Питер Джеймс - Dead if You Don’t

‘They’re not happy with the camera. EOD are on their way.’

Roy turned and looked at Bruno and thought, I need to get you out, now.

Saturday 12 August

17.00–18.00

In simulations, it had proven possible to evacuate every stand within eight minutes. Could that be achieved now, Adrian Morris wondered? He prepared to hit the panic button and order the total evacuation of the South Stand and the partial evacuation of the neighbouring West and East Stands — the seating blocks immediately adjacent — and called up on his screen the announcement he was about to read out over the public address. He glanced at his watch, every second feeling like an hour, his throat tight and his mouth dry, then read the words over to himself:

‘ We regret that due to a security incident, play has been suspended. We are carrying out a partial evacuation in the stadium. Supporters in blocks A — E in the East and West Stands and all supporters in the South Stand are asked to leave in an orderly manner, and follow the instructions of the stewards and the police outside. A decision whether the match will restart will be made as soon as possible. ’

The protocol was that he would order all concessions and toilets to be closed, immediately.

Oh God, he thought, staring again at the camera, then at the message, his guts twisting. Am I doing the right thing?

But is there any other option?

Saturday 12 August

17.00–18.00

‘What is happening, Papa?’ Bruno asked his father, seeing him end the call.

Grace looked back anxiously at the camera on the empty seat. ‘I don’t know, Bruno.’

He was desperate to get his son — and himself — away from that camera. Ellis had confirmed his worst suspicions, that something was wrong about it, about the man who had left it there. Very wrong. And now he had all the information he needed.

But he was in a quandary. If he did rush Bruno out, and a few minutes later the bomb detonated, there would be questions asked. He was a police officer, aware there was a bomb, and he simply fled with his son?

All around him fans were on their feet, roaring, totally focused on the game. They wouldn’t take any notice of him if he did try to warn them. But the longer they stayed, the greater the risk that the bomb, if real, would detonate. Any second now, the game would be halted and there would be a public address announcement to evacuate. Surely?

‘I think there’s a suspect item in the stadium, Bruno,’ he said, trying not to look obviously at the camera, but unable to keep his eyes off it.

‘Is this a terrorist attack?’ Bruno asked.

He squeezed his son’s arm. ‘Hopefully a false alarm.’

‘Will they stop the game for a false alarm?’

‘Let’s hope it’s just that.’ Again, he looked anxiously at the camera. Thinking it through. If they evacuated the stadium, could the game be restarted later today? They would have to wait for the Army Explosive Ordnance Division to arrive, and from experience that could be a couple of hours. Once here, the EOD would send a robot to examine the camera and assess it. Then they would either try to disrupt it or, more likely, carry out a controlled detonation of it.

There was no way the match would resume today. And the public relations damage to the city, on its most important match ever, would be immense.

‘Don’t you think mathematics is important, Papa?’ Bruno said, turning to him.

‘Mathematics?’

‘All these terrorist bombs.’ Bruno nodded solemnly. ‘They kill sometimes twenty people, sometimes one hundred and twenty. There are twenty-four thousand people killed every week on the roads of the world, in traffic accidents. But no one stops people from driving. There are thirty thousand people in this stadium today. So, if a bomb exploded, maybe one hundred would die. That’s a pretty small percentage, don’t you think?’

Roy Grace looked down at his son, curious that he knew all this data, and concerned by the matter-of-fact nature of his voice. ‘Bruno, I don’t consider one unlawful death to be acceptable and nor should you.’

He shrugged, saying nothing.

What exactly was Bruno trying to tell him? Was it his way of dealing with his fear of this new paradigm, the terrorist threat that blighted everyone’s lives these days?

Or was something else going on inside his head? A reluctance — or inability — to grasp reality?

‘How would you feel if your best friend was blown up, Bruno?’

‘Erik?’

Erik was his best friend back in Munich. The two of them played competitive online battle games against each other, most days.

‘Yes, Erik.’

‘Then I’d be the winner!’

Saturday 12 August

17.00–18.00

No one took any notice of the two men, wearing high-viz jackets over dungarees, pushing a wheelie bin across car park A. Out of immediate sight of the entrance gate, they halted beside a dark-green BMW and opened the rear door. Tipping the bin on its side, the lid opened and they pulled out a young man, roughly, bashing his head on the edge of the door.

He cried out in pain.

They clambered in either side of him, and the waiting driver accelerated away as fast as he dared without drawing attention.

One of them grabbed the boy’s phone and tossed it out of the window.

‘Hey!’ he yelled.

‘We don’t want to be tracked, asshole!’

‘What’s going on?’

‘Shut the fuck up,’ the other man in the rear growled, putting his hand on Mungo’s head and pushing him down, roughly, out of sight.

Scared of these aggressive strangers, Mungo did what he was told. He shut the fuck up.

Saturday 12 August

17.00–18.00

Roy Grace looked at Bruno, trying to fathom out his son’s thought process.

He glanced back at the camera, then at the glass-fronted Control Room at the far end of the pitch. Come on, come on, guys, when are you announcing the evacuation, for God’s sake?

Then the words of his training came back to him.

Think the unthinkable.

The unthinkable was a bomb detonating at the city’s first Premier League game.

He was thinking hard about the guy in the red baseball cap, who had been looking around nervously, then had hurried from the stand, leaving his camera behind.

Thinking about all he knew of terrorist bombs from his training and from the International Homicide Investigators Association conferences he had attended in the USA over the years, many of them covering in detail terrorist bombing atrocities. One thing that had stuck in his memory was that every bomb needed a detonator. It could be a timer that fired a spark that detonated the device. Or a text sent to a receiver that would detonate it. Or impact. Or a motion sensor.

He did a fast assessment. Looked at his watch. It was less than five minutes or so since the man had left his seat. That ruled out a motion sensor that would set the device off — if it was indeed a bomb. More likely a timer or a text detonator. But the perp would want to be well clear of the stadium grounds before it went off. At five minutes, he would not be, yet.

He made a snap decision.

One he knew might cost him dear. Maybe his career. Perhaps his life.

The words of the former Chief Constable rang in his ears.

Whilst everyone else is running away from danger, we’re the people who run towards it.

‘Stay here,’ he commanded Bruno.

He left his seat, clambered past the rest of the fans in their row, and down the aisle. For a second, he studied the camera on the seat along from the older man and the small boy.