Apache

And bang, out popped a black-turbaned head from the second ring to the right, followed by a puff of smoke from behind him then a cloud of dust as he loosed off an RPG at the firebase. Quick as a flash, he disappeared again.

Tunnels. The black circles were part of a fucking tunnel system. Where did they lead to? Had the black turban been in there all along? We’d had no idea about them – nobody had. Maybe he’d shot the five marines from there…

My stomach turned to liquid. Zulu Company had been surrounded the second they drove in there. Black Turban would only have been fifty yards away from them when they got to the wall. And now he was only fifty yards away from Mathew.

16. GIVE ME FOUR VOLUNTEERS

‘Billy, Taliban in the tunnels thirty-five metres south of Mathew. Engaging. Watch my strikes.’

As soon as Carl managed to flip us around enough, twenty of my cannon rounds went straight down Black Turban’s hidey-hole. No wonder it was RPG Central at the firebase.

I put another burst of twenty down Black Turban’s hole for good measure, and then another twenty to collapse each of the four other tunnel entrances. There was no way of knowing if any of the 120 rounds had hit anyone, but if we hammered them hard and fast enough, perhaps we could scare them away. At least they’d know we were onto them.

Billy continued to hammer the village with 30-mm HEDP rounds. Maybe there were tunnels under some of its buildings too. It would explain how they were infiltrating so fast.

Billy had used up more than half his Hellfires, so he switched to rockets and planted eight HEISAPs over a fifty-metre radius into the main cluster of buildings. Their charges were powerful enough to penetrate the walls, pelting the occupants with stone and debris, followed by a killer pressure wave. We switched over guard and attack roles.

‘My gun. Firing.’ Slaving the cannon to his right eye, Carl looked straight down at the back end of one of the buildings hit by Billy. ‘I’ve got movement in the village.’

He was right; as his first rounds flashed and exploded on the stone, eight Taliban sprinted from the other end of the building. He gave them three more bursts of twenty before they reached cover.

‘Good shooting, bonny lad,’ was Geordie’s verdict.

We were back on strike now, so I sent a Hellfire straight into the building that the lone escapee had just reached. They didn’t like our rockets, so I slammed eight Flechettes – containing 656 five-inch-long Tungsten darts – into the village centre. The darts could penetrate armour, so they’d get through those walls. Flashes of bright orange light erupted on each side of the aircraft as we came in again.

‘Long-range missile launch,’ Bitching Betty announced. ‘Six o’clock.’ The flares continued to pour off. My neck cracked as I threw my head rapidly back and to the right. I could see Carl follow suit.

‘Ugly Five One, missile launch six o’clock.’ Carl’s voice sounded laboured. He pulled as hard as he could on the cyclic to throw the Apache onto its back. ‘Billy and Geordie are chucking flares too.’

We’d been locked on at exactly the same time, but no missiles had passed our windows. The two pilots compared notes.

‘Geordie, we’ve just had a long-range missile launch from the south-east. Confirm the direction on you.’

‘South-east. Long range too.’

‘Where the bloody hell is it then?’

All four of us craned our heads round. There were no telltale smoke trails to give away the firing point.

‘Maybe it was the sun. Our systems could be playing up.’

‘On both aircraft? You’re the Ewok, Carl.’

‘Yeah, I know. That’s bollocks. I don’t like it.’

Did the Taliban have a SAM down there now? They’d certainly had enough time to ship one in. Apaches had been scrapping over the fort for six hours now. If it was a SAM, it must have misfired. There was definitely something down there, but God knew what. Widow Seven One had more bad news.

‘Be advised Ugly Five One, Zulu Company will be a further thirty minutes. Keep suppressing for their assault.’

Billy was livid when Carl relayed. ‘What? For fuck’s sake… How much time do they think they’ve got?’

It was now 9.48am, and we’d been on station for an hour and eleven minutes. We’d prepped the area for a rescue now, not in half-an-hour’s time.

‘We’re not going to be able to do this for much longer you know, Ed. I’m down to one Hellfire, sixteen Flechettes and 120 thirty Mike Mike.’

‘Copied. We’re stuck between a rock and a hard place. If we slow down on ammo, we lose Mathew. If we continue at this rate and they’re not ready, we lose Mathew when we run out of ammo. I’ve only one Hellfire, eight of each rocket type and 80 thirty Mike Mike,’ I reported in return.

I got back onto the JTAC.

‘Widow Seven One this is Ugly Five One. We’re depleting our ammunition. We could really do with some fast air on the village.’

‘Affirm Ugly Five One. Still no fast air on station. I’ve requested it three times. I’ll request it again.’