“I missed, again. Damn it!”
“But that’s okay, what counts to me is that you identified the target. I know it’s a stupid question, of sorts, but how did you know the assassin was the little boy?”
“I saw him pull out the grenade from under his tunic. I saw him pull out the pin and throw it. At the moment I felt most focused I saw my target as he would be in the future, I saw the little boy and what he would be doing a few moments from now and I knew I had to stop him.”
“Bloody excellent! Mark. This is what the Captain and I have been waiting for. This is why we have been training you as the shooter – it’s a much more intense role that we were sure would bring out your gift.”
“I still missed.”
“It matters not, Mark. This is the last time I will ask you to shoot. Now, for your own confidence I want you to take that shot once more and remember to squeeze the trigger, always remembering control, sight alignment and sight picture. Focus on the scope’s reticle, it must be crisp and true. Breathe slowly or not at all and hold the trigger at its fullest most position after you have shot. Now, send.”
Mark focuses on the now paused projector and concentrates on the young boy’s face. He moves the cross hairs to the centre mass of the child, slows his breathing and finds his Sniper’s Sight and with focus and intent squeezes off one round. He hits his target, perfectly. The simulation ends.
“Kill confirmed. And I thought you could never shoot a woman or a child?” said Lee.
“That was before I saw a boy throw a grenade into a group of unarmed and innocent civilians, he wasn’t even aiming for the soldiers” replied Andrews.
“I know, again this is a simulation of an incident that actually took place, I remember it well. It was an operation to blacken the hearts and minds of the local populace against the British Army, carried out by al-Qaeda some years ago.”
“Did it work?”
“Unfortunately it did, once again there was no over-watch that day, no sniper protection and six innocent civilians died and many more injured. The incident never got any press coverage, why would it? There simply was not a viable western media angle on it – imagine the headlines… anyway, let’s move on shall we? Hand me my rifle and let’s return to things being the way God wants them to be – me sniping and you identifying my targets!”
Andrews gladly hands the rifle to Sniper Lee.
“This poses a pretty interesting question though, doesn’t it?” said Lee.
“What does?’
“The fact that you saw the little boy throw the grenade? In reality it happened years ago?”
“Yes, but it was also about to happen now, so I saw the immediate future, my immediate future? Not so?”
“Apparently, yes, you did and that’s what we have all been working towards, tweaking the meds and exercises to get you to a point where you can predict the near future and become a tactical asset to our team out on operation but still, I’m perplexed.”
The two men stand and Sniper Henry Lee scratches his chin with his thumb and forefinger of his weaponless left hand while looking absent mindedly into the distance, seemingly through the screen.
“What’s wrong, Henry?”
“Well. We haven’t played the scene through, have we, it’s paused…” Lee said while nodding to the end of the video range where the projector was paused, the little boy still in centre screen with an X marking the bullet’s entry point to his chest.
Both men stare at the screen and after a few, somewhat uncomfortable moments, Andrews finally speaks.
“Let’s play it through, let’s play the video to the end. I must see him do it. I must see the boy throw the grenade.”
“Too bloody right. It’s the only way I’d be able to sleep tonight, to make sense of this, the only way I would be able to keep a sound mind.”
Chapter Five – Execution
Disgraced journalist Richard King lies curled up in the corner of the prisoners’ cell – an underground pit about the size of a swimming pool covered by sheet metal. It’s sweltering inside and there’s no ventilation, the stench of human sweat and excrement infuses the dense air. He cries out for his mother and snot drips from his bulbous nose.
Robert Sharpe walks over to the pathetic figure of the curled up man and puts his hand on his shoulder and tries to reassure him that everything will be okay, this despite the fact that the former SAS soldier has already resigned himself to death, death at the hands of the Islamic State. Though he has already decided that unlike all those before him he will not go quietly. He will not die obediently.
“Take your hands off me, you prick. It’s your bloody fault I’m here, you were supposed to protect me, it’s your fault I’m here. It’s your fault.”
Robert Sharpe’s face turns blood red from unbridled anger at the words of this selfish man. In his mind he hears his own words to King before crossing into Syria just four days previously.
“We must NOT go into Syria, Richard. It’s simply too dangerous, I cannot mitigate the risks there, I can not protect you or any of the crew once we are over the Iraqi border. It’s simply too dangerous with the Islamic State on the rampage.”
Those very words that echo in his head over and over again at night while he cannot sleep. Those very words that proved futile and worthless.
“Well I’m going, Bob. With you by my side or not. My fixer tells me he can get me an exclusive interview with the leader of IS, an EXCLUSIVE! Can you imagine the worldwide coverage such an interview will get! I’ll be back on top where I belong. Now, you can either come with me or let me go alone, oh and I’ll send a report back to your bosses letting them know that you were too scared to do your job!”
Sharpe had argued with the obstinate journalist for over an hour and even threatened to kidnap him himself and drag him back to the airport, and was actually about to, when King had run and locked himself in his room. Two hours later and Sharpe had to relent when the head of the Private Military Company he was contracting for called him on his satellite phone and threatened him with breach of contract and holding back three months’ wages, after the MD himself was threatened by King’s producers. This was money Sharpe desperately needed in order to keep his house back in the UK that was under threat of foreclosure by the bank.
That was when former SAS Sergeant Robert Sharpe had written to his previous commander, Captain John Taylor, and alerted him to his predicament. Regrettably his letter had never made it out. It was still secreted in his anus, where he had put it moments before their fixer had betrayed them to ISIS hours after crossing into Syrian lands. Moments before they were searched, stripped naked and then made to change into the orange jumpsuit they all now wore.
Sharpe withdrew his hand from the correspondent’s shoulder and moved to a corner of the pit. He gets down onto his haunches and takes in his surroundings. In the pit with him are six other men including Richard King and the oil worker whom he knows only as Angus. The other three men he knows are all former Iraqi soldiers who still wear their uniforms, identifying them as such, which are now covered in blood, from the regular beatings, and their own urine and shit. They were thrown into the pit only an hour previously.
To Sharpe’s surprise one of the Iraqis meets his gaze and then stands and moves towards him.
“My name Yusuf, but you can call me Bull, that’s what the Americans used to call me when they used to train us for Hussein’s army.”
Sharpe takes Bull’s offered hand and shakes it. He notes the strength in Bull’s arms and at looking at the size of his shoulders, neck and head, Sharpe immediately sees why this man was nick-named after a powerful beast.
“Robert. But you can call me, Bob, everyone else does.”
“Good to meet you, my friend.”
“Friends already, are we?”
“What else could we be – those bastards up there are our common enemy, therefore it follows that we must be friends. Is that not so?”
“I guess so.”
; Sharpe pauses and unthinkingly cocks his head as he stares at this man now crouching only feet away from him. He has never met a soldier, or Iraqi national for that matter, that speaks English so well.
“I know what you are thinking so I shall answer your questions without you having to ask me, that way you will not have to be rude. I was the personal bodyguard to Saddam Hussein. From the age of 14 I was trained and tutored by the men who trained and tutored his sons. In reality I was forced to be there and effectively brainwashed into serving the Hussein family as a bodyguard and protector who had no life of his own. But how could I complain, a boy like me would never otherwise have had such an upbringing. So if I was not with his sons looking after them I was with the great man himself. At first I would carry just a knife, kept hidden, and keep an eye out on the other bodyguards, them not knowing who I actually was, and I’m sure other boys were there just to watch me, that’s the way it was, everybody suspected everyone else. Until finally they trusted me enough and I carried a gun. Until eventually I was Saddam’s most trusted man.”
The man falls silent and stares blindly into the dirt in front of him.
“You said you trained with the Americans, when was this?” asked Sharpe.
“Before everything went completely to shit, they would send in their CIA and train us with the most modern weapons that they would then sell to Saddam. They knew that a new threat was rising, they have always known this, that’s why they secretly helped keep Saddam in power for so long, where he belonged. But after he fell, well that was the beginning of the end, for us, for me and for my country. Anyway, since then I joined the regular army and moved my way up the ranks. Things were looking good for me, until yesterday of course.” Bull chuckled to himself and shook his head from side to side.
“Where did they capture you?” asked Sharpe.
“On the border, me and my most loyal men were making a stand and had been promised support from our Special Forces but they never came. We were over- run in the morning and every man of my unit killed in action or executed upon capture, except for me and those two” he pointed to the two men lying with their backs against the dirt wall. “They can no longer speak -- they cut out their tongues.”
“So the obvious question is why have they left yours intact then?” asked Sharpe bluntly – not a time for subtlety he reckoned.
“Because I speak fluent English, my friend. I’m afraid they plan on using me somehow.”
At that moment shards of bright light broke through the shadows of the pit. The hatch opened and the prisoners looked up to see the silhouette of a figure hovering above. Seconds later and a ladder was dropped to the ground leading outside and into the open.
“Come out, all you! Now, out!” said a harsh voice in broken English.
Slowly, very slowly the prisoners looked at each other and began to stand, even King managed to get to his feet and gradually they shuffled to the bottom of the ladder.
“Hurry, quick now, move, hurry, come up!!” the voice commanded.
One by one the men made their way up the ladder, led by Bull and followed closely by Sharpe. As each man reached the top of the ladder they were grabbed from behind and a black hood placed over their heads.
They were led away, manhandled and kicked and then each man saw black as a crashing blow to the head knocked them unconscious.
Sharpe opened his eyes to the sound of laughing and a thundering pain in his now throbbing head. His was on his feet but barely able to stand. His body was being supported by a noose tied around his neck. If his legs gave in he would surely choke to death. The hood was still over his head so all he could see was black cloth.
Then he felt warm liquid trickle down his back and onto his legs, then the smell hit him and he realised it was urine. They were pissing on him.
The hood was yanked from his head and bright sunlight filled his vision temporarily blinding him. Then he heard a voice, at first distant but as the ringing in his ears died down he began to comprehend the words.
“So Mr. Bodyguard, today you will die, today you will meet your devil and serve him in hell, you and your fellow infidels.”
Sharpe immediately recognised the voice of being that of the man in the execution video he had seen weeks earlier. And as his vision came into focus he saw that the man was also wearing the same black clothing.
“Now turn around and watch what is about to happen to you, infidel” London said.
Sharpe turned to his right to see Richard King, the broken oil worker and then the three Iraqi soldiers one by one along the line next to him. They were also all barely standing with a rope tied around their necks, attached to a wooden structure that ran the length of about 10 metres high above their heads, taking most of their weight. Out of the corner of his eye he could see more Islamic State fighters dressed in black and saw the man behind him, who had just urinated on him, putting his manhood away.
A bright light caught Sharpe’s attention and he looked straight ahead and saw a powerful light mounted on professional looking camera equipment – the cameras were rolling.
“Is this it, my time has finally come” Sharpe thought to himself.
“Today, infidels, the white and westernized enemies of Allah. You will die!” said London.
Sharpe’s mind raced and his promise to himself to not go quietly into the night came rushing back to him. But what could he do now, he thought he would have had more time, to plan and prepare as any good SAS trooper would. He had heard them say that they would kill another hostage every 36 hours giving him at least 4 days to plan an escape or at the very least a way to kill as many of the bastards as he could before his death. Why were they not sticking to the plan, were the allied governments finally taking military, boots-on-the-ground action against the Islamic State, were they retreating? he wondered.
“By the will of God you shall watch the man before you feel the power of Islam” said London.
Sharpe then felt two pairs of hands grab his shoulders and head and force him to look down the line in the direction of the first of the Iraqi soldiers.
“This is another show of our strength and the strength of Allah, the only God. This man is a traitor and a slave to the Iraqi puppets of the United States and their oil empire, kill him! Allahu Akbar.”
“Allahu Akbar” the Islamic fighters chanted in unison as one of the black clad men moved behind the now mute soldier and placed a 9MM pistol to the back of his head.
“Allahu Akbar”
The fanatic pulled the trigger.
Click
Nothing happened.
A mock execution? Sharpe thinks to himself – he had heard about them and he was warned about them in Interrogation Training but he had never been through one, not even while captured behind enemy lines in Bosnia, in what he had thought at the time was a war carried out with such brutality that it could never be surpassed in violence and evil, all those years ago. How wrong he was.
The man swears and tries to cock the weapon, it’s jammed and he’s unable to eject the faulty round. He tries unsuccessfully once again and swears out loud in anger. His accent surprises Sharpe, only momentarily though, as it’s British, with an unmistakable East London twang.
As if realising his mistake the London jihadist puts his hand to his mouth and quickly walks away.
London barks for another man to draw his weapon and carry out the execution.
As ordered another fighter walks forward and loudly cycles his weapon – an AK47 assault rifle. He places the muzzle against the back of the soldier’s head and without any ceremony pulls the trigger. The assault rifle explodes into action and the 7.62 round is sent down the barrel of the weapon at a speed of 2400 feet per second and ends the soldier’s life instantly – cleanly penetrating the man’s skull shredding brain on the way through and removing the lower half of the man’s jaw as it is blown off the rest of his face. The body slumps in the air hanging limply from the rope, then without the restriction of the lower half of the man’s face
the body slips from the noose and falls to the ground.
So it’s not a fake execution, it’s the real deal, time to die.
The Islamic State men find the dead, jawless, body of the man slithering off the rope to be hilarious and glorious in equal measure as they laugh in between shouts of Allahu Akbar.
Their God must have a sick sense of humour, Robert Sharpe thinks to himself.
Without another word or instruction from London the executioner moves down the line and murders the other mute soldier. Shouts of Allahu Akbar fill the air once more. The soldier is dead within moments. The fighter moves down the line and puts his AK to the head of Bull, a momentary friend of Robert “Bob” Sharpe. The two prisoners quickly look at each other and both defiantly nod to one another one final farewell.
Bull’s face and eyes betray not even the slightest hint of fear, humiliation or defeat. Instead he radiates strength, dignity and honour in his final moments in this world.
SAS Para-Ops: MEGA SET - SAS Para-Ops Books #1, #2, #3, #4, #5 & #6 Page 18
