Hatchet

by Israel Levy

  “I don’t understand, I don’t understand,” she muttered.

  Yaron and Ziv looked at the computer screen again, trying to figure out what they were missing.

  “Radio Hatchet.”

  “Hatchet, this is Hatchet Two.”

  Abraham’s voice responded. “This is Hatchet, over.”

  “We have an unclear situation. Are you seeing the image on screen?”

  “Affirmative. That’s Musa, the new cell leader. He’s the one who took over from Faris and the only one that has the access code to the bank account. Please relay to all teams that he must not be killed. Did you say there’s a situation with Naomi? Over.”

  Yaron tensed at the mention of Naomi’s name over the radio, in clear violation of protocol.

  “Affirmative, over.”

  “Put her on.”

  Yaron placed the headphones on Naomi’s head.

  “Naomi, listen up. You’re right. This is Musa, the cell leader, whom you know as Moshe.”

  Naomi felt like she was about to have a heart attack.

  “You, you knew about Moshe.”

  “Affirmative. We can’t talk about this now. We have to move quickly. So first, pull yourself together. Musa or Moshe, either way he is the only one in possession of the banks access code. Yaron has been ordered not to kill him. You’re the only one who might be able to get the code from him. Without it the whole operation fails. Do you copy?”

  Naomi breathed heavily, her entire body drenched in sweat with the realization that her entire relationship with Moshe had been transparent and was a part of some larger scheme she had no knowledge of. She felt her life, her emotions, her mind, had all been toyed with. She breathed heavily.

  “How dare you, how dare you,” she whispered into her mouthpiece.

  “This is Hatchet. Pull yourself together. Do not jeopardize the mission,” Abraham’s voice was harsher than she’d ever heard it. “Remember what I told you. Some things are bigger and more important than me or you. You know that. That’s why you’re here, Naomi. I know choosing you wasn’t a mistake. Some things that are unclear right now will be cleared up later on. Over and out.”

  Ziv washed Naomi’s face with water from the canteen, and slowly her breathing became normal again.

  “Naomi, we have to start getting ready. Are you up for this?” asked Yaron, knowing he had just witnessed a tornado without understanding its source.

  “OK, give me two minutes.”

  Yaron and Ziv breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Hatchet Two, this is Hatchet Three” the Seals team reported its approach to the convening point.

  “Roger that. Stand by, we’re coming towards you.”

  Yaron, Ziv, Naomi and the two soldiers put on their vests. One of the soldiers kept watch and stayed in the dugout by the radio as the team crawled out one by one, making their way backwards downhill into the valley away from the camp. Behind the first bend Yaron stopped, kneeled, and made a squeaky sound with his lips. A corresponding sound answered him from the darkness and three figures emerged. They were Gilad, Adam and Udi, running towards them in a hunch.

  Gilad removed a large canvas from his bag and both teams climbed under it. Naomi took out her laptop and on screen was the image of the camp as captured that moment by the soldier who remained in the dugout. Ziv reached in his pack for several palm computers, identical to Naomi’s, and he, Gilad, Yaron and Adam strapped them to their forearms. Again Yaron reached in his pack and took out what looked like webcams attached to bands. He told all team members to strap them to their foreheads.

  “Now, switch on so I can bring you online.” They did so and within two minutes everyone had the footage from the camp on their monitors.

  “Hatchet Two here. We are receiving individual images.”

  Two guards patrolled the camp. Yaron gestured to Gilad silently to take them out, then switched to the images from inside the tents and turned to confirm their aims for the mission.

  “OK, heads up. We only go in once Musa and the fat man come out of the computer room and go to sleep. The no kill order applies to both of them, and no matter what, the takeover must be silent, clear? I want two from their commanders’ tent alive. Do you copy?”

  Everyone nodded, fitted silencers onto their guns, and carried their M-16’s diagonally on their backs. Yaron folded the canvas and they were enveloped by darkness. They dispersed and began to move past the lookout spot towards the camp. About twenty meters from the closest tent, a navy team passed Naomi in a quick crawl. The two guards finished their patrol and stood at the kitchen tent. All teams froze. Gilad’s guys were no more than an arm’s length away from the guards, the images from their cameras transmitted to everyone. One of the guards took out a cigarette and his friend came closer, holding out a lit match. In utter silence Adam and Udi moved quickly, swooping in from the darkness, grabbing the two guards from behind. With one hand over the men’s mouths and a knife in the other, they took them out in mere seconds. Naomi’s stomach turned seeing the kill.

  They signaled an OK to Gilad and he checked the computer on his arm and quickly turned to one of the sleeping tents. It was dark but the figures lying in the cots were still visible on camera. He signaled to two team members and they vanished inside the tent. Only a highly trained ear could detect the pop of the gun silencers. Again the entire scene was transmitted to the command room.

  “Tent 1 clear.”

  “Hatchet Three hold your position.”

  Yaron gestured for Ziv and the two other soldiers to crawl into the second sleeping tent. They entered and the faint sounds of their silencers meant the job was done.

  “Tent 2 clear, we have two alive.”

  They emerged from the tent, dragging two barefoot, shirtless men with black cloth bags over their heads and their hands in plastic zip ties.

  Chapter 12

  The full moon shone over the desert and visibility was good. The sharp shadows cast by the hills and tents added a surreal ambiance to the scenery.

  Naomi tried to focus on the job at hand, playing the recent developments over and over in her mind (“Did they know all along? And what about Moshe, Musa? Did I fall in love with a terrorist? Were they using me to get to him? Was all of it just one big scam that everyone but me was in on?”).

  “Hatchet Two, this is Hatchet, pay attention – exit from the computer room now taking place.”

  Everyone was on edge. Gilad checked his palm computer. The crate was shifted aside and the fat man emerged first, talking to Musa who came up after him. They did not notice anything and kept talking as Musa moved the crate back in place. They walked into the command tent.

  Before they could react, the Hatchet Three team lunged at them, covering their heads with black sacks. Not a single word was said. The two men tried to put up a fight but were bound on the floor within two minutes.

  “Min hada? Min antum? Who are you?” cried Musa, but got no answer.

  “Are you Americans? Are you British? Who are you?”

  Yaron and Naomi entered the tent.

  “Uskut, be quiet,” said Yaron in Arabic, in a loud whisper.

  “Israelin?! Intum Israelin! You are Israeli!”

  “Uskut!” barked Gilad. “You can talk in Hebrew if you want to.”

  Both men fell silent, bewildered.

  “Jaysh al Israil?! Allahu Akbar, the Israeli Army!”

  Gilad and Adam grabbed both men and sat them down in chairs.

  “Hatchet Two, bring the other two prisoners in the room and remove their head covers. They must witness the whole interrogation process. Do you copy?” Abraham ordered over the radio.

  Ziv and the soldier pushed the prisoners in, bringing them to sit on their knees, and removed the bags from their heads. They blinked a little at the light and one of them spat at the soldier, earning himself a blow from th
e butt of Ziv’s weapon.

  Naomi’s heart raced at the sight of Moshe, sitting there with the black sack over his head and his hands tied behind his back.

  She kept her distance , staying in the shaded part of the tent. Yaron turned to Musa in Hebrew.

  “You see, there’s nothing you can do. We’re already here. Oh, and Aisha sends her regards.”

  Naomi’s heart skipped another beat (“Oh god, I have to get through this insanity somehow”).

  “Aisha? Who is Aisha?”

  “Other than your cousin and fiancée, you mean?”

  Musa’s back straightened as if he was trying to keep up with the last few minutes’ crazy developments. (“His cousin and fiancée? How is that possible? He couldn’t have been pretending that much! His fiancée?!”) Naomi felt overwhelmed with rage.

  “She says hello and asks, on behalf of the family, that you give us the access code to the banks.”

  “What banks? What are you talking about? We’re out here in the middle of the desert and you talk to me about computers?”

  “I didn’t say anything about computers,” said Yaron. It seemed as if, under the black hood, Musa was holding his breath.

  “Let me be clear, we will not harm Aisha and your family if you cooperate.”

  “Hatchet Two, come in, this is Hatchet.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Switch your device to speaker phone.”

  “Roger that,” Yaron did as ordered.

  “Musa, ya albi, my love, haza Aisha, ya Musa,” Aisha’s voice echoed across the tent. Musa shrunk in his chair as if someone had punched him straight in the gut.

  “Musa, aismaeni? Do you hear me?” Aisha went on. “Tell them to stop. They can kill me and my mother and no one will ever know. Enough, ya Musa, enough.”

  Musa said nothing and then, all of a sudden, lifted his head and yelled: “Never, never! I will sacrifice my life and the life of my family for the sacred cause of fighting you dirty Jews! I’ll die before I ever help you!”

  The two prisoners too began to scream and shout but Adam kicked them until they fell silent again.

  Gilad punched the black canvas with all his might and Musa was thrown off the chair. Naomi moved forward instinctively, as if to help him up, but Yaron gave her a harsh, almost lethal look.

  “Step out and contact Wheels, tell them to move in.”

  Naomi answered, not even realizing what she was doing. “fine, I’m going out,” she said.

  Still on the ground, Musa froze in place. He turned his head towards her, trying to focus on the familiar voice he’d just heard.

  “Naomi?”

  Everyone stopped short and all eyes were on Naomi. She felt as if she was standing naked in the middle of the tent. She brought a finger to her lips and made a shushing gesture.

  “Shut your mouth!” Gilad punched the sack and lifted him off the floor, shaking him from side to side. The whole while the fat man sat in his place, the sack on his head, sobbing wordlessly. Naomi went outside and turned to Ziv, who was lying on his stomach with the young soldier by his side, his weapon at the ready for anyone who might be approaching.

  “Gather the Wheels.”

  “Wheels 1, this is Hatchet Two, over.”

  “Wheels here, over.”

  “Gathering with Hatchet One Experts, over.”

  “Roger that.”

  Ziv, Naomi and the soldier lay flat on the ground, blending into the shadow cast by the kitchen tent. They saw a car’s headlights in the distance (“I guess the cars are just now passing the bend in the slope”). A few minutes later the lights reappeared on the road leading to the tent camp.

  “Wheels, this is Hatchet Two, lights out, over.”

  The lights were extinguished at once. In the moonlight they were able to make out the three Japanese SUVs as they arrived at the camp and parked facing the road. Naomi felt a sudden jolt of joy, seeing her friends Yaniv, Gila, Keren and Aaron. She rushed towards them and told them to disperse and hide among the tents’ shadows. Then she went back in the tent and gave the thumbs up to let everyone inside know the job was done.

  “Hatchet, this is Hatchet Two. We have Wheels and Experts with us.”

  Yaron motioned for Gilad to lift Musa and the fat man from their seats. They dragged them to the tent entrance and Udi removed the sack from the fat man’s head.

  “Open the entrance.”

  “Je ne comprends pas, I don’t understand,” he said in French with a thick Irish accent.

  “Shut your mouth!” Udi yelled at him and slapped him as hard as he could. “Do what we tell or I will take off your balls,” he screamed at him in broken English.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the fat man kept shouting.

  Gilad entered the tent and began punching the fat man until he was bleeding from his mouth and nose.

  “Do you know what we’re talking about now? Use your head, while you still have one.” Gilad punctuated his words with a series of kicks to the fat man’s stomach. The two prisoners watched the scene with anger and frustration, but could do nothing. Naomi felt sick, but resisted the urge to interfere and simply looked away. Adam turned to Musa in Arabic.

  “Ya Musa, why would you let that fatso die like that, for no reason? And not just him. You know what I’ll do to your fiancée Aisha. She looks pretty now, but once I’m done with her no one’s ever going to want to marry her. Got me?”

  Musa rose to his feet, yelling in Arabic.

  “You filthy Israeli dog! If you hurt a single hair on Aisha’s head, you’re dead!”

  Adam sent a swivel kick at Musa’s legs, making him fall to the ground, his face now covered with a sticky red paste of sand, spit and blood.

  “Enough, have mercy on us! I can’t take it anymore,” cried the fat man.

  “No, you dog! Don’t crack!” the two prisoners yelled at him, ceasing only after another series of kicks.

  Gilad led the fat man to the crate. The man turned the crate’s handle clockwise three times, pressed it once and then turned it four times, anticlockwise, and the crate shifted to the side.

  “Hatchet One, this is Hatchet Two. Bring in the Experts.”

  Gila and Aaron entered and went down to the computer room first.

  “Wait, don’t touch anything. Let Yaron see if the place has been booby-trapped.”

  They went back up and Yaron descended into what in fact was more an alcove than a room.

  “Naomi, get down here,” Yaron whispered into his mouthpiece.

  Naomi went down, trying to examine the dark nook with a flashlight. There was just one computer located in the center of the tiny room. Yaron approached it and Naomi remembered what the fat man had told her back in Belgium.

  “Yaron, stop,” she said, and Yaron froze in place.

  “What is it, Naomi?”

  “I think it’s a trap. Something doesn’t feel right. It looks like the computer isn’t plugged in.”

  Yaron looked at the computer and its surrounding more closely.

  “You’re right, damn it, move back.”

  An explosive device was stuck to the bottom of the table and attached with wires to the keyboard.

  “Shit, if we had touched the keyboard we’d all go up in a blaze with them to meet Muhammad. How did you catch that?” he asked, but Naomi said nothing.

  Yaron called in one of his young guys, an explosives expert, who came down and began examining the bomb. Naomi could feel sweat pouring down her forehead and into her eyes, but didn’t dare move. After what felt to her like hours the soldier finally turned to Yaron and said “disarmed”, before moving back.

  “That doesn’t solve the problem of where the real computer room is.”

  Naomi shined her flashlight across the nook walls, going over them as slowly as she could, when su
ddenly she spotted an odd button that looked out of place at the bottom of the fifth step.

  “Yaron, check it out.”

  Yaron signaled the soldier who examined the button and concluded it was not booby-trapped.

  “Hatchet Two, this is Hatchet, over.”

  “Go ahead Hatchet.”

  “What’s your status? Are you in yet?”

  “Negative. It’s just a decoy alcove. But we found something. I’ll point my camera to it so you can see,” he showed them the button.

  “Pay attention, Hatchet Two. We know this type of lock, we’ve seen it in Belgium. Press it twice. When a level pops out of the stair, pull it upwards.”

  “Roger that.”

  Naomi heard the radio communication and signaled to Yaron that she was on it. Before he reacted she pressed the button twice and a lever popped out, just as Abraham said. She pulled it upwards.

  All at once the nook was flooded with a blinding bright light that burst from an opening under the ladder. A door swiveled on its hinge and everyone covered their eyes instinctively to protect them from the brightness. Yaron took a step forward towards the opening, shielding Naomi behind his back.

  They found themselves in a state of the art computer room, as if designed for a major company. It was a very large room, its walls covered in images of demolished houses, dead terrorists, Israeli soldiers standing at a checkpoint, interrogating an old lady, a father and son that had been killed in Gaza during the intifada.

  Naomi’s heart skipped a few beats. This was a museum, commemorating the Palestinian war of terror. In the center of the room, on a smooth concrete floor, stood an advanced server next to a round table with four computers, all turned on.

  “Hatchet, this is Hatchet Two. Are you seeing this?”

  “Affirmative, Hatchet Two, excellent. Proceed to the next stage.”

  Aaron and Gila came rushing down the steps and into the computer room, amazed expressions on their faces at the uncanny sight.

  “My god, the pinnacle of technology in the middle of nowhere.”