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The black-clad figures approaching them didn’t need cover. They were cover. Even from one hundred yards, Koenig could see they were wearing prototype integrated body armour. All futuristic and menacing. Looked like matte-black Iron Man suits. Full-face protective masks with built-in anti-flare goggles. Tactical helmets with slots for mounted accessories. Burn-proof coveralls. Armoured plates covering the torso, thighs, shins and arms. Thick boots. Hinged knee and elbow guards. Clunky to walk in, like an unsaddled medieval knight. But against the 9-millimetre Parabellums from Koenig’s and Draper’s SIGs, they were literally bulletproof. Koenig had known armoured suits like this were in development with a dozen defence contractors, but he’d never seen them used in the field.

‘Great,’ Draper muttered. ‘We’re about to be killed by Darth Vader.’

Their gait was exaggerated and ponderous. Slow but relentless. Like an incoming tide when you were stranded.

Koenig snapped off a couple of shots. He didn’t expect to hit them; he wanted to see how they’d react to incoming fire. Whether they trusted their armour. They did. They ignored him. Continued walking towards them. Confident of the inevitable.

They were carrying Spectre submachine guns. Italian-made. To the casual observer, Spectres looked like their famous cousin, the Mini Uzi. They had similar rates of fire, around nine hundred rounds per minute, and a similar effective range, a little over fifty yards, but it was magazine capacity that made the Spectre the better weapon, Koenig had always thought. Fifty rounds compared to the Mini Uzi’s thirty-two. A third more. When you were using weapons like Spectres and Mini Uzis, magazine capacity counted. You weren’t bothered about accuracy. It was all about the firepower and the noise. They were a reassuringly odd choice. Professionals avoided Spectres and Mini Uzis like the pox.

Stupid weapons and stupid armour. That was good.

But they weren’t firing yet. Hadn’t even raised their weapons. As it was with Uzis, conserving ammunition was important with Spectres. One undisciplined burst and you were empty. Not firing while they weren’t in effective range indicated they weren’t as stupid as he’d thought. That wasn’t good.

Koenig couldn’t see a way out. The men in body armour would walk right up to where they were taking cover. Lay down suppressing fire, then shoot them like they were pigs in a poke.

‘I don’t suppose you have anything bigger on the plane?’ he said. He waved his SIG in the air. ‘I kinda feel outmatched with this.’

‘If we can make it on to the plane, we’re taking off,’ Draper said.

‘They shot your pilot in the head,’ Koenig reminded her. ‘Unless you know how to fly a—’

‘This is a transatlantic flight, dickhead,’ she snapped. ‘There’s a copilot onboard. He’s probably locked himself in the can, but he’s in there somewhere.’

‘You have another pilot?’

‘Of course I have another pilot. It’s the law.’

Koenig thought for a moment. ‘Well, this changes everything,’ he said.

He stood up.