All that Peter carried was a lightweight eleven-ounce VHF
transceiver for “communicating with his men in the terminal building and in a quick-release holster on his right hip a Walther PK 38
automatic pistol.
Each member of the assault team carried the weapon of his own choice. Colin Noble favoured the Browning Hi-power .45 for its massive killing power and large fourteen-round magazine, while Peter liked the pinpoint accuracy and light recoil of the 9 men. parabellum Walther with which he could be certain of a snap head-shot at fifty metres.
One item was standard equipment for all members of the assault team. Every one of their weapons was loaded with Super Velex explosive bullets which trebled the knockdown power at impact, breaking up in the human body and thereby reducing the risk of over-penetration and with it the danger to innocents. Peter never let them forget they would nearly always be working with terrorist and victim closely involved.
Beside Peter, Colin Noble unclipped the thin gold chain from around his neck which held the tiny Star of David, twinkling gold on the black bush of his chest hair. He slipped the ornament into his pocket and buttoned down the flap.
“I say, old chap-” Colin Noble gave an atrocious imitation of a
Sandhurst accent shall we toddle along then?” 4 Peter glanced at the luminous dial of his Rolex. It was sixteen minutes to eleven o’clock.
The exact moment at which my career ends, he thought grimly, and raised his right arm with clenched fist, then pumped it up and down twice, the old cavalry signal to advance.
Swiftly the two men raced out ahead, absolutely silent on soft rubber soles, carrying their probes at high port to prevent them clattering against tarmac or against the metal parts of the aircraft,
dark hunchbacked figures under the burden of the gas cylinders they carried.
Peter gave them a slow count of five, and while he waited he felt the adrenalin charge his blood, every nerve and muscle of his body coming under tension, and he heard his own words to Kingston Parker echo in his ears like the prophecy of doom.
“There is no middle ground. The alternative is one hundred per cent casualties. We lose the aircraft, the passengers and all the Thor personnel aboard her.” He thrust the thought aside, and repeated the signal to advance. In two neat files, bunched up close and well in hand,
the assault teams went out, at the run. Three men carrying each of the aluminium alloy scaling ladders, four with the sling-bags of stun grenades, others with the slap hammers to tear out the door locks, and each with his chosen weapon always a big calibre handgun for Peter
Stride would trust nobody with an automatic weapon in the crowded interior of a hijacked aircraft, and the minimum requirement for every member of the assault teams was marksmanship with a pistol that would enable him to pick a small moving target and hit it repeatedly and quickly without endangering innocents.
They ran in almost total silence; the loudest sound was Peter’s breathing in his own ears, and he had time now for a moment’s regret.
It was a gamble which he could never win, the best that could happen was the utter ruin of his life’s work, but he steeled himself brutally and thrust aside the thought. He ran on into the night.
Just ahead of him now, silhouetted by the lights of the terminal building, the dark figures of the “stick” men were in position under the bulging silver belly; and lightning flared suddenly, so that the tall silver thunderheads rippled with intense white fire, and the field was starkly lit, the double column of black-clad figures standing out clearly against the paler grass. If they were observed, it would come now, and the crash of thunder made Peter’s nerves jump, expecting detonation and flame of a dozen percussion grenades.
Then it was dark again, and the sponginess of wet grass beneath his feet gave way to flat hard tarmac. Then suddenly they were under the Boeing fuselage, like chickens under the protective belly of the hen, and the two columns split neatly into four separate groups and still in tight order every man dropped onto his left knee, and at the same moment, with the precision of repeated rehearsals, every member of the team lifted his gas mask to cover his nose and mouth.
Peter swept one quick glance back at them, and then depressed the transmit button on his transceiver. He would not speak a word from now until it was over; there was always a remote possibility that the hijackers were monitoring this frequency.
The click of the button was the signal to the members of his team in the terminal and almost immediately, there was a rising whistling howl of jet engines running up.
Even though the aircraft were parked up in the northern international departures area, they had been turned so the jet exhausts were pointed at the service area, and there were five intercontinental jet liners cooperating. The combined sound output of twenty big jet engines was deafening even at that range and Peter gave the open hand signal.
The “stick” man was waiting poised, and at the signal he reached up and placed the drill bit against the belly of the fuselage. Any sound of the compressed air spinning the drill was effectively drowned,
and there was only the slight jerk of the long probe as it went through the pressure hull.
Instantly the second “stick” man placed the tip of his probe into the tiny hole, and glanced at Peter. Again the open hand signal, and the gas was spurting into the hull. Peter was watching the sweep hand of his watch.
Two clicks on the transmit button, and the lights behind the row of shaded portholes blinked out simultaneously as the mains power was cut and the air-conditioning in the Boeing’s cabins with it.
The howl of combined jet engines continued a few seconds longer and Peter signalled the ladder men forward.
Gently the rubber-padded tops of the ladders were hooked onto the leading edges of the wings and into the door sills high above them by black-costumed, grotesquely masked figures working with deceptively casual speed.
Ten seconds from discharge of the Factor V gas into the hull, and
Peter clicked thrice. Instantly mains power to the Boeing was resumed and the lights flicked on. Now the air-conditioning was running again,
washing the gas swiftly from the cabins and flight deck.
Peter drew one long, slow deep breath and tapped Colin’s shoulder.
They went up the ladders in a concerted silent rush, Peter and Colin leading the teams to each wing surface.
ten minutes to eleven,” said Ingrid to Karen. She lifted her voice slightly above the din of jet engines howling somewhere out there in the night. Her throat was dry and sore from the drug withdrawal and a nerve jumped involuntarily in the corner of her eye.
Her headache felt as though a knotted rope was being twisted slowly tighter around her forehead. “It looks as though Caliph miscalculated. The South Africans aren’t going to give in. -” She glanced with a small anticipatory twist of her lips back through the open door of the flight deck at the four hostages sitting in a row on the fold-down seats. The silver-haired Englishman was smoking a
Virginia cigarette in a long amber and ivory holder, and he returned her gaze with disdain, so that Ingrid felt a prickle of annoyance and raised her voice so he could hear her next words. “It’s going to be necessary to shoot this batch also.”
“Caliph has never been wrong before.” Karen shook her head vehemently. “There is still an hour to deadline-” and at that instant the lights flickered once and then went out.
With all the portholes shaded the darkness was complete, and the hiss of the air-conditioning faded into silence before there was a murmur of surprised comment.
Ingrid groped across the control panel for the switch which transferred the flight deck onto the power from the aircraft’s own batteries, and as the soft ruddy glow of the panel lights came on her expression was tense and worried.
“They’ve switched off the mains,” she exclaimed. “The air-conditioning this could be Delta.” W “No.” Karen’s voice was shrill. “There are no flares.”
“We could be-” Ingrid started but she could hear the drunken slur in her own voice. Her tongue felt too large for her mouth, and Karen’s face started to distort before her eyes, the edges blurring out of focus.
“Karen-” she said, and now in her nostrils the unmistakable aroma of truffles and on her tongue the taste of
