It was like sitting in a car, lights out, 100mph, and driving at a narrow gap between two points, all on the say-so of some guy you didn’t know, who told you it was clear all the way. Total trust was required – there was no recovering the aircraft if you came in at 200 knots and the guys on the ground had fucked it up.

Carr tried to game the possible issues.

They ranged from a casual compromise – some local stumbling into them – to a serious contact initiated by an aggressive enemy force, and everything in between.

In his next sched to Nicholls, he’d confirm the final co-ordinates of the strip and would also lay down the abort protocols.

A green flare on approach meant it was safe to land.

A red flare, and the pilot was to pull out of the landing, go into a holding pattern and re-approach after ten minutes.

No flares at all…

Well, that meant they were deep in the shit.

The aircraft was to RTB, and Carr and his team would have to take their chances fighting their way out and extracting in the vehicles.

There was no way he was going to bring the plane in to a bad situation. No doubt there’d be men on it whom he knew, and he wasn’t going to be responsible for any more deaths if he could help it.

That thought turned his mind back to Fred West, lying dead a couple of dozen metres away. Just as quickly, he turned his mind away again. There’d be plenty of time for memories and mourning in the coming days and weeks, but first they had to get home.

He glanced at his watch. Another ten minutes, and Kev would be up to replace him, and he could get a brew on.

He looked back out at the harsh desert.

He wanted to get those girls back home, more than anything.

The plan wasn’t perfect, but few are.

He’d have liked more men and more time, but they had what they had.

And he was confident it would be enough.

Some might say they’d been lucky so far, but Carr didn’t believe in luck.

He believed in speed, aggression and surprise: their plan, their courage and their skill had got them to this point, and it would get them home,

Any cunt got in the way, they paid the price.

He looked at his watch again.

‘Come on, Kev,’ he murmured to himself. ‘I need that fucking brew.’

Chapter 110.

110.

CARR HAD EVERYONE up and standing-to, watered and fed and ready to go, with the vehicles fuelled, an hour before they were due to leave.