‘Move!’ he snarled.
Ollie stepped out into the corridor. He felt bad for not helping Maksim, but the Russian had lost it. Even if they had managed to overpower the soldiers, they’d be stopped on the way out. There were 500 elite Sixth Brigade troops in this barracks. If they were going to escape they needed something more sophisticated than a ruck.
‘Up the stairs,’ ordered the soldier, shoving Ollie in the back.
With David at his side, he started to walk.
‘Ever done torture training?’ hissed David.
Ollie nodded.
‘Just stay inside the box,’ David advised.
The box, thought Ollie grimly. He’d been through the torture drill as part of his basic training, the same way most officers did, but of all the different skills he’d acquired during his time in the Blues, that was the one he most hoped he’d never have to use. The technique was first developed by the Americans during the Vietnam War, for soldiers captured by the Vietcong. It had been widely taught in Western armies ever since. You created a mental box inside your head, a place with sturdy psychological walls, filled with all the things you most valued in life, and you retreated into that space, and tried to ignore whatever indignities were being inflicted upon your body.
Easy to teach, decided Ollie. Not so easy in practice.
‘That bad, you reckon?’ he said aloud.
David nodded. ‘They’re not bringing us out for a nice cup of tea, that much is for bloody certain.’
They broke into bright sunshine. It was just after eleven in the morning, and another five soldiers were waiting to escort them across the dusty parade ground. They stepped up into a small square building made from rough concrete breeze blocks.
‘This way,’ snarled the soldier, jabbing Ollie once again with the butt of his AK-47.
He stumbled inside, struggling to keep his balance as the force of the blow rattled down his spine.
It was just a single room. There was a light bulb hanging from the ceiling, and a stale smell of blood and sweat reeking out from the slabs of slate on the floor. The walls were lined with bricks, and there were no windows, making it hot inside. Small, compact and, most importantly of all, soundproofed, noted Ollie. Just the way you’d design a torture chamber.
He looked up. The North Korean Sungoo Park was standing straight in front of him. He was dressed in a plain khaki uniform, with heavy black boots, and an electric cattle prod in his right hand. Directly behind him, a noose was strung up to a metal bar attached to the ceiling, and next to it a single wooden chair.
‘Christ,’ muttered Ollie under his breath. A hanging.
‘Stand to attention!’ snapped Park.
Ollie stood up straight. What’s in my box? he wondered to himself. Katie? Not really. If she wasn’t determined to live like a City banker’s wife, whilst married to an Army officer, then he might not be in this mess in the first place. His dad? Not likely. He’d never forgiven Ollie for going into the Household Cavalry in the first place, then he’d never forgiven him all over again for not being able to hold down the job in the City he’d wangled for him when he quit the Army. No comfort there. Nor from his mother either. She’d died in a car accident when Ollie was just three and he could scarcely remember her. Maybe Lena, the Italian nanny who had looked after him from the age of three to eight, before he’d been packed off to boarding school and a succession of aunts, holiday camps, and au pairs who looked after him during the holidays. Yes, Lena, he reflected. He used to climb into her bed sometimes when he was scared in the night, and there was nowhere else for him to go. With her long black hair, deep brown eyes, a permanent, infectious giggle, and a scent of boiled sweets, she was the person he’d crawl up next to in his own personal box. But Jesus, he thought to himself. A nanny you haven’t spoken to for twenty-three years. It’s not much for a man to cling onto in what might well be his final few minutes on this earth.
‘I’ve summoned both of you up here because you are the only two officers amongst the men we captured,’ Park announced. He was a short man, with intense, wiry muscles. But there was a hardness within him that suggested he was made out of pressed steel.
‘This isn’t the army,’ said Ollie stiffly. ‘No officers . . . just men.’ Park attempted a thin smile but it soon vanished. ‘Oliver Hall. Once of the Household Cavalry - your Queen’s own bodyguards. There is no more prestigious regiment in the British Army.’ His eyes flashed across to David. ‘And David Mallet. Formerly a Major in the Irish Guards - the Regiment that draws upon the cream of Britain’s Catholic public schools.’