Nasiriyah, 215 miles south-east of Baghdad, Iraq
Fifteen Years Ago
Enoch Hart narrowed his eyes against the sun and followed the black smoke as it mushroomed up into the sky. Smoking shreds of blackened paper drifted across his vision like confetti. The air was as hot as a furnace, and the clawing stench of war filled his nostrils. He rubbed his mouth and felt his lips crack in the dry, unrelenting heat.
The three surviving members of the SAS team were huddled behind a burned-out Toyota pickup truck in the middle of a heavily shelled road on the outskirts of Nasiriyah. On both sides of the road lay ruined buildings. Shop fronts had been reduced to crumbling shells of exposed brickwork and shattered masonry.
The mission had been simple but not easy: take out an insurgent-held communications centre and then get to the extraction point before the enemy knew what hit them. Taking out the target had gone like clockwork. However, due to faulty intelligence concerning the strength of enemy numbers, their escape was now spinning out of control. The hornet’s nest had been truly kicked, and all hell was breaking loose around them.
Disguised in Arab dress, the elite soldiers of 22 SAS Regiment reloaded their weapons and assessed their dwindling options under the blazing Iraqi sun. Less than forty-eight hours ago, they had been training in the famous ‘Killing House’ facility at SAS headquarters in leafy Herefordshire, England. Now, they were breathing in the choking dust of an Iraqi war zone.
‘Got to get off this bloody road!’ shouted Hart to the two other men as he racked the cocking bolt of his weapon.
On the opposite side of the street, the barrel of a machine gun edged out and right-angled itself around the corner of a wall. It let off a ragged burst of gunfire. A flurry of bullets zipped overhead and thudded into a wall on the other side of the road.
‘Any ideas?’ cried the squad leader as he adjusted his dark wraparound sunglasses.
Hart rubbed his dripping neck and motioned to a large building fifty feet down the road. ‘Over there. We might be able to bust out the back.’
Resting the barrel of his weapon against the truck, the third SAS man in the group followed Hart’s line of vision down the optical sight of his machine gun. With the side of his bearded face still snug against the weapon, he concurred with Hart’s proposal. ‘Looks like it’s our only play.’
It was a crapshoot, but if they didn’t move soon, they would be all out of options.
‘Okay,’ called out the squad leader while risking a glance over the roof of the truck. Through the shimmering reflection of the asphalt road ahead, he could make out movement. ‘Hostiles, maybe a dozen, at least one heavy machine—’ His voice was drowned out by the ripping blast of a sniper rifle fired from high on the building opposite.
Hart felt something splatter against his cheek. He whirled around to see his comrade crumple to the ground. Blood bubbled up from behind a smoking bullet hole in the squad leader’s sunglasses. It quickly pooled around his head in a crimson halo. Hart was immediately on his knees assessing the injury, but it was hopeless. The sniper round had torn through the soldier’s head.
Hart and the other SAS man locked eyes, and a steely determination grew in their faces. Together, they mouthed a hurried countdown and then bolted in the direction of the building. A fraction of a second later, the place erupted in gunfire. Bullets tore effortlessly through the side of the truck, punching lines of holes into the metal panelling. Searing rounds whizzed and zipped around them as bursts of gunfire cut through the air.
The two SAS men returned fire as they ran, the rat-a-tat of their weapons deafening in their ears. Out of the corner of his eye, Hart glimpsed shapes closing in on the pickup truck behind them. He gritted his teeth and willed himself forwards. They were now only twenty feet away. His chest burned as his feet scrambled over the loose terrain towards the building.
Fifteen feet.
Raking gunfire churned up the dust all around their feet as they ran.
Ten.
They vaulted over the low wall surrounding the building.
Five.
Almost there.
Skidding to a stop, the two men simultaneously grabbed for the door handle.
Then, a muzzle flashed from the opposite side of the road. A boom echoed off the surrounding buildings, and Hart heard the sickening sound of shattering bone feet away from him. An instant later blood misted the door. Hart’s comrade collapsed to the ground. His legs kicked out with a violent spasm before his body went slack. Another loud shot and a bullet whizzed past Hart’s cheek. It drilled a hole through the wooden doorframe in an explosion of splinters.
Hart turned and aimed his weapon wildly at the invisible enemy. Before he could get a round off, he felt the searing punch of a bullet cut across the top of his left arm. He was a sitting duck. Pain spiked through him as he tore open the door. Almost falling through, he slammed it shut and locked the bolt behind him. With dread spilling through him, Hart scrambled away from the door.
For an instant there was silence, and then came an explosion of sound. Bullet holes riddled the door, sending pencils of light in random directions. As Hart fell to the ground for cover, pain lashed along his left side. Desperately, he felt the shredded material of his jacket. His fingertips came away stained red. Cursing, he raised himself onto his elbow and craned his head to the roof. In the gloom, his eyes slowly adjusted to his new surroundings. He was momentarily puzzled. Unlike its bare exterior, the inside of the building was elaborately adorned with gold and blue paint. A striking fresco of a man’s face stared down from the roof. It looked like the face of a religious icon. Was this a church?
The sound of raking gunfire tearing into the fabric of the building snapped him back to his senses. There was no back door or rear window. He was trapped. He shook the pain from his head and quickly reloaded his weapon.
Moving closer to one of the simple windows at the front, Hart snatched a glance outside, trying to evaluate the positions of the enemy. Almost instantly he shrank away from the window at what met his eyes. Close to the pickup truck, an insurgent heaved a rocket-propelled grenade launcher onto his shoulder. Panic raced through Hart’s body as he clocked the weapon and frantically scrambled over to the opposite wall.
His eyes darted around the room and landed on a small piece of carpet in the centre of the floor. One of its corners was folded over to reveal the edge of a brass grille set flush into the floor tiles. Hart dashed over and tore back the mat to reveal the grille underneath. He could see steps leading down into a basement. Using his weapon as a lever, he worked it open and slid it to one side.
As he lowered himself through the hole, his world erupted in a storm of flying brick. A rolling shockwave of rubble, smoke and flame threw Hart forward down the steps. He tumbled downwards, his vision exploding in white light as his body slammed against the hard edge of the steps. He came to rest face up in a cloud of floating dust, his arm unnaturally twisted up under his back.
Slowly he blinked his eyes open. For a moment, everything skewed in his vision, with shapes blurring in and out of view. He heard the echo of a disembodied voice and saw a swirling confusion of forms around him. Then a hazy silhouette materialised from the mist. It was a man. Hart felt himself drifting away, as he strained to focus on the outline of the figure bearing down on him. The man wore a white robe, like a monk.