Nick Oldham - Critical Threat

‘Yes.’

Another pause, then, ‘Watch and shoot.’

Bill patted Henry on the back and he started to walk slowly forwards, revolver still pointing towards the floor.

Three metres down, one of the targets spun to face him.

Henry reacted. He stopped, adopted the classic combat stance, bouncing down on his knees, bringing up the gun at the same time and double-tapped — bam! bam! The gun recoiled wildly as the powerful bullets exploded out of the muzzle. The noise in the confined space, in spite of the earmuffs, was incredible.

The target spun away, having shown for two seconds.

Henry knew he had missed at this distance.

A bead of sweat trickled down his temple. He lowered the gun, gritted his teeth and walked on, two rounds discharged, ensuring he remembered how many he had fired. It was easy to forget in the heat of the moment.

Two different targets spun to face him. Henry took them in and was surprised to see that one of them was a woman holding a baby; the other was the gunman. He dropped into the combat stance and double-tapped the correct target, again knowing he had missed.

Four gone, two left.

The targets clattered out of sight.

Henry walked another two metres and a single target appeared, into which he drilled his remaining bullets, now having got some measure of the recoil of the huge gun. Before the target disappeared, Henry dropped to one knee behind one of the walls and transferred the gun into his left hand, whilst at the same time flicking open the cylinder and ejecting the spent cartridges on to the floor behind him with an exaggerated flick of his hand. He fumbled in his pocket and found the speedloader, slotting the bullets into their new homes, then stood up, ready again — just as two targets reappeared, both wielding firearms.

He reacted instantly, a double-tap for each of them, and was feeling pretty good at the result.

Four bullets gone, two remaining … he walked on, heart pulsating, sweat dripping, adrenaline gushing … ready to shoot again.

‘And I am a transsexual,’ the person at the front of the classroom announced proudly, bringing an inner groan from Henry, who began to wonder how much more of this he could stand as his eyes flickered to the transvestite sitting next to the transsexual. It was becoming a freak show and he could sense a creeping feeling of despair in the room from all the other delegates. And there was another session to go after this.

He could still feel the kick-back of the big revolver in his hands, smell the cordite in his nostrils, and half-wished he had the Magnum in his possession to see how well he could double-tap live targets. I’d give them a head start, he thought sportingly, then hunt them ruthlessly down.

He twitched as his mobile phone vibrated in his pocket. He sneaked it out and glanced at the newly arrived text message asking him to contact the force incident manager regarding a murder which had just been reported. He didn’t want to jump for joy that some poor unfortunate person had been killed, but at least it got him out of this purgatory, because if he stayed there was every chance there would be a gender-bender-related murder.

Six months later

As much as Henry Christie had been assured at the 3 a.m. briefing that his task, his responsibility, during the operation — codenamed ‘Enid’ — was probably the one with the least chance of risk associated with it, he could not help but feel just a little bit excited.

It had been stressed that his role was peripheral to the main operation and, more subtly, that he was there only to make up numbers; it was just that they needed someone of his rank to help out and because chief inspectors were thin on the ground for various reasons; the corporate barrel had been scraped and Henry had been found lurking in a crack like an ugly germ.

Obviously that had not been said out loud at the briefing, but Henry knew this to be the case. He had been called in because no one more suitable — preferable — was available and they needed someone of his rank to hang the blame on should something in his corner of the op go tits up. The ‘no blame culture’ that had been bandied about a few years before was now a dead duck, floating feet up in the water. Today’s climate of fear and failure in policing definitely needed scapegoats, hence Henry’s presence. If it all went well, then he wouldn’t even get mentioned in dispatches. It was one of the things that came with being someone who was considered too hot to handle, someone who nobody even wanted to be near enough to cattle-prod away.

But for once, Henry couldn’t care less, because for the first time in an eon, he was feeling enthusiastic.

It came not from the minor role, but from the feeling that had made being a cop so worthwhile throughout his long, often tortuous career. Here he was, sitting in a scruffy, battered police personnel carrier, kitted up to the eyeballs in protective equipment like a Jedi knight, in the dead of night, amongst a feral gang of Support Unit officers who belched, swore, farted, laughed and joked, and didn’t give a rat’s scrotum whether or not Henry was a chief inspector, because they knew they were good, the best. They knew their job and as soon as they stepped out of their van, they would leave the childishness and inappropriate behaviour behind and become cold, ruthless and professional whilst performing their allocated task. He’d once been on Support Unit and had been just the same.

It was 4 a.m. now. An east Lancashire dawn was just around the corner. The streets of Accrington were damp and silent and a dozen hairy-arsed bobbies were raring to go on the word of command.

What could be better than this?

Henry was back at the razor sharp end after months of lying fallow. A wonderful sensation. Out playing with the lads ’n’ lasses (there were two female officers in the back of the van and the rather butch sergeant next to him), just waiting for the nod via his earpiece. It was something he didn’t do enough of these days, rarely getting the chance to grubby-up his hands with day-to-day policing.

The buzz was incredible.

Just sitting in the front of the van on the bench seat with the sergeant squeezed between him and the driver. Biding time. When every other non-crim soul was tucked up in bed asleep, he was out on the streets.

He was even in uniform, wearing his public order overalls — which, if he was honest, he’d had to cram himself into, steel toe-capped boots and a flat uniform cap with the chequered band. The chief inspector’s model, of course, with a bit more padding for the brain than the plebs of lower rank were issued with. However, no matter what sort of police cap he wore, he always thought he looked more like a bus conductor because, for the sake of comfort, he always wore it tipped on the back of his head.

Here they were, waiting for the signal, all systems go.

Despite the air of flatulence, Henry could not mask his smile. In the next few minutes, a collection of size eleven boots and heavy metal, double-handed door openers would combine as his team for the night ‘front-and-backed’ a terraced house and then, as the doors flew off their hinges, they would pour in like wolves. Around the division, half a dozen similar raids were being choreographed concurrently, one of them being a fully armed incursion.

Terrorism was in the neighbourhood and this was the police response to it.

Henry’s smile became grim. How the world had changed, he thought sadly, wondering what would greet his team as they roared into the target address. His smile changed again, this time becoming twisted and sardonic, when he realized that if his one and only fleeting experience with the Security Services was anything to go by — and it seemed that most of the intel for Operation Enid (who the hell chose that name?) had come from MI6 — Henry’s raid could go one of a number of ways. Either it could be spot on as promised, or it could be completely the wrong address, or, worst case scenario, they’d barge into a highly dangerous terrorist cell hiding out in a booby-trapped house and get themselves either blown up, or shot to bits.