'And if we don't?' muttered Dad.
'If you don't surrender now,' Blythe went on, as if he could hear us, 'I will impale your friends one by one and leave them to die slow, painful deaths. My soldiers will then lay fires in every building in this compound and burn them to the ground. All the gun towers are manned, there's no way to escape. Wherever you're hiding, we'll smoke you out. And if you survive the fire, then you'll join your friends on a stake. Quick and easy; slow and painful. Your choice. You have two minutes to make your position known.'
We moved back from the edge. Tariq was in shock, David looked furious, Dad's face gave nothing away; he was busy calculating the odds.
'Okay,' said Dad, 'here's what we do…'
'Pardon me Sar'nt, but I think I'd better handle this,' interrupted David. 'I can get us out of here.'
Dad looked skeptical.
'How?' I asked.
'I'm Special Forces, Mr Keegan. I'm trained for this kind of thing. Just before deployment I completed a SERE course.'
'Seriously?' asked Dad. 'You're like, what, twenty?'
'When you've got a father like mine, Sir, you don't have much choice but to be the best. He started preparing me for Special Forces the day I finished potty training. I'm the youngest soldier ever recruited to my unit, and trust me, I did it all on my own.'
'Your father must have been very proud,' I said, sarcastically.
'I no longer have a father,' he replied, matter of fact.
'What's SERE?' Tariq asked.
'Survival, evasion, resistance, escape,' he replied. 'I can get in and out of anywhere.'
'Then we have to stop him,' said Tariq, finally. 'I can't watch this happen again.'
He looked at us desperately, but none of us could meet his gaze.
'We can't leave them! We can't!' he said urgently. 'If you won't help me, I'll do it myself.'
'Sit down, T,' said Dad.
'John, I won't let this happen,' said Tariq, almost shouting now. 'They're going to die because they followed my orders. Orders I gave trying to save your life. We can't abandon them.'
But his face, the tears in his eyes, betrayed the truth. Tariq knew it was hopeless.
Dad put his arm on Tariq's shoulder and gripped it tightly, leaning forward and resting his forehead against the distraught Iraqi's. 'They're dead already, T. It's over.'
'So what, we just run?' said Tariq, crying now. 'We let him kill our friends and we walk away? Then what the fuck has this all been for? What's it all been for?'
'Oh no, we don't walk away,' said Dad. 'Not now. Not after all this.' He turned his attention to David. 'You know this camp, right?'
David nodded.
'You can help us move through it undetected?'
'If you do exactly as I say and keep your heads, I believe I can, Sir.'
'Then here's what we're going to do,' said Dad, and I could see the resolve harden in his eyes as he spoke, seeing my father the soldier fully apparent in front of me for the first time. Suddenly I could see why he'd commanded the respect of the resistance. When he turned to us and outlined his plan, the force of his determination was impossible to resist.
Ever since I'd arrived in Iraq he'd been on the back foot, imprisoned, reacting to events, frightened for me. But now he was in a position to take direct action again. I realized there was a whole side to my father I'd never seen before. And it echoed in me. I learned as much about myself as I did about him in that moment, and I felt proud.
'We're going to hunt and kill General Blythe before the hour is out,' said Dad, calmly. 'And anyone who gets in our way dies. Everyone with me?'
All eyes were on the son of the man we were proposing to kill.
An awful, gut wrenching scream of pure terror and agony erupted from a hundred tiny speakers.
'I believe that is an achievable objective, Sir,' said David.
Chapter Six
Dad took me to one side as we prepared to leave.
'I want you to stay here, Lee.'
'What? Why?'
'We're going to into combat against a vastly superior force of men who want to kill us. It's no place for a boy. I couldn't live with myself if I got you killed. You sit tight, wait 'til dark and then try to slip out on your own. You'll have more of a chance that way. We'll rendezvous at the football ground tomorrow morning. Okay?'
I didn't know where to start, but I felt the anger welling up in me and tried to choose my words carefully. I failed.
'Fuck that. And fuck you,' I spat. 'I'm the one who rescued you, remember? No place for a boy, my arse.' I clenched my jaw and stared him down, full of defiance.
I could tell he wanted to get into it, shout me down, ground me, even give me a slap. But I could see the uncertainty in his eyes, no longer sure which, if any, approach would work with me. He was right to hesitate.
Eventually he just nodded.
As the dying screams of Brett, Toseef and Anna echoed around the buildings and gardens, we moved through the compound like ghosts.
We stole the uniforms off the first four soldiers we encountered, and took their weapons too. Viewed from a distance we would now look like a normal patrol. But we only broke cover when needed, preferring to move through the buildings and shadows.
David was terrifying; silent, focused, seemingly without fear, and totally in control. My dad and Tariq followed his every move and gesture like the practiced guerrilla fighters they were. I just tagged along behind them, trying not to give the game away with a careless move.
When we encountered guards or patrols David would take the lead, sidling up to them with the grace of a dancer, silencing them so quietly he almost seemed gentle. He would wrap his arm around their throat, compress their carotid artery and squeeze until they passed out. Then he would lay them on the floor, take hold of their hair and slit their throats.
When two or more stumbled across our path Dad would take the second, and Tariq would take the third. Although neither of them were as poised and fluid as David, they each held their own.
Tariq favoured a slow, delicate, tiptoe approach until just out of striking range, and then he would suddenly leap forward with his arms raised and snap the neck of his prey with a flourish, and let them collapse to the ground at his feet as his arms went wide as if to take a bow.
My father, on the other hand, was more straightforward. I was shocked by the calm precision with which he killed.
He would walk casually up behind his intended victim with his knife drawn, looking like he was going to pat the guy cheerily on the back and suggest a quick beer. He would then wrap one arm around the man's mouth as he slid the knife in between their ribs, as matter of fact as slicing open an envelope.
We hid the bodies as best we could, but we knew we had to move quickly. Sooner or later someone's absence would be noted, or a patrol would not radio in on time, and they would begin to zero in on us.
It probably only took us fifteen minutes to make our way to the main palace, but it felt like a lifetime. I didn't need to kill anyone during the journey, and I was grateful. I didn't want Dad to see me get blood on my hands. Not yet, anyway.
I was worried that he'd see my face as I took a life and he'd realize the truth about me.
The first time I murdered someone – not the first time I took a life, that was earlier – I was out of my head on drugs. I remember the actions but not how it felt.
