‘Would that work?’
‘You saw the looks on the faces of those guys at the airport. They’re not keen to get into a scrap with the enemy, not if they can help it. If they think the game is up, they’ll give in.’
‘Whoever is advising them rebels knows what the fuck they’re doing,’ Loader said with grudging admiration.
‘It’s the Russians,’ said Mallet. ‘Those bastards know how to fight.’
Bowman thought back to what Lang had told them in Monte Carlo.
They’re sending in some guys.
Military advisers.
Special Forces. Big blokes with guns.
Ten or twelve guys at most, he figured. Veteran SF operators. Calling the shots, directing the KUF paramilitary force in battle. What the military theorists liked to call a force multiplier. The Russians would have been on the ground for weeks, probably. Drilling the rebels in fire-and-move tactics, suppressive fire, using the dead ground to advance unseen on an enemy position. Nothing complicated. But highly effective. A few core tactical principles, good instructors and an intensive training package could transform a group of ragtag rebels into a cohesive, disciplined fighting unit.
If we come up against those guys, we’re knackered.
He said, ‘Still nothing from Mike?’
Mallet grimaced and shook his head. ‘It’s been hours since they’ve heard from him.’
‘Could mean anything,’ said Loader.
‘Aye,’ Mallet replied. ‘But it doesn’t look good.’
Loader said, ‘If he is under attack, let’s hope he can hold them rebels off for a while.’
‘Mike won’t give up that easily,’ Bowman said. ‘He’s got forty guys with him from the Presidential Guard, remember. The best troops in the country. And the palace is in a good defensive position. He should be able to hold out until we can relieve the pressure.’
‘So why isn’t he answering?’
‘We’ll find out soon enough,’ said Mallet.
They raced on. Bowman kept glancing at the clock, counting down the time and the distance to the palace in his head. Eighteen minutes to go. Seven miles. Almost there. They were passing through the outskirts of the city. Bowman saw tin-roofed shacks, crude dwellings, gleaming new mosques. Mountains of rubbish festered along the sides of the road. The streets were dark and empty. Everyone had locked themselves indoors to wait out the fighting. Like the moment the outlaws rode into a town in the Wild West. No one wanted to get caught in the crossfire.
They continued west until they hit the main bridge across the Karatandu River. Bowman stuck close to the Hilux as the convoy raced across towards the centre of Marafeni. Mallet strained his eyes, scanning the ground ahead. The three other operators in the back of the Land Cruiser stared out of the windows with taut expressions, gripping their rifles. They drove on for another quarter of a mile, and then Casey shot forward and pointed through the windshield.
‘Look,’ she said.
Bowman squinted, his eyes struggling to pick out details in the oily dark. Then he saw them. Three lifeless bodies lay sprawled across the bare dirt ground in front of a food market, their torn clothes stained red. A pack of feral dogs licked at the blood pooling beneath them. A fourth man was slumped face down in a puddle of stagnant water. At the far end of the street a taxicab had been torched. Several more fires raged in the distance to the west. In the orange glow of the flames, Bowman spied bands of looters darting in and out of damaged shopfronts, stealing whatever they could find. Across the road, a couple of kids in football shorts were tugging off the boots from the corpse of a policeman.
‘Looks like Six was right,’ said Loader. ‘This is fucking carnage.’
The passed another large group of rioters, but none of them bothered the convoy. They had other priorities. They weren’t looking to get themselves killed in a contact with a bunch of heavily armed soldiers. A pair of tattooed convicts broke away from their mates and started towards the Land Cruiser, sensing new victims. They caught sight of the hardened faces inside, the weapons they were packing, and quickly retreated. Casey watched them skulk off down the street in search of easier prey.
‘Where are all the rebels?’ she asked. ‘All we’ve seen so far are looters and escaped prisoners.’
‘They must have moved on,’ Mallet said.
‘To where?’
‘The other targets. Mobile transmitters, barracks, border crossings. General Kakuba and his Russian mates will want to gain control of the country as soon as possible. Before the president’s troops can regroup.’
‘Or they might be at the palace,’ Bowman said.
Loader grunted. ‘If they are, we’ll hit them fucking hard. With the firepower we’ve got, we’ll go through them like a dose of salts.’
The convoy rattled on through the main commercial district. Bowman fought to stay alert in spite of his growing exhaustion. The few hours of kip he’d had on the jet had been his only chance to rest in two days, and he wondered how much longer he could push on before it affected his performance. Another six hours, he told himself. That’s all. Get to Mike and the family, secure them until the reinforcements show up. Then you can rest.
He glanced down at the satnav. We’re a mile from the presidential palace. Not far to go now.
As they neared the city centre, Bowman saw more signs of the violent uprising. Dead bodies littered the streets. Some of the victims had been hacked to pieces. Several others were missing arms and legs; blood gushed out of ragged stumps. Gangs of escaped convicts in bright-orange overalls roamed the city, armed with clubs or machetes. Directly ahead, the Hilux rocked as it drove over a corpse in the middle of the road. Bowman wrenched the steering wheel to the right, swerving to avoid the dead body rolling in the dirt.
‘What the fuck are these guys playing at?’ Loader growled in the back seat. ‘We’re supposed to be protecting this lot, not mowing them down.’
‘Not our concern,’ Mallet said coldly. ‘We’re here for the family. That’s it.’
‘Guess the major wasn’t kidding when he said they wouldn’t stop
