The Keepers of the Persian Gate (30 page)

“As for the rest of the Western World, I am not in a position to argue its case either way. So be it considered within the jurisdiction of this court, then I will proudly take the fall for those crimes, just like any good soldier would,” answered Prince Hector.

“Your Highness!” shouted Paddy.

“Shut up,” said Farooq.

“He has confessed!” shouted another of the gunmen.

Prince Hector was lifted from the witness box and taken in front of the camera.

“Mr Farooq, you have not allowed the defence to question the defendant,” shouted the judge.

“This trial is over,” shouted Farooq, placing a gun against the Prince’s head.

“If you kill the murderer, Mr. Farooq, the quantity of murderers will not change,” stated the Prince.

Paddy suddenly jumped the bench and grabbed Farooq’s gun; however, another one of the combatants moved and shot Paddy. Paddy fell, laying on the ground motionless. The Prince managed to dive for cover behind the witness box while his guards was able to disarm another combatant. A fire fight ensued. All the while, the judge was helpless to do anything. After several minutes of fire, there was a stand-off. Tony Morley lay on the ground; turning on his mobile, he managed to get a text out to Morgan.

“The game’s up. The security services now know what’s happened.” shouted Morley, holding his mobile phone aloft from underneath the desk.

Paddy regained consciousness but could not move. He was bleeding badly. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see that one of the Jihadi Knights was holding the Prince hostage behind the witness box.

“Ok, you let us go, and no one else will be killed!” shouted Farooq.

Slowly, the combatants began to move to the public entrance of the court. One of them smashed the locks with the back of his weapon.

“Remain still!” shouted Farooq as the last of the combatants backed out of the court. The court room was devastated by gunfire. Morley rushed over to check on Paddy.

“Alright, son. You’re going to be alright,” said Morley.

Prince Hector’s guards slowly made their way out the doors to follow the Jihadi Knights who had Prince Hector hostage.

The next thing, Paddy heard loud gunfire and shouts out in the main public corridor. “That’s not Jihadi Knights,” he thought to himself. This gunfire went on for several minutes. As he lost consciousness again, he could barely make it out, but he knew what he was seeing as he lay on his back was a helicopter, hovering over the glass atrium above the court. Men dressed in black descended on wires to the roof of the court. The last thing he saw before he passed out was one of them waving through the glass.

Within minutes, the courtroom was filled with military personnel. Prince Hector had successfully been released from the custody of the Jihadi Knights. Despite pleas that he be taken to a secure location, he demanded to return to the court to check on Paddy’s condition. An army medical team attended Paddy on the scene and he was taken out of the court on a stretcher, wearing an oxygen mask. He was escorted out by Tony Morley and Prince Hector. The judge was attended to by a separate medical team.

As they got out onto the lawn, Morley noticed smoke billowing from inside Belmarsh. “What the hell’s going on over there?”

“Prison riot. Seems they started a fire over there and one of the wings had to be evacuated,” replied a prison guard.

“What wing?”

“Oh, it’s the secure wing,” replied the prison guard.

“Wait… where is Abdullah Atwah?” shouted Morley.

As Paddy was lifted onto a medical helicopter, Prince Hector jumped aboard, too. Not an officer in sight dared bat an eyelid as he did. Paddy stirred a little bit and begin saying something. “The helicopter…”

“Yes, we’re on a helicopter, Mr. Trimble. You’re going to be ok.”

“No, the helicopter over the court,” said Paddy.

“What?” said Prince Hector.

Morley, meanwhile, was making urgent inquiries about the location of the original defendant in the case, Abdullah Atwah, but nobody knew where he was. He then made for the entrance to Belmarsh, demanding to see the Governor. He, too, was nowhere to be found. The prison staff refused him entry to the main prison on the basis of the fire; instead, he was permitted to proceed to the prison hospital. He wanted to know whether the Mechanic was still on the wing. Just like the late Colin Hall, Morley had received access to the defence’s papers in the minutes before the trial and he now had a rough idea who the Mechanic was and knew that he was being held on the secure wing. Over in the prison hospital, the ICC guards were being attended to. They had all suffered severe smoke inhalation.

“How was there a fire on the secure wing?” Morley asked one of the doctors.

“Prison riot,” replied the doctor.

“But how did this happen on the secure wing?” asked Morley.

“Don’t know, I’m afraid,” replied the doctor.

The fire bellowed on for another hour while firefighters tackled the blaze. When the flames had receded, the firefighters, in conjunction with the prison guards, were able to conduct an initial assessment of the damage as well as doing a head count of both the survivors and victims of the flames. When they reached the Mechanic’s cell, they found a burned corpse.

When Tony returned to the scene of the attack on the court, he was informed that Abdullah Atwah was nowhere to be found. News cameras were appearing thick and fast by this stage and part of the ISC committee had also arrived. Morgan Wright was briefing a senior army officer as well as a Fire Marshall, who seemingly were getting ready to appear on camera. It seemed odd to Morley that the media were only arriving now. The live stream from Jihadi Knights had been broadcast some hours ago

“Morgan, what’s going on?”

“Ah Tony, well… I’m just explaining to the Brigadier and the Fire Marshall here how this was an exercise to test the resolve of the emergency services and the army in the event of a terrorist attack on Woolwich and Belmarsh,” replied Morgan.

“But…we
were
attacked,” replied Tony.

Morgan leaned in. “Yes, I know. But your version of events must never reach the ears of the public, is that understood?”

“I see. But what about the live internet stream which Jihadi Knights put up on the internet?”

“Live stream? I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

***

In the days that followed the attack on Woolwich, the Queen ordered that the seizure of Downing Street come to an end. Following a lengthy meeting with the Queen, the Prime Minister dismissed his Cabinet Secretary, who was also placed under investigation by Scotland Yard for his part in a conspiracy to monitor the communications of cabinet members. Meanwhile, Sefton & Grey reopened its doors, as did Dunlop & McLaine, following no arrests. A secret judicial inquiry, headed by Judge Brennan, would look into the events which led up to the attack on Woolwich. As part of Judge Brennan’s remit, his inquiry would examine the causes of the fire in the prison to ascertain whether the events were in any way connected. Simultaneously, the ISC ordered the Investigatory Powers Tribunal to launch a further investigation into the senior management of MI5. This time, the investigation would be chaired by Morgan Wright, assisted by Tony Morley QC.

The Prison Governor had seemingly fled the country, and Abdullah Atwah was also on the run. In a bizarre turn of events, documents collected from the Governor’s computer provided evidence that the Governor knew of the impending attack on Woolwich by Jihadi Knights, but had said nothing. Instead, it appeared when the attack commenced, he moved to cut off the live feed. However, his motivations for doing so were unclear. Therefore, the world did not see the heroic actions of the members of the court on that fateful day.

An autopsy report sent to the ISC and the ICC found that the corpse in the cell was indeed that of the Mechanic. The Office of the Medical Examiner found the following:

“Ludwig Von Gunten, a 72-year-old male, was found beneath debris. A post-mortem examination including autopsy of the body was performed in the prison hospital at Belmarsh Prison in Woolwich on August 14
th
2011, commencing at 1500 hours.

“The deceased was brought to the morgue in a disaster bag. Clothing has been burned off. This is the un-enbalmed body of a male which weighs 145lbs and measures 5ft 8 inches in height.”

The report concluded that the “cause of death was due to smoke inhalation and carbon monoxide poisoning, including burns to the internal respiratory system leading to heart failure.” Due to the fact that the Mechanic was Muslim, he had strict burial requirements. According to Islamic law, the body should be buried as soon as possible following the death. A small service was held on the Monday afternoon and the body of the Mechanic was buried in the Belmarsh prison cemetery.

Meanwhile, Paddy Trimble was recovering in the nearby Royal Artillery Barracks hospital. He had lost a lot of blood; the bullet had pierced his right lung narrowly missing his heart. However, the doctor treating him was confident that with a carefully orchestrated treatment plan he would make a full recovery. It was Monday night before Paddy regained complete consciousness. When he eventually came to, he looked to the right and noticed that Catherine was seated at the bottom of his hospital bed with her head resting against his legs. Paddy just sat there enjoying the moment. If Catherine was with him, then that meant she had been released from the custody of MI5.

“Hey, stranger,” he finally whispered.

Catherine looked up and smiled. “Hey, handsome.”

Just then, Prince Hector walked around the corner, stirring a cup of coffee. “Mr. Trimble. Well done, my good man. You’re a hero.”

“I…what happened?” replied Paddy.

“You acted in a manner consistent with the very best principles of the British Army, Mr. Trimble. And this young lady has not left your side since she arrived,” said the Prince, smiling.

“Prince Hector has visited every day, Paddy,” said Catherine.

“Thank you, your Highness,” replied Paddy.

“Please, call me Hector.”

“Thank you, Hector.”

“Right, well, I’m sure you to will have plenty of things to catch up on, so I best be heading off. But we will meet again soon, Mr. Trimble,” said Hector as he gently pulled the curtains around Paddy’s bed and gave him a wink.

Catherine approached Paddy to give him a kiss. But as she did, Hector returned. “Oh, and just one last thing before I go, Mr. Trimble. I intend to have a word with my grandmother about you.” Hector left the cubicle again.

“Sir Paddy Trimble. That’s got quite a ring to it,” said Catherine.

“It does, doesn’t it?” replied Paddy.

As Caroline leaned in for another kiss, some breaking news was coming through on the muted television in the corner. The lead story, unnoticed by the happy couple, was that a shooting had just occurred in the New York Hamptons, at the home of Robert Jackson, current Chief of the National Security Agency in the United States. Jackson was dead and his daughter and grandchildren were missing.

Epilogue

IT WAS ONE OF THE COLDEST DECEMBERS in London since records began. However, snow had been falling for several days which made Paddy’s short walk to work rather pleasant.

Adam Scott had recently been elected as the new Managing Partner of Dunlop & McLaine after an extended leave of absence. He had been arrested and taken in for questioning in the weeks following the death of Sir Mark Glover. However, the police could not find any hard evidence that could stick in court. To ascertain the nature of Scott’s previous career, they had tried to gain access to Scott’s employment records at MI6, but their requests were denied.

Meanwhile, the Brennan Inquest had already published its initial findings to the ISC and Parliament. The first prong of Brennan’s investigation looked at how the Jihadi Knights had managed to compromise the security of the Privy Court. In this regard, it was found that the Knights had entered the court on the Friday, posing as electricians, and claiming they were there to carry out routine maintenance on the electrics. The main circuit board for that particular court’s electronics systems was, conveniently enough, located in a secure box within the judge’s bench.

On the same Friday, the Jihadi Knights also removed a further switchboard up on the viewing gallery level under the pretext that they were accessing the fire sprinkler system. However, out of the ten men that entered the courts on that day, only five left and security did not appear to be counting in or out those who exited the court. The remainder were secured inside the respective compartments behind the panels until the commencement of the trial.

The methods by which they got their weapons inside were quite innovative. They had taken the weapons apart and split them into as many constituent components as possible. They then spread them out over the various bags they had brought with them. They used bags that were heavy and filled with weights, far too heavy to be put through the bag scanners at Woolwich. Accordingly, the Inquest found that security failed to check their bags.

A second prong of the Brennan Inquiry focussed on the breach of security of the trial. In this regard the Inquiry was required to investigate only those who had actual knowledge of the trial. For part of this, Brennan himself had to hand over the chairing of the inquiry to another judge who would examine Brennan’s own role in the events leading up to the Atwah trial. Further witnesses that were called in to testify during the inquiry included Paddy Trimble, Tony Morley and Prince Hector. The answers to the question of the leak had turned on who might have access to information and would have had the propensity to leak said information on the balance of probabilities. In this regard, the court concluded that Sir Mark Glover had passed the information to the Acropolis, who had in turn leaked the time and location of the trial to Jihadi Knights. Paddy lamented that this finding was a weak one, because there was no evidence that Mark knew of the trial.

The third prong examined the fire in Belmarsh. It would have indeed been a mysterious coincidence if, during the trial, a prison riot had broken out causing a fire on a high security wing, killing someone who was due to stand trial in the Hague for War Crimes. As if that were not enough, the Brennan Inquest found that the Governor of Belmarsh Prison’s own papers indicated was that he was actually a fellow member of the Mechanic’s organisation, namely, the Keepers of the Persian Gate.