, trying to coordinate his position with that of the target flat. The height was awe inspiring. He could see right over the entire city, a panoramic view of a million twinkling streetlights stretching to the horizon. He looked down over the edge of the high rise tower block, and the vehicles below him looked like fixtures in a model village. A torch blinked from the car park six hundred feet below him. Brendon waved his penlight in answer to them, letting them know that he was in position.

  The torch light below moved across the car park and then climbed up the wall of the building, stopping above the window of flat number forty three, confirming its position to him. The cradle needed to be moved about seventy yards to the left, in order to be positioned directly above the fourth floor flat. The cradle was twelve feet long and hung from two U shaped bars, which were welded to a guide rail on the roof. The guide rail had a winding handle attached to it, and Brendon turned it quickly. The well oiled cog twisted silently, and the cradle moved without making a sound along the edge of the roof.

  Brendon leaned over the wall and checked the position again. It was set directly over the target row of windows. He cocked his leg over the wall and stepped into the cradle. The cradle swayed gently and he grasped the edges and froze, frightened by the dizzying height, yet flushed with adrenalin and excitement. He checked his kit again, three hand grenades, a lump hammer and his Uzi, all present and correct. Brendon crept along the cradle slowly toward the electric pulley motor. There was a square metal control box attached to the cradle by a thick extendable flex. He put the penlight into his mouth and gripped it between his teeth while he studied the buttons, up, down, and stop. He grinned in the darkness and pressed the button marked down. The cradle rocked gently as the motor whirred into life and began to descend toward the unsuspecting targets below.

  Chapter Twenty Seven

  Lewis

  Lewis regained consciousness with a jolt. He blinked and looked around, trying to get his bearings. The harsh reality of his situation came crashing down around him as he felt himself being dragged across a tiled floor. There were two sets of strong hands holding his arms in a vice like grip. He could see a trail of blood smeared across the beige tiles, which was leaking from his tennis shoe. The pain in his foot and ankle was mind numbing. It felt like it was on fire. The gag had been stuffed back into his mouth and he couldn’t swallow. The back of his throat tasted of acidic vomit and white spirit. He tried to shout for help, a futile attempt to escape the horror of his desperate circumstances. A crushing blow to the bridge of his nose deterred him from making any more noise. Blood ran freely from both nostrils and the thick coppery taste of his own life force mingled with the others, making him queasy. He felt like he was going to vomit again, but he knew that to do so would choke him.

  The surroundings changed as he was dragged into a lift. Stainless steel walls daubed with graffiti, and numerous bodily excretions, and the overwhelming stink of urine floated into his surreal world of pain. Lewis felt like his senses were being completely swamped, pain, panic, and fear mixed with a sickening myriad of tastes and smells. He knew that he was probably about to die, but he still couldn’t embrace it. He wanted to fight it. All the years of war and violence that he had experi
enced in his native Somalia flashed before his eyes. He could have died a million times before this moment. He wondered if he had survived all that Somalia had thrown at him only to die with a stinking rag choking him to death. The elevator doors opened and he was dragged out onto a wide landing area.

  Each landing led to a small community of ten apartments, five to the left hand side, and five to the right. There were three two bedroom flats on each side, and two, three bedroom flats on the other, which balanced the use of the architectural living space. The even numbers were to the right, and the odd numbers were to the left. Lewis felt himself being dragged to the left of the landing. His injured foot snagged on the lift door as he was pulled through it, sending stabbing bolts of pain shooting through his body. He arched his back, every muscle in his body tensed to combat the pain. He screamed in agony but the gag muffled the sound to a garbled cry. There was another heavy blow to his already broken nose, rendering him useless. Unconsciousness dragged at his befuddled mind, mercifully dulling his senses. He heard voices whispering but they seemed very far away now, as his brain began to shut down, and he drifted toward the darkness.