Singapore Sling Shot

by Andrew Grant

  The hearse was waiting on the street when we arrived outside the Sacred Dream Funeral Parlour. Who comes up with names like that? I thought as we cruised up to it. The hearse pulled away into the lead and the rest of the vehicles came after. From Clementi, it was a relatively short drive to Choa Chu Kang and the cemetery itself.

  I’d never been to Choa Chu Kang Cemetery before. I’d never had cause to. It was huge and divided, it seemed, into separate smaller cemeteries for different religious groups. The driver of the hearse seemed to know exactly where he was going, which for everyone was probably a relief.

  Angels with wings and awkward pious figures stood with their heads bowed. There were hundreds and hundreds of conventional crosses. It seemed we were in Christian territory, Catholic even. Graves, old and new, filled the immediate horizon. The coarse grass was long. In places, it almost covered tombs and headstones. In other places, it had been cut short.

  We stopped. We were here.

  “Stanley and his family are buried here,” Sami told me. “I have arranged for Simone to be buried beside them.” Justine gave him a grateful smile. Jo opened the door and we slowly climbed out. There was rain in the air, but hopefully it would hold off. Petrol-powered grass cutters sounded in the distance. The cemetery custodians, it seemed, were fighting their never-ending battle against overgrown weeds.

  The grave was a black gash in the dirt. Squares of artificial lawn had been laid around it and positioned to hide the pile of dirt that had been removed. The undertaker’s cradle was positioned above the grave to receive the coffin. Assistants were removing flowers from the hearse and positioning them around the gravesite. It was all very civilised, all very practised and safe.

  The other vehicles had arrived and mourners were gathering around the gravesite. I noted the tomb beside the open grave. It was a huge affair. The marble was new. I didn’t have to go there to know this was where Stanley and his family lay.

  The priest came to the rear of the hearse. Sami gave me an almost imperceptible nod. He turned to the children and whispered to them. Justine was already prepared for what was to come, this, the final physical act she could participate in to lay her sister to rest.

  The undertaker and an assistant eased the casket out. Jo took one handle by himself, Justine and Angela shared one, while Sami and I took the other pair. It was only a short distance to the grave, and with the undertaker and his assistant hovering, we made it. The coffin was placed on the cradle and the priest called everyone in closer. Reluctantly, the mourners did as directed. There were now probably fifty or sixty people gathered to bid farewell to Simone DeLue. The rain started and umbrellas appeared like mushrooms.

  The priest began with a eulogy of his own. As he talked, my mind started to play the sort of games that used to be a part of my everyday life, the other life, the one I played in the shadows.

  Here, in the spectacular coffin lying there in front of us, was a young vibrant woman, the victim of a stupid accident. She had fallen down a stairwell and died. People died in accidents all the time, every day, every hour, every minute, every second probably.

  Coincidence in my world is a dirty word. There is no such thing. Things happen for a reason. If you believe in God, then it is God’s reason. Everything else happens and I believe the random or fickle finger of fate is a vastly overrated entity. Is anything about life or death truly random? Was it all pre-ordained and written in a big book in a heavenly archive as many maintain?

  As the priest continued to speak, I looked up and slowly turned my head to look at all of us gathered there. Sami was beside me. Justine next and then the children. Jo stood to my left and slightly behind me. The others, apart from the three former hostages, I didn’t know, but here we all were, gathered in a cluster around the grave.

  Then it, the nagging thing that had been playing on the edge of my subconscious, found a coherent voice. What if Simone’s death hadn’t been an accident? What if somehow Thomas Lu had orchestrated it? Lu would have anticipated that Sami, who had gone to great lengths to seek the release of the hostages, would, of course, be in attendance at Simone’s funeral. What better opportunity to take Sami Somsak out of the equation with a well-placed round from a sniper’s weapon?

  Even as that thought crossed my mind, I knew Sami had it covered. He had people scattered throughout the cemetery watching for just that eventuality: mourners with large bunches of flowers, flowers that smelt of gun oil, and eyes that were scanning every inch of the massive cemetery.

  The coffin! The thought hit me from out of the blue. In my previous life, moments, nanoseconds even, of understanding had saved my life and the lives of others. Now was such a moment.

  Suddenly it made sense, all of it! As I opened my mouth to shout a warning I already knew it was too late. A dull metallic click sounded over the voice of the priest.

  “Get down!” I finally managed to scream out as I threw myself sideways. I slammed into Sami, driving him down and away from me as the air exploded around us.

  36

  Lying there in the rank grass, time seemed to move in slow motion. I was lying prone with most of my torso behind the concrete slab of a low grave. As an automatic reflex, my head was turned away from the direction of the blast. I was looking at the flank of the hearse parked ten metres beyond me and seeing it with the pure clarity of my instant adrenaline overload.

  The sound that filled everything around me was a mixture of the sonic whiplash of high explosive and the voice of a million angry wasps. In front of my eyes the hearse, a big, white American tank, rocked on its springs as every scrap of glass disintegrated into sparkling dust. The metal flanks of the wagon rippled and pocked as dozens of holes appeared. The sound of a giant tin opener punching holes in cans underlaid the whine of the metallic wasps that filled the air. The shrill sound of ricochets as metal impacted on the metal and stonework of hundreds of memorials and tombstones created another layer of sound. Then there were the screams and shrieks as the deadly shrapnel found human targets.

  As I lay there, I heard the symphony of death and destruction with total clarity. Part of me, the professional me, was analysing the sounds, dividing them into a macabre list.

  When a projectile of any sort impacts with a human body, there is always a sound. Hit through the chest, human lungs and the diaphragm often pop like balloons. Meatier slaps tell of hits to the heavier areas of the body, a strike in the head sounds like a leather pillow being struck hard with a baseball bat. All of these sounds and more I heard as the roar of the explosions rolled on over me.

  I looked up, and above me the face of an angel appeared silhouetted against the grey sky. I had a glimpse of her bending towards me, her expression more blank than beautiful. Then my world went as black as death itself.

  Thomas Lu was waiting for word that his plan had succeeded. The sound of sirens had filled the Singapore evening. News reports speculated that a terrorist bomb had exploded in Choa Chu Kang Cemetery. Police and military units had sealed off the entire area. A stream of ambulances was reported running a shuttle between the cemetery and both the National University Hospital and Singapore General Hospital.

  It was mid-morning and Thomas Lu was seated in front of the wide-screen television in his study. He hadn’t moved since the explosion. The device used in the cemetery had contained a radio receiver and an electric detonator. Several of his people had been watching from a distance using a high-powered video camera trained on the Christian cemetery. They had waited, as instructed, until the service had begun, and then the bomb had been detonated.

  Lu smiled. It was a thin smile, one without any humour whatsoever. The bomb had been more than just a simple device. With several kilograms of C4 explosive at its core, and sandwiched top and bottom with thick steel plates, hundreds of steel ball bearings had been packed around the core. When the device had been detonated, the plates contained the vertical upwards and downwards force of the blast just long enough to send the deadly swarm of the shrapnel blast out of th
e coffin like a deadly scythe.

  The bomb had been the handiwork of one of Lu’s newest recruits, an Afghani-born bomb maker, a master of deadly IED booby traps who had perfected his art in decades of conflict in his own country before seeking gainful employment in Asia.

  “The authorities have not yet provided us with casualty figures,” one of the newsreaders was saying. The young woman was trying to maintain her most professional face, but she was failing. Her male counterpart, a man probably fifteen years her senior, was doing little better. Underlying the makeup, the pair’s faces struggled to hide the shock they were both feeling. They had seen live footage of the carnage that had taken place via their own news teams. The general public had not seen those terrible images and probably never would.

  “Estimates are that between twenty and twenty-five people have been killed and at least the same number again were injured, many of them seriously. It is not known who detonated the device or for what reason.”

  Lu sat back in his seat and this time, he did allow himself a smile, a genuine one. There was no way that anyone in the immediate vicinity of the coffin and the graveside could have survived. Sami Somsak and his inner circle must have died. Somsak was human and not a superman, and even if he’d been wearing a bulletproof vest or full body armour, he would have died in the blast.

  Lu rang the bell on his desk. It was time to indulge in a little celebration. He would have his secretary make a phone call and summon company. For the rest of this day and long into the evening, he would not celebrate alone.

  Call made, Thomas Lu switched channels. The bombing was the lead story on CNN as well. He sat and watched, sipping a glass of expensive whisky.

  “… Singapore cemetery. The explosive device is thought to have been an extremely sophisticated one. Singapore military bomb disposal and forensic officers describe it as the sort of improvised bomb widely used in the ongoing conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq.”

  “The number of dead has grown to twenty-eight, following the deaths of two seriously injured casualties last night and this morning.”

  “Officials say that several other survivors are still in a critical condition and are not expected to live.”

  “More on the fatal Singapore bombing in our special bulletin next.”

  The two CNN newsreaders tossed the grim facts backwards and forwards like a football, watched by millions of people around the world, including the smiling Thomas Lu.

  37

  We’d crossed the Mekong in the small hours of the morning three nights before. Now we were in the jungle, staked out on a small ridge. The window we’d cut in the canopy allowed us a view across a narrow valley containing rice fields and gardens. There was a compound on the far side. Tall bamboo fences, earthworks and guard towers contained men with all manner of guns. It was a place where the uninvited were definitely not welcome. We most certainly were not on the invitation list.

  “Good to be back in the bush again, Daniel?”

  “Fuck off!”

  Sami Somsak laughed at my childish response. Jo Ankar, who was ten feet above us, sitting in the crotch of a tree, chuckled. The three of us had played this game before, many times. I used my bandana to wipe away the sweat from my brow and retied it around my head. I did love the bush, it just didn’t do to show it. I was more at home here than on the streets of any city.

  The jungle, or as we call it “the bush”, is pretty much the same in Cambodia as it is on the other side of the river. Same trees. Same bugs. Same snakes and the same stifling heat accompanied by the same unrelenting humidity. It’s like living in a sauna stocked with all manner of biting pests. Oh, how I wanted to be riding along in the air-conditioned comfort of the Range Rover I was holding in the sights of the .50 calibre Barrett I was lying behind.

  The magnification on the varipower scope was set at x9. It could go up to x20, but long experience had shown me that all the higher magnification did was magnify the motion of my breathing and the slightest movement of my hands. Even the beating of my heart produced a constant repeated quiver at the higher magnification. So I kept the setting under the double digits.

  The Range Rover was stationary, sitting in the open gate of the compound. The distance was 700 metres. I knew this for a fact because one of our friendly overhead satellites had measured it most precisely. The centre of the broad but shallow stream that divided the valley was 300 metres away.

  “Here he comes.” Jo was using a pair of high magnification binoculars. He’d picked out our target as he exited the compound and climbed into the Range Rover. “He appears to have someone with him. I can’t make them out. Going in the back seat.”

  Through the scope, the rear door hid my view. Jo was able to see far more from his vantage point.

  “That’s unfortunate for someone,” I responded, rolling out from behind the huge rifle and standing. We were in no danger of being seen here. Deep under the forest canopy, we were invisible. I stretched and took a few pre-game deep breaths. When the action came down, it would be short, sharp and very brutal.

  The Barrett, a semi-automatic heavy hitter, was the ultimate sniper weapon. It fired a big 750-grain phosphorous bronze projectile or any one of half a dozen specialised rounds. These ranged from armour piercing rounds to those with explosive tips. The weapon could wreak havoc on any soft-skinned target. The Range Rover was soft-skinned. As, of course, were the people in it. There was no known body armour capable of stopping the enormous round.

  “He’s moving,” Jo called and that was my cue to get down to business. I pulled off my gloves to push squishy earplugs into my ears. The other two did likewise. We all pulled our gloves back on. They were essential. We weren’t leaving anything behind on this job but spent brass.

  The earplugs were a necessity because we knew there would soon be a lot of noise. Effectively, Jo was to be my spotter. I had a mixture of projectiles in the eleven-round magazine already in the gun. The rounds included a tracer. A tracer fired into a petrol tank had a very good chance of creating a fireball, and that was most desirable. Sami had a fully loaded spare magazine beside him. There was a round in the breech of the rifle and with two magazines of eleven each; simple math said I had twenty-three rounds to play with to do the job. When they were gone, we would move out fast.

  Behind the scope again, I settled and eased the crosshair onto the advancing vehicle. The Range Rover was driving straight towards us. The point where the river and the dirt track bisected was ground zero for me. The scope was calibrated to absolute zero at three hundred metres.

  The bugs buzzed and the sweat droplets formed and streaked their way down my cheeks, but I was locked in the zone. My concentration on the job in hand was total.

  At four hundred metres, I could plainly see him at the wheel. Dimitri Chekov was his name. He was a Russian bear and he was as big and as mean as one. Chekov was known as “the Headhunter”. This former KGB colonel was one of the most vicious killers in the dirty game we all played. Following his KGB and intertwining military career, he turned his talents to crime, big crime. Chekov had been based in Asia for the past five years with a hard-core Russian mafia made up of mostly former Spetsnaz troops and a few local thugs.

  Drugs and arms were Chekov’s currency. He had become a major player and a major problem for both my people and the Americans, both of whom wanted Chekov taken out with all due prejudice. That was why I was lying there sweating my bollocks off in the godforsaken Cambodian jungle.

  “Three hundred and fifty,” Jo called from above. I settled my breathing. The first shot would be aimed at Chekov sitting behind the wheel. Sun rays were falling on the windscreen and flaring back at me. I cursed. It didn’t matter. Sun flare or not, I knew where the driver was seated. That was where I was aiming.

  The Range Rover arrived at the ford and slowly started across. The 300-metre mark was dead centre in the stream.

  “Now!” I whispered. I took the trigger pressure and the big rifle kicked and thundered. The Barrett has a
real bellow, but the kick and muzzle-rise are negated by a lot of trick modifications, including an enormous muzzle brake. The flame of the first shot was away. A crimson streak sliced through the thick air and terminated in the front left of the vehicle’s windscreen. The sun flare vanished, as did the windscreen. I fired the second round to the same spot and then shortened my aim, settling on the front of the vehicle.

  The tracer and incendiary rounds that followed all hit home. With an engine that no longer functioned and with flames bursting from under the ruined bonnet, the Range Rover slewed side on and ground to a stop in the middle of the stream. Sami was handing me the full magazine. I changed and went after the fuel tank. Had I got Chekov? I had to believe so.

  When the second incendiary from the fresh magazine hit its target, the Rover’s fuel tank exploded. In seconds, the vehicle became a complete fireball. I hammered the remainder of the magazine into the driver’s compartment. The Barrett wasn’t going back across the river with us and when the ammunition was finished, that was it.

  “No sign of life,” Jo called from above as I stood. It was done. The Range Rover was a gutting mass of flame. Burning fuel was flowing downstream. Reeds and grasses at the water’s edge were catching fire. We were out of here.

  I pulled out my earplugs and pushed them into my pocket. Long tubes of shiny brass covered the ground around the Barrett. The cartridges had been wiped clean of any fingerprints and had been loaded into the magazines by gloved hands. We were leaving behind a big who-dunnit!

  I picked up the rifle and slung it across my shoulder. Jo dropped down out of the tree and the three of us started back the way we had come. Would there be a pursuit? We had to factor that into the equation, but without their leader, would Chekov’s mob attempt it? Either way, we had a lot of ground to cover. The principle we always operated on was based on the SAS model: hit hard with overwhelming firepower and get out fast, outrun the opposing force and get far beyond any of the roadblocks they had set up.