I could feel my heartbeat slamming out at an accelerated rate. Heard the thunder of it in my ears. The roar of my indrawn breath as it seared down into my lungs.
All the time, I kept my eyes locked on O’Bryan. Watched minutely as the hand holding the FN reached a level attitude. Was acutely aware of the whitening of the skin round his knuckles as he began to take up the pressure on the trigger.
I had no intention of getting to O’Bryan. He was too far away. I achieved my real objective though, completing my reckless leap in front of Sean, arms raised out by my sides as though in surrender.
As I did so, I could sense rather than see Sean start to move, as though I could hear the rasp of air as he used the cover I’d given him to dive for the Glock, with its single loaded round.
I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget the expression that passed across O’Bryan’s face at that point. Fleeting irritation, clearing rapidly as he recognised my intervention as a temporary one. One easily disposed of.
Then he shot me, twice, in the chest.
I saw the muzzle flash lance out as the first of the full-metal-jacket rounds launched from the end of the barrel at three hundred and sixty metres a second. Much too fast for the human ear to register the sound of the discharge. I was already reacting to the initial impact before anyone ever heard it.
I can’t accurately describe what it’s like to be shot while wearing body armour that isn’t fitted with a ceramic plate.
Damned painful is the first thing.
Somehow, I’d expected to be punched backwards. Instead, my body just seemed to absorb the double shock internally, collapsing in on itself like a tower block going down under the delicately-placed charges of the demolition team.
I think I heard someone screaming as I fell.
I don’t remember hitting the ground. I must have done because the next thing I knew I was on my back with an inconvenient half-brick cricking my neck back. Breathing was difficult and hurt like hell. I was gulping in air in short, useless little pants like I’d just gone into labour.
To be honest, to begin with, I’d no idea how badly I’d been hit. I hadn’t any past experience on which to base it. The whole of the front of my chest burned with a dead white heat. My eyesight started to buzz, graining my vision. All I could see was the heavens, cast orange from the distant sodium lights and the cloud-reflected looting fires along the next street.
Then another shot exploded into my awareness. It seemed so much louder than the first two, loud enough to make me twitch which was, I discovered, altogether a deeply bad idea.
From a great distance, I became aware of the sounds of a scuffle. Someone was crying out, in pain and anger. There came the squelchy thuds and grunts of blows landing. The dull, muffled crack of a breaking bone, and a final shrill, whimpering cry.
I listened to the noises like they were the sound effects in a radio play. Half my mind was screaming at me to get up, to join in. The other half told me another minute’s rest wasn’t going to make much difference to the outcome one way or the other.
I started to slide into unconsciousness, the clamour growing further away, as insubstantial as the cries of seagulls circling a plough.
It was only as I slipped beneath the final layer that I heard the fourth and final gunshot.
By then I couldn’t tell if it was real or imaginary. Whichever, it didn’t seem dreadfully important any more. My vision was blackening at the edges like burning paper. The darkness rushed up to meet me and gratefully, like a coward, I gave in to it.
***
“Charlie! Come on, come back to me!”
Gradually I became aware that someone was shaking me. Why couldn’t they just leave me alone? I was comfy where I was. Warm and dry.
They shook me again, more roughly this time, and I realised that actually I was freezing, and that damned brick was still under the back of my neck. To cap it all, I felt the first splashes of another burst of rain on my face. Just great.
I opened my eyes slowly and found Sean’s face a few inches from my own. His nose was bloodied and there was a nasty cut over his right eye. It took me several seconds to register that the wetness I’d felt was caused by his tears, running freely down his cheeks and dripping onto me.
I reached up slowly, and wiped one of them away with a grimy thumb. I realised with a sense of small wonder that it was the first time I’d ever seen him cry.
“Christ. Jesus,” he managed at last. His voice cracked. “Suppose he’d gone for a head shot!”
I gave him what passed for a shaky grin. “He’s not good enough, and he wanted to be sure,” I said, struggling to sit up.
The sudden stabbing pain in my chest made me gasp. I looked down and saw two small torn holes in the front of my sweatshirt, no bigger than the end of my finger. It was a sobering moment, but at least I didn’t have a matching pair exiting out of the back.
O’Bryan’s first hit had landed dead centre and, I discovered later, had cracked my sternum. He’d pulled his second, as people do when they’re not used to, and not compensating for, the spent-shell eject mech. That struck about three inches higher up and to my right, and left me with an exotically bruised cleavage, but did no lasting damage.
Sean met my eyes without speaking. As much as he could, one-handed, he helped me ease the sweatshirt off over my head. He yanked open the Velcro straps to release the vest, peeling it away from my body. The inside of the chest section had two inch-deep indentations in the polycarbonate sheet, that corresponded exactly to the bruises I could already feel forming.
The vest itself was ripped and torn, the yellow kevlar inner showing through the holes. As Sean tossed it aside I thought I heard the metallic jingle of the stopped rounds rattling together somewhere in the lining. I made a whimsical mental note to retrieve them. Some souvenir.
Then I looked past him, and my heart lurched at the sight of two still figures lying near me on the ground.
“How’s Roger?”
“He’s OK,” Sean nodded towards the inert form of his brother. “He fainted. He’s probably bust a couple of ribs, but he’ll be fine.”
I swallowed. “And O’Bryan?”
“He’s not so fine.” Sean gave an evil smile and for a moment I thought he’d given in to instinct, and to blind anger. “Don’t worry, he’s not dead – he’s just out cold,” he said.
The relief made me sag. “What happened?”
“I managed to get to the Glock just before O’Bryan realised what I was doing. I think we must have fired at each other at almost exactly the same time.” He flashed me a quick grin. “He missed. I didn’t. Took a nice gouge out of his forearm.” He nodded towards his own injured shoulder. “It levelled the playing field a bit.”
I shook my head, trying to clear it. “But I heard another shot,” I said, puzzled.
Sean stood up then, seeming very dark and very dangerous. “I said he wouldn’t get away scot-free, Charlie,” he said. “You just told me not to kill him. You didn’t say I couldn’t kneecap him.”
I had no sympathies for O’Bryan, but I winced at the thought of his shattered joint. “Which leg?”
“The right,” Sean told me. He smiled again, a look of ultimate satanic satisfaction, of perfect revenge, but when he spoke his voice was completely calm and matter-of-fact.
“Even if he does get away with this, I’m afraid he’ll have to sell those classic cars he’s so fond of,” he said. “Now he won’t even be able to drive an automatic.”
Epilogue
The riot on the Lavender Gardens estate went on for two days and nights. By the time it subsided the estimate of the damage ran into millions. The police officers involved suffered numerous minor injuries. One unlucky constable lost an eye. The rioters themselves came off worse, on the whole, but there were no reported fatalities.