Andy McNab - Deep Black

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Epub ISBN: 9781407039206

Version 1.0

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DEEP BLACK

A CORGI BOOK : 0 552 15019 3

Originally published in Great Britain by Bantam Press, a division of Transworld Publishers

PRINTING HISTORY

Bantam Press edition published 2004

Corgi edition published 2005

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

Copyright Andy McNab 2004

The right of Andy McNab to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All the characters in this book are fictitious,

and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead,

is purely coincidental.

Condition of Sale

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Set in 11/12pt Palatino by

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Corgi Books are published by Transworld Publishers, 6163 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA, a division of The Random House Group Ltd, in Australia by Random House Australia (Pty) Ltd, 20 Alfred Street, Milsons Point, Sydney, NSW 2061, Australia, in New Zealand by Random House New Zealand Ltd, 18 Poland Road, Glenfield, Auckland 10, New Zealand and in South Africa by Random House (Pty) Ltd, Endulini, 5a Jubilee Road, Parktown 2193, South Africa.

Printed and bound in Great Britain by

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Papers used by Transworld Publishers are natural, recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests. The manufacturing processes conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin

About the Author

Andy McNab joined the infantry as a boy soldier. In 1984 he was badged as a member of 22 SAS Regiment and was involved in both covert and overt special operations worldwide.

During the Gulf War he commanded Bravo Two Zero, a patrol that, in the words of his commanding officer, will remain in regimental history for ever. Awarded both the Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM) and Military Medal (MM) during his military career, McNab was the British Armys most highly decorated serving soldier when he finally left the SAS in February 1993. He wrote about his experiences in two phenomenal bestsellers, Bravo Two Zero , which was filmed starring Sean Bean, and Immediate Action .

He is also the author of the bestselling novels, Remote Control , Crisis Four , Firewall , Last Light , Liberation Day , Dark Winter and Deep Black . His new novel, Aggressor , will be available from Bantam Press later in the year. Besides his writing work, he lectures to security and intelligence agencies in both the USA and the UK.

Acclaim for Andy McNab:

McNabs great asset is that the heart of his fiction is non-fiction: other thriller writers do their research, but he has actually been there Sunday Times

McNab is a terrific novelist. When it comes to thrills, hes Forsyth class Mail on Sunday

www. books at transworld .co.uk/andymcnab

Addictive... Packed with wild action and revealing tradecraft Daily Telegraph

Firmly established as one of the UKs top thriller writers, McNab draws heavily from his experiences in the worlds most highly skilled special forces unit to make his fiction explosive, pacey and authentic Express Magazine

The word page-turner seems coined for McNabs work Crime Time

Also by Andy McNab

Non-fiction

BRAVO TWO ZERO

IMMEDIATE ACTION

Fiction

REMOTE CONTROL

CRISIS FOUR

FIREWALL

LAST LIGHT

LIBERATION DAY

DARK WINTER

and published by Corgi Books

Bosnia, October 1994

From where I was hiding, the bottom of the valley looked like no mans land on the Somme: acres of mud churned up by tank and heavy vehicle tracks, mortar craters filled with dirty water. Here and there a dead hand clawed at the sky, pleading for help that had never arrived.

It was a grey and miserable day, not yet freezing, but plenty cold enough to have robbed me of a whole lot of body heat over the last three days. Even so I was still luckier than the scattered corpses, half buried in the mud. Judging by their state of decomposition, some had been there since the summer.

I was about a hundred Ks north of Sarajevo, dug into the treeline at the base of a mountain. My hide looked across the valley to what had once been a cement works, precisely 217 metres away. The problem for the owners was that it had been a Muslim cement works. The perimeter fence had long since been flattened by Serb tanks, and not a single part of the complex had been left unscarred by the bitter fighting. Most of it had been reduced to rubble. A three-storey building that I guessed had once been a block of offices was just about standing, heavily pitted by artillery and small-arm rounds. Black scorch marks framed the holes where thered once been windows.

Id counted maybe thirty or forty Serb troops through my miniature binoculars, and I could see they were as cold and pissed-off as I was. Smoke billowed from an annexe, mixing with the occasional burst of diesel exhaust; one or two of Mladics boys were starting the vehicles, so they could get warm inside the cab.

I could only guess that, like me, they were waiting for the generals arrival. Ratko Mladic, the commander-in-chief of the Bosnian Serb Army, had been supposed to show up the day before, but that hadnt happened. Fuck knows why. Sarajevo had just told me to wait where I was, and that was what Id do until they told me to lift off the target.

I was up to my ears in a Gore-Tex sniper suit, a big, bulky overall with a camouflaged outer and a duvet-type lining. It had kept me warm for the first few hours, but prolonged contact with the ground was steadily draining me. I had about two days food left, but being so close to the target, I was on hard routine. I couldnt heat up food, or make a brew. Still, at least I was dry.

I raised the binos and scanned the ground again, controlling my breathing. It wouldnt take much of a vapour trail for someone to think I was having a cookout.

The coffin-shaped scrape Id dug after moving covertly into the area was about two feet deep and covered with camouflage netting. I adjusted it again to make sure the objective lens at the front end of the LTD [laser target designator] had a clear field of view to the factory. When Mladic arrived to do whatever he was going to do in the middle of nowhere, Id call it in. The Firm, getting shelled to shit by the Serbs back in Sarajevo, would green-light a fast jet loaded with a 2000-pound Paveway laser-guided bomb. About fifteen or twenty minutes later, depending on how long it took the platform, as we said in the trade, to deliver, thered be a top-level vacancy in the Serb high command.

After the hit, Id get the fuck out as quick as I could. The Serbs werent fools; they knew these precision bomb strikes were man-in-the-loop technology and theyd be out looking for me.