Recoil ns-9 Read online

  Recoil

  ( Nick Stone - 9 )

  Andy Mcnab

  Recuperating in Switzerland after a job that cost the life of one of his closest friends, ex-deniable operator Nick Stone has only two things on his mind: to ask his girlfriend Silky to marry him, and to lead a quieter life.

  But when his newfound love disappears, Nick is forced back into action. The trail leads him to Africa and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where it isn’t long before the past comes knocking on his door. . .

  RECOIL

  First published in Great Britain in 2006 by Bantam Press a division of Transworld Publishers Corgi edition published 2007

  Copyright © Andy McNab 2006

  About the Author

  Andy McNab joined the infantry as a boy soldier. In 1984 he was ‘badged’ as a member of 22 SAS Regiment and was involved in both covert and overt special operations worldwide.

  During the Gulf War he commanded Bravo Two Zero, a patrol that, in the words of his commanding officer, ‘will remain in regimental history for ever’. Awarded both the Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM) and the Military Medal (MM) during his military career, McNab was the British Army’s most highly decorated serving soldier when he finally left the SAS in February 1993. He wrote about his experiences in two phenomenal bestsellers, Bravo Two Zero, which was filmed in 1998 starring Sean Bean, and Immediate Action.

  His novels include Remote Control, Liberation Day, Dark Winter, Deep Black and Aggressor and are all bestsellers. He is also the author of four novels for children, Boy Soldier, Avenger, Payback and Meltdown as well as Quick Read novel, The Grey Man. His new novel, Crossfire, will be available from Bantam Press later in the year. Besides his writing work, he lectures to security and intelligence agencies in both the USA and the UK.

  Also by Andy McNab

  Non-fiction

  BRAVO TWO ZERO

  IMMEDIATE ACTION

  Fiction

  REMOTE CONTROL

  CRISIS FOUR

  FIREWALL

  LAST LIGHT

  LIBERATION DAY

  DARK WINTER

  DEEP BLACK

  AGGRESSOR

  and published by Corgi Books

  PART ONE

  Zaïre, Central Africa

  2 October 1985

  14:27 hours

  1

  Davy had offloaded his 175 Yamaha and gone ahead to recce the valley. He’d be back soon, unless the rebels had caught him. We’d been training Mobutu’s troops against these guys, and we knew that knitting baby bootees and collecting china thimbles wasn’t high on their list of favourite hobbies.

  When you’re up against the kind of guys who routinely machete off an entire village’s lips because one of the locals has been overheard saying something not nice about the president, you know it’s time to check chamber.

  Our four ancient, rusting Renault trucks were spread out and static just below the crest of the high ground. The drivers had killed their engines the moment we got here. It wasn’t something you’d normally do with old wagons like these, in case they refused to fire up again, but we didn’t have a whole lot of choice; the Zaïreans had only been able to find us a couple of dozen jerry-cans of fuel at such short notice, and those engines drank like a Swede on a stag night.

  The early-afternoon sun was relentless. So were the flies. The fuckers had found us within minutes and it took a never-ending Thai hand dance to keep them out of my face. I wiped sweat from my eyes with the corner of a red gingham tablecloth I’d ripped in half and draped over my head and shoulders. I’d put the other half to good use too: it covered the working parts of my GPMG.

  I opened the top cover and let the belt of 7.62mm link drop out. I lifted the feed tray, peered into the empty chamber and smoothed away a few grains of sand with a finger. We’d been bouncing along dirt tracks all the way from Kinshasa, and even the high commissioner’s table linen couldn’t stop the stuff finding its way into every nook and cranny. It didn’t matter that my nose and eyes were full of grit, but it would if it got into the working parts and the gun jammed at just the moment I needed it to go bang.

  Satisfied that the feed tray and chamber were shit-free, I cradled the link in my left hand as I threaded it back on to the feed tray. Then I slammed the top cover down again and thumped it with my fist for good measure; the belt was firmly in place. I gave the gun’s ancient wooden carry handle a jiggle to make sure the bipod was wedged firmly between the two sandbags lashed to the bonnet. We didn’t know how many rebels there were down in the valley, or how well they were armed, but when the shit hit the gingham I wanted to be giving as good as I got.

  I winced as I sat down. The seat covers were baking hot; so was the bodywork, steering-wheel, you name it. The whole front of the vehicle was open to the sun. We’d only had an hour to get our shit together, but we’d managed to strip the Renaults to the bone to make their profile as low as possible. We’d ripped the canopies off the cabs, the rear frame and canvas. There were sandbags where the windscreen used to be to provide a gun platform and the illusion of protection against small arms.

  ‘Mad dogs and Englishmen . . .’ Sam muttered, behind the wheel. In his Glasgow growl, even ‘Good morning’ sounded like a death threat.

  ‘Mad Jocks, more like it,’ I said.

  Sam and I were both wearing cheap market sunglasses, and old woolly gloves to protect our hands against the UVA. He also sported his trademark wide-brimmed and very sweat-stained bush hat; if I’d been a pale-faced, skirt-wearing oatmeal savage I’d have done the same. Sam was so fair-skinned he got burned by a fridge light.

  He checked the watch that hung from his neck on a piece of para cord. ‘That’s an hour he’s been gone.’ He kept it inside his shirt so the sun didn’t glint off the glass and give our position away. Basic fieldcraft: shine was just one of the things that had to be concealed when moving tactically cross-country; shape was another – which was why we were below the crest of the hill and not on top of it.

  I hoped Davy hadn’t broken down. The Yammy wasn’t exactly in showroom condition. We’d stolen it from outside a bar on the outskirts of the capital. With luck the poor fucker it belonged to didn’t depend on it for his livelihood.

  Way in the distance, a few clouds dotted the sky. I wondered whether there was any chance of them teaming up and delivering a downpour. Anything to clear the heat haze bouncing off the scrubland in front of me.

  Somewhere down in the dead ground in front of us there was an old plantation, abandoned when the Belgian colonials finally did a runner in the sixties, and inside the gated walls a cavalcade of Mercs: it had been heading west to rendezvous somewhere along Zaïre’s thirty-six kilometres of South Atlantic coastline with a fast boat from the American Third Fleet. They’d got this far, but couldn’t go any further. Rebels – nobody knew how many – were blocking the only road out.

  The int we’d been given was sketchy. All we knew was that the limos had stuff in the boot that nobody was telling us much about, and three officials from the British High Commission were stranded alongside them. Their job had been to liaise with the Zaïreans and supervise the handover to the Americans.

  ‘Politically sensitive material,’ was all Captain Standish, the team’s rupert, was telling us. ‘Important to the West’s relationship with Mobutu.’

  The joke going round the team was that the most sensitive material of all was the stuff covering Annabel’s tits; she was one of the three from the High Commission and Standish had been shagging her from the day we’d arrived. He was stupid enough to think we didn’t know.

  2

  We’d been in Zaïre a month, training Mobutu’s military to fire their weapons and use explosives without killing themselves – or us. We’d put all that on hold for a d ay or two when trouble brewed in the capital. Our students were needed to quell opposition on the streets.

  Mobutu had been calling the shots, controlling a country the size of Western Europe for nearly two decades now. He was supported by the West, who saw him as a counterbalance to Soviet influence in the region, but that still didn’t make him the sort of guy you’d want marrying your sister.

  He had consolidated his position in the early days by publicly executing anyone who even looked like they might become a political rival. Pierre Mulele, a rebel leader, was lured back on the promise of amnesty, but was tortured and killed by Mobutu’s boys. While he was still alive his eyes were gouged out, his bollocks were ripped off, and his limbs were amputated one by one. You could see where our machete-wielding mates got their ideas from.

  Mobutu had nationalized foreign-owned firms and forced European investors out of the country. His favourite trick was to hand the management over to relatives and close associates; theirs was to plunder the companies’ assets until the pips squeaked. It caused such a slump that Mobutu was forced to try to reverse the process. He’d needed Belgian aid to help repulse an attack by rebels based in Angola, and he needed us to help him out now.

  Despite everything, he’d been re-elected – but that’s not so difficult if all the other potential candidates are just too scared to stand.

  His minister of information did the rest. The evening news was trailed by an image of the Father of the Nation descending through clouds from the heavens. It was our favourite moment of the day. There were more portraits of the Saviour of the People than you could shake a machete at – every public building had a dozen of them, and government officials even wore them in their lapels.

  It wasn’t altogether surprising that the natives were getting a bit restless. Most were living in mud huts and dying of starvation, while our new best mate Mobutu had tucked away nearly five billion US in numbered Swiss bank accounts. This was almost equivalent to the country’s total foreign debt, but we, the US and even the IMF were still giving him loans.

  He was pro-Western, anti-Communist, and since chaos seemed to be the only alternative, he was worth a bung or two. Without Mobutu, Zaïre would disintegrate into ethnic violence and civil war – and so would the export of its vast mineral wealth to the West. So there we were, getting burned to a crisp, maintaining what our government liked to call ‘the UK’s interests overseas’.

  My only concern was making sure my gun was free of grit. Because as soon as Davy reported back, we were going to have to drive down into the valley and make like the Seventh Cavalry.

  3

  Annabel and the other two had satellite comms, which was how they’d managed to send a may-day from the bush about sixteen hours ago when the rebels had blocked the road and they’d taken refuge in the plantation house. There was no power, so to save battery they were just calling in every two hours with a sit rep. They also had no water or food, so the haphazard band of Mobutu’s troops who were supposed to be looking after them sounded as though they were only a couple of steps short of doing a runner.

  The US Third Fleet’s carrier task force were stationed permanently off the west coast of Africa so they could keep a friendly eye on their Nigerian oil assets, but their Marine Expeditionary Force were still going to be out of range until tomorrow. By the time they arrived on their helis, it might be too late.

  Our little gang, on the other hand, was only about two hundred Ks up the road. Downing Street had picked up the phone to the head shed at Hereford and now we were all set to escort the limos to the port. If the worst came to the worst, we’d keep off road and head cross-country, which was why we needed the trucks.

  We’d made ourselves sterile of any ID and borrowed civvies from our Zaïrean students to try to blend in – as you do in Africa, when you have red skin, a peeling nose and a government that wants to maintain its interests but doesn’t want to be seen doing so.

  Before I’d joined the Regiment, just over a year earlier, I’d assumed that every mission would be run to detailed planning and precision timings. But for most jobs I’d been on, we’d had less time to grab our kit and come up with a plan than fire-fighters on a call-out – and this one was no exception. We’d stripped down the Renaults, loaded them with two GPMGs, some AK47s, some crap trauma kit, and as much water and ammunition as we could lay our hands on, then headed east into the badlands, stopping only to refuel and nick the odd Yamaha.

  Even so, this should be a good day out; it sure beat potty-training Mobutu’s sidekicks. Judging by the look on his face, Standish certainly seemed to be relishing the challenge. Then again, maybe he was just looking forward to his next shag.

  He was sitting behind us now, crashing about with sat comms the size of a suitcase, fanning out the big mesh dish, trying to set it up, trying to get the right angle of dangle.

  Sam glanced round from the wheel to see what all the commotion was about. I leaned into the footwell to lace up my Reeboks. They were the only things I was wearing that were mine. I had a borrowed football shirt – the Greek national strip, apparently – and Sam was in jeans two sizes too big and a thick wool shirt that made him sweat like a pig.

  He gave his head a shake. ‘It’s pointless, boss. We’ll be there soon. She won’t be opening hers up for another hour anyway.’

  Standish wasn’t listening. ‘Hello, Annabel? Annabel?’

  Sam and I exchanged a knowing glance. I liked him a lot. Maybe it was because he was a Jock version of me. He’d also been shoved from one set of foster-parents to the next, and only really found a home when he’d joined the army. The rundown, gang-ridden housing estates and crap schools he’d been brought up in sounded just like mine. The only difference was that his local chippie used to sell Mars bars deep-fried in batter.

  I opened the glovebox and tipped some brown Milo powder from a tin into a plastic mug, then splashed warm water over it from a well-used one-litre bottle that had once been full of Orangina. Milo was a nightmare to mix unless the water was boiling but I had grown to like it, lumps and all. I offered some to Standish; the look on his face cracked me up.

  The day-to-day nitty-gritty really wasn’t his style. Standish was basically the link with the embassy, and spent as little time as possible with the team – which was why he looked set for a night at the opera and was getting to shag Annabel while the rest of us had a month’s facial hair and peeling noses.

  The man really running the job was Seven Troop’s staff sergeant, Gary B. Originally from the Royal Engineers, Gaz was a man of few words: ‘fuck’, ‘fucking’ and ‘fuck you’ pretty much covered it, as far as he was concerned. I had a lot of time for him. Just under six foot tall, with long, jet-black hair that curled round his neck, he looked like a roadie for the Stones – but since he’d developed two of the world’s biggest boils in the last couple of days, one each side of his neck, we’d nicknamed him Frankenstein. We only called him that behind his back, of course. Gary had a quick temper and none of us wanted to wind up on the receiving end of some friendly fire.

  He was in the lead wagon, maybe eighty metres ahead of us.

  ‘Annabel? Come in, Annabel.’

  Standish’s mop of blond hair never seemed to get greasy and never stuck up after a night in a sleeping-bag like ours did. Annabel probably lent him her hairbrush.

  He’d come to the Regiment from the Coldstream Guards; all those years under a busby must have given him plenty of practice at looking down his nose on the rest of the world. Every time he opened his mouth it was as if he was about to give a pep talk to the archers at Agincourt. I didn’t think he was ever going to be my new best mate.

  Sam, a sergeant with nine years in the Regiment, felt the same way. He reckoned Standish always seemed to be holding back on the full story, like there were some details he didn’t want to bother our little heads with. ‘I just don’t trust him,’ Sam growled. ‘He’s not solid.’

  4

  I studied the skyline. ‘Jesus, Davy, get a mov e on. Where the fuck are you?’

  ‘Don’t take His name in vain, Nick.’

  ‘Davy won’t mind, mate. I do it all the time . . .’

  I thought Sam must be taking the piss, but then I saw the expression on his face. It was like Standish would have looked if you’d told him Beef Wellington wasn’t on the menu tonight.

  He lifted his arse, fished in his back pocket and handed me a battered leatherbound book. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘It’s right up your street – sex, violence, revenge, all sorts.’

  I flicked open the cover. ‘It’s the New fucking Testament. I didn’t know you were into that stuff, Sam . . .’

  I suddenly felt like I’d been locked in the same cell as a double-glazing salesman. Weddings and funerals were the closest I came to the happyclappies, and when people started talking to me about God or country, it just made me run for the hills . . .

  His eyes flashed. ‘You’re not really getting the message, are you, son? I don’t like foul language being used alongside the Lord’s name. It’s like me calling your mother a whore.’

  I nodded, but still couldn’t work out why it offended him so much. And maybe my mum had been a whore – I’d never met her to ask.

  I handed back his Bible. ‘No, thanks, mate, not for me. There’s no pictures. And, besides, I know the ending.’

  ‘You’ll find out one day what you’re missing.’

  ‘How do you square all that with being in the Regiment? Hardly turning the other cheek, is it?’

  He beamed. ‘I know that what I’m doing is the right thing. Jesus wasn’t some kind of drug-crazed hippie who walked around followed by bluebirds and talking donkeys. He was a revolutionary. He said, “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.”