by Isaac Hooke
"Drop your weapons!" one of the men shouted, speaking Arabic with a Houthi accent.
Usama and the sheik opened fire with their AKs.
Knowing what was coming next, Ethan wrapped an arm around the sheik's chest and, wary of the spray from the man's AK, yanked him down behind the kitchen counter.
"What are you doing?" Al-Khayr said.
"Saving your life!"
The loud report from a Heckler and Koch filled the air.
Usama dropped, the back of his head cored in much the same manner as the earlier man.
"We have to surrender!" Ethan said.
The sheik ignored him and leaned past the counter, letting off a rifle burst.
Idiot, Ethan thought.
He spun his own rifle around so that he could use the butt as a weapon.
"Sheik, behind you!" Ethan said. Before Al-Khayr could react, Ethan rammed the stock of the AK into the back of his head, knocking the sheik to the floor.
"We surrender!" Ethan shouted. "We surrender!"
"Drop your weapons and kick them where we can see them!" one of the soldiers answered.
Ethan lowered his Kalashnikov to the floor and kicked it past the counter. He did the same with the sheik's. Al-Khayr was already starting to stir.
The two figures rounded the corner. One watched Ethan and the sheik, while the other covered the rear. Another pair of soldiers came forward shortly, wielding G36Cs without the shields.
The nearest man pointed the barrel of his HK at Ethan's face. "On the ground. Now! Hands behind your back!"
Ethan did as he was told.
The man flexicuffed him and rudely hoisted Ethan to his feet. Beside him, the other soldier cuffed the dazed sheik.
Ethan was loaded into one of two black Toyota Fortuners that had pulled up behind the house. Al-Khayr was placed in the second SUV.
Ethan sat against his bound hands, the flexicuffs digging into his wrists. Someone lowered a black hood over his head.
Not again.
He heard sporadic gunfire, and the fierce clatter as bullets raked the chassis. The vehicle rocked to and fro. The engine whirred as the Fortuner abruptly accelerated, and he heard what sounded like a gate breaking open.
Ethan knew there would be no pursuit. Any other vehicles parked at the house would have had their tires shot out. These were professionals.
About a minute later momentum yanked Ethan to the left as the vehicle navigated a tight bend; then he was dragged forward as the Fortuner came to an abrupt halt. From the sounds and movements around him, Ethan had the impression the men were removing their helmets and shoving them under the seats. He felt silk momentarily brush his face, and he thought the men were throwing robes over their clothing.
"I think we're good," someone said from the front seat. English. American accent. "Will?"
The hood slid from Ethan's face. He blinked a few times, letting his eyes accommodate to the light. He recognized the war-torn Al Hasaba district outside, which still bore signs of the clashes between the presidential guard and the opposition tribal forces from the Battle of Sana'a three years ago. Several of the residences lay in ruins, with the former occupants forced to live inside makeshift lean-tos.
Rough fingers pulled his arms to the side and the cuffs binding Ethan's hands fell away. He brought his wrists forward, flexing the fingers to restore circulation.
He glanced at the man who had cut his binds. Above that thick Abe Lincoln beard and tilted Roman nose, ironic eyes gazed from an olive face. He could have easily passed for a devout Yemeni, especially with the white thawb he wore then.
The man was, in fact, American. A former SEAL named William Hest. A military contractor, he currently worked for JSOC, Task Force 78, one of the top hunter-killer teams in the region.
"Damn it," William said with a thick Texan drawl, examining one of his fingers. "Think I broke a nail back there." The actual words came out "Thank I brack a nya-al."
Ethan forced a smile. "Funny." His own accent was more West Coast. He unsheathed the ceremonial dagger and dropped it in William's lap.
"Hey, I don't want that," William said. He tossed the tracking device into the cup holder.
"What took you guys so long back there anyway?" Ethan asked.
"The drone operator was having technical difficulties," William said.
Doug, another member of Task Force 78 and also the spitting image of your typical Gulf Arab, was the driver. He glanced in the rearview mirror. "I should have brought along my custom QAV 400. Sometimes I wonder about the stuff the DIA gives us."
"Glad to know I was in good hands," Ethan said sarcastically.
"The best." Doug grinned. "Oh, and here's your money." He reached back, offering the one thousand rials bill Ethan had given him on the way to the mosque.
"Keep it."
"What did you think of my performance?" Doug said. "Wasn't I the best beggar you've ever seen?"
"Definitely. Must feel good, knowing you have a job lined up for yourself when you're finished here."
William patted Ethan on the shoulder. "Thank you for flying JSOC airlines. We hope you enjoyed your stay in beautiful, friendly Sana'a. Come fly with us again real soon now."
4
Ethan reclined on a couch inside a house on the outskirts of the Old City. He was in a small guest room, seated before a coffee table. His handler, Sam, sat across from him. She wore a black abaya robe, and the full veil of her hijab was currently lifted so that her face was exposed. On the table in front of her lay the long black gloves that completed her outfit.
She was a senior non-official cover case officer, or NOC, in the Defense Clandestine Service, clandestine arm of the Defense Intelligence Agency, or DIA. She'd originally been part of the Strategic Support Branch before it was absorbed into the DCS. Like the CIA, her agency had case officers, linguists, analysts, and so forth, but it was hampered by far fewer congressional reporting requirements. Sam had hinted that she answered directly to the Secretary of Defense and the President.
Ethan's job description wasn't as clean cut. Officially, he didn't exist. Unofficially, he worked directly for Sam as an independent contractor. His work usually involved multiple roles, and blurred the lines between case officer, private investigator, kidnapper and assassin. The latter seemed to be the work he was involved with the most these days, though he was never actually allowed to use the word assassination in official reports—the DIA preferred the term "High Value Targeting."
"Sheik Al-Khayr cracked yesterday," Sam said.
The sheik would be at The Weave, an old textile factory just north of Sana'a. A DIA black site, it was used for discreet detentions and interrogations. To avoid any irksome congressional inquiries, the interrogators would likely be from the Political Security Organization, Yemen's foreign intelligence service.
"Anything you can share?" Ethan said, only mildly curious. She wouldn't reveal anything that might affect operational security.
He heard the subtle vibration of a cellphone; Sam reached into an inner pocket of her abaya and retrieved her smartphone. She read a message and began texting a response.
"Well, first off," she said while typing on the touchscreen. "We prevented the martyrdom operation in Tahrir Square during the Houthi rally. Secondly, the sheik spilled the PIN for his cellphone, and from it we've recovered the numbers and email addresses of Al Qaeda members throughout the region. Arms dealers, oil smugglers, kidnappers, you name it. Even better, the sheik gave us the 'onion' addresses of two private dark web forums run by the militants, along with his username and password. The man is an intelligence gold mine. It's a good thing we moved when we did. He was literally the catch of the year. He could be the key to unraveling Al Qaeda in the region. You should get a medal for your involvement. But, you know how it is."
"Yes," Ethan said. "Cue the unsung heroes theme."
Sam had to move fast on the remaining targets, Ethan knew. That was another reason she had hired her own team. As news of the sheik's cap
ture spread, emails and phone numbers would change, and the dark forums would die.
Even so, Ethan doubted he would be involved in the next leg of operations in Yemen. "So what's next for me?"
She finished texting, locked her phone, and looked up. "You."
"Me. My cover is blown."
She nodded slowly. Sam had been forced to launch the operation early. The sheik was only in town for those two days and any delay risked losing him. The original plan had been to sell or give Al-Khayr the bugged dagger and then capture him at a later date, but Sam had moved up the time frame when she caught wind of the suicide attack in Tahrir Square; also influencing her decision in the matter was the fact that the sheik was notorious for detecting and evading bugs.
Although the DIA team had made an effort to downplay Ethan's involvement—making it look like he had saved the sheik's life, for example—it was inevitable the blame would fall upon him. His visit coincided with the kidnapping, after all; it would be fairly obvious to surviving Al Qaeda members that Ethan had played a part.
"I'm reassigning you," Sam said simply. Her ambiguous response told him she didn't entirely believe his cover was blown, but she wanted him to stay under Al Qaeda's radar for a while anyway.
"Reassigning me."
She laughed. "Don't be so dour. You make it sound like I'm relegating you to a desk."
Ethan felt a sudden dread in the pit of his stomach. "Are you?"
"Hardly. An operative as valuable as yourself would be utterly wasted at a desk. Besides, if I did that, I think I'd be seeing your resignation. If I don't put you to use in one war or another, someone else will."
Ethan shrugged. He couldn't disagree there.
"Instead," Sam continued. "I'm reassigning you to one of the most target-rich environments in the Middle East. A place where we currently have a serious dearth of assets and intel. I've already got the legends made up."
She tossed a passport and birth certificate onto the coffee table.
"Are you going to tell me where this mystical target-rich land resides?" Ethan said, leaning forward to grab the legends. "Or are you going to leave me in suspense?"
She smiled obligingly. "I believe it's time you made your hegira to the great Caliphate in Syria."
"The great Caliphate." Ethan wasn't all that shocked. "Islamic State?" Ethan opened up the passport. His new identity was apparently that of a Saudi Arabian national.
"The very same. Ever heard of the 'Selous Scouts?' A spec-ops regiment of the Rhodesia Army. They operated from 1973 to 1980."
"Rhodesia."
"Yes. A former British colony, it was an unrecognized successor state until the reconstitution of the country as Zimbabwe in 1980."
Ethan raised an eyebrow. "Selous Scouts..."
"Their mission was to infiltrate the terrorist cells of the guerrilla factions in the country. These guerrillas sought to end the white majority rule in Rhodesia through insurgency and terrorism, but the Selous Scouts applied asymmetric warfare tactics to destroy them from the inside out. Essentially, Rhodesian soldiers learned to act and talk like terrorists, then infiltrated the cells, gathered intelligence from behind enemy lines, and acted upon it directly. They obeyed the five D's: detect, deceive, disrupt, delay, destroy.
"I want you to be one of my Selous Scouts. Go undercover as a foreign jihadi. Recruit local assets. Use insurgent tactics to attack Islamic State targets from within, and lay the blame at the feet of rival militant groups such as Al Qaeda." She paused. "If you think about it, everything you've done up until this moment has been part of your training, preparing you for this mission."
"An operation of this scale, this complexity..." Ethan scratched his beard doubtfully. "I could be out there for years."
"Foreign jihadists can leave whenever they want. It's an unwritten rule. The usual tenure seems to be about six months to a year."
"Basically until they're injured or die. Am I right?"
Sam pressed her lips together. "Look, if you don't want to do this, I'll understand."
Ethan smiled grimly. He noticed she hadn't brought up compensation. Smart. Because it wasn't about the money. Doing something that no one else could do—going undercover, infiltrating enemy camps, and wreaking havoc in the name of freedom and justice—well, that was what Ethan lived for. The potential long term of the operation was what bothered him, but he smothered that concern. The thought of having to work behind a desk...
"No, I'll do it. I'm your man. Like you said, this is what I've trained for my entire life. I'm a weapon. Use me."
Sam folded her arms, seeming suddenly defensive. "I've also purchased William's contract. He's no longer a member of Task Force 78, and is now under my direct command. I'm sending him with you. You'll meet another operative in Turkey who'll join the two of you and arrange for transport into Syria. He'll brief you on the details."
Ethan frowned. He understood why she had become defensive. "William and I are good friends, and we go way back, but I'm more of a lone wolf, you know that. And who's this third operative? Do I know him?"
"You do. Aaron Berkley."
Aaron was a former Army Ranger he'd fought with in Iraq. One of the few people who could do what Ethan and William did. Last time Ethan had seen him, Aaron had been working on some operation for Sam in the southern highlands of Yemen.
"Sam, look—-" Ethan began.
"The three of you will be working independently," Sam interrupted quickly. "You still get to be lone wolves, but you'll support each other as necessary. Trust me, when you're surrounded by brainwashed fanatics whose sole purpose in life is death by glorious jihad, it's good to have normal people to ground you."
"Are you speaking from experience?" He knew she had done deep cover work of her own, but he wasn't familiar with the extent of it. He'd heard her speak two dialects of Arabic to contacts over the phone, but that was about it.
Sam didn't blink. "You know I am."
Against his better judgment, Ethan capitulated. "All right. Fine. They can come."
"Good. You're our test group. If this operation is successful, we're going to expand, repurposing more units into Selous teams to infiltrate terrorist cells throughout the region."
"Where are you going to find the people?" Ethan said doubtfully. "You know what I do is a very specialized job."
"Oh I know," she said. "But we'll find them."
Ethan frowned.
"The goal is to eventually spread like a virus," Sam continued. "Ravaging the enemy from the inside."
"Until they develop antibodies," Ethan said. "And stop accepting recruits so readily."
"The openness of most terrorist groups to foreign fighters is their downfall. If our actions cause the Islamic State and other groups to stop accepting recruits, or require all newcomers to go through some complicated vetting process, then we slowly choke them of badly needed combatants. We win either way."
Ethan set the passport down on the coffee table. "So I was thinking of spending a week in the Mediterranean."
Sam smiled sadly. "No rest for the weary. Your flight leaves tomorrow. Better start brushing up on the Saudi accent you'll need for your new identity. Your mujahadeen brothers await."
5
Ethan stood in line at the passport control of Atatürk airport, Istanbul. He was in the "other nationalities" queue, a line that was a good hundred people long. There were eight service desks at the front of the queue, but only one of them was manned. The bored-looking official thumbed through the passports at what seemed a glacial pace.
Ethan glanced over his shoulder and spotted William a few spots behind. He made eye contact with the other operative, but neither of them offered any further signs of recognition.
Ethan took in the cornucopia of cultures around him. The Iranians in their dark blazers and white dress shirts with the collars open to the chests. The Omanis in their violet thawbs and cap-like mussah headdresses whose designs could have belonged on elaborate curtains. The southern Gulf Arabs with the pure
white keffiyeh shawls held in place by tasseled black agal loops. And of course the Western-dressed Turks.
Ethan was looking forward to infiltrating the Islamic State. He was given a tabula rasa: it was up to him to create his own leads and missions. Actually getting there, however, was the first big hurdle. As there were no international flights to Syria due to the fighting and sanctions, Ethan and William had to fly to Istanbul first, then board a domestic flight to Gaziantep near the Turkish border. From there they would make their way to Syria, following the conventional foreign jihadi route.
As he neared the front of the queue Ethan retrieved his passport. He thumbed to the photo page and glanced at his details. His name was "Emad Al Zahrani," a Saudi Arabian national born in Riyadh.
His turn came. Ethan stepped forward and presented his passport and the printout of the e-visa he'd purchased online to the man at the desk. The official took both items and said in bored, broken Arabic. "How long are you stay in Turkey?"
"I am staying for seven days," Ethan answered in formal Arabic, using an accent appropriate to a speaker of the Urban Najdi dialect of Saudi Arabia. During the flight, he'd practiced the nuances of the language via the Arabic MP3s he'd downloaded into his phone. He had mastered the tongue in a previous op and only needed a quick refresher; it helped that he'd spent most of his time in Riyadh's King Khalid airport lounge chatting with the locals.
"Where are you stay?" The mustached man flipped through the passport.
"The Princess Hotel, Gaziantep." Ethan offered a printout of his hotel reservation.
The official looked up and his eyes narrowed slightly. He didn't accept the printout. "Gaziantep? Near Syrian border?"
"Yes. Here is my reservation."
The official ignored the paper and waved over a nearby airport officer. He spoke to the man in hushed Turkish. Ethan caught the word "Gaziantep."
The airport officer seized the passport and told Ethan, "Come."
Exactly what he was hoping to avoid. Secondary screening.
Ethan was strip-searched in a windowless, steel room that was much like a prison cell—it even had a toilet and sink. The experience was unpleasant, but at least the obese officer didn't take his fingerprints. Some countries, like Singapore, did that automatically when someone was transferred to secondary. It was only a matter of time before other countries started adopting similar biometric security measures. That would make traveling under aliases very difficult in the future. Airport entry would have to be avoided entirely. Ah, the ever-changing world of espionage.
