Heroic

by Phil Earle

  We hit the second floor as Giffer’s boys cleared the first. Nothing to report. I felt torn, wanted to do well, to be the ones to find the stash, but wanted to walk out at the end of it too. Find the drugs and we’d find bullets. That had to be how it worked.

  Slasher scanned the corridor in front of us. ‘Twelve doors,’ he whispered in his broadest Scouse. ‘Jamm, Tomm, take the left side. We’ll do the right.’

  We nodded our agreement, Tommo relieved to be paired with me. Without hesitation we tucked guns against chins and spun into the first room, to find nothing but an ancient mattress. By the smell of it, it had doubled up as a toilet too. Grimacing, Tommo waved me forward to search it, which I did, flipping it with my foot.

  Nothing underneath or stuffed inside.

  Room clear. Move on.

  Our confidence didn’t grow with each cleared room, but the routine did, and within minutes the four of us were back on the stairwell, climbing higher, up to the fourth.

  But when none of us found anything on either level, the fear ratcheted up a notch. We’d only two floors left, twenty-four rooms, and in one of them there had to be a shed-load of gear and even more weapons guarding it.

  I was buzzing so hard now it was like being plugged into a socket. I could hear every rustle of my uniform, feel every millimetre of my lungs expanding as I breathed deeply.

  ‘This is it, Tommo,’ I whispered, but got no response. I hoped it was because he was bang in the zone.

  Top floor. Identical layout, same number of rooms. Rooms one, two and three were trashed but empty of anything important. As we spun into the fourth, nothing appeared any different. Except it was hotter and smaller. A good third smaller than any of the others so far. The skin on my face shrivelled at the heat.

  Tommo swore. ‘What’s going on!’ He aimed a kick at the wall, showering us with yet more dust. ‘There’s nothing up here. It must be on Giff’s floor.’

  Through the doorway I could see Slasher and Guido pulling another room apart. It gave me a second to yank Tommo back into line.

  ‘What is wrong with you?’ I asked, checking my comms weren’t live.

  ‘Isn’t it obvious?’ He looked around, like the answer was painted on the walls. ‘It’s this place. The heat. The locals. None of them want us here. These drugs we’re after, how do we even know they exist? The intel could be nonsense for all we know.’

  I could hear the panic in his words, see he was on the point of freaking out. Right when I – we – needed him calm. I closed the gap between us but he took a step back, eyeing me suspiciously.

  ‘What?’ he asked. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Keep your voice down, will you?’ I spread my arms in front of me as I reached for his drinking tube, to make him hydrate, but before I knew it, he’d deflected me, grabbing at my armour instead, spinning me straight into the wall.

  I should’ve been shocked. Fifteen years and he’d never so much as raised a finger in my direction. A white flash of anger lit up my head, only to be replaced by something strange, a thought that something was wrong.

  It was the wall. Instead of crumbling like the others, it had bent as Tommo flung me on to it. Not massively, but enough.

  I raised my finger to my lips and stepped away from the wall before pushing it a second time. Again, I felt it give. It was wood, not stone.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Tommo was angry still, that or fearful that the slap he deserved was yet to come. But I didn’t answer.

  My head was racing with the possibilities. Why was this one room smaller than every other one we’d searched? Hotter too? Shoving my fingers into my mouth, I pulled the gloves off and felt the wall. Warm.

  I mouthed at Tommo to do the same, but he didn’t get me, was still foaming like a lunatic. Without hesitation, I grabbed him by the straps of his pack and dragged him to the door, spitting in his ear as we went.

  ‘Calm down and listen! There’s something going on in there. It’s a false wall. I think we’ve found them.’

  His anger was replaced by a whimpering panic. ‘Well, what do we do?’

  Guido and Slasher approached, eyes quizzing us, so I let go of Tommo and tried to act normal. Quickly and quietly, I passed on what I knew. Told them to cover me as I went back to the wall. My first instinct was to unload into it. Pump every bullet I had deep into its surface in the hope of stopping anything else coming back. But I didn’t. Didn’t have a clue what was on the other side. What if it was an IED, a chance for them to blow us sky high?

  Instead I took my gun, and turned it quietly in my hands before pummelling the wall with the butt. Instantly it gave, my momentum shooting me forward as the weapon went clean through. At the same time, there was a crash from the corridor, a volley of bullets and a blur as two figures raced towards the stairwell. Slasher tore from the room and, with a shout, let rounds fly in their direction.

  There was a cry, the most piercing noise I’d ever heard, more bullets, more pain, two thuds. Silence.

  I was jammed, arms half in, half out of the wall panel, heart assaulting my ribcage. Using my gun like a crowbar I ripped at the wood, feeling a huge chunk come away, exposing a hidden room behind, packed full of tubing, buckets, vats. Cellophane parcels lined the floor, awaiting the men’s return. They’d be waiting a long time.

  After kicking at the last of the panelling, and bundling as much heroin into my arms as I could, I made for the door, waiting for the boss and the others to arrive.

  What I found in the corridor drained me of any triumph I was daring to feel.

  Two bodies. No movement except for the blood pulsing from them. It ran past Slasher, who was frozen to the spot, gun still cocked in the direction of the corpses. Guido patted his shoulder before easing the rifle to his side. ‘They aren’t going to fire back, pal.’ Slash said nothing, couldn’t take his eyes anywhere else.

  The blood collected at my feet, staining my boots, but I didn’t move either. All I could think was, thank god it was Slash and not me. Would I have even had the balls to pull the trigger?

  Tommo was still in the room behind me, shaking from the clatter of bullets. I was pleased he was there. The mess in the corridor could’ve been the thing that pushed him to the edge, if not over it.

  My headset crackled into life as the boss strode on to the corridor, Giffer and his crew behind him. ‘Look what you found!’ he yelled.

  I held the packages up like I was showing off a newborn, forgetting about all the death around me. I told myself not to feel guilty, that I’d done my job, found the gear and was still breathing at the end of it.

  ‘Top work,’ grinned the boss, slapping my helmet roughly. My whole body shook. ‘Is there more?’

  I motioned behind me, pleased to see Tommo holding the rest of the parcels. Looking like he’d done his bit.

  ‘Proper pair of sniffer dogs. You need to be careful. Keep this up and you’ll end up with a good reputation.’

  ‘Not much to do with me,’ I gabbled, the words out of my mouth before I even thought about them. ‘Was Tommo that found the wall. I just smashed it down.’

  The boss extended his arm to Tommo, who almost dropped the stash in surprise.

  Come on! I thought. I’ve given you this on a plate. Don’t mess it up now.

  Pulling himself together, Tommo took the praise before shooting me a confused look. I shook my head subtly: I’ll tell you later.

  We didn’t have time now, the room was overcrowded with high fives, relief so overwhelming you could smell it.

  The job was done, patrol was over, we simply had to make it back to base in one piece.

  I just hoped we hadn’t lucked out already.

  Jammy

  The base hummed with the news of our find, carrying us back through the gates like all-conquering heroes rather than a couple of scallies who’d got lucky.

  They wanted the story first-hand, in full Technicolor, and we were still so pumped up we were happy to oblige. I led the way, Tommo listening intently at f
irst, getting the details straight before going off and re-telling it to anyone and everyone in sight. I wasn’t shy of bigging him up, reckoned that if I gave him all the glory it might make the COs blind to any mistakes that followed. If today was anything to go by, I reckoned there were plenty on the way.

  After half an hour he’d adapted to his full-blown hero status, riffing further on things he hadn’t done, the bravery he’d failed to show. I made a note to give him a slap about that later. But not now, all I could think about was getting my body armour off before it pulled me to the ground. If I didn’t get into the shower quickly, they’d find me sleeping in it the next morning.

  The spray of water was more a trickle than a jet, but at least it was cold, teasing my skin slowly back to life. I watched the dust slowly dissolve, dirt sliding reluctantly to the floor, sticking to my feet then the plughole. I don’t know if it was tiredness or what, but after a while it seemed to turn from brown to red, until I was back in the corridor, watching the Afghan pair bleed out in front of me. I felt dizzy: deafened by the sound of my heart, the cubicle began to spin, every noise amplified. My arms shot forward instinctively, grappling at the wall to hold me up.

  Not now. Not when I’ve survived a first patrol. No glory in flaking out in the shower.

  I pushed a breath out, then another, again, more, until the carousel slowed and stopped. The water ran clear. I was clean, but empty.

  Back in control, I slid to the floor and let the water hug me for another minute, until I was ready to get dusty again and face the others.

  The walk from showers to barracks dried me quicker than any towel could, although I had to fight to keep mine tied around my waist as spirits were still high. There was no sign of Tommo, though, which bugged me. I’d hoped he’d still be telling stories when I came out, didn’t like the thought of him on his own, chewing stuff over. I quickened the pace, despite my legs complaining, and didn’t slow down till I’d slung our door open to find him asleep on his cot, fully clothed.

  He’d managed to take his helmet off but nothing else, body armour, boots, fatigues all still in place. Slumping on to my bed next to him, I tried to work out what to do. Leave him or try and get him sorted?

  I didn’t have to chew it over long.

  ‘I’d let him sleep if I were you,’ said Giffer, reclined on his cot, drawing heavily on a cigarette. ‘He won’t thank you for waking him.’

  I nodded, relieved someone else had made the call. Though Giff instantly had me back on edge.

  ‘There’s plenty of things he should be thanking you for, though, I reckon. Don’t you?’

  He was staring at me, but not in an accusing way. One thing I knew already about Giffer was that he didn’t roll that way. He wasn’t stirring, just observing.

  He was spot-on too, not that I wanted him to know.

  ‘What are you on about?’

  Sitting forward, he ground his butt out on the floor and smiled again.

  ‘You’re close. I get that. Nothing wrong with it. I’ve seen plenty of mates join up, can be a big help when the real stuff hits. You know who to trust.’

  ‘Well, I certainly trusted him today,’ I bluffed. ‘He spotted the wall for starters.’

  Giff’s eyebrows almost disappeared under his hairline. ‘Come on now, Jamm.’ He grinned. ‘Never kid a kidder. I’ve watched your boy there from the minute we arrived and he’s been touching cloth ever since.’

  I tried to protest but he wouldn’t let me.

  ‘It’s not a problem. I’m not the CO. And besides, aren’t we all terrified right now?’

  Was he winding me up? If he was bricking it, then he was a cracking actor.

  ‘Not you though, Giff,’ I said. ‘Nothing new for you, all this. And anyway, you’ve done all right, haven’t you?’ I made a point of visibly counting his arms and legs.

  He managed to smile and look serious in the space of a second.

  ‘Nothing but luck, my friend. Don’t be thinking it makes me braver than the rest of you, because it don’t. I’ve seen better, more courageous lads come back with bits missing, if they come back at all. All I’m saying to you is, I get what you’re doing with your boy there. I’d put a month’s wages down that our success today had nothing to do with him. I saw him, saw his eyes going in every direction in that market. He couldn’t focus long enough to know where he was, never mind spot and break down a false wall.’

  I said nothing, which told him everything.

  ‘I’m not judging. Him or you. All I’m saying is that we’re all as scared as him. He just has to learn to bury it, before it buries one of us. You understand me, don’t you?’

  I nodded, but hadn’t a clue what to do about it.

  ‘I promised people,’ I said in a rush, before Giff moved on. ‘When we left. That I wouldn’t dare show my face back on the estate without him next to me.’ I thought of Cam and how I’d meant every word.

  ‘We’ve all made those promises,’ Giff sighed. ‘Always meant them too. Especially when they’ve got sisters we’d like to impress.’

  He had a knack of getting to the truth that was both quick and terrifying. And a laugh as loud as a bomb-blast.

  ‘He has got a sister, then?’ he boomed. ‘Knew it, I did. Fit, is she?’

  I didn’t answer, didn’t need to.

  ‘Looks like she’s made a mark on you, though, eh? You didn’t join up just to impress her, I hope. Because I’ll bet she’ll have moved on by the time you get back, all bronzed and desperate.’ There was a tone in his voice that said he was speaking from experience.

  ‘There’s nothing going on between me and his Cam,’ I sighed. ‘There’s a group of us that knock about back on the estate. We’re all tight, so we made this stupid pact when we were eleven or something, you know, before the lust had kicked in, that we’d leave each other’s sisters alone. Kept it simple that way. No reason for any of us to want to kill each other.’

  ‘Sounds like a schoolboy error to me,’ laughed Giff.

  ‘Been regretting it for about two years. Still, I promised her I’d keep him whole, so thought today was a good idea. Keep any heat off him for as long as I can.’

  ‘You’re a good man, Jamm. Good soldier too, for what it’s worth. Best chance we have of flying out of here minus the bodybags is that we all act the same. I know they feed you this line in basic training, but it’s true. The boss, me, Slasher, Guido, even that idiot Caffeine, they’re the only family that counts while you’re out here. No one back home’s going to keep you alive, only us. Scary thought, like, but true.’

  He flicked my arm with his towel as he moved for the showers, leaving me with plenty to think about, my head torn between my two families, thousands of miles apart. It didn’t feel like there was space for everyone, but there had to be. Sonny still needed me as much as Tommo did. And as for Cam? Well, she wasn’t going to disappear no matter how hard I tried to forget. And to be honest, that suited me fine.

  Jammy

  The glory of our find didn’t last long. The heat soon sapped the buzz out of us, forcing us back into the shadows. We’d been warned that we might not be sat around for long.

  ‘Expect a response, lads. You don’t lose as much as they did and not see a kickback.’

  Patrols were doubled. The officers were worried that the Taliban would take our heist out on the locals, reckoning one of them had given the drugs up in return for protection. We needed to be visible as a result, do our jobs, keep things normal. As normal as you can with a machine gun in your hands.

  We felt the tension on every patrol; the number of locals on the street was down, even with the market in full swing, our arrival in the square greeted with greater doubt than ever. No one wanted to be seen too close, which suited Tommo, gave him time to find some confidence.

  Every patrol made the streets more familiar and we scanned them greedily for vulnerable points: windows tailor-made for snipers, roof-tops wide enough to launch a mortar attack from. I saw Tommo scope them, then c
heck to see how each of us were doing. He looked like a soldier, like the hero I’d told the others he was. All I could do was hope this new varnish wouldn’t blister in the heat.

  The temperature didn’t seem to bother the kids who lived in the village, nor did our presence. They carried none of the adults’ suspicion or doubt, saw us instead as walking sweet shops. From the minute we appeared in the square they’d surround us, dirty fingers rifling our pockets for whatever bounty we were carrying.

  You had to be firm with them, set rules, despite feeling appreciated for once. Sweets were always the ultimate rewards, more popular than the pens and pencils we had, but they came with a risk. Everything had risk attached to it round here, even a boiled sweet.

  ‘Have the wrappers back off them if you can,’ we’d been told by the boss. ‘Encourage them to eat them there and then, or have the terps tell them to bury the wrappers.’

  We’d looked at him baffled.

  ‘You worried about litter?’ I asked with a smirk.

  ‘Couldn’t give a toss,’ he’d snapped back. ‘But unless you want that same kid having his hands burned with cigarettes, then you’d better think about it seriously.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It might only be a sweet to you, but there’s kids tortured for accepting them.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘All it takes is a Taliban fighter to find one wrapper in a pocket. Says to them that the kids, their families, are all sympathizers. There’s been plenty of nine-year-olds walking around with only three or four fingers as a result. So give ’em out responsibly, with as much caution as every step you take on patrol.’

  We’d nodded, sobered by yet another thing to remember, as well as just trying to keep each other alive.

  There was one bunch of kids, though, who weren’t bothered about our booty. They only had room for one thing in their lives and that was football.

  I’d clocked them about two weeks back, amazed by the length of their games. The sun didn’t seem to touch them: instead they sprinted for hours, only stopping when the sun gave up, knackered.