Read Online Immediate Action by Andy McNab - Free Book Online Page B

left-hand junction about ten meters away from the point of the contact. Time and time again during the buildup training we'd practiced two ways of looking around corners. You can get very low and look around, close up to it, or, better still, you can move away from the corner and then gradually bring yourself around so you present less of a target. It was all very well in training because I knew there was nobody around the other side with an Armalite aimed at me. But here there could be. I took a deep breath, got down on my belly with the weapon ready to swing around, and had a quick squint.
        There was nobody there. I brought myself around and followed on down the road a bit, just to check that there weren't any runners that way.
        Then I returned to the scene.
        One poor fellow who had been part of the crowd was now halfway up the street. He had been in a wheelchair; the chair was lying on its side and he was crawling toward the housing estate, cursing and shouting.
        People were running from their houses to help him.
        I could hear mothers shouting at their children, doors slamming, the sound of people running. A woman in the shop was screaming, "There's nobody in here, there's nobody in here!" They knew that we were wound up, and they didn't want to be killed by faulty judgment.
        By this time Scouse was with me and the other two blokes who had come over the fence line. I went up to the bloke who was carrying the LMG and started kicking him.
        "Where were you?" I shouted.
        I had been all hyper; I'd wanted someone else there, and they weren't.
        But it wasn't their fault; they couldn't get there.
        We started to go forward, looking for runners, at the same time getting on the radio and talking to the SF (security forces) base to tell them there had been a contact. No need, they'd heard it anyway.
        All they wanted to know was "Any casualties? Any casualties?" At this stage I didn't know if any of us had been hit or not. The patrol to the north were running like loonies to get down to us. People were pouring out of the SF base; Land Rovers were turning up with people in tracksuits and flak jackets.
        There was a massive follow-up. The dog handlers arrived within minutes; roadblocks were thrown up. The police had to be informed what they were looking for. I got on the net and was trying to describe the vehicle.
        All I knew was that it was a dirty old yellow cattle truck, and because I had been on the floor looking up at it, I had seen that it had a fiberglass top to let the natural light in.
        All the cars parked in the area were riddled with rounds-5.56 from the players, 7.62 from us. There were empty cases all over the road.
        One of the blokes from the sangars at the SF base reported that he had seen somebody running up the disused railway. We couldn't see Jack shit.
        A Dog did his casting around and picked up the scent.
        The handler said, "Okay, let's go!"
        There was myself, the platoon commander who'd come out of the SF base, the dog handler and his mutt, and two other blokes, and off we went. It was a very tense time. It was our job to protect the dog handler, and at the same time we didn't know what the hell was up there. Was somebody behind cover, waiting to fire?
        We ran across fields. There was an old pig hut at the top of a hill, and the dog got agitated. The dog handler said, "We've got something here."
        "He's got to be inside," said the platoon commander.
        The dog handler stayed where he was, and the other fellows stayed to protect him as the rupert (officer) and I started to move up toward the shack.
        The officer shouted, "Any fucker in there, get out now! Otherwise we are coming in for you!"
        Nothing happened.
        He turned to me and said, "Right, when you're ready, get in there."
        I thought, Oh, good one, delegation of