Revolution (9 page)

‘Most of the electrical grid in the country has been destroyed due to shelling and acts of sabotage further inland as the rebels try to cut off supplies and power to the capital. The entire country’s infrastructure has imploded in the last few weeks, creating the humanitarian crisis we now face. It’s always the same in situations like this, ordinary people suffering as the fighting forces attempt to undermine or disrupt their opponent’s chain of supply. More people die as a result of this than do the soldiers actually involved in the fighting.’

Megan nodded, looking out of the windows at the dull grey clouds cloaking the mountain ranges and the forlorn, run–down farms that they passed by on the road.

‘I know, I’ve seen it all before in Bosnia, amongst other places.’

‘Bosnia was similar,’ Sophie agreed, ‘but it involved multiple factions split along religious lines, differing bloodlines that had feuded for centuries and were unleashed when Tito passed away and the fight for control of the country began. Mordania is different. This is a people’s choice versus the government’s democracy, soldier against soldier, Muslim against Muslim. There is no right or wrong side, no good or evil to choose between.’

Callum looked across at Sophie with a surprised expression.

‘This General Rameron is the embodiment of evil, and his troops perhaps more so. I’d take a democracy over a dictatorship any day of the week.’

Sophie shook her head without taking her eyes off the road.

‘Only because you want one. Most people on earth don’t live under democratic rule and have no idea what it means. Take Afghanistan – it’s been built over millennia under tribal rule. The people have it deeply ingrained in their psyche that strength is required to lead. Votes are not necessarily of interest to them. They need strong leaders and will violently oppose foreign intervention as they have done for centuries against Russia, Britain and now America.’

‘That doesn’t justify genocide,’ Megan pointed out. ‘The killing of civilians immediately removes the right of the killer to rule, victorious or not. The people will always rise again.’

Sophie nodded but smiled.

‘And if this
is
that rising?’ she challenged. ‘None of us are well enough versed in the history of this country to understand the motivations of those who choose to challenge the prevailing authorities and their leadership. They may seek power to control, to rule, but they may also seek justice.’

‘You sound like you’re defending this Rameron,’ Callum snorted.

‘No, not defending,’ Sophie countered. ‘I’m just saying that trying to impose our methods of governance on others, no matter how well intentioned, often causes as many problems as it seeks to solve.’

Megan gestured out of the windows to the desolate and abandoned homes scattered across the frozen countryside.

‘Our countries have big enough problems of their own, without messing about here,’ Megan pointed out.’

‘That sounds like an excuse for doing nothing,’ Sophie argued.

‘Nobody can change the world on their own.’

‘They can do more than someone who does nothing.’

The window beside Megan shattered with an ear–splitting crash and showered the interior of the cab with thousands of glass chips.

Sophie let out a shriek of alarm and jerked the truck’s wheel to one side, the vehicle swerving violently as the jeep ahead of them skidded to a halt. Megan and Callum instinctively bent forward in their seats, dropping as low as possible as the truck slid to a halt on the slushy road, its rear now facing the way the bullet had entered the cabin, the cargo shielding Megan, Callum and Sophie from view. Frantic voices shouted from outside.

‘Sniper! Two hundred metres!’

‘Move! Now!’

Megan sat upright, looking across at Sophie with sudden admiration.

‘Quick thinking. Are you okay?’

Sophie nodded as she checked herself over for injuries. Megan and Callum did the same, and then looked at the window. The bullet had passed low through the glass and had then travelled through the cab to exit through Sophie’s door less than an inch above her right thigh.

Sophie opened her door a fraction, calling out to the soldiers now crouched behind their vehicles.

‘The sniper’s elevated!’ she shouted. ‘The bullet dropped two or three inches through the cab!’

From where he crouched behind a troop carrier, Lieutenant Kelsey scanned the buildings scattered across the landscape in the lee of the mountains, gauging the distances and the assumed angle of the shot. He spied an old village hall with a raised clock tower protruding from its roof.

‘Try the tower,’ he whispered to a sniper laying prone next to his feet, down beside the tyre of the troop carrier.

The sniper, breathing calmly, swung his rifle around slightly and focused on the clock–tower, watching patiently.

‘Nobody move,’ a nearby sergeant said calmly but loudly enough to be heard by the nervous troops huddling behind the vehicles. ‘Easy now.’

In the truck, Megan strained to hear what was going on.

‘Who’s shooting?’ Sophie whispered. ‘The rebels haven’t come this far yet, surely?’

‘It’s not rebels,’ Callum said. ‘When law and order break down, people tend to get carried away with themselves. It’s probably a disgruntled local or a drugged–out youth. There’s nobody around to arrest them now.’

A tense silence reigned for several minutes as the British soldiers tried to identify the sniper’s location. Megan was about to suggest a careful egress from the area when the sniper at Lieutenant Kelsey’s feet whispered in a harsh voice.

‘
Enemy
.’

‘Where?’ the lieutenant asked.

‘The tower.’ The soldier’s voice was a whisper. ‘Movement inside, from the left to the right window.’

‘Weapon?’

‘Stand by.’

The sniper watched silently through the scope of his rifle, ignoring the tiny flakes of snow landing on his face. The silhouette of a body lay facing him in the window of the clock tower. He caught a glint of something in the pale light, a flash of metal or the glass of a telescopic–sight.

‘
Weapon
,’ he whispered, then, ‘
Incoming!
’

A tiny puff of smoke had burst from the clock–tower window. Almost instantly, a bullet ricocheted off the side of the troop carrier, causing the soldiers crouched there to flinch. An instant later the report reached them on the cold wind, its echo careering off the nearby mountains and into the wilderness.

‘Take him down,’ Lieutenant Kelsey ordered.

The sniper waited until the shadowy figure in the window stood to change position after his shot, and then held his breath for a single beat of his heart before pulling the trigger. The rifle in his grip shuddered as a terrific report crackled on the wind.

The sniper saw the shape of a body hurled backwards and out of sight from the distant window.

‘Enemy down,’ he whispered.

The lieutenant gave his sergeant a thumbs–up and the troops gave a brief cheer.

‘Fun’s over!’ the sergeant snapped. ‘Let’s get moving.’

In the truck, Sophie started the engine and began reversing to put the vehicle straight on the road.

‘Rough neighbourhood,’ Megan remarked as they began moving again.

‘You should see Anterik,’ Sophie replied, then glanced across at Callum. ‘Get any nice footage of people being shot?’

Callum had removed the camera lens from his pocket after the first shot had been fired, and had held it poking out of the window of the cab, roughly in the direction of the clock–tower.

‘I’ll find out when we get back. I can’t download on the move.’

Sophie did not reply, and Megan got the distinct impression that she was regretting allowing them to come along with her.

‘Have you always been this abrasive?’ Megan asked as casually as she could manage.

Sophie remained silent, instead yanking the gear–lever with as much force as she could muster as they accelerated to keep up with the jeep in front.

Megan said no more for the next hour, until, after driving between the towering slopes of the mountains and seemingly endless debris strewn villages and abandoned houses, a larger village appeared ahead, straddling a narrow river that churned beneath a stone bridge.

‘Anterik,’ Sophie said softly.

The jeeps slowed ahead of the truck, and through the blustering snow Megan could see armed militia standing in the road that led to the village, waving the convoy down.

Sophie changed down a gear and took a deep breath.

‘Let’s hope they’re in a good mood.’

***

The militia, far from being suspicious or aggressive toward the convoy, waved them through cheerily, clearly relieved to see the grain, medical supplies and well trained troops in their area. Their voices followed the truck as it passed them by.

‘English, American, bravo niet?!’

Sophie nodded and waved to them as she drove the truck across a cattle–grid and on toward the main town.

‘Jesus, it looks like the war’s already been here,’ Callum observed.

The houses and dull–grey apartment blocks that lined the streets were peppered with impact scars from mortars, shells and assorted small arms. Doors hung loosely from peeling frames, piles of rubble and shattered concrete lined the pavements and the skeletal steel shells of burnt out cars lay abandoned amongst the streets.

‘Anterik and the surrounding areas have seen low–level guerrilla war since 2000, mostly spilling over from Chechnya,’ Sophie explained. ‘Most of the casualties have been federal servicemen and local police forces, which is why the town is guarded now by militia – they’re just protecting their own homes and have no interest in Chechnya’s war.’

‘That explains why they were so pleased to see us,’ Callum said.

‘They have nothing,’ Sophie went on, ‘no water, no electricity, no effective sewage treatment, no hospital or doctors. Nothing. A UN convoy is like Christmas to these people.’

Megan looked at her in confusion.

‘I thought that the Mordanian government was taking care of the humanitarian side of things within its own borders?’

‘So did we,’ Sophie replied.

As if on cue, from the rubble strew houses and apartments flocked small groups of children, running through the thick snow in sandals and torn shoes, their emaciated bodies wrapped in rugs and sheets of old canvass and anything else they could find to keep warm. They ignored the chill wind and swirling snow, their eyes bright and smiles broad as they jostled to keep up with the trucks.

Megan noticed that Sophie Vernoux came alive at the sight of the children, winding down her window and smiling as she reached into her pocket. Handfuls of colourful candy were thrown liberally out of the window, the children catching them in mid flight with cries of excitement.

The convoy drew into the town’s main square, pulling around a crumbling monument to fallen World War One soldiers in the centre and stopping. The children were soon joined by small groups of elderly women and men all wrapped in threadbare clothes, their faces lined heavily with stress and fatigue.

Megan climbed down from the truck to stand beside Callum, and watched as Sophie began organising her volunteers to distribute the aid and medicines whilst Lieutenant Kelsey’s troops set up a perimeter around the edge of the square.

‘You think anyone here will recognise Amy from her picture?’ Callum asked.

‘I don’t know, but she may well have passed through Anterik so it’s worth a go. Try shooting some of this for the news tonight. We don’t want to disappoint our new friend Martin Sigby.’

Callum strode off into the centre of the square as though nonchalantly looking at his surroundings, whilst Megan moved amongst the growing crowd of beleaguered Mordanians, searching for anyone who looked as though they might remember a girl from several weeks before.

‘They’re all elderly,’ she remarked to Sophie as she moved alongside her.

‘Most of the young men are either fighting the rebels or have joined them,’ Sophie replied, hauling a sack of grain onto the bony shoulder of a child, whose other hand was clasped by what looked like his grandmother. The pair hobbled wearily away.

Megan shook her head, and then spotted a teenager amongst the throng, young but keen eyed. He looked to be at the sort of age where an attractive woman would not have gone unnoticed, but remained young enough not to have been called up to fight. Megan walked over to him as he hovered on the edge of the crowd, and held out the picture of Amy O’Hara to him.

The boy looked at her and then at the picture. He studied it for several long seconds and then put his fingers to his lips and let out a piercing whistle that rang in Megan’s ears.

From nowhere a small knot of pubescent children bolted across to his side, and the boy gestured at the picture. Megan felt a lance of hope pierce her heart as the children exchanged rapid bursts of dialect with animated hand signals, several of them pointing north toward the ever looming mountains.

Megan tried to listen to them, to pick out words that she might recognise. Suddenly the boy gripped her arm and began talking, pointing north like the rest. Megan could understand the general idea, but didn’t want to miss anything important.

‘Callum?!’

The Scotsman heard her from the other side of the square, raising his head questioningly.

‘Where’s Bolav?’

Callum strolled across to Lieutenant Kelsey, spoke for a few moments and after a barked order from the officer, Bolav appeared and loped across, his hands shoved deeply in his jacket pockets and his head hunched down in his collar against the cold. Megan explained the situation, and Bolav turned to face the children.

‘
Problick ton junoilya?
’

The children immediately began gabbling back to him. Bolav glanced at the picture and understood, regarding Megan with a tired expression as he spoke.

‘They say that she was here four weeks ago, maybe a little more. She was travelling alone and the locals told her it was dangerous to move further. She wouldn’t listen. She was looking for someone.’