‘Tempting to just go and ring the bell — could be a lot simpler.’
‘Yeah, and get your head blown off.’
Two hundred metres beyond the drive Dima slowed to a halt, waiting for the second car to catch up. Once its lights were in view he carried on at a crawl until he found the track to the right that he’d seen on his friend Darwish’s pictures. The track was deeply rutted and the car bottomed after a hundred metres. The cypress trees made a good screen. Dima opened his door.
‘Okay guys: let’s get kitted up.’
The air was damp, and pungent with the aroma of the cypresses. A mountain grouse, surprised by the unexpected visitors, shot into the air from near their feet with a furious clatter of wings, but otherwise there were no sounds, no wind. Vladimir took the rope kit and helped himself to a Dragunov. One of the reasons he was on Dima’s must-have list was his climbing skill. As a boy of nine he had escaped from a juvenile detention centre down a four-storey wall. A few years later he was making frequent visits to his girlfriend’s second floor bedroom, scaling the outside of the block where she lived while her father waited on guard, oblivious, in the hallway. ‘Like Dracula,’ he said, grinning with his remaining teeth.
They walked in single file towards the point in the wall that Dima had chosen. They couldn’t see any cameras but it was possible they were concealed. Where he had identified a bend in the wall on the pictures, he reasoned there should be a blind spot.
The walls were ten metres higher than even Kroll had estimated, but Vladimir wasn’t fazed. With the rope attached to his belt and the guys at the bottom feeding it out in case of kinks, he started up the wall at such a pace that it looked like he had suckers on his hands.
‘Nice,’ said Kroll. ‘Like Spiderman with balls.’
Vladimir disappeared from view, obscured by the trees close to the wall. Two minutes later he was down again, having fixed the rope to a rampart by tying loops round it and then using snail links to join the loops.
‘It’s a bit busy in there. You better look.’
Dima climbed the wall using the rope. What had he been expecting? A deserted open area, a few vehicles, not much happening. He couldn’t have been more wrong.
Since the last satellite pictures he had seen, taken only four hours before, the place had been transformed into a hive of activity. Three large trucks were parked facing the gate, each with its tailgate dropped. There must have been fifty men down there, all very young, looking like they had just been turfed out of the trucks and were waiting to be told what to do next. There were another twenty in semi-military uniforms, carrying a mixture of shotguns and rifles. Far from being the secluded hideaway of Al Bashir, this looked more like an improvised HQ. The wall he was secured to had deteriorated. There was no walkway. He was unlikely to be disturbed by a patrol, nor were there any cameras that he could make out. He pulled on the rope — the signal for the others to join him. It was pointless attempting to mount any assault themselves with those numbers below, he thought. But he also realised that the Go Team making a fast rope descent would be a disaster — unless all those below with arms were seriously distracted. There was just about enough room for the nuke team to land their Mil, but only once the personnel had been cleared.
Kroll peered down at the crowd and sighed. ‘Why does life have to be so complicated?’
Vladimir was by his side, reaching down to give Zirak a hand. ‘It’s what makes it interesting.’
This was why Dima had wanted Vladimir along. He thrived on unpredictability; he lived for it. Dima scanned the crowd below, trying to read what was happening. Someone in uniform prodded an older man with his AK. If these were recruits they weren’t exactly being welcomed. Coerced, more like. Where was Kaffarov? They would have to contain these men before they could mount a search. And clearing an area for Shenk’s chopper was another problem.
There was no sign of the big boxy Mercedes G-Wagen, identified on the satellite pictures as Kaffarov’s.
He turned to Kroll. ‘Call up the Slug. Put them on standby.’
A plan was forming in his head, which involved laying down enough fire in one area to provoke the crowd — and the shooters — into taking cover in one corner. But a second later he abandoned it. A prisoner, hooded, half- naked and shackled, was being led by four men towards the far wall. He was not going willingly. Could it be Kaffarov? He was short and from his torso he looked to be the right age. Whatever Dima thought of him personally, the mission was to bring him back in one piece.
He turned to Kroll. ‘Tell the Slug it’s go-go. Expect armed response. Tell them to be prepared to fire on descent.’ Then he addressed the others, pointing at the hooded man. ‘If that’s what I think it is we have to take out the executioners.’
Above the raised platform towards which the captive was being dragged was a thick beam, from which hung several nooses. His legs were flailing wildly. Despite the hood, he was under no illusion as to what was about to happen.
Dima beckoned Vladimir. ‘Prepare five rappels — when we go, we go down together.’ He looked at Zirak and Gregorin. ‘Which of you is the best shot?’ They each pointed at the other. ‘OK, G comes before V: Gregorin. Move twenty metres to your right and take out the hangmen. Don’t hit the prisoner: he could be Kaffarov. Kroll, how close are the Go Team?’
‘One minute.’
He heard the distant thrum of the Mil, but there was too much action down below for anyone to notice yet. In position, Gregorin watched the action through his sights, postponing the first shot as long as he could. Then three things happened in quick succession. A few of the gunmen on the ground looked up at the approach of the still invisible Mil, and Gregorin fired his first shot at the execution team. One fell. The rest, struggling to get the writhing man’s head through the noose, thought he had slipped or been kicked — until the second shot took the face off another of them. The others dropped the hooded man like a hot coal and ran for cover, as their victim flopped on to the platform and curled into a foetal position. Then from the corner of his eye Dima saw the lights of a truck come on. It shot forward, forcing its way through the men and the guards towards the gates. ‘Shoot out the tyres!’ yelled Kroll. ‘Stop the truck!’
But the men, panicked, were surging around the vehicle. It was impossible to get a clean shot without hitting the occupants or the crowd. Most of them now had their faces craned towards the sky, as the Mil came overhead, obliterating all sound as it hovered. The ropes came down, followed by the first of the Go Team. They loosed off teargas, but it wasn’t enough to cover them effectively as a volley of shots met them. Dima cursed as he saw the first two fall to the ground, wounded or dead.
‘Fire at will,’ he yelled to the others, but they had already started. ‘Take out the gunners.’ Then he saw it. Less than a hundred metres from the Slug, ghostly in the thick haze of the night sky, the Nuke team’s Mil hovering — drifting closer, as if waiting to land. It was way too early. It had no radar jamming. It wasn’t equipped for hostile action.
Dima screamed at Kroll: ‘Pull back! Get Shenk to pull back NOW!’
But Kroll couldn’t hear. He was preoccupied with the shooting. As soon as Dima looked back he saw it. A streak of bright light from the south arcing into the sky and then sweeping towards them, the warhead black and invisible against the blinding blaze of its propellant.
‘Missile!’
Dima could only watch as it slammed into the cockpit of Shenk’s Mil, shearing the front clean off, the flaming bodies of the crew falling from the wreckage. Meanwhile, the frontless craft turned upwards, dropped its tail and began to spin like a giant boomerang towards the Slug. The Slug pilots, facing the other way, would never have known what hit them. Dima and his team flattened themselves against the wall as the rotors of the two aircraft engaged. The smaller craft fell first, on to the wall opposite Dima’s team, wobbled, then slid nose down next to the hangman’s platform. The stricken Slug took longer, its sophisticated avionics struggling to compensate for the damaged rotors — but it was all too much for them. The nose of the craft reared up, the draught almost blowing Dima off the wall, as it smashed down into the centre of the compound. A giant fireball swept over them.
15
Forward Operating Base Spartacus, Iraqi Kurdistan
The shower was cold and the pressure zero, but as far as Blackburn was concerned it was the best wash he had ever had. He stood there far longer than his allocated time, and if anyone had a problem with that they could go
