Payback (45 page)

Burj Al-Arab Hotel, Dubai

The manufacturers of the Mitchell Climbing System claim that an experienced user is able to climb either up or down a particular distance at approximately the same speed.
By the time Richter hauled himself over the edge of the parapet, he was perfectly prepared to agree with them.

Ghul extended a hand as soon as Richter’s head appeared, and seconds later he was leaning safely against the parapet’s interior wall.

‘I couldn’t see the door handles,’ Richter reported, ‘but we must assume they’ve attached charges. It looks like I’m going to have to go in through a
window.’

‘I’ll get the plastic explosive.’

‘We haven’t got time for that. I’d have to lower myself down, attach the charge, climb up here, wait for it to blow, and then go down yet again. There’s a quicker
way.’

‘The minigun,’ Jackson suggested.

‘Got it in one,’ Richter said. ‘You’re good with weapons, Carole. Get airborne in the Bell and punch a few rounds through the window. Just make sure you aim carefully,
because our friend Hussein’s inside, trussed up like a turkey.’

‘No problem.’ She turned towards the staircase.

‘I’d better go with her,’ Ghul murmured, ‘in case the pilot has problems taking orders from a woman.’ He held out a plastic bottle. ‘Here. You’d better
have some of this.’

‘Thanks.’ Richter took it. He was already sweating profusely in the blazing sunshine, and needed to keep up his fluid intake. He’d drained about half the water when he heard
the Bell start up. As it lifted off the helipad, the pilot swung the helicopter in a tight turn, allowing its right side to face the hotel.

Richter leant over the parapet to watch, and seconds later heard the sudden spurt of sound as Jackson fired the minigun. Below him, glass shattered, and he quickly repositioned the rope to hang
directly over the damaged window.

By the time the Bell had settled back on the helipad, Richter was over the parapet and on his way down.

Dubai International Airport

The car was stopped at the entrance by two police officers. As soon as they’d confirmed that the passengers were from the Burj Al-Arab, they were directed onto a
service road leading to the hardstanding on which the Gulfstream was parked.

A couple of minutes later, the four Americans were strapping themselves into the leather seats, surrounded by boxes and bags containing more money than the Gross Domestic Product of about sixty
of the world’s poorest countries. In the cockpit, Sutter and Haig had started to run through the pre-start checklist.

Burj Al-Arab Hotel, Dubai

Richter was getting much better at it. This time it took him only about ninety seconds to lower himself down to the level of the shattered window. Even so, he remained
supremely conscious of the yawning drop below him.

Jackson had been as accurate as Richter expected, and the toughened glass had offered little resistance to the 7.62-millimetre rounds that had punched through it.

The hole was too small for Richter to get through, so he took a firm grip on the Ultrascenders, removed his feet from the Stiff Steps and kicked himself powerfully away from the front of the
building. He swung outwards about eight feet, then back towards the window, hitting it with both feet outstretched. Glass shattered, but the hole was still too small. So he swung out again, the
strain on his arms growing intolerable, and yet again.

The fourth time he hit the ruined window, his momentum carried him right inside the room. The climbing rope started to jerk him backwards, but he instantly released both the Ultrascenders and
went crashing and rolling onto the sumptuous carpet of the Royal Suite.

Dubai International Airport

With a whine, the port-side engine began to spool up, then it settled into a muted roar. Two minutes later, Sutter started the starboard engine. After-start checks took
them just under a minute and, as soon as they were completed, he requested taxi clearance.

It was unfortunate that two commercial aircraft had requested the same just moments before, and even before that there were already three aircraft heading for the runway threshold. So, as the
Gulfstream turned off the hardstanding, it was number six for take-off from runway 12 Right.

But even with that amount of traffic ahead of them, they still confidently expected to be in the air within ten minutes.

Burj Al-Arab Hotel, Dubai

Hussein stared at Richter with pleading eyes as he sprinted past, but at that moment the Englishman was concerned with one thing only – the suitcase nuclear
weapon.

For a few seconds he simply stared at the aluminium case sitting on the table with its lid closed. He could detect no anti-tamper devices on it, but perhaps Hussein might have seen
something.

Richter strode across to the bound police officer and ripped the tape off his mouth. Hussein howled in pain.

‘Did you see those Americans put explosive in the box? Or attach anything to it?’

‘No. They just set the timer, closed the lid and walked out. Please untie me now.’

‘Later.’ Richter ran across and checked all round the box again, trusting what Hussein had said, but wanting to be certain. Taking a deep breath, which he knew made no difference at
all, he unclipped the two catches, lifted the lid and peered inside.

The interior looked remarkably innocuous. In a fabric pocket was a set of keys. On the underside of the lid were instructions in multiple languages. He scanned quickly to the end of the English
section, where he read the words ‘Abort code’:

That seemed to amount to the only available information. To complicate matters, there were two keypads with numeric displays located either side of the weapon itself, not one as
he’d expected. On the far right was a single gated switch, and two glowing red and green lights. In the centre were two unmarked amber warning lights. Richter guessed these might be
circuit-testing lamps, but he hadn’t time to read the instructions next to them, because he’d just seen the twin countdown timers.

The two digital displays showed different information. The right-hand one indicated a time, but it was obviously not local so he disregarded it. The one on the left was counting down in seconds,
and as Richter looked, the counter passed ‘400’. Five minutes equalled 300 seconds. He had around a minute and a half left to enter the abort code.

Richter wasn’t a religious man but, as he pulled the notebook out of his pocket, he muttered a silent prayer that Bykov had given him the right number.

He opened the book, glanced at the figures, then back at the counter. ‘378’, ‘377’, ‘376’. He punched the ten digits onto the left-hand keypad, making
absolutely sure that he was pressing the correct button each time.

Then he looked at the digital display. ‘354’, ‘353’, ‘352’. ‘Oh, shit,’ he muttered. Had he used the wrong keypad, or did you have to do it twice?
Or were the numbers actually wrong? He moved his hand across to the other keypad and entered the same ten-digit sequence.

He looked back at the display. The numbers were still counting down. Then at the other panel, the one that showed the time. That had now cleared, and a message in Cyrillic script was displayed.
Richter translated it aloud: ‘Abort code accepted. You have fifteen seconds to confirm.’ As he looked, the figure ‘15’ in the message changed to ‘14’, and then
‘13’.

Again he entered the ten-digit sequence, as quickly as he could while still ensuring he got it right.

This time, when he checked the digital displays, the Cyrillic message in the right-hand one simply stated ‘Detonation aborted. You may now switch off the mechanism.’ In the left-hand
display the numbers had finally stopped. The timer read ‘307’.

Richter reached for the gated switch, then withdrew his hand. He was suddenly aware that the numbers displayed on the weapon might prove useful. He also realized there was very little time left
to stop the Americans. He took the keys from the inner pouch, closed the lid, clicked the catches home and locked both of them.

He ran over to the staircase and down to the double doors. As he’d guessed, there was a plastic explosive charge taped to the handle. It was a common enough type of detonator: delayed
action – usually ten to thirty seconds – until switch-on, then activated by any kind of pressure applied to the wire attached to it. The easiest way to disable it was to cut the wire.
The problem was that if the cutters slipped, Richter himself and a large part of his surroundings would be immediately vaporized.

He studied the tape securing the plastic explosive to the handle. That seemed the safer option. Richter took out his Kamasa multi-tool and selected a knife blade. Holding the explosive firmly in
his left hand, he carefully cut through each piece of tape, then moved the plastic explosive to ease the pressure on the wire. Once it was completely slack, he pulled out the detonator and tossed
it to one side, then dropped the explosive on the floor.

Richter flung open the doors to find Ghul and Jackson waiting outside. A nervous-looking Barzani stood beside them.

‘It’s disarmed,’ Richter announced. ‘Now we’ve got to stop that aircraft.’

‘I’ll call the airport,’ Ghul said.

‘We need more positive action than that. I’ll take the chopper.’ Then he pointed towards the upper level of the suite. ‘Hussein’s still tied to a chair up
there.’

Before Ghul could respond, Richter strode past him towards the lift and pressed the button. Jackson slid into the elevator beside him just as the doors started to close. Less than a minute later
they were back on the roof, heading for the staircase leading to the helipad.

The pilot was still in his seat, presumably waiting for further orders from someone, the engines running though the rotors were braked. Jackson glanced at Richter and caught his almost
imperceptible nod. While he climbed into the rear cabin, she wrenched open the cockpit door and slid into the co-pilot’s seat.

The pilot looked somewhat startled, and even more so when Jackson pulled on a headset and instructed him, in crisp and precise Arabic, to take off.

‘You can’t order me around,’ he began, but his voice died away as she produced her Glock 17 and aimed it directly at him.

‘Think again, or you’ll find yourself meeting Muhammad way sooner than you ever expected,’ she said. ‘Now get this bird in the air.’

Chief Inspector Ghul arrived on the roof just as the Bell lifted off. For a moment or two he watched it heading east, back towards Dubai City and the airport beyond, then reached into his pocket
for his mobile phone.

Dubai International Airport

‘November Two Six, Dubai Ground. Execute a one hundred and eighty degree turn and return to your stand.’

‘What the hell?’ Haig exclaimed. The Gulfstream was just about to enter the runway.

‘What is it?’ O’Hagan called out.

‘They’ve ordered us back to the hardstanding.’

O’Hagan unbuckled his seat belt and strode forward. ‘Is the runway clear?’

‘Hell, yes. We were the next aircraft in line.’

‘Right, fuck them. Probably somebody in their government’s got cold feet – or a sudden attack of stupidity. Just go.’

Sutter eased the throttles forward, turned the Gulf-stream onto the runway, then pushed them fully forwards. The aircraft immediately began accelerating.

As the Gulfstream crossed the piano keys, the Bell 212 swept over the airfield boundary, already flying close to its maximum speed of one hundred and thirty knots.

‘I must get clearance,’ the pilot shouted. ‘This is an active commercial airfield. I can’t fly over it.’

‘You won’t be flying over it, just going as far as the runway. And trust me, you won’t be getting into any trouble. Well, maybe not,’ she added,
sotto voce
,
peering ahead for any sign of the Gulfstream.

And then she spotted it. ‘Paul, it’s on the runway, and already rolling. You want to forget this and whistle up some fighters? There are Mirages stationed at Al-Dhafra. They should
be able to catch it easily.’

‘Not if I can help it. Tell laughing boy in the driving seat to get us down to ground level and intercept that fucking Gulfstream. We need to be on the aircraft’s left so I can bring
this minigun to bear.’

Richter heard a babble of Arabic in his headphone, then the Bell dived forward. He braced himself against the side of the open doorway and looked ahead.

The G450 was approaching take-off speed just as the helicopter drew alongside, some fifty metres clear, on the left side of the runway. Richter didn’t hesitate. As the Gulfstream
accelerated, he pointed the minigun straight at it, aimed for the centre of mass and squeezed the trigger.

The General Electric M134 minigun fires six thousand rounds a minute in its normal configuration, an almost continuous stream of bullets pouring out of the six rotating barrels.

Richter’s aim was initially a little off, the first bullets passing over and beyond the Gulfstream, but he immediately corrected. The stream of 7.62-millimetre ammunition ripped through
the thin and relatively delicate skin of the passenger cabin, moving down and forwards, tearing a ragged line through the metal that almost bisected the aircraft.

In the cabin, the four Americans stared in horrified disbelief as the bullets howled through the fuselage, obliterating everything they hit. O’Hagan tore off his seat
belt and rushed over to one of the port-side windows to look out. The Bell 212 was flying parallel, only yards away. In the open cabin door, an ugly black weapon was pointing directly at him.
O’Hagan instantly recognized the minigun – and then the face of the man behind it.

‘That fucking Richter,’ he screamed, as the jet began to break up around him.

In the cockpit, Sutter and Haig became aware of an increase in noise and vibration, but couldn’t immediately identify the cause. Haig called out ‘V2 – rotate,’ and Sutter
eased back on the control column. Just as he did so, the stream of bullets from the minigun reached the cockpit, killing both men instantly.