back over the Tigris, the way we came in this morning?’
Lieutenant Carter nodded wearily.
‘How much longer are they holding their position around K2?’
‘I don’t know. As long as it takes to complete the battalion’s evac.’
‘Tonight?’
Lieutenant Carter nodded. ‘Maybe.’
‘We’d stand half a chance at night at least, wouldn’t we? I mean,’ Andy picked up Carter’s SA80, ‘these have got those night-vision things, right?’
Carter looked at him and nodded. For the first time today Andy saw the faintest flicker of a smile spread across the young man’s mouth.
‘Yeah . . . and theirs haven’t.’
CHAPTER 28
12.57 p.m. GMT Hammersmith, London
‘Oh no we’re going shopping? Why?’ Jacob whined.
Leona led the way into the supermarket, pushing a trolley and dragging her brother along by the hand. Daniel obediently followed, trying to control two more trolleys simultaneously.
‘Because we are, all right?’ she snipped tersely. ‘Mum and Dad want me to stock up our cupboards.’ Jacob sagged.
‘So we’re doing a Big Shop?’
‘Yes, Jake, we’re doing a Big Shop. Now just shut up a moment and let me think.’
She looked around. It was busy with the sort of customers she’d expect to see midweek at lunchtime - people popping in for a sandwich, a snackpot, a pasty, and perhaps something convenient and microwave-able for this evening.
‘So where do you want to start?’ asked Daniel.
Leona pursed her lips as she decided.
She remembered a few years back when Dad had been momentarily distracted from his Peak Oil ramblings by the threat of bird flu. After the first case of human-contracted disease, he, like everyone else in the country, had hit the panic button and flocked to the supermarket to stock up on essentials.
He had returned home a few hours later with a car full of tinned pilchards in tomato sauce and, it seemed like, a hundred bottles of still water.
Tinned goods because they’ll last longer. Pilchards because that’s a very high protein meal.
That was how he explained only buying just the one type of food. Of course it made sense, very practical. But when a month or so later, bird flu turned out like SARS to be yet another mediahyped non-event, they’d been stuck with their own little tin-can mountain of pilchards in ketchup to work their way through. After a couple of months of stepping round the damned tins of fish, and trying to conjure up some inventive family meals that could use a couple of tins, Mum finally had enough and donated the lot to a nearby hospice.
But that was then, a long time ago now. And now here she was, in the exact same situation as Dad had been, having to decide what to buy, and how much of it.
Daniel started up the first aisle: Fruit and Veg.
‘Potatoes are good,’ he said picking one up and inspecting it. ‘I’m sure you could keep a small family going on one of these for weeks.’
Leona sighed, plucked it out of his hand and tossed it back onto the shelf. ‘Dan . . . are you making fun of me?’
Daniel instinctively shook his head, but a moment later the slightest smile leaked on to his face.
‘I’m sorry . . . this just seems, I dunno. It’s just getting a little intense. So far this has turned out to be a really . . . funny day.’
‘Funny?’
‘Wrong word, sorry. I guess I’m—’
‘Shit Dan, I can’t do this with you taking the piss out of me. I can’t do this on my own. I know this time Dad’s right; that we’re in for a whole load of trouble. But I can’t do this on my own.’
Jacob cocked his head. ‘Who’s in trouble?’
They both ignored him, staring at each other intently.
‘I apologise for dragging you along, Dan. I really do. But I’m glad you’re here with me. And if this goes the way Dad says it will then I think you’ll be glad you came with me.’
He had no family to go home to, to worry about. He had a biological mother out there somewhere in Sheffield that he’d looked up once and who’d made it clear he wasn’t that welcome. She had an all-new family, with all-new kids and a husband who was keeping her how she wanted to be kept. They had met just the once, and never would again, he had stoically assured her.
Daniel nodded silently. ‘I . . . look, I’m sorry Lee, I guess that whole abduction scene at your brother’s school has got me a bit, like, freaked. I sort of laugh and take the piss a