'I'm not your enemy.'
The Ranger didn't waver for an instant. 'I said drop it.'
We stared at each other for a moment, as I considered my options and he got ready to skewer me. I dropped the gun and kicked it over to him.
'Useless at close range anyway,' I said.
He looked down at Guria's body and I saw the shock on his face.
'But he's…'
'Just a kid. Yeah. Shot him anyway, though, didn't you.'
'Never. Not to kill, anyway. Did he move just before he was hit?'
I nodded.
He flashed me a look I couldn't quite interpret then backed onto the landing and gestured me downstairs.
Five minutes later we were in the kitchen of another house, further down the street, where the Rangers had regrouped. The other four kids were there too, rounded up like I was.
As I entered the house one of the kids — I think his name was Wallis — said: 'Hey, Sir, where's Guria?'
I just shook my head and let my captor push me down on the floor, where I sat cross-legged.
'So they call you Sir, do they, Son?' said a tall Irishman who seemed to have taken command. 'Fancy yourself a General do you? Like it when children call you Sir? Make you feel important?' He was barely holding in his anger, leaning down, getting in my face, trying to provoke me.
'No, I just find that it helps maintain classroom discipline.'
He pulled back his arm to slap me around the face, but one of his fellows grabbed it and pulled him back. He shook the guy off, but composed himself.
'Two of my friends are dead because of you.'
'And one of mine, because of you. Plus, if that car horn is anything to go by, the rest may be in serious trouble.' I allowed some of my anger to surface. 'We had everything under control here until you fucked it all up, charging in and trying to lay down the fucking law. Who made you judge, jury and executioner?'
'I'm not the one who just gunned down an unarmed man.'
'A kidnapper and a murderer. That lot have been stealing children from across the country for months now. They leave communities shattered, adults dead. And what for? Do you know? Do you know where they're taking the kids, what they want them for?'
'No.'
'Neither do I. But I doubt it's anything good. So yeah, I shot them. It was the best way to ensure we had a clean getaway. If you hadn't butted in, it wouldn't have been necessary.'
'So it's our fault?'
'Stop it!' shouted Wallis all of a sudden. We fell silent and stared at him, almost guiltily. 'You're a kind of police, right?' He said to the Ranger, who nodded. 'Well so are we, kind of. This is all just stupid. We're on the same side. The kidnappers are the bad guys.'
There was a long silence, then the lead Ranger said, as calmly as he could manage, 'Why the fuck did you shoot Grier?'
'It was a mistake. The boy with the sniper rifle… it was his first time in the field. He panicked. Must have thought he was buying us a chance to escape.'
The Ranger closed his eyes and wearily massaged his temples with his right hand. 'So Phil shot him.'
'And I shot Phil.'
'And these kids?' He gestured to Wallis and the others. 'Is this their first time, too?'
I nodded.
'So you're what, an army of children?'
'We're a school, not an army. But we defend ourselves when we have to.'
'You really think giving children guns is going to help?'
'Has done so far. You'd be in a US concentration camp by now if it weren't for us, mate.'
He shook his head in disbelief. 'Twelve year-olds with sniper rifles. Such a fucking mess.'
'Guria was thirteen,' said Wallis quietly.
'You know what,' I said. 'We can sort this out later. Right now I'm more concerned about my friends and the children they were trying to rescue. Can we work together?'
He considerd me carefully for a moment. 'What you did, shooting those people in the street. That was not right in the head.'
'Then sign me up for psychoanalysis, but do it later, yeah?'
He held my gaze, trying to decide what to do.
'Ferguson, we've got movement in the street,' said another Ranger, poking his head into the room.
My interrogator turned to leave, then glanced back at me and nodded, indicating that I should follow.
'But this conversation is not over,' he said softly as we walked down the hall to the front room. 'Just paused.'
'Hang on,' I said. 'I thought there were only five of you. Two are dead, that leaves you and the two in the kitchen. Where did this guy come from?'
'Josh here was on sniper duty himself, upstairs. But he held his fire until he was sure what was going on. Discipline and experience, see?'
We reached the window and peered through the tatty lace curtains. The children we had loaded into the minibus earlier were walking down the street in a tight huddle. It took a moment for me to work out what was happening, but then I looked closer and made out two men amongst the kids, scanning the houses on either side of the road carefully. They must have seen the bodies at the school gates and this new bunch of snatchers were using the kids as a human shield.
But worse — leading the group were my Dad and Tariq. Dad had a nasty gash across his forehead that had soaked his face and jacket with blood; Tariq had Jane slung over his shoulder, an unconscious dead weight.
I heard footsteps in the hall and turned to see yet another Ranger enter.
'The convoy's in the next road,' the man reported. 'The van drove straight into it. It's a write off, and I think the first lorry is too. They're disentangling them now.'
'Thanks,' said Ferguson, then he turned to me.
'Those people out front…'
'My dad, my friend and Jane. She's our boss.'
He nodded and I could see that he was thinking hard.
'Well, we have to rescue them,' I said.
Ferguson regarded me coolly. 'Do we? Do we now?'
'For God's sake,' I said, but then I took a deep breath and stopped for a moment before continuing as calmly as I could manage. 'I've got to assume you came here for the same reason we did — to find out who the snatchers are and where they're taking the kids, right?'
Ferguson nodded.
'Okay, so we want the same thing. Track these guys, shut them down. Now you could try and take this lot, capture a survivor, interrogate them. But how many kids would die in the crossfire? Your only option is to infiltrate and collect intel.'
'Go on.'
'They're going back to the school. I've been in there. I know the layout. We go in and we eavesdrop.'
'And free your people at the same time?'
'If the opportunity presents itself,' I said, although I was quite clear in my own mind that I'd rescue them no matter what.
'If this fucker tries to stop you,' says Mac, 'you'll just have to kill him. His men would never know that it wasn't the snatchers.'
The group in the street drew level with our house and paraded past silently. We watched them go, seeing the fear on the children's faces as they were marched down a shooting alley.
'Okay,' said Ferguson eventually. 'But just you and me. If we don't make it back, my guys will make sure your kids get home.'
