by Geoff Wolak
In the car park of the MOD building I ditched the respirator and said goodbye to the lads, Bob’s men walking me in. I met the Major and the Colonel with Bob, all faces sullen, and we walked towards the meeting room, Bob carrying a long bag over his shoulder. He handed it to me before we arrived at the room in question.
Inside, I spotted the Director of SIS, the lady just this moment sitting down with her team as we entered – a warm smile for me, and opposite her was a man I figured to be the head of Mi5, plus a man sat by himself looking worried – or angered, I couldn’t quite tell, and facing both parties were men from the Cabinet Office, one I recognised. Last to enter was someone I did not recognise, a tall man with an assistant. Bob informed me that he was the head of GCHQ.
‘Gentlemen,’ I rudely called as I moved to the centre of the room, the Major and the Colonel holding back. ‘And lady. My name is Wilco, SAS, and I called for this meeting, despite being just a lowly grunt.’
Several people looked like they wanted to shoot me at the cheek of this meeting, but most studied each other rather than me.
‘I would like to thank the Cabinet Office for allowing me to speak here today,’ I said, a glance their way. ‘As most of you should know by now ... I’ve been doing a good job of impersonating a Russian gunman, and on Friday I went – at the direct high-level request of Mi5 – undercover with a Russian gang, the gang that held hostages in Farringdon, as you will have seen all over the news.
‘When I effected an entrance Saturday morning to a safety deposit box business, I was surprised to find Pamela Houghton inside, attending a safety box, slush money for Mi5. I will state here and now for the record ... that the ringleader got a call twenty minutes earlier, and that my entry was very carefully timed – despite the fact that I could see no reason for such a well-timed entry.’
I opened the bag and pulled out an A4 brown envelope and stepped across to the head of Mi5. ‘Those are your Cayman Island bank details, sir, they were in the box she opened, as well as £110,000 pounds, the money now with Bob Staines, and yours to claim back any time you like.’
‘And the other money missing from the boxes?’ he asked as he examined the papers.
‘One point five million, sir, in the hands of Bob Staines,’ I informed him. ‘I took it, so that it would not fall into anyone else’s ... hands.’
He shot me a look.
‘What I also took that day, was a rifle, an AK47.’
‘That’s a serious offence,’ said the man sat by himself. ‘Removing evidence.’
Ignoring him, I unzipped the bag and stepped back to the head of Mi5. ‘This is that rifle, an old Russian made AK47, which – oddly enough – was logged into a Belfast police station twelve years ago.’ I placed it down on his desk. ‘You will note, however, that the London police have logged in four rifles, Chinese made. You will also note that I’m an expert with these things, and that I examined the rifles used by the gunmen, and they were Russian made, not Chinese, easy to tell from the rivets and fore end sight.’
From behind me, a voice said, ‘You’re saying that the police have the wrong weapons, that they were swapped?’
‘I am stating what I know to be the facts. And if you fingerprint that rifle you will match the prints to the gunmen. What conclusions you draw are your own.’ From the bag, I pulled out Rodos’s mobile phone. ‘This is the phone used by the leader of the gunmen, Rodos, and it’s number has been analysed by Mi6, who traced many of the calls – including calls made when he was inside the hostage siege – back to the mobile mast in the vicinity of the Mi5 building.’
‘Proves nothing,’ said the man sat by himself.
‘Shut up,’ the Director of Mi5 said in a tone that was not to be mistaken.
I handed the phone to the Director. ‘You can analyse the calls, dates and times and durations, cell towers used, and you may find something useful.’
I turned, and glanced at the Director of Mi6. ‘You will also note that the police have analysed plastic explosives used at the scene, and yet – my clothes were covered in residue when the bomb went off, a large grey cloud created. Plastic explosive doesn’t create much smoke, and on the day in question I got a whiff of something very familiar.
‘You see, I run a three-day scenario in Brecon where we simulate falling artillery, and we use old MOD High Explosive, so I know the smell. Having analysed the residue on my clothes, Mi6 matched it to old MOD High Explosive, not plastic.’
I faced the Director of Mi5. ‘There are also the facts gained inside the siege. Pamela told me that her immediate boss had sent her in, and that she had been set up.’
‘What!’ the man sat by himself exploded. ‘It was her decision to go there Saturday, I just signed it off!’
‘That I know to be correct and true,’ I loudly told him. ‘I do not believe you set her up.’
‘You don’t?’ he quietly questioned.
‘No. Moving on. The leader of the gang – when he failed to find the stated sixty million quid – admitted that the job had been funded and organised by Seppi Linderov, an odd fact given that I knew Seppi Linderov to be quite, quite dead for the past three months.’
‘Did you kill him?’ the Director of Mi5 asked me.
‘Certainly not, sir, I’ve never killed anyone.’ I glanced at the Cabinet Office guys, one smiling. ‘So you see, we have a mystery.’
The Director of Mi5 turned his head to a man. ‘I want all of Pamela’s team picked up, right now, held in isolation incommunicado, pressure them, explain that they’ll never get to see their families again.’ The man lifted a phone and stepped out.
The Director faced the second man. ‘I want her office and files locked down tight, her home searched, all calls traced.’
That man stepped out.
The guy from GCHQ stood, a step towards the Director of Mi5. ‘This is not what we’re about!’ he raged at his colleague. ‘Creating havoc to justify budgets and salaries! We’re here to stop the damn havoc!’
The Director of Mi5 remained calm. ‘Perhaps we get all the evidence, before slinging mud,’ he calmly stated. He turned his head to the man sat alone, who I assumed was Pamela’s buffoon of a boss. ‘You’ll need to resign, Martin, save an enquiry – and a public trial.’
‘I’m the fall guy?’ the man asked, not happy with his boss at all.
‘I don’t believe he knew,’ I stated.
‘That’s the whole point,’ the Director of Mi5 told me. ‘He should have known, he’s paid to have known what was going on under his feet.’
I nodded at that. ‘Gentlemen, and lady,’ I loudly called. ‘What happens next ... is up to you. I won’t be talking to the press, or anyone else, I have no axe to grind – even though some believe Pamela’s aim was to kill me.’
‘How did she die?’ the Director of Mi5 asked me.
‘She was stood near the lift shaft when the bomb went off, so I guess she lost her footing and fell.’
I could see a smirk across his face.
‘Ladies and gentlemen, I am a soldier, I follower orders, and I don’t care who issues them. If the government decides that I should work more closely with Mi5’s Russia House ... that is what I will do.
‘But what you all need to consider ... is that if I’m put on the stand at an enquiry, and I have to give testimony under oath, that I will – most likely – stick to the truth and the facts, save risking a prison term later on.’ I let them consider that. ‘Thank you for your time here today.’
I led the Major and the Colonel out, Bob following, and we said nothing till we reached his office, the kettle knocked on.
The Colonel asked Bob, ‘You think they’ll go for Wilco?’
‘They wouldn’t dare, the Director will be after them big time, people will be held and made to talk, those involved all getting a few years for some odd offence like fiddling expenses. He’s a step away from being forced to resign himself, so he’ll lash out at them. If anything happened to Wilco the PM would go ape shit.’
> The Major faced me. ‘Find a less dangerous pass-time for a while.’
I cocked an eyebrow at him and smiled. ‘Got any paperwork for me, sir?’ I quipped.
Bob faced me. ‘It was a good idea, getting them together like that, forcing the issue, I can see that now. We can keep this under wraps, but you also made sure that it would be dealt with. You’re wasted where you are.’
‘Fuck off, Bob,’ the Major told him.
Grinning, I faced Bob. ‘The GCHQ guy was not happy.’
‘People don’t realise the clout he has,’ Bob explained. ‘His budget is bigger than Mi5 and Mi6 combined, and then some. He also had field agents, and they install listening devices and signal boosters around the world. He has some good lads, they don’t get caught.’
An hour later I flew back with the Major and the Colonel, talk of spies, of Captain Bromley, and the dark world of double dealing – that and my fondness for touching up hostages. The Major informed me that Sergeant Crab was mad at me, because Crab had climbed over a fence to see why the case had been thrown in the water, and had been blown ten yards down the road, ending up soaking wet. It made us smile.
On Monday, after detachment orders, everyone wanted to know the detail of the heist, but I had to give them the sanitised version. And Bateman and Robinson were absent for some reason. Those lads who had been called upon for counter-terrorism work over the weekend were offered time off, if they wanted time off, many of the remainder sent to Brecon for some mountain hiking.
At noon I got a call from Bob.
‘Wilco, some bad news for the team I’m afraid.’
‘What’s ... that?’ I puzzled, now worried.
‘Bateman and Robinson, they were in a car smash on Saturday, no time to tell you.’
‘They’re alive?’
‘Alive, yes, but busted up, not sure if they’ll return to fitness, broken femurs, pins put in, broken collar bones, the works.’
‘Maybe The Programme.’
‘That’s one idea, a bit too soon to tell.’
‘I’ll go visit them at some point.’
It was a blow, and we were down two good men, the lads a little deflated.
Most of the team were warned that on Thursday morning they would tackle the 24hr speed march, and do it together. Slider was now running, but with some pain still, and taking it easy, Rocko not having any issues, Tomo as keen as ever, and he had replaced Smurf as both my younger brother - and keen little helper around the detachment.
Elkin was walking better, and helping out, attending those training sessions that did not involve running, which was most of them, and he got in a few hours flying a Cessna.
The news held my attention most days, and I scanned the papers, the powers doing a good job of playing down the heist, no mention of Pamela’s death.
On the Wednesday evening Bob rang me. ‘Got a minute?’
‘Sure, any news?’
‘One of Pamela’s team has struck a deal, he’ll just get a year inside, and he’s turned in the others. Looks like five trusted lieutenants were in on it.’
‘And their aim?’
‘Still not a clear picture, but Pamela seems to have given different people different stories, but the rush job to pay someone from that slush fund is now suspect, and the guy has disappeared. It’s starting to look like she had to go get the money and pay the guy, but was duped into doing so.’
‘Are you ... saying that she was innocent?’
‘No, just that ... we don’t have all the pieces yet. I think ... that Pamela’s original plan may have been altered slightly to catch her out by one of her own. She was not planning on getting held hostage, but she did get the weapons and the explosives.’
‘Muddy waters, Bob. Rather you than me, I run up mountains in fresh air. Have they covered it up?’
‘They have, the news sanitised, favours called in.’
‘A lot of people knew I was inside,’ I reminded him.
‘D-Notice on it all, and you’re down as having left after they threatened to start executing hostages – no mention of Pamela. Petrov is Europe’s most wanted right now, a valuable asset still. All the agencies have cooperated on bending the truth, an unusual united front.’
On the Friday morning, as we got back to the base from the speed march, we were all spent, but those with me had kept together and had kept my pace, the PTIs not having to shout at anyone.
Wet through after an early morning downpour, I lined up those involved as others came out and enquired after times and injuries.
‘Gentlemen,’ I called. ‘Today is Friday. Those of you interested, this weekend is detachment piss-up weekend, free hotel rooms in Cardiff, free bar and curry, lap dance money available.’
‘Uh ... Wilco,’ Swifty called. ‘Didn’t happen to find some money lying around on the floor ... or in a safety deposit box, did you?’
‘I did, it so happens, about twenty-five grand.’ They laughed. ‘So get home, get to sleep, be ready for the bus at 8pm outside the gate. Dismissed.’
On the Monday morning the detachment lads were in high spirits, but heads were still sore. And I was summoned by the Major.
I knocked, entered and saluted. ‘You wanted me, sir?’
‘Where did the money come from for the weekend bash?’ he loudly demanded.
‘From the same source that is funding this weekend’s officers’ bash, if you’re available, sir.’
He eased back. ‘I could be, yes. Nice ... hotel room?’
I nodded.
‘Transport ... there and back?’
Again I nodded. ‘Curry, lap dancing, beer.’
‘And whose money is it ... that we’ll be enjoying?’
‘The Zimbabwean Government by all accounts.’
‘Yeah? Well fuck ‘em. Let me know the details.’
O’Leary queried the money used, but I just pleaded ignorance. Later he indicated that I would receive a new lad on test and evaluation from Bob, the lad having been transferred from the Glass House.
‘This lad, he a bit of a handful?’ I queried.
‘He’s had issues with various people, yes. Sounds like a younger you.’
‘How old?’ I asked.
‘Twenty four, time served from seventeen.’
‘So he’s had long enough to know what he wants, and how the system works.’
‘How old were you when you figured out how it works?’ O’Leary quipped.
‘I still don’t know what I want, still considering my career path.’
‘Lad studied QMAR, became a good marathon runner, trained medic, which is all highly unusual.’
‘Why ... is that unusual?’ I puzzled.
‘He came from Transport, worked in Admin for a while.’
I lifted my eyebrows. ‘Now that is unusual. Still, Bob sees something in the guy.’
‘He speaks some Russian, Arabic, good Norwegian – for all the use that is. Dab hand with electronics, can drive and repair anything. And he’s a bit of a loner.’
I nodded. ‘This weekend is officers’ piss-up weekend, free beer and hotel rooms.’
‘Count me in. But I noticed that Moran attended the last one...’
‘He’s one of the lads at heart,’ I said with a shrug.
An hour later, as I stepped back into our room, a new face was threatening to punch out Rocko, which would have been a bad idea, Rocko taunting him, everyone taking the piss and taking bets. The new lad was as tall as me, slim and fit, jet black short hair, a scar over an eye, a look that suggested that he found the world a hard place to live in.
People moved out of the way for me. And I waited, staring at the adversarial pair.
‘New lad, Boss,’ Rocko said.
‘And do we welcome new lads ... or try and piss them off?’ I asked.
‘He’s a bit sensitive,’ Rocko said.
‘Then don’t upset him. Get the kettle on, and see if you can be nice for a change.’ I faced the newcomer. ‘What’s your name?’
&n
bsp; ‘Smithson.’
‘And what do they call you?’
‘Smithy or Smitty.’
‘I would have never had guessed that.’ Turning, I loudly announced, ‘Everyone, this is Smitty, and he ... will work alongside Tomo, if he lives to pass selection.’
‘What am I doing here anyhow?’ Smitty queried. ‘This is the SAS base, but you lot are not SAS apparently, and I was told I could cut my sentence if I tried out for a new unit.’
‘This is the SAS base, my name is Wilco -’ His eyes widened. ‘- of QMAR fame, and ... other less notable feats, and this is Echo Detachment. Around you ... are the best special forces operators the Armed Forces have to offer, better than the SAS. And you, you’re stood amongst them, soon to be training alongside them.’
‘I am?’ His face was a picture. ‘Wh ... why?’
‘Because you got noticed. You run marathons, you studied QMAR, you’re a medic, you speak a few languages and you’re a self starter, and ... you’re an unsociable misfit with a prison term. What were you inside for anyhow?’
‘I rammed my CO’s car with a lorry.’ He shrugged. ‘He was being a prick.’
‘Does anyone see anything wrong with that?’ I loudly asked, getting back shaking heads and smirks. ‘Still, if you rammed my car I’d kick the shit out of you.’
‘So you need someone to make the tea?’ he quipped.
‘Not at all. You are here ... to do our selection, and if you do well you get dropped behind enemy lines by parachute or submarine, you shoot a few people and then ... get yourself killed. Does that sound ... like something you’d like to do?’
‘All apart from getting killed, but I’d not pass SAS selection I don’t think.’
‘Our selection is not quite the same, and you have time. What’s needed ... is a good attitude and a willingness to try.’
‘I’ve never been accused of having a good attitude before.’
‘Were you forced to sit the medic exams?’ I asked.
‘Well, no ... I studied in my own time.’
‘And you get up early and run most days without anyone paying you to do that?’
