Andy McNab - Crossfire

The red light went out. The two of them looked at each other.

I dropped my head.

Trainers laughed. 'You'll be more pissed off than that in a minute, boy.'

He moved behind me. The kick to the back of the chair was so hard I shot forward. My arse came right off the edge of the seat and dropped to the floor. The plasticuffs slid down the chair legs.

Sundance savoured the moment. 'Get on your knees and crawl to the board.'

I could hear them behind me, rocking the tabletop, playing with the straps.

'We're going to take you for a ride on this baby. But you should know, son, you're only getting a one-way ticket…'

My wrists strained against the metal. I closed my palms round the bottoms of the legs. I eased first one wrist free and then the other. I struggled to my knees.

'That's right, here, boy – walkies!'

I sprang to my feet and grabbed the seat of the chair. Swinging round, I squared up to them lion-tamer style, the chair positioned like a four-barrelled machine-gun.

Sundance's face hardened. 'Don't fuck about, son. You're only going to-'

It was his turn to be drowned out.

I yelled at the top of my voice and charged.

My shoulder sent Sundance flying. He lost his footing and tumbled over the waterboard.

Trainers' eyes widened as I hurtled him back against the wall. The tip of one of the legs dug into his stomach. He bellowed with pain and tried to grab it but I pushed as hard as I could.

His muscles couldn't resist any more. The skin gave suddenly, and the rough, rusty tip jumped forward six inches.

Sundance was struggling to his knees.

I let go of the chair. Trainers slid down the wall with the leg still embedded. His gaze was fixed on the entry wound. He looked puzzled.

I leant down and grabbed the wooden stool by one of its legs. The starship flew into the air as I swung the stool down hard on to the top of Sundance's skull. He dropped like I'd tasered him.

I clubbed him again, this time between the shoulders. The third blow smashed into the back of his neck.

His body convulsed like he was having a fit. Blood poured from his head. I brought it down again, crushing his temple. His hands jerked up momentarily, then dropped. He lay very still.

'Bastard! Bastard!' Trainers' cry was half scream, half groan.

He was slumped against the bottom of the wall like a drunk in a pool of piss. His legs were splayed and he'd kicked one of the buckets over. The chair leg still skewered him.

His eyes glazed as he gripped the leg but made no attempt to pull it out. Perhaps the rusty tip was acting like a barb.

I ran the three or four steps across to him and kicked into the seat where he'd had my bollocks just a few minutes before.

The leg jerked back into his stomach and wedged against something hard; his spine, maybe, or the wall. Fuck him. This one was for Magreb. Dark red, almost brown, deoxygenated blood oozed from his guts. I kicked again and again.

I stood over him for a second, my chest heaving. I knew I had to get moving, had to keep the initiative. But I also needed to stop, catch my breath and think. What was the plan? What the fuck was I going to do?

Get Dom, and get out.

Sundance stirred. He was coming round. I went back to him and brought the stool down once more on his head, then again to make sure he was going to be able to keep Trainers company.

I flipped him over and pulled off his fleece. I didn't feel the cold any more – adrenaline and fear had taken over – but I knew I'd need it soon. I pulled off his desert boots, unbuckled his belt and took off his jeans.

Trainers panted in the corner like a rabid dog. He was trying to suck air but his body didn't know how to any more. He'd lost too much blood. His eyes were empty.

I kicked the chair sideways and he slid slowly to the floor.

The hinges were on the right. The handle poked out of a hole drilled into a steel plate that covered the whole door. I put my ear to the metal but couldn't hear anybody on the other side.

I glanced back at the two bodies, then eased it open. Bright light poured in from the corridor. It was a couple of metres wide and fluorescent strip-lights dangled from nails and hooks on each wall. All the doors seemed to be steel-plated. Each had a spyhole, a foot-long bolt, and a puddle of water beneath it. There wasn't a sound.

To the right, about thirty metres away, the corridor led to what I assumed was the holding area.

I closed my door behind me and turned left. Sundance's laces dragged in the puddles. I made a mental note of which cell doors didn't have the bolts thrown. If Mr Sheen or one of his mates appeared, I'd need somewhere to hide.

After about ten metres I came to a pair of steel doors that were clearly newer than the building. I threw the bolts and pulled one open a couple of inches. The first thing I heard was a helicopter in a low hover.

I eased the door open some more, and stuck my head out. Sunlight blinded me. Two white GMC Suburbans were parked about fifteen metres away on the far side of a small compound. Beyond them was a pair of large, rickety gates set into a crumbling block wall.

Birds sang. I looked above me. There weren't any windows. It was a low-level industrial building. The paint was peeling and some of the concrete had crumbled away to reveal the rusty skeleton beneath.

I heard the beat of rotor blades and swung my head to the right. A Puma came into view about two hundred yards away, then disappeared behind the wall. As the engines wound down, I could see the top of a pole and a fluttering flag. I couldn't make out the country, but I'd already seen enough.

We were in ISAFland. Which meant we were comprehensively fucked.

I rebolted the door and moved back along the corridor, checking the spyholes left and right.

The first cell held an Arab in an orange jumpsuit. He'd only been given a blanket and a plastic bucket to piss in. A fluorescent light burned brightly in the ceiling. He sat cross-legged, reading the Koran.

In the cell opposite was a Pakistani lad. He was naked. Burn marks on his back had turned to weeping sores. His beard was long and ragged. He sobbed as he crouched on his haunches in a pool of his own shit.

The next few cells told much the same story. Some prisoners were naked, some clothed. Some had blankets, some lay shivering. One was chained to the wall by his ankles. Most were cut, swollen and scarred. Different strokes for different folks. The Serbs knew exactly what they were doing.

I didn't feel anything for any of the prisoners. They might have been caught planning to bomb the shit out of London, or have killed and maimed young squaddies out here or in Iraq. If some were innocent, that was tough. I couldn't save the world. I wasn't doing that well trying to save one man.

I carried on past the waterboarding room to where the corridor went off to the right. There were five or six doorways each side. I could hear voices coming from the second cell on the left. The door was ajar. A power lead ran through it from a socket in the corridor. A phone cable headed the other way towards another starship lying outside the last door on the right.

I moved very slowly, my shoulder skimming the wall. I'd come to the right place. As I got closer, the smell of lemon became more powerful. I lowered myself to my knees, then flat on my stomach. I inched my head towards the gap between door and frame.

It looked like the crew room. Two empty sleeping-bags lay on US Army cots. A TV and DVD combo sat on a chair in the corner. The voices came from badly dubbed porn. Beside it, against the wall, was a trestle table upon which two pistols lay in leather holsters, the kind you clipped under the waistband of your trousers. They were Sigs; I could tell by the grips. There was a pile of spare mags. Two mobile phones were plugged into rechargers connected to the extension lead. Brew kit and US Army MREs (meals ready to eat) sat next to a kettle and a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniel's.