“And that is?”
“Everyone in the world dies!”
ACT 55
There did not seem any point in restraining Jane she was already stuck on a small fishing boat out in the North Atlantic. I had kept the phone and removed its battery, so that it could not be used as a tracking device. I did not know what to believe about Jane, I doubted that I could trust her. She had seemed so genuine and passionate when we had made love back in Sandside Croft. I did not know if I loved her, or hated her. I was disappointed in myself for having been fooled, and for having feelings for someone so short a time after meeting them. She was stunningly beautiful, but had been willing to place all of our lives in danger. Perhaps she believed Marcus’s promises to her. If this was as it looked to be. I was sure that we would all die. The question was how we died and where we died. Jane had lied to Marcus, when she told him we were not armed any more. We had a full complement of arms, including the Claymore Anti Personal Mines along with our AS50’s and all the other small arms. We did have enough fuel in the Boat for about another four to five hundred miles. I needed to talk to Lachie, Hans and Abdalla without Jane present. But I needed her to stay in my eyesight at the same time. I asked her to stand at the front of the boat while we sat down on the deck just in front of the wheelhouse. Sandy was at the wheel Stuart and Rosemary were back down in the Galley. Dusty was sleeping in a bunk. He did not fare well at sea and had been sea sick most of the time since we left Dounreay.
“Do you have a plan Andy?” Abdalla asked me.
“I do have a plan in my mind but it is continually formulating and I am not even sure if most of it will work.
“Try breaking your plan down into little segments, I have always found it is easier that way” Hans said as he toyed with his KaBar on the wood of the deck.
“Don’t you think it would be better for you to lead us in this Hans?”
“I have experience this is true as does Abdalla. But we are not British citizens. You are the correct choice as you are the highest ranking British soldier here.”
“I also agree with both Hans and Abdalla, you are the correct choice to lead us. Andy you and I go way back and I have always trusted your judgement. So what do you have in mind for us?”
Lachie spoke warmly and with a confidence in me, a confidence that I truly did not have in myself.
“OK so breaking it down the first thing we need to do is in two parts. The first is to get the Catherine May out of sight from any other boats or ships. And if at all possible out of Satellite viewing. I am sure that Marcus Brown will be searching for us, as will ‘The Suit’. Hopefully for now they will be looking for us in all the wrong places. But at some point they will widen their search locations and they will check every inhabited and uninhabited Island between here and Iceland. So we have to either stop them or should I say, stop both of them looking for us. Hans has found an inlet which he describes as a bit of a Fjord and that the water, seems to flow into a cave at the foot of the North West cliffs on this Island. The second part is to move the helicopter and the barrel, preferably to separate locations on this Island. If we can find some way to hide the chopper or disguise it that would be of a great help. So let’s get part one done. Did you get enough rest Hans?”
“Yes thank you Andy. I can work on just an hour or two of sleep at a time.”
“Right guys, let’s do part one. When we get close to the Fjord, Hans and I will go in first and make sure there is space for the Catherine May. Then if there is we will guide you in. Then we take it from there.”
We all stood up and filled our back packs with items that we thought we would require, Torches, and the rope tied of in one foot increments with a lead weight tied to the bottom, had been made up for me by Stuart. Hans would man the outboards, and I would take the readings. It was almost midday on a beautiful clear and calm spring morning. The weather itself was a long way removed from the hell that was in my mind.
I instructed Lachie to keep a close watch on Jane, Abdalla would keep an eye out for any approaching craft or aircraft. Hans and I got in the Zodiac and cast of from the bow. We moved into the little fjord slowly and steadily. I took constant readings which varied from forty feet to twelve in the actual inlet. I could not see any opening for a cave as it was completely dark at the end of the inlet. I switched on my torch and shone it directly ahead. There was a cave there but I was not sure if there was enough height for the Catherine May. There was just about enough width and with twelve feet of water below, so there was enough depth. Hans and I entered the cave it was huge. I shone my torch to the ceiling and around the walls. Inside there was a small but accessible shoreline. We approached it slowly until the bow of the Zodiac touched the course sand.
“What do you think Hans? Will the Catherine May get in and more to the point will she be able to get out?”
“From the look of things the tide is in. When the tide is out the ceiling will be higher at the entrance but the depth of water below the boat will be less. I think the tide in here probably rises and falls about four feet. So yes I think the Catherine May can get in if we drop her radio masts, and Take the life raft containers from on top of the wheelhouse she should make it in. It is the perfect place to hide her and safe too. Due to the way the inlet comes in from the north and then swings to the east. It will be totally invisible to sight, radar and satellite. The beach area is big enough for people to get ashore and stretch their legs even though it’s only thirty or forty feet.”
“What’s that over there Hans?”
I shone my torch to the right hand side of the sandy beach. There looked to be an old wooden jetty of some form. I got off the Zodiac and walked over. There was indeed a small wooden jetty, well what was left of it. There were some rough hewn posts and most of the planking had rotted but there were still a couple of feeble looking boards left. I shone my torch around the area looking to see if there was a way up. Some carved stone steps had been chiselled out of the rock face. I walked towards it then I saw it. There was a skeleton laid on the steps. The clothes were nothing more than a few strands of some canvas like material.
“Over here Hans.”
Hans came over to where I was standing
“Who is he?”
“I don’t have a clue Hans, but I think he has been here for a very long time, probably more than a hundred years. That wooden Jetty has rotted over many years, and judging by the skeleton no one has been in here since his or her demise.”
Hans looked around the area of the body and only found an old flask. There was a leather belt about the skeleton with a large plain brass buckle. There was an old knife that had rusted to nothing so that just a stump and an ivory or bone handle remained.
“Do you think he got stuck in here Andy?”
“I think it is more likely that he was killed or died from the Black Death. According to Rosemary the Island was ravaged by the Bubonic plague and everyone either left or died. I wonder where those steps lead.”
“You stay here and look around I will go back to the Catherine May and see if we can clear the top of the wheelhouse. Then I will lead them in. It should be about half an hour.”
“OK Hans see you soon.”
I went up the steps they were slippery at the start where the tide had come in. But after a few steps they became just wet from the moisture within the cave. I climbed up and then the steps just stopped. I would guess about two hundred feet above sea level. There appeared to have been an opening in the past. Either someone had blocked it or there had been a cave in. So now there was no exit to the surface of the Island from here. I walked back down to the Skeleton and gave it a quick examination from the number of ribs it was a man. He had only a few teeth left in his mouth, not an uncommon thing from his era of time. But there was no obvious sign of murder. It was of course possible that he had been blocked in here and left to die. He would not have survived much more than a few minutes in the frigid North Atlantic Sea, if he had tried to swim for it. I heard the Zodiac before I saw it then I saw two spotlights close behind. I could make out the silhouetted figures either side of her with poles ensuring that the Catherine May did not hit the sides of the entrance. The top of the wheelhouse had been cleared and the boat slid almost silently under the opening to this large underground chasm.
Hans powered the Zodiac up onto the beach and killed the three Honda Engines. We would have to find a way to secure the Catherine May so that as the tide came and went she would not damage herself on the walls of this cave. I would leave that up to Sandy and Stuart to organise. He could use us, if needs be to assist with that. I knew he no longer had an Anchor. So she would have to be fixed to at least one wall.
“What did you find out about our friend here?” Hans said pointing to the bones at the foot of the steps.
“Not a lot, just that he is, sorry, was a man. The steps lead up about two hundred feet and then it’s blocked off. It might be worth a look on the surface? We know roughly where it is in conjunction to the inlet.”
“OK Andy I am going to start ferrying most of the folks to the shore then Hans and Abdalla along with myself can take a look around the Island. I still have the tarp that I used to cover the Helicopter at Altnabreac but we will have to do something to change it from being white. That or else we find another way to hide the helicopter.”
“OK if Sandy needs some help in tying off the boat, then we will do that, before we take off and have a look on top”
Hans and I pushed the Zodiac back into the water and he set off the thirty or so feet to the boat. He started ferrying people ashore. Lachie, Rosemary, Jane, Dusty, Abdalla and Kyla came ashore. They all had backpacks and also Rosemary had a Tilley Lamp which illuminated the entire cave. It was almost silent in there with just the gentle lapping of the water at the walls of the cave. The roof extended up almost at the same angle as the lie of the land above so it was between thirty and two hundred and twenty feet high. With the narrow ledge which had the steps carved into the bare rock, going up to about two hundred feet and then coming to a sudden end. It was decided to set up some form of camp on the beach. Sandy managed to find enough points to secure the boat to one wall. So we ferried him and Stuart to the internal beach of the vast cave. Sandy gave us some netting that we could use in conjunction with the tarp to help hide the helicopter, as soon as we had finished doing what I had in mind. We took the Zodiac and went back around the coast to where I had first seen Hans, when we arrived. Hans guided the boat into where the pathway, led up to the top of the Island. We had climbed the path and then over a piece of well grazed ground. Still walking upwards until, we could see the unmanned lighthouse in front of us. About fifty yards to the left of it was the helicopter. And next to it was the barrel. There was absolutely nowhere to hide the Helicopter. I walked around the Island looking for the Pictish settlement that Rosemary had told us about, without any success apart from mounds of stones. So we spread out and worked a full grid on the Island. Still we found nothing, except the sheep, that were the sole inhabitants of this barren Isle. The only standing building was the lighthouse.
“Abdalla do you think that between the three of us we could very carefully move the barrel to the lighthouse.”
Abdalla and Hans were both big powerful men, much more so than me.
“I think Hans and I could carry it from the helicopter between us. It would be more awkward with three of us we would end up tripping. We could make a cradle from the ropes and cut some of the tarpaulin. But we would need some strong poles.”
“Can we use the hand rails from the walkway of the lighthouse? They look to be made from two inch galvanised steel tubing. The only problem is how do we cut it into lengths?”
“There has to be some tools in the lighthouse let’s take a quick look in there.”
Hans tried the door
“Locked” He said
Abdalla gave it an almighty kick with the full weight of his solid body behind it.
“Not any more”
“Subtle Abdalla, Real subtle”
“It’s open. You wanted it open and I doubt they left the key under the mat”
“You have been sitting to close to Lachie I think, Abdalla”
We walked in and it had the hollow and empty sound that functional but non domestic buildings have. There was a hallway with two more doors and a short flight of stairs to the actual light room. Power was from an array of solar panels along with a small wind turbine. Abdalla pushed his shoulder against the first door, forcing it open, and we went in. I tried the handle as I went past it, it was unlocked.
“Abdalla the door was not locked”
“So?”
“Nothing”
We struck gold there were a multitude of tools including a large hacksaw.
“Problem solved” Hans said as he picked it up along with a large ten-pound hammer.
“We only need to cut one end then we can bend it until it snaps. Rather than expending all our energy sawing.
So that is what we did. We had two six foot lengths of heavy steel piping. We laid out the tarpaulin and carefully lay the barrel on its side on top. Then we doubled up the edged of the tarpaulin and cut holes with our KaBars so that we threaded the pipes through like a curtain pole. Then put ropes under the tarpaulin and barrel for extra measure tying off both ends. Abdalla stood at the front between the two poles that lay on the ground. Then Hans went and stood the same way at the back. Each of them bent down and picked the poles up, until they had taken up the slack.
“Lift on three” Abdalla commanded
“One, Two, Three”
Both men groaned at the weight of the barrel. It came off the ground. Taking the weight on their shoulders as they straightened their backs, they started walking towards the lighthouse. I helped Hans on the back as we went up the three steps to the door. Then we walked in to the main corridor. They carefully put it down on the floor of the hallway.
“Can we stand it up so that the sealing clamp is at the top? Sorry for asking you to do all the donkey work while I watch” I said.
They stood the barrel up and we went back outside into the sunshine
“Now what do we do?” Asked Hans
“Now we try and Hide the Helicopter, if we use the tarpaulin along with the netting. We should be able to gather enough clumps of grass to weave them into the fishing net. It won’t be perfect but hopefully it will pass a cursory glance or a satellite image. At least if we use enough grass and any gorse and whin bushes we can find.”
It took us almost two hours to cover the chopper. Not perfect but to my eyes it looked pretty damn good.
“What now?” asked Abdalla.
I think Hans had already figured out. What I had in mind to do with the barrel, but he had like me kept it to himself.
“We go back and eat then sleep the light will be fading soon. Hopefully we will have a worry free night, one without someone trying to kill us.”
We strolled back down the hill and down the pathway to our Zodiac. Then we followed the coast back into the cave. There was a small fire burning when we got there, the smoke drifted out the entrance. I supposed they were cooking on the beach or trying to keep warm. Abdalla jumped out of the boat as soon as we got there and quickly covered the fire with sand.
“What did you do that for?” Jane asked
“Do you want to get us all caught. The smoke coming from that fire is drifting out of the opening and could be seen by satellite or passing aircraft. This is supposed to be an uninhabited Island. That means NO OPEN FIRES during daylight hours. If you want to cook them, we use the Boats cooker or you eat cold rations.”
Jane looked really embarrassed and I thought she was about to cry. I could also see the disappointment on the faces of Rosemary, Sandy, Stuart and Dusty. Lachie also looked ashamed. I felt for him but I knew Abdalla was right to do what he did and he was also right to chastise them all for it. Our lives depended on us being invisible at the moment.
“Sorry folks but Abdalla is correct. Now we are back with the Zodiac you can go back and forth to the Catherine May as you like. I would suggest that we men make a latrine over there behind the old jetty and Rosemary and Jane use the toilet on the Catherine May. As far as cooking goes I say we make a large pan of pasta, I saw that Sandy has some on board. If you want to wash use the sea. We can’t afford to waste the fresh water we have. It’s just for cooking and drinking nothing else. Is that OK with every one?”
They all nodded their agreement to this. I planned to tell them later what I had in store for tomorrow and possibly the following day. But for tonight, every one deserved a rest. Time just to chill out. I still needed to have a chat with Jane. I knew my feelings towards her were true, but in light of her recent admissions I wondered, if she had just played me. She had said to Marcus on the phone, that she loved him. So I was not sure that she was being truthful about us. Perhaps she was one of those women that use men in the same way that some men use women. Would she remain loyal to our side of the divide and what would she think to my plan when I revealed it? I waited until she wanted to go on board to use the boats toilet and I went across with her in the Zodiac. It probably looked strange to everyone else. I had told no one about what Jane and I had been up to in Sandside Croft. I was not even sure if I wanted to tell my oldest and dearest friend. Though I knew I would at some point, just not now. We tied off at the stern of the Catherine May and then I got on board and offered my hand to her, which she took. That electricity that had flowed between us at the croft was still there, but it was tinged with a feelings of betrayal.
“You are not here just to watch me pee, are you Andy?”
“No I wanted to catch you alone. I need to know where we stand. I don’t just mean we, as in you and me, I mean the, we, as in you me and all of us here. What you did before, in using us. It was wrong. I know that you thought you were following orders, and that you were serving two masters as in Marcus and ‘The Suit’ and that the lines between right and wrong became blurred and the lines between emotion and loyalties also were crossed. You said you were falling in love with me. Was that just an act? Was the passion in Sandside another act? Was the confession an act? I have to know what is real.”
“Yes I was in love with Marcus at least I think I was. It could have been infatuation. I think it was not so much me, but Marcus. He has a way of using people, to get things he wants done. Marcus told me not to trust ‘The Suit’ I really don’t know his real name, I was just to get ‘him’ on the phone, or call the ‘number two’. We all only started calling him ‘The Suit’, after you started to call him that. It just kind of stuck. So much so that even Marcus referred to him that way. As far as my feeling for you go, they are real. My heart flutters when you are close to me. I never planned for the thing at the croft. It just happened and I have not slept with Marcus. He kept promising to take me away with him. He was going to leave his wife. We were going to go and live in Mexico. He said he was going to buy a Hacienda near the beach, just south of Cancún. I realise now that he was just using me, as he used every one including you and your friends. It was the same way he used the other team, before you. I should have told you before.”
“Yes Jane you should have told me from the start. I need to be sure I can trust you, not just with my feelings but because all of our lives depend on us working together.”
“Andy, there is one more thing that you have to know.”
“What’s that Jane?”
“Remember being told that there might be a Wet Work team sent in to get you?”
“Yes that was just after we had a visit from Mervin”
“What I should have told you yesterday, or even the day before. When the Black Door ops were closed, you were all automatically placed on that list. They were only holding off, from killing you, to see if you found what had been taken from Porton Down. ‘The Suit’ and his men are the Wet Work team. When they find you they will kill all of you.”
I grabbed her by her wrists and stared her eye to eye
“What about the men from the Island and, those that wanted this boat?”
“They were hired by Marcus. To make sure he got the barrel”
“And you just thought you would keep that little bit of information to your fucking self! You know that because, you are with us. They will, Fucking kill you, and your dad as well. They will not come and say, we will kill him and him and then say, oh we will not kill her or her innocent father, or Rosemary. They will fucking try to wipe us all out, in the one hit. Jesus, Jane for a member of the SIS you have behaved like a complete fucking idiot. I don’t even know how to feel about you know.”
I must have been shouting because Lachie shouted over the water
“Is everything all right over there?”
I put my head around the side of the wheelhouse
“We are fine Lachie I have just a few disagreements with the way SIS have been playing us. I will be back over with Jane in a minute.”
“Just go to the toilet Jane. I will wait here for you.”
She came back five minutes later. I could tell she had been crying but had wiped her face. Her eyes were red.
“Come on Jane lets go. We will work it all out”
We got back into the zodiac and went back to the shore. Rosemary and Jane then went back to the boat and cooked up a big pan of pasta with tomatoes and smoked sausage along with a bucket of coffee. And it was actually a bucket. Rosemary said that she had scrubbed it clean using sea water and then wiped it out and boiled up the coffee in it. They brought back bowels and cups for all along with the pasta and coffee. We ate for the greater part in silence, with just the odd bit of chit chat. I guess my shouting at Jane had worried them all a little. I had decided to not throw all the blame at Jane’s door publically. Lachie, Hans and Abdalla already knew. And it would have proved pointless to destroy her relationship with her father. I was however going to tell everyone just how much danger they were in. My plan would initially place them in a very high level of danger, if not kill them outright. Rosemary and Stuart cleared the plates and washed them along with the pans in the sea.
ACT 56
“OK can everybody gather around, I want to tell you about my plans for tomorrow, I will be doing some things, that I feel need to be done. It is my opinion that the barrel that we thought contained some form of radioactive compound, does not. I believe that its contents are far more dangerous to the world. We have also been working for the wrong side. I have previously shared my suspicions with my military brothers that you all know. We have unwittingly been working for a man who is very high up in an organisation called SIS. This is not a new organisation. They have been around since before World War Two. Most of you guys will have heard of MI5 and MI6 on the movies all that James bond stuff, well SIS is the parent umbrella for them. We, that is to say those of us from a military, or even Jane from the police, were recruited to work for SIS under the guise of saving the UK from some kind of terrorist attack. It turns out that the terrorist attack to be carried out by our boss. He is at the top of the Spy world. The team that has been chasing us and trying to kill us all are the good guys, in all of this. Due to the embarrassing nature, to the British Government a gagging notice has been issued on us, a bit like those that they put on newspapers. Except the order that has been issued on us, is for us to be killed.”
The faces of all the civilian members of our team went white and there were gasps, Sandy and Stuart both hugged Rosemary, and Jane hugged her father.
“I want to give you all an opportunity not to take part in what I am proposing to do. You can go your own way and try to hide. All of us including the civilians cannot use our banks, credit cards, passports even our cars without triggering an alarm. That will result in a wet team being sent to kill you. You can’t go to your homes or the homes of your friends and families. The Catherine May cannot be seen without the risk of it being destroyed. All of this is because of this Barrel of stuff that was stolen by the man we work for. The rest of the world believes that we intend to use it either for financial gain or to cause World War Three.”
I let that set in and then told them the next part of my plan. If that part worked then I would tell them what I would be doing, but only after I had completed the first piece of my plan. If it failed, we would all be dead anyway. So it would be of no consequence and would be moot.
“Tomorrow along with one volunteer, I intend to open the barrel to see what its contents are. I will be opening it inside the lighthouse building. Where there is no wind. If it is filled with Radioactive Plutonium or Uranium, then our Advanced NBC Suits should protect us long enough for me to replace the top. If it is filled with Biological material, then our suits MAY protect us. They will not protect you, assuming that the contents inside are in damaged containers from the rough handling that the barrel has suffered recently. If the contents are in SAFE containers, then we will be fine. I am told that most Biological material made for armaments are either in fragile thin plastic vials bottles or glass ones. Assuming they are not damaged there will be no immediate danger to us or for that matter to the world. I can’t call anyone to help us, without them sending people immediately to kill all of us.”
It was quiet before. But now the silence was palpable, so much so that the other noises of the sea blocked out even my thoughts for a moment.
“I will volunteer” Jane put her hand up as if she was in a classroom at school.
“Be very sure, because if I am wrong either way, if it is Uranium of some futurist form of Ebola in a damaged container. Then we will die. It will only be a question of how long and how painful, that death is.”
“I am sure Andy a lot of this is my fault.”
“The only person who can bear the full blame is Marcus Brown. So now you all need to decide what you want to do. I will give you all until tomorrow. If you want to leave then go, if you want to help. Then stay. The only chance any of us have of getting out of this alive is to stop this entire operation that was being carried out against our Country. Now we have had a busy few days, get some sleep. Tonight no one will shoot at us.”
Lachie came over to me with Hans and Abdalla.
“You intend to destroy it somehow don’t you?”
“Yes I think so, and we will need to figure out a way to do that, without a laboratory.”
ACT 57
I woke in the morning, washed myself in the sea water. I even shaved. Rosemary and Abdalla were up before me and had been to the Catherine May and made a big pan of porridge and again a bucket of coffee. I ate mine and even had a second bowl. I now needed to know who was staying and who was going. I finished up my breakfast and loaded up the Zodiac with Two blue ANBC suits along with a bag of tools. Then the time was there to ask.
“OK folks you have had a night to sleep on it. I will not force anyone to stay, but I have to ask you to tell me now. Are you staying or are you going?”
My gaze fell upon Lachie first. I knew he would stand by my side until death. That was just his way. He was my true friend, who asked nothing in return except honesty. If I was entirely truthful I hoped they would all say that they were going as that would make my task a lot easier. Lachie’s eyes locked with mine and he simply nodded. Abdalla the consummate soldier, he stood as always proud and tall, a Kenyan tribal elder who became a soldier, to protect his country from terrorists, both from within and without his homeland. This was not truly his fight. The soldier in him was telling him, you never leave a man behind. He had promised me his allegiance. His moral compass would not allow him to break that. Hans only wanted right to win over wrong. Like Abdalla he too was a soldier to the core and would stand back to back until there was no fight to be won or lost. These men were my brothers in arms, they would stand with me not just as my friends, rather they would stand with me as a matter of duty. We would stand together until there was no blood in our veins to power our hearts and bodies.
They all said “stay” almost in harmony with each other
The civilians and I had included Jane within that as she had never seen or been on a battlefield, excluding Altnabreac. I knew she was staying out of a sense of correcting the wrongs she had committed against her country and those she had committed against her friends and on a personal level against me. Because Jane was staying her father would stay and stand beside his daughter. Out of a fathers love and to avenge the death of his wife. That then left Sandy, Stuart and Rosemary. I