Stephen Leather: Nightshade

‘Wait here,’ said the sergeant, then he raised both hands above his head. ‘Would you all please move down the road!’ he shouted. ‘I need you to all move well away from the school, now!’ No one moved and the sergeant wished that he could what they did in the movies and fire his gun into the air, but he knew that would be the quickest way off the force. He took a deep breath and shouted at the top of his voice. ‘Everybody move down the road now!’ he yelled. ‘There’s a man in there with a gun and you’re all at risk.’

A second ARV arrived and squealed to a halt. The teachers started herding the children down the road. The sergeant turned to the teacher next to him. ‘You’re sure it was a shotgun?’

The teacher nodded. An armed policeman ran over from the newly arrived ARV. He was Ricky Gray, a relative newcomer to the unit but an excellent shot and unflappable under pressure. He nodded at Rawlings.

‘Any idea how many shots have been fired?’ Rawlings asked the teacher.

‘Five. Six maybe.’

‘Was it a double-barrelled shotgun or a pump action?’ asked Rawlings.

The teacher frowned. ‘I’m not sure.’

‘Did it have two barrels? Or did it just have one?’

The teacher nodded. ‘Two.’

The two ARV drivers hurried over to Rawlings. The driver of Rawlings’ car was holding two carbines and he handed one to Rawlings. His name was Vic Rhodes and he’d worked with Rawlings for more than five years.

Four was the minimum for an emergency entry but Rawlings would have been happier with six. As if a fairy godmother was granting him wishes, a third ARV came roaring down the road.

‘And what does he look like?’ Rawlings asked the teacher.

‘Like a farmer. Waterproof coat and green Wellington boots.’

‘How old?’

‘Forty. Fifty maybe. I didn’t hang around to get a good look.’

Rawlings patted Rhodes on the shoulder. ‘Call in a sit-rep, Vic,’ he said, then jogged over to the car. Sergeant Tom Chisholm climbed out of the front passenger seat and nodded at Rawlings. Though he was the same rank as Rawlings he had more experience and he naturally assumed the role of Op Com — operational commander.

‘There’s another car on the way,’ said Chisholm. He nodded at the school building. ‘Heard anything?’

‘Five shots. Maybe six. There’s one casualty in the playground.’ Rawlings pointed at the body of the deputy headmaster.

A shot rang out from the school and the policemen flinched. ‘Make that seven,’ said the officer who was accompanying Chisholm, twenty-two-year-old Neil Sampson.

‘Okay, we’re going straight in,’ said Chisholm. ‘There are kids at risk, I’m not waiting for a senior officer.’

A police van was heading towards them. Sampson handed Chisholm his G36. ‘Let’s get in there,’ said Chisholm. ‘If there’s a bloody inspector on that bus we’ll be out here all day.’

The six men ran towards the school entrance, cradling their carbines.

As the armed policemen raced across the playground to the main school building, McBride was walking down the corridor towards the school’s gymnasium. In the classroom behind him was another dead girl, shot at point blank range while the rest of the pupils screamed in terror. The double doors leading to the gym were panelled with glass and McBride could see a balding teacher in a dark blue tracksuit peering at him, his hands shading his eyes.

McBride raised his shotgun and the teacher turned and ran away from the doors. McBride stopped, took a long, deep breath, exhaled slowly, and pushed the doors open. Several of the children screamed but most of them just stared at him open-mouthed. The teacher pushed his way through the children to a fire exit. He pushed the metal bar that opened the door and shouted for the pupils to get out.

McBride swept his shotgun from side to side, then settled on a dark-haired boy with girlish features who was standing with his hands over his eyes, peering through his splayed fingers. McBride stepped forward with his left leg, raised the butt to his shoulder, braced himself for the recoil and pulled the trigger. The boy’s white T-shirt burst into a vivid crimson and he fell backwards, his hands still over his face.

Sergeant Chisholm flinched at the gunshot. He turned to look at Rawlings, who was to his left. Chisholm grimaced and pointed straight ahead. They were moving down the corridor, checking the classrooms one by one and making sure that they were clear. They had found two dead girls in a room on the right of the corridor, and another dead girl in a room to the left. They were just about to move into the next room on the left and through the open door they could already see a dead boy sprawled on the floor.

Normal procedure would be to continue checking the rooms as they moved down the corridor, but there was only one gunman and the shot had come from immediately ahead of where they were. The gymnasium. Chisholm pointed straight ahead and Rawlings was already moving. They ran quickly, followed by their four colleagues, guns at the ready.

Their footfalls echoed off the tiled walls as they ran at full pelt but they were still twenty metres from the gymnasium doors when they heard the second shot.

The teacher was screaming at the children to get out, standing with his back to McBride with his arms outstretched to the side as if he could shield them with his body. The second boy that McBride had shot in the gym lay twitching on the floor under a basketball hoop. The boy was missing most of his head and the chest was a bloody mess but the legs continued to beat a tattoo on the wooden floor and his right hand was trembling.

‘Out, come on, get a move on!’ shouted the teacher. The pupils didn’t need any urging — they were all terrified, and pushed and shoved as they forced their way through the fire exit.

McBride calmly ejected the two spent cartridges and slotted in two fresh ones. His eyes were stinging from the cordite and his ears were ringing.

He walked over to a wall and slowly sat down. He used his left foot to prise the Wellington boot off his right.

He looked over at the fire exit. Most of the children were gone. The teacher was still standing with his arms outstretched, urging on the stragglers.

The doors to the gymnasium burst open and two men with black carbines appeared, crouching low and swinging their weapons around. One moved to the left and the other to the right, then two more stepped through the doors. All four were dressed in black, with Kevlar body armour and black ceramic helmets.

‘Put down the gun or we will shoot!’ shouted Chisholm. All four officers had their weapons aimed at McBride. Two more armed officers appeared and all six men fanned out across the gym, their guns trained on McBride’s chest.

‘It’s all right, boys, there’s no need for that,’ said McBride.

‘Put the gun down!’ yelled the sergeant at the top of his voice. His finger tightened on the trigger of his carbine.

In one smooth motion McBride swung the shotgun around and propped the stock on the floor. He lifted his right foot and slipped his big toe onto the trigger.

Sergeant Chisholm realised what the man was about to do. He lowered his carbine and began to move forward but he had only taken two steps when the shotgun exploded and the man’s head disappeared in a shower of blood and brains that splattered across the climbing bars. The sound was deafening in the combined space and the sergeant’s ears were ringing.

Neil Sampson groaned and then threw up, bending double as his chest heaved and vomit splattered over the polished wooden floor.