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surprise, he seemed to be all in one piece. Dizzily, he looked over at the quads. The others were mounted and ready to go. They were waving him on and their mouths were moving as they yelled encouragement, but he could not hear a thing. Paulo headed for the nearest quad at a stumbling run and climbed on behind Hex.
    ‘Let’s get out of here!’ called Alex.
    The three quads blasted out from under the camouflage awnings and headed off at high speed with their trailers bouncing crazily. Three minutes later they rounded the shoulder of another dune and disappeared from sight, leaving nothing but a trail of settling dust behind them.

S IX
    In the early dawn light the huge, dusty refugee camp sprawled in the middle of a plain of dark, featureless sand. The only splash of colour came from the black, white, green and red flags that fluttered from the tent masts, and the only sound was the snap of canvas in the fierce, gusting wind. Alpha Force grinned at one another as they headed across the plain towards the camp. It might look bleak but it was a welcome sight. The previous day, once they were sure they had not been followed by the Moroccan soldiers, they had waited for the cool of the night before travelling back to the camp. Now they were tired and hungry and looking forward to a wash and a change of clothes.
    As they reached the outskirts of the camp, the packed-earth roads between the tents and mud-brick huts were empty, but the whine of their quad engines brought heads popping from doorways and children tumbling out into the dust. Soon their arrival had turned into a noisy procession and they had to slow the quads to a careful crawl to avoid squashing small children under their wheels.
    Khalid climbed down from the back of Alex’s quad and walked along, waving and smiling like a returning hero. The camp was divided into six villages, or darias, and this was his home daria. He was well known and loved here, and nobody noticed his scarred face. The sad fact was that Khalid was not unusual. There were plenty of other Sahawaris with landmine injuries. The smaller children especially loved Khalid. They were clustered around him now, hanging from his arms and clinging to his gandourah. Khalid bore it all with a broad grin on his face.
    Minutes later, they arrived in the main square at the centre of the daria. In the middle was the all-important water cistern, which supplied the whole daria; around the edge a row of low, mud-brick buildings housed a primary school, a crèche, a dispensary and a hospital. As Alpha Force turned off their engines and climbed tiredly from the quads, the hospital doors flew open and Philippe Larousse hurried out, closely followed by a tall black man in western clothes who was checking them over for injuries before he was even out of the doorway. This was John Middleton, Amber’s uncle, who acted as a financier, organizer and anchor man for Alpha Force, as he had done for Amber’s parents before they were killed.
    ‘Hi,’ said Amber, smiling at his anxious face. ‘Don’t worry, Uncle. We’re all back in one piece.’
    ‘No problems, then?’ asked Jack Middleton, looking from Amber to Paulo, who was standing next to her.
    ‘What?’ shouted Paulo.
    ‘I said, did you have any problems?’
    ‘What?’ shouted Paulo again.
    ‘Is he OK?’ asked John Middleton, giving Amber a questioning look.
    ‘Wha-?’ Paulo’s third shout ended abruptly in a grunt as Amber dug her elbow into his ribs.
    ‘Sand in his ears, probably,’ Amber lied. She knew that Paulo was still suffering from the after-effects of the landmine explosion, but she had no intention of telling her uncle about that particular incident. When they had all first come up with the idea of forming Alpha Force, John Middleton had been very reluctant to agree to it and she did not want to give him any reason to change his mind.
    Just then a tall, imposing Sahawari woman walked into the square. Her brightly coloured malaafa robe covered