Authors: John Mannion
‘We must also be prepared for the consequent damage to the nation’s economy, the effect on the strength of Sterling on the world financial markets and in the confidence of the public at large towards relying on a new generation of nuclear power stations to supply the nation with electricity. Indeed, there is likely to be a drop in public confidence in the ability of government and the security forces to protect them from further attack! On the positive side, however, we are now very close to the usual ten day Christmas shut-down by many manufacturing industries. This should mitigate against any need for a reduction in power supplies to households over the Christmas period. Furthermore, I have already received assurances from all the affected sites that teams will be working day and night over Christmas, to speed up the repairs and reconstruction work needed to get these stations up and running again as soon as is humanly possible.’
For Sergeant Chambers of the CNC, as for many others, their experiences of the recent past would live with them for a long time after the events. Those individuals, whether innocent bystanders, or emergency service personnel attending an incident, or hospital staff dealing with the aftermath, were left with images of their experiences imprinted on their minds and with emotions stemming from their own personal reality of that experience.
For the traveller on the Underground train, or the young person frequenting the nightclub, there was the shock and horror of the conflagration they had found themselves caught up in. The feeling of unreality.
‘These things happen in other places and to other people, not to me or people I know,’ was a common sentiment.
They felt undermined at finding themselves unprepared, helpless victims with no control over what was happening in their personal space. Many of these people would find it difficult to get back to a normal routine, at least for some time. Some would become recluses, locked away in their own reality. Others would alter their lifestyles to accommodate a new awareness of unforeseen possible danger in everyday life. The loss of friends, relatives and acquaintances under these circumstances undermined their feeling of security.
For the hospital staff – the doctors, nurses and support staff – there was the memory of the horrific sight of the injuries presented on such a huge scale. Most had never encountered anything like it before. For the younger doctors and nurses, it had been a baptism of fire; something they would probably never encounter again. Most would have been aware of limitations in their skills at that stage in their careers, and these incidents had emphasised this fact. Many more experienced medics and nurses were also left with feelings of inadequacy; the feeling that they could have done more to alleviate the pain of an individual, maybe could have saved a life if they had acted differently. Some blamed others. ‘If the facilities or organisation was better prepared, the outcome could have been different!’
As Sergeant Chambers sat going over the events of that tragic day at Oldbury, he had difficulty communicating his true emotions to Yvonne, his therapist. She sat listening patiently to her client. She didn’t interrupt, allowing him to articulate the pent-up dark emotions he couldn’t clear from his mind.
‘If I had been in the driver’s seat, it would have been me slumped over the steering wheel. Why did I survive, and young Adam didn’t? It seems so arbitrary. Why did anybody have to die? It’s so pointless. What was it all for? What has it achieved? I was in charge. Maybe, if I had proceeded with more caution and not been carried away with the high drama of it all, Adam would still be alive.’
Sometimes the feeling of guilt at having survived, overwhelmed Chambers. In the still of the night in bed, in the moments when he was alone, he would keep going over the events of that day. The nightmare wouldn’t go away.
He had tried drinking himself into oblivion, but had come to realise that this only made matters worse. The darkness always returned, only to be accompanied by a hangover and the need for more booze to steady his shattered nerves. Eventually his drinking resulted in him being placed on sick leave with a requirement to attend therapy. He knew this was his last chance to come to terms with the darkness; to salvage his sanity, his life, his career.
Theo Akinola also found himself reliving that moment of blind rage in Slough. However, after being cleared of any wrongdoing by both the Metropolitan Police Professional Standards and Independent Police Complaints Commission Investigators, he had found solace in the knowledge – as he had come to see it – that he had done society a big favour. He didn’t subscribe to the view, which in his opinion was naïve, that all human life was valuable. He didn’t derive any pleasure from his deed, but neither did he feel any guilt.
Ed Malone sat in front of the TV set in his living room, watching the Prime Minister’s address to the nation. As was usual in the Malone household, when certain subject matter was being addressed on the screen, Ed felt obliged to give a running commentary of his own feelings on the subject.
Sue knew the pattern. He’d always turn up the volume and then shout over it, giving his opinions. On these occasions, Sue could feel the rage rising inside her.
‘Why can’t you shut up and let me hear what they’re saying? I can listen to you later,’ she would want to scream at him.
But she never did. Rather, it was often joked about later on. Sue had her own opinions which she talked about with friends, but she rarely discussed them with Ed and was especially apprehensive about airing them when he was particularly agitated. As he was on this occasion! She would let him have his rant, get it off his chest, and then calm would return.
The Prime Minister was speaking about the recent terrorist activity, but it was impossible for Sue to hear what he was saying as Ed raged,
‘It’s the same old, politically correct nonsense!’ The Premier was making it clear that these terrorists were not Muslim terrorists, but just terrorists.
Ed shouted at the image on the TV screen: ‘The fact they proclaim their allegiance to the Islamic faith and are fighting for an Islamic world order is to be ignored, I suppose? The majority of British Muslims don’t support Islamic extremist violence or dogma. However a substantial minority do. Politicians have to stop lecturing non-Muslims against anti-Islamic prejudice. The Islamic community has to get its own house in order. After all, most of the victims of the extremists are Muslims.’
Addressing Sue directly, ‘Do you realise how many of the political elite in Britain and other western nations today were Marxists and Communists? Some still are deep down. Surely they must be either seriously delusional or, worse, totally evil individuals to idolise mass murderers and are in either case unfit to be leaders of a democratic nation.’
Ed continued, ‘This is going to be a long war. Within the job itself, there’s the likes of Russ Ward. He never leaves the dream factory if he can help it. He’s got his tongue permanently lodged up the bosses’ arses! People blame form-filling, imposed by government, for lack of police presence on the street. The truth is poor police management. The new breed that now have control over the service love their forms and flow charts, their management speak.’
Sue, sitting across from Ed, uttered, ‘Ed. Try to relax. There’s no point in getting yourself so stressed. You know it’s going to make no difference. You’ll wind up having a heart attack.’
He replied resignedly, ‘I know.’
Ed reflected. He knew if he had his time again, he would find his choice of career less appealing!
On the other side of London, Salim was staring out of his office window. He felt a sense of satisfaction with his work of the past few weeks. He knew much more needed to be done to bring about final victory but, with the help of the corrupt, morally bankrupt British establishment, victory was assured. In the background he could hear the Prime Minister address the nation. He smiled with contempt, muttering to himself,
‘As long as this country and other Western nations have leaders of this calibre, our eventual victory is most certainly assured. The Judea Christian nations of the West will, in time, succumb to the teachings of Islam. God willing!’
‘We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.’
Attributed to George Orwell
Salim was staring out of his office window across the Thames. He smiled to himself. 10am on a fine Easter Saturday. The operation was now underway. Oxford would be crowded with shoppers, amongst them many tourists. Allah willing, many Americans amongst the throng. It would indeed be a target-rich environment. It had been a stroke of genius on his part to persuade his masters against mounting the operation in the West End of London, where there were a substantial number of armed police officers available. Still, it had to be a target that would grab the world’s attention. Oxford was such a target.
It was a perfect early April morning. The sky was cloudless over the city of dreaming spires and the temperature was in the high teens Celsius as the dark blue transit van turned off St Giles and stopped outside the Parthenon Hotel in Beaumont Street. The passenger in the driver’s cab picked up his AK47 assault rifle, which he had placed at his feet, opened the door and got out. He walked briskly to the rear of the vehicle and threw open the double doors. Five more young men, each carrying a backpack over his shoulder and an AK47, jumped down from the vehicle. The six terrorists then swiftly approached the entrance to the four star Parthenon Hotel. The driver of the van depressed the accelerator and sped away towards the police station at St Aldates.
The six terrorists entered the hotel lobby and their leader immediately fired a burst of automatic fire at the reception desk. The two reception staff and three guests fell to the floor, their bodies shredded by the hail of bullets. The six terrorists screamed in unison at the top of their voices, ‘Allahu Akbar!’ and divided into pairs, each pair heading in a different direction so better to create havoc among the guests and staff.
Two members of the terrorist cell entered the hotel restaurant, each unleashing a hail of bullets at the diners. There were screams of terror as the diners reacted to the horrific intrusion. Tables and chairs flew in every direction, blood spattered around the room along with bone fragments and pieces of flesh which stuck to walls, furniture and fellow guests. The two young men looked at each other and smiled, as one of them pulled a grenade from his backpack and walked across the room toward the kitchen. He pushed open the door and casually rolled the grenade across the floor. As soon as he had released the grenade from his grip, he stepped back behind the swinging doors and pressed his body hard against the wall. There were screams already in the air as the grenade exploded, sending forth a blast wave and shrapnel in its wake. Lighted gas appliances were damaged in the blast and flames erupted from them, engulfing other material and rapidly turning the kitchen and dining area into an inferno and a funeral pyre for the dead and injured staff within. The sprinkler system failed to get to grips with the flames. The water supply proved insufficient for the scale of the incident. The sound of the hotel fire alarm resonated throughout the building.
Another pair of terrorists had meanwhile burst into the hotel gym, immediately unleashing a maelstrom of lead on the half dozen sweating, panting individuals, sending one man flying in the throes of death from a treadmill across the floor. Within seconds all in the room, save their murderers, were lying dead, blood oozing from multiple wounds, involuntarily twitching and defecating. Deprived of the last vestiges of dignity in their death throes. The two terrorists then casually turned and left the now tomb-like silence of the room to continue ‘God’s work’.
While their fellow assassins were approaching their designated targets on the ground floor of the Parthenon, the remaining two members of the terror cell had rushed up onto the first floor. Cleaners were busy at work cleaning and replenishing rooms. Many of the guests had, thankfully, vacated their accommodation. The two terrorists ran up to a member of the cleaning staff and one of the men screamed into her face, eyes blazing,
‘The room keys! Come on, the keys!’
The terrified woman grabbed the keys from the cleaning trolley and, trembling, handed them over to the violent looking young man. The man looked at her.
‘Are you Muslim?’
The woman stared at him blankly
The terrorist repeated, ‘Are you stupid, woman? Don’t you understand?’
‘Yes, yes, I am Muslim,’ she replied, her voice hesitant.
The terrorist ordered the woman: ‘Go then. Now! Get out of this place immediately. Don’t stop.’
Nirmala, who had been in the UK for only nine months and hailed from Indonesia, fled the hotel, never looking back. Other cleaning staff on the first floor had already fled on seeing the men with guns.
At the sound of the fire alarm, guests peered out of their rooms, quizzical looks on their faces which said, ‘Was this a real fire, a false alarm or a test or drill? How do we respond? Do we get out of the building now, first grabbing our valuables, or wait for further instructions from staff?’ These questions were on the faces of the first floor occupants for only a fleeting few seconds. When they saw the gunmen in the corridor, the danger signals to their brains started to push the hotel fire alarm to the back of their minds. At first there was hesitation. Their thoughts raced through likely scenarios. ‘This, whatever it is, cannot be real. A place of safety. Quickly!’ Room doors slammed shut in an instance. The terrified occupants either stood frozen by fear behind the flimsy protection or screamed incoherent information and instructions to fellow occupants within.
The two terrorists commenced a room-by-room search of the first floor for guests and staff, opening room doors and spraying occupants with automatic fire. Occasionally an occupant, by reason of their appearance, would be asked their nationality or their religion. If they gave the right answer to the question, they were told to get out of the building immediately. This was not the case for most of the helpless innocents trapped in the unfolding nightmare. They died instantly in a hail of bullets. No explanation. Nothing personal.