They ran forward in complete silence. Every man knew what he had to do when they reached the compound – there would be no time for questions or second-guessing decisions that had already been made. They were reliant on surprise, speed and superior firepower, and there were question marks over the last, as they had no idea how many men there were within the compound.
Mac and Logan led the way out of the caravanserai, splitting into two streams of men to go down the alleys on either side of the compound. Two men peeled off the cohort in each alley to watch the back and secure the route out once they’d grabbed Bakker. Mac led four of the militiamen to the gate – their mission was to gain entry, immobilise the guards and lock down the compound, while Logan and the remaining three of the governor’s men waited to one side, ready to surge through the gate to breach the main building, take out remaining personnel and free Bakker.
Mac signalled to two of his team. They stepped forward, AKs slung behind them, with pump-action shotguns raised, one aimed at the gate’s upper hinge, the other at the lower hinge. Beyond the gate, there was no sound but the uneven chugging of the generator, hopefully enough to cover the scuffle of boots on gravel. Mac took a deep breath, then counted them down with his fingers.
All hell broke loose.
With the hinges pulverised by the shotgun blasts, Mac’s other two men were able to shove the gate out of the way. It fell inwards with a loud splintering noise. The thundering of the militiamen’s boots across the wood was greeted by a howl of surprise from the doorway of the main building. A man emerged, brandishing a Krinkov, but immediately dropped to the ground, taken out by Commander Ibrahimzai as Mac’s team fanned out across the empty courtyard.
Mac swiftly scanned the landscape. Directly opposite the gate stood a two-storey house, with a covered terrace running along the front. This was where the man who’d just been shot lay bleeding out on the bare cement. The building’s upstairs windows were shuttered, and above them, a low railing topping the wall suggested there was a roof terrace. Two vehicles, a Surf and a technical, were parked, nose to tail, on the left-hand side of the building. To the right, underneath an open-sided lean-to, sat the ancient generator, louder now they were closer.
Another man, the sentry they’d seen patrol the outer wall earlier, came at them from between the side of the house and the parked vehicles. He opened fire, but immediately took a hit from Mac’s AK – his muzzle dipped and all his rounds hit was the stony ground.
Behind Mac, Ibrahimzai set up the PKM gunner and a rifleman to guard the compound entrance, while he and the other militiaman on the team moved forward to check around the vehicles for any more shooters. As Mac waited for them to reappear, ready to give cover if any shots came from the upstairs windows, he heard them slashing tyres to prevent pursuit. As they came round the corner of the wall, he waved at them to provide cover while he checked the other side of the house where the generator was.
As he came up level with the side of the lean-to, there was a roar and a giant of a man with a huge belly and a long black beard emerged from behind it, brandishing a pitchfork.
A pitchfork? What the actual fuck?
Mac raised his AK and opened fire – but nothing. The fucking piece of Soviet shit was jammed. The pitchfork giant was bearing down on him. He dropped the AK to hang on its sling and smoothly transitioned to his Browning, which was in a thigh holster on his right leg.
Firing three rapid shots, he felled the man with a couple of chest wounds just as the prongs of the pitchfork came within inches of his neck. The prongs clattered against his useless AK as the giant crashed to the ground, the third round clipping the side of his head and dislodging his black turban on the way down.
‘Allahu akbar, Allahu…’ He coughed on his own blood as his lungs filled up. The words turned to a gurgle in his throat as he drowned.
Mac was breathing heavily, holding the Browning out in front of him as he scanned the area for further threats. Nothing. He holstered the pistol and lifted up the AK. He removed the magazine and racked the cocking handle back to clear the chamber. The unfired round ejected, and he replaced the magazine and cocked the weapon. But could he trust it now if he needed it again? He decided to stick with his pistol, at least while they were still inside the compound.
Satisfied that the courtyard and gate were secured in Ibrahimzai’s capable hands, Mac joined Logan on the concrete terrace. So far, this had taken less than a minute. The compound was silent, and there were no noises from beyond the walls to suggest that they’d roused the neighbours. He nudged the fallen gunman with his foot. The man was dead. A Krinkov lay by his side and Mac swooped down to pick it up, swinging the malfunctioning AK round to his back. He quickly removed the Krinkov’s magazine and, finding it empty, replaced it with one of his own.
Then he lined up as third man in the stack, behind and to one side of Logan and one of the militiamen, catching his breath so he would be ready to spring into action again. Logan waited in the doorway, hardly breathing at all as far as Mac could tell. He was holding his AK with his right hand, and he reached back with his left to count down with his fingers.
Three. Two. One.
Zero.
With a hefty kick, he slammed the door back against the inside wall, then flattened himself against the wall on the other side, using his AK to cover the left half of a large square room. The second man in the stack flew in and scanned the right-hand side of the area, sweeping his Krinkov in a wide arc. The room was empty.
Mac came through the door. Directly ahead of him, at a perpendicular, a flight of mud-brick stairs led up to the next floor. Mac heard a shout from above and running footsteps. He pointed his weapon, ready to blast away the lower legs of anyone who attempted to come down.
Meanwhile, Logan, keeping flat against the side wall of the room, made his way around the perimeter to a position from where he could fire directly up the stairs. At the same time, the militiaman took up a position by the door to ensure no one could follow them inside.
Suddenly Logan let off a burst of rapid fire, aimed towards the top of the stairs. There was a cry and then a body tumbled forward, catching a round from Mac’s borrowed Krinkov as he sprawled headfirst and crashed to the bottom of the staircase.
‘Going up,’ yelled Logan, signalling Mac to stop firing.
He leapt over the man’s body and took the stairs two at a time, ready to fire in a split second if anyone at the top had the dumb idea of coming at him.
The stairs turned a corner, at which Logan took up a covering position, pointing the barrel of his rifle up towards the landing. Mac ran past him and then stopped, crouching on the top step but one. His heart hammered and his lungs burned – his chest felt fit to burst. Finger taking up first pressure on the trigger, he listened. Silence. All he could hear was his own breathing. But he’d learned well enough never to trust a silent house, so he waited longer. If there was anyone up here, he would draw them out. Behind him, he heard Logan slowly making his way up, step by step. He came level with Mac and then indicated with a jabbing finger that he would go right and Mac should go left.
Somewhere, in one of the bedrooms, a floorboard creaked.
Mac nodded and once again Logan counted down from three with his fingers.
In unison they emerged from the staircase, back to back, sweeping the top landing, weapons primed. Mac kicked open a bedroom door. There was a man sitting on the bed, struggling to get a magazine into his weapon, but messing up with nervous fingers. He dropped it and immediately raised his hands. Mac stepped forward, his Krinkov trained on the man’s head, and with one foot kicked the guy’s AK away to the far wall.
‘On your knees.’
The man looked at him blankly. He was wearing nothing but his underpants, and in a shaft of moonlight coming through the window, Mac could see a girlie mag lying on the bed. Dirty little fucker had been cranking one out. It was all Mac could do not to burst out laughing.
‘On your fucking knees!’ Mac knew he wouldn’t understand English, so he gestured with the barrel of his gun. Then the punk understood him and dropped forward from the side of the bed to kneel on the floor. He didn’t have a hard-on now. Mac took a step backwards and bumped against Logan in the doorway.
‘Jesus Christ, Mac, we’re not taking any prisoners.’
Logan elbowed him out of the way, stepped forward and executed the man with a burst of fire before his victim even understood what was happening. His body dropped to the floor with a thud, blood flooding out of half a dozen bullet wounds.
‘There’s one more room up here,’ said Logan, quickly loading a fresh mag. ‘Door’s locked, so I reckon we’ll find Bakker on the other side of it.’
‘Come on then, let’s get him.’
Mac strode down the landing to the other end, where there was a single door leading off to the left. He tried the handle – it was indeed locked.
‘The guy on the stairs was probably on guard duty. Key’s probably in his pocket.’
‘No time,’ said Logan. He hammered the door. ‘Bakker? Are you in there?’
They listened, leaning against the door, for a reply, but there was nothing. If Bakker was in there, he could be gagged, unconscious or dead. Or maybe he wasn’t even there at all.
‘If you can hear us, get away from the door. We’re going to shoot the lock.’
There was still no answer.
Mac switched the Krinkov for his Browning and raised it to take aim, hoping to hell that Bakker was nowhere near the door. Logan stepped back and Mac braced himself – in the confined space of the upstairs landing, the noise would be piercing.
He fired.
There was a whip-crack of metal against metal as the bullet ploughed into the lock.
Mac raised his boot and launched a hefty kick, snapping the door open.
He peered into the pitch-black room, the shuttered windows not letting in a glimmer of light. His eyes, already accustomed to the dark, discerned the outline of a figure slumped against the far wall. It moved, a slight twitch, accompanied by the grunt of someone with a gag in their mouth.
Logan came up behind him and shone a torch into the room, lighting up a pathetic figure. The man was filthy, clothes ripped, gagged, hands bound behind his back, blond hair caked with blood and a bruised face. He was chained to an iron ring that had been crudely set into the wall with cement. Above the gag, Mac could read panic in his eyes.
But something didn’t stack up. He looked nothing like the photo of Tomas Bakker in his Well Diggers personnel file.
Mac blinked and looked harder. ‘Who the fuck are you?’