When the alarms went off, he wasn’t surprised. They’d found the corporal and private out on the moorland, or they’d found the Land Rover parked up and checked the paperwork. It was irrelevant which.
As the first soldier hurtled through the doorway, Bunty pointed at the far end of the hut away from the women and children.
“Back there,” she screeched. “He has a gun.” She was a woman used to issuing orders, her voice loud and authoritative over the screaming children. Which is why the soldier was watching her and not the shadow by the door who knocked him to the ground with one ferocious punch.
“This animal attacked us,” she pointed at the unconscious man, as three more soldiers dashed through the doorway, almost knocking each other out of the way in their rush.
“Search the hut for weapons.” North issued the order like he was born to it as he strode out. “Don’t harm the prisoners. Bar the doors and don’t let anyone else in here.”
In the main camp, nasty boys poured from buildings, transforming their own base into a battlefield full of armed and dangerous men in pursuit of an unknown enemy. Adrenalin. Weaponry. Inexperienced soldiery. The perfect conditions to get shot.
And he was still locked behind an electric fence.
Could he blag his way out like he blagged his way in? Not for one second. The camp was in lock down.
He summoned the soldier who let him pass through into the hostages’ enclosure. The nasty boy came close to the gate and North gestured for him to release the lock on his side. He needed out, urgently if not sooner.
From a safe distance, the guard called out: “Orders says when the klaxon goes off nobody’s getting out of there. We need the prisoners secure.”
North nodded. Of course, the prisoners needed to be secure.
“Yep. But you need this – quick, man.” He held out Walsh’s Bible, careful to keep the gilt edges in hand so the soldier couldn’t see what it was. The Bible was stolen, but he didn’t think Walsh would mind. “It’s how they’re communicating with the outside. You need to take it to the CO. Right now, before the next transmission.”
The boy swore, opened the first gate, stepped into no man’s land, then hesitated, glancing behind him.
“Hurry, soldier,” said North, “or we’re all buggered. You and me most of all.” He pointed towards the shed as if he feared a surge of rioting prisoners.
The boy drew close to the fence, to North’s outstretched hand, and North shot him once through the kneecap. As he dropped to the ground, North reached through and hooked the key.
Shock was the only thing stopping up a scream, but it was coming. One second. Two. North stepped over the writhing figure whose bloody hands clutched at the shattered kneecap. It was a hard lesson, but he was still alive to learn from it. Who did he think he was guarding? What crimes did he think dying men and little children committed? The guard opened his mouth to scream in agony, and inside his teeth were rotten. North couldn’t have him shouting for help. He balled his fist and put him out cold. Best pain relief he knew.
The recruits were trigger-happy and North’s wasn’t the only shot fired. He moved at a fair trot, but not running. The pace of a man under orders from command. Heading for someplace he was supposed to be.
Pulling open the door of the eight-wheeler, he hauled out the driver by his arm and leg. A yell of protest before the man’s bald head smashed down against the pavement. North heaved himself up and into the cab, throwing the rifle on to the passenger seat, locking the doors, and turning the key in the ignition all in the same movement.
There was a shout and the rapid report of gunfire as the driver’s crumpled body was spotted. North crunched through the gears to throw the juggernaut into reverse and straight through the row of cars behind, the crunch of metal against metal, the shattering of glass and shouts of angry men. North swung the huge wheel and crunched his way back up the gears as he accelerated away – a mini with a Union Jack on its roof caught in his back bumper dragging behind him. North grinned. It was what he’d hoped. Some clever soul had souped up the engine to cope with the iron screens protecting the windscreen and front of the cab. His boot against the metal pedal against the floor, the engine roared and he ducked as a bullet came through the window ploughing straight into the back of the vinyl seat.
A Land Rover took off behind him, then another, but they couldn’t get past as he swung the huge wheel first one way and then another, the mini shaking loose, tipping and rolling as one of the 4x4s smashed into its front end.
The barrier was down. The mesh gates closed. The sentries had their General Purpose Machine Guns ready and, he was guessing, fixed for sustained fire. A glimpse of the Welsh guard’s face. I’ll be sure to get the CO to copy you in. The bullet spray came hard and fast into the windscreen, the glass splintering, cobwebs breaking out across the entire screen as the lorry smashed through the barrier and into the mesh of the gates. The impact shuddered through his foot, his leg bones and up into his spine, and for a nano-second North wondered how it would be to die at the wheel, before the gates gave with a shriek of metal, and he was through and on to the open moorland.