Chapter 30: Return of the King

"Hold on Sir David," Laura said. "I'm thinking that we shouldn't be so hasty in publicising what we think has happened. There's a lot at stake here. There are thousands of teenagers here who are looking to Jamie to lead them and thousands of others holding out the hope that he's going to liberate them from the terrorists. I think the balance of advantage here lies in keeping this quiet for now."

The Ambassador considered the young girl's words and realised she had a fair point. He was too remote from what was going on in Scotland to have fully considered the impact of Jamie's death on the survivors.

"Besides, there might be another interpretation of how the State Department have responded. Why would they even talk to you suddenly when they've been giving you the cold shoulder so far? And to go so far as to share what is probably classified information with you, isn't that a big leap from how they've been acting over the past few days?" Laura asked.

"I admit I was surprised when they shared the information with me," Sir David replied, "but what other interpretation could there be?"

"You're the career diplomat, aren't you supposed to be the expert here?" Lee joined in.

"Apparently not. It seems His Grace's sister is doing a far better job than I am. The only thing that might fit is if the State Department was authorised to give me the information as a conciliatory gesture. That might indicate that there has been a terrible accident rather than an attack that was sanctioned, or ordered," said Sir David.

"Perhaps they don't know what has happened to Jamie?" Laura suggested hopefully.

"Perhaps," said the Ambassador, belatedly realising the young girl needed something to cling-on to.

The second Blackhawk - code named fork hunter2 - had watched as the TOW fired from the Lynx somehow managed to take out one of the terrorist jeeps, despite the fact the missile was no longer being guided. Neither of the US helicopters had missiles loaded owing to the need for the extra fuel tanks so they were left with their miniguns. Of course they were still formidable weapons in the hands of the gunners.

The 7.62mm rounds sawed through the thin metalwork bodies of the two remaining jeeps, jeeps built for domestic use and therefore carrying no armour. Assam and four of his teenagers managed to scramble from the wreckage and took cover in nearby warehousing.

The team leader of the SF team on the Blackhawk signalled to the pilot that he wanted to be dropped on the roof of the building, but the pilot waved him off. There was no way he was risking taking his 'copter that close to hostile forces. Instead he wheeled away and dropped down two warehouses over to let the SF team jump out the ground.

No sooner was the team out of the helicopter than the pilot was urging his machine back up into the relative safety of the skies.

Normally, Special Forces missions in Europe would be the province of the 10th Special Forces Group (SFG) whose 1st battalion was based at Boeblingen, near Stuttgart in Germany. However, the 1st battalion had been wiped out by the virus attack on Germany and although the 2nd and 3rd battalions were based at Fort Carson, Colorado, a decision was taken to send the Green Berets of the 7th SFG instead.

Based at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, 7th SFG normally had responsibility for action in South America and the Caribbean, but now they were at Faslane in Scotland.

One ODA (operational Detachment Alpha) had been assigned to baby-sit the NSA technicians at GCHQ in Cheltenham. A second ODA was leading the current assault. The ODA had twelve team members, a Captain, a Warrant Officer and a range of specialist sergeants of various classes and seniority. The twelve had been split between the two Blackhawks so the Warrant Officer who had jumped from fork hunter2 had five men with him.

He led his men at the run towards the line of warehouses immediately in front of them. His first order of business was to hit the enemy as quickly and as hard as he could. The last thing he wanted was to give them a chance to settle, think and prepare themselves for an assault. He wanted to keep the momentum working in his favour.

The black suited squad, all wearing the distinctive US military 'brain bucket' or Kevlar helmet, sprinted for the warehouse doors. There was virtually no pause as they quickly checked through the open doors and then ran for the doors on the other side of the shed. Their rubber soled boots made surprisingly little noise and their heads swivelled from side to side and up and down, looking for danger.

The WO1 motioned for the team to slow down and take up positions on either side of the second set of doors and he glanced outside, quickly making sure the road between the warehouse they were in and the next one over was clear. A hand signal was all it took to have the five team members racing forward once more, the mix of Uzis and HKMP5s they had opted to use, braced and at the ready.

All the team members knew the warehouse the tangos had gone into was the next one over and they moved forward through this second shed with much more caution. They passed an array of machine tools and soon were taking up position once again at the shed doors that led out onto a road.

The WO1 peered round the edge of the door to take a quick peek at their target. What he saw through the open shed doors opposite were the four Pakistani teenagers who were drawing breath and thinking about what their next move should be. The Warrant Officer pulled his head back quickly, but not quite quickly enough. Assam was largely obscured from the Green Beret's view and he therefore believed he was only facing four tangos.

Assam caught movement from the warehouse door opposite and recognised it for what it was. He sized up the odds in an instant and decided a sacrifice would need to be made if he was to escape with his skin in one piece.

"Come, we can't sit around here. I think the helicopters were American, no doubt carrying soldiers of the Great Satan. We need to move. That way," he said, pointing to the warehouse opposite.

All four of the teenagers responded without thinking. They looked up and down the road to make sure it was clear and then began to scurry across to the warehouse opposite, not noticing that Assam wasn't following them.

The men of the 7th SFG couldn't believe their luck. They let the tangos reach the mid-point of the road and then stepped out and fired their weapons in unison. The teenagers danced like marionettes as the hail of lead thumped, thwacked and punched into their bodies repeatedly. It was all over in seconds, the Pakistani youths not managing to get off a single shot.

The team covered each other as they emerged from their warehouse and crossed to confirm the tangos were all dead. The next order of business was to check out the shed they had come from. By this time Assam had slipped from the doors on the other side of his shed and was trying to put as much distance between himself and the American forces as possible.

A thorough search of the shed showed that it was empty and the WO1 was convinced all the terrorists were accounted for. He didn't realise how much time had passed and was surprised to hear and then see his Captain and the other Blackhawk returning to circle over the base.

"Cap'n, why don't you get the fly boys to settle their birds to conserve fuel. All the tangos have been accounted for down here and we'll need some time to check on the Trident situation," said the Warrant Officer into his radio.

"Are you sure Wobbly-one? These are pretty expensive birds," replied the Captain.

"I'm sure sir, bring 'em down and let's try and find these Tridents."

The US Navy had supplied information about where the Trident missiles should be, so their search was relatively straightforward. It took less than twenty minutes to find the cavernous store that was blasted into the living rock and which was re-inforced with metres and metres of concrete and steel.

The Green Berets were not surprised to find the store had a sophisticated locking system to control access to the missiles and they wondered anew at why the brass was worried. No one was likely to get into this store any time soon without encrypted codes and a way to defeat other security technology such as retinal scanners.

When they radioed this information back to the Stennis they were ordered to set themselves up for a long stay defending the missile store. The Captain cursed, but immediately detailed men to set up defences and others to forage for food and water.

Aboard the Stennis Admiral Drew MacColl was not a happy camper. He had fought tooth and nail to prevent the flyboys and the Special Forces teams from ever getting near his carrier. It was an insult to ask the navy to play nursemaid and taxi for the other services. He had been told that time was of the essence and to simply get on and do what he was ordered to. As an Admiral, he wasn't used to such treatment.

He knew that on occasion the navy hosted Special Forces missions, but it had never happened on one of his ships and he had first of all refused to let them onto the Stennis until a direct order arrived from the President himself. The order made it clear he was to sail that day and that the Chief of Staff of the United States military thought it was actually a good idea to have all the services represented for this mission.

Now he was sitting in the command and operations room shaking his head. He hated to say 'I told you so' but now he had been proved right. Some trigger happy SF 'superman' had splashed the King of Scots and some of the shit that was even now hitting the proverbial rotating air cooler was bound to land on him.

There would also be an inquiry, despite all the shit that was going on around them. Rules were rules and an inquiry would follow as sure as night followed day.

"At least they took out the terrorists and confirmed the Trident missiles are secure," he thought to himself, "thank heavens for small mercies."

Stuart regained consciousness first, the pain from a wound in his shoulder brining him round. He groaned as he tried to roll over and realised that he was lying on top of Jamie. Pain flooded his body, from the wound, from the force of the crash-landing and from the impact with the wall he was up against. He struggled to pull off the flying helmet that Jamie always insisted he wear. It was a fair bet that the helmet had saved both of them from damage to their heads when they had collided with the wall.

He paused for a moment to let the sudden feeling of nausea pass and then pulled himself up into a sitting position. A glance behind him showed the Lynx, or at least what was left of it. Stuart realised they had been very lucky that they had reached and opened the door to the building they were in. If they been out in the open and closer to the helicopter when it exploded, there was no doubt they would have been caught by debris and shrapnel.

"Jamie! Jamie, wake up man," he called.

When there was no reply he leant over and shook Jamie's shoulder. His friend twitched and then let out a groan.

"Jamie, wake up. Are you all right?" Stuart tried again.

Another groan came from Jamie's slumped form and then his arm moved. Moments later, Stuart could see the other boy trying to push himself up from the floor. Stuart continued to talk, hoping that would help in some way.

"You've really got to practice those landings man, that was kinda rough," he said.

He heard a strangled laugh from inside Jamie's flying helmet and then a gasp of pain.

"Don't make me laugh, it hurts when I laugh, but then it hurts when I don't laugh as well," Jamie managed to get out.

He turned himself over and rested his back against the wall that they had both cannoned into. It was clearly a struggle, but eventually he managed to remove his helmet and looked across at the other boy.

"How many fingers am I holding up?" Stuart asked.

"Twelve," replied Jamie, making the other teenager laugh in turn.

"How far away from the base did we get?" Stuart asked, getting back to business.

"Probably not far enough. Can you stand? We should probably try and find some transportation and get as far away from here as possible," Jamie replied.

He pulled himself up, using the wall to help steady himself. He realised his body had taken some punishment over the past few days and was also concerned about the blood on Stuart's shoulder. He saw that his friend has also managed to get to his feet and they moved toward the door with their legs still slightly wobbly.