First Response (8 page)

‘A head shot while the cage is in place would be safe,’ said Murray. ‘Death would be instantaneous and there would be no chance for the trigger to be pressed.’

‘You would need to be able to guarantee a kill, and while they’re inside that’s not possible,’ said Kamran.

‘A double shot, one to smash the window followed by a kill shot would do it.’

‘Too much of a risk,’ Kamran said.

‘There is another possibility. If we can get close, a machete would take off the lower arm like slicing a carrot. No arm, no trigger.’

Kamran shook his head. ‘If we can get close. There’s been no indication that’s going to happen. They’re not allowing anyone in or out.’

‘I’m just giving you your options,’ said Murray. ‘The sooner we end this, the better.’

‘I’d already come to that conclusion,’ said Kamran, frostily.

‘I wasn’t stating the obvious,’ Murray said. ‘The point I’m trying to make is that these guys have just two options: to talk or to blow themselves and their hostages up. The fact that they have no weapons other than the vests is telling. With a knife or a gun they can increase the threat level bit by bit. Hurt a hostage or single one out to kill. But our guys don’t have that option. They talk or they detonate. There’s no midway stage. It’s all or nothing.’

Kamran exhaled through pursed lips as he realised what the SAS officer was getting at. None of the men were carrying guns or knives. And they didn’t appear to be in contact with anyone. That meant there could be only two possible resolutions. Either the jihadists got what they wanted. Or they and their hostages died. There was no middle ground.

Kashif Talpur joined the queue to get onto the bus. He took a quick look over his shoulder. Two police officers were walking along Tavistock Square, deep in conversation. The man in front of him was having trouble with his Oyster card. He kept tapping it against the reader but it didn’t seem to work.

‘You’ll have to get off,’ said the West Indian driver.

‘It’s got ten quid on it, for sure,’ said the man. He was in his forties with greasy, matted hair, wearing a green jacket that had once belonged to an East European soldier.

‘If it doesn’t work you’ll have to get off.’

‘There’s nowt wrong with it,’ said the man, and slapped the card against the reader so hard that everyone on the bus heard the thwack. The reader beeped and the man waved his card in triumph.

He moved down the bus and Talpur stepped forward. The driver glared at him from behind his vandal screens. ‘Come on, I haven’t got all day,’ he snapped.

Talpur turned away and looked down the bus. The passengers reflected the multi-ethnicity of London. Twelve men and women. Half were Asian, four were black, one was Middle Eastern and one was white. The nearest was an Asian woman in a black headscarf holding two carrier bags of groceries. He was supposed to choose the passenger closest to the driver but he knew that she was going to panic and probably scream blue murder. The passenger next to her, closest to the window, was a young black man with headphones, eyes closed, head bobbing back and forth in time to a tune that only he could hear. Talpur would have preferred to use the man but his instructions were clear and he had been told not to deviate from them.

‘Oy, are you going to tap your card or not?’ said the driver, impatiently.

Talpur grabbed the woman’s right hand and handcuffed himself to her. For a few seconds she sat stunned, then screamed at him in Urdu. She let go of her bags and her groceries spilled onto the floor. Apples, oranges, naan bread, a box of eggs. Talpur stepped back and pulled the chain tight. The woman continued to scream at him, peppering his face with spittle. He slapped her, hard, and she immediately went quiet. With his right hand he undid his coat and opened it so that everyone could see the suicide vest. ‘
Allahu Akbar!
’ he shouted. ‘You must all do as I say or we will all die here!’ He reached into his pocket and pulled out the trigger, slipping the Velcro strap over his palm.

He turned to the driver, who was staring at him open-mouthed. ‘Close the door, now!’ Talpur shouted. The man did as he was told. Talpur stared at him through the protective glass. ‘If you make any attempt to leave the cab, you will be responsible for the death of every single person on this bus. Just stay where you are.’

The driver nodded, wide-eyed.

The woman was sobbing quietly now, her hands covering her face. ‘You all need to listen to me!’ shouted Talpur.

The man sitting by the window noticed what was happening and took off his headphones. ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ he asked.

There were footsteps on the stairs and a middle-aged black man peered from the stairwell.

‘You have to do exactly as you are told or everybody dies. You are all prisoners of ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. We are demanding the release of six prisoners who are being held in Belmarsh Prison. Anyone who has a phone must start tweeting now. If you can’t tweet, send text messages to your friends. Tell everyone that ISIS demands the release of its six brothers in Belmarsh. Do it now. Use hashtag ISIS6.’

No one moved. The only sound was the sobbing of the woman next to him.

Talpur raised his right hand so that they could all see the trigger. ‘Start sending the messages now. The ISIS Six must be released by six tonight or everyone dies!’ he shouted.

One by one the passengers took out their phones and started tapping away, except for the sobbing woman he was handcuffed to. She continued to bury her face in her hands and cry.

‘I’ve got the details of the six ISIS guys in Belmarsh,’ said Sergeant Lumley. Kamran pushed himself out of his chair and walked around to the sergeant’s station. Lynne Waterman joined him. There were six photographs on Lumley’s left-hand screen, each made of three images – left side, right side and straight ahead. They were all Asian, dark-skinned, with straggly beards and contemptuous eyes. There were differences between them but they were clearly all cut from the same cloth. ‘What’s the story?’ asked Kamran.

‘They’ve all returned from Syria in the past two months,’ said the sergeant. ‘The top three are all members of the North London Boys. They signed up with ISIS, probably even before they left the country.’

Kamran nodded. The North London Boys was a network of Muslim fundamentalists, mainly of African and Arab heritage, who funnelled jihadists from London, first to Somalia and latterly to Syria. It was this network that had helped create Jihadi John, the ISIS figurehead who had appeared in numerous videos of savage beheadings.

‘The three at the top flew in together from Turkey and were arrested when they arrived at Heathrow,’ continued Lumley. ‘They’d been in Syria for five months and are known associates of Jihadi John.’

‘Known how?’ asked Kamran. ‘They’re always wearing ski masks.’

‘They were at school with him,’ said Lumley. ‘They went to the same mosque, and posted pictures on Facebook while they were in Syria. One of them posted a selfie he’d taken with Jihadi John. They were both wearing masks, but there’s no reason to doubt it was him. In another picture he was holding a human head.’

The young men who went out to fight for terrorist organisations like ISIS often behaved as if they were in some crazed video game, Kamran thought. He could barely comprehend how someone born and brought up in Britain could end up hacking off the head of a fellow human being and boasting about it.

‘The three at the bottom have been picked up separately over the past month. One came in through Northern Ireland, two on the Eurostar. Again they were on our watch list and were picked up as soon as they entered the country.’

‘All British Pakistanis?’ asked Kamran.

Lumley shook his head. ‘The three at the bottom are Bangladeshis. At least, their parents are. All three were born in Britain and are from the Portsmouth area. They were members of a group called the Britani Brigade Bangladeshi Bad Boys. Dozens of them went out to Syria via Turkey last year. Most are still out there, dead or still fighting. These three came back after a few months. It probably wasn’t as much fun as they thought it would be.’

‘And what’s the story charge-wise?’ asked Kamran.

‘They’ve all been charged under section five of the Terrorism Act 2006,’ said the sergeant, ‘and they’re all being held on remand. The CPS is working with the Ministry of Justice to see whether they can be charged with treason.’

Waterman nodded. ‘They’ll be able to throw away the key if they can do that,’ she said.

‘Best way forward,’ said Murray. ‘It’s crazy putting these radicalised kids in prison for a few years, then letting them out again. Prison just toughens them up and makes them even angrier. But put them away for twenty or thirty years and they might just calm down.’

‘In addition to these six, there are more than two dozen family members also facing charges, though not all of them are in Belmarsh,’ said Lumley.

‘What charges?’ asked Kamran.

‘Engaging in conduct in preparation of terrorist acts, arranging availability of money and property for use in terrorism, failing to disclose information about acts of terrorism.’

‘And what about connections between the three from north London and the three from Portsmouth?’

‘Nothing obvious,’ said Lumley. ‘Other than the fact that they all went to fight for ISIS in Syria.’

‘If there is a link between them, that might lead us to whoever is organising this,’ said Kamran.

‘It could just be that they’re members of ISIS,’ said Waterman. ‘That might be the only connection.’

‘But what about the family members?’ asked Kamran. ‘Why not ask for everyone to be released? Why just these six?’

‘Because the families are collateral damage, not jihadists,’ said Waterman. ‘But let me get our people looking for links.’

‘And we need to see if there are any connections between these six and the jihadists out there now.’

‘I’m on it,’ said Waterman, heading back to her workstation.

Malik peered out of the store, looking left and right. The mall was deserted and had been for the best part of fifteen minutes.

‘I need to go to the toilet,’ said Zoe. The sales assistant was standing as far away from him as she could get without putting tension on the chain. Each time the chain tightened, Malik would snap it towards him and tell her to stay close. The other sales assistant and the four shoppers who had been there when Malik arrived were now huddled in one of the changing rooms. Malik had told them to stay there and to tell everyone on social media what had happened.

‘You will have to wait,’ said Malik, moving back into the chair.

‘I can’t wait.’

‘Then you will just have to do it here.’

‘You could undo the handcuff. I’ll let you put it back on afterwards.’

‘Do you think I’m stupid?’ snapped Malik. ‘If I take that off I’ll never see you again.’

‘But I have to pee!’

‘There’s nothing I can do,’ he said. ‘Now shut up. I need to think.’

Malik wiped his forehead with his sleeve. He was uncomfortably hot but there was no way he could remove the coat while he was handcuffed to the girl. Taking the cuff off wasn’t an option because he didn’t have the key, but he didn’t want to admit that to her.

Tears began to trickle down her face and Malik groaned. ‘Girl, pull yourself together.’

‘I want to pee.’

‘I know. I know. Look, is there a toilet in the back?’

‘Just the changing rooms.’

‘What about a bucket or something?’

‘A bucket?’

‘You can pee into a bucket.’

‘I’m not peeing into a fucking bucket.’

‘I’m trying to help here,’ said Malik. He squinted at the name tag, white letters on a black plastic oval. ‘Look, Zoe, I know we’re in a bad place at the moment but if we stay calm and see this through, everything’s going to work out all right.’

‘You’re not going to blow us up?’

‘I don’t want to die today, Zoe, and I certainly don’t want to die like this.’

‘Mohammed, can you hear me?’

Malik stiffened. The shout had come from outside the store. ‘Who’s that?’ he asked Zoe. She shrugged, not sure if he expected her to answer the question.

‘Mohammed, I’m with the police and I’m here to talk to you. Can you hear me, Mohammed? Let me know that you can hear me, will you?’

‘Is that your name, Mohammed?’ asked Zoe.

‘No. Well, yes, but no one calls me Mohammed, not even my mum.’

‘He wants to talk to you.’

‘I’ve nothing to say.’

‘You have to tell him what you want.’

‘They know what we want. We want the six ISIS prisoners released.’

‘Mohammed, I’m coming up to the front of the shop. I’m not armed and I’m alone. I just want to talk.’

‘Stay the fuck away from me, man!’ shouted Malik.

‘I just want to talk. I’m almost there now. Come to the entrance and you’ll see me. I just want to talk.’

‘I’ve nothing to say to you!’ shouted Malik. He took a hesitant step towards the entrance.

‘It’s just a conversation,’ said the man. ‘That’s all I’m here to do, establish contact so that you have someone to talk to.’

‘I don’t need to talk to anybody,’ said Malik. ‘All you have to do is release the prisoners. There is nothing to talk about.’ He took another step to the entrance, keeping the trigger held high above his head. He pulled Zoe after him.

The man was about twenty feet away from the entrance. He was wearing a black flak jacket with POLICE in white letters across the front and was holding his hands above his head, fingers splayed. He stopped when he saw Malik, and smiled. ‘Mohammed, good to see you,’ he said. He was in his thirties with hair that looked as if it hadn’t been combed in days and a close-cut beard.

‘You need to get the hell away from here, now,’ said Malik.

‘I just want a quick chat,’ said the man, slowly lowering his hands. ‘Your name’s Mohammed, right?’

‘No one calls me that.’

‘Mo, then? Is that what they call you, Mo?’

‘My name’s Sami.’

‘Sami Malik? I thought it was Mohammed.’