“Across the compound. I’ll walk you.”
Fatima tightened her grip on Sassi’s hand and said, “I want to go home.”
She knelt in front of Fatima and said, “It’s dark now. We can’t get back into your neighborhood. It’s four hours away. I’ll take you back tomorrow. Okay, Fatima?”
The eyes killed her. Fatima looked at her with the most pained gaze. This was why she could not let anyone inside. She had slipped with Fatima, but once she returned the girl to her parents, no more. Sassi steeled herself, led Fatima to a guardian in the tent, and said, “Watch her until I get back.”
She would get Fatima and let her sleep on a cot in her room on the base camp, which was really nothing more than a Sealand container modified into sleeping quarters. Fatima squeezed her hand tightly, forcing Sassi to use her free hand to remove Fatima’s surprisingly strong grip.
Sassi turned before her will broke, and walked toward Schmidt, who was staring at her approvingly. The Germans, she had learned, in general were better at being hard and dispassionate than certainly herself and some of the few friends she had made along the way. Prior to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, she had been told, the UN was easy. Kosovo, Macedonia, Bosnia, and other former resort countries were plentiful times for the UN. While there was still suffering, it was mild compared with what she had witnessed in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Macedonian army had caused tens of thousands of civilians to flee into Kosovo, but most of them were quickly absorbed into the Kosovar Albanian society.
No, these kinetic wars had an entirely different texture to them. The human suffering was deep. The loss was painful, like that captured in Fatima’s hollow gaze. Would there ever be a future for her? For any of them?
Sassi shook off the negativity when she felt Schmidt’s hand on the small of her back. She swatted it away and said, “I’m fine to walk by myself. I know where the building is.”
Schmidt was undeterred and pressed ahead, though he did remove his hand. The night air was cool as they walked up a gravel road past several modular buildings that were tantamount to a modern trailer park. The light hum of the generators constantly buzzed in the background. Sassi was certain she would experience hearing loss before her tour here was done. They approached the equivalent of a double-wide trailer and ascended the wide, wooden steps.
She kicked her hiking boots against the doorjamb before entering—a habit—to shake the dirt and mud off the soles. Inside, a black man nodded and rose from his chair. General Cartwright towered above the desk. Like Charles Barkley or Zion Williamson, the man was big, wide, and powerful. The army uniform strained the seams around his biceps and chest. The three stars stuck with Velcro to the front of his uniform enhanced the gravitas of this man with the gleaming shaved head, looking like a black Mr. Clean.
“Hi. I’m General James Cartwright.” He held out a catcher’s mitt of a hand, which Sassi shook.
“Sassi Cavezza.”
“Please, Ms. Cavezza, have a seat. Mr. Schmidt, thank you, but I’ll just be talking to Ms. Cavezza.”
Sassi liked this American already.
“As her supervisor, I prefer to stay,” Schmidt said. He sat in one of the two well-worn chairs facing the general’s battleship-gray desk.
Cartwright turned his head in Schmidt’s direction and glowered, a predator sizing up prey.
Schmidt pushed his chair back and for a moment seemed to want to challenge the imposing general but evidently thought better of it. “I understand,” he said as he departed the room.
Sassi smirked. “That may work on him, but not on me.”
“I got the impression you rather enjoyed that,” Cartwright said. He lowered his frame back into the chair.
“Oh, I did,” she said. “He’s a total PITA.”
“PITA?”
“Pain in the ass, as you Americans say. The Italian version sounds much harsher. But enough with the pleasantries. Why am I here and not with my people planning for tomorrow’s resettlement operations?”
The list in her mind was endless, filled with logistical and organizational requirements. As it stood, she was going to get precious little sleep anyway. Now a time-suck meeting was distracting her from her primary mission.
“I like it. Straight to the point,” he said. His voice was a deep baritone, which worked well with his physique. She imagined he was a force of nature. His uniform had several subdued badges on it. Airborne, Ranger, Special Forces, and other insignia that were equally impressive.
“None of us have time to waste, General.”
He nodded. “True. So, I’ll get right to it. My people tell me that you took some pictures today. In a basement in al-Ghouta?”
Sassi remained expressionless. How in the hell could this general know that she had taken a few pictures in a basement? She had been underground, negating any possibility that drones had captured her movements. Even if there were a drone in the air, the most they could have seen was the Russian tanks, her entering and exiting the same house, and then her, Hakim, and Fatima racing away under gunfire. He might have deduced something from that, but nothing as specific as taking pictures.
“Ms. Cavezza?”
“General, what are you talking about?”
“I thought you didn’t like to waste time? Play games?”
Touché.
“Okay. I took two pictures,” she said.
“Walk me through it,” he directed.
She told him about the doll and the light at the end of the tunnel, realizing how stupid she sounded.
“Very compassionate of you to help Fatima Abel. Her father is upset, by the way.”
“I know. He called me.”
“As he did me, Ms. Cavezza, but back to the point. The pictures?”
“They shot into the basement. Weapons. Automatic rifles.”
“AK-47s?” the general prompted.
“I don’t know and don’t care. I was nearly killed.”
“Why do you think that is the case?”
“Because I saw something that they didn’t want me seeing.”
The general aimed his thumb and forefinger at her, cocked like a pistol, and let the hammer fall. “Who is ‘they’?”
“Terrorists? Book club? Cartographers? How am I supposed to know?”
“You’ve been there every day for the last couple of weeks. I’m sure you’ve established relationships.”
“Minimal. It’s a tough area.”
“Roger that. Can I see the pictures?”
“First, let me ask you how you know I have the pictures.”
Cartwright stared at her for a moment, his leaden eyes unblinking.
“We have intelligence methods here that help us operate in the region. There’s a Turkish base just up the road that has American air force jets and nuclear weapons. In the opposite direction are Lebanon, Syria, and the Palestinians, all dominated by Russia and Iran. We have Israel, our ally, surrounded by Hezbollah and Hamas. The Syrians and Hezbollah are attacking our ally in the Golan Heights. I didn’t agree with the Iraq War back in 2003, but I didn’t get a vote. I was just a major doing my duty in Mosul. But I’m not sure the replacement is any better than Hussein. Iran now has a land bridge into Jordan and Syria. That’s not good for our geopolitical advantage. We work with the UN and other NGOs to try to bring stability here and elsewhere. All of that is to say that we have intelligence assets invested here that you can’t imagine. And one of those assets noticed that you had two pictures upload into a secure cloud. Now, we could go in there and take them, see them, or you could just give them to us. We’re not in the habit of stealing property of the UN or its people. We will if we have to, but I thought I’d ask first.”
“That’s kind of you, sir. Tell me, have you and your minions already been roaming around my personal stuff in my cloud storage? Looking for nude pictures to get your jollies?”
“I understand you’re angry. I am being completely honest with you. We could just go in there and get them. I have no idea what
is in those pictures, but I’m extending the courtesy to you.”
“That’s a whole lot of talking for just saying you aren’t going to tell me how you got the pictures,” Sassi remarked.
“I thought some context would be helpful.”
She retrieved her phone from her small black rucksack. Thumbing in the password, she said, “What is it that you think is on the pictures?”
“We have no idea. I understand that you were in a former ISIS stronghold that has changed hands many times. ISIS, Syria, Russians, and so forth. We have indicators of a terrorist attack—”
She cut him off. “Yes, you left out one group, General.”
“Who is that?”
“The people who live there. Remember? It’s my job to return them to their homes. Would you like to return to America and see your neighborhood ravaged?”
“Of course not. I get your point. Well made. Still, it’s bad-guy country big-time there.”
“We don’t go in blindly, General. Our intelligence folks noticed a considerable drop in ISIS activity a couple of months ago.”
Cartwright’s eyes remained fixed on hers. “I’m interested,” he said.
“Nothing more to say. There were about twenty-five ISIS leftovers there. Now there are about five. We figured we could begin to resettle.”
“Twenty ISIS operatives missing?”
“Well, maybe not missing, but certainly no longer in the area.”
“Any idea where they went?”
“Not our job.”
Cartwright nodded and after a moment said, “Okay. The pictures, please?”
She was swiping through her pictures and not finding the photos she had taken just hours ago. “Mannaggia!”
“Pardon me?”
“That’s Italian for many things. In this case, it appears your troops have already invaded my space.”
“What do you mean?”
“The pictures aren’t on my phone anymore,” she said.
Cartwright picked up his cell phone and dialed a preloaded number.
“Flanigan, get your ass in here now.”
A moment later, a young sergeant scrambled through the door to the office. He was wearing the same style camouflage uniform as Cartwright but was opposite in every other way. He was skinny, white, and wore black-rimmed glasses propped on a large nose. He was carrying what appeared to be a ruggedized iPad. Computer nerd, Sassi guessed.
“Talk to me,” Cartwright said to the young man standing at attention in front of the desk. “Have you been inside Ms. Cavezza’s computer or cloud?”
“No, sir. I was waiting on the word from you.”
“Stand by.”
Cartwright looked at Sassi. “Can you open your cloud and tell me if it’s in there?”
Sassi nodded, punched the cloud app, and waited as it spooled up. She thumbed on some folders inside the application and opened her picture albums. She normally organized her photos at the end of each day, spending a few minutes to capture her history. She had folders for Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, several African countries. She divided the folders into travel, UNCHR, and family. She checked them all. There were a few loose pictures that she hadn’t placed in folders from this morning’s drive into Ghouta. They had taken the coastal route, and Sassi had reflected on the harsh reality of the beauty of the sea smashing into the cliffs to her west and the barren combat zones to her east. She felt as if she had been on a thin dividing line between life and death. Often the line was no wider than a strip of asphalt.
“Either you guys are excellent liars, and this is all some kind of a hoax, or someone took those two pictures from my cloud and my phone.”
“Well, technically, if they take it from your cloud, it removes it from your phone,” Flanigan said.
“Be quiet, Flanigan. We don’t need explanations. What we need are solutions. Can you find those pictures?”
“I can try, but if we’re dealing with pros here, and I suspect we are, then it might be impossible.”
He opened his tablet and began punching some icons.
“Username and password?” he said without looking up.
Sassi told him, though she felt violated. She used the same password for just about everything, and now she was going to have to change all her bank, email, and app logins. After a few minutes of Flanigan rooting around in what she suspected to be her storage, the sergeant said, “There was access to the cloud at 19:23 hours local. It’s 21:14 right now. So, basically, two hours ago, someone jailbroke your phone and took your pictures and probably stole your password. Do you have it saved in your phone?”
Sassi nodded. She did. “But it is encrypted and in code.”
“These guys knew what they were doing. Sorry, boss. Everything’s gone. The memory card on her phone doesn’t have a trace. Real pros. I’ve got nothing,” Flanigan said.
Cartwright sighed heavily. “I should have authorized you to grab them when we got the alert.”
“No. No. That’s not the lesson to be learned here,” Sassi said, shaking her finger. She stood and leaned forward on the general’s desk. “The lesson is you stay out of my shit.”
Cartwright looked at Flanigan and said, “That will be all, then.” Flanigan raised his eyebrows, tucked his tablet under his arm, and conducted a proper about-face as he exited the room.
“Roger that,” Cartwright finally said to Sassi once the door had clicked shut. “I can handle you breathing down my neck. That rolls off me like water off a duck’s back. What I can’t handle now is the threat that you may be under. We’re going to have to lock you down.”
“Lock me down?” Sassi spat the words as if she’d just eaten bad sushi.
“Think about it. If someone penetrated your cloud and phone just to get two photographs, what do you think they’ll do to your brain to erase the memory, the details?”
“They’ll penetrate it with a bullet before I let you lock me down,” Sassi said. “I’m happy to tell you what I saw in there if you can convince me that you didn’t take it. I don’t know who to trust here.”
“We didn’t take it. We could have, but we didn’t. U.S. policy is to go through the Five Eyes intelligence experts—you know, our allies—first before we do anything like this. We do monitor external activity. For example, we knew you had uploaded something to your cloud in the area of operations. Our policy, however, prevents us from looking at precisely what you uploaded. Two pictures. That’s all we know. Then our satellite picked up the fighters that chased you out of town. We did facial recognition on them, and they are three well-known ISIS fighters, meaning they are bandits who will fight for the highest dollar, usually more. They could be on the Russian, Syrian, or Iranian payrolls. It changes too quickly for us to know for certain.”
“But they’re not on your payroll?” Sassi quipped.
Cartwright nodded. “Touché. No, they’re not and never have been. At least not these particular mercenaries. I won’t lie. We’ve had our share of alliances here in the area that I’m not proud of, but these guys aren’t one of them.”
Sassi sat down in the chair and leaned back. “There were maps with pins and strings. The main pin was in the Port of Tripoli, Lebanon. That string led to Cyprus. And then there were multiple strings from Cyprus to North America.”
“That’s helpful. What do you think it meant?”
“You’re the army general. You tell me,” Sassi said.
“Well, it could be that the people who live there are opening a business and they see Tripoli to Cyprus as their best trade route to go to market in the eastern United States. Lots of black market in Cyprus and lots of disguising point of origin. Might be Syrians trying to evade the sanctions.”
Sassi stared at the general, whose eyes remained fixed on her. It was obvious that he didn’t believe a word he was saying. She gave him credit for having an active imagination. There were no merchants in sight at that location or neighborhood, and he knew it.
“You seem unconvinced,” Cartwright said.<
br />
“I was about to say the same thing about you,” Sassi replied.
The general chuckled. “Fencing with you is no easy task.”
“Nor should it be. I have an inherent distrust of the military. Not just the United States but all militaries. I’m no pacifist or kooky believer in utopia, but neither am I giving the benefit of the doubt to the military, regardless of the country. I’ve seen the horrors you people inflict. You drop your bombs from miles up in the sky or shoot your rifles from hundreds of yards away. Your artillery comes out of the sky from nowhere. And innocent men, women, and children suffer. I understand that there is evil in this world. I’ve seen it when I was chained to a wall in a basement in Fallujah. I’d made my peace. Soldiers didn’t save me that day. The village elder did. Eventually, the soldiers came, and the ensuing fight destroyed the town. Whose fault was it? Who knows? It was war. After the Sunni uprising, I moved hundreds of families back into Anbar Province only to find rubble. But they made do. You know why?”
She didn’t give him a chance to answer.
“Because it was home. It was what they knew and where they and their ancestors had lived all their lives. It was easier to rebuild on familiar ground than restart on unfamiliar ground. I don’t trust the military. I do trust the heart’s desire to be home. Those are the principles by which I operate.”
Cartwright looked over each shoulder, as if there were an audience behind him listening to Sassi’s speech.
“Words to live by. I don’t trust that my own government knows what the hell they’re doing. The intelligence community is too busy spying on each other to be any good to us over here. All I know are my capabilities and mostly those of my men. Flanigan there? He may be the biggest nerd in the world, but there’s nothing he can’t do inside the wires.”
“Except get my pictures back … if he doesn’t already have them.”
Cartwright shook his head with a rueful smile. He raised his arms in mock surrender. “I capitulate.”
“I figured you for a tougher fighter than that, General. No wonder you guys are losing.” Sassi smiled.
Reaper: Drone Strike: A Sniper Novel Page 5
