The sweat trickled down the thin skin on the top his spine and he could feel beads of it emerging on back of his stiff legs between the standing hairs. As still as a lion before the strike, he stood poised in the thick black swamp around his feet, the cold water filtering through his jungle trousers and pouring slowly into his boots. The place must be a minefield, it must be, that’s why he couldn’t move and it was the only reason he couldn’t lift his feet. Irrational thoughts cascaded through all possible explanations as to what the hell he was doing here. Teeth tensed with anticipation to the point of shattering, all he could do was remain perfectly still and stare between the broken trees and smoke with the howl of millions of screaming crickets and god knows what else lay in the jungle growth around him. The thick and humid tropical air tasted of the sweet smell of cordite, that beautiful miasma he knew so well from burnt gunpowder and explosives, so delicious to those who survive the fight to taste it. But there was no mine beneath his feet, and there was no weapon in his hands and couldn’t understand why he was catching his breaths in quick gulps. He didn’t remember running, and he didn’t remember a fight. The thunderstorm of panic was controlling his heart while his body remained locked in paralysis as the swamp beneath him kept giving way as it casually swallowed him. Fucking move! Nothing was listening to him. The thought pulsed as hard as it could into every combination of muscle movement he commanded, but his body would not give him the width of an atom. The cold water was traveling up his legs fast, but he kept looking across the jungle floor past the white splinters of blasted fresh wood littered the wet sludge. The empty cases still smoking as they trembled in the thin surface water all around him that he couldn’t remember firing. Across the swamp, through some shredded Lilly pads, a child’s arm lay limp on the surface of the water in a pool of blood-curdling mud. The rest of the body was almost entirely stolen by the swamp. The boy is alive, something would not give up within him and the fury he threw at his paralysis fell flat on its face, and would not let him reach out and grab the small wrist before it was too late. The sinking had pulled him in up to the waist, and all he could do was panic before the drowning. It was coming quickly, he had dreamt of this moment before, and he begged for it to be a dream again. The anxiety had joined the electrical storm in his heart. He realised he’d only opened his eyes a few seconds ago and found himself here, yet it felt like he had been here years. The relief was coming as the surface water crawled up towards his throat. The arm was nearly gone and he held on to the tips of the small fingers with the power of his soul through his fork lightening stare. He couldn’t blink and watched the fingers fade, and as soon as they did, he just let the swamp take him down without a fight. Vibrations were trembling around him, everything throbbed and rumbled then the water was at his chin and pouring into his mouth which he couldn’t close. Over his tongue, it cascaded down into his trembling lungs. This was it, this was the end. He stopped breathing, his lungs were full, and just before his ears were filled with the black water, in that final zip of sound before the deafness, he heard something. A ringing.

For a moment he had no idea where he was as conciseness dawned. He was sleeping on the same sofa he had been for the last few weeks. He lay there blinking away the remnants of the dream while his heart slowed, recurring dreams inevitably pass, but any dream now was a luxury if only the hours of the night would allow him the time. Soaked in sweat, tortured by thirst he just lay looking at the boxes in the corner of the living room next to the kitchen door, the only things not packed were the tv which he never used and the sofa which somehow had become his new bed. Then he felt the vibrating under his head like a bumble bee was trapped, buzzing away sandwiched between the cushions. He pulled his arm from his chest and reached between the pillows and slid his hand around and pulled out the phone. The screen blinded him and he squinted and saw the name Will stamped above the number. He swiped across the screen with his thumb and threw his legs off the sofa knocking over an empty bottle of beer, and sat up in one quick movement pressing the phone to his ear.

‘Vince, you need to get in pretty sharpish my good man, I’ll send someone,’

Vince frowned, trying to think what it was he’d done while he had been asleep. He didn’t eat last night, it was too late by the time he got in, and he needed to pack, but couldn’t do it. Anyone else would phone before Will if something had come in and that’s why he answered.

‘No, no,’ Vince stood up looking around for his shoes, eyes still squinting, patting his jean pockets for his wallet. He had fallen asleep fully clothed, ‘I’m up, I’m on my way…if it’s special branch tell them I’m on fucking leave,’ The phone was suddenly filled with dead air and he could hear shuffling and chairs being moved across a stone floor at the other end, and it made him stop while he slid his feet into his trainers. The dream had vanished completely.

‘Just get in Vince…quickly. There are some people here to see you,’

It was as cold an English morning as January could muster but its touch was held away by the fizzing radiators at the window in the office. Vince had not blinked in perhaps a minute as he sat in the chair before the commanding officer across the table from him. If he knew this was going to be a brief of this kind, he would have worn his uniform, but instead, he sat in the same sweat-soaked vintage t-shirt he woke up in. The fabric was growing some small holes around the collar, and a faded brand of some Asian beer on the front was almost invisible. He didn’t much care for image, not anymore and jeans will do for any occasion. The last cut had outgrown itself and was curling into his ears, days of facial growth complimented it. He knew the patrol was concerned and could feel the heat, and if they saw him in the car park they would be thinking he had been in prison since he was pulled off the job a few weeks ago. But they could not see the could the venom leaking into his blood as he thought of the visitors sat behind him, coming for more of his time.

It was unsolicited, even to the CO, but there was a feeling that the eyes looking at him from behind belonged to people who turned up and rearranged things and all manner of rank complied. He clocked them on the way in, thinking he knew them but he didn’t really look, not well. Because he couldn’t care less and he hadn’t in a while. New faces and names all blurred into a single entity now. But something was odd since the CO had taken the name placard from the front of his desk and moved it out of the way for the thin laptop playing to Vince between them. The old office had escaped modernisation with its old oak furniture. A shelf of folders and trays of paperwork behind the main seat and a wafer-thin flatscreen monitor lit up the commanding officers stern face. Vince had been in this room perhaps five times in his seven years in the regiment and each time the summoning to here was announced it was because he was under some form of investigation. But he knew the commanding officer well, and there were few others within the unit that we’re on first name terms with him. He took out his notepad and pen in preparation as he sat down when he first come into the room, but on the page, nothing was written and the pen hovered over the lines for the entire duration. The shadow of the Islamic State videos he had to watch a few months back jerked his memory. Beheadings next to crucifixions. First person drive by’s in cars packed with people. But he he could feel himself frowning over what he was watching on the laptop screen. There were no words to write, and he merely had to watch it and wait until it was over. Two men in some wrestling match in a forest wielding knives trying to fight each other off. It was as good a quality as you can get from a 1080i head camera with only a flaming torch as a light. They looked as though they had been at it for an hour and were filthy, but he noticed they wore the same attire. The poor resolution of the footage gave little in the way of identification of the men. He couldn’t make out the pattern on the uniform. American woodland, maybe, but there was so much blood it made it impossible to tell. It was being filmed by a third man, who was whispering some urgent narration in French as he documented the pair scrambling around falling into trees and straining. The camera followed them around with the burning torch as they fought, and he caught sight of a figure in the light as it shifted around, stood between some trees. He had to catch it quickly, a single frame that had just enough light exposure to see an old woman stood watching the two men try to gut each other. It was a documentary, but where on earth was there their currently fighting in forest conditions, a cold forest at that with steam pouring from the men. Chechnya, it must be. He clicked the pen as the screen turned black and the video stopped suddenly with the video controls appearing. They sat in a stale silence with the late morning sun casting lines from the blinds onto the wall. The commanding officer turns the laptop around to himself and closes it. Vince lifted his eyes to him and rolled the edges of his lips down, could be Chechen mujahideen.

‘As of today, you are no longer under my command. You’ve won the lottery,’ The CO said as he leans back in his chair. It was the only thing he wished to tell Vince because the decision came from elsewhere up a chain of command posts that grew more and more mysterious the further Vince tried to follow them to their roots. No one dared say that to Will, as he tried to find the expression of a hint from Will but the colonial leaned out of the light and knew he meant it. He was waiting for something to do with his pending case to be brought into it.

‘That’s very interesting, but you said a couple of weeks at least of leave. I need time Will. Is this about Sierra Leone?’ If it was, then he’d tell them exactly what he told them last time. No comment. Like he was told.

‘God knows I’m sorry for your loss, you know that. But this is out of my hands, Whitehall has approved it, I got the call this morning. And no, I wouldn’t worry about Frankenstein anymore. You’ll have a full brief from task force Doom when you get to Russia.’ Will added as he brushed his hair back creaking forward on his chair. I’ve never asked anything from you, not a thing Vince thought, biting back a burst of fuck you’s. But he remembered them, that strange name of that peculiar group.

‘Doom.’ He said, still in some slight shock over what he has just witnessed on the screen, now even more so hearing that word and that they were connected. The chair creaked as he turned to look behind him to the two men sat at the back of the room and a woman sat in the corner with a dark blue scarf around her head like a hijab, but she wore walking boots and a puffy, goose down jacket. He turned back two Will and adjusts his posture, taking a deep breath as if to add a full stop to his train of thought. He just wanted to know a little bit, he couldn’t help the curiosity.

‘Who is she? Is it just me?’ He could feel his dignity got lost in the question but there was no other question to ask, he already knew he had no choice. Will’s eyes glaze over like he just died trying to think of an explanation, but before the silence could grow overwhelmingly unprofessional, he turned around again to the two men and the woman who had remained silent since Vince passed them when he walked in. He watched the two men uncross their legs in unison. One stood up and goes to the window where a picture hung next to the window of a team of weary and exhausted tramps, stood with rifles slung across their chests and a pink jeep laced with bullet holes behind them. At the top of the photo in some old italic font, ‘We are the pilgrims master, we shall go always a little further.’ The man sitting next to the picture on the window sill and cross his arms, stretching the green fleece shirt around his wide back. Some heavy duty walking trousers, waxed and a patch work of strategically placed stretch panels. His boots were built for mountain expeditions with laces doubled around the ankle. Casual attire for someone who had just overridden the command of the Special Air Service. His face was tangled with scares, and his history was something quite horrifying. Two large trenches, three centimeters wide ran up from his chin, over his lips, nose and eyes and all the way around to the back of his head. His eyes were sunken deep as if a long period of introspection had pulled them back in.

‘You better be a significant part of this industry, coming in here like this. Is this just for me?’ Who do they think they are, he felt like he was being inspected as they just sat and observed him, motionless. They were making sure that they had the right one for the job. When the man by the window spoke in a rich Russian accent, Vince could feel the dread of the orders coming. An International collaboration for some surreal event that he had no idea about. But where? Until now he had considered himself quite informed.

‘No,’ The scarred man finally responded, stroking his beard, ‘A five-man team will be an efficient escort for you. We’ve read the debrief from operation Frankenstein and have dissolved the inquiries from both governments. You have been released from all further court proceedings in the interest of this, okay? My name is major Karp, and I am the Doom liaison officer,’ The mid-morning light silhouetted over his shoulders from the window like a barcode on death across his face. Vince stared on through no man’s land. Where did he get them scars? His stubbornness would not let him ask as he thought about the disaster in Sierra Leone. Doom, they had been whispered about around here, but it was still a rumour that never really had an origin to anyone who had never met them. A whisper of information that was so mysterious that whoever possessed it would have to depart from some credibility to mention. It was bizarre to take seriously, but now the scars on that major’s head were very significant, and they were carved into his flesh in a very real place. Vince traced every inch of them up his face and the conclusion was cold, it was where the truth met the rumour. They are not the scares from bullets or shrapnel. Vince looked properly at the other two, feeling slightly surrounded. The man with a blond and rusty beard sat next to the woman had a deep, bulging laceration running up from his neck which terminated somewhere in the beard. A strange blonde stripe running through his hair like a birthmark. They each had a signature disfigurement or decoration written in suffering and pain. The woman was still making notes, Vince couldn’t see her with the headscarf hiding her face.

‘What is the significance of all this? Who is that woman?’ Vince knew it was about the woman in the video, and the soldiers tearing each other’s intestines out was secondary. The woman recrossed her legs, and laid the small notebook on the armrest.

‘She is the last Old Believer, the last true Christian on earth.’ Her voice had a slight tremble to it but held a tone of wisdom like an old English, politician.

‘Christian? You will find no faith in me, not an ounce, so anything else is a waste of all our time. I see you’ve all been torn up and I admit I am curious but show some respect,’ He said, signalling to all of them with a skewed glance that the religion aspect was to him impossible to take seriously. Karp leaned from the window and put his hands into his trouser pockets. He stood straight and tall, and Vince could tell he could fight. He wanted to turn the light on and expose them and be done with it.

‘No, I cannot appreciate it. You’re fucking going, and when you get there, if you get there, you will change in ways you cannot understand. The old woman is old, and soon she will die. Get your men in, everything is cancelled. This is the end of Christianity captain Mann,’ Karp turned and walked to the door and jabbed the handle down appearing annoyed and set off down the corridor. Vince looked across to the other two, there has been no Christian business for a while, not since Kosovo and Bosnia. Madness he thought and waited to see who would follow, but he wanted the woman to step into the light so he could see her face. She leaned out as she stood up and Vince saw her face was a mask of lacerations like she had walked through a blizzard of razor blades. He could see by the structure that she was once pretty. The scars were old, and she was old, and he could see some tragic story behind her grey eyes as she looked at him while she stepped to the door.

‘I’m truly sorry for your loss, but there is no better time than now, at this point of it. The inferno you feel is a power you can harness and channel to places you never knew you could reach. You have twenty four hours. I’ll see you out there,’ She tossed the loose side of her headscarf over her shoulder. The fury swelled into in a boiling blush around his face as she walked off down the corridor passing a wall of old and new photographs of troops, regiments and insignia from all kinds of other units. A delta force offering hung in the collection of memorabilia, a lightning strike formed into a triangle carved into some wood by mysterious hands somewhere. She never looked once at the pictures.

‘Recognise any of them from Frankenstein?’ Will said quietly as he leaned forward, there had never been such a silence between responses or air of confusion in this office since the regiment took over the barracks. But that face, it was an instant wonder, and the words wouldn’t once sound interesting, but no such thing had ever been allowed to be said an office of such precise power.

‘No. Not them three, the ones I was attached too must have been troopers. Nco’s at best,’ Vince said as he turned once more to see if the woman was still there, but they had all gone.

‘Was she tortured? Is that something we know about,’

Will leaned and took a book from the top of his desk which Vince was hoping was nothing to do with him when he first laid eyes on it upon entering.

‘She’s a geologist. An explorer.’ Will said as he tossed the book across the oak wood to him. Its plain leather jacket looking up at him with the crucifix branded into the thick leather.

‘You’ve got twenty-four hours to convert to Christianity,’

He couldn’t believe he heard the words from such a profoundly respected man. The pictures hanging from his walls commanded so much more.

‘You must be joking,’

‘Jokes are well and truly over Vince. Good luck.’

Vince lifted the thick front cover with his thumb and looked at the first line on the first page.

                                    Lat 52.677543 Long 97.863921

                                              No beast so fierce

Next Chapter: ORDERS