by Chris Ryan
‘Thirty seconds, maybe a minute.’
‘That’s too long!’
‘We’re on our way!’ Abby shouted into the phone. ‘Hold on, we’re on our way!’
– Hold on, we’re on our way!
If Abby sounded panicked, it was nothing compared to how Lili felt. The soldiers were still on the ground, but they had started to return fire. Their aim was not good. Like Lili, they were clearly shooting with handguns and the distance was too great for accurately aimed shots. But they were within range and as the sixth, seventh and eighth shots whizzed past them, Lili realised it was only a matter of time before one of them got lucky.
She had fired two shots herself and she didn’t know how many rounds remained. She fired again, above the heads of the soldiers. She heard them shouting to each other. There was a brief pause in their return fire. Then it started up again.
‘The helicopters!’ Hwan shouted. ‘They’re coming this way! They know it is us!’
Lili swore. ‘How much longer?’ she shouted, and released another round over the soldiers’ heads.
– We’re on the bridge! We’re twenty seconds away. Can you hold out that long?
‘We don’t have much choice,’ Lili muttered under her breath, and released another two rounds in quick succession.
‘Hold on tight!’ Prospero bellowed. ‘I can see them!’ They were speeding along the bridge, the engine of the old van screaming. ‘I’m going to make a handbrake turn. You’ll be thrown around. As soon as I’ve turned, open the side door to let them in. We’re going to draw fire, so keep yourself protected!’
But there was nothing in the van for them to hold on to, apart from each other. Max, Abby, Lukas and Sami interlocked their arms and gripped hard, ready for the speeding vehicle to spin a full 180.
Abby heard the vehicle before she saw it: the high-pitched whine of a struggling old engine speeding from the other end of the bridge towards them. From her prone position she saw its headlights approaching. ‘Get ready to move!’ she told Hwan as two more rounds narrowly missed them.
‘Move?’ Hwan whispered. ‘We can’t.’
‘Fine,’ Lili said. ‘Lie here and let them take you. I’ll say hi to your parents.’
‘All right,’ Hwan hissed.
Lili looked back again. The sound of the vehicle was getting louder. It was thirty metres away.
Twenty.
Ten.
She aimed her handgun above the heads of the soldiers again, ready to give covering fire.
‘Get ready,’ she hissed. ‘In three, two, one …’
‘Get ready!’ Prospero shouted. ‘In three, two, one … Now!’
She hit the brakes and spun the steering wheel. The cadets tumbled into each other. Max winced – his shoulder had crashed against hard metal. The tyres screeched as the vehicle twisted through 180 degrees before coming to a sudden halt.
‘Open the door!’ Prospero bellowed, but she didn’t need to. Lukas had thrown himself against the side door and had yanked it open. There was gunfire, and Max tried to see what was happening through the opening. A round hit the chassis of the vehicle. They flung themselves away from the door, with not a second to spare. A second round entered the vehicle. It hit the interior of the van with a spark, then ricocheted to the floor only a few centimetres from Abby.
The vehicle was straining, a stone in a catapult ready to fly as soon as Lili and Hwan entered the van.
But there was no sign of them. Where were they?
‘Go!’ Lili shouted.
She fired three rounds in quick succession over the heads of the soldiers. Then she pulled Hwan to his feet and together they sprinted to the van. It was only about fifteen metres, but it felt a lot further. The van’s door was shut. Her three rounds suppressed the soldiers’ fire only for a couple of seconds. Lili and Hwan were ten metres from the vehicle when they fired again. The door slid open. A bullet hit the vehicle with a high-pitched metallic sound. A second round passed just by Lili’s right ear and flew into the van.
She knew it was going to happen. The gunfire was too fast and too heavy for her to avoid it. When the bullet hit her, it felt like a solid thump on her right arm, followed by a flash of white-hot pain. It knocked her to the ground. Hwan, who was running next to her, somehow became caught up with her and fell too.
She felt blood oozing from her arm. The pain was sharp. Stabbing. Blinding.
‘Get into the van,’ Lili hissed at Hwan through clenched teeth. ‘Leave me here.’
‘Is that supposed to be a joke?’
Hwan grabbed her by her good arm and pulled her to her feet. Together they stumbled towards the van and Hwan pushed Lili inside. She collapsed on to the floor, bleeding badly but relieved to see her fellow cadets.
‘Make sure Hwan gets in,’ she whispered through the pain. But Lukas was already pulling him into the van.
‘Go!’ Max shouted. ‘Prospero! Go!’
The van shot forward. Lili cried out in pain as one of the other cadets, she couldn’t tell who, knocked against her arm. The sound of gunfire receded as somebody slid the door shut. It was dark inside. The cadets were talking at Lili, but she couldn’t understand them. The pain in her arm was too intense. She clutched her arm. It was warm and sticky. She felt faint.
The vehicle accelerated. One of the cadets wrapped something tightly around Lili’s arm. She didn’t know who it was. Then the van suddenly filled with light, and she saw it was Abby. The cadets had fallen silent, and Lili knew why. Where was this new light coming from?
The vehicle turned dark, then light again. Then Max said what Lili was beginning to suspect. ‘It’s a searchlight! It’s coming from one of the helicopters! They must know it’s us! They’re following! Prospero, we need to get to the pick-up zone! Now!’
20
04:00 hours
Max pressed his face against the van window. They had cleared the bridge. The soldiers who had been firing at Lili and Hwan were no longer in sight. From the back of the white van, Max could see two helicopters flying close and low, their searchlights beaming directly at the cadets’ van. They had bigger problems.
‘How far to the pick-up zone?’ he asked Prospero.
‘Ten minutes, if we don’t hit a road block.’
‘What?’
‘How’s that girl?’ Prospero asked.
‘She’s losing blood,’ Abby said. ‘I’ve bandaged it and I’m putting pressure on the wound, but she needs help.’
‘Then let’s hope your friends turn up,’ Prospero said.
She was clearly an expert driver. They moved at great speed through the suburbs of Pyongyang, Prospero controlling the old van as if it was a racing car. But it was impossible to outrun the two helicopters. They stuck terrifyingly close, their searchlights following the van so accurately that it was as bright as day in its interior. Max saw Abby tending Lili, her hands smeared with blood, her face intent. Sami was too exhausted from his exploits in the river even to look scared. Lukas was frowning, frustrated at his inability to do anything but crouch in the back of the van while Prospero did all she could to get them all to safety.
And Hwan. Max had last seen him at the hotel. Could it really have only been a few hours ago? Hwan was watching him, his expression impossible to read. As they stared at each other, Max became aware of something: sirens, distant but approaching. He snapped back to the situation outside.
‘We’ve got police cars chasing us!’ he warned Prospero over the engine.
Prospero said nothing. Max slid heavily against the side of the van as it turned sharply, and was dazzled by one of the searchlights beaming directly in his face.
Time check: 03:57 hours.
‘How much further?’ he yelled.
‘Two minutes, maybe three. But don’t expect this to be straightforward …’
‘You don’t say,’ Max muttered. Through the rear window he could see the police cars, their blue neon lights urgent and close. He counted five, but knew there could be more.
>
‘Abby! Throw me your sat phone!’
Abby did as he asked. Max dialled the number for the Watchers, but it didn’t connect. He swore under his breath. They were just going to have to pray their pick-up would arrive.
‘This is it!’ Prospero called over her shoulder. Max checked out of the window, squinting against the searchlights but also using them to view the surrounding area. When the Watchers had said that the pick-up zone was a deserted football stadium, he had imagined Wembley. This place couldn’t be more different. The van was speeding over a derelict pitch strewn with weeds and pot holes. There were grandstands at either end but one had collapsed in the middle. This place plainly hadn’t been used for sport for many years. He looked up at the sky. The Watchers had said they would arrive in a stealth helicopter. He saw no sign of anything.
‘Where are they?’
Nobody had an answer. Prospero urged the van to one end of the pitch and shouted, ‘Hold on tight!’ She performed another 180-degree handbrake turn so that she was facing the oncoming vehicles.
The van was still, the engine quiet. Although they could still faintly hear helicopters and sirens, it was weirdly silent. Max clambered over his fellow cadets to look through the front windscreen.
What he saw chilled him.
There were six police cars. They had stopped in a neat row, lights flashing, along where the halfway line should be. Behind them, the two helicopters were touching down. The headlights from the cars and the helicopters lit up the pitch in front of them, and Max could see the silhouettes of armed figures – ten, maybe more – stepping forward in a line in front of the police cars, before kneeling in the firing position.
Prospero was still gripping the steering wheel. She revved the engine, but the vehicle didn’t move.
Time check: 03:59 hours.
‘Where are they?’ Max repeated. ‘What do we do now?’
‘Open the back of the van,’ Prospero said quietly, her voice hoarse.
‘But they’re not …’
‘Just do it, Max. Use the van as cover. Keep low. They’re going to open fire any second. The van is our only cover.’
‘What about you?’
Prospero’s eyes narrowed. ‘We do what we have to do,’ she said. ‘Stealth or not, your chopper can’t land or take off without a distraction.’ She turned to Max. ‘I’m that distraction.’
‘No,’ Max told her. ‘Wait –’
But as he spoke, a shot rang out from the police line. A round hit the windscreen. It didn’t shatter, but a spiderweb network of cracks spread across the glass, making it impossible to see through. Prospero shouted, ‘DO IT!’
Lukas fumbled for the latch that opened the rear doors of the van. He opened them gingerly, as if expecting gunmen to be behind the vehicle as well as in front of it. But there was open ground: just a patch of weed-strewn football pitch and the rusted, misshapen frame of an old goal. Max checked his watch. It was 04:00 exactly. ‘Where are they?’ he muttered. ‘Where the …’
He saw it, but he didn’t hear it. A sleek, insect-like black helicopter appeared, slowly descending. Any sound from its rotor blades was masked by the growl of the van’s idling engine. Its nose was pointing towards the back of the van, and it was so close that Max could see the pilot’s face. The stealth helicopter was using the vehicle as cover.
‘Go!’ Prospero roared. ‘Get to the chopper before they advance! Get out before they open fire!’
The cadets didn’t argue. Lukas and Abby helped Lili out of the van. She was barely conscious and it took both of them to help her stagger towards the helicopter, which was open. Sami seemed disorientated, but could walk, just. He followed the others to the chopper.
That just left Max and Hwan.
Hwan had his back against the side of the van. Max stared at Prospero as if suddenly understanding something.
‘Get him out of here!’ Prospero roared, her voice shaking.
‘Go!’ Max hissed.
‘I don’t want her to …’
‘JUST GO!’
Hwan swallowed hard. He ran to the back of the van and sprinted to the helicopter.
‘You still there, Max?’ Prospero called. She was revving the engine aggressively. ‘Bad place to be.’
‘Come with us!’ Max shouted. ‘You don’t have to do this.’
‘None of us have to do any of this. But as soon as that helicopter leaves the ground, those gunmen are going to open up. Stealth Black Hawk. Nice bit of kit. But a single round in its fuselage will ground it. Our friends with the firearms are going to need something else to shoot at. A van heading towards them at 70 mph should do it.’
‘But they’ll kill you if you do that.’
‘And they’ll kill you if I don’t. I’ve been on borrowed time since they captured me, Max, and it just ran out. Now get the heck out of here before you mess the whole thing up.’ A strange smile crossed her face. ‘It’s the right thing to do.’
Max stared at her. All he could see was the reflection of her steely gaze. Like a bulletproof vest, she was impervious to arguments. He clambered to the back of the van, where he felt the fierce downdraught of the stealth chopper’s rotor blades. He was about to jump out of the van when Prospero spoke again. ‘Hey, Max!’
‘What?’
‘You and your friends are good. The best I’ve seen. Make sure you save a few lives for me, huh? You can start with the Korean kid’s mum and dad.’
Max set his jaw. ‘Roger that,’ he said, and hurled himself from the van.
The rotor blades of the stealth chopper made a low whomp ing sound that seemed to be just on the edge of Max’s hearing. There was the stench of burning rubber, and exhaust fumes billowed from the van as Max sprinted to the chopper and leaped inside. It was dark inside. He couldn’t tell who was who, or where. He heard Hector’s voice – ‘GO GO GO!’ – and felt the helicopter lift up into the air. He spun round to see the door of the chopper closing. There was a small porthole window and he pressed himself up against it to look out at the scene below.
The van was speeding towards the line of armed men. They broke formation and scattered to escape it. The helicopter banked, and Max lost sight of the ground. A few seconds later, it straightened up and he could see again. The van had turned and stopped. Clearly Prospero never had any intention of hitting the gunmen.
Her compassion was not returned. As Max watched in horror, there was a barrage of muzzle flashes, crackling like sparklers all around the van. As Black Hawk continued to rise, Max had to strain his neck to keep the van in sight. He wished he hadn’t. The entire van erupted into an orange and black fireball. He squeezed his eyes shut, but the fireball was burned on his retina and he could see it clearly for a full ten seconds before it faded away.
When he opened his eyes again, the ground was out of sight. Black Hawk had turned and was travelling faster. Exhausted, drained and sickened, he collapsed to the floor of the helicopter.
He knew Prospero was dead. Nobody could have survived an explosion like that. Everything they had gone through over the past twenty-four hours had been for nothing.
The operation had been a disaster. The Special Forces Cadets had failed.
21
DMZ
Max slumped inside the chopper. He was just aware of Lili whimpering with pain. Woody and Angel lifted her on to a stretcher bed that was fixed to the chopper. The other cadets crowded round them.
‘Get to your seats!’ Angel shouted. ‘Don’t get in our way!’
Reluctantly, the cadets moved to uncomfortable high-backed airline seats. Hwan was still crouching on the ground. He looked as if he might faint. Hector, with uncharacteristic gentleness, helped him into a seat. Then he turned and, grim-faced, indicated that Max should take a seat close to the flight deck. Hector consulted with Woody and Angel, then came and sat next to him.
‘She’s going to be okay. Lili, I mean. The bullet just grazed her arm. She’s lost some blood and it’s going to hurt for a bit, but –’<
br />
‘How many cadets have died on operations?’ Max interrupted.
‘Enough,’ Hector replied. It was clear he would say no more. After a brief pause, Hector spoke again. ‘MH-X Stealth Black Hawk,’ he said. ‘Invisible to radar and any other location-searching devices the North Koreans might throw at it. We have a Special Forces flight crew.’ He pointed at the two men in the flight deck who were navigating with the aid of night-vision goggles. ‘Those two choppers back at the football ground might try to chase us, but they’ll never catch us. We’re heading straight to the South Korean side of the de-militarised zone. Once we’re there, we’re safe. The North Koreans won’t risk a conflict beyond the DMZ.’
‘We messed it up, didn’t we?’ Max said.
‘What makes you say that?’ Hector seemed genuinely perplexed.
‘Our job was to rescue Prospero. Now she’s dead.’
‘Your job was to give Prospero a fighting chance. What she did with that chance was up to her.’
Max suppressed a wave of anger. Hector sounded cold and matter-of-fact. But he didn’t look it. Max realised the older man’s true feelings were perhaps more complex than he, Max, could understand.
‘She didn’t have a family, did she?’ Max asked.
Hector didn’t reply.
‘You didn’t want us to know her real name because you knew she might die in the rescue attempt. If we knew her real name, we’d have felt closer to her and found it more difficult if she died. You lied to us from the beginning.’
‘There’s a difference between lying, Max, and protecting you from the truth.’
Max didn’t know what to say. They were silent again. ‘She didn’t have to do that,’ he said eventually. ‘We could have all got out alive. Including her.’
‘Sure we could,’ Hector said. ‘This aircraft is fitted with two 7.62 millimetre miniguns and a Hellfire missile. We could have taken out those North Korean gunmen in an instant, and the choppers. But how many men would we have killed? Ten? Fifteen? For obeying the orders of a regime that would kill them if they refused? Plus, by now the UK would be at war with North Korea.’ He gave Max a hard stare. ‘We’d have done it, Max. We’d have done it to get you cadets out of there. We’d have done it for Prospero too. She knew that. She decided that her way was better. For what it’s worth, I admire her decision.’
