Zero Hour (2010) ns-13

by Andy McNab

  Anybody out here would have to be totally off their heads. If I got challenged I’d pretend to be a drugged-up dickhead. It was pretty much how I felt right now.

  That thought triggered a memory of my old mate Charlie. He’d been on his last legs about five years ago, and he’d done one final job to earn his family a wad before he keeled over. But I already had the money. I had what Charlie had been after. Why the fuck was I still doing it?

  Fuck it - it must be the rain making me miserable. I knew why I was here, and it wasn’t just to have one last crack. It was also about Lilian and those poor fuckers in the green house in Copenhagen, and the rest of them who’d been fucked up and fucked over by those shaven-headed bastards. I couldn’t clear my mind of the sounds and images of what had happened above our heads while Anna was posing as the world’s most uncompromising trafficker. The guys in that house were animals, and someone had to stop that shit happening. I wasn’t going to be saving the world single-handed: I was small fry and hadn’t got much time left to go on a crusade. But I could get one girl out, and maybe free the others, even if it was just a pinprick in the shit-pile.

  There was less than a hundred metres to go now. I still couldn’t see any cameras or motion sensors. That didn’t mean there weren’t any. If the intention was to detect people rather than deter them, they might have gone for concealment.

  I pulled up about twenty metres short, looked and listened. The silhouette of the silo tower rose into the night sky; it dwarfed the remaining two-thirds of the building. I could make out two windows on the ground floor to the right of it, and two more one storey up. The arrangement made sense of Anna’s description of the interior: two doors each side of the front entrance and a staircase on the left. There were no lights that I could see, and no movement.

  A concrete strip ran from the front of the silo to the chained gates on Distelweg. The dock was less than thirty metres away from other side of the tower.

  The silo was the only old building in the area. Maybe it was some kind of historical monument. Or maybe it just hadn’t figured in anyone’s regeneration plans yet. Everything else I’d seen had been thrown up with new brick or metal sheeting.

  I found a slab of old concrete to sit down on and cocked an ear towards the target. I stayed like that for five minutes. Only then did I look around me, giving my unconscious the chance to take in as much as it could.

  My jeans clung to my legs. My boots weighed a tonne. I didn’t have to fake it too much when I swayed towards the silo, hands in pockets. If someone was watching me, I’d look as though I was doped up to the eyeballs.

  I mooched along to the left, to the silo tower. The closer I got, the more obvious it was that there were no cameras. It looked as though they’d decided not to draw attention to themselves by throwing up surveillance equipment.

  I liked doing this part of the job, just as I enjoyed going through Passport Control on fake documents and all that shit. Beating the system always had given me a buzz, ever since I was being a total arsehole on the Bermondsey estates.

  The silo was square and about sixty metres tall. The bricks were rotting and most of the pointing had fallen out. The only things that seemed to hold it together were the old steel reinforcing plates that ran up the sides, and a thick layer of graffiti.

  There was no entry point on the gable end. I moved to the corner on the side nearest the water, and sank slowly to my knees. I craned my neck gently round at muddy ground level.

  There was no light whatsoever here. The concrete stretched all the way down to the dock, interrupted only by weeds pushing up stubbornly through the cracks. A big section of hard standing lined the water’s edge, where a crane had probably once stood. A conveyor-belt ran down to it from the top of the silo at a forty-five-degree angle, supported by a steel framework made from the world’s biggest and rustiest set of Meccano.

  Noord 5 was five hundred metres away on the other side of the water. Its street-lighting and the intermittent sweep of car headlamps did nothing to help me. I put my ear to the brickwork to listen for a generator, but heard nothing.

  I moved along the front of the building, covertly now, until I reached two large steel doors big enough to drive a truck through. Yet more weeds grew right up against them, looking like they were intent on forcing entry. None of them had been trodden on or driven over. Two padlocks were covered by security cups so you couldn’t cut through them, and the huge rusty crossbars looked like they hadn’t been shifted any time this century.

  I carried on towards the far gable end. More windows: two up, two down, all boarded up with metal anti-vandal sheeting. I put an ear to the one I hoped the girls were still behind. There wasn’t a sound.

  I found the door Anna had gone in through. It had two locks. Going by the shine on the brass inserts, they were almost brand new. I sat against it, switching back into dosser mode, and had a look around. The next nearest building was a two-level warehouse or factory about three hundred metres away on the perimeter of the wasteground. Again: no light, no noise, no movement. This silo was a good place to hide people.

  I put my ear to the lower keyhole. Nothing. I stuck my nose against it and inhaled deeply. I might be able to smell cooking or a cigarette, anything at all that would give me an indication of life. But all I got, as Anna had said I would, was the aroma of cake shop.

  I got to my feet and gave the top and bottom of the double doors a push. They didn’t give an inch. They were bolted from the inside. Somebody had to be in there.

  There was no other entrance apart from this one and the large steel doors, as far as I could tell. But that didn’t mean it was the only means of access.

  I walked back to the conveyor-belt and started to climb. I only had to scale four or five metres of Meccano, but the junctions I used as hand- and footholds were awkwardly spaced and the steel was rusty and wet. By the time I heaved myself over the top, I felt like I’d completed an assault course.

  The conveyor-belt itself was just over a metre wide. Its rubberized fabric was rotten and frayed and a lot of the steel banding was exposed. I raised myself slowly onto my hands and knees and started to crawl. Almost immediately, the rubber between the rollers gave way with a loud, tearing sound. I dropped flat, listened and watched. Then I decided not to fuck around. If they’d seen me, they’d seen me. It wasn’t as if I could do anything about it. I might as well carry on until I heard the shouts.

  The belt led up to a pair of rusty metal doors each about a metre square. A gentle push and they opened.

  The brickwork was four courses thick. If there was still any flour in there, it would be bone dry. I edged forward on my elbows until my chest was on the lip of the hatchway and peered down. Right at the bottom, the faintest flicker of light showed through what looked like a tunnel connecting the silo with the rest of the building.

  A vertical access ladder was fixed to the wall. I curled my body until I was able to reach my boots, unlace them and tug them off. I scraped off the worst of the mud on the top edge of the Meccano, tied the laces together and slung them round my neck. I eased myself back through the hatch, feet first, until I made contact with the top rung. I took a breath and started down.

  After about twenty metres I stopped to look and listen. My feet hurt without the boots to protect them, but that was better than leaving mud on the ladder or having clumps of it fall off and land below.

  The further down I went, the stronger the smell of flour and the brighter the light. I paused again just before reaching the ground. The edges of the silo were lined with flour two or three feet high.

  I stepped down onto a concrete base. I didn’t need to worry where I trod. There were plenty of disturbances in the flour, including footprints.

  The opening into the rest of the building was about the size of a garage door. Steel shutters above it were locked in the up position.

  Very slowly, I moved my head around the corner. A brick wall stood immediately opposite me, in the middle of which was a door. Two
windows either side of it were in darkness. There were also three windows on the second floor of what had probably once been offices. Light spilt from the one on the right - enough for me to see its haze reflecting off the remains of what had once been hundreds of tonnes of flour dust piled up against the walls.

  A body moved across the window.

  I froze.

  Male, early twenties. Both forearms dark with tattoos; cigarette in mouth; bare-chested and overweight. His bitch tits wobbled as he moved.

  He shouted something to someone and gestured at his crotch. A young girl shuffled into view. Her hair was dark and frizzy. She sank slowly to her knees in front of him. Her head disappeared below the sill. Bitch Tits soon had a slack smile on his face. He looked down at her, took a deep drag and flicked some ash onto her head.

  I stayed where I was. If there was just one of them, maybe I could take him now, then get Lilian and the rest of them out.

  I heard screams from the ground floor, along with some very pissed-off male shouting.

  The door to Bitch Tits’s office burst open. The new arrival wore a lot of black leather. His head was shaved, neo-Nazi style. His face had multiple piercings.

  Bitch Tits wasn’t impressed by what he was hearing. ‘Well, fucking find her! Don’t you dare fucking lose her!’

  He was a Brit - a Scouser. It was beginning to sound like a family business.

  The ground-floor office door was also thrown wide. This time the yells were Dutch.

  I didn’t see any of the bodies. I was too busy climbing back up the ladder as fast as my legs would carry me.

  12

  I lay on my side at the top of the conveyor-belt and pulled my boots back on. I gulped in mouthfuls of air. The smell of decayed rubber made me gag.

  The shouts below me - now in heavily accented English - echoed round the tower.

  ‘There is nothing.’

  ‘She is not here.’

  More shouts from the Dutch guys outside. Bodies bomb-burst from the door. Bitch Tits screamed with anger - or it could have been fear. His voice was high-pitched, out of control. ‘Fucking get out there! Fucking find the bitch!’

  I finished tying my laces and started reversing carefully down the conveyor-belt, keeping as low as I could. A few metres below me, fucked-off men tried to organize themselves for the hunt. It wasn’t working. Bitch Tits was going completely ballistic in Scouse. ‘Yous cunts! We’ll all be in the shite! Get out there!’

  By the time I was about two-thirds of the way down, the shouts had begun to fade. I stared into the darkness. The search party had spread into the wasteground. I jumped the last couple of metres and ran for cover.

  I legged it in the direction of Distelweg, making each big chunk of concrete a single bound. I checked the ground ahead as best I could, straining my ears for the shout that would signal they’d found her. She’d be terrified. Maybe she’d got stuck trying to get over the fence - desperately wanting to, but having lost all control because she was so scared.

  I heard nothing. Total silence. The Dutch must have gone out via the gate or jumped the fence. Keeping in the shadows, I used my three-light marker to navigate back to the gap. Someone else had been through here since I last had. Someone in bare feet. I could see the mark of my boots in the mud, and also the imprint of small, frantic toes.

  I slipped through and kept to the edge of the road, almost hugging the fence. The search party would be moving up and down Distelweg by now, checking every bit of cover, flapping more and more as the minutes ticked by.

  I came level with the Panda and felt around in the scrub for the keys. Once inside I powered down the window and had one last listen before I fired up the engine.

  Lights extinguished, I moved off slowly, following the road on the bay side of the dock. It started to rain again.

  There was a massive thump on the front of the car. I braked hard.

  A face flew up out of nowhere and banged against the windscreen. For a split second, all I could see was a mass of wet blonde hair and a pair of big scared eyes.

  I threw the engine out of gear. Fuck the handbrake. I jumped out to grab her.

  By the time I got round to the front of the car the girl was already scrabbling along the tarmac. There was blood on her face. Her jeans were soaked. Her feet were bare.

  ‘Lilian?’

  She was swallowed up by the shadows as quickly as she’d appeared.

  I stopped and listened.

  Nothing.

  I jumped back into the Panda. There was a streak of blood on the windscreen. If it was Lillian, I had to get to her before those fuckers did.

  I moved off, nice and slow, windows down.

  13

  I drove across the canal and into the prefab estate. A left took me back towards the Distelweg bridge. I parked up about a hundred metres further on and tucked Brad’s mallet into the waistband of my jeans. I’d move back onto the target on foot and start searching again from there. I didn’t want to take the car through the area twice that night. It was bad drills. Bitch Tits and his mates might still be out there.

  The shop lights splashed across the wet pavements. I was hungry and thirsty, and it was going to be a long night. I went into a mini-mart and bought crisps, pitta bread and a bottle of water. I managed the whole transaction without a single word to the guy behind the counter. I just grunted and paid.

  I jammed the crisps into the bread as I walked past a line of graffiti-covered boathouses. I kept close to the walls and fences of the industrial units, ready to dodge oncoming headlights. I threw the last of the crisp sandwich down my neck as I approached the tile warehouse.

  I heard a cry.

  Then male laughter, followed by grunts and curses, monosyllabic and aggressive.

  I took a couple of steps.

  And heard it again.

  There was a blur of movement from beneath the canopy. The girl ran from the shadows, naked and sobbing. Two guys appeared behind her. Too fast, too powerful. They grabbed her and dragged her back into the darkness.

  It wasn’t hard to work out what they were doing to her. I just needed to know how many of them were doing it.

  Another cry. Part pain, part despair.

  It looked like Bitch Tits was the only one allowed to sample the merchandise on site, and this lot fancied a taster before they dragged her back to him.

  14

  Rhythmic sobs continued to come from under the canopy. I inched forward, fingers closing around the handle of the mallet.

  I heard more grunts and A couple of slaps. There was a muffled, anguished scream followed by a chorus of laughter. The air was heavy with cannabis.

  There were four of them, all fully paid-up members of the neo-Nazi club. Crew-cuts, tattoos and plenty of face metal were the order of the day. The girl was on her knees. Three of them stood around her with their jeans halfway down their thighs. A fourth lounged against the door with a stupid grin on his face, smoking a joint. It was either his turn to chill, or he preferred to watch.

  The girl’s bloodstained face was rounder and younger than the image I had of Lilian. Much younger. She took a couple more slaps to the head to make her work harder.

  A million years of training told me there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t intervene. Bad things happen. This shit went on a million times a day, all over the world. I was here for a job. I wasn’t the UN. I needed to let this run its course. Four guys here raping this girl meant four fewer guarding Lilian. I needed to stop fucking around and get back to the silo.

  But there was another voice in my head. Anna’s voice. What about this girl? What about her parents, her sisters, her brothers? How would you feel if this was happening to someone you cared for, if this was happening to me?

  I looked round for something heavier than the mallet. A bit of scaffolding would have come in handy. A wheel-brace, maybe …

  Then I checked myself. What family? Every scrap of experience and years of fucking up screamed at me: I had to let this one go
.

  I turned and headed back the way I’d come. I’d have to pull my finger out if I wanted to get this job done by first light.

  When I’d covered about twenty metres I straightened up and shoved the mallet back into the waistband of my jeans.

  Another heartbreaking scream pierced the darkness.

  Fuck it.

  I pulled the mallet out again and turned back.

  I was in auto mode, en route to a possible nightmare. I’d need to be quick and hard - just take them down and run. After that, the girl would have to sort her own shit out.

  I got within a few metres of them. She was still on her knees. The one in front of her looked up just in time to see me jump into the air and bring the mallet down hard a couple of inches above his eyebrows. He didn’t say a word. He couldn’t. All I heard was a loud pop as the toughened rubber worked its kinetic shit and he crumpled to the floor.

  I spun round, swung back my arm and zoned in on the guy to my right. He got the good news just above the temple. He groaned and collapsed onto the girl.

  She whimpered and tried to kick him off.

  I turned to the other two. The one with the spliff was still some distance from Planet Earth, and instead of rushing me, the other stupid fucker was pulling up his jeans. I barged against him. He staggered back under the canopy, arms windmilling, and crashed into his mate.

  I didn’t give them a second to recover.

  Mr Windmill’s jeans had slipped back round his knees.

  I swung the mallet from right to left, demolishing his cheekbone and part of his jaw. He howled with pain. It didn’t make up for what he’d done to the girl, but it was a start.

  Mr Spliff threw up his arms to protect himself, but he still wasn’t up to speed. I cannoned into him. As he went down I gave him two more quick hits. He’d managed to cover his head, so I snapped his wrist with the first blow and banged the second into his bollocks. That opened him up big-time. I brought down the mallet right on top of his closely shaven nut. Hard rubber smashed into soft bone with a dull thud. He wasn’t going anywhere fast. He wasn’t going anywhere, period.