They'll hack us to pieces in seconds. Stan's wife will be a widow, his son will be without a dad and it will all be my fault. My fault for turning an important search mission into a juvenile, hairy-arsed, straight to-video personal fucking adventure.
The random shooting continued. One man, standing on the bank no more than eight feet from them, casually loosed off a couple of rounds from his SLR as he urinated into the river, and the SAS men flickered an expressionless glance at each other as the 7.62 rounds passed inches over their heads and tore into the far bank. A few yards further on a woman with her dress pulled up over her back crouched listlessly in the mud as a bearded soldier drove into her from behind. Around her, a surly and impatient knot of men watched and waited, and masturbated to make themselves hard for when their own turns came.
This hellish scene was repeated at intervals along the bank and more than once Alex caught himself or so it seemed staring mesmerised into the eyes of an RUF warrior. His heart appeared to be beating hard enough to disturb the greasy surface of the water. It seemed impossible that he had not been seen.
But the soldiers, it turned out, were less interested in driftwood than in the slopping palm wine buckets from which, at intervals, they refilled their half gourds and plastic beakers. Those and the half-dozen wretchedly prostrate women on the shore refugees, Alex guessed, displaced by the fighting.
The current, perceptibly faster now, swept them past the outhouses. The first, Alex guessed from the rhythmic chugging sound, housed the generator. In a second, from which the buckets were being carried, he supposed that they had some kind of distillery. The third, a mud-walled dwelling whose palm-frond roof had collapsed inwards, was anyone's guess, but as they drifted past it the palm wine stink was joined by that of slit.
And then, for no more than five seconds, Alex saw them:
three pale-skinned figures, their heads bowed, their hands tied behind them, kneeling in the narrow passage between the two cinder-block huts. They were being guarded by a single uniformed soldier carrying an SLR, smoking a joint and wearing a pink bubble cut wig.
Alex's eyes widened and he turned to Stan Clayton, saw that the other man had clocked the guard and the captives too. Then they were passing the speakers, and taking the full thumping force and screaming distortion of 'No Living Thing'.
'I think I prefer the Martine McCutcheon version,' murmured Clayton thoughtfully, as an RUF man heaved a wet tree root on to the bonfire and a shower of bright-orange sparks whirled skywards. They were only eight or nine yards from the nearest whooping, rifle-waving soldiers now, but the amplification from the sound system was such that the corporal could probably have yelled at the top of his voice without being heard.
And then, as the firelight dimmed and a column of dense brown smoke replaced the flames, Alex felt the current take sudden hold, swinging the branch and themselves into deeper water. The two men silently struggled to remain concealed and to keep the branch parallel to the shore. They were clearing the camp fast now the bonfire was already well behind them but they were moving inexorably towards the Rokel's racing central channel.
'We're going to have to let go,' gasped Alex and heard Clayton's grunt of agreement beside him.
'On three, underwater and kick for the side. One, two .
Alex released the branch, dived, and felt himself lifted by the current and swung with doll-like helplessness through the dark, churning water. There was a roar at his ears, a sense of vast and indifferent force, then a rock or a boot exploded in a vicious flash of light against the side of his head.
Somehow, even as he briefly lost consciousness, he managed to keep his mouth shut. Hours or maybe seconds later, desperate to breathe, he clawed his way to what he thought was the surface, struck mud and felt himself dragged downwards again by a hand at his collar. For some reason, there seemed to be air at the bottom of the river. He tried to inhale, gagged and found that a mud-tasting hand was clamped over his mouth. Water streamed from his nose. He could breathe again. He opened his eyes.
Clayton's worried grin was inches away.
'You all right, Alex?' They were in deep, eddying water beneath the bank. The music and din of the camp were still loud, but no longer deafening. Stan Clayton had one elbow under Alex's chin, the other anchored to a solid-looking mangrove root.
'Are you OK?' The whisper more urgent now.
Alex tried to nod and then, retching, vomited foul tasting water. There was blood in his eyes and his head hurt like hell. Somehow he found a root of his own and passed an unsteady hand over his face.
'Yeah . thanks, Stan. Lost it there for a moment. Thanks.'
I was seconds away from drowning there, he told himself Seconds away from death.
'I think we're more or less clear of the camp,' continued Clayton.
'The other blokes can't be far, but I'm a bit worried about them fuckers we 'ad to duck round on our way here. Bride of Frankenstein an' his mate.
'Let me have a look,' said Alex and with Clayton's help hauled himself up so that his eyes were level with the bank. They were less than twenty yards from where they had descended the tree roots, but of the sleeping RUF soldiers there was no sign. Instead, Don Hammond was leopard-crawling towards him through the shadows, grabbing him under the arms, dragging him by sheer brute force up the slick clay face of the bank.
'I reckoned it was either you guys or a hippo wallowing around out there,' said the sergeant.
'Come on, Stan, grab hold.' When Clayton was on the bank too the three of them moved back from the river and into cover, and Alex swiftly brought the sergeant up to date concerning the ITN team.
'How did they look?' asked Hammond.
'Alive,' replied Clayton tersely.
'Where are the other guys?' asked Alex.
The sergeant inclined his head towards the bush.
'Just moving the two guards that were here away from the path. We reckoned you'd be coming out about here.'
'Did you kill them?'
'Yeah, course we did.' He looked at Alex doubtfully.
'Are you OK? You look as if you've got some kind of head wound.'
'Took a whack in the river on something. Stan dragged me in by the collar.'
'Well, that'll have saved us all some paperwork.
Dead officers we don't need. Are you OK to tab back to Millwall, or do you want me to go?'
'I'm fine to go, Don.'
'You sure? What's eight nines?'
Alex hesitated. The question seemed strangely unanswerable.
'And the motto of the Parachute Regiment?'
Again, Alex was silent. He'd begun his military career with the Paras but couldn't for the life of him .
Hammond nodded and glanced at Clayton.
'I'd say you're a bit concussed. I'll tab back to Millwall with Lance and pick up the home-bound chopper. You stay here and set up the assault.'
Alex nodded. The sergeant was right. A single navigation error between here and Millwall more than an hour's night march through thick jungle could cost the captives their lives.
'Put it this way, Alex.' Stan Clayton grinned.
'At least if you stay 'ere you're guaranteed to be here for the fireworks. Go back wiv a leakin' 'cad and Ross'll just send some other fucker.'
'OK, guys, OK. I hear you,' said Alex, raising his hands in mock surrender.
'Don, have you managed to draw a map of the camp?'
Hammond nodded, and pulled out a sheet of waterproof paper marked up with outlines and co- ordinates.
'Right,' said Alex.
'The ITN people, when I saw them, were being held in the passage between these two cinder-block buildings here, which you've called Hut One and Hut Two. Was that how you saw it, Stan?'
'Yeah, it was.'
'And from what I could see they looked very tired.
Their morale was poor. Each or any of them might be hurt, possibly badly. But I'd say that all three were
