by Scott McEwen
“Then you will give her that whenever she needs it!” Naeem snapped. “Brother Kohistani’s men can’t be troubled with women’s work. They’re a war party! Now shut your mouth.”
To Badira’s immense relief, Sabil Nuristani came hurrying up the trail carrying a lantern of his own. “Wait, Naeem! You cannot send our only nurse away from the village in the middle of the night.”
Kohistani stepped forward, speaking to Nuristani in Kalasha. “I will send her back very soon. Have no fear. You have done us a very great service keeping the woman alive. When Badira returns, I will send her with medicine for the village.”
“Medicine that he will steal.” Sabil stabbed a finger at Naeem.
“I will send enough for all,” Kohistani assured him, willing to promise anything that might avert a confrontation between the two antagonists long enough for him and his men to get clear of the village.
“No,” Sabil said. “We have sick people here! I am the head man, and I say our nurse does not go!”
Naeem grabbed a stick from one of his men and stepped forward, delivering a vicious strike to the side of Sabil’s head. Sabil dropped like a stone, the lantern crashing to the ground next him.
“I should have done that days ago.”
Badira ran forward and knelt beside Sabil. “He’s dead!” she shouted. “You’re a murderer!”
Naeem kicked her away from the body, striking her across the back with the stick. “Obey, woman! Go—and never come back! This is no longer your home!”
28
AFGHANISTAN,
Nuristan Province, Waigal Valley
Crosswhite made sure the team was set, then moved out up the trail with Forogh to recon the smugglers’ position. They expected to make contact within fifty or sixty yards, but hadn’t gone more than fifty feet before they heard a Pashtun voice speak to them from behind a large tree. Both men froze, bringing their weapons to bear but holding fire, scanning the forest through their NVGs to see the trees coming alive with men picking their way carefully through the darkness.
Forogh stepped forward, answering the Pashtun in a casual voice.
Crosswhite fell back a pace to give him room. The men moving through the trees couldn’t see them, but they were obviously maneuvering to outflank the sounds of the voices. He could tell from the harsh tone that the man behind the tree was giving Forogh a hard time, demanding to know who they were and what was going on back at the clearing, keeping his voice loud enough for his men to hone in on his position.
Crouching low, Crosswhite keyed his radio three times without speaking, waited three seconds, and then keyed the radio three times more. This was the signal for Alpha to bring the rest of the team forward expecting a fight. He could see from Forogh’s posture that he was prepared to engage the man behind the tree, but the interpreter’s voice remained casual. He would have heard the radio signal as well and would know it was his job to buy time for the SEALs to get into position.
Of course, the man behind the tree was doing the same thing for his own people, stalling for as much time as possible. Crosswhite doubted the fellow realized there were any Americans in the area. More likely, he suspected they were tribal bandits looking to steal his cargo. The tree was too big for Crosswhite to get an angle on him, so he would have to trust Forogh to handle the fellow on his own. He quickly sized up the ten men working their way blindly among the rocks and the trees, divided evenly on either side of the trail, assessing that he and Forogh would be surrounded in less than a minute’s time.
Alpha and his SEALs drew within visual range, and Crosswhite listened as Alpha assigned them targets from left to right.
The talking between Forogh and the Pashtun stopped abruptly, and the forest was thrown into an eerie silence, both men having run out of bullshit.
Alpha quietly gave the command: “Fire.”
The SEALs’ suppressed M4s hissed in the darkness, and Crosswhite saw eight Pashtun fighters drop dead across his field of vision. A pair of AK-47s let loose down the slope to his extreme right, but the gunners were taken out an instant later.
A grenade popped on the other side of the tree, and Crosswhite heard it clatter among the rocks behind him as the man took off. Forogh dove behind a rock and Crosswhite threw himself flat against the earth, instinctively aware that he was well within the grenade’s kill zone. The force of the explosion lifted him from the ground and threw him against a boulder, knocking the wind from his lungs. He could hear nothing but a high-pitched whine as he struggled to move and then blacked out.
He came to with a white light being shined into his eyes.
“Captain, can you hear me?”
His thoughts were slow to clear. When he could move again, the first thing he did was grab for his groin.
“It’s all there, Captain. You’re fine. You got your shit rattled—that’s all.”
“Get me on my feet.” He groped clumsily in the dark.
The corpsman kept a firm hand against his chest, holding him down. “No, your brains are scrambled. Keep still.”
“What about the guy behind the tree?”
“He’s down,” Alpha said.
“Forogh?”
“He’s fine, Captain. We’re intact and the perimeter’s secure. Just keep still until you got your shit together.”
Alpha stood up and took Forogh aside. “Did that guy say whether there’s anyone else nearby—anyone who might have heard the grenade blast?”
“I got the impression they were surprised to find anyone else in the area,” Forogh said. “That should mean we’re okay, but you never know . . . we’re in the Hindu Kush.”
One of the two SEALs who had been sent forward to locate the pack animals came over the radio: “Alpha, its Trigg. We’ve got five donkeys about seventy-five yards up the trail. There’s nobody else here, but we’ve got something you should see.”
Crosswhite was on his feet again within a few minutes, but he was still fogged, so Alpha retained temporary command. They had to assume they were exposed now, so the mission took on a sense of urgency as they moved out to link up with Trigg and the other SEAL. When they found them, Trigg was standing beside a quintet of hobbled donkeys. The opium cargo was bundled and stacked off to the side of the trail.
“Whattaya got?” Alpha said.
Trigg motioned for him to follow. “I almost walked right into it,” he said quietly. He stopped Alpha about forty feet up the trail where it began to narrow and used a handheld laser trip-wire illuminator to illuminate a series of monofilament lines zigzagging across the trail at knee height. The wires showed up white in their night-vision goggles. “Ever seen that before?”
Alpha shook his head in the darkness. “No. Is this how they were covering their approach or what? What’s this lead to?”
Trigg turned to face back the way they’d come. “Those two claymores set in the trees there.”
Alpha turned to see a pair of M18A1 claymore antipersonnel mines mounted head-high in the trees, one to either side of the trail. It was immediately obvious that anyone who came marching down that trail in the middle of night would have gotten himself and anyone following within fifty feet blown away.
“Drugs are a dirty business,” Alpha muttered. “We have to be extra careful now . . . and we’re behind schedule.”
They disarmed the booby trap, packing the claymores away for safekeeping. The donkeys were set free, and the team formed up to move out with Trigg on point, using the trip-wire illuminator whenever he felt unsure of the trail.
Crosswhite recovered within the hour to resume command. They were racing the sun now, so he kept them moving almost at the double, never stopping to rest, checking the GPS on the move as they ascended ever higher into the mountains. It was a grueling climb, and they sucked their CamelBaks dry. Anyone who fell out to take a piss had to run extra hard to catch up. There would be very little time now to reconnoiter the village and get set up before first light.
Three hours into their ascent, the lead
element rounded a bend in the trail and ran head-on into a Pashtun patrol of seven men working their way down the mountain to link up with the opium smugglers.
The Pashtun men had their AK-47s slung over their shoulders, and they were talking casually among themselves when five American commandos came barreling around the bend. Trigg and Crosswhite ran smack into the two lead men of the Pashtun patrol, and all four of them went sprawling, their feet and weapons tangled together in a jumbled mess.
There was a lot of shouting and yelling from the startled Pashtun as they tried to sort out what the hell was going on. Forogh added his own haranguing voice to the fracas, trying to sow extra confusion among the Afghanis, but someone snapped on a flashlight, and the situation went immediately critical. The rest of the American column rounded the bend, and the Pashtun AK-47s were unslung. Within half a second shit was flying everywhere. Men were fighting hand-to-hand with rifle butts and knives, kicking and shoving as everyone fought for space.
Crosswhite bit down hard on the hand of the fellow he had collided with, tasting blood as he fought to straddle the flailing man who beat at his face with his free hand. He finally managed to drive his thumbs deep into the Pashtun’s eye sockets and jumped to his feet, only to be knocked over again as Forogh was knocked off balance by a SEAL just joining the fight. The SEAL went flying past them to deliver a vicious butt-stroke to a Pashtun blindly firing his AK-47 in a sweeping horizontal arch. Miraculously, the SEAL was able to cave in the Pashtun’s face before he could complete the sweep, saving at least two American lives besides his own. Had Trigg and Crosswhite been on their feet during the first half of that sweep, both of them would have been cut down.
The last four SEALs to round the bend had a very clear picture of the battle. They could see the last three men in the Pashtun column gripping their AK-47s in terror. Without night vision, they were unable to see what the hell was going on, and therefore had no idea which of the shadowy forms slugging it out on the trail before them were the enemy. The Pashtun broke and ran, and were cut down before they had gone more than a few yards.
The melee ended a few moments later, and Crosswhite grabbed up his M4 calling for everyone to sound off. Everyone was alive, but two SEALs had broken their night-vision goggles in the fight, and another named Fischer had a bullet hole through his left shoulder blade.
“I can make it,” Fischer insisted a short time later as the corpsman strapped his upper arm to his side. “Just leave my forearm free so I can reload.”
Crosswhite was still spitting Pashtun blood. His face was covered with lacerations, and the bridge of his nose was gashed open and bleeding. “You left-handed, son?”
Fischer shook his head. “No, Captain.”
“Small mercies,” Crosswhite muttered, selecting three SEALs at random and ordering each of them to trade Fischer all but one of their pistol mags for his M4 ammo. “Okay, listen up,” he announced in a low but peremptory voice. “This mission is fast becoming a goat fuck, and there’s no telling how many motherfuckers up the trail know we’re coming now. So we’re gonna take a vote on whether or not to continue. There’s ten of us, but if anyone wants to call no joy, we’ll call the game now without anyone giving you any shit. I’ll take full responsibility for the mission and lie my ass off when I get back about who really knew what.”
“Nobody votes to go back because of me!” Fischer blurted. “I can make it.”
No one else immediately spoke up.
Finally, Alpha cleared his throat, and Crosswhite turned to look at him through his night-vision goggles. “What’s on your mind?”
“Is that how they do things over at Delta, Captain? Turn back at the first sign of trouble?”
Crosswhite chuckled. “Let’s move it out. We’re behind schedule.”
29
AFGHANISTAN,
Nuristan Province, Waigal Valley
Halting their descent through the mountain darkness, Sandra and her Hezbi captors listened to the Pashtun AK-47s chattering on the far side of the valley. When the firing subsided after a couple of minutes, a pair of scouts was dispatched to investigate. The column settled in to wait, and Kohistani drew his fighting men close, briefing them to expect an American attack from any quarter. He did not believe in coincidence, and he was not naïve about American UAV capabilities. If the Yankee murderers knew or even suspected that the woman pilot was being held in Waigal Village, one of their drones could be scanning the valley with its infrared cameras at that very moment.
Sandra was coherent enough to discern the change of mood in her captors. Before the rattling of the AK-47s, they were moving smartly down the mountain with a minimum of apparent caution. Now they were stopped and pulled into a tight defensive perimeter encircling her stretcher, whispering back and forth like a pit of agitated vipers, ready to strike in any direction. With only Badira paying her any attention, Sandra began to work at the knotted ropes securing her to the stretcher, readying herself to move if an American rescue team were to appear suddenly. She promised herself that she would summon the strength to get up and run when the time came, despite the opium doping her reflexes and the pain ravaging her leg.
The time dragged on, however, and as the minutes stretched into an hour, her faint adrenaline surge faded to nothing and her determination flagged. Her mind fogged, and the pain began to take over once again. After an hour and a half, she squeezed Badira’s arm in the darkness, signaling that she needed another hit from the opium pipe.
Badira ignored her request, knowing that Kohistani would not allow her to strike a match under the circumstances.
As the pain increased, Sandra began to think more clearly. She summoned all of her strength and drew a deep breath: “I’m here!” she screamed in desperation. “I’m here! Come and—!”
A fist slammed into the side of her head, knocking her senseless. Another fighter jumped up and knelt heavily on her diaphragm to prevent her from drawing enough air for another scream in the event she came to.
The scouts returned ten minutes later, reporting to Kohistani that they had found seven dead Pashtun on the trail across the valley. One of the scouts dropped a fistful of spent 5.56 mm shell casings into his hand.
“The Americans killed them all and kept moving up the mountain toward the village,” the scout said. “They won’t arrive before first light. By the time they discover she’s no longer there, we’ll have reached the truck.”
Kohistani smiled in the darkness. “Allah be praised,” he said with great satisfaction, having believed until that moment that the woman’s screams had doomed them all. “It is no accident that we are at this place in time, brothers. Allah does not deal in coincidence.”
He stepped over to the stretcher, using his own flashlight to check on their prisoner whose left eye was now swollen almost shut from the blow that had silenced her screams. He shined the light in Badira’s eyes, telling her, “You should have thought to hold a hand over her mouth.”
“Perhaps you should have thought to tell me,” Badira retorted.
He rapped her in the face with the butt of the flashlight, splitting her upper lip. “Do not mistake me for a simple village head man,” he said, his voice almost friendly. “Now gag the American, and make sure she remains gagged until we reach the truck. If she calls out again, you will be held responsible.”
30
AFGHANISTAN,
Waigal Village
Shortly before first light, Crosswhite and the SEALs from SEAL Team Six arrived on the southern perimeter of Waigal Village. They were exhausted and out of water, but they were only twenty minutes behind schedule. Crosswhite ordered the corpsman to dole out two time-released Benzedrine capsules to each of the men, then gave orders for Trigg and Alpha to recon the east and west perimeters of the village. The northern periphery of the village was built into the mountain itself, which extended upward another thousand feet.
From their vantage point below the village, Waigal resembled a giant house built from playing cards,
each hut looking as though it was built upon the other. Though in reality, each dwelling was built into the steep, rocky slope of the mountain. The village was above the tree line, so tree cover was very sparse. The SEALs would need to move into the village as soon as possible in order to take advantage of their night vision.
Crosswhite crouched behind a boulder, looking up at the village through his NVGs. “That’s an imposing sight,” he said to Forogh.
“It is,” Forogh agreed. “They speak mostly Kalasha here. I don’t speak Kalasha.”
Crosswhite turned to look at him. “You might have mentioned that before we left the fucking house!”
Forogh shrugged. “It wouldn’t have mattered. No one speaks Kalasha except these people.” He patted Crosswhite on the shoulder. “Don’t worry. Many of them will speak Pashto as well. I doubt very much the Taliban who are holding your pilot are of the Kalasha tribe. It’s not their way. You should mention that to your men.”
Crosswhite grunted. “We won’t kill anyone we don’t have to.”
He got on the radio: “Bank Heist Two, this is Bank Heist One. Do you read? Over.”
The Night Stalkers were quick to respond: “We read you five-by-five, Bank Heist. Over.”
“Bank Heist, be advised we are in position and preparing to move on the target.”
“Bank Heist Two standing by . . .”
Crosswhite glanced over at Fischer, who crouched behind another boulder gripping a suppressed MK 23 pistol in his free hand. “Good to go?”
Fischer nodded.
Alpha was the first to call in: “Captain, I can’t see into the village from over here. The mountain’s too steep. All I can see are the fronts of the huts. I’ve got no movement whatsoever.”
“All right,” Crosswhite answered. “Work your way back here. Trigg, what do you got?”
“Still maneuvering,” Trigg replied. “But so far nothing at all.”
