by Scott McEwen
“Because I was a goat herder,” Forogh said. “These men are not goat herders . . . at least not all of them.”
“Then why all the fucking goats?”
“Wait here.” Forogh began to creep forward.
Crosswhite knew Forogh from around the base, but he had never worked with him in the field. “Does that haji know what the fuck he’s doing?” he asked Alpha.
“If he says something’s wrong,” Alpha replied, “I believe him—we should let him do his thing.”
Crosswhite crawled forward on his belly to stretch out with his M4 covering the man sleeping near the AK-47. Innocent goat herders or not, if one of them came awake and grabbed for that weapon, he’d have to go.
Forogh slipped up to a goat and crouched beside it, stroking its neck for more than a minute before finally coaxing it to its feet, holding it by the horn and guiding it along through the crowd. Using the goat as an escort, he was able to pass through the herd without spooking the rest of the animals. He crept to within ten feet of the tree where the herders slept and crouched behind a rock, letting the goat go and cradling his M4.
A moment later, Crosswhite heard him speaking softly over the radio net. “We can take these men. They’re heroin smugglers—using the herd for cover. There will be more of them up the trail guarding their cargo. They’re probably headed for Waigal the same as us.”
“How do you know that?” Crosswhite said.
“I can’t explain right now. You’ll have to trust me.”
Crosswhite slid back into cover to confer with Alpha. “What the fuck do you make of that?”
“If he says they’re smugglers, I believe him.”
“Well, that alone doesn’t give us the right to kill them,” Crosswhite said.
“You’re in command,” Alpha replied with a shrug.
By now, the rest of the team had closed ranks, and the column was stretched over no more than fifty feet. All of them keeping watch in every direction.
Crosswhite got back on the net. “Forogh, I have to know why you think they’re smugglers before I can authorize taking them out.”
After a slight pause, Forogh replied, “They look like smugglers.”
Crosswhite looked at Alpha, feeling the devil beginning to bite at his ass. “What the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”
Alpha didn’t need to think it over. “I trust him, Captain.”
“You willing to risk prison on his advice?”
“I’ve risked my life on his advice more than once, and I’m still alive.”
Crosswhite drew a breath and made his decision. “Forogh, how do you suggest we deal with these fucking goats?”
“Can you make your way over here the same as I did?” Forogh asked.
“Christ if I know. Stand by.” He looked at Alpha. “Here goes nothing. Watch those hajis on the tree line.”
Crosswhite crept out to a goat and crouched beside it the same as Forogh had done and began stroking its muzzle, making his way down the animal’s neck. When he seemed to have the goat’s confidence, he coaxed it to its feet and tried taking it by the horn. The animal immediately jerked its head away and butted him in the leg, its horn thudding against the suppressed HK Mark 23 pistol strapped to his thigh. He grabbed the horn again, this time much more firmly, and stood still, waiting to see what the animal would do. It bleated in protest, but this did not seem to rile the others nearby, so he set out along the same path as Forogh, leading the reluctant goat. They had another brief wrestling match along the way, but Crosswhite covered the distance to the rock and let the animal go, crouching beside Forogh.
“You did that very well,” Forogh said.
“I felt like a fucking idiot,” Crosswhite muttered. “So what’s next? We can’t bring the rest of the team through like that.”
“Kill those two men,” Forogh said, pointing around the rock.
Crosswhite looked at him. “How do you know they’re not goat herders?”
“Kill them, and I will show you.”
Crosswhite stared at him for a long moment, then scanned the high ridges along both sides of the canyon. Going around the herd to make their way back down into the trees would take a lot of time, and there was no guarantee they wouldn’t spook the herd. Moreover, if Forogh was right about there being a band of smugglers farther up the trail, they could very easily end up in a damn firefight. Had this been a sanctioned mission with UAV overwatch, there would have been no problem. Infrared would tell them in two seconds whether or not the enemy was waiting up the trail. As it was, however, they were operating the old-fashioned way—on wit and instinct alone.
“Give me your piece,” he said.
Forogh took the MK 23 pistol from his own holster and handed it over.
After informing the rest of the team as to his intentions, Crosswhite leaned his M4 against the rock and rose up. He drew his own pistol and checked briefly on the other two men still sleeping forty yards away at the edge of the tree line. He stepped carefully around the rock and crept toward the tree, gripping a pistol in each hand. Each MK 23 was chambered with a .45 caliber and fixed with a high-efficiency marine suppressor. Unlike the carbine’s supersonic .223 caliber ammunition, the pistol ammo was subsonic, so there would be no sound at all when he fired, other than the cycling action of the pistols themselves. As an ambidextrous shooter, Crosswhite would—in effect—be able to kill both men with a single shot, thus further limiting the risk of alerting the other men or spooking the goats.
He crept to within four feet of the sleeping men, sighted on both their faces, and squeezed the triggers. Their heads exploded open like a pair of busted cantaloupes, and he dropped into a crouch, whipping around to cover the other two men. No one and nothing stirred. It was like nothing had happened.
Forogh was beside him with his M4 a few moments later, and they traded weapons again.
“Now show me how you know they’re smugglers.”
Forogh crouched beside the closest corpse and jerked open the dead man’s robe to reveal the garb of an Afghan mountain warrior, complete with grenades and a bandolier of AK-47 magazines. “Do you see? They are using the herd as cover. I have seen this before.”
Crosswhite breathed a sigh relief and turned to measure the distance between the other two men. “What about them?”
“We should take them alive,” Forogh suggested. “They are the real herders. They will be happy to tell us how many men are waiting up the trail.”
They reached the sleeping men a short time later to see that one of them was rather old, the other in his late twenties maybe. Crosswhite stepped hard on the younger man’s throat and pressed the suppressor into his eye socket. Forogh clamped a hand over the old man’s mouth, and put the pistol against his head, speaking harshly to both of them in hushed Pashto.
Both herders nodded their heads in fervent understanding, clearly petrified. They were rolled onto their bellies, and their hands were secured behind their backs with nylon zip ties.
Needing no prompting from Crosswhite, Forogh began to question the old man at once. “We can call the team forward,” he said at length. “There are eleven smugglers with five burros bedded down fifty meters up the trail. The old man says probably no one is standing guard, but he doesn’t know for sure. In the morning, they will continue up the trail to Waigal Village. Apparently, the village is expecting them sometime tomorrow.”
Crosswhite was crouched across from Forogh, watching around warily. “Ask him where the fuck they came from. Why isn’t there any goat shit back the way we came?”
Again, Forogh questioned the old man at length. “He says they travel an old goat trail down the eastern rim up that way.” He thumbed north over his shoulder. “He says his people use . . . have used this clearing to rest and water their herds for centuries. He says the Taliban began to move opium through this area about six months ago, for a new market in Tajikistan. I believe he is telling the truth.”
“Okay,” Crosswhite said. “What will they d
o if we leave them alive?”
“Are you are asking me or them?”
“You.”
“I think they will take the herd back the way they came, up the ridge to the east and down the other side into the next valley.”
Crosswhite called the rest of the team forward, and the SEALs took up covering positions all around. By now, the goats were aware of their arrival and didn’t seem to care one way or another. He broke out a map and gave orders for the old man’s hands to be freed. He shined a red light on the map, and Forogh made sure the old man understood where they were.
“Ask him which direction they’ll go,” Crosswhite said.
The old man pointed out their route.
“Okay, Forogh, tell him this: They are to wait here until noon tomorrow before they leave. You tell him if they leave any sooner than that, they will be shot. Make sure he understands.”
Forogh admonished the old man, and the old man nodded his head up and down, babbling away. “He says he understands. They will do as you order. He says they want no trouble. They love America.”
Crosswhite nodded. “Yeah, everybody loves America. Just make sure they know they’d better stay their asses in this fucking clearing until high noon tomorrow.”
“He promises to do as you order,” Forogh says. “Also, he says you smell like cigarette smoke and asks if you will share some of your American cigarettes with him.”
Crosswhite chuckled. Taking a pack of Camels from his arm pocket, he shook out half the pack and offered them to the old man. “Tell him not to blaze up before first light.”
“Blaze up?”
“Not to light any cigarettes before morning.”
Forogh translated and the old man shook his finger, babbling away. “He asks you not to worry. He says he fought against Russia with the Mujahideen and knows how to smoke safely in the night. Also, he would like to know if they may have the weapons of those two dead men by the tree.”
Crosswhite nodded. “Tell him they are a gift to him, but he is not to touch them until morning.”
Forogh made sure the old man understood. “He asks one more thing. He asks if you go up the valley to bring back the American woman.”
Every hair on Crosswhite’s body stood on end. “Ask him what he knows.”
“He says you need to hurry. The HIK has moved into the village.”
27
AFGHANISTAN,
Nuristan Province, Waigal Village
Sandra was deep in an opium haze when Naeem and Aasif Kohistani stepped into the room and stood over the bed. Naeem held out a kerosene lantern so they could get a good look at her, sweating with fever, her leg badly infected. She opened her bleary eyes just long enough to mumble “fuck you” before closing them again and drifting off.
“It is a good thing Brother Nuristani sent for me,” Kohistani said. “Soon the leg will rot, and the poison will spread. She’ll be dead soon . . . without proper care.”
Naeem was still seething over the Americans’ failure to pay the ransom as promised. He knew nothing of Jackal’s death or of the arrests that had been made, only that the intermediary had not delivered the money to his contact in Kabul as planned. It was possible the intermediary had kept the money for himself, but he doubted it. The man in Karzai’s office was reported as very reliable, and there would have been plenty of money to go around without the need for a double cross.
When Kohistani had arrived earlier in the day, Naeem had at first grown even more incensed, vowing to hang Sabil Nuristani over the fire by his heels, but after Badira reported that the woman would die long before another ransom attempt could be made, he had silently thanked Allah for his fortune. Perhaps he could work some kind of a deal with the Hezbi man to avert a total loss.
“Our nurse is not very good,” he mumbled, disgusted with Badira’s lack of medical skill.
“It is not the nurse, brother,” Kohistani said gently. “It is the lack of medicine. And the raw opium she is smoking is suppressing her immune system.”
Naeem scarcely understood how an immune system even functioned. “How much is she worth to you in this condition?” he asked gruffly.
Kohistani placed a friendly hand on his shoulder and smiled. “You should never have tried to ransom my prisoner.”
“You left her with me,” Naeem said. “I thought you’d finished with her after the interrogation. I was going to split the profits with you.”
“I am not interested in profits,” Kohistani said, glancing at his bodyguard Ramesh to make sure he was ready to kill Naeem if it became necessary. “I have much bigger plans for this woman than something as trivial as money.”
“Money is not trivial,” Naeem said, his gaze narrowing. “Perhaps if the Hezbi wasn’t so secretive about its plans . . .”
“We are secretive for good reason,” Kohistani said easily. “I will send you some rifles and medicine for your men.”
“No,” Naeem said, backing away. “That is not enough. She is worth very much more to you than that. You have contacts with Al Jazeera. You will put her on the television and bring yourself much glory. I deserve a better reward for capturing her. So far you have given nothing.”
Kohistani stepped forward again, putting his arm around the younger man’s shoulder to guide him gently to the next room, where they sat down at the table in the light of the lantern. “We do not seek glory, you and I. We are servants of Allah. We are fighting a jihad . . . and anything we gain from this woman should be used for the glory of Allah alone.” He watched Naeem’s eyes, expecting an argument. “Do you wish to know why the ransom was not paid? I will tell you why—it was Allah’s will that it not be paid. He, too, has greater plans for this woman.” He paused again, long enough to accept the hot cup of tea one of his other men had just brought into the hut. “Now, my brother . . . I want you to turn her over to me in exchange for the rifles and the medicine that I offer—along with the video that you made.”
Naeem saw his only chance for glory slipping quickly from his grasp. His uneducated mind raced for a solution to the problem. Defying Kohistani outright could definitely cause long-term problems, but he had to salvage something from the ransom debacle.
“Very well,” he said decisively. “The woman is yours, for the rifles and the medicine—but the video is mine. It will take time, but I will sell it to Al Jazeera myself and use the money to help the village.”
Kohistani smiled kindly, much preferring to kill Naeem, but the Taliban were still useful to the HIK, so it was worth treating them with patience. He realized that Naeem was an extremely ambitious young man, a Wahhabi fundamentalist with delusions of grandeur. If left to his own devices, he could all too easily become a de facto warlord in the region, and the last thing Kohistani needed was a powerful ignoramus operating inside his sphere of influence. Uneducated zealots were unpredictable, as much a danger to everyone else as to themselves. To make matters worse, Naeem was pride filled and greedy, a borderline psychotic. Kohistani believed he understood very well why this unruly fellow had been sent north by his Taliban mentors in the south—they had wanted to be rid of him and to make him the problem of the HIK.
“Very well, brother,” he decided. “I will give you one of the big Canadian sniper rifles and fifty rounds of ammunition in exchange for the video . . . to be delivered with the other rifles and the medicine.” Kohistani was talking about a captured .50 caliber McMillan Tac-50.
Naeem’s eyes lit up. He would never get another chance to possess such a weapon. “I want one hundred rounds of ammunition.”
Kohistani shrugged. “Fifty is all we have, brother, but the ammunition is far easier to come by than the weapon itself. You should accept the offer.”
“Very well,” Naeem grumbled, already feeling the weapon in his hands. With a rifle such as that, he would be equal to the Americans. He would make their bodies explode the way his cousin Muhammad’s body exploded when he’d been shot two years earlier, delivered to his uncle’s home in the back of a pickup
truck, practically blown in half by a single shot. He ordered one of his men to go and fetch the video. “What will you do with it?”
“I will give it to men who know to use such a prize for the glory of Allah,” Kohistani replied, relieved that the young fool sitting before him could be bought so easily with a toy. Now he had what he needed to draw the Americans into his kill zone. Soon, US citizens would be clamoring even louder for their troops to be called home where they belonged. “Now, brother, I must be leaving. We will take the American with us. I trust you don’t mind us taking her nurse along to tend to her?”
Naeem shook his head. “They’re both yours. The nurse is a widow. She belongs to no one. You will take the American east to Bazarak?”
Kohistani hesitated just a fraction of a second before answering. “No, north to Parun.”
“I see,” Naeem replied, thinking to himself, So it’s east to Bazarak like I expected. He knew the HIK had already moved into the Panjshir Valley in force.
They spoke of the jihad as Kohistani patiently finished his tea, treating the young upstart with far more deference than he merited. Within the hour, Sandra was wrapped in blankets and strapped to a battered Russian army stretcher left over from the previous war. Badira was then shaken from a sound sleep in her hut and told she would be leaving with the HIK men who were taking the American pilot north to Parun. She was given time to dress and hurried out the door.
She walked down the narrow trail to the village gate, where she saw four men standing in the darkness bearing Sandra’s stretcher.
Naeem exited a nearby hut, preceding Kohistani and holding a lantern head high. “Badira, you will go with them to keep the woman alive.”
“There’s nothing I can do for her,” she said with contempt. “There’s no more medicine to give her. Only the opium, and anyone can give her that.”
