Just as well, then, that the Alpha Unit carried no weak link. Each apartment would be hit as hard and as fast as the others. No matter which one contained their targets – no matter which two-agent team breached – it would not end well for those inside.

Dempsey raised his open left hand, as if preparing a vertical salute. With one last glance to his left, he lowered his thumb.

It had the desired effect. His first four agents all visibly tensed for what was about to occur. His fifth – Gallo – adjusted his stance and placed the muzzle of his M90 inches from the third door’s secure lock.

A second later and Dempsey lowered his little finger. One more and his ring finger was down. Another and only his index finger was left up.

Time.

Dempsey’s remaining digit had barely touched the skin of his palm as the gunfire began. Three doors. Three weapons. One result. Two simultaneous semi-automatic three-round bursts saw to the locks on apartments one and two. A single round from Gallo’s shotgun devastated the third.

The agents moved like clockwork. Countless hours of close-quarters assault drills had seen to that.

Dai and Wrixon moved in sync through their two doorways, rifles raised to their shoulders as they both swept to the right. Jabari and Silver followed their respective leads, each taking the left.

Perfect execution of the manoeuvres they had been taught by Dempsey.

He and Gallo were equally well rehearsed. So was their reaction when they instantly saw that theirs was the occupied apartment.

The door had been shattered by Gallo’s single shot; the wood from a football-sized hole in its frame had peppered the back wall, sending the targets inside diving for cover.

Having spotted them, Gallo stepped to his right and made space, allowing Dempsey to flick a flash-bang grenade through the doorway.

‘COVER!’ Dempsey stepped back into the corridor as he shouted.

The warning was unnecessary. Gallo had already shielded his ears and turned his back to the door. The corridor wall provided both men with a barrier to the blinding light that would follow.

But still, old habits die hard. And good ones never should.

Even with eyes averted and ears covered, neither man could miss the detonation of the flash-bangs. And so both were moving again in an instant.

Gallo breached the doorway first. He covered the entire right half of the apartment’s reception room with one sweep of his shotgun.

Dempsey was a heartbeat behind, sweeping the room’s left side with his own Heckler & Koch G36C assault rifle.

The first thing Dempsey noticed were two long tables, each running the length of the right and left walls of the apartment’s main room. Both were covered with steel bowls, scales and – most telling – brick-shaped packages of solid white and brown powder.

Dempsey made the observation in an instant, and in the same moment he noticed something else: there was no hostage in this room.