Firefight (11 page)

It was deserted. There was seating for perhaps seventy
people and the chairs faced towards the rear of the aircraft
rather than the front. They all took seats in the front row,
but spaced themselves out so that they had a couple of
seats on either side of each other, then strapped themselves
in.

Around them, the noise of the engines started to get
louder. Another man appeared - the flight lieutenant. 'Takeoff
in two minutes, guys,' he told them, before walking back
to take his place up front.

The engines were screaming now and Will felt the aircraft
shudder into movement. The lights on the deck dimmed
and within a minute the plane was speeding down the
runway and was airborne.

Will took a deep breath. He hadn't left British soil for
more than two years. It seemed so surreal doing it now
under these circumstances.

They stayed strapped in as the aircraft climbed steeply
through the clouds; only when it started to level did Will
unbuckle his seatbelt. The scream of the engines had subsided
a little now, but it was still loud - Will had forgotten how
noisy these military transport aircraft could be.

'I'm fucking starving,' he heard Kennedy say from a
couple of seats away. The others grunted in agreement.
Ahead of them, at the back of the plane, a grey metal
microwave oven was fitted into the wall. Next to it was
a cold cabinet, which Kennedy opened. He pulled out a
cardboard container of frozen army rations, then blitzed
it in the microwave. The smell of the starchy food hit
Will's nostrils and it occurred to him that he hadn't eaten
since his early breakfast in the café near Kate's house. He
was hungry, he realised, and when Kennedy had removed
his food from the microwave, Will went to get some of
his own.

The army rations were plain, but hot and welcome.
Will ate three of the little boxes of food - beef stew with
dumplings, baked beans with sausage and a chocolate
sponge with gloopy chocolate sauce - before his hunger
was satisfied and the others also wolfed the rations down
enthusiastically.

'We should get some sleep,' he told the others, and they
all nodded. They delved into their rucksacks, each taking
out a strong string hammock, which they hung from the
side of the plane. Anderson came round with a small cardboard
box of pills.

'I got these from the med centre before we left,' he
announced, handing a tablet to each of them. Will didn't
need to ask what it was - taking a sleeping pill was pretty
standard procedure before a long flight and these were
specially designed to ensure that you got a few hours of
well-needed shut-eye, without the risk of waking up feeling
drowsy. He put one on his tongue, felt the acrid taste in
his mouth and swallowed it. Then, without another word,
he climbed into his hammock.

It was strangely comfortable lying there in mid-air and
the dirty, mechanical noise of the plane's engines started
to become hypnotic. There was a small window by his
head and as he lay there he looked out into the blackness,
watching the light at the tip of the wing flashing on
and off.

If a military man stops his career before the time is right, he
risks wasting away into nothing.
As drowsiness fell upon him,
Will heard Pankhurst's comment echoing in his head. He
hated admitting it to himself, but the Director General was
right. Will had been wasting away in Hereford, but it had
taken this to make him realise it. He realised something
else, too. Dangerous though it was, he was looking forward
to Afghanistan.

This was what he had been trained to do.

This was what he was
meant
to do.

And it was good to be doing it again.

With those thoughts going round his head and with
sound of the aircraft's engines filling his ears, Will Jackson
fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

When he awoke, his ears were popping. The Galaxy was
losing height. Will looked at his watch. 2 a.m., UK time.
He did a quick calculation - that would make it 6.30 a.m.
in Kandahar. Sure enough, as he looked out of the window,
he saw that the blackness of the night was giving way to
a glimmer of morning light.

Around him the others had already woken and were
packing their hammocks back into their rucksacks. No
one was speaking - there was no banter, no small talk.
Everyone seemed businesslike and efficient. Will hauled
himself from his own hammock and started getting his
things together.

The flight lieutenant appeared again. 'Ten minutes till
landing,' he announced, and the four of them strapped themselves
in once more.

Kandahar Airport, Will knew from past experience, was
much easier to land at by night. During the hours of sunlight,
it tended to merge into the surrounding countryside, whereas
when it was dark, the two-mile runway was lit up like a
Christmas tree. When he felt the wheels of the Galaxy touch
ground, it was a strange sensation. No matter how used you
were to flying, there was always a vague sense of relief when
the aircraft touched down; but today it was tempered with
a heightened sense of anticipation. Up until now there had
been a sense of unreality about this whole thing, but the
moment he knew he was on Afghan soil, it hit him that
there was no turning back. He just had to get on with the
job in hand.

Kandahar Airport was a huge, sprawling space. Stuck in
the middle of one of the most inhospitable regions of
this inhospitable country it was not only a civilian airfield,
but home to troops from all over the world. Pankhurst
had explained to Will that the NATO-led International
Security Assisted Force were based here, but he knew
from his own past that it was also home to the RAF's
Harrier GR7 detachment as well as the detachments of
AH-64 Apache attack helicopters, CH-47 Chinook
support helicopters and Lynx utility helicopters. Soldiers
from America, Canada, Britain and, of course, Afghanistan
worked side by side out of this airport, so it was no
surprise, as they walked down on to the tarmac, to see
how busy the place was, even at this early hour in the
driving snow, which reduced visibility to only a few
metres. Voices were shouting above the noise of the aircraft
engines; a Harrier screamed down to land on the runway,
while all around them were armed troops going about
their early-morning business. Everyone's breath steamed
in the cold air and as they drove around the airfield, beams
of headlamps from all the vehicles flashed blindingly, like
mechanical fireflies at night.

It was freezing cold and within seconds of stepping on
to the tarmac, snow started to settle thickly on their clothes.

'Will Jackson?' a voice called.

Will looked round to see a figure in RAF uniform
standing by a military truck. Its yellow headlamps cut a
beam through the half-light and the snow. The four-man
unit walked towards him. 'I'm Junior Technician Evans,' he
said. 'I've been sent to escort you.' The kid had a shock of
ginger hair and green eyes. His face was chapped from the
cold, and he barely looked old enough to walk to school
by himself, let alone be out here.

Will nodded and they climbed into the truck, Kennedy
and Drew bringing the weapons case with them. The
vehicle moved off and they were driven along a winding
road that skirted the edge of the airfield. It stopped, about
a mile later, outside a glum-looking pre-fabricated hut. A
couple of trucks were parked outside and from the glow
of light coming out of the window, Will could tell it was
occupied.

'Who lives here?' he asked the young RAF soldier, gruffly.

'His name is Arthur Rankin, sir,' he replied. 'He's an assistant
to the NATO Senior Civilian Representative. He helps
coordinate liaisons between the military and the local Afghan
population. He's requested that you report to him as soon
as you land.'

'Fine,' Will said. He turned to the unit. 'You three wait
here. I'll see what he has to say.' He climbed out of the
truck and hurried through the snow to knock on the door
of the hut.

'Come in,' a voice called, but Will had already opened
the door and stepped inside.

It was warm in the hut, thanks to a large electric heater
burning at full blast; but warmth was the only comfort the
place offered. It was sparsely furnished - at one end was a
solitary desk that looked like it came from a school classroom,
with a beige computer and a telephone on it. Around
the walls were a number of metal filing cabinets and sitting
behind the table was an enormously fat man wearing a
thick woollen overcoat. Standing at the other end of the
room was a tall, skinny man with dark skin, a long scruffy
beard and sturdy Afghan clothes. He had a large, hooked
nose, deep brown eyes and his hair was bundled into a black
turban.

'Shut the bloody door, for crying out loud,' the fat man
barked. His voice was posh and it didn't do much to endear
him to Will, who closed the door slowly behind him.

'Beastly place,' the man shuddered. 'As hot as hell in the
summer, colder than a snowman's bollocks in winter.' He
stood up and waddled towards Will. 'Arthur Rankin.
Welcome to Afghanistan,' he said, stretching out his hand.
'You must be delighted to be here.'

Will shook his podgy hand without much enthusiasm.
'Not really,' he replied. 'The sooner we can get our business
done, the sooner we can leave.' He looked meaningfully
over at the bearded man.

'This is Sami,' Rankin said. 'He's your fixer.'

Will nodded curtly at Sami. 'I take it you have details of
our contact.'

Rankin rolled his eyes at Will's aggressive demeanour. 'Of
course he has the details of your contact,' he said. 'I hardly
think he's here for the company or the comfortable
surroundings.' He smiled at his own joke. 'I'd like to offer
you a seat, but I'm afraid NATO won't stretch to any extra
chairs in my delightful office.'

'I'll stand.'

'You'll have to, my friend.'

Will ignored him and turned to the fixer.

'Where do I meet him?'

Sami eyed him warily. 'Kandahar, at eleven o'clock this
morning.' His voice was heavily accented, but he obviously
spoke English extremely well.

'Where in Kandahar?'

'There is a small café near the bazaar next to the main
mosque in the centre of the city. It has no name, but you
cannot miss it.'

'I'll say,' Rankin interrupted in his braying voice. 'Ghastly
little place, always filled to the rafters with screaming Afghans
smoking their revolting tobacco.'

Will did his best to ignore the comment and he could
sense that the fixer found Rankin as unpleasant as he did.

'Your contact's name is Ismail,' Sami said, calmly. 'He
has been feeding us good information about what the
Taliban in this region have been up to, but he is extremely
nervous.'

'I don't blame him,' Rankin snorted. 'If they find out
what he's been doing, he'll be in the arms of Allah faster
than you can say "Islamic Jihad".'

'Have you met him?' Will asked. He had addressed the
question to Sami, but Rankin answered.

'Absolutely not. I try to leave Kandahar Airport as little
as possible and there's no way our man would ever come
to us here. No, we have agents like Sami on the ground
handling him. They pass information on to me and I pass
it upwards.' He cast a curious glance at Will. 'I must say,' he
observed,'there hasn't been any intelligence passing through
me that I would have thought warranted the arrival of the
SAS.'

He looked expectantly at Will, clearly hoping he might
enlighten him; but Will remained stony-faced.

Rankin shrugged.

'As I was saying,' Sami continued, 'Ismail is an extremely
nervous informant. As he's never met you before, he's insisting
on using a double-password.'

'All a bit World War Two to my mind,' said Rankin, 'but
if it stops the Taliban waving their cudgels at the little man,
I suppose we ought to humour him.'

As each second passed, Will found himself loathing more
and more this pompous official who worked in the relative
safety of the airport base, yet was so dismissive of the people
on the ground risking their lives. 'Why don't you just give
me the passwords?' he growled.

'Give them to him, Sami,' Rankin ordered and the fixer
handed Will a piece of paper, folded once. Will read the
words that had been carefully typed on it and slipped it in
his pocket so that he could commit them to memory later.
Then he looked back at the smug, fat man opposite him.

'How sure are you of this Ismail's reliability?'

Again Rankin shrugged - he did that a lot, it seemed
to Will. 'He's an informant. He's given us good intelligence
about the Taliban, but where he gets it from he
refuses to tell his handlers. He's reliable, but he's still an
informant. He's screwing
someone
over - we just don't
think it's us.'

Will nodded, then turned back to Sami. 'What do you
think?'

Sami's eyes narrowed. 'My job is not to think about such
things,' he replied. 'My job is to stay alive and pass on the
information I am given to my superiors.' As he said that
word, he hesitated slightly and glanced at Rankin. 'They
decide whether to act on it or not.'

'But what's your gut feeling?' Will had only known these
two men for a matter of minutes, but already he trusted
Sami's instinct much more than Rankin's.

'My instinct,' Sami said, 'is that Ismail is a young man
very much out of his depth. The Taliban are not stupid -
they will find out soon enough that he is betraying them
and when that happens he will be executed. But until then,
we would do well to take advantage of the information he
is giving us.'

Will assimilated this for a moment while Sami and Rankin
watched him carefully. 'I'll need local clothes,' he said, finally.
'And transport.'

Sami inclined his head slightly. 'It has already been
attended to. I will be able to come a certain amount of
the way with you, but no further. There are barricades on
the way into the city, which we will want to avoid, but I
know a route that should stop us having to negotiate these.
I will get you to within walking distance of the café, but
it would go badly for me, you understand, if I were to be
seen in the presence of a member of the military.'

Will gave him a nod of thanks, but before either of them
could speak again Rankin gave them both a slightly dismissive
wave. 'Speak to the kid who picked you up,' he said.
'He's been told to give you whatever you want. Now if
you'll excuse me.'

The fat man turned and put his hands over the electric
heater, rubbing them together. Will sneered. He didn't want
to be in this guy's presence any longer than was necessary,
so he left the hut and hurried back to the truck, Sami
following close behind.

*

The clothes Sami had supplied them with were bundled in
the back of one of the trucks outside the hut. 'This vehicle
is for you,' he told Will as they stood out in the bitter snow.
'It looks old, but in fact it is in very good condition. The
paintwork has been scuffed and damaged in order to stop
it from standing out. There are not many new vehicles in
my country these days.' He kicked one of the tyres. 'These
are the only things that might attract attention,' he continued.
'Winter tyres, with a harder tread. But the risk is small, I
think. Not many people will know what they are.'

He pulled out a canvas bag, dumped it on to the snowy
ground, then climbed into the back of the truck. Once inside,
he pulled up a metal panel to reveal a storage area, then
grabbed a clinking handful of metal. 'Snow chains,' he said.
'Ismail will not tell me where he is taking you, but it is
possible that you may need these. Also there is a -' he seemed
to struggle to find the word '- a winch, in case the vehicle
comes off the road. The driving conditions south of here are
not good. There are also extra tanks of diesel fuel for you.'

'Thank you,' Will said, sincerely. Sami was a typical fixer
- no-nonsense, helpful. It angered him that the guy had to
put up with an idiot like Rankin. 'You're a lot more help
than he was.'

Sami inclined his head. 'I have noticed that a tour of duty
in Afghanistan brings out the worst in people,' he observed.
'I do not judge him too harshly. We should ask your driver
to take us somewhere where you and your men can change.
Kandahar is not far from here, but the road can be slow in
this weather.'

'I'll need some local currency,' Will told him.

'I have it here. I suggest I distribute it once you are
changed.'

Will nodded and they made their way back to the truck,
where brief introductions were made. There was no small
talk.

The young RAF soldier drove them to a small hangar
which he explained had been requisitioned for the use of
British servicemen at the airbase. They attracted some
curious looks as, carrying their weapons case, they were
led to a private area where they could change their clothes,
but they shrugged all that off. Maybe the rumour had gone
round that an SAS unit was on site; maybe it hadn't.
Whatever the cause of those funny looks, the four of them
were too focussed on the job ahead to give them any
thought.

The clothes Sami had provided were rough and cheaply
made, but they were at least warm. There was no point
trying to make themselves look like Afghans, but if they
could avoid people thinking they were soldiers it would
make what they had to do in central Kandahar more
straightforward; and the fact that they all had beards was
a help. Once they had picked up the contact, they would
be able to change back into their cold-weather gear,
which would be more suitable for the journey south.
Will donned a pair of thick trousers made from a scratchy,
Hessian-type material, a warm woollen jumper and a
colourful Afghan hat; the others dressed similarly. They
each attached holsters under their clothes - Anderson,
Drew and Kennedy had chosen shoulder holsters, but
Will had always found a waist holster to be more comfortable.
He took the Sig 230 from the weapons case, loaded
it, then hid it neatly under his jumper. They carefully
stowed grenades and ammunition into their rucksacks,
then loaded their Diemacos and slung them across their
backs. Once they were ready, Sami took a bundle of
afghani, the currency of the country, and handed them
around.