Dying Wishes

By Steve Goldsack

Featuring SAS troopers, Russian mobsters and beautiful but vulnerable women, Dying Wishes takes us from the mountains of Afghanistan to the mean streets of London. Tom must forgo his grief to fulfil his best friends dying wish, to re-unite his family. With devastating news of his own and no clue where to start he returns to Britain, determined not to fail what could be his final mission.

Saffron is a smart, beautiful woman who has made the worst mistake of her life, Vitaly. He is a sociopath and murderer, as well as a cunning charmer, who allows no one to escape his vice like grip. She may have managed to run but can she stay safe? With his seemingly trusted henchman Yuri, hot on her heels, she will have to move heaven and earth to survive, with her own safety no longer her main concern.

Whilst meeting up with old friends and making new surprising connections, Tom searches for Saffron using contacts from the world of espionage and skills better suited to dealing with terrorists. He is prepared to go to any lengths to protect her, even as low as his hated enemies if need be.

This adventure takes Tom into the dark underbelly of London’s Soho, into the midst of a world inhabited by Russian and Chinese gangsters, prostitutes and drug dealers. A world where he must negotiate the unknown hazards, whilst his physical prowess diminishes rapidly. Tom is not alone, Ricky, his new sidekick, will prove as surprising as he is helpful in more ways than one.

This is an all-out helter-skelter ride, where personal safety becomes irrelevant in the bid to grant more than just one man’s Dying Wish.

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Steve Goldsack
• Release date: Mar 6, 2012
• ISBN: 9781466099876

Steve Goldsack

I am a South Londoner, now living in idyllic Kent. I am a father to three amazing kids and husband to a loving, beautiful wife. I have been writing since I was 7 years old and through a strange set of circumstances have found myself with the time to finally publish one of my works, there will be a follow up to this story so keep them peeled for new stuff in the near future.

Book preview

Chapter One

Join the Army and see the world, the ad had said back then. See the arse end of the world thought Tom, as he sat listening to his sergeant going over some operational detail for one of the other teams. He was sitting in a thrown together shack in a quiet corner of an operational base that he couldn’t remember the name of, in the arse end of Helmand province Afghanistan. He had been to some shitty places in his career, from the gloomy streets of the province as a Para, to the sweaty jungles of Thailand and South America, but this was his worst one by far. It was hot and cold in equal measure, there was dust in everything, especially food and drinks and the locals were the most inhospitable he had encountered, even having little kids from the Falls Road throwing stones at him was preferable to these bastards.

Apparently, this hadn’t always been the case. Back in 2001 when the British had first arrived in Helmand, the locals had blessed them as saviours from the fundamentalist Taliban regime; they gave out presents and welcomed the soldiers into their homes for tea, a great honour for anyone in this country.

Slowly over years of constant fighting, bullying by Taliban insurgents, and accidental killings by allied troops, the tide had turned. They were now pariahs, no longer welcome in any of the small villages around the region. Tom had only been on the ground a few days, and that was long enough, as far as he was concerned. But a couple of the guys from 6 troop had been here a month and had nothing good to say about anything, they were well known whingers but he had to admit he couldn’t fault anything they had said, yet.

His attention flitted back to the orders being handed out. They had not gotten to him yet, Jules looked thoroughly bored. The heat in the room was unbearable in isolation, but with twenty-four men, all sweating and breathing at once it ramped things up to a whole new level of discomfort. Yes, they’d been trained to handle all temperatures and environments, but that was on operations and it didn’t stand you in good stead for briefings in the middle of a fucking desert.

The talk finally came around to Tom and Jules’s mission. They listened as they wrote down the relevant details. They were to be dropped in the mountains near a small village, which didn’t have a name it was so insignificant, where they were to get eyes on some likely characters, spotted by ISAF, the International Security Assistance Force, the name for the UN’s operations in Afghanistan.

There was a constant stream of intelligence, known informally as intel, and images that were beamed in to ISAF, by drones that flew over the whole of the country, searching for signs that would give away anything of value, from a military standpoint. The mission was to be self-contained and would be covert, radio contact would only be permitted once a day, at eleven fifteen and any orders would be conveyed by encoded signal at that time.

They looked at each other, no need to speak to convey the arse ache this kind of job usually turned out to be. Hours of lying in some cold hole in the ground, to find out that one of the locals knew a cousin of someone who had once been the driver of Osama Bin Laden’s best mate.

Intel was nearly always shit, and they were well and truly bored of never getting anything of value from the targets they were sent to spy on. As they finished the meeting with a general pep talk from the operational commander, Colonel Graves, a short stocky man who would have looked at home in the front row of one of the regimental rugby teams, all bent nose and wonky teeth, he emphasised the need for success in the intelligence war. The words were delivered in his plum in the mouth style, his posh accent belying his private school education. The end of his speech was a rousing call to arms, that wouldn’t have been out of place at Rorke’s Drift, it didn’t get quite the response he was hoping for but it did raise a cynical smile from the career soldiers, who had been in enough of these briefings to recognise an officer on his way up, doing his best to get noticed by Top Brass.

The rest of the day was set aside for getting the necessary kit together, rations had to be drawn and weapons checked and double checked, munitions loaded into bergens along with the specialist listening equipment and most important, the satellite phone that was their link to the Head Shed, the operational headquarters back at base.

Once done, they met in the mess for some warm brown stuff that was nominally called a chilli, to talk about anything, but their respective jobs. This wasn’t new or exciting to these guys and there were plenty of more interesting things to discuss, like who was shagging who, where the other lads were working, and by others they meant ex colleagues. There was always news of guys who had left the regiment and were now working on the circuit, how much they were earning these days, how piss easy they had things, and wouldn’t it be better to leave the regiment and join them. It was all talk, no one really settled down into civvy life after being in the regiment. The buzz wasn’t replaceable with bodyguard duty for some rich Saudi prince or a celebrity, even the work in places like Kabul or Baghdad wasn’t as exciting as it sounded.

Tom was now 29 and had been a soldier for thirteen years. On joining the SAS he was one of the youngest troopers in the regiment, but he had earned his place the hard way. He had been a bit of a beanpole when he joined the Army straight from school, tall at 6’3" but apart from broad shoulders, which made him look like he had a coat hanger in his jacket, he was nothing to look at. His hair was neatly shorn in his usual style, he couldn’t remember ever having hair as a kid, his mum shaved it to the bone every two weeks to avoid nits, then as he got older, he just kept it up because it was tidy and low maintenance. When he did finally grow it, he had to look less military when he worked in the Province, it was a light brown colour, which Jules described as dog shit brown. He had an open honest face, a bit flat nosed but not ugly, just easily forgettable which came in very handy working undercover.

The years of rigorous training had added significant bulk to his long frame and he was a fine figure of a man, especially with his shirt off. They called him the Plonker Adonis back in Hereford, and he took it with good grace, even though he’d had to look up what Adonis meant.

Four years in the regular Army serving in the Royal Anglian’s as a rifleman, where he worked his way up to lance corporal, were followed by another four in the Parachute regiment. P selection had been tough; his best mate from his old regiment had to be invalided out, due to an accident while training. Tom had scraped through though, and was as proud as punch to wear the red beret. He thought at the time he’d reached his pinnacle as a Lance Corporal, he didn’t envisage climbing much higher in the ranks and Para’s were the bee’s knees of the British Army, or so he thought.

He was on duty in Crossmaglen, a small town on the borders of Northern Ireland when he first met Welsh Dave, a scrawny, odd-looking guy who was in and out of the compound at irregular hours. He had terrible dress sense, his ginger hair was always a mess and he looked more like the enemy than the enemy did, if that was even possible. As it turned out, this was exactly the look he was going for. He was on secondment to the Para’s for some intel stuff, and his full time job was an SAS trooper with the Detachment, a covert operations team tasked with hunting out and destroying the Paramilitary organisations, who were targeting British interests both on the Sceptred Isle and the mainland.

At first, Dave had been aloof, not really saying much to the rank and file guys. However, as he stayed longer, he became one of the regulars in the NAAFI bar, which was really just a table with some optics and a small fridge in the main hall. When sober, he would be quite reserved, but after a skin full of scotch, he would begin to regale the lads with tales of the infamous SAS, or the regiment, as it was known by service men, except those in the RAF who had their own regiment, which wasn’t anywhere near as impressive.

To Tom, this sounded brilliant, the tales of derring do, allied to raucous stories of risky japes pulled out on training exercises was all he needed to hear, where he was sure he had reached the top of the tree before, now, he was aware there was a penthouse suite as it were, and the SAS were now his new target. He did his homework, grilled Dave for all he was worth about selection and stuff, then set out on the path to ultimate glory. He had to interrupt the training for a short while due to his mother dying, but this spurred him on even harder. After twelve months of hard graft, constant fitness training and stamina work, he was allowed to enter selection, an almost mythical test of soldiering, that few passed and those that did, did so very rarely on their first attempt. Tom had been one of only six guys on his set to get the sand coloured beret. Forty had started out, many of them fellow Para’s, some marines and even the odd regular Army soldier. The six that finished were three Para’s, a signaller and two Royal Marines. He had never felt as proud as he did the day of his confirmation into the ranks of the Special Air Service.

Now, five years later, he had managed to get back up to lance corporal in rank and had been around the world a couple of times, spending time in Asia, South and North America, and even some time in Australia and New Zealand. The work wasn’t easy, but it was rewarding, and knowing you were the envy of almost every professional soldier out there was a good feeling. The downside was the shitty jobs you were given, always in the most ludicrously inhospitable places, icy tundra, hot deserts and sweltering jungle. There never seemed to be a nice temperate climate, where you could wear your old-fashioned BDUs, and feel comfortable for a while. SAS soldiering wasn’t all that he had imagined. The guys who had brought the unit to public recognition in the Iranian Embassy siege had been lucky, in so far as they had been on a real high profile mission with the attention of the world, this was the stuff of legends for them, the rest of the time it was gruelling work in God awful places for little or no thanks at all.

As they finished their meal and put their plates on the shelf for the catering staff to clean, they said their farewells, no emphasis was put on the dangers they each might be facing. This was work and as such, just a regular day with regular goodbyes, a snide comment here, a boasting retort there, not so much machismo as banter from guys focused on their own task at hand.

Tom and Jules went through a couple of things before turning in. A hammock slung under a mossy net a few feet apart was the best they could manage for a bed. As the bugs chirruped in the darkness, Jules looked across at Tom, trying to see through the poor light and opaque netting if he was awake still.

Mate you still there? Tom you up mate? he spoke quietly so as to not disturb anyone outside of their little corner of the compound, although the other guys were still rattling around, sorting stuff or just chatting over a fag and brew before they turned in.

Yeah mate still here, can’t sleep for these fucking insects banging on about shit to each other, what’s up, you got pre mission nerves again? Am I gonna have to give you one of the Guvnor’s pep talks?

There was a slightly sarcastic tone that Jules recognised, but he was in the mood for some serious talking and brushed past the attempt at banter.

Nothing so simple mate. I’ve been talking to Ellen recently, and before you say anything she called me, I was as surprised as you to hear from her.

Tom snorted at this and was about to speak.

Anyway, she called me just before we rotated out of Hereford. She’s back in Yorkshire now, the wanker she left with has gone and she needed to speak to me, I couldn’t very well tell her to fuck off, could I?

Yes, you fucking could mate, and that’s what you should have done. That lowlife slapper isn’t worth your fucking time. What’d she want; some fucking money I suppose?

Jules took a short breath. He was prepared for this response and had wondered how he would get Tom to listen without continuous interruptions.

Listen mate, this is important, I know what a cow she was to me. After all, it was me who kicked her out, but she wasn’t asking for anything, not for herself anyway, she was looking for Saffy.

Tom rolled onto his side to look at Jules.

What’s up with Saffy? She was fine last time we spoke, enjoying her course and stuff, living the high life of a student from what she said. Didn’t have a good word to say about her mother either, I might add.

Jules was getting impatient with Tom, he wanted to say his piece, but knew if he was going to get Tom on board he would have to let him have his say.

Listen mate, it’s not as simple as that, she says that they haven’t spoken in months, literally six months, and when she tried to get her at her digs they said she’d moved out, left the uni altogether, when she rang the pastoral people they confirmed she had gone.

Tom had shut up now as his interest was piqued.

They couldn’t explain it either, she was ahead of the game academically, she hadn’t even left an explanation, Ellen is really worried about her.

Jules was concerned to, Tom could hear it in his voice but he was trying not to let it show. Tom thought back, it had been even longer since he had spoken to her himself.

I wouldn’t worry mate, she’s a smart kid, maybe she just had enough and wanted to do a gap year or something, and why would she tell her mum, they don’t exactly have daily chats since she fucked you over, so it’s not a surprise she isn’t filling her in on anything and everything.

He was speaking to Jules but trying to convince himself at the same time, I reckon she’s probably let herself into your place back in town, we’ll get someone to pop in and check while we’re out here, yeah?

Tom hoped he was right, he felt terrible it hadn’t occurred to him to call her. Saffron had always been a wilful girl and upping sticks and leaving her university because she felt like it was just like her.

Yeah, I’m sure you’re right mate, but I’m worried about her. She took the whole break up really hard and she don’t have anything to do with Ellen anymore. I can’t let this just go Tom, they are all they’ve got if anything happens to me. I need them to be there for each other, I need a favour mate, you can say no if you like, but it would mean a lot to me.

He paused to ensure there was no ambiguity about his words; he had Tom’s full attention.

I want you to talk to Saffy for me, she loves you and listens to you like a big brother, you don’t have to give her a load of flannel about her mum. I know how you feel, but just point out what’s going on, we could bite it anytime and they need to be back together so I don’t have to worry about them both separately, just try for me mate, it would really be doing me a huge one, what do you say mate? Tom?

Tom groaned theatrically and rolled back onto his back, the hammock swinging wildly as he moved. He deliberately left Jules waiting, as he went through the idea in his head, he wasn’t just Ellen's biggest critic, he fucking hated her, although they had been best of friends before she screwed Jules over. How was he going to be able to speak to Saffron, a girl he loved dearly but he knew hated her mum right now and try and get them to be on good terms again, this was an epic mission as far as he was concerned.

Okay mate, this is what I’ll do. I’ll have a word in her shell like but I’m not going to put her under any pressure. I don’t think Ellen deserves her, but if it’s what’s gonna get you to shut up and let me get some shut eye, I’m willing to have a go, yeah, that good enough for you?

Jules’s teeth could be clearly seen in the darkness as he smiled, Tom was an arsehole sometimes, but he was a good mate, a great mate in fact.

Yeah that’s great, I’ll let you sleep now, do you want a lullaby or you planning on another wet dream tonight?

Tom just grunted in response, turned onto his other side swinging as he did so, he then proceeded to make snoring noises much to Jules’s delight.

They both woke at first light. As soldiers, they had gotten used to the drill while on operations and exercises of mustering before first light, this wasn’t necessary anymore, and the regiment didn’t require any antiquated proof of their men’s discipline. What they needed, was stone cold killers who could carry out any number of tasks. Time keeping wasn’t important outside of operations and making them get up just to prove they could, wasn’t an issue.

Tom rolled off of the would be bed, stretching his back to relieve the stiffness. In a hammock, any movement was accentuated tenfold so you got used to staying still; this led to a sore back and neck more often than not. Once the little wrinkles of a night sleeping in hell had been stretched out, they got a brew on. They started to roll stuff up and put it into their huge bergens, these would be a life support system out on ops, if they couldn’t find it in there they didn’t have it basically, so they took great care to make sure they forgot nothing of note.

You still okay with what we talked about last night mate? I know you was half asleep and all, but I just wanna check you’re all good for this one?

Tom tutted as he looked up from forcing something into the top of the already tightly packed rucksack.

Yeah, yeah mate, I get it fine, do my Jerry Springer thing and reunite the family for you, no problems, you know I’m famous for my people skills don’t you?

This made them both laugh, Tom was infamous for being quiet, he could banter with the lads no problems, but in any social situation he was a nightmare. He had a couple of girlfriends in the past, but he rarely managed to pull on a night out because he just didn’t get into anything with women. Other members of the troop were like cartoon characters when it came to the women, all the cheesy chat, open necked shirts, the lot. They would give little hints as to who they were, it was strictly forbidden to say you were in the regiment, security issues and all that, but it didn’t stop some of them giving it large to some half wasted young lady in a bar or club. Tom on the other hand usually told them he was an office clerk or something, if he even went as far as saying anything at all.

I know you’re not gonna enjoy it mate, I get it, but Ellen is her mum and until now, she’s done a grand job, so try your best for me and Saffy, yeah?

Tom just nodded and got on with his last minute stuff. His weapon was lying on the ground between his legs. An MP5K, a shortened version of the Heckler and Koch machine pistol popular with police forces throughout Europe, this version was tiny, no stock to speak of and about an inch of barrel protruding from the front. It wasn’t an accurate weapon, but highly effective in close quarters which was just the job for these kind of ops. Tom picked his up and went through the maintenance drill, checking what there was of the barrel and firing mechanism, etc.

Jules’s was within reach, so he did the same. You were supposed to do your own, so you knew for certain it was in good nick if it got heavy, but Jules knew Tom was adept at this stuff and was happy to put his trust in his mate’s skills on this matter.

They spoke very little as they awaited the order to assemble, the kit had been checked and double-checked and there was nothing much to be said or done at this point. They took the opportunity to have a last cup of tea, it was unlikely they would be drinking anything hot for a while, and then sat on top of their bergens in the main assembly area awaiting the Chinook that was going to drop them a few kilometres from their target. There was no sense of anticipation or excitement, because this was just another shitty job, and they would be back here in a few days complaining to everyone else how hot or cold they had been, and what a pain in the arse the other trooper had been, or so they thought.

Chapter Two

As they laid in the dark, a draught blowing through the doorway was picking up spirals of dirt from the floor; Tom looked to at Jules’s back. The cold was breath-taking and Tom was begrudging Jules his current point of recumbence, he was laying further into the dwelling, up against the internal wall.

The positions were not accidental, as it was quickly established that the occupants were Arabs, and therefore not speaking Pashtu, the local language. Jules was the more fluent in Arabic, and therefore, most likely to pick up what was being said.

Typical, thought Tom.

He spent weeks upgrading his Pashtu just for this tour, and the fuckers turn out to be Arabs, or A-rabs as Jules called them.

They had snuck into the cave, cum hut, once they were sure the men they had followed were inside the rear room, which was buried into the mountainside. The targets had been identified the night before by ISAF, as being of importance, this was all they had been told at this point, but it wasn’t unusual to be treated like mushrooms Tom thought, kept in the dark and fed on shit.

Once they had received the go from ISAF, they moved out into the deserted area of the village they had been sent to reconnoitre. Basically, the adobe huts were all empty, the few remaining residents preferring to live in the troglodyte fashion, i.e., caveman style. This had been a boon to the two man team from the get go, allowing them to have the ultimate luxury for a special ops team on close proximity observation (CPO), that being a fire and habitable accommodation.

They had very carefully checked the visibility of any smoke and for light contamination, which was not a problem, as the only other residents of this mountain hamlet were all on the farthest side of the village, and no matter where they looked from; there was no evidence of their presence.

It wasn’t strictly the done thing, but they had both learned long ago to adjust the interpretation of the rules to suit their current predicament. The time spent in the squat hut was not to be described as pleasant under any circumstances, but the two men knew that elsewhere throughout the region, their compatriots’ would be laying down under crappy stinking rags or in shallow delves, shitting into plastic bags and eating nothing but chocolate bars. They would sit close to the small fire and laugh about the other lads, doing impersonations of those with reputations of never shouldering the crap parts of the job without a good old moan, always slagging off the officers for the fact they have to be stuck in their current shitty locales.

They were all good men but in any group you had the whinger, and theirs was no exception. Well trained, extremely professional, just moaning bastards at the same time. Both of them knew they had been extremely fortuitous in finding this village so rundown and under populated. The fact that they could have the comparative luxury of the squalor they were in. The fire was more for light than anything else, as it generated very little heat. The fuel for the fire was found within the many derelict huts around their own, it was some form of dung in little cakes, which when dry burnt slowly and stank to high heaven.

Their first few nights were spent tentatively searching out the surrounding area, moving slowly and carefully, as it turned out quite pointlessly, as they found out by venturing out a little earlier one evening. They saw the ten or so men, and three women disappear into the only three occupied caves well before sundown. The Predator had informed them of the number of bodies likely to be around, but the proximity to the caves meant the Intel was not accurate enough to trust entirely. Personal clarification was the only way the troopers could be sure they were safe to move, albeit surreptitiously, during the darkest hours. The earlier call from ISAF was unexpected, breaking a routine, which was beginning to become unhealthy. In their current situation, anything routine could cause complacency, and that was likely to result in a mistake.

They had just eaten some warmed through beans they had been hoarding since the first night on the ground. They had realised they would be able to have them warm at some point, and this evening they had decided to crack them open before going out into the gloom.

The satellite receiver hummed to make them aware, the annoying beep having been turned off, for obvious reasons. There had been a vehicle tracked all the way from Kandahar, stopping at various encampments along the way. It was thought they would have missed this particular set of dwellings out altogether, and head further on towards the Pakistani border, but it had turned off the beaten track and headed into the mountains. What the troopers didn’t know was these travellers were believed to be Al-Qaida, which would have alerted them to the need for Arabic.

There were three men in the clapped out old pickup truck, there seemed to be a proliferation of these old, usually white trucks. Tom had wondered if they had decommissioned all of these, then the Taliban would have had to give up, such was their importance to the Afghans. There was something loaded onto the rear, which was covered in a sheet of canvas which may have been why they were of interest at this time.

They pulled up as close to the caves as they could, and the men of the village came to greet them, bowing and hugging as appropriate. The three men, aided by the local men, carried their load into the most frequented of the three caves in use.

Jules headed back into the village to ensure the men were not being trailed by counter intelligence, something not unknown in the regiment’s dealings with Al-Qaida.

Tom stayed eyes on the doorway, hidden behind the closest of the huts to the cave entrance. His job was to make sure they hadn’t just stopped to have a cuppa with their old school mates, and were going to jump back into the ramshackle pickup truck, which had amazingly brought them so far across the dust strewn landscape.

With all necessary checks made, the men crawled slowly through the doorway, pushing aside the heavy curtain hanging in place of a door. Wood wasn’t exactly easy to come by, and wasting it on doors was something they wouldn’t have considered. The cave in question, took the regular pattern they had recced on previous nights in the disused version further up the mountainside they were perched against.

There was a vestibule of sorts, usually about six to eight feet deep, and then a wall made of adobe bricks with another blanket-covering the opening into the rear of the cave. They had surmised from previous night’s work that the porches, as Jules called them, were seldom used, at least not during the colder months. There was usually a pile of blankets and other smelly crap thrown out there, the area behind the blankets was still a mystery as each of the caves would be naturally different, after all they were caves and not man made.

As they slowly, and meticulously worked their way into the ante-room, Jules climbed silently into the pile of rags, while Tom, with his next to useless knowledge of the local tongue, stayed near the doorway ensuring they were not stumbled upon by a random night caller.

Although previous night’s experience had shown that no one was willing to venture out in the dark, maybe they knew about the Predators flying up in the night sky, or they just didn’t have the need. It was bitterly cold, and although the darkness wasn’t complete, the people they had seen were not young and maybe couldn’t see so well.

As a conversation continued within the rear room, Jules placed his ultrasonic listening device as close to the hanging blanket as he dared. The talking was audible as a distant grumbling to Tom, and he could discern that things were not all rosy behind the curtain.

He would have asked Jules for a sit rep, but he knew that he needed to keep his attention on the room. Although they were recording everything, on a digital device attached to the receiver, it was vital he kept up with everything in case they just upped and decided to leave, thereby compromising the entire Op.

They had been there for a good forty minutes, when Jules started to look worried, the voices quietened unexpectedly, then a sudden cry rent the air. Tom looked across at Jules with a questioning shrug, the light was poor, but they could see each other well enough and Jules shushed him with a waving gesture, while he cupped the earphone to cut out any outside noise. The cry was followed by a deathly silence, which to Tom went on for what seemed like minutes, but Jules was already picking up hushed exchanges in the cave seemingly, from further back, and whatever he heard was not good, if his expression was any indicator.

Jules then leaned towards Tom, beckoning him to go further away, which in the current positions would be out of the doorway, as speech was forbidden they tried to communicate by sign, and this was a struggle as the light and the odd situation meant the signing wasn’t conclusive. All Tom could fathom was Jules wanted him to back away from his current location but he couldn’t discern why. Not being one to doubt the skills of his long time mate, he checked through the blanket that the coast was clear, out of habit, rather than necessity, then crawled backwards out through the hole in the adobe walls, finally come to rest standing up against outside wall. He hoped the shadows cast by the shrouded moon would conceal him, while whatever Jules was working on got sorted.

The unexpected move back out into the exposed mountain air gave Tom a moment of discomfort, as the chilled air caught in his throat. He had just managed to bring himself back on track, when breaking all rules of close ops, Jules trundled out of the doorway and whistled into the darkness, his eyes unable to adjust to the change in the light.

Tom, momentarily shocked by the speed and noise of Jules’s departure from the cave dwelling, reached out and pulled at his shoulder. Jules drew down with his Glock, but seeing it was Tom, dropped it back into his leg holster.

He leant into toward Tom, We gotta get the fuck outta here mate!

He was speaking in a loud whisper, the type used in films when the operatives are arguing outside a top-secret base just prior to going in, not something you did outside an actual enemy position, whether going in or getting out.

What the fucks going on mate, you been spotted? We compromised?

Whatever it was, the look on Jules’s face was hard to read in the shadows.

Listen, we need to get as far from here as we can, I can’t explain now just fucking leg it The last part, he practically shouted. No attempt to disguise their whereabouts no thought for the other dwellings they would soon be running through. There seemed to be no concern about any of the other village residents being disturbed by the sudden shout or clomping of heavy boots as Tom ran through the small alleys on the hard track.

Tom automatically headed towards the Laying Up Point (LUP), He assumed this was the plan Jules had in mind. After all they would need as much of their kit as possible if they were going to be out on the mountains for any length of time. They would certainly rue the lack of anything important when they had to survive the night, possibly under hostile enemy fire. Their firearms were hidden beneath the rugs and blankets that had been in the hut when they found it, if this had gone noisy, and it appeared it had, then they would need the firepower to get away from these Arabs without losing their lives.

As he turned onto the last section of alley before their hut, Tom looked back to see where Jules was. He wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Had he fallen? Or was he now in front of Tom?

There was a maze of small alleys and Tom may have not taken the quickest route. He jumped through the blanketed entrance to their LUP, pulling the dusty old rag in behind him. The room was evidently still empty and the only light came from the dying embers of the fire, not enough to cast even the merest of glows. Luckily, the removal of the blanket let some of the moons light through, and it allowed Tom to see where their packs were stashed, but also to see that Jules was not here. He grabbed his Bergen, checking it was closed, and then lifted his small MP5K from beneath the stinking pile of rotten old blankets, checking the magazine was in place.

He paused, should he take Jules’s weapon too? If he went back and didn’t find him it could cause problems, Jules might reach the hut and finding his weapon missing assume Tom had been compromised or captured, but on the other hand, if he did locate Jules, he would be severely handicapped in a fire fight, relying solely on his side arm.

Adrenaline was coursing through his veins, his ears full with the sound of his fast beating heart. He could hear no other sounds and he fought to calm himself, knowing that the easiest one to kill was the man who didn’t hear it coming, and at the moment a giant in hob nailed boots could have come up behind him, such was the internal noise. He opened his mouth slightly to allow himself to hear a little more, the jaw made your ears play tricks, and Tom needed to be sure of everything he heard from this point on.

Thus far, there was nothing to suggest