Ryan, Chris - Zero 22

The guy had apparatus spread out on the thin hotel carpet in front of him. Orange blocks of plastic explosive. A detonator. A coil of thin cable. A small battery pack. A knife. Several transparent bags of nails. A needle and thread. And a baseball jacket, a few sizes too big for him. It had white arms and a black body and, on the back, a cheerful picture of Donald Duck and his cheeky nephews. As the man in the grey T-shirt watched, he turned the baseball jacket over and started to cut neatly into the lining.

‘You know what you’re doing, brother?’ the man in the grey T-shirt said. He took pains to disguise his American accent.

The man on the floor didn’t look up. But he nodded as he reached for one of the packets of plastic explosive. ‘I have done it many times before,’ he said, before adding, more quietly: ‘But never for myself.’

‘You’ll be a martyr,’ said the man in the grey T-shirt. ‘Inshallah, people will say your name for a hundred years.’

‘My rewards will not be in this world,’ said the man on the floor. ‘They will be in the next.’

‘Your place in paradise is assured,’ said the man in the grey T-shirt. He watched him for a moment, then quietly left the room. He walked along the corridor towards one of the men standing watch.

‘Is he doing it?’ said the man quietly.

‘You bet,’ said the man in the grey T-shirt. No need to drop his American accent now.

‘You think he suspects?’

‘He thinks we’re his best buddies. It’s like he’s blind to everything except . . . you know, the thing .’

‘The thing ?’ His companion was clearly amused by the euphemism. ‘He shaved his body yet?’

‘Just his face.’

‘He’ll shave his body. Tonight probably. Ritual thing, you know? Chest, arms, legs.’ His companion pointed to his groin to indicate another area that would be shaved. ‘So you’re in for a treat, watching him do all that.’

‘We could always swap.’

‘Not a chance, my friend.’

They stood in silence for a moment.

‘This is a crummy hotel.’

‘I’ve seen worse.’

‘Oh yeah?’

‘Sure. But it doesn’t matter. We’ll be out of here tonight. Nine fifteen tonight, we’ll have earned ourselves enough dough to get the presidential suite in the Grand Hyatt.’

‘I guess. Going to be quite the firework display, huh?’

‘Couple of extra bangs. That’s what the tourists come for, right? Bangs.’

‘Right.’ A beat. ‘I’d better get back to him.’

‘Sure. Bit of luck he’ll be getting lathered up already. Allahu Akbar, huh?’

‘Yeah. Allahu frickin’ Akbar.’

The man left his companion and walked back down the corridor towards Room 297. He stopped just outside it and drew a deep breath. Put himself back into character. The white jihadist. Sympathetic to the bomber’s cause. His friend. His brother.

He touched his key card to the sensor and re-entered the room. His ‘brother’ was packing plastic explosives into the baseball jacket. He stood and watched.

07.00 hrs. It was a bright, sunny morning but Danny felt anything but. His body ached with tiredness. He realised he was losing track of the days, as well as running out of time. The hit could happen in a matter of hours, and they were still on the wrong side of the Atlantic.

The C-17 was on the ground. Surrounded by vehicles. Engineers called to each other across the tarmac, checking the landing gear, moving up and down the open tailgate. Nobody paid Danny, Bethany or the General much attention as they made their way up into the dimly lit aircraft. ‘Home from home,’ Bethany said, looking around at the interior which was just as stark and utilitarian as the Hercules they’d used for their insertion into Jordan. There was a triple line of uncomfortable-looking seating up front, and a number of hammocks fixed to the sides. A few wooden storage crates. Danny didn’t know what they contained. Otherwise, this personnel carrier was close to empty.

‘Don’t get too comfortable,’ Danny said. ‘An insertion into water is a little different.’

‘How so?’

Danny was about to explain when he saw four figures in Crye Precision camo gear walking up the tailgate, slightly silhouetted by the morning light outside. Their clothes, and the huge waterproof bags they were lugging, told Danny that these were the SBS guys who’d be accompanying them. He left Bethany and the General and strode forwards to meet them. As he drew closer, he recognised one of the guys: Damien Parker had been on a few training exercises with Danny in the past. He had a ruddy face and looked a hell of a sight younger than he was, but he was a good man. Danny held out his hand. ‘How you doing, mate?’

‘Fucking busy times, Danny,’ Parker said. He introduced the rest of his team: Alex Lewis, Rob Emerson, Dave Gordon. Danny shook hands with each of them in turn. ‘Did you come straight from the office?’ Emerson asked, indicating Danny’s suit.

‘Something like that,’ Danny said.

Parker peered into the aircraft. ‘I don’t want to know what you’re up to,’ he said, ‘but do you mind if I do the briefing once we’re up and running?’

‘We’re in your hands getting into the water and on to the ship,’ Danny said. ‘However you want to play it.’

‘Let’s get up in the air first,’ Parker said.

Danny led them back up into the body of the C-17. Once they were inside, he could tell that the SBS guys recognised the General’s face, even if they couldn’t quite identify him. But they said nothing about it. Their gazes lingered on Bethany. It wasn’t often that someone as beautiful as her found their way on to a mission like this. Their appreciation went unremarked upon, however. They were too professional for that.

A loadie approached them. ‘We’ll be refuelling twice in mid-air,’ he told them. ‘Once over UK airspace, once mid-Atlantic. Wheels up when you’re ready.’

‘Have you jumped before?’ Parker asked Bethany and the General. They nodded

‘So here’s what you need to know about landing in water.’ Parker pointed at Lewis, Emerson and Gordon. ‘These three guys are going to jump first, Lewis and Emerson in tandem, Gordon solo. I’ll be in tandem with you.’ He indicated the General. ‘We’ll follow Lewis and Emerson. Danny and the lady will follow Gordon. We get into any kind of trouble, they’ll be waiting for us in the water to help out. We’ll be jumping from about fourteen thousand feet, and we’ll cut away our chutes when our feet hit the water. You need to expect to go straight under the water. We’re expecting the sea state to be calm, but don’t let that fool you. The water will be cold and your natural instinct will be to breathe in. Unless you want a lungful of salt water, and you don’t, you need to clamp your mouth shut and concentrate hard on not inhaling. You’ll be wearing a life vest. As soon as you’re submerged, you need to inflate it. It should bring you to the surface in a few seconds. Once we’re above the water, Lewis and Emerson will help us unclip our tandem harnesses. We’ll then wait in the water until a RIB from the frigate picks us up. Bit of luck, it’ll only be a couple of minutes, but it might be longer. The most important thing is that you keep away from the cut-away chutes and avoid getting tangled in the lines. Is that all clear?’

Bethany and the General nodded again.

Parker pointed at one of the waterproof bags they’d brought aboard. ‘We have the dry suits and rigs here. We’ll get changed when we’re about an hour out. Questions?’

There were none. They all strapped themselves in for take-off. As the C-17 accelerated along the runway, Danny realised that for the first time in days he felt a sense of calm. There was something reassuring about being in transit. Here, in the belly of an RAF flight, surrounded by military personnel, he could be sure of one thing: for a few hours at least, nobody would be trying to kill him. That thought made him glance at Bethany. They were separated by a couple of empty seats. She was sitting upright, staring straight ahead. She displayed no emotion. Danny couldn’t read her. He wondered if she seemed even more brittle than usual. He felt a moment of respect for her. She’d pushed on through this mission and kept her head. Very few people could manage that. He felt a pang of guilt for what was to come.