Passport to Paradise

I'm on the floor. Everyone else at the gig is looking around. Only people who've never heard it think gunfire is firecrackers. Someone heavy falls on me. That will have cracked a rib. There's a hole in her forehead so I'm not going to ask her to get off. I can move my head just enough to look at the stage. The band are already leaving. I'm hearing the same old shout I heard in Helmand and in Basrah before that. If God is so great why has he got these losers running round telling everyone, with a Kalashnikov? Isn't the Word of God good enough? They're shooting for fun now. One of them has a high-pitched voice. Of course it's not a woman. They occasionally get the honour of wearing the boom-bang belt. I've always wondered if they get to Heaven. Do they get buff studs? No, of course not, they probably get to be one of somebody's 100 virgins. Everyone, dead or not, is on the floor now. I think some people got out. People near the fire exits. That'll teach me. How soon we forget. But I'm on holiday. Haven't worn a uniform for ten years.

I count only two of them, but I could be wrong. Maybe if there are two brothers they'll sound the same. When not shouting about how great God is, they speak in French. I know what they're saying although I don't understand a word. 'Any Jews? Any Americans?' It's a relief when nobody speaks. That probably means there aren't any here. Difficult to believe though it is, sometimes people answer. I check the dead woman's face, smear some of her blood on my neck. It's dark. They haven't put the auditorium lights on yet. I hope they don't. One of them walks over to me. I get ready for it. His boot hits my ribs. No air comes out, I've already exhaled. It's hard to go floppy as soon as the kick hits, but I can do it, I'm supposed to be dead. That's why a real soldier puts the bullet in, whatever the Geneva says. And they are not real soldiers. They kill civilians. They look them in the eye and they kill them. Of course, we killed civilians. Smart bombs can be awful dumb, but you need to be a pilot to drop one. Close killers don't kill civilians. It's not altruistic. Kill a civilian and you'll be in deep, deep shit. Even today 'I thought he was a terrorist' doesn't wash. The fact that they call themselves soldiers is neither here nor there.

Closer to the stage a guy is being dragged up by his hair. He looks like he might have a grandfather or cousin in Morocco. He shouts 'Allah Hua Akhbar!' But I know it won't save him, and most likely so does he. I'm wrong about Morocco. He shouts in English.

'Syrian, Syrian. I am Syrian. Look, here is my passport.'

There are three of them. I hear three people laughing, even twins don't laugh the same, in my experience. The Syrian gets one shot. I hear the sound of a body being dragged away, bumping over the dead and the scared to death. There are a few cries from those not wise enough to stay quiet. They get one shot too. These guys are very calm I think. The usual cockwomble fires bursts on automatic and this gets the adrenalin going and the others fire in bursts and the whole thing turns to bullets and blood. At which time, of course, they run out of ammo. You don't want them to run out of ammo, in case they are wearing boom-bang belts tonight too.

But these guys are good. The long bursts at the beginning were for Rumsfeldian shock-and-awe.

See! Who says we've taught them nothing.

There are sirens outside. They're not close. If the French have any sense they won't arrive like that. If they arrive at all. I'm mostly thinking about lying still and not drawing attention. While only the stage lights are on, I think I might make it, in spite of my bone haircut. Maybe I should grow my hair, if I ever get the chance. I'm also thinking about the Syrian. Maybe he liked Rock Music in Raqqa, perhaps that was enough to make him attract the lunatics' attention. Maybe he saw the posters and told himself, 'I'll go now, now it's safe. It doesn't matter if I've never heard of them. I'm going.'

The cavalry arrive eventually. The spokesman for the hostage takers is the one with the high-pitched voice. It's the usual nonsense. I've used it as a diversion to get a better view of the three of them. One of them is clutching the passport, waving it. They open the entrance door. Two of them fire what they have left in the magazine. Number one pulls the cord. Maybe I'm the only person to see the passport thrown towards the remains. Two and Three run outside to the right and the left and pull their cords on the way. I bet the passport survives. I get up and make for the fire exit. There's no point in meeting the rescuers head on. It's not my fight now but I do wonder if they'll work out the passport trick.