Sharp Shot (2 page)
“So, what are you waiting for?” said Chance, positioning
the first of the high explosive charges against a bank of computer
servers. He checked his watch and set the timer.
When he looked back over his shoulder, the lab was empty.
Five minutes later, Chance had set explosives at key points around
the room. He made sure the vital areas would take the brunt of the blasts:
the containment vessels, the centrifuges, the data storageâ¦He took the
empty backpack with himâthere was no point in leaving behind anything
that might identify who had been there. The main reason for using Chance
and his team rather than an airstrike was that no one would know for sure
who had destroyed the place.
With the alarms going, the Republican Guards would be hurrying back
from the diversion Halford and Darrow had arranged. Assault rifle at the
ready and set to deliver continuous automatic fire, Chance ran from the
laboratory.
He had to assume anyone he saw would be hostile. The civilians should
be running for their lives. He knew from the regular location and progress
updates in his earpiece exactly where all the members of his own team
were. Anyone coming back into the facility had to be the enemy. Chance cut
down three soldiers in the corridorâtaking them out before they even
knew he was there.
Out into the central compound Chance hurled several smoke canisters.
It would slow down the returning troops, and it would mask his own escape.
A dark shape passed him in the fog of yellow smoke, and Chance shouted at
it:
“The lab is secure,” he yelled in the local dialect.
“The problem is in the admin block.” He smiled grimly as he
heard his words repeated by the incoming soldiers.
A bullet meant for Chance ricocheted off the wall close to the main
gate. He turned and fired on instinct and a khaki-clad figure collapsed
behind him. Chance didn't wait to see if any others followed. He was
running across the sand, away from the noise and confusion, away from the
smoke and the bullets. A quick look at his watch told him there was no
time to hang around.
He reached the sand dune and hurled himself over, rolling down the
other side and skidding to a halt close to the Jeep.
Dex Halford looked down at him from where he was sitting nonchalantly
in the driver's seat. The door was open and he was dangling his legs over
the side, swigging from his water bottle.
“What kept you?” Dex asked with a grin.
McCain was in the passenger seat. “If you're late you ride in
the back,” he called. Then he frowned. “Isn't Darrow with
you?”
“He's cutting it fine,” said Chance, checking his watch.
The second hand was sweeping up towards the
12. Just a few seconds. “Five,” he muttered as he
counted them off. “Fourâ¦three⦔
“Here he comes,” said Halford.
A dark shape rolled down the dune, just as Chance himself had done.
“Sorry I'm late,” said Darrow as he reached the Jeep.
If he said anything else, it was lost in the sound of the blast. The
night sky was turned to sudden daylight. Brilliant yellow washed across
the landscape and a ball of smoke and fire mushroomed upwards.
“Time we were going,” said Chance as the noise
died
away. “You and I get to ride in the back,” he told Darrow,
slapping his comrade on the shoulder.
“Chauffeur service, I love it.” Darrow swung his
backpack off and dragged it up into the Jeep with him.
Chance watched him, puzzled. The backpack was obviously heavyâvery
heavy. But it should have been empty.
The Jeep bumped over the rise and tipped down the other side of the
dune, gathering speed. In the distance, the installation was burning. Tiny
figuresâsoldiers, civilians and scientistsâwere milling round it in
confusion.
“Job done,” McCain called from the front of the Jeep.
“Nice one, team,” Chance told them. “Just two
small loose ends to tie up, then we're home and dry.”
“And what are those?” Darrow asked.
“First,” Chance told him, “there's the small
matter of the team photograph. And secondâI want to know what you've got
in your rucksack.”
Darrow met Chance's gaze. For a moment he said nothing. Then he
looked away. “Souvenir. I'll show you when it gets light.”
The plan was to cross the border into East Araby, a small country to
the south east of Iraq, also bordering Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. By
daybreak, Chance's team was within a hundred and fifty kilometres of the
border. In the Jeep, it would take only a few more hours.
They heard the plane long before they saw it.
“One of ours?” Darrow wondered.
“Doubt it,” said Halford. “We need to find some
cover.”
“Camouflage netting?” McCain suggested.
Chance shook his head. “We have to assume they're looking for
us. We'll need better cover than that.” He had the map open on his
knees. “Head slightly to the left, over that rise. There should be
the remains of a village.”
A small black shape skimmed the horizon over to their right. The
plane turned slowly, heading back towards them.
“Has it seen us?” Darrow wondered.
“Not yet,” Chance shouted above the roar of the Jeep as
Halford accelerated. “Might see the sand we're kicking up, but we'll
have to risk that.”
McCain had his binoculars out. “Iraqi air force markings. It's
a Foxbat.”
Chance swore. The MiG25âcodenamed
Foxbat
by NATO
forcesâwas a powerful aircraft. It was fast enough to outrun an
air-to-air missile, but the good news was that it didn't carry
ground-attack weapons. It was used for reconnaissance and interception
only. Banking steeply, it disappeared into the distance.
Ahead of them were the remains of the village. It was more like a
small townâderelict stone-built structures disappearing into the
distance. Most of the roofs had collapsed, some buildings reduced to just
a couple of broken walls.
“You could get lost in there for a week,” said McCain.
Halford steered the Jeep rapidly between several low walls, then over
a bank of sand and into the enclosed remains of a house. The Jeep jolted
to a stop, and immediately Darrow and Chance were unrolling the camouflage
netting and dragging it over the vehicle.
All four of them were out of the building in moments, taking shelter
in the shadow of a section of wall thirty metres away. If the Foxbat
returned, it was more likely to spot the Jeep. If it did, they wanted to
be far away from it.
“Can't hear anything,” said McCain. “Maybe we're
OK?”
“Give it half an hour,” Chance decided. “It may
have spotted us and called in support. We don't want to be caught in the
open if it comes back, especially if he's got company.”
“Time for the team photo then,” Halford decided. He took
out a disposable camera. The camera had come from a supermarket, but
Halford had removed the cardboard casing that gave away its origins. It
was plain, functional, black plastic.
“Right,” said Halford, “the challenge is to work
out how we take a picture with us all in. There's no timer.”
McCain sighed and took the camera. “Why do I always have to be
the practical one? I need a small stone aboutâ¦this big.” He held
his thumb and forefinger in a small circle.
There was no shortage of stones about the right size
âjust big enough to cover the camera's shutter button. McCain
balanced the camera on a low section of wall that protruded from a higher
wall. Then he put heavy stones round the camera to hold it in place. He
wedged another on the top, jutting out over the lens, but leaving the
shutter button with the small stone on it exposed.
“Right, assume your positions.”
“Is that it?” Halford asked, laughing. “Now
what?”
“Yeah,” said Darrow, “what's the big deal. Someone
still needs to press the shutter.”
“I think that's the idea,” said Chance. “Right,
Ferdy?”
McCain was grinning. “Exactly right. Get ready. The camera's
lined up with this bit of wall here, so let's all stand in front of it.
Oh, and we'll need some pebbles. About this big, I should think.”
He picked up a stone the size of an egg and weighed it in his hand.
“Yes, that should do it. I'll go first.”
“What are you going to do?” Darrow asked.
“Bung rocks at it. Ready?”
They could see at once what McCain meant when he tossed the egg-sized
stone. He lobbed it up on to higher section of wall. The stone rattled
down the wall, bouncing on to the stones holding the camera steady.
“Missed,” said McCain. “Who's going next?”
The third pebble did it. Halford arced it into the air above the wall
just as first McCain and then Darrow had done. The pebble rattled down,
and this time struck the small stone on the shutter button. The weight of
the impact was enough to take the picture.
“Nice one, Ferdy,” said Chance as they all watched
him
retrieve the camera and wind on the film. “Now then, let's see what
Mark's got in his backpack, shall we?”
Reluctantly, Darrow opened his rucksack and lifted out his
âsouvenir'. It was a statue made from a dark brown material, like
terracotta, about half a metre tall and maybe fifteen centimetres wide. It
was in the shape of a lion standing upright on its back legs, and it was
obviously old; the features and details had worn away, the material
scuffed and scratched and flaking. Chance remembered that one of the
scientists had been carrying itâhe must have run into Darrow soon after.
“Blimey, it's heavy,” McCain commented, lifting it up to
get a better look. “What d'you want this for?”
“It just took my fancy.” Darrow lifted the statue
carefully out of McCain's hands and pushed it back into his rucksack.
“No big deal.”
“Reckon it's valuable?” Halford asked.
“I'll let you know.”
Chance was looking grim. “You shouldn't have taken it,”
he said. “We didn't come here to steal artefacts, whether they're
valuable or not.”
“Oh come on, John,” said Darrow, suddenly angry.
“We were going to blow it up. I found it in the admin
block when I
was planting the explosives. It just seemed a shame to destroy it. So
where's the harm? I mean, they're not going to come and ask for it back,
are they?”
“Actually,” said Halford, “I think they
might.” He pointed across the mass of broken buildings and
collapsed walls.
Two small black shapes were streaking rapidly towards them across the
sky. As they watched, one of the black shapes flashed, as if it had caught
the sun.
“Incoming!” yelled McCain.
Moments later, a building just thirty metres away exploded in a
fireball. Heavy machine gun fire strafed across the sandy ground.
The four men hurled themselves into the cover of the wall. There was
another explosion, even closer. A wall exploded under the impact of the
rocket, stone and debris flying through the air. Darrow gave a cry as a
lump of rock struck him across the side of the head, hurling him sideways.
Then as suddenly as it had started, the attack stopped. The two
aircraft sped onwards, into the distance.
“Soon as they turn, they'll be back,” said Halford.
Chance was beside the prone body of Darrow. “Out cold. He's
losing blood, and I think his collar bone's broken. We have to get him to
the Jeep.”
“That could be a problem,” said McCain, kneeling beside
them. He pointed across to the burning remains of the building that had
taken the first rocket hit. “That's the Jeep. Maybe they saw its
heat signature.”
“Then we have to walk. We'll take it in turns to carry Mark. We
move out as soon as it's safe.”
“And when will that be?”
“The planes aren't turning,” Halford reported, joining
them. “I reckon the Foxbat wasn't sure he'd seen anything, and they
were just making sure, maybe trying to flush us out if we were here. They
fired at anything showing up on the infra red and just got
lucky.”“And we didn't,” said Chance. “They might
send in ground forces to check. Let's make sure there's nothing left of
the Jeep, and we bury anything that we don't take with us. We need to
travel light. With luck we can call in an extraction, but if not then it's
still another hundred and fifty kilometres to the border. So the only
thing we're taking with us apart from water and weapons and the first aid
kit is Mark, got it?”
“What about this?” McCain asked, kicking Darrow's
heavy rucksack containing his souvenir statue.
“You check on the Jeep,” Chance told him. “Dex,
you do what you can to help Mark. See if you can stop the
bleeding.” He picked up the rucksackâit really was very heavy,
and there was no way they could take it with them and carry Darrow. Speed
was vital now. “I'll bury this with the rest of the gear,” he
said.
The present day. Gloucestershire, England.
Jade Chance was out jogging. The route she tookâthrough the village
and back across the hillsâwas almost exactly six and a half kilometres.
She tried to run every day after school, and occasionally she persuaded
her brother Rich to go with her.
But not this afternoon.
When he was at home, Dad quite often joined her. Jade had expected
him to be slow and out of condition. He ate the most appalling rubbish, he
smokedâthough less than he used toâand as far as Jade could tell he
drank only black coffee, beer and champagne. Sometimes together.
It was November, so it was already dark when Jade got back. She'd
left Rich doing his homework, and
he was still at it when she returned.
“Dad phoned,” said Rich, without looking up. He was
sitting at the dining table in the main living room of the small cottage
the three of them shared on the outskirts of the small Cotswold village.
“Did he say where he is or what he's doing?” Jade asked,
going straight through to the kitchen.
“Nope.”
“Did he say when he'll be back?” Jade called as she
opened the fridge.
“Nope.”
“Did he say where he's put the tin opener?”
“Nope,” Rich called back. “But I did ask,”
he added after a moment.
“Liar.” Jade started to unload the beer and champagne
from the fridge. “So why did he bother to call?”
“Don't know. That was something I
didn't
ask.” Rich was standing in the doorway, watching Jade empty the
fridge. “I hope you're not going to empty all that down the sink
again,” he said.
“No. But I don't see why the fridge has to be full of Dad's
booze. One bottle of champagne and two bottles of beer, that's what he's
allowed now. If you've finished
your homework, you can go online and order
some real food and drink.”
“You mean healthy stuff.” Rich was smiling. “You
mean lettuce and carrots and things that only rabbits eat. You mean fruit
juice and bottled water.”
“Among other things.” Jade stood up and surveyed the
collection of bottles on the worktop. “That should do it. If we're
left on our own to look after ourselves, we might as well eat healthily
and sensibly while we can. He could be gone for weeks. Are you sure he
didn't say when he'll be back?”
Rich shrugged. “He's working for Ardman. He could be anywhere
in the world for days or weeks or even months, I guess.”
“All the more reason to make the most of it.”
“Yeah,” Rich agreed. “I did an order yesterday,
anyway. They're supposed to deliver it this evening. Don't worry, I put us
down for some health food. Salad and fruit and vegetables. Oh, and I
ordered some Coke and burgers too. And we can have pizza tonight.”
He grinned at Jade's horrified expression. “You can put extra
pineapple on yours. Then it'll count as fruit.”
Before Jade could protest, her phone beeped. It was warning her it
was almost out of power, so she went
through to her bedroom to plug it
into the charger. By the time she returned, Rich was back at his homework.
There was something else Jade was determined to do while Dad was away.
That was to unpack at least some of the crates and boxes that had been
standing unopened in the spare room since they'd arrived several months
earlier.
Dad was used to living out of suitcases and boxes, but since the
death of the twins' mother, Jade hadn't really felt anywhere was home. If
she unpacked Dad's stuff, if they filled the cottage with things that
belonged to them as a family rather than the people they were renting the
cottage from, then maybe this would become home.
It frustrated Jade that Rich didn't seem to have the same problem.
Maybe he was more like their dad. He seemed happy just to unpack things as
and whenâand ifâhe needed them. If she left it to the men, Jade knew,
they'd never be moved in.
Another reason for unpacking, though she could barely admit it to
herself, was that despite everything Jade was enjoying her new life. Dad
could be annoying and irritating, but he'd demonstrated time and again
the
lengths he'd go to for his children. It was strange to think that less
than a year ago John Chance hadn't even known he
had
children, and they'd known nothing about himâ¦
School was OK, and Jade had made some friends. There was a time, a
few months back, when she'd expected to be asked to leave. But Dad's boss
Ardman had somehow persuaded the Head and Governors that getting involved
in an armed siege during which large sections of the school were blown up,
and others demolished by various members of the Chance family
âincluding Dad, who'd driven his BMW right through the main reception
blockâwasn't actually an expellable offence.
Somewhere at the back of Jade's mind was the thought that if she got
everything unpacked, it would be that much more difficult, that much more
unlikely, that they would have to move on. The cottage might not seem
quite like home yet, but she hoped it soon would.
“Box time!” she called to Rich as she packed the
beer and champagne into a cupboard.
“What, again?”
“One a day, remember? We agreed.” She went back
through to
the living room.
“We didn't agree,” Rich told her. “You decided. An
agreement requires the consent of both parties.”
Jade sighed, deciding it wasn't worth an argument. “You sort
out the shopping,” she said. “I'll do the box after I've had
a shower. Deal?”
“I suppose.”
Jade grinned. Her twin brother drove her every bit as mad as her dad
did. But she couldn't imagine being without him. She went into the
bathroom, thinking how lucky she was really to have Dad and Rich. How
lucky she was that no one had tried to kill her for months now.
But that was about to change.
Rich watched as Jade dragged a large cardboard box in from the spare
room. She sat cross-legged on the floor beside it. Her shoulder-length
fair hair was still wet, and she'd pulled on a sweat shirt and jogging
bottoms.
“Anything good?” Rich asked.
“Books, papers, magazines.” Jade pulled out a handful of
magazines and spread them on the carpet beside her. “I mean, why
does he keep this stuff?”
“You can always put it away again.”
She was leafing through the different magazinesâ
National
Geographic
,
The Rifleman
,
The
Economist
,
History Today, Jane's Intelligence
Review
â¦The books were just as varied. There was a battered
hardback copy of
Oliver Twist
stacked with a book about
the Falklands War. Jade pulled out a paperback thriller published in the
1970s. The cover was a photograph of a woman dressed in combat uniform. Or
rather, half dressed in it. Jade tossed it to one side.
“That looks good,” said Rich, kneeling down beside her.
“No it doesn't,” she told him. “Leave it where it
is. That's the rubbish pile.”
“Dad might want to read it again.”
“You think he got past the front cover the first time?”
Jade threw another paperback after it, it landed face down.
“What was that one?” Rich asked eagerly.
“You don't want to know.”
“You mean
you
don't want me to know.”
Jade had lifted out another stack of books and magazines. There was
an old newspaper on the top. The headline read, âGovernment Denies SAS
Involvement in Hostage Rescue'. Underneath it was
another paperâa lurid
tabloid from the same day. Its
headline was: âOur Boys Give âEm Hell'.
“Wonder why he's kept these?” said Rich.
“Like we can't guess.”
“Shall I put them with the photos?”
Jade nodded. “Good idea.”
There was a small desk in the corner of the room, by the French
doors. These opened on to a small patio overlooking the back garden. The
desk had a sloping front that folded down to become a writing area. Behind
it was a rack of pigeon holes and compartments. Jade had found a stack of
old photos in one of Dad's boxes, and put them inside the desk. Since then
they had found several more to add to the collection.
The newspapers were too big to go with the photos, so Rich put them
in an empty drawer in the bottom part of the desk. Jade seemed busy
unpacking the box, so Rich opened the lid of the desk and took out the
bundle of photographs.
There were maybe twenty or so, taken at different times in different
places. Most of them showed John Chanceâin army dress uniform, in a
dinner suit, on an assault course covered in mud, but grinning. There
was
a crumpled picture of Rich and Jade's mother. It was a small, creased,
passport-sized shot, and it looked like it had been kept in a wallet or a
pocket for years.
But the picture that intrigued Rich was a faded snapshot taken in the
desert. At least, it looked like the desertâthere was lots of sand, but
the four men in it were standing in front of a low wall. All four were
dressed in khaki army uniforms. One of them was a younger John Chance,
another Rich and Jade knew was Dex Halford, who'd been in the SAS with
their dad. They both looked so youngâin their mid-twenties, Rich
guessed.
One of the other two men was slightly shorter and stocky with a thin,
dark moustache. He was standing beside John Chance, looking slightly wary.
The fourth man was wiry and had a shock of hair the same colour as the
sand. He was grinning and pointing at the camera with one hand, while his
other hand was resting on Dex Halford's shoulder.
On the back of the photo was written in biro:
Iraq
âNovember 1990. JC, DH, Mark and Ferdy.
“What's that noise?” Jade asked suddenly.
Rich pushed the photos back inside the desk,
dropped the newspapers in front of them, and closed
the lid. “I didn't hear anything.”
“Sounded like thunder.”
Rich pulled out his mobile phone. “I'll check the
forecast.” He started up the web browser. It drained the battery,
but he enjoyed using it.
“Gadget man,” said Jade. “Why don't you just look
outside?”
“It's dark,” Rich protested as he waited for the webpage
to load.
“You can still tell if it's raining. Rainâyou know, that wet
stuff that drops from the sky.”
“Nothing forecast,” Rich told her.
He pushed his phone back into his pocket and opened the French doors.
The evening was quite warm for late autumn. There was a half moon and the
sky looked clear. Rich stepped out on to the patio. The security light on
the wall above came on at once, detecting Rich's movement as he walked.
The small garden ended with a wooden fence made of thin panels. There
was a gate that led out to the small wooded area beyond. Behind that were
fields and a small stream snaking through the hills. To Rich, brought up
in an American city before the twins'
mother brought them home to Britain,
it seemed very isolated and quiet.
Now the quiet was shattered by the sound Jade had mistaken for
thunder. Standing outside, Rich could hear it much more clearly. It was
coming from the woods behind the house.
It was gunfire.
Rich stepped quickly back inside and locked the French doors.
Outside, the security light went off. The doors were reflective
panels of black. Rich found himself looking at his own reflection, Jade
standing beside him.
“Fireworks, do you think?” said Jade.
“No. Guns.”
Typical
, thought Jade.
Just when it seemed
like we could finally settle down
â¦
“Might just be hunters,” she said, hopefully.
“At night?”
Jade sighed. “OK, we'd better take cover. And call the
police.”
At that moment the security light came on again, bathing the patio in
harsh white light.
Rich and Jade took a step backwards, as a dark shape approached the
cottage. It crashed into the
doors, bursting them open. A man staggered
into the room, his eyes wide and staring. His face was caked in blood and
his clothes were tattered and dirty.
Rich stared open mouthed. He knew the man. He'd been looking at his
picture just now. He might be twenty years older, his sandy hair going
grey, but it was obviously one of the men from the photograph taken in
Iraq.
“Chance!” the man gasped. “Looking for John
Chance. He's the only person who can help me now.” The man
collapsed to his knees, then toppled forwards to fall motionless at Rich's
feet.