Tim Stevens - Delivering Caliban

The back door , Purkiss thought. None of them would be coming in there because they’d risk getting hit by friendly fire from the front.

He shouted at the others but the cacophony was too great. Grabbing the shotgun he crawled on his elbows towards the doorway. On the way there he saw the oxygen cylinder, half-hidden under Crosby’s body behind the sofa.

He slid across on his belly and grasped the ring at the top of the cylinder and dragged it free, Crosby collapsing hard on to the floor. Purkiss heaved both cylinder and shotgun through the doorway and sat with his back against the frame. The gunfire was coming in five-second bursts now, one gun keeping the momentum going while the others were reloaded.

Into the relative quiet Purkiss shouted, ‘Kendrick.’

Kendrick looked round, disorientated, saw Purkiss at the door.

Purkiss tapped the oxygen cylinder.

Kendrick stared for a second, then nodded once, getting it. Purkiss stood, lifted the shotgun in one hand and hoisted the cylinder across his other shoulder, and ran.

The back door, ruined by the blast from the shotgun, gave way to a kick. A scrubby back yard was bordered by the high forest. He stepped over the body of the man he’d hit with the Remington earlier ran close to the wall, following it to the right of the door. At the corner, a narrow concrete path ran along one side of the house to the front.

Purkiss reached the front corner and, keeping low, risked a glance round. Across the scrap of lawn the remaining three men were clustered between their Range Rover and the front of the house. They were spread out and advancing unhurriedly, each holding an assault rifle. Armalites of some variety.

Purkiss gauged the distance. Ten yards. Perhaps twelve. He gripped the oxygen cylinder by the ring, hefting it. Because of the angle he would have to use his left arm, his weaker one.

He waited until all three of the uninjured men had reloaded and stood spread out before the cabin, one kneeling and two erect, firing again in what was clearly meant as a final, punishing assault. Then he stepped slightly beyond the corner of the building and swung his left arm up and over his head.

The oxygen cylinder spun almost in slow motion, describing a high parabola and dropping just as one of the men spotted Purkiss at the corner and yelled, bringing the spewing end of his rifle to bear. Before the seam of fire could stitch its way across the corner of the cabin the cylinder landed in front of the guns.

Purkiss heard the chink of bullets against its side and actually heard it hit the ground a split-second before it exploded, the sucking whoosh propelling fragments of its casing outwards like a starburst, one whipping into the timber above his head. A sheet of flame surged and dwindled as suddenly and the screams began, terrible even to Purkiss’s ears. He’d dodged back to avoid the shrapnel but glanced back and saw one man on his back on the ground, clawing at the dancing sprites of fire eating away his chest and belly and nipping at his hair; another man stumbling aside, his rifle still gripped in one fist, his other arm brushing in confusion across his eyes. The fourth one had landed on his belly on the lawn and kept his wits about him and was crawling forward like a commando, grasping his weapon.

Along the front of the cabin from Purkiss, he saw Kendrick lean across the sill of the shattered front window and take aim with his rifle. The stumbling man had orientated himself once more and raised his rifle. Kendrick loosed off two shots, hitting the stumbling man in the chest and knocking him off his feet, and the screaming burning man on the ground who convulsed and then stopped his shrieks. Kendrick ducked out of sight as the crawling man on the lawn pointed his rifle upwards at the window. As Purkiss stepped out the man swung the gun to aim at Purkiss. Purkiss racked the shotgun and fired, but he was too far away for a clear shot and was already diving back behind the corner as the muzzle of the rifle erupted again.

Pressed against the wall, Purkiss counted the seconds: on three he’d swing round again and use the shotgun. Into the silence he heard Kendrick’s voice. ‘Purkiss? You okay?’

He’s coming out the front door , thought Purkiss. He thinks I hit the crawling man.

‘Stay back,’ yelled Purkiss, and stepped back past the corner, levelling the shotgun.

Kendrick was staring at him, halfway through the doorway. Behind him, below the front window, the crawling man had the rifle aimed.

Kendrick saw Purkiss’s eyes and began to turn. It was too late.

The shots came, two, three, and Purkiss almost closed his eyes against the scream.

Kendrick had turned and dropped to one knee. Past him, the crawling man sprawled, blood gouting from his chest. Nakamura leaned through the front window, his Glock still trained on the man.

For a full six seconds nobody moved, the tableau frozen in the sudden silence.

Sussex County, New Jersey

Monday 20 May, 9.20 pm

‘We call it in.’

‘We don’t.’

The argument had been raging between the two agents for ten minutes. The four of them were roving about the property, Purkiss and Kendrick in silence. There was nothing useful among any of Crosby’s possessions, nothing by way of identification on any of the dead attackers.

It was time to go.

Berg and Nakamura stood facing off like a bickering couple.

‘I could pull rank here, Danny.’

‘We’re way out of line,’ said Nakamura. ‘We’re acting without authority. Rank doesn’t come into it.’

Berg pulled out her mobile phone. Nakamura took a step closer.

‘Berg, god damn it — ’

‘I’m calling it in anonymously, okay?’ she snapped. Nakamura raised his hands in a whatever gesture.

Purkiss walked down to the Taurus and gave it a once over. No bullet holes, and the tyres looked intact.

As Kendrick approached Purkiss saw his hands were shaking a little. He said, ‘You okay?’

‘Yeah. Christ, it hits you, doesn’t it? Afterwards.’

In the car, Nakamura at the wheel once more, Kendrick said, ‘Kind of liked your shooting back there.’

‘Huh.’ But Nakamura looked pleased.

Nakamura took the driveway quickly and turned on to the hillside road, heading back the way they’d come. It was an isolated location but not so remote that the noise wouldn’t have attratced attention. The emergency vehicles began to flash past them after five minutes.

Purkiss said, ‘We need access to your database again. As soon as possible.’

*

They found access at a diner in the first small town they reached on the way back towards New York. It had a light evening crowd, mainly student types.

Berg approached the owner, a surly man in his sixties, and held her shield high, speaking a few quick words. Within minutes the rest of the patrons had been cleared out. They muttered angrily but looked fascinated at the same time. Purkiss and the others looked a mess. Dust and wood splinters coated their hair and their clothes. Perversely, Purkiss looked the most presentable of all of them; Nakamura had found a sweater in the boot of his car which Purkiss put on to replace his jacket, which was streaked with Crosby’s blood. The sweater was both too short and too wide for him

The two waitresses had hung up their aprons and were on their way out. The owner turned the CLOSED sign outwards and locked the door. He said, ‘Help yourself to coffee.’

‘Thanks,’ said Berg. ‘You’ll be reimbursed.’

He disappeared into a back room. Berg opened her laptop on one of the tables near the back, where they could all view it. She used the code the owner had given her to get into the diner’s WiFi network and accessed the database within a minute.