Exit wound

‘Sure.’ I gave her a lopsided smile. ‘My plan is just to get on with it. If we fuck up, we fuck up, and they’ve won – but at least we’ll have tried.’

I fired up the Ural again and we lurched in the direction of the shots.

107

One K further on a red flag hung limply at the roadside, a big old cotton thing weighed down with rain – a warning that the ranges were active. Even the most rough and ready set-up of this kind has worked out its safety templates. They cater for the rounds going down the range at the target, with a safety margin each side to cover fuck-ups. Templates normally look like big, open fans, at the base of which are the firing positions. Anywhere inside that fan is the danger area.

Another hundred down, we came across a second red flag and, soon afterwards, a red and white barrier across the road, next to a small shed. I really was back in Brecon.

I could see movement inside. Whoever the sentry was, he’d be bored out of his skull spending all day on stag. I knew the feeling. I’d done range-sentry duty a million times.

He came out reluctantly to see what the deal was with this bike and sidecar. The look on his face said he was already getting ready to turn us back or fuck me off onto another route.

He noticed the civvy clothes and all the gear hanging off the Ural, like we were on some kind of eccentric cross-country rally. He didn’t have a weapon, but why should he? He was just a lad on stag. He’d drawn the short straw. Or, in this weather, maybe not. At least he was nice and dry.

He didn’t have a clue who we were, but he didn’t look overly concerned. Nine times out of ten, the deeper you are inside an area, the safer you feel.

I dismounted nonchalantly and treated him to a five-hundred-watt smile. ‘Hello, mate, how’s it going? Fucking wet, eh?’

His brow creased. He was in his early twenties and had goofy teeth. I could see the sides of a crew-cut under his helmet, which he wore tipped back. I could almost hear the cogs turning.

Was that English?

He pointed behind me and spun his hand.

‘Yes, mate, that’s right. Anna – give me a helmet.’

She reached into the nose of the sidecar and passed it up to me. I showed him the helmet in my right hand as I walked towards him. He stared at me from behind the barrier, inquisitive more than intimidated.

I kept on talking. ‘Listen, mate…’ His eyes were bloodshot. He’d probably been hitting the vodka bottle in one of those shacks opposite the camp. ‘I’m going to fuck you over. I’m sorry.’

I focused on his eyes.

And then I swung my helmet hard at the centre of everything I could see that was flesh rather than metal.

He didn’t have time to react. He took the full force of the blow and he buckled. I threw myself on top of him as he went down, my knees in his chest. I pounded the bike helmet a couple more times into the side of his face, once hitting the ridge of his helmet and missing, once connecting. I didn’t want to hurt him badly. All I wanted to do was keep him out of it for a while. I yanked his helmet off and gave him one more good whack.

Anna went ape-shit. She tried to drag me off. ‘Nick, stop! You’ll kill him. What’s he done? Stop it!’

I stood up. ‘Look for a map in his hut. Go, go!’

Of course I wasn’t going to kill him. I just needed to control him. I had to be short, sharp and aggressive – there’s no other way to do this sort of thing. If you hesitate, he might turn out to be Russia’s cage-fighting king. If you don’t control him straight away, you could land up in a prolonged fight, with the only way out being to kill or be killed.

So, short, sharp and aggressive it had been. Anna wasn’t going to understand this right now – all she could see was another poor bloody squaddie at the sharp end of a fight he hadn’t asked for – but it was the best way to get what I wanted and still keep him alive.

He had a big lump on his head, but he’d be back having a few bevvies with his mates in no time at all.

108

I was dragging him towards the sidecar when Anna came out of the shed. She had two maps in her hands. One was a folded sheet, the other fixed to a board and covered with plastic film.

The sentry wasn’t fully conscious, but he was compliant. I half slapped, half pushed him down into the seat. I shoved his head between his legs and held it there. I didn’t have to use much force. The lad’s survival instincts had kicked in now and he knew which side his bread was buttered. ‘Anna, I need his helmet.’

She handed it to me, concern etched all over her face.

‘Don’t worry, he’s coming with us.’ I tossed it into the sidecar, along with Semyon’s bloodstained one. ‘You ride, OK? We need somewhere off the track.’

I climbed on behind her with the board in my left hand. My right stayed on the sentry’s head. He needed to know somebody was controlling him. It would make him feel safer, and therefore more obedient. It didn’t mean he wouldn’t be scared. He’d know by now that if he tried anything he’d be on the receiving end of a lot more pain.