Crossfire ns-10 Read online

  'You're going to be right as rain, lad. The doctor said you'll be up and walking today.' The Scouse was thick as soup.

  'Rhett?' I tried to open both eyes.

  'Course it is, you soft twat.'

  He was sitting on a plastic chair beside me. He had fresh combats and body armour on, and sweat ran down his shiny clean-shaven face. He cradled his helmet under his arm.

  We were in a huge marquee. The plastic roof was twenty metres above me, stretched over an aluminium frame. The area had been partitioned into cubicles with 3x3-metre plywood. My head hurt, and I smelt of Dettol, or whatever had been thrown over me when I'd been washed and sorted out. It was hot and muggy. Shouldn't a hospital or whatever this was have airconditioning?

  'I feel like shit. Where am I?'

  He tried to laugh, but couldn't manage it. 'COB.'

  My eyelids drooped. They wanted to stay glued together. I was thirsty, but my mouth felt too furred-up ever to let anything through again. As I lay on my back and tried to get my fingers working, I heard Land Rovers speed past. I'd have recognized that engine note anywhere. The odd Brit shout penetrated the marquee walls. I eventually opened my eyes again. It was still a bit blurry but that felt like tiredness rather than drugs.

  All my kit from the palace was on a bench in the corner. There wasn't much of it, but I didn't care. Out here, whatever you had would be in shit state within seconds.

  I took a breath and forced myself to sit up.

  'I got bad news, Nick. It's Pete…' Rhett was grim-faced. 'He's dead, mate.'

  I couldn't have heard him right.

  'He got shot about four hours ago. Sorry, mate, he was a good lad.'

  Pete's gone… I've got to go… I've got to go…

  'Where's Dom?'

  'Dunno. Probably well shook up. He saw it happen. Media Ops asked me to break the news. It's a fucker.'

  I pointed over to my kit. 'Can you pass my mobile? It's in one of the side pouches.'

  I was fully awake now. I was thinking about Tallulah, Ruby and those birthdays he was determined not to miss.

  I sparked up the phone. Iraqna had treated me to a three-bar signal.

  I called Dom. The default Vodafone Ireland message kicked in immediately.

  'It's Nick. Rhett's just told me. Call me back soon as, mate. I need to know you're OK.'

  I sat cradling the phone in my lap. 'What the fuck happened?'

  He placed his helmet carefully on the plywood floor. 'Fucking nightmare.' He shook his head. 'We brought both of them back here from OSB. You were out of it, so Dom said they'd decided to go outside the wire to film the Merlins flying low into the city. Some fucker must have been waiting. Pete took two rounds. There's always some of those shites hanging around looking for a target. Dom ran and got help, but it was useless. He'd have died instantly. What can I say? Fucking crying shame…'

  'What about the shooters?'

  'The QRF [quick reaction force] were out like a bunch of fucking whippets, but they'd legged it.'

  'Where's Dom?'

  'His kit's gone. He's fucked off.'

  I willed the phone to ring. A cameraman had died on my watch, and now the reporter was missing.

  I looked up. 'Help me get dressed, mate.'

  21

  I did it as fast as I could, one-handed and with a bit of help from Rhett. My jeans and T-shirt were on my Bergen, but my boots had probably been burnt along with the rest of last night's shit-covered, infected gear. I dug out my trainers.

  'You know where they keep the bodies?'

  Rhett was in awkward mode. 'No, it's not the sort of place we want to go near.'

  I held out my good hand and we shook. 'Thanks, Rhett. If you want to come with me and have a last look, you can.'

  'Nah, I want to remember him as a gobby shite.'

  He left and I finished dressing. A mirror hung on a bit of string from a section of frame by the side of the bench, and I saw what was left of a large black M that had been written on my forehead in permanent marker. At some stage I would have had a label attached to me too, to make doubly sure everybody further down the chain knew I'd been administered morphine. It affects other treatments.

  With greasy, sticking-up hair and already sweating, I pushed aside the green nylon sheet that acted as a door, turned left and walked down a corridor of cubicle walls towards the sound of music. I passed air-conditioning ducts, but they weren't working.

  There was another cubicle at the end of the corridor. This one was an office. Two guys in white coats sat on plastic chairs, watching MTV. They had their backs to me but I could see the mugs of brew and a packet of Rich Tea.

  'Lads, where's the morgue? I think one of my mates is there – you know, the cameraman who got shot.'

  They both looked round, and then at each other. It was hard to interpret their expressions. Either I wasn't allowed access, or neither of them wanted to miss Beyonce shaking her tits on MTV.

  The blond one stood up. 'Next door.' He picked up his armour and helmet. 'Where's yours?'

  'Don't know, mate.'

  I followed him out into the blinding sunshine. I almost had to close my eyes. We turned right in the sand and headed for a concrete-block building. The guy turned back to me as we walked. 'You ever seen a dead body before, mate?'

  I nodded.

  Entering the building was like stepping into a fridge. This was where all the air-conditioning lived. Beyond sheets of thick plastic hanging from the ceiling lay five stone slabs like kitchen worktops.

  A body lay on one, covered with a sheet. Two clear evidence bags lay on the floor next to him. One was smeared on the inside with wet blood that must have rubbed off his clothes. The other, much smaller, contained his personal effects. His wallet, his watch, his wedding ring. And his precious memory stick.

  The guy went over and pulled the sheet back, then stood aside and leant against the next slab along.

  Pete's couple of days' stubble would keep growing for a bit longer, but he'd been cleaned up pretty well. I realized this was the first time I'd seen him without a smile on his face.

  He had two strike marks in his chest. They'd dried up and looked like big scabs. The rest of his skin was pale.

  'What's going to happen now? How's he going to get home?'

  'I guess we'll fly him back to Brize. That's what normally happens.'

  I looked at Pete again. Something about those strike marks wasn't right.

  I walked all the way round him, looking for more strikes, more marks. 'Why wasn't he wearing armour?'

  The guy was getting bored now. He'd done his bit. Beyonce beckoned. 'Don't know, mate. He just got shot and brought here. That's it.'

  I lifted Pete's right arm, then pulled it up a bit more until his shoulder lifted and I could see the exit wounds in his back. They were large, as they always are when the rounds are allowed to exit the body. I put his arm down where it belonged.

  'I'm going to see you all right, mate…' I said quietly.

  The medic came towards me with the sheet. 'No need to worry about that.'

  'I wasn't talking to you.'

  I picked up Pete's personal stuff and left him to it. I walked back out into the sun. Dom and I would take his gear to his family. The least we could do was make sure the stuff that was most important to him got back to the people who were most important to him. Small things in big firms always tended to go missing.

  Why wasn't he wearing Osprey? Everyone had to wear it even to go for a dump. Pete was so careful. He would have had it on. Even if those two rounds had pierced his body armour by some sort of miracle, they wouldn't have exited like they did. When a high-velocity round enters the body, it creates a vortex behind it like the wake after a boat. As it leaves, the pressure equalizes. There's a small air explosion that rips the exit wound open. It's what high-velocity rounds are designed to do.

  22

  My arm hurt like fuck as it swung and I had to cradle it against my chest.

  Screwing up my eyes, I
turned right, headed past the morgue and into the dining tent. People were coming and going with mugs of brew. The entrance was full of people in body armour and helmets washing their hands in cleansing liquid so's not to waste water. They looked at me like I was an alien. 'I know, I haven't got any. Anybody know where Media Ops are?'

  I was pointed beyond the cookhouse. I turned left by the showers and half walked, half ran, asking for directions along the way. Most people knew their own areas and that was it.

  Eventually I found myself outside two Portakabins with huge air-conditioning condenser boxes. I knew where I was now. This was where we'd had our briefings.

  There was movement inside the second Portakabin. I went in and the place was almost as cold as the mortuary tent. The Royal Artillery captain who'd done the meet and greet was behind a desk. I couldn't remember his name – I'd just nodded and agreed as he gave his talk, not expecting to see him again. But I did remember he was in the Territorials, and had volunteered to come out here. In the real world, he was responsible for Plymouth Council's CCTV cameras.

  He seemed shocked to see me. 'Nick, how are you? I was coming round later. I wanted you to rest first.' He looked uncomfortable. He stood up and took a breath to give me the bad news.

  I put up a hand. 'I know Pete's dead. The recce sergeant's already seen me.'

  He sat down, relieved not to be the one. I was a civvy. I might want to cry on his shoulder and have a hug.

  'Why didn't he have any body armour on?'

  'I don't know. We told you lot to wear it all the time – and a helmet. It was part of the briefing. Dom told us they were getting some shots of the Merlins flying low. They didn't have permission. They didn't inform anyone of what they were doing. We cannot take responsibility for these actions. They should have informed me that they-'

  This was bollocks. 'Where's Dom now?'

  'He's left. I don't know where or how. His kit's gone and he hasn't even signed out.'

  'Signed out? How the fuck's he going to get out of here? Call a minicab?'

  'He must be taking the two o'clock. It's thoroughly irresponsible behaviour – it doesn't help the media's call for closer liaison.'

  'Shut up, for fuck's sake, and give me a lift to the terminal.'

  I followed him back out into the heat. The Media Ops company car was a dust-covered Discovery that knocked out air-conditioning, but not enough. I shielded my eyes from the glare as we came out of one compound and went into another. We bounced over dusty tracks, working our way up to the metalled road that paralleled the runway.

  'What's going to happen to Pete?'

  'The TV station has notified his wife. They're arranging for her to receive him at Brize Norton. After that? Well…'

  I held up the plastic bag. 'I'll take this back to her.'

  We hit the tarmac. The terminal was about two clicks further up. It looked like another of Saddam's palaces. Lots of marble and towers, but surrounded by barbed wire and HESCOs. Squaddies zoomed up and down the road in stripped-down Land Rovers with.50-cal machine-guns on the back.

  The Brits had used the terminal as their temporary HQ after the war until the COB was built. It had since been handed back to the civilian authorities, and catered for just one flight a day. No airline except Jordanian was willing to take the risk.

  We parked outside the building. I didn't care if the media guy stayed or not. I just ran into the cavernous empty terminal.

  There were about four people in civvies, but none was Dom. All the rest, about ten of them, were RMPs with dogs and SA80s.

  Another marble quarry must have been gutted to build this place. The roof had to be at least seventy metres high. The walls still had gaffer-tape marks from where the Brits had run cables.

  The check-in area was a line of about forty desks along the far wall. All had digital displays behind them. None was working. None of the belts was moving.

  One solitary guy sat behind one of the desks. His eyes widened as I ran towards him. The flight wasn't for at least another hour and a half and it wasn't as if there were masses of people gagging to get aboard.

  'This for the Jordanian flight? The Amman flight?'

  'Yes, yes.'

  'Has Dominik Condratowicz checked in yet?'

  He looked at me blankly.

  I took a breath and slowed down. 'Mr Dom-in-ik Con-drat-o-wicz.'

  He checked his manifests and I leant forward to help him. I couldn't see the name. 'Do we buy tickets here? This desk?'

  'Yes, yes.'

  'Has he bought a ticket?'

  'No.'

  Dom hadn't checked in so he certainly hadn't gone airside – if there was an airside. I didn't know how it worked in this place.

  Fuck it, I'd stay right here until the flight left and see if he turned up.

  I moved off and sat on one of the millions of vacant chairs, waiting for him to show.

  Flicking through Pete's gear, I found nothing that gave me any clues about what had happened. There was just the normal stuff in his wallet. Two Lloyds debit cards, organ-donor card, that sort of thing, with about sixty dollars.

  Filming helicopters, my arse.

  I got out my mobile.

  'It's Nick Stone in Basra. I need to talk to Moira Foley. It's important.'

  I was waiting for Kate to answer, then go to find Moira, but the boss herself came straight on. 'Hello, Nick. It's Moira, how are you? I've been so worried…'

  I knew she hadn't so she didn't have to sound so concerned. 'Pete… you know?'

  'God, it's fucking awful. They called me at home and-'

  'Where's Dom? You know where he is?'

  'With you. He filed with Pete, then called me after Pete was shot. He said he'd told you what happened.'

  I held the mobile away from me and checked the display for messages. The thing was always on silent as it was a big no-no to have a mobile go off in the field.

  'Nick, hello? Hello?'

  I didn't need to move it back to my ear to hear her.

  'I need him to call me back soon, Nick. Tell him we need a report to go with the film. It's great footage and we really need to-'

  I cut her off, sat back and waited.

  PART TWO

  23

  Guy's Hospital, London Monday, 5 March 1538 hrs My arse was numb. I'd been parked on a hard plastic chair in A and E for the best part of four hours and still hadn't been called to see a doctor. Maybe I shouldn't have told the triage nurse I'd gouged my arm at work with a chisel. I should have been more upfront about being brassed up by a 7.62 short. At least it was getting a rest in the foam sling they'd given me in the land of Pizza Hut delivery.

  The only entertainment left after London Lite and a couple of Sunday supplements people had dropped under the chairs was the flat-screen TV on the wall above the reception desk. It played without sound, and there's only so much BBC 24 tickertape reading you can take. Besides, I didn't like what I'd been seeing.

  Two Polish builders were sitting next to me, one with half a finger hanging off and the other making more noise than if it was his injury and he'd lost a whole hand. Two teenage girls with huge earrings and their hair scraped back went on much too loudly about who was having who on their estate, and who'd had whose kid.

  I stared down at the Bergen between my feet, getting even more angry with Dom as I thought about Pete's few possessions stuffed into my side pouch. It hadn't been an attack while filming, and it couldn't have been an ND (negligent discharge). The rumour mill would have exposed it by now.

  But I'd find out who had done it and why, and Dom was going to tell me the truth if it was the last thing he did. But the fucker had evaporated.

  The Big Mac and fries I'd blocked my arteries with at the on-site McDonald's an hour ago were making me thirsty. A kid came in with a bloodstained T-shirt wrapped round his hand. Within minutes, he was called to the only free cubicle. There was time to go and get a drink.

  I checked the dressing wasn't leaking as I'd ripped the wound open on
the way back to the UK. My Bergen strap had scraped down my arm as I took it off and its weight had ripped the stitches from the skin.

  Trolleys lined both sides of the corridor, loaded with old people coughing up shit. I couldn't tell if they were waiting for A and E or were just overspill from the wards.

  The two Poles got very excited about something on the TV. I looked up to see, for maybe the tenth time since I'd been sitting there, the crystal-clear, black-and-white images of me tumbling into the sewage and Pete being my hero. Of course, the part where he'd killed people had been cut. Cameramen don't do things like that.

  It was being played over and over again, not only because it was great bang-bang but also because it was being pushed out as a tribute to Pete – and to Platinum Bollocks, of course, for filming it. As for me, being security, thankfully I didn't get a mention. I was just 'a member of the crew'. No TV company wants it known that they have protection. It isn't good for the image.

  I watched as I got hit and dropped like a bag of shit. The Poles were loving it. Real live bang-bang, filmed by a real live Polish hero.

  I'd booked myself on to the next day's two p.m. Royal Jordanian to Amman. The flight had had the world's most obvious sky marshal sitting in the galley by the cockpit door. Kitted out in a very sharp suit and some of Russia's finest steel sticking out of his holster, he was even scaring the flight attendants.

  We landed at three thirty, but there were no useful connecting flights till the morning. I'd spent last night on an airport bench because I wanted to be sure of a ticket for the nine a.m. BA to Heathrow the moment the desk opened – only to discover when it did that the airline will put you up in a hotel if you're waiting overnight for a connecting flight.

  It had been last night that I fucked up my arm again. I sort of let them think I was a wounded soldier and they upgraded me to business all the way through to London.