The two soldiers worked together, Bowman pacing out various distances from the stronghold and setting down visual markers, then reporting them back over the comms to Webb, who then made notes of the ranges with a pencil and paper. Creating a series of reference points for the guys on the roof to help determine the distance to the target. Bowman paced out fifty metres, set down a large rock from a water feature in the garden. He placed more markers at fifty-metre intervals, all the way to the fence, and then the treeline. Which was five hundred metres from the mansion. The demarcation line for the mortar. Everything between that line and the two-hundred-metre mark was mortar-lobbing territory. Anything shorter than that would land dangerously close to the defenders.

If we have to start putting down rounds at that range, thought Bowman, the enemy will have breached the estate.

And we’ll have our backs to the fucking wall.

He laid a final marker at the edge of the clearing, then jogged around the estate, checking the condition of the perimeter fence. Looking for any weak points or gaps big enough for a human to sneak through. He deposited stones beside the largest gaps, so the defenders could easily concentrate their fire on those areas.

He didn’t feel tired now. Adrenaline was taking over, juicing his bloodstream, boosting his fatigued body. Adrenaline, and the iron will to win that lived within all SAS men.

The odds of the team getting attacked in the next few hours were high, Bowman knew. The Machete Boys would expect their scout to return from the mansion shortly. Once he failed to report back, the Boys would come looking for him. And they would be ready for a scrap.

So will we, thought Bowman. We’re preparing for the fight of our lives.

He hurried over to the Unimog to unpack the remaining boxes of 7.62 mm belt. The soldiers under Mavinda’s command were frantically burning down vegetation or piling earth on top of logs around the fire pits. To the east, two men from the Presidential Guard carted an aerial ladder over to the guest house. One of the guards held the base while the second raised the fly section until the top rung drew level with the guest house rooftop. They braced the ladder against the façade and started scaling towards the roof to set up another firing position.

At the front of the mansion, Gregory and the Karatandan soldier with the toothbrush moustache were preparing one of the platoon’s FN machine guns in a fire pit. The weapon looked essentially the same as the Gimpys used by the Cell. But older, battered and rusting, with a scratched wooden stock.

Mallet checked his watch and shouted across at Bowman. ‘That’s it! We’re going topside. Hurry the fuck up!’