DropZone Read online

  ‘Which is where we come in,’ said Natalya. ‘Right?’

  Johnny nodded and looked at Ethan. ‘Like I said, the skydiving competition was the perfect cover for Sam to leave the country and for us to follow on in case it turned into a full-on shit-storm – which it has.’

  ‘So eloquently put,’ said Kat, shaking her head.

  ‘So we were sent to the competition just in case Sam needed us?’ Ethan asked.

  Luke nodded. ‘No one would suspect a thing,’ he said. ‘Gabe got the communication from Sam as we left FreeFall. The jet was being held in reserve, just in case this kicked off.’

  The more Ethan heard, the more unreal it all seemed. He’d just found out he was a member of a special ops team working for MI5. It was like something from the movies; something that only ever happened to good-looking actors on the big screen – oh, and as it turned out, him! He felt himself grinning like an idiot and tried to focus. ‘You’ve still not explained how we’re involved,’ he said. ‘Or what’s in the files on the disk.’

  ‘The contents of the files are on a strictly need-to-know basis,’ said Johnny. ‘And Gabe doesn’t want us to know. Which means none of us needs to ask. All we have to do is help Sam. He’s arrived at the target destination but is unable to locate and extract the disk without being compromised.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Natalya. ‘What has happened? Did Gabe not know the situation before he sent Sam in?’

  ‘The situation’s changed,’ said Johnny. ‘There are more x-rays on the ground than originally thought and it’s now too risky for Sam to act without a diversion.’ He looked at Ethan and grinned. ‘Which is where we come in.’

  ‘X-rays?’ asked Ethan.

  ‘Enemies,’ explained Kat, then turned to Johnny. ‘And by “compromised” you mean killed, don’t you?’

  Johnny nodded and looked at Ethan. ‘You keeping up with this? It’s a lot to take in.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Ethan, smiling. ‘It’s not every day you become part of a covert ops team, is it?’

  ‘Shit happens,’ Johnny said with a shrug.

  The plane dropped suddenly and Ethan heard the engines squeal a little, felt his stomach flip. It had been doing that a lot in the past few minutes.

  ‘This situation Sam’s in . . .’ he said. ‘Does it mean we have to take guns with us?’

  ‘For a start, we use the term weapon rather than gun,’ said Luke. ‘And, no, we won’t go in armed. We never do. The job of the team is always to try and slip in under the radar, not to go in and take people out. We need to be invisible. Weapons have a habit of making people very obvious indeed. But we will be taking in explosives to create a diversion.’

  ‘He means we’ll blow shit up,’ said Johnny.

  ‘Sounds dangerous,’ said Ethan.

  ‘Comes with the territory,’ Johnny replied, ‘and it’s all part of the fun. Anyway, who wants to live a life that’s risk-free? Better to live as a lion for a day than a lamb for a year, right?’

  ‘That’s cheesy,’ said Ethan.

  ‘I know,’ said Johnny. ‘Can’t believe I said it.’

  ‘True though,’ Kat put in quietly.

  ‘If the op goes well, we’ll still be going to the competition,’ Luke added. ‘It’s all part of the cover story.’

  Ethan looked at the team – his team – four people he now counted as the best friends he’d ever had. He was about to jump from a jet with them – on a mission for MI5 to rescue the toughest bloke he’d ever met in his life. Just a few weeks ago he wouldn’t have believed it was possible, wouldn’t have believed he could have the skills for such a mission. But it was and he did. He was confident of that. Sam – the team – wouldn’t have chosen him otherwise. All he had to do was stay sharp, stay focused, and remember everything he’d been taught.

  ‘OK,’ he said, ‘ignoring the lion/lamb thing, I do have one more question.’

  ‘What’s that?’ said Johnny.

  Ethan smiled. ‘What’s the pay like?’

  25

  ‘We go in thirty,’ said Johnny. ‘Let’s move.’

  The team moved to the rear of the plane.

  ‘You’re with me,’ Kat told Ethan. ‘We’re going in tandem.’

  ‘Tandem?’ said Ethan. ‘But isn’t this a high-altitude jump? I didn’t know you could do that.’

  ‘Well, you can,’ said Kat, ‘and we can’t have you doing one without any prep. Natalya’s got no experience of doing tandems and she’s taking the explosives in anyway. And you’re too heavy to go with Johnny or Luke. So it’s me.’

  ‘Explosives?’

  Kat nodded. ‘Natalya’s the expert in that area. Seems to know more than Sam, and that’s saying something.’

  ‘I can’t work her out,’ said Ethan.

  ‘You’re not the only one.’ Kat led him through a door and down some metal stairs. ‘I’m probably her closest friend and all I know is that I know nothing about her. This way.’

  They went through another door, and immediately Ethan noticed the temperature drop.

  ‘At this altitude we’ll be jumping with oxygen,’ Kat explained. ‘And it’s very cold so we’ll be wearing thermals. I’m sure you’ll look very sexy in them.’

  Ethan found himself in a section of the plane that had been entirely stripped of anything comfortable. The walls were just metal plates and struts riveted together. And the sound of the plane’s engines had seriously risen in volume. To speak and be heard, everyone had to shout.

  Johnny nodded at them. ‘I’ll give Gabe eight out of ten for kit prep,’ he said.

  ‘Only eight?’ queried Ethan, trying to stop his teeth from chattering.

  ‘He left my lucky teddy bear behind,’ said Johnny.

  Luke pulled out a map, laid it on the metal checker-plate floor. ‘This is the DZ,’ he said, pointing just below a patch of dark green on the map as everyone else gathered round. ‘We’ll be nicely hidden by the trees and we’re only half a click from here, which is where Sam and the disk are. Our job is to draw attention away from that point and allow Sam sufficient time to get in and recover it.’

  ‘Click?’ asked Ethan.

  ‘Kilometre,’ translated Kat.

  ‘What is “here” exactly?’ asked Johnny. ‘Doesn’t look like much on the map.’

  ‘That’s because it isn’t,’ said Luke. ‘In fact it’s what’s left of a fifteenth-century castle. It’s built right above these sea cliffs here. This is what our satellite picked up,’ he added, producing some black and white bird’s-eye-view photos of the castle. Ethan couldn’t quite believe he’d just heard Luke refer to a satellite as though they owned it.

  ‘Main access to the castle is from the beach, here,’ Luke went on, pointing at the map again. ‘This line here is a path that runs from the beach up to the clifftop.’

  ‘Looks lovely,’ said Johnny. ‘When can I move in?’

  Luke ignored him. ‘We HAHO into the DZ, then we’re on with the diversion. RV is the beach. Sam is to meet us there. I’ll contact him when everything kicks off.’

  At this, Natalya piped up. ‘I have spoken to Gabe and checked the kit,’ she said, her face as serious as ever, though she sounded excited. ‘We have more than enough detonators and P4. To secure the beach, we are taking anti-personnel mines – Claymores.’

  ‘And how do we get off the beach when we’re done?’ asked Kat.

  ‘One of the packs we’re taking contains two inflatable canoes,’ said Luke. ‘A sub’s on course to pick us up at dawn.’

  ‘A sub?’ said Ethan. ‘You’re joking, right?’

  Luke shook his head.

  ‘What if the beach is compromised?’ Natalya asked.

  Luke rested a finger back on the castle, then dragged it up a little to rest on a small black shape nearby. ‘In that case we leave from here,’ he said. ‘It’s the old watchtower.’

  ‘Thanks for the added colour there,’ said Johnny. ‘You see, Eth? It’s not just fun, it’s a learning experience too!’
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  Ethan leaned closer to look at the map, then back at the pictures of the castle. The watchtower was perched right at the top of the cliffs behind the castle ruins.

  ‘How do we get down those?’ he asked. ‘It’ll take ages to climb.’

  ‘It would . . .’ said Kat, looking across at him. ‘Actually if we go that way, you’ll be doing your first BASE jump sooner than you think! But we’ll only do that if everything goes tits up – our aim is to make sure it doesn’t, OK?’

  Ethan couldn’t think of anything to say to that so he kept his mouth shut.

  ‘That’s it,’ said Luke, bringing everyone back to the task in hand. ‘Final point to remember is that this is a covert op. We need as little contact with the x-rays on the island as possible. We get in, provide Sam’s diversion, and get out. Understood?’

  Talk over, everyone leaped into action. They started to sort through bags of kit Ethan had never seen before, handing out various bits and pieces to each other, checking everything once, twice and then a third time. And they were getting changed out of their everyday clothes, into stuff that looked considerably more hardcore.

  Ethan turned to Kat, who was now dressed in black combat trousers, a black jacket and black boots. The outfit made her look scary as hell.

  ‘Why’s it so cold?’ he asked, finding it impossible to stop shivering.

  ‘No heating,’ said Kat. ‘No point making the luggage nice and cosy. Don’t worry, though – this’ll sort that out.’ She handed him a pile of clothing. ‘You’ll need to strip and put the black kit on first,’ she explained. ‘You’ll be in that for the mission after we land. It’s a pretty fab material actually: breathable, as close to silent as you can get, and completely waterproof.’

  ‘Doesn’t look waterproof,’ said Ethan, holding up the jacket and trousers.

  ‘What were you expecting?’ asked Kat. ‘Oilskins?’

  Ethan examined the other piece of clothing, which looked like a jumpsuit, but was padded and much heavier. ‘What’s this?’

  ‘Once you’re dressed in the other kit, pull that on over the top,’ Kat told him. ‘It’s a silk-lined, thermal-insulated suit. It’ll stop you turning into a six-foot ice-pop when we jump.’

  ‘It’s that cold out there?’ Ethan felt pretty chilly as it was, and they were still in the plane.

  ‘It sure is. We’re jumping from a jet travelling at hundreds of miles an hour, thousands of feet up. The wind-chill factor’s going to be pretty extreme.’

  ‘Point taken.’

  ‘Then get a move on,’ said Kat. ‘And if you’re embarrassed about getting your kit off in front of me, I promise I won’t grope you or tell anyone if I see anything weird.’

  ‘There’s nothing we—’ Ethan began, then saw the smile on her face. ‘Ha ha,’ he said, and started to get changed.

  When he was finally dressed, Johnny came over with some more kit.

  ‘Boots and socks,’ he said, handing them over. ‘They’re your size, trust me.’

  Ethan took them. They too were black. And the boots had a high ankle and the mother of all treads.

  Johnny smiled at him. ‘They’re not general issue. Government couldn’t really afford to have squaddies running around in these things. They’re an adaptation of an Italian mountain boot. Couple of hundred quid a pop.’

  Ethan slipped on the socks – two pairs: one a silk lining sock, the other a thick wool sock with padded sole – then eased on the boots, laced them up. They felt absolutely amazing – snug, comfortable, warm.

  ‘They won’t require any breaking in, either,’ said Johnny. ‘Leather’s been specially treated. Kat?’

  She turned round.

  ‘Just so you know,’ said Johnny, ‘Ethan has a tendency to scream like a big girl when he’s doing a tandem. And his language is simply appalling.’

  Kat laughed. ‘I’ll look after him.’

  Johnny went back towards Luke, who Ethan could see was now talking to Natalya and looking through some large black holdalls.

  ‘Right, Ethan,’ said Kat. ‘The rig.’

  ‘It’s a tandem rig,’ said Ethan. ‘Bigger canopy because of the additional weight.’

  ‘Exactly. We need to get it adjusted just right so we don’t cut off our circulation when we’re gliding. It’d be pretty embarrassing to land with you dead.’

  For the next few minutes Kat pushed and pulled at Ethan, clipping him in and making sure everything felt right, comfortable.

  ‘How’s that?’

  ‘Fine,’ said Ethan.

  ‘Now the oxygen.’

  Ethan looked at the large, black, canvas-covered box in Kat’s hand. She handed him a face mask.

  ‘We’ll both get our oxygen from this,’ she said. ‘All you need to remember is that there’s more than enough in here for us both. Don’t panic and start breathing like you’re about to die; you’ll use it up quicker, or hyperventilate and pass out.’

  ‘Not good,’ said Ethan.

  ‘Right,’ agreed Kat. ‘Flying in with you unconscious wouldn’t be as easy to control. I might even have to cut you loose, drop you before we get there.’

  Ethan looked at Kat. Was she serious? ‘I’ll make sure I stay awake and alert,’ he promised.

  ‘All you need to remember,’ said Kat, ‘is that when we jump, you have your head back and your arms crossed, just like you did with Sam. That’ll allow me to flip us over, get our descent under control and deploy, without having you destabilize us.’

  Ethan felt a hand on his shoulder. It was Luke.

  ‘Sorted?’

  Ethan nodded. ‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘Totally.’

  ‘Good,’ said Luke. ‘Remember we’ve all been watching you, not just Sam and Gabe. If we didn’t think you were up to it, you wouldn’t be here.’

  ‘No,’ said Johnny, coming over with Natalya. ‘You’d be sedated at the front of the plane, utterly unaware of just how cool we really are.’

  ‘Are you serious?’ asked Ethan.

  ‘Deadly,’ said Johnny.

  For a few moments Ethan was silent, thinking about that. Then he looked up and said, ‘Right, so tell me about the jump. I’ve done plenty at twelve thousand. How different is it at thirty-two thousand?’

  Everyone smiled at him. It felt really good.

  ‘The big difference,’ began Kat, ‘is the amount of time you’ll spend in the air.’

  ‘You’ve been skydiving up until now,’ Luke continued. ‘Forty-five-second freefall, followed by about five to ten minutes in glide. This isn’t a skydive. We leave the plane and deploy canopies immediately.’

  ‘So how long are we in the air?’ asked Ethan.

  ‘We’ll be gliding across approximately thirty miles,’ said Luke, ‘so we’ll be in the air for about two hours.’

  Ethan did a double-take. ‘Two hours? No way!’

  ‘Way,’ said Johnny. ‘You’ll love it. Everyone knows what they’re doing, including you. It’s just another jump, but from a little bit higher, is all.’

  ‘Gets pretty surreal though; particularly when you’re drifting through cloud,’ said Kat.

  ‘Here . . .’ said Luke, handing Ethan a watch. It looked bomb-proof, Ethan thought as he put it on his wrist. ‘And this is a tactical throat mic.’

  Ethan looked at the next piece of kit in his hands. It looked like a length of black elastic attached to a wire, a battery pack, an earpiece and two small cylinders that pointed inwards.

  ‘It’s designed for operators in the military,’ said Luke, ‘and you wear it round your neck like this.’

  Ethan watched as Luke put one on himself, securing it round his neck. He felt like he was watching a demonstration of some new gadget on a weird military TV shopping channel.

  ‘These two things here’ – Luke pointed at the cylinders – ‘are the dual transponders or throat mics. If you want to talk, just press both of them against your throat and you’re on.’

  Ethan copied Luke, and put on the throat mic.


  ‘It’ll block out most ambient noise,’ continued Luke as Ethan slipped the earpiece in, ‘and will even pick up a whisper.’

  ‘Yes,’ Johnny said, his expression serious and businesslike. ‘The throat mic is the product of choice both on and off the battlefield. Thank you, Luke.’

  Ethan laughed.

  ‘Anyway’ – Luke ignored Johnny as best he could – ‘you’ve probably seen plenty of these things being used in bad action movies by macho actors.’

  ‘You know – the ones that look like me,’ said Johnny, checking Ethan had put the thing on properly.

  ‘We’ll be on a chat-net,’ said Luke. ‘It means everyone can speak at the same time.’

  ‘So don’t go telling Kat you think Luke’s a dick,’ said Johnny, ‘because he’ll hear you.’

  ‘We’ll be tumbling out of the plane in close formation, one after the other,’ Luke continued. ‘Aim is to get out, find space and pull the canopy quickly. Once we all know where we are, we’ll head off.’

  ‘So how do we know where we’re going?’ asked Ethan. ‘And how do we keep close when we’re jumping in the dark?’

  Johnny began to answer, but the call came through from the pilot.

  ‘No time for any more explanations,’ said Luke. ‘We’re good to go.’

  26

  Luke called everyone over, and Ethan followed Kat, who leaned closer and said, ‘We may take the piss, but Luke’s generally our reason for staying alive. If he doesn’t check it, don’t use it. OK?’

  Ethan stood with everyone else as Luke did his rounds. And after what Kat had just said, he looked at Luke in a new light. He knew from experience that he was into the detail, but to know he was so vital to everything the team did made him listen all the harder. After all, Ethan was pretty keen on staying alive. He was amazed at just how thorough Luke was. Nothing got missed. He pulled Johnny up for a pocket left undone. The pocket was empty, Johnny had protested, but that didn’t matter, not to Luke. He even checked Kat and Natalya’s hair.

  ‘When are you two going to cut this off?’ he asked. ‘It’s always a tangle risk, you know that.’