by Gary Haynes
The hamlet was an hour’s drive away by Desert Patrol Vehicles: high-speed buggies that looked like souped-up sandrails fixed with M60 machine guns. They’d stop the DPVs a mile or so from the rescue site, just close enough for the black box to operate. They’d walk on foot to ensure the terrorists there wouldn’t be spooked by the roaring sound of the DPVs’ air-cooled 200 hp VW engines.
Tom motioned to Nathan, who walked over to him, “How’s it lookin’?” he asked.
“Like we’re in the middle of a Mad Max set,” Nathan said, grinning, as he put his hand on a DPV’s roll bar. His expression changed to stern resignation. “We don’t have a positive ID. The mission is flawed, you ask me. If she’s there, I’d say there’s a ninety per cent chance they’ll kill her before we get to her, or she’ll die in crossfire. And there’s three unidentified vehicles heading toward the hamlet, less than twenty klicks away.”
“Can’t a drone take them out?” Tom asked.
“No problem. But she could be in one of them. Would you make that call?”
No, Tom thought.
“That could be an extra fifteen fighters. But successful or not, we won’t leave any of them alive. That much I’m sure of.”
Tom nodded, although he felt mentally numb.
103.
No more than a quarter of a mile from the Red Sea, crescent-shaped sand dunes surrounded the hamlet on three sides, the fourth being open to the hundreds of barren square miles of the so-called Empty Quarter. There were no perimeter fortifications, just a few makeshift goat pens made from thorny scrub and jagged stones. The hamlet had five African-style mud-and-thatch huts, together with a central timber one. Fishing nets and woven pots lay in clusters between them. Two metres from the wooden hut, smoke-tipped orange flames rose from an open fire. Three Yemenis were huddled around it, smoking cigarettes. Nearby, a pair of small dogs pulled at either end of a discarded bone, their lips curled back, snarling.
Atop the southern sand dune, Tom lay between Kali and Nathan, who was scanning the hamlet with his panoramic night-vision goggles. Global Hawk spy planes, equipped with advanced synthetic aperture radar, and high-altitude Reaper drones with thermal imaging systems, were feeding him with real-time information via pilot operators at Camp Lemonnier, but an on-site confirmation of the layout and the number of occupants was essential. Nathan had a HK416 carbine fixed with a thermal scope and a red-dot infrared laser, which was invisible to anyone without night vision. Although he’d told Tom that his orders were that he’d have to remain unarmed, he had relented once the DPVs had stopped, and handed him a SIG P226 handgun, saying that if anyone asked, he didn’t get it from him. It was for self-defence only. He reiterated that he couldn’t become involved in the mission proper. Tom had thought that a decent gesture.
The sound of the fire crackling and the Yemeni guards sitting chatting around it seemed to be amplified threefold, Tom thought. He heard his heart pounding in his chest, his breath through his nose, and did his best to mentally calm himself as he sensed the adrenalin coursing through his veins.
Nathan had split his SEALs into three attack squads. Alpha squad covered the only way in for the vehicles, which were only a few minutes away, while Bravo and Charlie squads occupied the dunes on the southern and northern slopes of the hamlet proper. A fourth squad, made up of the master chief’s snipers, was situated on the dune leading to the coast. They all wore headphones and cheek microphones.
Sensing movement around him as the assaulters finalized their positions, Tom picked up an infrared field-scope and held it to his right eye. The images cut to a muted green. Eleven occupants. Two moving. That’s nine possibles, he thought, discounting the possibility that the secretary was travelling in one of the approaching vehicles. Then there were the three around the fire. That left six possibles. One emerged from the hut at four o’clock. He walked a few paces before hitching up his sheepskin jacket and urinating, which left five possibles in the huts.
The secretary could easily be disguised as a man, but it had been agreed that the chances of her being allowed to roam about the site freely were so low that the figures outside were deemed hostile. But he knew that without a positive ID, Nathan would have to risk the vehicles getting here before his men moved in. Although the black box would prevent the fighters in the hamlet from alerting them by cellphones, and the SEALs’ weapons were suppressed, the occupants of the vehicles would see or hear the discharges from the Yemeni’s weapons miles away.
Tom lowered the scope, about to check the SIG’s chamber and magazine. But before he released the clip fully from the well, the headlights of three vehicles appeared out of the darkness. This is it, he thought, pushing the magazine back into place.
The Land Cruisers skidded to a halt and armed men in suits exited at speed. Nathan ordered the attack and suppressed flashes flickered in Tom’s peripheral vision. The guards who were in motion around the hamlet’s cluster of huts fell in quick succession, their bodies landing with soft thuds, taken out by the snipers.
The three Yeminis by the fire grabbed their AKs and lay flat, firing randomly into the night. Then they threw smoke grenades towards the perimeter as they rushed into the nearest mud hut in the melee. With that, a massive explosion boomed through the night air. The beachside dune had erupted, sending up a huge, sand-filled cloud. As it settled Tom could see that the top quarter of the dune had disintegrated, leaving an uneven, crater-ridden series of sand hillocks.
Nathan swore under his breath. Tom knew that none of the master chief’s snipers could have survived such an impact. He reckoned that the Arabs had rigged the dune to prevent a seaborne assault. He turned towards the vehicles, forcing himself to concentrate on the unfolding events, rather than dwell on the carnage that had just occurred.
The men from the vehicles who hadn’t been cut down as they’d exited had half flung themselves to the ground, or had begun scaling the surrounding dunes. The area erupted into a seemingly chaotic firefight. Tom watched as the shadow-like figures of the lead operators moved down in unison from the dunes; he knew this was the most crucial time.
There was a series of half-muted explosions. Tom guessed the sand around the perimeter had been peppered with IEDs or landmines. “Jesus,” he muttered. The twisted bodies of three assaulters writhed on the ground, while others lay motionless, their legs severed. Nathan hadn’t put any contingency plans in place for such an eventuality at his briefing, and the secretary’s life was hanging by a cotton thread.
After telling Tom to stay put, Nathan flipped up his NVGs and removed the lens cap from the thermal sight, which would allow him better vision in the smoke. He pulled out two fragmentation hand grenades from his pocket and handed them to Tom, saying that he should use them if their rear was compromised. Tom nodded before looking over at Kali. The interpreter’s hands were shaking, his eyes wide. He looked as if he were on the verge of screaming. Nathan launched himself down the slope, heading for the master chief, who’d been hit by shrapnel and was dragging himself back to the base of the dune, rounds hitting the sand around him.
104.
Tom picked up the scope again. The thick smoke haze, exacerbated by the small-arms discharge and explosions, obscured his view in front, so he checked around the vehicles. An operator knelt about two metres from the base of the dune. He aimed his HK at the rear vehicle. The suppressed cracks from the muzzle meant he was attempting to disable it and cut off a retreat. But after the burst had ripped into the side-on tyres, the vehicle reversed. Tom figured the car must have been fitted with run-flats.
Nathan had said that the wooden hut held one occupant, which was likely to be the secretary. The drones had picked up a heat signature there, which hadn’t moved since it’d been monitored. But she could be in one of the other huts, or the two remaining vehicles. He just hoped she wasn’t in the one that had been scared off, although had no way of knowing for sure.
He glanced sideways. Kali had his eyes closed now, and appeared to be content to leave matte
rs to fate, although he was making a faint mewing sound, like a puppy, as he shielded his ears with his hands.
Feeling impotent, Tom watched a group of Arabs retreat and crouch down behind the second vehicle. Too close, he thought, knowing they were susceptible to ricochets and flying metal shards from rounds hitting the bodywork. He spotted the SEAL with the scar emerge from the nearest dune, aiming the grenade launcher, the XM25 CDTE. A couple of seconds later, a microchip shell exploded in a white flash a metre or so from the rear of the vehicle, the noise loud enough to wake a hibernating bear. The men were scattered like bowling pins as the blast and shrapnel hit them, their screams hysterical and unnerving.
Tom focused back on the hamlet, where the smoke had thinned a little, but almost immediately noticed movement in his peripheral vision on the crest of the dune to his right. He jerked the scope away.
An Arab from one of the vehicles was aiming a sub-machine gun at Nathan’s back. The platoon chief was heading towards the nearest hut after dragging the master chief a quarter of the way up the dune and covering his head with his own ballistic vest. As the Arab aimed Tom jumped up from behind Kali’s trembling body. He couldn’t risk shooting over him, since, if he missed, the interpreter was clearly incapable of defending himself or even rolling down the slope.
As he ran along the crest he pointed and fired. Nathan turned just as Tom’s third round hit the sand by the Arab’s head. But then the handgun jammed. The sand, he thought, knowing that if it stuck to a cartridge it could prevent the breech mechanism from working. He cursed himself for not checking the clip. With that, the area was lit up by an airborne flare. It must have been ignited by a fighter, Tom thought, because all the operators had NVGs and thermal imaging scopes.
But he kept running, despite the sand collapsing beneath his feet. He saw that the Arab was turning the weapon in an arc towards him. Before he could fire, Tom launched himself into the air, landing onto the still-outstretched gunman. He grabbed the muzzle and thrust it up. The Arab shouted out and headbutted Tom’s hand. He winced as it connected, the metal preventing a give. As the Arab sank his teeth into Tom’s exposed thumb he used the butt of the SIG to bludgeon him. After the third hit, the man was rendered unconscious.
He tried to prise the Arab’s fingers from the weapon, but, despite the man’s state, they seemed to be lodged tight. A round hit the sand by Tom’s shoulder. A split second later, another pinged over his head. Tom dived a metre or so down the leeward slope and began scrambling his way back to the interpreter.
By the time Tom got to Kali, he was still ducking his head down and the mewing had been replaced by feverish praying in Arabic.
Tom released the clip on the SIG, and blew on it furiously, removing the disabling grains before slipping it back into the well.
Then Kali freaked.
Screaming, he swivelled around and got up onto his knees, about to bolt down the leeward side of the dune. Tom twisted at the waist and grabbed him by his pants. A shot rang out and Kali toppled sideways, half covering Tom with his twitching body. Peering down, Tom saw three men scaling the steep slope beneath. He struggled to pull the pin on one of the hand grenades before lobbing it down towards them. The grenade exploded as he eased Kali off him. The Arabs’ bodies were shredded by the shrapnel, the blast flinging them backwards. He drew the SIG and fired two rounds into each of the splayed bodies before turning his attention back to the interpreter.
Kali had an entry hole in his chest, but was still breathing. The air was being drawn into his chest cavity through the hole, making a distinctive gurgling sound. Tom knew a sucking chest wound would collapse the man’s lungs if left untreated. He didn’t have a radio to call over one of the medics, even if that had been a possibility.
He took out the med kit from his pocket. He removed the sterile latex gloves and a pre-packed Asherman Chest Seal, a disc-shaped dressing consisting of an adhesive seal with a one-way valve in the middle. Cleansing the wound of blood, he applied the seal, ensuring that the valve was working, allowing air and blood to escape without re-entering. Then he gave him two shots of morphine.
With Kali stabilized, he focused back on the hamlet. A SEAL stooped down in front of the wooden hut, a pump-action shotgun in his hands. He blew the door off with a couple of breaching shells called TESARs, after aiming at the hinges. The shells were designed to disperse into a harmless powder once they had impacted with the target. But before the operator behind him could move in, both men were felled by rapid fire, the rounds slamming into their unprotected legs.
About three metres away, Tom watched a man lower an assault rifle before crawling towards the wooden hut, the weapon resting in the V between his forearms and biceps as he utilized the odd pocket of heavy smoke that still lingered above the sand for cover.
The secretary, he thought, lowering the glass and grasping the SIG.
Three of Tom’s rounds hit the sand around the man, the impact of each flinging up a handful of grains. Just as the shooter raised himself up at the entrance to the hut, a flicker of sparks signalled that one of Tom’s rounds had hit the muzzle. The rifle spun out of the fighter’s reach, but he flung himself forward, bursting through the opening and disappearing from sight.
Tom decided to act, despite Nathan’s words. As he pushed himself up, preparing to run down the dune, he twisted his head. Another Arab from one of the vehicles had reached the crest about twenty metres from him, his hands clasping an MP5K sub-machine gun.
Aiming the SIG, Tom heard a nearby burst. The man’s chest erupted, his weapon landing to his left. Tom stuck the SIG into his pants and crawled over to where the MP5 had landed, hoping it was still functional. He checked the chamber and the clip before wrapping the sling around his hands instinctively and turning his attention to the hamlet below, readying himself to run down the dune and join the ongoing gunfight.
As operators stormed the outlining huts, gaining the upper hand, he knelt onto one knee, aiming at a fighter who was shooting from the hip as he raced between the huts. But before Tom could squeeze the trigger, an intense pain erupted above his ribcage. The ballistic vest covered his torso, but as he’d raised the weapon he’d exposed an area about the size of a fist under his arms. A split second later, the pain seemed to career throughout his whole upper body, as if it had travelled in his blood vessels.
And then Tom was rolling down the steep, leeward slip face, the sounds of the ensuing firefight muted and remote now, each turn making him grit his teeth and moan as the entry wound made contact with the sand.
Finally, he was lying on his back, the MP5’s strap still wrapped around his hands. He went into a spasm. The night sky turned red, as if blood had filled his eyes.
He blacked out.
105.
When the wooden door had been blown off its hinges, Linda had flinched and gasped into the cloth gag. Sitting upright on the concrete floor, still blindfolded, she’d prayed that her captivity was at an end. The US military have finally come for me, she’d told herself.
Gunfire and the screams of the dying and injured assaulted her ears. But now, just above the fearful racket, she heard something like a trapdoor being pulled up a metre or so by her head, and a waft of air brushed her face as it crashed to the solid floor.
Her shackles were released and a large hand yanked her up.
“We’re going down, missus. Just me and you. So relax or I’ll open up those healing wounds of yours.”
She recognized the voice instantly. It was the man who’d beaten her at the chateau. The Englishman. But the thought of going under something as unstable as sand filled her with a terror far greater than being in his presence again. She shook her head frantically, screaming into the gag, and flailed her arms about. But she was grabbed by his muscular arms in a bear hug. Smelling his tobacco breath a few centimetres from her, she was picked up. Sensing he was manoeuvring her into position, she braced herself as best she could for what she guessed would be a fall.
Tom blinked open his ey
es. The pain was still intense, but the red haze had faded. Snapping back to reality, he gripped the MP5, testing his strength. His hands were weak. He heard the crack of gunshots and realized that he’d fallen backwards, because the now intermittent small-arms fire was coming from the other side of the dune.
With the acrid smell of battle in his nostrils, a descending flare half illuminated the area around him. He squinted, then focused. The ground was rising less than twenty metres ahead of him. He figured he was hallucinating. But then the unmistakable shape of the back of a man emerged from the sand. Then another person. A women dressed in a burqa. Just before the glare from the flare fell beyond the dune, the man turned sideways. Tom sucked in air and clenched his jaw muscles. It was Proctor. And that meant that the woman in the burqa was likely to be the secretary.
He kept perfectly still. Proctor appeared to be unarmed, but he could be concealing a handgun under his woollen jacket. Forcing himself not to groan, he saw Proctor walk in the direction of the beach, the woman he took for the secretary being hauled behind him.
He struggled up, seeing that the sand was wet with blood where he had landed. He began to drag himself after them along a scratch, the narrow trough between the dunes, the pain almost making him pass out. After about ten metres, he dropped to his knees, blood leaching from his wound, his breath laboured and ragged.
