Brannan: The Movie

By Stephen Cord

Joe Brannan is living the good life; as skipper and owner of a charter dive-boat operating out of Thailand’s sin city Pattaya he has everything. Everything that is, except the cash flow it takes to keep his beloved boat operating. Then, due to an unexpected twist of fate, he is approached by a beautiful movie starlet with a lucrative proposition that could change his fortunes forever.
All he has to do is rescue a superstar hostage from the clutches of a gang of international terrorists.

TROPIC HEAT. IMPOSSIBLE RESCUE. INSANE ODDS.

Is Joe Brannan finally out of his depth?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Proglen
• Release date: Sep 11, 2019
• ISBN: 9786164560246

Stephen Cord

Stephen Cord was born and raised in the North-East of England. He left school at the age of seventeen and joined the army. Leaving the military after several years' service he pursued a career in the merchant navy. Now retired and living in the Philippine's his hobbies include scuba diving and sailing. He makes frequent excursions to Thailand from his new home.

Book preview

ONE

It was hot. The air was heavy and sluggish, pressing stickily on the six men who were lined up in a row on the open beach. The men were all dressed identically, in black combat gear, and they were all carrying Heckler & Koch MP5 sub-machine guns. Grimacing and squinting, they stared straight ahead at the screen of thick jungle that fringed the sand, where the plants looked lush and bloated, as if they’d overfed on the relentless humidity. At the centre of the line of armed men, Joe Brannan stood blinking the sweat out of his eyes. He wanted desperately to wipe that sweat away, but he had been ordered not to move. Not until they got the signal. Then it came, and all hell broke loose.

All right, let’s do it! bellowed the man to Joe’s left, and they all surged forward. Explosions erupted along the beach. Fireballs wobbled into the air. There was an ear-splitting bang and the man to Joe’s right screamed horribly as he was catapulted into the air. Joe began jinking right and left, firing his HK from the hip, screaming his battle cry. Water spouts geysered up from the ocean behind him. Another man went down, his chest blowing out in a gory mess. There was a big wind and the sound of a helicopter’s blades slicing the air just above his head. From the corner of his eye, he saw lines of sand spouts stitching their way across the beach towards him. Then he was caught in their midst, and bullet holes riddled him from crotch to shoulder, exploding clouds of blood. Face twisted in agony, he span around in a half-circle, staggered a few steps, and went down in a sprawl of limbs.

Cut!

Thank fuck for that, thought Joe, spitting out a mouthful of sand. Raising himself slowly to his feet, he looked around at his companions, who all seemed to be rising from the dead. A camera on a long boom swept across the top of the false jungle.

As you were, an amplified voice rang out, causing them all to freeze. As you were. Final positions please. We’re going for a last take before we lose the light.

Mouthing a string of silent curses, Joe eased himself back down onto the hot sand, and once again assumed his final position.

After a couple of minutes, the megaphone crackled out again. And … action!

From where he was lying, his face frozen in a rictus of death, Joe found himself watching the last take of the day unfold before his dead staring eyes.

*

Turk Manning, square jaw set hard, strode purposefully out of the jungle to survey his handiwork. He was a magnificent figure of a man, at least six foot four in height, with a great breadth of shoulders. Narrowing his eyes dramatically, he grunted something unintelligible that would be dubbed in later. He was carrying a smoking MP5 sub-machine gun and wearing an artfully torn and carefully grimed white vest that emphasised his superb musculature. Behind him, the foliage quivered and a woman of stunning beauty dashed to his side to hang on to his well-muscled arm. She looked around with wide, dramatically shocked eyes. She was wearing even less than Turk, and her award-winning, sweat-slicked breasts heaved impressively. One of the corpses let out a low groan that went unnoticed by everyone.

Is it over, Brad? Are we finally free? she gasped, looking up at Turk with adoring eyes.

Raising one eyebrow, he turned to her. Free? That’s a big word, Katy. Are we ever truly free? What the fuck!

Reaching down, Turk grabbed at the woman’s wrist and began shrieking in an outraged tone. What the fuck is this? He held up the actresses arm so that everybody could see the chunky automatic pistol dangling from her fingers.

Why has she got a gun? We discussed this. Turk Manning doesn’t seek help from the ladies to off bad guys. I’m a lone wolf, a one-man army.

Pulling her arm free, the actress stamped her foot. C’mon, Turk. This is the twenty-first century, and I got equal rights. As a modern liberated woman, I demand the freedom to shoot sumthin’ too.

Cut! The director, hands flapping, came running across the sand. Chantelle, honey, I thought we’d agreed you wouldn’t be carrying.

Planting her hands on her hips, Chantelle rounded on the director. Cut the shit, Capo, we didn’t agree nuthin’.

Enough! Turk exploded, throwing his gun to the ground and whirling away to crash back through the artfully arranged jungle. I can’t work like this. Get the bitch under control Capo.

That’s it, run away you … you misogynist ape, Chantelle yelled after him.

Purple with rage, Turk’s face thrust back out of the foliage. I’m going to Google that, he managed, before disappearing once again.

Capo turned distraught eyes to his director of photography. Can we go again?

Too late Capo, light’s gone, the man called back.

Capo’s shoulders slumped and he signalled to the assistant director, who raised the megaphone to his lips and bellowed out, Okay everyone, that’s a wrap. See you all bright and early tomorrow. Don’t forget to check the call sheets.

Joe sat up. He was covered in sand and sticky fake blood. His ears were ringing and he had a headache.

You having fun yet?

He looked up into the beaming blood-spattered face of Dave Rubeck, stunt coordinator and former U.S. Marine.

I’d rather be in a real firefight, Joe muttered, spitting out more sand.

You and me both. Rubeck grinned, helping Joe to his feet. Don’t forget to hand your weapon in to the armorer before you leave, or you will be in a real firefight – with the Thai police. He slapped Joe on the back before striding off to help another dead body sort himself out.

*

Joe’s long strides carried him quickly across the dirt parking area towards a battered Toyota pick-up. He was a tall man, and lean, though the breadth of his shoulders, toned by years of scuba diving, stretched his T-shirt tight. His face, bronzed from working long hours at sea, was hawkish and handsome, with green eyes and a cleft chin. He slid behind the wheel of the pick-up, grimacing as the sun-heated upholstery burned through his clothes. Firing the ignition, he set off down Jomtien Beach Road in the direction of Pattaya city. He had the windows closed and the air-conditioner cranked up high; even though the road ran along the shoreline, there was no cooling sea breeze to relieve the humidity. Behind the beach and the road, unremarkable hotels and condominiums strobed by like white pickets in a fence.

Despite the fact that filming was taking place just on the outskirts of Pattaya, Thailand’s largest tourist resort, the drive to the town’s harbour would take him the best part of an hour, due to the density of the evening traffic. He had changed out of his shredded combat gear, and the explosive squibs that had been attached to him had been removed, but there were no showers provided and, despite a session with the wet-wipes, he still felt sticky and grimy. His headache had stayed with him, and he wasn’t looking forward to turning up again early tomorrow morning to repeat the experience. The glamour of Hollywood, he reflected, wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. At least he was making money as an extra, which was more than could be said for his dive boat operation. He owned a fifty-foot motor-cruiser that was available for charter to tourists who wanted to take dive trips. But business was slow, and although she was the light of his life, Betty, like all big beautiful boats, consumed money. Money he didn’t have. He was almost broke.

Coming down the hill into town, trapped in a slow-moving procession of traffic, he had plenty of time to look over the panorama of rooftops, concrete and tiles, advertising hoardings, and drying laundry. As soon as he could, he turned off into a side street and followed it down to the harbour. As he drove along the waterfront, he eased off the gas and looked out the side window. There was Betty riding high at her mooring, effortlessly dominating the harbour. Despite the exhaustion that fogged his mind, he felt a stir of pride, a sense of achievement as he ran his eyes over her iceberg-white superstructure, taking in the streamlined rake of her radar arch where, hanging from a short mast, the Thai flag dangled limply. A little of his despondency sloughed away until he could remember when he used to be cheerful; well, maybe not cheerful, exactly, but at least optimistic, convinced that he would be able to make things work out in the end.

Bollocks to everyone and everything, he muttered to himself. As a last resort, I can always haul anchor and head for the horizon.

The road curved around the harbour, hemmed in on one side by the steep slope of a jungled headland with its riot of thick foliage, and on the other by a low sea wall. He rolled to a halt by a shabby-looking garage, one of a line of identikit units set back from the road at the foot of the steep hill. A faded sign identified the concrete cube as the business premises of Brannan Diving.

Pushing open a smaller door set into the unit’s bigger roller door, Joe stepped into his real place of work. The rectangular space contained a comprehensive range of scuba-diving equipment, including a compressor for recharging tanks. Gan, his first mate, looked up as Joe entered, his face as blank as a carving.

Dropping into a worn chair behind a battered metal desk, Joe took out his phone and put it on charge before asking, Well, Gan, any budding Cousteau’s been pestering you, demanding a dive trip?

Grunting a negative, Gan moved to the coffee machine and began pouring. Joe checked his phone yet again for messages, but there was still nothing.

Try Mongkol, the tall Thai man suggested, placing a steaming mug of coffee on the desk.

No point. He’d call if he had anything, Joe replied, taking a sip of his first mate’s outstanding coffee.

Mr. Mongkol was a travel agent with lots of contacts in the local hotels who, for a ten percent commission, encouraged visitors to take dive trips on the Betty.

You been paid yet for playing soldier? Gan asked.

Joe sat back in the creaking chair. According to the unit accountant, I won’t get paid until they’ve finished with me.

We need a website, Gan muttered, half to himself.

No, we don’t, Joe snapped back, too quickly, his chest tightening at the thought of his face and location being flashed across the Internet.

Gan shook his head. Well, what we do need is more diesel.

Joe pursed his lips in thought. "I’ll get a deposit up front from the next charter, so we can bunker just enough to get us out to the islands and back. How is Betty? Everything shipshape?" He hid a grin behind his coffee mug. The question was impertinent and unnecessary, for Joe knew that Gan loved Betty as much as he did, and that she couldn’t be in better hands. But he asked anyway because he enjoyed trying to get a rise out of his taciturn first mate.

Choosing not to dignify the mocking question with an answer, Gan walked unhurriedly to the door. See you tomorrow, he called over his shoulder, and left.

Sighing, Joe put his feet up on the desk. He knew he was wasting his time teasing Gan. They had been working together for years now, and such an easy familiarity had been forged between them that his gentle taunting was easily dismissed. Even so, there was a limit to Thai tolerance, and Joe would never try to get a rise out of Gan in public, as that could incur a loss of face, which could result in his first mate losing his temper. He didn’t want that to happen. In his early forties, Gan was tall and broad, which made him an unusually imposing figure for a Thai, and Joe had seen him really angry only once. Something he definitely didn’t want to see again.

Draining the coffee, he rolled his chair away from the desk, stood up, and patted his pockets. Yes, he decided, he had enough money for a couple of beers. Headache dismissed, he snatched his salt-weathered sea cap off a hook and, settling it on his head at a rakish angle, strode out into the cloying heat of a tropical Pattaya evening

*

Entering Pattaya’s famous Walking Street to merge with the crowds, Joe felt the usual conscious pleasure. Now that the sun had dropped below the rooftops, the first wave of revellers were shaking off their siesta and coming out to play. The pedestrianised street was bustling, loud, and full of music and drink and good times. Although Pattaya had a number of entertainment districts, Walking Street was its Times Square; nowhere else did eyes sparkle so bright, voices sound so happy, colours look so vivid, food taste so rich, or the very air throb with so much excitement. The street was lined with open-fronted bars, restaurants, stores, dance clubs, and go-go joints. Flashy, trashy neon flickered everywhere, like a prelude to a tropical storm.

Thumping music assaulted his ears as he navigated around the knots of tourists and locals, the seething mass concealing the corruption, the crime, and the desperation that lurked behind the flashing signs. It was almost impossible, he mused, to imagine that just a few hours earlier, without the camouflage of neon and the flattery of night shadows, the street had been just another row of tawdry concrete buildings. Once again, the place had successfully masked its run-down and pockmarked face behind a veil of man-made stars.

Easing his way through a stream of package tourists, those wistful onlookers, the wide-eyed factory employees from China, the office workers from Japan and Korea, he crossed the main drag to enter a narrow side street. A couple of freelance hookers with the bodies of twenty-year-olds and the eyes of fifty-year-olds ignored him. They were seeking more profitable prey – the two-week millionaires; drunken western men who partied like lunatics.

There were fewer people eddying in the narrow lane, and Joe made quicker progress. As he walked, the air closed in on him, thick and unmoving, redolent of the aromas coming from food stalls that lined the way. He strode past huddles of pretty girls in unfeasibly high heels, perched on plastic stools around folding tables, their go-go costumes, or lack of them, hidden beneath tightly wrapped silken dressing gowns as they giggled and scooped noodles into their scarlet mouths. Pressing on, he reached his destination – the Devil Woman bar.

As he entered the open-fronted establishment, he tipped his cap at the blazing, old-style neon sign that depicted a naked girl with horns and a pitchfork. Inside, it was happy hour, and the bar was congested with a lively crowd of expats. Those smug, loud-mouthed, pretentious temporary citizens of Thailand. Burnt-out boozers pushing sixty, who behaved as though they were still young bucks. The banter between the men was light-hearted and crude, punctuated with raucous laughter.

As he made his way across the room, a beautiful Thai woman, tall as a supermodel appeared at his side. Hello sailor, she breathed into his ear. Buy me a drink?

Sure thing, Rose. He smiled.

Hips swaying, she guided him over to a vacant bar stool. Unprompted, the girl behind the bar brought a Tiger beer for Joe, and a rum and Coke for Rose. Raising the condensation-run bottle, he took a long chug. The beer was so cold it had no taste. Smacking his lips, he looked around and asked, So, how’s business? Thus completing the ritual that he and Rose went through every time he walked into the bar.

After taking a lady-like sip of her drink, Rose gusted a theatrical sigh that threatened to liberate her magnificent breasts from the low-cut dress she was wearing. "No good. Too many bar in Pattaya, not enough farang."

Joe waved a hand at the packed room, where bargirls moved through the crowd, teasing each other and casting bright eyes around. "Plenty of farangs here," he remarked amiably. Farang was the name Thai people gave to Caucasian foreigners.

Rose snorted into her glass. Sure, plenty now because it happy hour. Beer half price, they all cheap charlies, go home soon.

Joe nodded in understanding. It was the usual evening pattern; the old men were eking out their pensions so they drank their fill of discounted beer early, before staggering home with a takeaway under one arm and a bargirl under the other. Back in their rented condos, they’d invariably fall asleep in front of the TV while the unsullied girl finished off the takeaway and chatted on her phone until she was ready to leave.

Joe shook his head at the futility of it all. But he didn’t judge, because he was only too aware that in twenty years’ time he’d probably be following the same routine. If he was lucky.

You still working for movie? Rose asked.

Yep. For as long as they need me.

They finish this week. Move another place, she told him with an air of certainty.

What? They haven’t said anything to me,