The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime 10

FISTS OF DESTINY by Col Bury

IT WAS TIME. They were ready. In the modest living room of the red-brick council semi, Bill took a breath to compose himself and gazed into innocent eyes.

“Apologies for the swearing in advance, guys, but I want you to know the full story,” he said, dipping his head, before recounting the events of the day evil visited Manchester…

The infamous Manchester rain gave way to a rare and stunning sun. It certainly wasn’t a day to be stuck inside the biggest skyscraper in the UK outside London – the Beetham Tower.

The business conference was due to start at 9 a.m., but Steve being Steve, he was there half an hour before. The discipline and respect gleaned from his military days were still a big part of him, despite now being on civvy street. His punctuality and meticulously bulled shoes, so shiny you could check your hair in them, were a testament to that.

The droning increased as people filed into the Hilton Hotel conference room on the twenty-second floor, just under halfway up, and Steve wiped sweat from his brow with a hanky as he headed for the large windows to take in the sights.

He noticed a big Asian bloke wearing a puffy jacket, who took a seat on the front row. Steve briefly felt uneasy, wondering: Why would somebody wear a padded winter jacket on such a hot day? Quickly dismissing the thought, he smiled inwardly, realizing his army days had made him paranoid.

He gazed in awe at a panoramic view over half the vast city; the “capital of the north” they called it. In sheer contrast to the plush tower, he looked south at the clusters of gloomy high-rise flats in the distance, where buying drugs was as routine as popping to the corner shop for a loaf. Focusing on the “The Seven Sisters”, a group of flats in Old Trafford, one of which Steve had managed somehow to escape, he could just make out the roof of his dad’s old local, where, sadly now, heroin ran as freely as ale. The surrounding streets led to the notorious Moss Side, home of the tit-for-tat shootings that had resulted in the media giving the city its unfortunate epithet: “Gunchester”.

On the flipside, Manchester’s vibrant music scene, stemming from the likes of The Smiths, The Happy Mondays, Stone Roses and, latterly, Oasis, had given rise to another nickname: “Madchester”. Steve recalled bopping on the dance floor of the Hacienda while brimming with amphetamines. Happy days…though long since tainted by unshakable images of his friends being blown up in Kabul, the guilt of survival still jabbing at his heart every day.

Below him, the bustling dots of city-centre shoppers and dominosized cars signified the city’s many decent folk going about their business. Scanning further, the Manchester Ship Canal and the River Irwell were like arteries leading to the heart of the city, the motorway network the veins, and the many rail-tracks the capillaries. The friendly Manchester folk were undoubtedly the blood running through the city, keeping it forever vital. However, one wrong turn from a naive visitor into the suburbs, and their experience of the so-called ‘friendly city’ would likely be one of hours spent at the local nick, telling a cop how they were beaten up for their possessions.

Surrounding the tower, numerous old red-brick warehouses – a reminder of the city’s past as a leading powerhouse in world textiles – were now converted into snazzy designer outlets, coffee shops and apartments, including Steve’s beloved Hacienda, where he’d met Lucy all those years ago. Lucy and the kids kept him going these days. They were the only antidote to the memories of comrades blasted to pieces, that sometimes brought him to the brink of suicide.

Steve ran a hand across the side of his heavily scarred neck, a constant reminder of the day he’d crawled from that burning tank… leaving his mates… screaming…

He shook those haunting screams away. He wasn’t surprised to see a woman beside him gawping. He vaguely recognized her: about forty, wearing a pinstripe suit and more make-up than Coco the Clown. Embarrassed, she swiftly diverted her gaze, pretending to look out of the window. Steve wasn’t too bothered; he’d got used to the staring years ago, and the name-calling – “Turkey Neck” being their favourite, not his. He followed the new direction of her gaze.

Outside, on a billboard, a huge poster, one half red, the other blue, advertising “United v City”, epitomized the passion of this football-mad city. Unfortunately, on derby day the red and blue often represented blood and bruises, especially the evening after the match, when beer-fuelled exuberance could erupt into violence.

A tram caught his attention, faintly rumbling the girders of a bridge to his left, a mass of tiny commuters exiting like scurrying insects as it stopped at Deansgate station, bringing him back from his musings.

Inside the conference room, everyone was dressed formally, clutching their respective folders, briefcases or handbags. A group to his left were also taking in the view, debating whether they could see Blackpool Tower in the distance through the Majorcan blue sky. One know-it-all chap with a fake tan and designer suit raised a few eyebrows, suggesting that from the top you could see Jodrell Bank Observatory and even Snowdonia in Wales!

By now, everyone was vying for the best seats – not too near the front, mind, in case the spotlight was on you, such was the nature of these sales-training days. However, never one to shirk a challenge, Steve had already placed his suit jacket around a chair, front centre.

As the others took their seats, Steve looked around for a familiar face, checked his watch and then shook his head. He’s late as usual – typical! He returned to his seat at the front, seeing that the big guy wearing the puffy jacket was actually sitting in the chair beside his.

Steve ignored the uneasy feeling again, and began flipping through one of the brochures that had been left on each seat. Apparently, the Hilton owned the first twenty-three floors, including 285 bedrooms, a restaurant and even a swimming pool. The floor above was Manchester’s only “sky-bar”, and from there up to the forty-seventh floor at the top were 219 privately owned apartments and sixteen penthouses, making the Beetham Tower the tallest residential building in Europe.

A gunshot blasted out, changing everything.

People screamed, some hitting the floor; others just froze, staring agog. Steve ducked and pivoted, seeing a skinny, olive-skinned chap running to the front of the room brandishing a revolver. He seemed pretty pissed off, his face contorted. Steve spotted the headband with the Pakistani emblem, and the uneasy feeling within him escalated. The screaming around him evoked unwelcome memories, but he shook them away again. Not now!

Steve hoped this was just a daring mass robbery but doubted it, wondering, Why the headband?

A few seconds later, the big bloke beside him tied a similar headband around his head and stood up, shrugging off his puffy jacket. The crowd gasped in unison. The man glared manically, holding up one clenched fist containing a detonator button, attached by dangling wires to a mass of explosives strapped to his ample body via…a suicide vest.

IED…Improvised Explosive Device…probably packed with ball bearings, nails and screws, for maximum shrapnel effects on detonation…

Steve was now thinking, 9/11.

He was two metres away, witnessing the sheer madness in Bomb-man’s wide eyes and the sweat dripping from his brow. Steve bowed his head, picturing Lucy and his kids, as Pistol-man started barking out orders in broken English.

“Pass mobile phones to end. Anyone tries make call… I kill!”

It was surreal. People just did as they were told, but little involuntary bursts of sobbing and yelping from the crowd prompted Pistol-man again.

“Shut the fuck up! No noise. Phones now!” he shouted, training the handgun on the stunned crowd.

After taking his Nokia from his trouser pocket, Steve motioned to pass it along to a pretty girl of no more than twenty. He noticed her hands shaking, her face paler than the moon, her eyes tearfully pleading with him. As he gave her the phone, he gently squeezed her hand, softening his hard features as best he could in a bid to reassure her.

Biting his lip, he saw discreet movement to his left and spotted the woman who’d been staring at him earlier. She skulked low, dialling on her mobile, probably calling the cops.

Bad move.

“No, no…bast-aaard!” yelled Pistol-man, running past Steve. Without hesitation, he blasted out two slugs. The first triggered a loud, splintering crack in a window; the second hit the woman in the forehead. She jerked back momentarily before slumping forward in her chair. Shocked sales reps nearby were showered crimson, Steve feeling a light spray on his own neck. He gently ran a hand across it then looked at his palm, seeing the red smears. He clenched his fist tight, fighting to control his instincts. The girl to his right held her hands to her face, blocking out the madness while stifling breathless sobs.

Steve heard a faint mumbling directly behind him and briefly turned to see a balding, bespectacled chap with sad, red eyes. There was an unpleasant whiff and he saw that the man had pissed his pants.

The man whispered, desperately, “Please…no…I have children…they need me…” A bearded bloke beside him shuffled sideways in his seat, distancing himself from the stench of urine while wearing a look of confused dismay.

The shrieks and crying intensified from further behind, and the unwanted memories pumping through Steve were now strangely fuelling him.

An athletic-looking man in his early thirties tried to make a run for it towards a door at the front. With a grimace, Pistol-man shot him in the back. The man collapsed on to the plush carpet like a discarded rag doll, face first, arms outstretched.

“No more! You fuckin’ hear me?” spat Pistol-man.

Everyone was still, silent but for the occasional burst of weeping. Think! Steve kept sneaking glances around him, from his bowed position. Not yet.

Bomb-man looked very agitated, sweat dripping down his face. His raised fist began to shake, the detonator protruding below his thumb.

Pistol-man tossed all the mobiles into a pile, the odd one bleeping, having not yet been silenced for the meeting. He climbed three steps on to the stage, and began a speech.

“Listen… you fuckin’ infidels!” he shouted, pausing to spit at the crowd.

Interrupting him, U2’s “It’s a Beautiful Day” chimed, and Pistol-man snapped, firing two more shots into the pile of phones. People winced, jumping in their seats. Defiantly, the tune only finished when it was good and ready.

Subtly edging his body sideways and trying to keep his head still, Steve scanned the extremes of his peripheral vision, absorbing his surroundings. His eye-line eventually found the man he’d searched for earlier, sitting at the back. They knew each other well, and exchanged a brief, yet telling, glance and imperceptible nods.

Ignoring the rest of the bullshit speech, he managed to slip the photo of his kids out of his wallet. He gazed at the snapshot then kissed it, tears welling, heart leaden.

Amid Pistol-man’s fragmented words… “avenging… jihad… paradise… infidels…” Steve’s mind drifted back to Kabul… Mad-dog Maguire… Johnny Bartlett… Davy McPherson… and then he sprang from his seat, charging like a bull on speed.

His right fist impacted with Bomb-man’s nose, bursting it, crushed tomato-style. Steve’s momentum carried him on and he grabbed the stumbling Bomb-man’s wrists. Pistol-man’s cursing was now irrelevant, as he fumbled bullets from his pocket to reload the handgun. Steve and Bomb-man stumbled towards the windows, the detonator wire swinging between them. A cacophony of screams, both in the room and in Steve’s head, drove him on.

He felt the terrorist’s strength as they grappled face to face, two metres from the windows. The stench of his sweat, the taste of his blood, was sickening. But adrenaline and focus carried Steve forward, bundling Bomb-man nearer the glass with an encouraging headbutt.

They parted momentarily and Bomb-man took hold of the detonator. Steve lunged at him, thrusting him into the cracked window, shattering it. Giant shards crashed down and the would-be killer toppled backwards, his arms clutching frantically at nothing.

Time seemed to stop… then, as if in slow motion… Steve felt himself falling…

…the wind rushed noisily in his ears… distant screams… the beautiful blue sky somersaulting in his vision, alternating with the rapidly approaching streets… face-up, Bomb-man plummeted, just below Steve… a flash of an evil grin… a deafening blast… forever silencing those haunting screams…

Bill brushed a hand through thinning grey hair and gazed into little eyes that were bravely fighting back tears.

“Okay, guys?”

Nods of acknowledgement.

“That day twenty-two people died, most of them shoppers below. If it weren’t for your daddy, the death toll could’ve been two thousand…and twenty-two.”

First to speak was Holly, her voice faint, crackly. “So…my daddy…was a hero, Uncle Bill?”

“Yes, darling. Your daddy…IS…will always be…a hero.”

Holly hugged her uncle tightly, her head resting against his paunch.

Jake spoke next, swallowing before clearing his throat. “But…what happened to Pistol-man, Uncle Bill?”

“That revolver only had six bullets, lad. Your daddy knew that too.”

Bill smiled, and held up his own sturdy fist.