The tension in the group was mounting. The last two hours had been spent with only the hum of the bikes breaking their thoughts. The anticipation was stifling.
Finn’s gut was churning. He really needed to go to the toilet but there was no way he could do anything about it now. His mouth was dry and his heart was pounding. He had been visualising himself for the last two hours, running the attack through in his head. The trouble was he had only been able to visualise himself getting off the bike and dropping to the ground, waiting for orders. He just kept visualising the same action over and over. He couldn’t imagine anything past the point of dropping on the ground.
‘Ten minutes, boys,’ said Higgins’ voice calmly came over the comms unit. ‘When we’re on the ground and I give the order, we will be running to the fence line. We need speed and silence. Speed and silence,’ Higgins repeated.
No one said a word. Finn nodded to himself. His eyes were wide under his goggles, his body stiff. Higgins switched his comms unit so it would only transmit to Finn, Carver and Jessop. ‘Breathe, guys. Think about your training.’ Finn concentrated on taking a few deep breaths — immediately feeling better.
A couple of silent minutes passed. ‘Okay, boys. Five minutes. Let’s get frosty.’ Five more tense minutes passed before Higgins’ voice again came over the comms unit: ‘Right here, men,’ as Higgins rolled to a stop.
Finn concentrated on his breathing, trying to stay focussed and slow his mind down, repeating the mantras that had been drilled into them during training.
The bikes all rolled to quiet stops. Finn could see the lights of the camp, searing in the night-vision goggles. It looked big, like more than 30 troops might be sitting there waiting for them, thought Finn.
Higgins jumped off his bike, double-checked his GPS, and then called Bravo team who responded immediately. They were in position and ready to move.
‘Dismount,’ said Higgins quietly. ‘Bravo team, move in. I repeat, move in,’ said Higgins into his helmet comms.
‘Copy that. Bravo moving in,’ replied the leader of Bravo team, which came through everyone’s integrated headsets.
Turning to the rest of the men who had now gathered near the lead bike, Higgins waved his arm. ‘Let’s move out.’
Finn’s legs felt heavy and useless. Running across the desert towards the lights, he felt out of control, as if someone with a remote was controlling his leaden legs. He forced himself to slow down, to regain control; the last thing he could risk now was a rolled ankle. As he ran he kept an eye on Bull, who was ahead and to the left of him.
After a few minutes of running, they were 50 metres from the fence. Higgins raised his hand, ordering them to stop and get down. Dave dropped down and took up position with the silenced sniper rifle. Lifting the protective cap on the high-powered sight, a very faint green glow was emitted. Dave, who was a crack shot, would stay here until they breached the fence. His job was to take out the guards and he was already scoping out his targets, mentally assigning an order in which he would take them out as efficiently as possible.
Higgins spoke into his comms. ‘Bravo, this is Alpha. Final position achieved. Are you ready to breach?’
‘Affirmative. In position, ready and waiting,’ came the reply.
Higgins had one last look around at his men to ensure everyone was in position and ready. ‘Go for breach. I repeat, go for breach,’ waving to his men, ordering them to move up to the fence.
Finn saw Bull get up and run. This was it, he thought as he hauled himself off the ground, running toward the fence line.
The 50 metres to the fence line seemed to take forever. Finn felt utterly vulnerable, just waiting for the first bullet to lodge itself in his head. Every step closer to the fence felt like another step closer to death. Finally, after an agonising run, Finn quietly crouched down at the fence. He couldn’t believe that they’d made it this close to the camp without being spotted. Looking to his left, he saw Bull crouching down, going to work with his wire cutters. Finn fumbled with the cutters in his belt. Finally getting them out, he began shakily cutting at the fence. His hands got worse, to the point where he had to use two hands to keep the cutters steady. The tension was agonising; with every snip of wire Finn was convinced a guard would hear. But still nothing.
Looking over, Bull was sliding through the fence. ‘Fuck,’ Finn whispered to himself, concentrating even harder on cutting the wire.
Finally done, he pushed his rifle under the fence and then slid under himself. Looking down the fence line, Finn signalled Bull the all-clear. Bull looked back and gestured to his eyes. Finn, confused, took a second to realise that Bull was referring to his night-vision goggles. Finn hadn’t noticed how bright the display was. Lifting the unit from his head, he could see the camp was illuminated like daytime.
Dave, who was watching their progress through his scope, now trained the rifle on the first of his targets standing on a tower at the northern end of the camp. Squeezing the trigger gently, the rifle dispatched a high-velocity round straight into the chest of the unsuspecting guard. The only sound from the rifle was a faint, dull thump of high-pressure air being released, which, from his distance, was virtually silent.
Quickly, Dave moved on to his next targets, professionally and economically taking out guard after guard in the pre-assigned order he had established earlier in his head.
Higgins gave the order to engage. Finn stood and, like the others, put his rifle to his shoulder, knees bent, both eyes open, sweeping his weapon and his gaze to find targets, just as he had been trained. The first shot came from Higgins, who spotted a soldier coming out of the latrine. The noise destroyed the quiet of the camp. Seconds later came a piercing siren and a flood of lights around the compound.
Deafening noise erupted.
Movement everywhere.
The air alive with bullets.
Fear.
Screams of panic.
Screams of pain.
The fighting raged for 20 minutes. For Finn it felt like an eternity. But then the Chinese were surrendering, throwing down their weapons, kneeling and putting their hands behind their heads. Finn registered this with a shock of disbelief. They were surrendering.
Bravo and Alpha teams converged on the centre of the compound to organise a clean-up. They had to go through the entire camp and lay their explosive charges and get out before the Sankaku attack helicopters responded. Luckily for them, it seemed that their action in the north was keeping the San’s occupied.
Higgins and Mac, the highly-experienced soldier who led Bravo team, went in search of intelligence, while Bravo team set up the explosives and Alpha team processed the prisoners. There was no way they could take the captured soldiers with them, so they had to be marched out into the desert.
Higgins and Mac went into the communications building and found what they were after — Solid State Computers (SSCs), innocuous-looking small black rectangular boxes, small enough to fit comfortably in the palm of a hand. The SSCs had no moving parts, no wires, no heat signature, no inputs and no outputs, nothing that could be damaged or broken, yet they were capable of holding up to a petabyte of data. The only way to access the information inside them was through coded wireless technology, which the Australian Militech teams were just starting to learn how to break.
‘Take the office next door, Mac. I’ll clean this lot up,’ said Higgins.
‘On it,’ replied Mac. ‘I wonder if there’s any Chinese porn on these things,’ said Mac with a chuckle, examining an SSC.