Sting of the Scorpion, page 8
Taking a roll of duct tape he wrapped the end around the hose that had been creased by the bullet. He kept wrapping it round until the hope was tightly sealed and firm, then he cut the roll. “Fire her up, boss,” he told Jacko.
Jacko did and as soon as the engine started Mac poured the water into the radiator until the radiator was full, then he put the cap back on and closed the hood, “Right boys” he turned to the two still stood there, “That should hold for about thirty miles, but the radiator is completely buggered after that, let’s get the hell out of here”
“Boss, get this shit off the road NOW” Mac screamed as they came round the corner, he was watching their backs and had just glimpsed their worst nightmare, Jacko floored the gas and found the first place he could get off the road then floored it as he headed for cover, anything would do. They just made it when a BMP 2 troop carrier came round the bend loaded with troops and guns bristling. It was the lead vehicle in the lead element of a massive convoy. The Iranians were looking for them and they were bringing serious firepower!
Chapter 12
Twenty-two thousand miles above the site, something was watching. Catching every little detail and relaying the information back down to the earth some seven to ten thousand miles away, across continents and oceans, where the information was about to cause absolute panic.
For years, the West has had a major distrust of Iran and all things Iranian. Ever since the regime came to power in the late 1970s, there seemed to be no middle ground on which both Iran and the west could agree. It didn’t help that the biggest power in the west was literally caught with its ‘pants down’ when the revolution happened. They not only backed the wrong players but were caught ‘red handed’ spying on the new regime, something that caused a major standoff that lasted over a year and caused major embarrassment to all concerned.
Langley went ballistic! Major explosions in Iran so close to a major pipeline, and then talk on the intercepted calls of ‘terrorism’ and ‘terrorists’ threw them for a loop. In Langley’s language, the two words Iran and terrorism were almost never on opposite sides of the ledger! They were virtually synonymous with each other.
Phone lines were going crazy as more and more analysts were calling in to ask, “What the hell?” Or basically, “How the hell did someone do this without us knowing about it? And who the hell is responsible?” No one was looking forward to telling the President!
Tel Aviv was even worse. Things like this have a tendency to get blamed on ‘The son of Shaytan’, as the Iranians loved to call Israel. So they’d be expecting at least to know what they’re going to get blamed for. Having an irate Prime Minister on the phone wanting to know what the hell they were being accused of was not a pleasant experience. Dealing with President Obama when he wasn’t happy was bad enough. Benjamin Netanyahu was positively dangerous, he’d thrown things and not just in general but at you, and they tended to hit their target!
Downing Street called an immediate meeting of ‘C.O.B.R.A’. The emergency response team of the security services, everyone was scared this could escalate into something bigger. The Iranians and Israelis both have nuclear arsenals and even the slightest hint that Israel was involved could set the ‘hounds of hell’ loose and the way the Iranians were mobilizing it seemed that’s what was happening!
One thing that was on everyone’s mind, but no one wanted to say it was could Isis be behind the attack? Isis are Sunni Muslims but the Iranians are Shiite, a divide that’s filled with fourteen centuries of hatred and bloodshed! Could they be resurrecting the centuries-old blood feud in some crazy way?
There was one place that was watching the events unfold, yet was a sea of relative peace. That was Sir Michael’s office, not MI6 (that was in uproar), but his inner sanctum. His door was closed and jamming devices blocked any signal trying to intercept what was going on in the office. He could still call out, though. He was watching the satellite feed MI6 had hacked from one of the US spy satellites over Iran.
MI6 had an official link to the satellite. But he knew it was heavily censored by Langley. They showed them only what Langley wanted them to see. So MI6 hacked a couple of other ways in so they could get a better picture without letting on they had the other information, Langley knew they’d done it but it met with the idea that kept the politicians happy that no one was ‘giving away’ secrets. Langley had done the same with the British networks. Everyone knew and yet no one knew!
“Brenda,” Sir Michael pressed the button on his intercom, “I’ll expect the PM to call any minute. Can you tell him to come right over please?”
“Sir,” the receptionist replied, “He’s already on the line demanding you go over there right now!”
“Sorry Brenda,” Sir Michael replied, “No can do right at this moment. Tell him I have his answers, but for his ears only and they’re not leaving this room! Tell him I’ll be free in about fifteen minutes.” he clicked the intercom off and unplugged it. ‘Probably get the sack’ he thought, ‘but this is too important and too delicate to be let known everywhere.’ Reaching into his pocket he pulled out a mobile phone and punched in a number.
The number was pre-set on the speed dial and rang on the other side of the continent.
The recipient answered on the second ring, “Glad to see you’re awake down there” Sir Michael spoke into the phone, “We’re on scrambler, aren’t we?”
“I am,” the reply came back, “I presume your end is secure too” it was the Colonel.
“Just a quick update, they got in” Sir Michael spoke softly as if that would make a difference.
“So that’s what the panic is about,” Simpson replied. “You should see the headless chickens running about here!” you could hear the amusement in the voice, “I take it from what’s happening things aren’t as easy as we’d hoped?”
“They never are, but it looks as if young Metcalfe is doing his hardest to create enough havoc for the rest of the team to get away. From what I can make out, they may have had to split up to make their escape,”
“Jacko said something about that just before the drop.” Simpson spoke up filling in some of the blanks in the plan, “They weren’t sure but young Metcalfe worked in the region before joining the regiment. He knows the ways out there.”
“He was in Iraq though, not Iran, right?” Sir Michael was a little confused.
“Officially yes,” Simpson replied, “But I know he took at least one unofficial trip over to the border, if not over it with some Kurdish folks. What direction are they heading?”
“One group went out by the road, heading southwest, the other, looks like they headed south and I’m not sure I want to know how they got out!”
“You’re right there,” the colonel chuckled. “Guy’s a bit of an adrenaline junkie even for a ‘blade’ but I’ve got a pretty good idea where they’re headed. We’ve got our side all ready to go. I’m moving us to Erbil in about ten minutes. There’s an Iraqi airbase there that the commander’s agreed to let us work from.” He stopped for a moment then continued, “any calls and we can be there in ten minutes,”
“Good to hear. Now I’ve got to go. I’ve got an irate prime minister to educate.” Sir Michael clicked the phone off, closed it up and put it into his desk drawer. Just then Michelle buzzed to tell him that the prime minister had arrived along with the minister of defence. He told her to show the PM in but under no circumstances was the minister of defence to be allowed in, apart from himself and the Prime Minister. Everyone else was under suspicion until the mole was found, and if that made him enemies, well, he could live with that.
“Just what the hell are you doing telling me who and whom I can’t bring to a meeting with my head of intelligence?” The PM stormed into the room in a fury. He didn’t even bother with the pleasantries or wait to be ‘announced’ as protocol would normally dictate.
“Good morning to you too Prime Minister” Sir Michael tried to diffuse the situation, “If you’ll take a seat I’ll explain some of what I can” he showed to the prime minister to take a seat. Cameron was refusing to.
“I’ve got the bloody Americans screaming all kinds of stuff, the Israelis ready to launch a nuke strike ‘as a precaution and we haven’t got a bloody clue, then when I try to call you I get some cryptic BS about having some answers, what the hell are you up to?”
Sir Michael hadn’t risen from his chair, he’d hardly taken his eyes off the computer screen. But now he took a moment to make eye contact. “I said I could tell you some of it, enough to get you to persuade the Israelis and Americans that we don’t need a ‘strike’ and I will, but you need to shut up and listen!” He was getting pretty frustrated.
The Prime Minister finally calmed down enough to sit down and say. “Okay, you’ve got two minutes before I fire you! Go ahead”
“Remember the bombs in Istanbul?” Sir Michael began.
“What the hell has a terrorist threat got to do with this?”
“Everything and they weren’t terrorists!” Sir Michael countered, “we were meant to think they were.” He stopped for a moment to let that sink in. Then, pressing a button on his desk, a large flat-screen TV came to life, he’d already set the details of what he wanted up so he went straight into it. “They were a cover for them to kidnap this diplomat,” Chambers’ face came onto the screen.
“The Iranians going to all that trouble for a bloody diplomat? Give me a break,” he was rising from his chair.
“Who said the Iranians?” Sir Michael shot back; “in this game, you need to know who the real enemy is,” Cameron stopped dead and began paying attention.
“The diplomat has the intelligence that in the wrong hands will blow every operation both we and the Americans have run against certain ‘criminal gangs’ as well as Islamic terrorists for the last five years! And that’s just a conservative estimate” he paused for a moment, then continued, “I’m talking hundreds, if not thousands of lives at stake and billions of dollars. We couldn’t let that happen, not at any price”
The PM was silent for a moment as he took it in, “but if it’s just a lone operative, then why not a drone strike? It’s easy and clean!”
Sir Michael actually wanted to throttle the man for even suggesting that, but then again the PM was thinking of the political fallout from the idea of a team getting caught in Iran and being traced back to Britain as opposed to a drone strike,” that went ‘off target’ by a mere two hundred miles! He took his time responding. “Mr PM, there’s a reason I said for your ears only” he began, “There were only three people in the world knew the Intelligence that diplomat had, one’s here in the room with you, another is the diplomat and the third is the young MI6 operative with the team of ex SAS soldiers trying to break him out, how the hell the enemy got the intelligence we don’t know as yet, but one thing we do know is we have a problem! Mr PM, we have a serious breach in our security and the only way to find that leak is to bust that man out, that’s what they’re doing!”
“And destroying any kind of agreement we’ve had with Iran in the process!” Cameron shot back, “are you folks totally off your trolleys with this?” he demanded, “the political ramifications are,” he began.
“Will never get out,” Sir Michael cut him off. “The Iranians are about to realize they’ve been played for the patsies! They employed the same security firm that’s in cahoots with the drug barons and they were using the fortress in Iran as their safe house thinking we’d never attempt to take them on in the ‘devil’s playground’ they got that wrong.”
“How many people know about this?”
“About the breakout?” Sir Michael asked. “Only eight in total and six of them are on the ground in Iran. Colonel Simpson is in Iraq with a couple of Longbows and a spare Lynx, then there’s you and me, that’s it,”
“What about the Americans and Iraqis?”
“Mr PM, there’s a leak, and until we know where it is no one can know, not even the Defence Minister!”
Chapter 13
Joey and Sandy waited, unable to move in case the villagers saw them. So far they hadn’t, and they did not know just how close to a sudden and unexpected meeting with their maker they came to as they moved on under the steady track of the Colt commando and the Kalashnikov in Joey and Sandy’s hands.
“That puts paid to going that way” Joey was looking around for an alternative to where they were headed. The villagers had walked down the path they were intending to take. It had been clear they were looking for something or someone. Both the villagers had been carrying AK47s, which was a part of standard dress code in the villages round here this was Kurdistan region and Kurdistan is a law unto itself!
There was a wooded area west south-west of where they were. It seemed to disappear over the hill and possibly joined the forest that was on the other side of the valley. There was a risk it didn’t, and they’d be left exposed, but they couldn’t carry on the path they were on as the villagers would be back, and there just might be more of them.
“How long do you think it’s going to add to the journey?” Sandy asked as she followed Joey, she’d learned to trust him in these decisions.
“I’m not sure,” he replied. “I just know we can’t keep on the same path. There’s usually a path in the woods we can follow, one the smugglers use to move from village to village without the authorities knowing about them.”
“You know this because?” She was really curious as there’s been nothing in any of the briefings to show how he knew this!
“You’ve read my file!” It was more a statement saying ‘You should know.” But he continued, “A couple of years ago, I worked training some of the Kurdish militia in Iraq. Training them in bomb disposal” he moved through the wood. “Most of the guys I was training had spent time in Iran. Some worked as smugglers, bootleggers believe it or not!”
“Bootleggers? This is Iran, you know?” She stopped and looked at Joey’s back. “Really, at times some of the most ridiculous things come out of that boy’s mouth! It’s not 1930s Kentucky,”
“What? Are you surprised that the Mullahs like their booze?” Joey turned laughing slightly, “It might be banned by Islam,” he continued, “But they’re just as human as the rest of us, and they love their Johnny Walker red label!”
“You’re a mine of information like this.” Sandy half-joked back. She was tired and while the verbal duelling had been amusing, and even helped to take her mind off the more pressing fears. But she couldn’t help enjoying having her own ‘walking encyclopaedia’ walking through this wood with her.
THE MOVIES ALWAYS SHOW military convoys as seemingly endless lines of trucks and a tank rolling down a road. The reality is something different. They are usually grouped in blocks of four to six called ‘packets’, where each vehicle within the ‘packet’ stays within sight of each other. But there might be as much as two or three miles between each ‘packet’.
The first packet took only about two minutes to roll past. But it was the two most intense and nerve-racking minutes they’d had since the mission started. All it would take was for the commander in the BMP to rotate the turret, and they were screwed!
“Go, get the hell out of here,” Mac whispered as soon as the last vehicle in that first packet disappeared round the bend. They possibly had seconds before the next would appear. Jacko dropped the vehicle into gear and they drove off down the dirt path they’d turned onto.
Two miles further in, they came to a crossroads, each track led to a village. There was no real way they could safely get back onto the road in this Landcruiser. There was only one thing for it, they had to chance passing through one of the villages. That meant they’d need a vehicle when they got to the other side!
The Iranians were setting up roadblocks on the main road. That meant they knew some of the team had gotten out using a vehicle. They probably had the details of the vehicle that was used and it was only a matter of time before they had the resources to go into the villages and could begin searching from village to village, what was worse was that the villagers themselves would take part in the searching.
The only chance they had was to put as much ground between them and the searchers as they could and to send their pursuers a simple message. “If you want to live, then BACK OFF!!”
Gregorovitch was looking pleased with himself. Finally, things were starting to come together. The fires in the compound were finally under control. The mess that was a Landcruiser, and the gates were removed and reinforcements were beginning to arrive.
The makeshift command post was down in the village at the foot of the mountain. As they began to organize the search for the people responsible. He was looking at the map he’d pinned on the far wall of the building and thinking. ‘Okay, if I were you, what would be my move?’ when one of his commanders burst into the room.
“Sir,” he began, “one of the villagers has located where the parachutists landed.” He moved forward and looked at the map; “If I may,” He lifted a pointer and pointed to the valley to the south of the fortress. “Here sir, about five miles south of the fortress, we found the parachutes just off the main valley and about half a mile from the road here.” He indicated the thin red line running east to west, “the road takes them right to the border.”
“You’re thinking that they RV’d with the Landcruiser there?” Gregorovitch asked, “And headed for the border.”
“I think it should be considered Sir.” The officer replied.
“Very well. Send a team to check out the road. Especially the junction you just showed me. But have the dogs start their search where you found the parachutes, they’d got a three-hour start.’ He took a pack of cigarettes out of his breast pocket. Took one out of the pack, lit it using his lighter and took a long ‘drag’ before continuing. “That means they’re at least fifteen miles away now, maybe as much as thirty, depending on how fit they are!”
