Once A Pilgrim. James Deegan

there and prop you up. Keep an eye on the doorway, okay?’

      Another nod.

      Sweating, Carr dragged Skelton the ten or twelve feet over to the side of the room. It was a bastard – he weighed more than 270lbs with all his kit, and he couldn’t help much, and Carr felt horribly vulnerable, especially when he had to turn his back to the door to sit him up.

      Once that was done, Carr pulled the tourniquet from his chest rig.

      ‘Keep watching that fucking door,’ he said, feeling for the entry point on Geordie’s leg.

      He found it, and then located the exit wound on the back of the thigh. It was large, and wet with blood, and full of bone splinters.

      Shit, he thought. But at least the artery appeared to be intact.

      ‘Okay, mate,’ he said. ‘It’s fine. I’m going to put this on, yeah? It’s going to hurt a bit.’

      Carr applied the tourniquet and pulled it tight.

      Geordie let out a low moan of animal pain; he was a hard man, and Carr knew he must be in something near agony.

      ‘That’s done, mate,’ he said, wiping his bloodied hands on his combats. ‘Now listen, I need to go and clear that last room. Anyone but me comes through that door, you kill them. Got it?’

      ‘I’m coming,’ said Geordie. ‘You can’t do it by yourself.’

      He tried to stand, but fell back down.

      ‘Ah, shit,’ he said. ‘That does fucking hurt. Give me a hand up.’

      ‘Don’t be stupid,’ said Carr. ‘Stay here.’

      Geordie gave him a thumbs-up with his left hand, his right wrapped round the pistol grip of his Diemaco, which was aimed at the doorway.

      Carr smiled, returned the thumbs-up, and stepped out and back into the hallway.

      Looking at the door to the last room, readying himself to step through that breach.

      And then the handle started to move, and the door began to open.

      Carr moved to the wall, flush to the door, and took aim.

      A bloodied hand gripped the side of the door recess, and then a man of sixty or so stepped out, unarmed, hands cradling his belly. His white shirt was stained red with blood from a gunshot wound to the stomach, and when he looked at Carr the Scot saw shock but no fear in his eyes.

      He smiled at Carr and nodded – as if he was acknowledging a stranger in the street, on a nice summer’s day. But then another man, much younger, stepped out behind him.

      The second man looked at Carr for a split second, yelled ‘Allahu akhbar!’ and raised his hand.

      Carr was diving back into Geordie’s room when the suicide vest detonated, and the force seemed to propel him even quicker.

      Momentarily stunned, he came to a few moments later, lying in a heap in the floor, his ears ringing, covered in plaster and dust, and coughing and choking.

      From outside, somewhere across the street, he could hear a voice shouting, ‘John! John!’

      He sat up and looked around himself.

      His hearing became clearer, and he realised that the shouting was coming from Geordie.

      ‘Jesus man,’ said Skelton, his own pain momentarily forgotten. ‘Fuck me. You okay?’

      Carr patted himself down, and stood up. ‘Motherfucker,’ he said. ‘That was close.’

      He could feel the heat before he saw the flames.

      ‘Geordie,’ he shouted. ‘We’ve got to get out. The place is on fire. I’m gonnae have to help you up. It’s going to hurt, bud.’

      Skelton shot him a withering look. ‘Just get on with it,’ he said. ‘It’s not like I can fucking hang around, is it?’

      Carr keyed his radio. ‘Steve, house clear. We’re coming out the front. Get some guys over here to pick up Wayne, he’s down at the back.’

      He helped Geordie to his feet, and they made their way quickly down the stairs, the injured man hopping on his good leg and cursing as he went; the flames were confined to the top floor, close to where the guy had detonated, but still the heat drove them on.

      Outside, the assault teams had cleared the grey villa, and they were now starting to regroup, ready to move out.

      In the distance, one or two shadowy figures were flitting across the road – locals, roused by the firefight.

      As yet they’d not been contacted.

      But it was only a matter of time.

      They needed to get moving.

      Geordie was starting to falter, the adrenalin waning.

      Carr laid him on the ground, as gently as he could.

      ‘Medic!’ he shouted. ‘Medic! Quick!’

      One of the team medics rushed over and took in the situation.

      ‘Has he had morphine, John?’

      ‘No mate, nothing. The tourniquet’s only been on couple of minutes. Soon as you get a drip in him, get him back to the vehicles and call into the Ops room. Casualty requiring immediate surgery, get the medevac stood by at the FOB.’

      For a moment, he’d considered bringing the medevac into Dora, but he didn’t think the injury was life-threatening, and he wasn’t going to risk a heli and its crew, even for his best mate.

      With Geordie handed over, he looked at his watch: from the first explosion until now, only six minutes had elapsed.

      He jogged over to the OC. Forrest was standing talking to the primary assault team leader, and Carr picked up the tail end of the conversation.

      ‘Definitely dead?’ Forrest was saying.

      ‘That’s right, boss.’

      ‘Fuck me. We’re going to be popular now.’ He looked at Carr. ‘Did you hear that? Joker’s dead.’

      ‘Yeah,’ said Carr. ‘Good news.’

      ‘It’s not fucking good news, John.’

      ‘Hey, boss,’ said Carr. ‘We’ve got Wayne down round the back there, and Geordie’s took a bad one to the leg. So you’re right, it’s not good that he’s dead. It’s fucking great. Now, we need to get the fuck back to the FOB.’

2.

      SIX MONTHS LATER – nineteen years after he’d passed Selection and walked into Stirling Lines in Hereford for the first time as a young blade – it was all over.

      Carr had spent the time since getting back from that last tour on gardening leave, getting ready to leave the Army.

      It wasn’t easy – the military was all he’d known since his early adulthood – and his marriage was collapsing. Not many lasted in his line of work: the longest period he and Stella had spent together since he’d joined the Regiment was three weeks, and being thrown together – with all the comedown of a demanding trip to Iraq, and the emotion of leaving... They weren’t at daggers drawn, but she didn’t know him anymore, and he didn’t know her, and neither of them cared too much. She was talking about taking the kids back home to Bangor, the County Down town where they’d met and courted. He wasn’t too keen on that – his little girl, in particular, was happy and settled in a good little school near Hereford – but he wasn’t sure he had the strength to fight her.

      At least he had a decent job lined up – security manager with an oil company in Southern Iraq. Eight hundred quid a day, month on, month off. He might finally buy himself a decent car.