The bloke stank. He had a week's bristle on him and it was rough against my face and neck as he squeezed and squeezed, his eyes closed, snorting through his nose as he cried for help. He was a big old boy, packing over two hundred pounds of solid weight.

I needed help, too, and screamed for Sarah. There was no way she couldn't have heard me, but she didn't respond. I wasn't entirely sure what this boy was trying to do, whether he wanted to kill me, or if he was just fighting to protect himself.

I yelled again.

"Sarah! Sarah!"

He responded by lifting his head slightly to scream out even louder. It gave me a momentary window. I head-b.u.t.ted him, trying to make contact wherever I could. He did the same. Then something happened that moved the situation on. You don't normally feel pain during a fight, but I felt a stinging in my left ear. His teeth were sinking in. I could actually hear the skin break and then the sound of him straining to bite harder. The f.u.c.ker had a gristly bit of my ear lobe in his mouth and was starting to pull his head back.

I felt the capillary bleeding at once, warm and wet, splashing the side of my cheek as his heavy breathing spat it out. He was in a frenzy, growling at me through clenched teeth, snot and saliva. I was still trying to get my hands down toward my leg so I could reach my pistol, which wasn't helping keep my ear intact.

I managed to get my legs around his gut. I tried to squeeze, but could only just about get my feet together. I felt the snorting from his nose move away from my face slightly, which wasn't good news for my ear. Then his head jerked back, taking part of the lobe with him. The pain felt like a blowtorch on the side of my head, but now that he'd moved back a bit I could start to get my hands around his head. I could see the blood on his face and snot running down from his nose as he fought to breathe through his still-gritted teeth. My fingers reached his eyes and he squeezed me up even more, shaking his head and screaming as I began to get a good hold on his face and dig deeper with my thumbs. He tried to bite my fingers.

I moved my right hand so I had a flat palm underneath his chin, then switched my left to just below the crown of his head and grabbed a fistful of his hair.

You can't just whip a head around to break someone's neck. The design is too good for that. What you have to do is screw it off, as if you were untwisting the cap on ajar. You're trying to take the head off at the atlas, the small joint at the base of the skull. It's relatively easy if you're doing it against somebody who's standing, because if you get them off balance, their body is going down and you can twist and turn at the same time, so their momentum works against them. But I couldn't do that; all I could do was keep my legs around him and try to keep him in one place.

I managed to get my boots interlocked, and at last I could squeeze and push down with my legs, at the same time twisting up with my arms as hard as I could. I kept on turning as we both screamed at each other. The f.u.c.ker didn't like it; he knew what was going on, but fortunately for me he was too old and too fat to do much about it.

His neck went without too much of a crack. He slumped down, and there wasn't much noise coming from him; there wasn't even a body jerk.

He just went very still. My hands were covered in blood, snot and saliva. I rolled over and kicked him off.

My weapon was only about five feet away. I picked it up and checked that the magazine was on tight, and that I still had a round in the chamber.

I started to move back to Sarah, then stopped. I ran back to the Syrian.

I could hear firing again, and people screaming and shouting, both Brits and Arabs, maybe just thirty meters away. It's funny how these details take a back seat when you're worrying about other things.

I scrabbled around and eventually found the piece of my ear still in his mouth. I couldn't be a.s.sed trying to stop the bleeding on the side of my head because I knew it wouldn't; capillary bleeding goes on forever. It would sort itself out. But I would want to get the severed bit sewn back on. It wouldn't be too good with a chunk missing because I'd have a VDM (visual distinguishing mark); but worse than that, I knew a couple of people with bits of their ear missing, and it looked f.u.c.king ugly. The only alternative was to have a 1980s Kevin Keegan haircut to cover it up.

I got back to the room and banged on the door.

"Sarah, it's me. I'm coming in, I'm coming in."

Glen was still at the end of the corridor. When he heard my voice he shouted, "Come on, for rack's sake! Drag her f.u.c.king a.s.s out... now!"

He was right.

Enough was enough, we were all going to die here soon.

I pushed the door open and Sarah was still standing over one of the PCs with her laptop plugged into some other s.h.i.t. I looked over at the Source.

He was sitting in the same position I'd left him in, as if he were watching the TV A small amount of blood was trickling from a hole in his shirt, but it was the one in the front of his head that gave the game away. Blood was oozing out like lava flow. The back of his head lolled against the sofa; it had ballooned out slightly, but the skin was keeping all the fragmented bone in place. It looked like a car windshield that's been punched; the gla.s.s goes out in the shape of a fist, but it's still held together. Blood and gooey gray tissue were dribbling onto the sofa. You didn't have to be George Clooney to know this boy wouldn't be surfing the net anymore.

Not even looking at me as she manipulated the keyboard, she said, "He tried to attack me. But he is happy G.o.d would have sent him seqina."

She knew I wouldn't have a clue what she was on about, and added, "Tranquility."

I looked at him again. He hadn't moved from where he'd been when I'd left the room and there was no look of tranquility on his face. He hadn't attacked her. So what; as if I gave a f.u.c.k. It was probably part of the alternative brief she'd been given. AK fire called me back to the real world.

"Come on, let's go. Now, Sarah!"

"No." She shook her head.

"I'm going to be a few seconds more."

The incendiary devices were still on the table. One of my jobs, unless she was going to tell me that had changed, too, was to destroy any equipment on target.

She hit the final key.

"OK, we can go." She started to pack herself up.

I went to the sofa, pulled the Source away and let him roll onto the floor. Picking up one end of the sofa and dragging it across the room, I leaned it against the bench of computers. I got the wastepaper basket, scattered the contents on the bench top and added a rug from the floor and a couple of chairs. I wanted as much flammable stuff as possible near the incendiaries.

I said, "Are you sure you're ready now?"

It was the first time she'd looked at me since I'd returned to the room. I saw her studying the red mess on the side of my head. I pulled the pin of the first device and positioned it on the table between two VDUs. The handle flew off, and by the time the last one was placed two were already burning fiercely. I could feel the heat, even through my jump suit.

I ditched the bergen; everything I needed now was in my belt kit. The air was filling with the noxious black fumes of burning plastic. I grabbed hold of Sarah, who had her repacked bergen slung over her shoulders, and headed for the door. I opened it a couple of inches and shouted to Glen, "Coming through! Coming through!"

He yelled back, "Shut the f.u.c.k up and run! Run!"

I didn't look left or right, just ran for the door by the same route we'd come in. Within less than a minute I was in the cold night air, my eyes peeled for the gap in the fence. It was pointless worrying about getting shot; I just ran in a stoop to make as small a target as possible, keeping Sarah in front of me.

I caught a glimpse of Glen behind me, plus another bloke still farther back. They followed as we sprinted toward the fence, rounds thudding into the ground around us. The Syrians were firing far too many rounds in one burst and couldn't control their aim.

Reg 1 pulled open one half of the upside-down V Sarah slid into the gap like a baseball player going for base. I prepared to do the same. I caught up with her as her slide stopped on the other side and kicked her out of the way so I wasn't blocking the gap for the other two.

"Move! Move!" I expected them to do the same to me. Nothing happened.

Reg 1 had already seen the reason why: "Man down! Man down!"

Looking back through the gloom, I could see a shape on the ground about twenty meters away. Whoever was with him already had his hand in his loop and was trying to drag him toward the fence. Each of us was wearing a harness, a large loop made of nylon strapping between our shoulder blades with which a downed body could be dragged or hooked up to a heli winch for a quick extraction.

"Stay here don't move!" I could see from Sarah's expression that for once she was going to do as she was told.

I ran out to the dragger, and between us we pulled Glen toward the hole in the fence line. He was moaning and groaning like a drunk.

"s.h.i.t, I'm down, I'm down."

Good. If he was talking, he was breathing.

I could see that the legs of his coveralls were shining with blood, but we'd have to look at that later. The first priority was to get him, and us, out of the immediate area.

I slid through the fence, turned on my knees, got hold of Glen's harness and dragged him through the gap. Sarah said and did nothing. Her bit was done; she was way out of her depth now. Reg 1 and 2 were waiting with her; the other two patrol members were giving covering fire from the olive-grove side of the fence as we moved toward them, letting off double taps at anything that moved. They needed to conserve ammo; we didn't have Hollywood mags.

Reg 1 was shouting commands.

"Move back to the FRV, move back."

He had a sat comm out, its miniature transmission dish pointing skyward, telling the world that we were in the s.h.i.t. I didn't know who he was talking to, but it certainly made me feel better.

Every other man carried a poncho stretcher a big sheet of green nylon with loop handles as part of his kit. Reg 2 laid his on the ground as I removed Glen's belt kit and bergen and put it on my back. So much for traveling light. As we rolled him onto the stretcher he was still conscious but, if he hadn't already, he'd soon go into shock.

It was then that I heard an ominous slurping noise in time with his breathing. He had a sucking wound to his chest: air was being sucked inside his chest cavity instead of going through his mouth. It was going to need sorting out quickly because otherwise the f.u.c.ker was history. But there wasn't enough time to do it here that way we'd all die. We'd have to wait until we reached the FRY Reg 2 heard the noise, too. Grasping Glen's hand, he placed it on his chest.

"Plug it up, mate." He wasn't that out of it, he understood what he needed to do. With a chest wound we couldn't give him morphine; he was going to have to take the pain.

Two of us got hold of him, one on either side of the stretcher, and started to hobble along with him as quickly as we could, Sarah following at my heels. I didn't look at what was going on behind us, but I heard the rate of covering fire from Reg 1 and 2 step up as we moved off.

We hit the tree line, Glen's moans distorted by the jolting as we ran. We got farther into the grove, and only then moved to the right, under cover.

He was still conscious and breathing noisily as we laid him on his back.

The light from the target area was just enough to see my hands moving as they worked on him. There was no need to worry about clearing his airway, but his hand had fallen from his chest. I put my hand over the wound to form a seal. Hopefully, with his chest now airtight, normal breathing would return. I could see the anguish in his eyes. His throat spluttered as he coughed and fought the pain.

"What's it like? What's it like? Oh, s.h.i.t."

He screwed up his face even more as Reg 2 moved him. It was a good sign: he could still feel it, his senses hadn't given way yet.

Reg 2 finished checking him.

"No exit wound."

First you've got to plug the leaks, then you have to put in fluid to replace what's been lost. I watched as Reg 2 grabbed the field dressings from Glen's belt kit and ripped them open. You always use the casualty's own dressings; you might need yours later. The packaging was Israeli, but they looked the same as ours, like big fat sanitary napkins with a bandage attached. Their job, in any language, is to block up wounds and stop bleeding by the application of direct pressure.

A round from an AK had also ripped through the muscle ma.s.s on his thigh, like a butcher's knife slicing open a side of beef. He was losing blood fast. Reg 2 started to cavity-pack the wound.

The downside of Glen still breathing was that we couldn't shut him up.

Over and over he groaned, "What's it like? What's it like?"

I looked down at him. He was covered in sweat, and the dust had caked onto his face.

"Shut the f.u.c.k up," I said.

"It's nothing, we'll fix it." You should never let a casualty see you looking concerned.

Sarah was several paces behind me, watching the route we had just taken, weapon out. I half whispered, half shouted, "Sarah! Come here!"

She moved toward me. I said, "Put the heel of your hand over this hole when I take mine off, OK?"

He was losing consciousness. Close to his ear, I said, "It's OK, you can speak to me now." There was no response.

"Oi, come on, speak to me, you f.u.c.ker!" I pulled on his sideburns. Nothing.

I pulled up the left sleeve of his coveralls to expose the six-inch band of tubigrip on his forearm. Underneath that was the catheter, already inserted in a vein before we moved on the target. You'd have to be mad not to; a bit of anticoagulant in the catheter to stop the blood from clotting and it will last for a good twenty-four hours. You are a bit sore afterward, but it will save your life. It's hard to get a vein up to insert a catheter once you've lost fluid, especially under fire and in darkness.

Reg 2 had nearly finished packing the thigh wound. It would have been no good just piling bandages on top, because the muscle underneath was still going to bleed. You have to really pack the cavity, keeping direct pressure on the wound, and that, in turn, will stop the bleeding. That done, he now needed fluid.

Glen's breathing was very rapid and shallow, which wasn't a good sign.

I felt the pulse on his neck; same problem there. His heart was working overtime to circulate what fluid was left around his body.

Shots were now being fired at us from about a hundred meters away but all my attention was focused on Glen.

Reg 2 shouted at Sarah.

"Watch him and tell us if his breathing starts to slow down. Got it?" She nodded and started to take notice.

I pulled the plasma expander from his belt kit, a clear-plastic half-liter container shaped like a liquid soap bottle. I ripped it out of its Israeli plastic wrapper and threw that on the ground. I bit off the little cap that kept the neck of the bottle sterile. f.u.c.k hygiene infections could be sorted out in hospital. Let's keep him alive so he can get to one first.

By now I also had his IV set out of its protective plastic coating, and was biting off the cap to the spearhead connector and jabbing it into the self-sealing neck of the bottle. I undid the screw clamp, took off the end cap and watched as the fluid ran through the line. I heard it splash onto Glen's face. He didn't react. Bad sign. Rolling the screw clamp on to stop the flow, I wasn't concerned about air bubbles in the line; a small amount doesn't matter certainly not in these circ.u.mstances. Let's just get the fluid in.

There was more gunfire from the target area, too close for comfort, and for the first time since we'd been in the trees our blokes fired back. The Syrians had found us.

Reg 1 was still in command. He was down at the tree line waiting for us to sort Glen out.

"How much longer up there?"

Reg 2 called back.

"Two minutes, mate, two minutes. I need your fluids."

As he jumped up with his weapon to collect the kit I unscrewed the end cap of the catheter and screwed the IV set into it.

Sarah was still plugging the hole. I could hear her breathing quickly in my ear as she leaned over Glen.

"Nick, listen to me. Let's leave them to it, let's go."

She was right, of course. The two of us would stand a far better chance on our own.

I ignored her and carried on working on Glen, gently squeezing the bottle to get the fluid into him. She whispered, a bit more urgently, "Come on, we need to go now, Nick. Remember, this is what they get paid for.

And you are paid to protect me."

Glen had to be dangerously low on fluids, but he was still conscious just.

"Sarah, pa.s.s me your fluid, quick."

She used her free hand to pull the bergen straps off her back to get to it.

The first bottle was now empty. I turned off the IV with the screw clamp.

Sarah had her fluid in her hand. I said, "Open it."

I heard her ripping the plastic with her teeth as I pulled off the empty bottle. She handed it over. The sound of gunfire was still very much in the background.