Rotten Gods
Page 30
‘You,’ Léon says, ‘are coming with me.’ With a shove he propels the drunken man towards the door.
He does not even turn to farewell the blonde, who sinks back to her seat, watching him go.
Within thirty minutes the contractor, Robert Collins — Robbie to his mates — is showered and drinking coffee in an interview room, dazed and subdued. For an hour, Abdullah and Léon fire questions, establishing his bona fides, waking his employer from his London bed in a final check that he is who he says he is and not some red herring.
His authenticity established, it only remains to decide whether this new information is drunken fabrication or fact, and the level of detail provided soon points towards the latter. In the end, Abdullah sends him to the residential complex, under guard, to sleep off the alcohol.
When the door closes, the two men stand before the windows, curtain buffeting in the light sea breeze, staring out across the night. Léon cannot resist a flash of a smile at his own success in finding the electrician. The regret at not having the girl is a small thing in comparison. Perhaps when this thing is over …
‘Do you see the power station over there?’ Abdullah asks.
It is impossible to miss the huge complex, with its rows of giant steel pylons carrying power to the most electricity hungry city on earth. Beyond are the tall funnels of the station itself, painted red and white in bands. ‘Yes, sir.’
‘As you know, there is a maintenance platform near the top of one of the funnels, and we have had men with optical equipment up there observing the conference room since the crisis began.’
‘Yes, of course.’ The conference room has just one window, and the power station funnel is the only point from which it is possible to see through it.
‘Dr Abukar has taken to occupying a particular seat, for part of the day and most of the night. Zhyogal moves around almost constantly, but Dr Abukar does not.’
Léon is starting to smile. ‘How far away from the conference room is your observation post at the power station?’
‘Nine hundred and thirty metres. Out of accurate range of conventional small arms, but what about a fifty-calibre sniper rifle firing an armour-piercing projectile, sighted in for precisely that distance? It’ll make short work of even cyrolon. One or two rounds punching straight through the window, followed a moment later by a high-explosive round, striking Dr Abukar in the head or upper body, not just killing, but obliterating him. At the same moment someone on the inside flicks a switch that makes the doors open and the lights go out. In come our troops. Sound interesting?’
‘What if Dr Abukar presses the remote control before he dies?’
‘He does not always have the trigger in his hand. Much of the time he carries it in his pocket. Our man will not shoot if he is holding it.’ Abdullah says nothing further, just stares out at the power station smokestacks.
The shadow beneath the tree is a welcome sanctuary, so dark that Captain Pennington’s blackened face is invisible without the goggles.
PJ moves in on his hands and knees, then rises to his haunches, feeling the relief in the strained muscles of his thighs, abdomen and back. ‘They’re in there. I saw them. Two girls and the nanny.’
‘That fits with this.’ Pennington opens his hand, displaying something that shines even in the shadows.
PJ takes the object from his hand, holding it close to his right eye. ‘What the hell is it?’
‘A tiny gold star. Jewellery perhaps. Deepak found it on a recce down to the harbour. How many guards are there?’
‘Twelve at least, fifteen at most. Carrying AK47s, two heavy MGs.’
‘Their positions?’
PJ describes what he has seen.
Pennington says nothing for a moment then, ‘There’s four or five more down at the harbour, guarding the boat.’
This information is sobering. At least twenty well-equipped militants, and these Almohad have proved in the past to be no pushover. These ones, moreover, occupy a strong defensive position. PJ’s eyes lock on Pennington’s, trying to gauge what he is thinking, knowing that it is going to be hard.
Dark shapes slither into the shadows under the tree. Sitting up, waiting, the silence thick and heavy. The tension is palpable. No one likes entering a hostile zone full of adrenalin then being forced to wait.
Pennington’s voice is clear and emotionless in the night. ‘We’re going to have to abort, I’m afraid.’
No one says anything for a moment, then PJ explodes, his voice still low, but thick with shock. ‘Sir? The hostages are there, and they are being mistreated.’
‘No. I can’t see any way of taking out the terrorists without giving them an opportunity to slaughter the hostages. Therefore I have no choice.’
‘Forgive me for saying so, captain, but there is a way.’
‘How?’
‘The Enniskillen Drill. We’ve practised it a hundred times.’ The name Enniskillen referred to an unpublicised hostage rescue in Northern Ireland. ‘Set Stewie and Dave up high with their rifles to take out the terrorists inside the hut with the girls, hit the guys around the fire with the rocket launcher. Disable the trench with grenades at the same time. We can be inside the hut in ten seconds.’
‘That might be too long,’ the captain points out.
PJ thinks of the girls, knowing that if he walks away their captors will kill them — as soon as they are of no further use those monsters will kill them. ‘We have to take that chance. There is no other way.’
‘What about the harbour? There are another five men down there, maybe more.’
‘We have to leave it until after we’ve freed the hostages. We can’t divide our forces.’
The silence stretches on for a long time, but finally: ‘OK, we do it, but we do it my way. The Enniskillen Drill, but I want CS gas into the hostage hut.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
‘Does everyone understand what they have to do?’
Silence.
‘Take the lead, Johnson, and good luck.’
PJ stands and takes the first step towards his enemy, and the girls, and the tall woman with so much spirit.
The drill is so well rehearsed and understood that men move to their positions without a sound. PJ’s eyes stray often to his watch, for timing is critical. A few seconds either way might be catastrophic.
The positions of the team are also important, yet there is no way of determining these apart from sheer instinct. Training. Having decided on his location, PJ wriggles forwards another few metres before planting his elbows, eyes squinting through the low power telescopic sight, picking out a target. Forefinger drawing up the fractional slack in the trigger.
Again a glance at the watch. Thirty seconds. Long seconds only a fighter knows. First comes the dull primer pop of the launchers out to the right, and the canisters landing. Grenades thumping, the area exploding into angry light. A dozen automatic weapons open up. PJ is already shooting, weapon on semi auto, firing one round after another.
Saif al-Din, eating a hurried meal of dates and cheese washed down by tepid Pepsi cola from the cab, hears the first gunshot and freezes. The suspicion that he should never have travelled to this island becomes a certainty in his mind.
Upon his arrival, Saif first led the mujahedin in prayer, then prepared a meeting with the factions. Agreement could not be reached, and he had resorted to the satellite telephone he carried — that implement as essential to the modern terrorist as guns — calling for instructions before the issue was resolved.
Now the men of the camp appear to be working together again. For an hour they have been listening to MP3 recordings played via iPod connected to a portable stereo, of that most famous speech by the movement’s founder, Yaqub Yusuf. Saif sees how their faces light up with new fervour.
Bravery is essential for our brotherhood to win through over the oppressors; those who defile God’s earth. Death to America and her allies. Death to the Jews. If you do not fight one day our world will be ended, and ther
e will be anarchy — your wives raped, your sisters raped.
The gunshot tells Saif that the kufr have found them and attacked without warning, failing to set off any of the booby traps that he was assured they would blunder through.
This turn of events, Saif knows, might threaten the success of the operation, as well as others in the future. The island has become both base and storehouse, and a secure anchorage. Down in the harbour sits the eight-metre RIB, a sturdy vessel with a sheltered wheelhouse and berth down below. The hardware of jihad — five hundred kilograms of explosives, a hundred assault rifles, handguns and ammunition — are piled in an ancient and solid fisherman’s hut on the shore.
Besides that, there is unfinished business. The two kufr girls are still alive. This failure weighs upon him, yet the business of reconciling the mujahedin has taken precedence, and he had intended to remedy the matter after the evening meal.
Quick thinking as always, smelling the gas as the canisters detonate, he throws his head back, lifts the can of Pepsi and pours the bubbling fluid down over his face, saturating his closed eyelids. The properties of the soft drink in resisting the effects of tear gas are well known and understood by freedom fighters across the world.
Thus protected he drops the empty can and sprints back into the building to where the children are held. The kufr soldiers will be after the girls, of course, and taking one as a hostage might be the only way of ensuring his survival. The other, of course, must die now. The lights are off, but there is enough light from the outside fire and exploding munitions to see the hostages. His hand falls to the butt of his pistol, drawing it and aiming down at the larger of the two children, firing two rounds into her, watching her body jerk as the bullets strike before moving to the smaller child. Lifting and holding her against his chest, ignoring the sharp pain as the pressure of her body pushes the automatic pistol in its holster against his rib cage. The girl’s cries and the beat of small hands against his chest are of no account.
Now he hears the crump of exploding gas canisters and realises that he has just seconds to vacate the building. He leaves through the back entrance at a run, where smoke is already thick from the grenades. Using this cover, he moves from the clearing into the sparse vegetation of the cliff tops, holding the girl tight to still her struggles. Gunfire comes from behind him, but he does not turn, just rips mighty lungfuls of air through his nostrils and expels them through his lips, taking leaping strides, almost tripping once but recovering his balance in time.
He enters the darkness away from the camp, and the concussion of gunfire loses its sharpness, the smell of phosphorus smoke fading, whipped away by the sea breeze that blows more briskly as they near the cliff, cool on his face after the claustrophobic hut.
Stopping at the edge of the cliff, he smells the sea now, hunting for a downwards path with his eyes. The girl in his arms struggles, cries out, a sound lost against the already withering firefight, but enough to alarm him. Freeing one hand he brings it down hard on the side of her face.
‘Shut up, or die now.’
The warm bundle collapses in his arms and he tucks her back further, legs dangling like those of a chicken. He begins to run down the track towards the boat, heedless of the crumbling stony surface.
Men scramble from the huts — half dressed, guns in hands, coughing from the CS gas, cut down where they huddle and fall over each other in the rush to find safety, struggling to react to a wraith-like enemy that comes from all directions. The gas is a new variant of the old chlorobenzalmalononitrile formula, safer than previous versions yet, delivered as an aerosol, debilitating with the slightest contact.
Targets now scattered, PJ leaps to his feet, running. His feet hammer into the compound as if disconnected from his body. The retractable stock of the HK53 thumps against his shoulder. He views the world through the single-minded ferocity of the lens, focusing on the door. A bearded face appears and he follows it before squeezing the trigger, watching the man go down, following the fall, firing again before resuming the scan.
The hapless faces of the targets stream with tears and mucus. Most drop their weapons from the effects of the gas. PJ knows what it feels like. Once, during a drill, he was affected and he still remembers the nausea, disorientation, dulled senses. It is almost impossible to function in the conventional sense.
PJ primes a green phosphorus grenade at the door to signal that he is into the building. Time moves slowly as his eyes, empowered with the night-vision goggles, scan the interior.
A figure races for the door and PJ takes him with a three-round tap to the chest. Moving deeper into the room he sees two human shapes huddled on the floor. Another stands nearby, misty green through the goggles, an Uzi submachine gun directed at the hostages. On his face is a gas mask. The man takes on an inhuman aspect, the mask giving him an otherworldly shape that hardens PJ’s resolve.
The field of fire behind the target is clear. PJ shoots him twice, watches him fall, then runs to where the oldest of the captives sits, weeping over the unmoving form of one of the girls.
Other men enter the hut now, checking, securing. PJ snaps, ‘Help me get them out of here, for God’s sake.’ One leads the young woman towards the door while he moves to the girl, lifting her beneath her knees and shoulders, carrying her outside, past the prisoners kneeling near the central fire, setting her down at a safe distance where he assesses her quickly. She is conscious now, breathing heavily, her eyes wide with fear. He can see two wounds: one in her shoulder and the other a nick on the side of her neck. He compresses the shoulder wound with his bare hand, stemming the flow of blood that has soaked the side of her shirt.
‘Medic,’ he calls, ‘over here. Hurry.’
The girl’s breathing changes and PJ realises that she is trying to speak, words interspersed with great racking sobs. ‘He … took her. Hannah. She’s … gone.’
‘Who took her?’
‘The black one … The dark one … When the … shooting started … Please get her back.’
‘Where did he go?’
‘Out there.’
PJ feels his throat squeeze tight. ‘I’ll get her, I promise.’
More promises. Hell. Blinding impatience, frustration, relief, subjugated by the realisation that the matter is not finished. He waits until the unit medic takes over her care, unpacking his field kit beside her, then moves across to where three bearded prisoners huddle around the fire. PJ grabs one by the hair and trains the HK on him. ‘Where is the other girl?’
The upturned face stares up at him, then spits a single sentence that finishes with ‘Allahu akbar’.
Someone touches PJ’s shoulder. ‘There’s no point. He doesn’t speak English.’
‘The hell he doesn’t.’ PJ brings the muzzle of his weapon down to kiss against the man’s temple. The smile widens, mouth dark and studded with yellow teeth. Strings of saliva join upper and lower jaws. ‘Allahu akbar,’ he croaks out.
‘He’s saying that God is Great. He wants you to pull the trigger. He wants you to martyr him.’
‘Jesus Christ, how do you beat these bastards?’ PJ shouts, shoving the man down, where he lies still, seemingly expecting a bullet.
PJ turns away. There are more of them down at the harbour. That is where she must be. The memory of the little girl being led across the compound fills his heart. He made a promise to a father, now to a sister, and it is not one that he intends to break.
Five men guard the storehouse, a stone hut tunnelled into the cliff, one of the original fishermen’s huts that dot the stone outcrops of the archipelago. The boat sits adjacent to the timber jetty built of old teak logs brought unknown decades earlier from across the sea.
As Saif approaches he grunts out the password and the others crowd him, recognising him with relief. ‘What is happening, sayyid? Please instruct us. Have the kufr attacked?’
‘The kufr have overcome the camp. Help me carry explosives, let us fill the boat. Hurry! A battery, detonators, wires.’
Saif smiles down on her. She too will die; will be with him at the moment of detonation. But not until the last moment — then if the kufr chase him by boat he will have a hostage. Westerners are weak. They will not fire on him when she is aboard.
Now, lifting his head to listen to the sporadic gunfire, he climbs over the gunwale, loping back to the storehouse, where the mujahedin are unloading; the nervous, sweaty smell of them strong despite the breeze.
The storehouse is loaded with bags of nitrate fertiliser explosives, the remnants of a purchase made through Afriwide International suppliers in Nairobi, Kenya. Saif organised the consignment himself, using a fabricated NGO as a front, choosing the ammonium nitrate variety that he has used with success in the past.
The entire shipment was mixed with diesel fuel at the correct ratio here on the island and rebagged. Detonator systems were made up using 12-gauge shotgun cartridges, heat coils, plastic tube, and wire. Fifty kilograms of explosives went to make up the charges carried by Zhyogal and the others into the Rabi al-Salah Centre.
Now, Saif supervises the loading, packing explosives into the V-berth cabin of the RIB, the bags sitting in the curves and corners around the bunks. All the time Saif plans ahead — thinking of the next step. He knows that the kufr commandos must have come from somewhere. Out there in the sea is a ship, a big one. It would be a glorious act to send it to the bottom of the sea.
They carry across five more bags, enough to tear a hole in a battleship.
The mujahedin beg to be allowed to come with him and die also as martyrs.
‘No,’ he tells them, ‘stay here, defend this storehouse, and when you are about to be overcome, detonate the rest of the explosives. Kill as many of the kufr as possible. I will see you in the green gardens of Jannah before the sun rises tomorrow.’