Andy McNab - Zero hour

I was surrounded by display cabinets bursting with trophies, framed certificates and photographs of bigwigs handing them over, shots of social and sports events, class and year portraits. It got me thinking. I decided to have a closer look.

It took a few minutes, but it was worth it.

A group of students dressed like Victorians stood, bathed in sunshine, outside the building; a party maybe, or some kind of commemoration. Lilian was in three of the pictures. She was alone in one, poking her tongue out at the camera. In another she looked almost shy, alongside three or four other girls. It was the third that interested me. The lad she was with had eaten a few too many pies. He had a mop of fuzzy brown hair and bum-fluff on his chin. He and Lilian had their arms around each other. Their eyes were swivelled towards the camera and they seemed to be enjoying a very un-Victorian kiss.

I was about to move on to the next display when Anna rushed out of the office. 'We need to go.'

I kept scanning the photos. 'Hang on, look at-'

She grabbed me. 'Now, Nick. Now.'

Sweaterman was piling down the corridor towards us with a posse of six or seven very pissed-off mates.

'What the fuck's happening?'

The office clerk came to her door. She shouted and waved her arm to move us on.

'No questions.'

I started walking fast beside her. We went back the same way we'd come in, with Sweaterman's posse in hot pursuit.

Anna didn't turn a hair as we drove away. There was no need to flap. They hadn't jumped into vehicles and followed us. All we had to do was make some distance.

I watched in the wing mirror my side as we rumbled across a cobbled junction. Trams, buses, cars, carts – all tried to head in a dozen different directions at the same time. Once we were clear I glanced behind us.

'What the fuck was all that about?'

'They thought we were secret police.'

I turned back but kept an eye on the wing mirror. A dark blue Beamer with the new shark-eye headlights and low-rider sills was shadowing us, but keeping its distance. The front fairing made it look like a hovercraft. It was having a hard time with the cobbles and potholes.

'So teachers now stand up to the police round here, do they?'

'The people united will never be defeated. Haven't you heard?' She allowed herself a smile. 'Or, as they've been saying more recently, the people with Twitter will never be defeated.'

'Like the green revolution in Iran?'

'They had it here first. As soon as they heard the result, the students started tweeting, trying to mobilize opposition. There was also a rush on Facebook and videos on YouTube. Suddenly everybody knew what was going on. It gave them a sense of power. Something they'd never experienced before.

'The police wanted to get in there and grip everybody, of course. The first people to arrive for a rally outside the government buildings found their cell phones were dead. The network had been switched off. But somebody had Twitter, and they used it to give live updates over the GPRS networks. The authorities won that round, but it could be the beginning of the end of totalitarianism. It's fascinating, don't you think – what started as social networks becoming the tools of political change? I might do a piece on it-'

I cut in. 'Chuck a right.'

She didn't ask. She just did.

We turned onto a single-carriageway street lined with shops and apartment blocks. A group of cyclists, all women in black, wobbled over the cobbles in front of us. Anna had to slow down. She glanced in the rear-view. 'The BMW?'

I didn't turn round. I smiled and moved my hands as if telling her a funny story. 'He still with us? He's been back there a bit too long.'

She turned her head and smiled back. 'The registration is C VS 911. That's a Chisinau plate. Four men. Very short hair. Not smiling, not talking.'

I nodded as we eased past the women, still jabbering away with no awareness of the vehicles trying to get past in both directions. Anna changed up and we accelerated.

'Take the next right.'

The indicator clicked away. The Polo lurched across a pothole as we hit a small side road. I sat back and waited for Anna.

'They've come with us.'

'Any of them talking on a phone or radio?'

'No.'

'Good. They're not setting an ambush. As long as we keep moving we're OK for now. Every time we turn, see if they communicate.'

'Who do you think they are? Secret police? Uni security?'

'Did you get as far as mentioning Lilian's name in the office?'

'No. The woman was on the phone, face like thunder. She was probably getting the good news from the guy in the sweater.'

'Could it be the university warning us off, or trying to find out who we are? Might be police, I guess – maybe somebody saw me checking out Lilian's picture. They may be doing the same. Whatever, we need to bin them as fast as we can.'

'How am I going to do that? Are we going to drive around in circles until we run out of fuel?'

'Head back towards the hotel. Remember the supermarket across the road? Drive into the car park.'

We overtook an old guy with ladders roped to his bike as she worked her way back onto the main.

'They're with us.'

'Normal speed. Nothing we can do about them. We've got to concentrate on that lard-arse in the photo. We need to find out who he is. Maybe she's done a runner with him. It could be something as simple as that. Falling in love and all that sort of shit.'

'How are you going to go back and check that out, Nicholas?' She sounded annoyed. 'You going to disguise yourself as a normal human being or something?'

'Give Lena a call and tell her we're on our way.'

I pulled out her iPhone and dialled the number. She was waffling away in Russian as we approached the multi-storey.

'We want one on the ground floor if we can. In between a couple of parked cars.'

She drove under the height bar and into the gloom.

'There, to the right – straight in.'

Anna swung the wheel. The Beamer followed us in and rolled to a halt. They only had two options: back out, park up and come back on foot, or come past us looking for a space. They couldn't park close by because we'd have eyes-on. With luck, they'd have to carry on up to the next floor.

Anna slipped in between two minging old Skoda-type estate cars. The Beamer's tyres screeched on the painted concrete as it carried on up the ramp.

She turned off the engine and started to get out. I gripped her arm. 'Bring everything. This car's history. We're not coming back.'

We made for the pedestrian exit. There was no point checking behind. It was all about making distance and getting as many angles between us as we could.

We'd soon find out if they were following. I hoped not. There were a lot more of them than there were of us. And they were big fuckers.

17.05 hrs Irina sat behind the desk. Lena collated documents and pictures for her visit to the mother of the girl in Barcelona. She was still trying to trace her. The address they'd been given was wrong. I could barely see them. The women were all smoking their cigarettes like they were one step away from the firing squad.

Anna brought them up to speed. 'Nicholas heard rumours about one of the traffickers in London. His source said he was moving girls to the UK and had a contact at the university.'

'Contact?' Irina rested her hands on the mountain of box files in front of her. 'What is his name?'

I shrugged. 'I wasn't given his name, but I was shown his picture. There's a shot of him outside the faculty office.'

Lena was still gobbing off on her mobile.

'We got chased out before we could find his name.'

She didn't bat an eyelid. 'I'll go and have a look.'