Zero Option

'One minute,' Tony announced.

I tucked the sight down the front of my shirt and settled my PNGs back over my eyes. At fifteen seconds I closed my eyes — and it was lust as well, because the flash and bang came fractionally before Tony called them.

This second explosion, being much closer, sounded far more dramatic. Anyone looking back towards the camp would have got an eyeful. Before the echoes had rolled away we were bobbing down the gully and across the road. I held my breath and kept going steadily until we were well clear, then stopped everyone and turned to cover the crossing while I called Whinger on.

Now we were on the hard ground and up to full speed. We had a much shorter way to go than on the run-in, because our pick-up point was only a couple of kilometres beyond the south bank of the big wadi.

After twenty minutes of steady travel, I called, 'M1 stations — comms halt now. Close on me.'

With pickets out ahead and behind, Whinger set up his Satcom and started aligning the little dish-aerial. I thought of the big aerial in the camp, still functioning, and tried to put that minor failure behind me. As Whinger fiddled, I took another look at Pat. When I loosened the tourniquet, blood started to seep through the wound-dressings, so I tightened it again and got another IV going. I stayed with him while Whinger was getting through to Hereford, chatting quietly to encourage him, trying not to think about Norm.

'Fucking great bang,' Pat muttered hazily. 'What was that?'

'Tony put your quad into orbit, to stop anyone else getting their hands on it.'

'Shit hot!'

'Going through,' said Whinger.

I passed the IV bag to Tony and took the handset.

'Zero Alpha, Zero Alpha, this is Delta Four. How do you hear me?'

'Zero Alpha. Loud and clear. Over.' It was Mac's voice, his Glasgow accent unmistakable even via the satellite.

'Delta Four. I confirm the bird is down. We're clear of the target area and heading for the pick-up point.

ETA there between figures four zero and figures six zero minutes from now. Repeat from four zero to six zero minutes.'

'Zero Alpha. Roger. Your transport is en route to you. Will confirm your timings to Captain Steve.

Over.'

'Delta Four. Roger. We have one casualty. Bravo Seven has a serious leg wound. He's stable, but we need a doctor soonest. Best if we can have one on the Here.

Over.'

'Zero Alpha. Roger. We'll do what-we can.'

We found a different way down into the wadi and picked out a path across its boulder-strewn floor without difficulty. After a quick run across the gravel plain, we were on the pick-up location well within the window I'd given. The ground there was flat and hard, with a bit of sand on the surface, but no obstructions, so that the heli would be able to land anywhere. Having chosen the best-looking spot, we spread out in all round defence and listened for the sound of engines.

The night was utterly quiet, with just a breath of wind from the south-east. Looking back to the north, I could see no lights in the sky, no sign of vehicles moving, and I guessed that after a token watch in the desert the Libyans had retreated into camp. I imagined a fire-crew fighting the blaze in the accommodation block. If the whole building had gone up and Khadduri's body had been incinerated, the home team might never realise that he'd been assassinated.

Scanning through my PNGs, I could make out the other quads dotted round in a circle. It was difficult to sit still and wait, so hyped-up did I feel. Every minute or two I had a word with Pat, lying in the trailer beside me. During one of the longer silences, the idea of meeting Norm's next-of-kin began to bug me. Because he came from so far away — Glasgow — and spoke so little, I didn't know much about his family. I had the impression that his father was dead and his mum had married again. What was I going to say to her?

I kept trying to work out when our Chinook would have taken offfrom Siwa and how long it might take to reach us. As we had no solid information, everything was guesswork. From their pre-briefing, the crew knew that EtV Six was twenty kilometres due south of the camp perimeter, and I was confident they were heading for us.

It was Whinger, with his very sharp ears, who heard the sound first. 'Aircraft engines east,' he announced. I switched my radio to the channel I expected the chopper crew to be using and called, 'Hello Steve, hello Steve, this is Geordie. How d'you read me? Over.'

'Hi, Geordie. You're loud and clear. I'm heading two-six-zero. Estimating six minutes to the LZ. Over.'

'Roger. That's great. Keep coming. We can hear you due east of our position. The deck's clear for you to land. We've got i firefly on now.'

'Roger. Do my guys need any particular instructions for loading your casualty?'

'No, thanks. We've got him laid in the trailer, so he can be driven straight in.'

'Roger. Standby.'

'And… Steve?'

'Yes?'

'We've only four quads left. Had to bin the others.

So the loadies'll only need to count four in.'

'Roger.'

It was a fantastic relief to know that the chopper was on course. Again I gave thanks for the existence of the Magellan and the pinpoint accuracy it offered us. No doubt the crew of the Chinook would have found us in the end by using old-fashioned methods of navigation, but almost certainly the recovery would have taken longer. Most of my anxieties fell away; now the main worry was Pat.

For three or four minutes the engine hum grew steadily louder.

'We're hearing you stronger,' I called. 'Keep coming.'

'Roger,' Steve called, and then, 'OK, OK. I've got you. We were almost spot on. Turning towards you now. OK, the firefly's on the nose. All clear to land beside it?'

'Perfect. We're standing off.'

'Roger. I'll come straight in.'

I went back on to our chatter net and called to Whinger: 'Pull away from his line of approach or you'll get your bloody head cut off. All stations, start up. He'll be here in under a minute. Stew, you'll be first on with the trailer.'

'Roger.'

Pulling the PNGs down on to my chest, I replaced them with ordinary ski goggles, started the quad and turned to face into the circle. For a few moments I could hear the noise of my own engine. Then the thudding of rotor blades and the scream of turbines blotted it out, and all at once a great black monster was looming towards us out of the night, practically at ground level, with a dark sand-cloud seething behind it.

Without wasting an instant, Steve hovered, turned in the air and put his arse down right beside the firefly. In the last few seconds the noise became overwhelming.

Sand and dust boiled up furiously, and as I drove into the cloud I found the ramp already down, and there were the loadies, beckoning Stew on. In less than a minute all four quads were safely aboard, and we lifted away.

In the dim light of the hold I could see that Tony's face and hands were smeared with dried blood.

Khadduri's. My hands were the same, but the blood was Pat's. The blood all down the backs of my legs was Norm's.

For our lads, the relief of being airborne was overwhelming; we felt we were already half-way home, our troubles behind us. For the crew, though, things were different. From their strained faces I could see they were shitting themselves with the possibility of going down in alien territory. Not until we'd cleared the Egyptian border would they be able to relax. Engine failure, or a SAM from a trigger-happy sentry in some Libyan frontier-post — either would spoil the party in a few seconds. In my mind I ran through the emergency drills we'd talked about in Hereford, what we'd do in the event of a forced landing. We still had enough explosive to destroy the Chinook if need be, but that would be the last resort.

As for Pat, I knew the important thing was to make him keep fighting. On other operations I'd seen guys who'd been wounded hold out well until they thought they were in safe hands, and then suddenly slide downhill as they stopped making a positive effort to survive. When that happens, shock can take over.