by Oliver Tidy
‘Get what you wanted?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good. Both OK?’
‘Fine.’
‘I suggest we wait for full dark. Maybe an hour or more. Just to be safe.’
‘Agreed.’
‘Keep safe. Keep your heads down. I’ll be in touch.’
Acer turned the radio off. As he was staring out over the ruins of the city, he heard the sound of boots and the voices of men in the street below. He slipped the radio into his pocket and put the Sig in his best hand. He peered down through the curtains and the dirty window. There were five. All wearing army fatigues. All carrying automatic weapons – unslung – looking like they were searching for something or someone. Acer swore and turned back for the stairwell.
The time he’d been in the apartment had been long enough to have dropped the natural light in the enclosed stairwell by several points on the lux scale. He hesitated. And listened, straining his hearing for the sound of a footstep. The kick of a stone. The noise of disturbance.
He wondered about retreating, waiting them out, hoping they weren’t too thorough or too well informed or too bothered or too heroic or too related to the man he’d killed that morning. He thought of Zeynep and hoped to Christ she hadn’t just entered the building and sat down on the nearest surface. He wished he’d taken a minute to impress upon her the constant need for vigilance, to hide herself well just in case something like this happened. But he hadn’t.
He huffed and stretched out a foot for a clear space on a step three down from where he was.
Zeynep had gone into the building and realised that she was tired. Emotionally exhausted and physically weary from the previous couple of days. She yawned expansively, put the box down on the nearest surface and sat down on the floor. She had a view of the street outside.
She heard the men before she saw them. They weren’t being quiet. Weren’t trying to be. Five indistinct shapes came around the corner of the street. Each was holding a rifle in both hands. They looked like they were there for a reason. Not passing through on a random patrol. Her remaining energy flowed out of her as though evaporating through her skin. She could do nothing but watch them get closer and closer. They were looking in the open fronts of the buildings. One of them went into next door. She could hear him calling to his colleagues.
She summoned up some strength and pulled her outstretched legs in, tucked her knees up under her chin. The noise of her boots dragging across the couple of feet of debris-strewn tiled floor sounded loud enough to attract attention, made her stop breathing and look up. She rotated her head slowly to either side, looking for better cover, cursing herself that she hadn’t been bothered to hide properly, to take her situation seriously enough.
There was nowhere for her to go. Nothing for her to hide behind. Not without making a noise. No option but to sit and pray that the light had faded enough to make her invisible. That shelling might start up again and send them scurrying for cover. She closed her eyes and couldn’t stop thinking about what a burst of automatic gunfire would do to her flesh, her bones, her future.
Acer had managed to get down two floors. Now he was in almost complete darkness. He stared down the hole that was the stairwell – it looked more like a deserted mine shaft – knowing that the further down he went the more rubble there was and so the more chance there was of a slip, of a noise, of dislodging the smallest little thing with the toe of his boot that would send it clattering down the tiled concrete floors, making enough noise to bring them running and shouting and shooting.
Two of the men were outside her shop. They weren’t looking in her direction. They were looking about the street. Up at the buildings. She dared not even breathe. Then a third man joined them. He looked nervous, vigilant. He stared directly at her. Then he looked harder and raised his weapon and she knew he’d seen her.
***
43
Acer had slipped into an apartment. He hadn’t risked another flight of stairs. He was still three floors up. He crossed to the window and looked down. He saw three of the five in the street. He searched for the other two. A shout snapped his head back round to the three. One of them already had his rifle up to his shoulder. He was pointing it into the building Zeynep had gone into. The other two brought their rifles up. No one had fired yet. The other two men came running noisily.
The man continued to shout and point his gun. Acer watched, crippled with indecision. Zeynep came out of the building with her hands high in the air. She was grabbed roughly by the nearest man and pulled out into the middle of the street.
Acer watched as she was pushed to her knees, hands behind her head. They didn’t look like they were going to shoot her – yet. As he watched and breathed, he tried to put himself in their shoes. A woman, hiding out in an abandoned building. She can speak to them in their own language. She looks like one of them. She doesn’t have to be someone they are looking for in connection with the morning’s shooting. She doesn’t have to be a threat to them.
He looked at the front door of his apartment and wondered again about the mineshaft. What could he achieve by attracting their attention? By confronting them? He felt the heat of his uncertainty, his frustration, his fear, for her, for him. He was suddenly in no doubt that to show himself to them would be to ensure his execution in the street. He would be left to rot, to decompose as dog food, like the blown-up stray on the pile of rubble in the next road.
More shouting and a scream dragged his attention back to Zeynep. She was lying down. One of the men had his rifle butt raised in the air.
Zeynep understood they were going to rape her before they killed her. She couldn’t stop the tears of anger and helplessness from coursing down her face. Her muscles were struggling to respond to the commands she was sending them. She realised she’d wet herself. One of the soldiers noticed it staining the light fabric of her trousers and darkening the dust of the floor around her knees. It made him angry. Angry enough to crack her on the side of the head with his rifle butt.
She listened to them discussing who would have her first as the warmth of her stream quickly chilled on her legs. She wondered where Acer was. Was he watching? Was he planning something? Was there anything he could do? She wanted him to do something, anything. She didn’t want to die in bombed-out Aleppo, like a street dog.
Acer continued to stare transfixed at the scene on the street. He swallowed and his throat was dry. It made him cough and he jammed his sleeve into his mouth to deaden the noise. He heard one of the men laughing. Of the five, he seemed the biggest. Something about his laugh and bearing made Acer believe he would also be the oldest and in charge. There was some argument. Some raised voices. And then two of them grabbed Zeynep and yanked her back into the building while the bigger, older man pointed to one of the young ones. He handed his rifle to one of his colleagues and began undoing his trousers.
They swept the rubble and the box off the tabletop and threw Zeynep down on it. Two of them pinned her arms while a third started working at her boots and trousers. She kicked out and earned a hard blow to the face for her trouble.
The men had raised their voices in their excitement. Behind them, from the tall building opposite, came the noise of disturbed debris bouncing down stairs. The men turned quickly, guns levelled at the dark hole that was the doorway. Zeynep was temporarily forgotten as the men all trained their attention and their weapons on the building. Another movement from inside echoed around the walls and out onto the street.
The older, bigger man said something to Zeynep. She shook her head. The man helped her up from the table and to her feet by grabbing a handful of her hair. She yelped. He took out a nasty-looking serrated knife and held it to her throat. He walked her out into the street in front of him. The others followed, guns levelled. Zeynep stood in her knickers with her trousers round her ankles, several inches shorter and many kilos lighter than the man. An uneven match.
The man called across the street. They waited and aimed. The big man told
two of them to go in and get whoever was in there. After a moment’s hesitation they looked at each other and moved forward.
From his position, Acer could not see what was happening outside. He heard the man shout in his direction. He had to hope that they had abandoned their intended raping to investigate his noise in the building. Soon he heard feet and movement downstairs. He prepared himself.
Acer had looked at the group and seen one older man with four younger men. He believed the older man to be in charge and the younger men to be conscripts or raw recruits. From what he could make out of their faces in the gloom and from across the street they had not looked like experienced, battle-hardened veterans. The older man had a confidence and a swagger about him, but the others did not display the same body language.
Acer believed the older man would not come into the building himself. He would stay safe and send in two of the younger, leaner, lighter, weaker young men. With their youth would come a lack of experience. They had guns, which often gave men, especially young men, confidence beyond their abilities. Acer was counting on being right in all these things as he heard the men discuss something and then begin their ascent of the stairwell. He took a deep breath and waited.
Where Zeynep stood, being used as both a shield and a hostage by the big, experienced soldier, she heard, with those waiting, the sound of a scuffle, someone falling perhaps, then a loud short burst of automatic gunfire. Then nothing. The man who held her called out to the two he had sent into the building. There was no reply. The other two younger men shifted uncomfortably.
The sound of someone moving slowly down the stairwell, getting louder and nearer to the building’s exit, broke the spell. The four of them stared into the blackness to see who would come out. It was one of the soldiers. And immediately behind him, with one hand grabbing a handful of his jacket collar and the other ramming the Sig into the back of his neck, came Acer. Zeynep heard the sound of the weapons behind her being raised and readied. The man holding her cursed under his breath.
Acer said, ‘Tell them that I’ll trade him for you. A life for a life. Or we can shoot it out. If we do that, some of us will die. And say it loud Zeynep so the boys can hear it.’
Zeynep translated and relayed the message.
The younger men looked at the old soldier for guidance. Acer remained outwardly calm, composed, his stare fixed on the old soldier. If he gave the command to fire, as he well might, Acer knew he would die quickly. And that would be that.
The old soldier spoke.
Zeynep said, ‘He says, where is the other boy?
Acer said, ‘Not dead. Unconscious. No one has to die here.’
Zeynep translated. The man spoke again.
Zeynep said, ‘How do you want to do it?’
Acer did not relax. He did not assume he had won this battle of wills. It was quite possible the old soldier was just buying time while he considered his options.
Acer said, ‘You take their guns. Put them in another place. You come with me. They all go free.’
Zeynep said, ‘Then they’ll just get their guns and come after us.’
Acer said, ‘No they won’t, Zeynep. Translate and trust me.’
Zeynep translated. The old soldier spoke.
Zeynep said, ‘He says if they give us their weapons how does he know you won’t shoot them? You will still have a gun.’
Acer said, ‘Tell him we don’t want to hurt anyone. We just want to get out of here. If they cooperate, no one need get hurt.’
Zeynep translated. The man answered.
Zeynep said, ‘He says we killed one of his unit this morning.’
Acer said, ‘Remind him that the man was shooting at us. He was trying to kill us. It was different.’
Zeynep passed it on. One of the younger soldiers spoke. The old soldier shut him up with a harsh rebuke.
Acer waited and watched. He was becoming doubtful of his plan working. He said, ‘Tell the older one that if it ends here I won’t shoot the man I’m holding – his boys will do that for me. My first shot will go into his face.’ Acer turned the gun to point it at the old soldier.
Zeynep translated. The old soldier’s mouth gave an impression of a sneer. He finished weighing his odds. He told the others to hand over their rifles. He released Zeynep so that she could collect them. He stood facing Acer with a look of utter loathing twisting his features.
Acer said, ‘Take them, Zeynep. Get them away from them before one of them decides to be a hero.’
She hitched up and buttoned her trousers. Then she took their guns and came to stand next to Acer. Acer did not let the young man go.
Acer shot the old soldier in the leg. The big man collapsed to the floor screaming and holding his thigh. The younger men started babbling and panicking. Acer fired another round into the air. They shut up and stared at him, terrified.
Acer said, ‘Zeynep, tell them they have a decision to make. Carry him back to wherever they came from and save his leg, maybe his life, or try to follow us and die.’
She told them. The old soldier answered for them. Zeynep said, ‘He’s not happy with you. You broke your word.’
‘I never gave my word. Does he want saving?’
‘Of course.’
‘Tell them to get going then.’
‘All of them?’
‘This one is coming with us.’
Zeynep relayed the message. There was more gabbling. Acer said, ‘Get the box, Zeynep.’
The soldiers still hadn’t moved in their confusion.
Zeynep came out with the box. Acer said, ‘Give it to him.’ She thrust it at the youth who was going with them. He had little choice but to grab it.
Acer picked up one of the rifles and shoved the youth in the back with it. He said, ‘Pick up that other rifle. We might need it.’
They didn’t wait to see the other two struggle away with the old soldier, or what they would do about their unconscious colleague in the building.
Acer said, ‘They might run into another patrol round the corner. We need to get going.’
Acer jabbed the young soldier again to hurry up. They started moving quickly away and were soon swallowed up in the deepening dusk.
***
44
They didn’t stop or speak for a couple of streets. They stumbled along the road, made uneven and difficult to navigate because of all the mess and the absence of good light. The young soldier remained in front, with Acer’s rifle barrel continually encouraging him to maintain the briskest possible pace.
Acer said, ‘It’s too dangerous to cross where we came over this morning. If they don’t know already that we’re back in the area, they soon will, and then we’ll have no hope of getting over. Plus this area might well be swarming with troops looking for us. We’ll have to find another way.’
Zeynep said, ‘Maybe Tanner can help.’
Acer indicated the young man should halt in a space under an overhanging sheet of corrugated iron. Acer took the radio out of his pocket. He called up Tanner and explained the situation.
Tanner said, ‘You’re right to be cautious, Acer.’
‘Any suggestions to get us out of here?’
Tanner had a think. He said, ‘You’re not going to like it, but it’s still the best option that you come the way we planned. We can offer you the covering fire if you need it. When it’s dark it’s very, very dark. Hole up for a few hours. Hide somewhere they can’t find you. Maybe they’ll think you’ve abandoned the idea of coming back across. Maybe they’ll think you’ve been scared off. Double-bluff them.’
Acer looked at Zeynep. To Tanner, he said, ‘Let us have a talk. We’ll get back to you.’
When the connection had been broken, Acer said, ‘It makes some sense. But I still don’t like it. On the other hand we’re about to lose the light completely and stumbling around in the dark in this bombed-out city is not my idea of fun. We’d run all sorts of risks.’
Zeynep seemed resigned to the idea that things hadn’
t changed. ‘What will we do with him?’ She looked at the young man.
Acer said, ‘We can’t let him go. He’ll lead anyone he finds right back to us.’
‘Please don’t kill him, Acer.’
‘I wasn’t planning to. He can stay with us until we leave. We need to find somewhere fast and get him securely trussed up. Tell him that if he gives us no trouble, I’ll let him go.’
Zeynep translated. The young man spoke back to her. Acer recognised fear and distrust in his speech.
Zeynep said, ‘He says that’s what you said back there, but you still shot the man. You lied then. Why should he believe you now?’
Acer said, ‘Fair point. Tell him that if I didn’t shoot the old boy in the leg, then we’d be dead by now. I didn’t trust him, either. Shooting him in the leg was just a necessary survival tactic to put him and the other two out of action. If I’d wanted to kill anyone or all of them, I could have done it easily, as soon as they handed over their weapons.’
Zeynep related this to the young man. He seemed to understand. She said something else to him. The young man cast his eyes down and muttered something back.
Acer said, ‘What?’
‘They were going to rape me. All of them. A gang rape. I told him if he gives us any trouble, you’ll shoot him in the leg and I’ll cut his balls off, and there’s no one here to carry him home.’
Finding another empty partially destroyed building in another partially destroyed street was not difficult. They hid themselves well in the dark that they hoped would work better for them than it would for any searchers looking for them. Acer found some material that he could tear into strips and tie the young soldier up with. The last thing he had to say to him through Zeynep was that if a foot patrol should happen to come within shouting distance and the young man thought about attracting their attention, he should know that he would be the first to die.
Through Zeynep, the young soldier answered that he would not cause them trouble. He had a sister and a mother to support in the western part of Aleppo. His father was dead and they relied on his being a soldier, with its perks, just to survive. He also found some humility and apologised to Zeynep for the threats of rape. It was not something he had wanted to do, but the old soldier was different, he said. He could have been telling the truth or he could have been trying to win some sympathy for when they came to make a decision about him.
