‘They’re scared to return fire,’ Charlie says inside the house.
With the trees and foliage masking their arrival, Safa and Emily run aiming and ready. Harry carrying the Browning. Ben with the Barrett. Heart rates building. Tension growing. This is it. This is the start of the show of force.
‘THIS IS ALPHA . . . SHOOT TO KILL . . . MAXIMUM AGGRESSION . . . MOTHER, IF YOU CAN HEAR ME, DEPLOY THE SOLDIERS TO THE GROUND FLOOR . . .’
‘Flash-bangs,’ Emily mutters. They hear the explosions. Tens of them thrown on the order of Bravo into the drawing room. The booms sound and roll. Percussive and full of bass. Glass smashing. The windows blowing out. ‘Bravo goes in,’ she says.
‘IN IN IN,’ Bravo roars in the house. His strong, cultured private-school tones so loud and deep. Seconds later, the sound of sustained gunfire comes through to the four still working their way towards the house. One submachine gun at first. Then more. More and more. Harry remembers the man reaching his hand in to fire into the stairwell.
‘Faster,’ Safa orders, increasing the speed. They see figures in camouflage pouring across the grounds towards the front door.
They will not send every soldier in the house. The British Army is one of the finest fighting forces in the world. They are excellent at what they do. You have to work harder to be better, to be faster.
‘LEFT SIDE,’ Emily snaps, the figure seen. Her finger squeezes the trigger, the first shots from their side are taken. The first kill gained as the soldier spins in surprise, blown back off his feet. The sound of the M4 assault rifle masked by the cacophony of noise searing the air.
‘FASTER.’ Safa runs now. Leading her team. A camouflaged figure glimpsed ahead. She aims, waits for him to come into view behind the tree and fires, shooting the soldier dead. She snatches a glance at her watch. Four minutes.
‘AHEAD, AHEAD,’ Safa screams. ‘DOWN DOWN DOWN . . .’
Figures running at them, drawn by the shots. She aims and fires. Rounds whip through the foliage. Fire is returned. Emily holds, aiming, waiting. She fires a burst, a figure drops. Safa kills another. Emily takes the third, pauses and tracks the fourth running away. She guns him down, shooting him in the back.
Four minutes twenty.
‘FASTER,’ Safa orders.
In the house, Harry runs with his arm covering his face to protect it from the debris flying past. Noise everywhere. He drops. Unable to move on. His arms and face bleeding.
They sprint through the undergrowth. Safa checks her watch. Four minutes fifty. She sees the spot. The foliage between them and the house now much thinner. Soldiers still running in. Soldiers all around them. They take advantage of the chaos to run through and hope to hell they reach the mark.
‘WE’VE GOT THEM PINNED,’ Bravo shouts into his radio.
Safa looks at her watch. Four minutes fifty-five. She fires while running at a soldier. Rounds slam into his chest. Emily fires to the side. Ben and Harry stay behind. Knowing the drill. Seeing the spot they have to reach.
On the servants’ stairs, Miri glares at her stopwatch. ‘Five minutes six seconds, five minutes six seconds.’
‘GO NOW, GO NOW,’ Harry roars a few feet from her. He changes the magazine in his pistol as he prepares to go down and engage to buy time.
‘HOLD,’ Miri shouts.
Bravo grins. He’s got them pinned in place.
Outside the house, Harry reaches the spot. Emily and Safa go left and right. Harry goes in between them, dropping to brace the heavy machine gun on the bipod. Ben stops behind them. Lifting the sniper rifle to sweep round.
In the drawing room, Bravo turns towards the door with his hand lifting to the radio mic to transmit the situation and suggest they look for the exit point from that corridor.
Outside, Harry sees the soldiers and black-clad figures pouring fire into the wall. The room full of them. So many. More still running into the house. A growl. A lip curls. His finger pulls back and all other sound around them is blotted out by the enormous thud of the Browning roaring to life.
He pours rounds through the window. Bravo’s heightened instincts and speed of reaction save his life while all around him men die screaming.
Ben said this has to be done, so Harry fires to slaughter them from the rear. This is war. Bad things happen in war. His whole body judders from the recoil as he feeds the belt into the gun.
The noise of the heavy machine gun draws the soldiers who are still outside the house. Emily and Safa fire hard and fast. Killing them as they run.
The soldiers take cover and fire back. Ben breathes. Focussed and controlled. He sweeps round, staring down the sights. Waiting, doing what he practised. He fires without thinking. He fires suddenly and takes the recoil in his already sore shoulder with a glimpse of the pink mist left where the soldier’s head was before the fifty-calibre round took it away.
‘TIME TO GO . . . MOVE NOW . . .’ Safa shouts.
Harry surges up, lifting the Browning as he rises. Emily and Safa covering his flanks. They run on, aiming for the patch of higher ground.
Echo staggers from the door ramming into his back on the landing. The five agents turn to see the famous face of Safa Patel with that split second of hesitancy buying her the time to press the attack. Safa Patel against five of the best agents the British Secret Service has. She holds them off. She doesn’t win, but neither do they. A blur of arms. A blur of bodies moving, twisting, blocking and countering. Safa held five of you off on her own. You ever see anyone else do that?
Ben sights the door of the house. That’s his marker. Behind him, Harry strafes the undergrowth, suppressing the forces. Safa and Emily flank Ben. Covering his sides. Calm now. Easy now. Ben breathes, steadying his nerve as he lifts the aim from the door and up to see through the windows. There she is. Safa fighting five people on her own. The sight is stunning. Mesmerising. An incredible display of her prowess. She moves like water. So graceful. So brutal. So fucking fast. He spots Emily, Tango Two. She looks so different there. Attacking Safa. Being beaten back by Safa. All of them being held off by Safa. Ben grins. He can’t help it.
‘I fucking love you, Safa.’
‘Focus, bellend.’
Ben sees Harry run from the door on the landing to slam a vicious kidney punch into Charlie’s side. The whole thing is a blur. Figures seemingly dancing and weaving. He sees Alpha kick at Harry. He sees himself run from the door into the fray. He drops the sight to the stairs. Seeing the soldiers and agents starting to climb. A twitch of the sights back to the fight on the landing. Miri leading Bertie, Ria, Roland and Susan.