Hijack: A Sgt Major Crane crime thriller (A Sgt Major Crane Novel Book 6)

by Wendy Cartmell

  ‘We heard the gun-fire. What’s happened?’ Mick plucked at Billy’s shirt.

  ‘Is Colin alright?’ Hazel’s staring eyes were large in her pale face.

  ‘All this is really upsetting Charlie,’ Peggy deliberately looked at the other hijackers, but they wouldn’t meet her defiant gaze.

  ‘Who did he shoot at?’ Emma stood and looked at Billy, her voice carrying over the heads of the others.

  ‘No one,’ Billy replied. ‘Kourash didn’t shoot at anyone. He just fired a few warning shots, that’s all.’

  As everyone sank back in their seats, Billy looked across at Emma. Relief was clear on her face. But who was the relief for? Was it relief that Colin hadn’t been killed? Or relief that Kourash hadn’t tried to kill anyone? Billy wasn’t sure and could only hope he’d done the right thing by keeping the truth from her.

  16:00 hours

  Colin’s rescue had been a fiasco. There was no getting away from it. They were dealing with a mad man. Although, personally, Crane had always believed that Kourash was mad. Would someone in their right mind hijack a train and expect to change the long standing British Government policy? They would never negotiate with terrorists. End of. Simple.

  No one would forget the images on television of the rescue helicopter banking away from the train, flying the dying hostage to Leeds hospital. A route that unfortunately took it over the crowded media field, from where the bullet holes were clearly visible on the side of the helicopter. And if you missed seeing the holes, there was no avoiding the plume of black smoke pouring from the tail of the aircraft. Thank goodness the crew had managed to winch Colin into the aircraft before flying over the media field. The pictures were flashed around the world at warp speed thanks to the internet and 24 hour live television. If Kourash wanted world-wide infamy, he certainly had it now.

  There was only one good thing to come out of it. COBRA had agreed to Crane’s suggestion to manipulate public opinion. A suggestion that had morphed into Colonel Booth’s and Hardwick’s idea, of course. It wasn’t too much of a surprise to Crane. He’d always known of the power of the government, the British Army et-al, to feed selective bits of information to the public. The pieces of news the establishment wanted them to have. Their ability to keep information from the public was legendary. He himself had been involved in bringing an army cover-up to light, spun after a soldier had killed a woman. It was only the second killing that had tipped the balance and meant Crane was able to expose the cordon of lies the establishment had bound the truth in.

  Crane pulled his thoughts away from a previous case, back to the current problem. There was a certain amount of support for Kourash and his merry band of compatriots, from ISIS, Muslim extremists and other loony fringe collectives. Add to them the calls from the liberals wanting a peaceful negotiated settlement and you had Muslims and Christians all calling for the same thing, albeit from different angles and for different reasons. They were effectively tying the Prime Minister’s hands, forcing him to enter into protracted negotiations. The news programmes and newspapers had been full of background stories on the hijackers as well as the hostages and it was hard to tell who was garnering more support. There were heart wrenching stories of the innocents on both sides. The innocents in Bagram Detention Centre being held with no material evidence against them and the innocents on the train. All human beings who had legions of friends and families praying for their safe return.

  So the plan was to manipulate public opinion. Get everyone calling for the brave lads of the British Army, specifically the legendary SAS, to storm the train and rescue the hostages. To achieve this, the Prime Minister had to sway public opinion and get the people of Britain to realise that the real heroes here were the poor innocent captives on the train, not their captors. It was time to start a whispering campaign on social media. Play ISIS and the terrorists at their own game.

  Members of the Cabinet were primed and ready to speak to their contacts in the media. Senior Government figures were scheduled to give interviews. A famous presenter was being approached about a special edition of the programme, Question Time, with selected members of the audience and a panel who would call repeatedly for the army to storm the train. Press home the thought that it was about time something was done. Ask the question - surely the Prime Minister wasn’t going to lie down and be made a fool of by these lunatics?

  Major social media bloggers were to be recruited to write blog posts supporting a rescue and the newspapers encouraged to give over their front pages to the call to arms. Persons of standing on Twitter, with thousands if not millions of followers were asked to tweet out the hashtags; #bringinthearmy #stormthetrain as well as the already popular #freethehostages.

  Crane needed to talk to Harry Poole and Diane Chambers. There wasn’t much time to get things rolling, as they needed to hit the deadlines of all the daily newspapers for their overnight production. The television stations were to be primed and ready for reporting tomorrow’s headline. Headlines that would read: the British public were overwhelmingly clamouring for the special forces to go in and rescue the hostages. Even if in reality they weren’t, Crane felt sure they would be by tomorrow afternoon. Just in time for the SAS to start their rescue mission.

  18:00 hours

  Billy approached the toilet with some trepidation, brought on by the smell that greeted him while he was still some way away from it. An understandable if uncomfortable reality of a hijack situation. Services were severely strained. The water used to flush the toilet had long since run out and their precious drinking water was being used sparely, to try and help with the problem of getting rid of human waste. But Billy wasn’t there to use the facility, merely to get to his phone.

  He closed the door of the tiny cubicle behind him. Squatting down, he opened the cupboard under the sink and was relieved to find the mobile still in place. Powering it up he tapped his foot as he waited for the phone to connect to the network and update itself with any messages waiting for him. He had long since turned off the volume on the phone, so that any new messages would not be announced by a merry tune.

  Muttering, ‘Come on, come one,’ under his breath, he opened the toilet door just a crack, to make sure no one had noticed he’d gone. From his limited view he could see two hijackers at the far end of the carriage. They looked fairly relaxed and were chatting to each other, telling funny stories by the sound of it, as their laughter drifted over to him. Closing the door with care, he looked back at his phone and was relieved to find a new message.

  With the last of his battery he read the missive from Crane. Storming the train tomorrow night. In the early hours of the morning, 04:00 hours. Be ready.

  As Billy read the words, ‘be ready’ his battery died, rendering the mobile useless. He couldn’t wander over to a hijacker and ask to get his phone charger out of his kit bag. Ever cautious, he returned the now redundant instrument to his hiding place. No point in risking Kourash or his men finding the phone.

  Thinking about risks, Billy still wanted to try and get Hazel out of the hell hole they’d found themselves in. But, to be honest, Kourash’s stunt of shooting at the helicopter and Colin had put him off. He wondered if Colin had made it, but to be honest if a bullet hadn’t killed him, his heart surely would. Billy felt he couldn’t try anything that would put Hazel and her baby in harm’s way. If she went into labour, then that might be a different matter. So for now he’d just have to keep her as calm as possible. And that meant Billy not doing anything stupid.

  The best thing to do was to make sure the hostages all got down on the floor at the first sign of the arrival of the SAS. Crane had said 04:00 hours, but they needed to be ready before that. Primed to lie down on the floor at the first hint of a rescue. Rolling under a seat would be even better. Not only to dodge the bullets that would be flying around, but to stop Kourash or his men grabbing one of them and using that person as a human shield.

  The experience on-board the train was wearing down the nerves of the pass
engers as their captivity dragged on. Billy emerged from the toilet into their tiny carriage which was becoming more tomb-like with each passing day. It was becoming hotter, uncomfortable and filthy, not to mention smelly.

  Strangely enough, Billy had to admit, those most deeply affected by fear were the male hostages. He wondered if it was because they were more sensitive to the menacing implications of their plight. It was as if he, Mick and David, considered it their male responsibility to know as much as possible about every new development and debate what dangers it might pose for them. Scraps of overheard talk among their captors or a radio report from the driver’s cab, helped them to guess the demands and intentions of Kourash and his men more quickly than the women. Billy decided he would talk to Mick and David and between them agree when the women, and Charlie, would be told of the rescue attempt.

  Emma nervously entered the driver’s cab, after Kourash’s request for her to go to him. Well not so much of a request, as a demand really. She desperately hoped she hadn’t done anything wrong. She much preferred his smile to his scowl.

  ‘Emma, my pretty,’ he said, turning on that 1,000 watt smile. ‘I wanted to make sure you were alright after the shooting. I hope it didn’t upset you too much.’

  Emma breathed a sigh of relief. So it was the smiling Kourash who was waiting for her and she returned his smile with gratitude and slumped against him as he put his arms around her.

  ‘Did I frighten you very much?’

  Emma nodded against his chest. Suddenly aware of how much she had actually been frightened by the recent shots and the earlier explosion, despite her show of bravado in the carriage with the other hostages. Tears sprang unbidden to her eyes. She blinked them away, but not before Kourash had seen them and traced the track of one tear with his finger.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ he breathed into her ear. ‘You must remember that I’ll never do anything to hurt you. Please believe me,’ he begged.

  Emma struggled to be rational through the web of emotions that were entangling her. The tendrils binding her to Kourash tightened just that little bit more every time she saw him.

  ‘Do you have to do this?’ she said. ‘I’m so afraid that someone is going to get hurt, Kourash.’

  ‘Do you mean me?’ his lips moved against her cheek as he spoke. ‘Are you afraid I’m going to get hurt?’

  As his lips found hers she finally faced her fear. He was right. She wasn’t worried about anyone else on the train, she realised. Just Kourash. She’d do anything to keep him with her. To keep him safe. Just as he would for her.

  As his kisses became more passionate, she struggled briefly, weakly. Not really wanting him to stop. It was more for show really. But he did stop and pulled slightly away from her.

  ‘What is it, Kourash?’ she asked, frantic that she’d done something wrong, something to offend him. She didn’t know much about Muslims. Perhaps what they were doing was wrong in the eyes of his religion. Her hands fluttered against him, plucking at him, her fear rising to the surface again. She was confused, disoriented and isolated without his arms around her. She knew that emotionally she hadn’t coped with this hostage thing very well. At first, all she’d wanted was to be able to go home, to be returned safely to the bosom of her family, to get far away from this madness. When she realised that wasn’t going to happen, at least for a long time, she needed reassurance, guidance. She needed to be told that everything would be alright in the end. Wanted someone to take charge and tell her what to do.

  As Kourash’s eyes stared through her into her very soul, she knew he understood how she felt. Thankful, she dropped her gaze to the floor, meekly awaiting his next move.

  He took a step away from her, turned the catch on the door to lock it then quickly returned to embrace her in his arms, holding her as though he couldn’t bear to be apart from her one minute longer.

  In the darkened driver’s cab, on a train isolated atop a 100’ viaduct, Kourash became her father, protector, lover and champion. In all her 19 years, Emma had never felt anything like it.

  19:00 hours

  Billy’s anger was threatening to boil over. Hours of captivity and a feeling of uselessness were making him feel impotent. It seemed that whatever he did either had no effect on their situation, or made things worse. He so desperately wanted to... to... do something. Inactivity was making him irritable and feeling claustrophobic. He wondered why he couldn’t deal with this hijack situation as easily as he’d done with the bullying gang over the weekend.

  He slid down in his seat and put his feet up on the opposite one and allowed his mind to drift back. He re-lived the weekend, to see if he could get any inspiration from his earlier success.

  Last Saturday night, after a confession from his father that there was ‘a bit of trouble’ on the estate where his parents lived, Billy had slipped back to the Working Men’s Club, where a couple of hours earlier they’d enjoyed a few pints.

  Making his way back to the Working Men’s Club had been easy. As his eyes had adjusted to the night, his soft soled shoes made no sound and his dark clothes melted into his surroundings, so he hadn’t attract any attention from the odd clutches of kids he saw messing around on street corners.

  Tony, the Working Men’s Club manager, had told him the bar was normally emptying out by about midnight. So feigning tiredness from the long journey, Billy had managed to get his dad out of the pub just before 11pm, after plying him with beer and whisky chasers. It was just after the witching hour when Billy arrived back at the club. Melting into the shadows in the open doorway of the rubbish store, located to the left of the club’s entrance, he’d settled down to wait and watch. What he had seen had shocked him. A drunken man had his car stolen, a man’s pocket was expertly picked and, most shocking of all, Tony had been relieved of the night’s takings.

  After making his excuses to his parents the following night and pretending that he was going back to Aldershot on the train, Billy had crept back to the Working Men’s Club hoping that the kids were creatures of habit and would stick to their well-practiced modus-operandi. He knew how stupid that was and that it would make them easy to find, but doubted they had thought about it. It would probably never have occured to them that, for once, someone would want to find them and might just fight back. Would want to make them feel as afraid as they made their victims.

  Billy’s thoughts returned to his present situation. If only he could do something to the hijackers to make them feel as afraid as they made the hostages on the train. Take out one or two of them. Help the SAS lads out, by making sure there was at least one less hijacker to deal with when they stormed the train tomorrow night. But would he get a chance? And how could he do anything without a gun?

  20:00 hours

  Whether it was Billy’s contemplation of his exploits over the weekend and his heightened desire to do something, he didn’t know, but before he knew it, opportunity knocked. The hijackers were beginning to get very lazy when it came to watching the hostages. They seemed more interested in shouting at Kourash, or chattering about him amongst themselves. Just such a conversation was taking place in front of Billy. The two men had their heads close together, mumbling and grumbling and frequently looking at the door that led to the driver’s cab, where Kourash was.

  As one of the hijackers moved along the carriage, still chatting to his compatriot, Billy saw his chance. The first man was heading for the toilet. If the second stayed where he was at the top of the carriage, Billy may be able to use the element of surprise and rush him, disabling him and getting his weapon.

  Billy elbowed Mick in the side to gain his attention and nodded in the general direction of the lone hijacker, widening his eyes to signal he was going to try something. Mick nodded very slightly in reply and both men watched as the first hijacker reached the toilet. As soon as he had entered the cubicle and closed the door behind him, Billy sprang out of his seat using the momentum of his push-off to quickly close the gap between him and the hijacker. Arm outstretched
, aimed at the man’s throat. The combined elements of force and surprise meant the hapless hijacker fell instantly to the floor, his body further punished by Billy as he landed on him. Writhing on the floor the hijacker was unable to shout for help as his damaged larynx refused to work.

  The gun had been involuntarily released from the hijacker’s hand and had dropped to the floor, where it slid underneath the seats where Emma was sitting. As Billy continued to press his weight onto the stunned hijacker he shouted, ‘Mick, get the gun! Quick!’

  Mick obeyed the instruction immediately, crabbing on his hands and knees towards the seats where the gun lay. But he was older than Billy, with slower reactions and didn’t make it in time before someone else picked it up. It was Emma.

  ‘Well done, Emma,’ Billy said, craning his neck to see what was happening behind him. As he watched her stand and then point the gun at the hijacker on the floor, Billy untangled himself and stood up. ‘Give the gun to me,’ he said and reached for it.

  Emma’s wide eyes blinked in her pale face.

  ‘Emma, quick, before the other one comes back, please give the gun to me!’ Billy’s urgent plea didn’t break through whatever was going on in Emma’s head. She seemed catatonic. Still the gun was aimed at the hijacker on the floor. Her eyes were wide, pupils dilated. The gun trembled slightly in her hand.

  As Billy reached for the gun, the door to the driver’s cab opened. Out stepped Kourash. The sight of him seemed to break through Emma’s spellbound state. She turned and pointed the gun at Billy.

  ‘For God’s sake, Emma,’ hissed Billy. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I’d put your hands up, if I were you, Billy. Back up and sit down,’ Kourash said from the doorway. ‘You don’t want Emma here to shoot you by mistake, do you?’