First Response Read online

  Max had been biting for the past month, and they weren’t playful nips, either. He thought it was funny to fasten his teeth onto a girl’s arm and bite until he drew blood. Sally figured he’d either grow up to be a vampire or a serial killer. He had taken a particular liking to a sweet little girl called Henrietta, who wouldn’t say boo to a goose. He had already tried to bite her twice that morning and Sally was at her wits’ end. If Henrietta ended up with a bite mark, Sally would get the blame and she really didn’t need the grief. There were sixteen children in the class and two teachers. Sally and Laura had split the class into two and unfortunately she’d been stuck with Max. Punishing the child was out of the question, but there was no way of reasoning with him. His parents never said no to him, and at home he spent most of the time with his two Scandinavian au pairs, who catered to his every whim.

  ‘Right, let’s have story time,’ she said, clapping her hands. ‘Max, why don’t you choose the book?’ She pointed at the bookcase and nodded encouragingly. ‘Something with ponies, perhaps?’ Hopefully if she got him to participate, he’d forget about sinking his teeth into Henrietta’s arm.

  The door to the classroom opened and Sally frowned as she saw a tall, thin black man walk in. His head was shaved and he had sunken cheeks, one of which had a curved scar across it. Sally knew immediately he wasn’t a parent. London might have been one of the most ethnically mixed cities in the world, but the nursery wasn’t and the man certainly wasn’t related to the Chan boy or the Indian twins, who were the only non-white children on the premises. Sally’s first thought was that he was a beggar. His long coat looked cheap and he didn’t appear to have washed in a while. But it was his eyes that worried her most – they were wide and staring, almost fearful.

  ‘Can I help you?’ she asked. She looked at Laura, but Laura was busy organising a painting exercise and hadn’t noticed him.

  The man tried to smile but it was more like the grimace of an animal in pain. ‘I am sorry, madam,’ he mumbled. He wiped his face with the palm of his hand and Sally realised he was sweating. Maybe he was sick. He certainly appeared disoriented.

  ‘I think you might be in the wrong place,’ she said, pointing at the door. ‘This is a nursery school.’

  ‘I am sorry,’ he said again, but louder this time. He took two steps towards her and grabbed her hand. She yelped. Before she could say anything he had clamped something metallic around her wrist. She stared at it in horror, trying to comprehend why he had handcuffed himself to her.

  He stepped back and several feet of chain rattled from the pocket of his coat. He undid the buttons with shaking hands and Sally’s eyes widened with fear as she saw what lay beneath it.

  ‘Allahu Akbar,’ he mumbled. He closed his eyes, his lower lip trembling. ‘Do exactly as I say, or everyone will die.’ He nodded at Laura. ‘You, lock the door. And then get up against that wall with the children.’

  LAMBETH CENTRAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMAND CENTRE (11.15 a.m.)

  The Lambeth Central Communications Command Centre was at 109 Lambeth Road, and the three numbers were posted in huge white letters to the left of the four-storey building, a stone’s throw from the south bank of the River Thames. Kamran had to show his warrant card to get in, even though he was expected. He took the stairs down to the special operations room, which occupied the entire basement of the building. Sergeant Joe Lumley was waiting for him at the door, holding a mug of coffee. Kamran grinned as he took it. ‘You read my mind,’ he said. ‘And keep them coming.’

  Kamran hadn’t specifically asked for Lumley so was pleasantly surprised to see that the sergeant had been assigned. He was a twenty-year veteran of the Met, a former Special Patrol Group officer, who was totally calm under pressure, the perfect number two on a day when the shit seemed to have well and truly hit the fan. ‘There’s an inspector manning the fort but I thought I should give you a heads-up before you go in,’ said Lumley.

  ‘Good idea,’ said Kamran. ‘They’re saying Operation Plato, is that right?’

  ‘Three hostage situations in play and an AVR had sight of a suicide vest. They’re releasing their demands through social media at the moment but we haven’t made contact with any of the terrorists yet.’

  ‘What time did this kick off?’

  ‘There were tweets and Facebook postings about the first incident from five past ten onwards,’ said Lumley. ‘The second incident was at Wandsworth and social media there kicked off at ten twenty-five. Now we have another in Fulham. I’ve put myself next to you in the Gold Command suite, and because of the nature of the threat I’ve put the MI5 rep there too.’

  ‘Five are here already?’

  Lumley nodded. ‘Yes, she’s in your suite until you decide where to put her. And there’s an SAS captain just arrived. He doesn’t seem to require a workstation so at the moment he’s just floating around.’

  ‘Fire Brigade, Ambulance?’

  ‘Already here.’

  ‘And who’s the TFC?’ The tactical firearms commander was an inspector who was responsible for the sixteen armed-response vehicles stationed around the capital.

  ‘Marty Windle.’

  Kamran nodded his approval. Inspector Windle was a safe pair of hands. ‘Okay, into the lion’s den,’ he said.

  Lumley pulled open the door and Kamran stepped into the special operations room. It was half the size of a football field, with no windows, just banks of fluorescent lights overhead. It was filled with dozens of pod-like workstations, several of which were already occupied by shirt-sleeved police officers, their triple screens filed with data and CCTV feeds. To his left were two suites, one for himself as Gold Commander and next to it the Silver Command suite where the various commanding officers could hold their own briefings.

  At the far end of the room there were four pods, each made up of three desks in a triangle, all with the same high-backed black ergonomic chairs. To the left was the Diplomatic Protection Group pod and next to it the pod used by SCO19, the armed police. The DPG were armed and SCO19 could draw on their resources as needed. Marty Windle was at one of the desks and waved an acknowledgement to Kamran. Kamran waved back. The pod in the middle of the group was manned by the Pan London support staff, who handled outgoing calls to the various units around the capital. At the far right were the pods of the London Ambulance Service and the Fire Brigade. Spaced across the room there were white supporting pillars a metre or so in diameter, and a dozen or so whiteboards on stands for when a scribbled note was more efficient than the keyboard.

  Closer to the door a pod of supervisors looked after the support staff and next to them the General Policing Command pod was generally staffed by a chief inspector and an inspector. Dozens of other pods could be staffed by whatever resources the Gold Commander considered necessary, usually one police sergeant and two constables or civilians. ‘According to the deputy commissioner, I’m the interim Gold Commander,’ said Kamran. ‘Let’s make sure everything is up and running by the time my replacement gets here.’

  Kamran strode over to the Gold Command suite, where a woman in her late twenties was waiting at a desk. She stood up and smiled. She was short, just over five feet tall, with blonde hair and a sprinkling of freckles across a snub nose. She held out her hand confidently, even though she had to tilt her head back to look him in the eyes. ‘Lynne Waterman,’ she said. ‘Here to help in any way I can.’

  ‘Pleasure to meet you,’ said Kamran, putting his briefcase and coffee mug on his workstation, then shaking her hand. It felt tiny and he took care not to squeeze too hard. He doubted that she had given her real name; MI5 officers almost never did. ‘Have you been in a special operations room before?’

  ‘First time,’ she said. ‘Though I know how it works, obviously.’

  ‘Sergeant Lumley can get you settled at the workstation next to mine,’ he said. ‘I think I’m going to be needing a lot of intel from you.’

  Lumley took the MI5 officer to the neighbouring workstation as Kamran removed his ja
cket and slung it over the back of his chair. An inspector in shirt sleeves came over. ‘Superintendent Kamran, Inspector Adams. I’ve been holding the fort until you got here.’

  They shook hands. ‘We haven’t met before?’ Adams was in his thirties, slightly overweight with receding hair and square-lensed glasses with thick black frames.

  ‘I was with the Fraud Squad, transferred to the command two weeks ago,’ he said. ‘Trial by fire, from the look of it.’

  ‘First name?’

  ‘Ian.’

  ‘Right, Ian, bring me up to speed,’ said Kamran, sitting down and picking up his mug.

  The inspector nodded. ‘There are three suicide bombers, all of them holding hostages. One in Brixton, one in Wandsworth, one in Fulham. We have three ARVs at the Brixton location, including a supervisor vehicle. There’s another supervisor vehicle at Wandsworth with another ARV. There’s one ARV at the Fulham location with Trojan One en route.’

  Trojan One was the inspector’s vehicle, the most senior officer on the ARVs. The supervisor vehicles had sergeants on board. Trojan Ones were also known as kit cars as they carried extra weapons, ammunition and various items of equipment to help them gain entry to buildings.

  ‘As this is being treated as a terrorist incident radios have to be in TXI mode, right?’ Transmission inhibit mode meant that personal and vehicle radios were prevented from searching for transmitter sites as that could accidentally detonate a device. Personal radios were not to be used at all within fifteen metres of a device, and for vehicle-based radios that was increased to fifty metres.

  ‘That’s in hand, sir.’

  ‘Negotiators?’

  ‘All en route,’ said the inspector.

  ‘So no one is talking to them?’ asked Kamran.

  ‘No, but social media is going into meltdown,’ said Adams. ‘Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, the works. The bombers are allowing their hostages to use their phones.’

  ‘Wonderful,’ said Kamran. ‘How are we monitoring that?’

  ‘At the moment we’re all looking at the various feeds.’

  ‘Right, I need one person collating everything. Anything important copied immediately to Sergeant Lumley. How are we doing with CCTV feeds?’

  There were close to half a million CCTV cameras in London and the centre had access to all those controlled by the government and the local authorities.

  ‘We have coverage of all three locations but, to be honest, you can get better pictures on television. All the news sources are there, Sky, the BBC, ITV, the works. The TV cameras started arriving within minutes of the hostages tweeting.’

  ‘What about helicopters?’ The Metropolitan Police’s Air Support Unit had three Eurocopter EC145 helicopters equipped with night-vision and infrared cameras, which could be used as aerial observation and communication platforms.

  The inspector smiled awkwardly. ‘Ah, didn’t think of that.’

  ‘Let’s get as many up as we can,’ said Kamran. ‘Now, what are their demands?’

  ‘The tweets and Facebook postings all say the same,’ said the inspector. ‘There are six former ISIS fighters being held in Belmarsh Prison. All six are to be released and taken to Biggin Hill airport where they want to fly out on a twin-engined jet.’

  ‘Well I wish them good luck with that,’ said Kamran. ‘What do we know about the explosives they have?’

  ‘We’re analysing CCTV footage at the moment but in the pictures we’ve seen they’re wearing coats.’

  ‘We need an explosives expert here,’ said Kamran.

  ‘I’ve already put a call out to the Bomb Squad. They’re sending someone over from Euston,’ said Adams. The Metropolitan Police was unique in that it had its own bomb-disposal team on staff. Other forces around the country called on the expertise of the army, in particular the 11EOD Regiment of the Royal Logistic Corps. They formed part of the Terrorism Command – SO15 – and were based at the old Traffic Police garage at Drummond Crescent, not far from Euston station.

  ‘Good,’ said Kamran. ‘Now, we’re going to need to ID the hostage-takers as soon as possible. We need CCTV and photographers at the various locations. As soon as we get a clear shot, pass it to Joe and he’ll run facial recognition.’ He looked at Sergeant Lumley. ‘Liaise with Five, obviously.’

  ‘Will do, sir,’ said Lumley.

  ‘And let’s get the details of the six ISIS prisoners they’re referring to.’

  A young female officer stood up from her terminal and waved at the inspector. ‘There’s another one, sir!’ she shouted. ‘Kensington. A childcare centre!’

  MARBLE ARCH (11.40 a.m.)

  ‘Do you want a muffin?’ Hassan asked his father, even though he already knew the answer. Imad El-Sayed always had a chocolate muffin with his morning cappuccino. It was as much a part of the man’s daily ritual as the five times a day that he prayed to Allah.

  El-Sayed frowned as if it were the first time he had ever been asked the question, then nodded. ‘A chocolate muffin would be good,’ he said. He manoeuvred his vast bulk over to a table by the window as Hassan joined the queue to order their coffees. El-Sayed was a big man, with folds of fat around his neck and a massive stomach that protruded over his belt. He had gold chains on his wrists and an even thicker one around his neck. His watch was a gold Rolex, studded with diamonds. El-Sayed was a rich man who liked to flaunt his wealth. Several Arabs at neighbouring tables nodded a greeting as he sat down, and he acknowledged them with a tight smile.

  The coffee shop was busy but not yet crowded. The morning rush had passed and there was usually a lull until noon. Hassan and his father were regulars there as it was a short walk from the bureau de change El-Sayed owned. The staff of three dealt with currency conversions for tourists on the street, while offices behind handled larger transactions. It was a good business, which paid for a large house in Hampstead, a Bentley for El-Sayed and a Maserati for Hassan.

  El-Sayed settled into his chair and linked his fingers over his belly. He closed his eyes and listened to the babble of conversations around him, mostly in Arabic, spoken with a multitude of accents – Kuwaiti, Lebanese, Egyptian, African … Not for nothing was Edgware Road between Marble Arch and Paddington Green known as Little Arabia. The street was lined with Arabic banks and shops, Lebanese restaurants and halal groceries. It felt like home and in many ways it was because, other than biannual trips back to his native Lebanon, he had lived in London for the past twenty-five years and all his family were now British citizens.

  ‘Father?’ said Hassan.

  El-Sayed opened his eyes. His son had placed his coffee and the muffin in front of him. He smiled and thanked him. A television on one wall showed the Arabic version of Al Jazeera news. There was a picture of a church and a reporter was describing what had happened. A suicide bomber was locked up with a priest and worshippers in a Catholic church in Brixton. The bomber was demanding that six ISIS terrorists were released from Belmarsh Prison.

  The channel switched to a studio discussion where another reporter was talking to two terrorism experts, a Westerner in a suit, the other a Saudi in a long-sleeved, ankle-length robe similar to the one that El-Sayed had on. El-Sayed listened intently. There were four suicide bombers in various parts of the city and they were all demanding that the ISIS prisoners be freed. ‘Did you see this?’ he asked his son.

  Hassan put down his coffee. ‘It has only just happened,’ he said. ‘Everyone’s talking about it on Twitter.’

  ‘Twitter?’ repeated El-Sayed. He snorted. ‘You spend far too much time playing with your phone.’

  ‘It’s not playing, Father,’ said Hassan. ‘The news was on Twitter long before it was on TV. The brothers are allowing their hostages to spread the message.’

  ‘Do they really believe that this will work, that the government will release the ISIS fighters?’

  Hassan grinned. ‘Wouldn’t it be something if they did?’ he said. He sipped his coffee again. ‘You had no idea that something like this was going
to happen?’

  El-Sayed shook his head. ‘None at all.’

  ‘There are four of them. It must have taken a lot of organising.’

  El-Sayed nodded thoughtfully. ‘No question,’ he said. ‘But why bombs? Why not just kidnap hostages and threaten to behead them, as they do in Syria? Or shoot them as they did in Paris?’

  ‘Because this is bigger, Father,’ said Hassan. ‘Can you imagine how effective it will be if they show how easily they can strike, even in London?’

  ‘You sound as if you would prefer the bombs to go off, my son.’

  ‘And why not? We need to bring the fight here, don’t we? This is where we need to make changes.’

  ‘Things will change here,’ said El-Sayed. ‘They are changing already.’

  ‘But not fast enough, Father.’

  The door to the coffee shop opened and an Asian man in a buttoned-up coat walked in and looked around. Instead of joining the queue for coffee he stared for a few seconds at the television screen, which was now showing a shot of the Southside shopping centre in Wandsworth where armed police were standing outside the main entrance, guns at the ready, as uniformed officers helped with the evacuation.

  The man looked around the coffee shop again, then headed towards where Hassan and his father were sitting. He stopped and looked down at the space next to Hassan. Hassan shook his head. ‘Please, we are sitting here,’ he said.

  The man smiled and held out his hand, as if he wanted to shake, then lunged forward and grabbed Hassan. Almost immediately he fastened a steel handcuff around the young man’s wrist.

  Hassan stood up, trying to push him away, and a look of terror flashed across his face. ‘I’m wearing a bomb!’ the man shouted. ‘Be careful!’