by Ron Lealos
“Dostum told us Karzai knows about the dope but no direct participation,” Finnen said. “Karzai isn’t acquainted with Wintershall or Schultz. Dostum claimed nobody in power wants us to leave. Too much money to be made. Nothing about oil, since the Afghans don’t have any except to allow transport. Dostum was thick with the Taliban, making sure they’re strong enough to continue the war and keep the aid dollars flowing. That’s what he said before I shot him right after he blabbed to Morgan about me. Nothing we didn’t already know.”
Dunne looked at Washington. “What did you hear?”
Surprised by the switch of focus, Washington almost choked on his beer.
“Nuthin’,” Washington spluttered. “They made me stay outside and guard the door. I think they were afraid I might see some of the spook voodoo. I missed the party. Of course, they made the house darky carry the girl. That be me.” He took another long drink and let out a long “aaah,” mimicking Finnen’s best.
“Before we go any further,” Dunne said, “I want you all to know something. About the Russian Girl’s web page.” He was talking about the “gotcha” back on the base. “That’s an encrypted Top Secret site. You shouldn’t be talking about it to anyone around Langley.”
Finnen and Washington couldn’t stop the grins from wrinkling their faces.
“Oh, the one that comes with the wet Kleenex?” Finnen asked.
“Does the laundry service include stain removal?” Washington asked.
“If we call, will you answer on the bone-a-phone?” Finnen asked. The litany began.
“Is it assault with a friendly weapon?”
“Burpin’ the worm?”
“Shakin’ hands with the guvnor?”
“Custard’s Last Stand?”
“Enough,” I said. “I don’t give a shit about Dunne’s sexual orientation. Or porn-site preferences. I want to know the whole story. And if you were willing to sacrifice Washington and me. And who is she?” I said, pointing at Ms. Masari.
Silence.
Khkulay, aka Ms. Masari, stood and stepped to the bar. She went back to her seat after refreshing her orange juice. She was stunning in tight jeans and a white blouse that highlighted her dark, smooth skin. On the way, she had bent over to check on the girl, putting a blanket from the overhead on top of the young one’s pajamas and adjusting her seat belt.
The plane began to taxi. Everyone but Khkulay disregarded the instruction to fasten their seat belts.
“How long has Ms. Masari been working for you?” I asked, watching Dunne finish whatever it was he was drinking.
The only thing missing in Dunne’s appearance was the laptop appendage. He looked more comfortable than usual, sprawled in the leather chair with his shirt unbuttoned down to the middle of his chest. But he was watching me, taking note that I still hadn’t unloaded my weapons.
“Not long,” Dunne said. “Never, in fact. She was on a death list we found on a Taliban cell leader. The story she told you was true. Her parents were killed by the Taliban. A few weeks ago in Jalalabad. One of our assets found her in the market and told me she might be valuable in providing background and analysis. It took us a while to check on her. Finnen knew most of the plan, but not her. She didn’t even know your real MOS. Of course, Ms. Masari understands the Taliban better than any of us. We had her stay at her house until it was safe to get her out and she was cleared. The scene at the market gave me the chance to do that. And to get the savior fluids running in you so we’d have lots of opportunity to explain how you messed up the mission. If you did.”
There was no way I could bring myself to thinking of Khkulay as new Agent Masari. She was still the girl Finnen and I had rescued. She wasn’t smiling or smirking when I looked at her.
“Is that right?” I asked Khkulay.
She bowed her head and said, “Yes, Morgan.”
“And did you know I wasn’t an accountant?”
“No. I’m still not really sure, but I have seen what you can do. No one would tell me anything about you except in whispers.”
“There was a need for all the drama?” I asked.
It was Dunne’s turn. He bent forward in his seat.
“Distraction,” Dunne said. “We wanted to make sure you had something else to think about when you were out hunting intel and targets. You’ve been getting a little confused lately about your job, and this operation was too important for you to have doubts. I knew you would want the mission over so you could get back to being Prince Valiant.”
Dunne shook his head from side to side, while I marveled at the complexity the Company could design.
“You proved it,” Dunne said. “You’re getting sloppy. The men we hired to act like Taliban took the wrong truck. You should have noticed the government decal and been suspicious. And the man with the floppy army hat? No Taliban would ride around in a pickup designated like that or wear part of an Afghan army uniform. It just showed me you were diverted by a helpless, beautiful face and would go along with things just so you could see her again.”
“Sounds like a lot of work to me,” I said. “And it was all to keep me from asking questions? You’re full of shit, Dunne. There was more to it than that.”
That ugly white-toothed smile. Dunne looked like Ted Bundy when he grinned.
“Good news and bad,” Dunne said. “If you’ll just sit down after you stow your gear, I’ll tell all. The plane’s about to lift off, and I don’t want you to hurt yourself if you fall.”
The plane was turning, about to reach the end of the runway. Overhead lights flickered as the pilot completed his pre-flight check.
Massacre them all. Purge the demons, and replace the memory with the bodies of bleeding Company assets. And innocents like Khkulay and Washington. A certain death sentence for me.
Then, it clicked. I had been used and deceived. Exactly what I signed on for and nothing less than I should expect. Maybe there’d come a time for settlement, but it wasn’t now. I quickly unpacked and took a seat as the Gulfstream began to speed toward the dark sky. Dunne’s distraction was still working, and I was sitting right across the aisle from her.
With our backs pressed against leather, we didn’t speak. Inside my head, I was slapping myself. Whether Khkulay was involved didn’t mean she had betrayed me. It was all my fantasy. Not hers. The Company had never been shy about using women to achieve their goals. Finnen had told me about one of the strategies he had developed while he was in Bosnia. He was trying to find a Serbian genocidal monster named Azbelnek. Intel said Azbelnek and his men liked young girls. The city was full of orphans, and Finnen had no trouble recruiting actors for his plan. He only had to offer the girls a hot meal and a safe place to sleep. The orphanage was raided every few weeks, and many of the hungry children disappeared. Azbelnek was supposedly holed up in a bombed-out apartment complex in Sarajevo. The operation was a variation on the “honey trap” plots. Finnen called it a “kiddy trap.” From his hidden position across the street in another crumbling building, Finnen and his Croatian squad watched the shawled girls stumble down the cratered street in front of Azbelnek’s hideout. He had instructed the children to act disoriented and lost. He gave them Mars bars to seal the deal, promising more if they did what he asked. Slowly, the girls moved across the open space. Within minutes, three armed men came out of the collapsing apartment. They were dead before they reached the girls, who hid behind a crumbling wall as Finnen had told them to do. Azbelnek took longer to die, and the Croats hung his body from what was left of the third-floor wall with a sign that read “Baby Raper” in Bosnian. As far as I could tell, nothing like that had been done with or to Khkulay by the Company. And it wasn’t her fault whatever tricks had been used and the reasons why.
Eyes raised to the cloth-covered ceiling, Finnen appeared to have found Shangri-La. He was slouched in his unbuckled seat and wasn’t any longer confining himself by the use of one of the crystal glasses. The bottle of Bushmills was in his hand and a leprechaun smile on his face.
> During the months of my tour, Finnen was the closest thing to a friend I had made. Dunne was all business, and Washington was only just found. I knew Finnen hated the Taliban, and his opinion wasn’t based on Company policy. While he may have helped Dunne devise the scheme, I would still trust Finnen with my life. If we had been discovered inside Dostum’s castle, Finnen would have died, too. The rest of the tricks were just noise.
The question remained why Dunne felt the need for “distraction” and if he was setting me up to take the responsibility for any failure. I believed I knew the answer, but I wanted Dunne’s confession.
The plane was reaching cruising altitude, and everyone seemed lost in their visions of the rock pile we had just left. Or dreams of other times and places. I cleared my throat and watched Dunne sip from his drink.
“What’s the good news?” I asked Dunne.
Dunne looked at me and raised his glass.
“You’re the best field agent I’ve ever met,” Dunne said.
Finnen gagged.
“And meself?” Finnen asked. “I suppose I’m just a lump’a Newcastle coal?’
“It’s not always just about you, Finnen,” Dunne said. “You’re good, too, but you’re a drunk and a philanderer.”
“Cheers, mate,” Finnen said, toasting Dunne with his drink, a huge grin on his face. “I accept the compliment.”
“Morgan has shown his expertise in interrogation, disinformation, and combat. He’s never failed one mission,” Dunne said, glaring at Finnen.
“The bad news, Morgan, is you’re developing a conscience,” Dunne said. “That’s a dangerous load to carry in your job. And you have this romantic view of the world. The mission was too important for guilt or self-examination to slow you down. I figured with your mind set on saving the girl, you’d do most anything it took to see her again. And if you blundered, I had two excuses. Salvation and an unpatriotic morality.”
“And what was the mission?” I asked.
“Exactly what I told you,” Dunne said. “The only disinformation was the level of Company involvement. And, of course, Ms. Masari, in a small way. We knew Dostum was a drug lord, but he was keeping the North relatively peaceful and under his control. He was giving us enough intel that we were stopping most of the arms deliveries to the Taliban. And the money was traceable to the weapons dealers who were permanently sanctioned when we could get to them. It was ‘need to know’ and I felt, with Khkulay in the mix and your suspicions about CIA connections, you’d have to follow it out. Meant the same result for me.”
“And if we failed?” I asked.
Something new. Dunne actually turned away, his teeth covered in a grimace.
“There was a stringer from the Financial Times snooping around Qalat,” Dunne said. “He was hot on the oil trail after the reporter from the Wall Street Journal was killed. We had the story ready to feed him. You were a pissed-off soldier who was getting revenge for a drug deal gone wrong. All the legend was in place. We’d just have to show him your body. That would be the public story. The Company would have its own. But I knew it wouldn’t ever get that far. As I said, you’re too good. If you got caught somewhere along the line before the hit on Dostum, both you and Washington, you wouldn’t know much.”
“You were gonna have us killed?”
“If you failed, we wouldn’t have had to. You’d be dead already.”
“Why now? If Dostum was so valuable, why kill him?”
“Dostum and Schultz were murdering innocent soldiers. It was just a few days ’til the stringer found out and connected the dots. And the Company has a conscience too. Sometimes. Dostum was losing control of the North and acting crazier. He was a psychopath and becoming uncooperative.”
“Wintershall?”
“The Trans-Afghan pipeline is important to stability in the region. A benefit for all concerned and meets many of the United States’s strategic objectives. Wintershall was willing to take the gamble on building it. No one else was. Wintershall over-extended themselves, and Dostum knew it. He contacted Schultz, not us. We didn’t stop them.”
“Were you running Abernathy?”
“No. He was Dostum’s man.”
“What’s going to happen with Abernathy?”
“He’ll be dishonorably discharged soon, and he’ll find the Cayman account empty. His wife will be a single mom soon, after she’s seen the pictures Langley’s sending her. Abernathy’s gonna find it rough to get a job.”
“You’re letting him off easy.”
“You know we don’t shoot American citizens. We’ll just ruin his life.”
Everyone in the cabin seemed to be quietly processing what Dunne had revealed. Washington couldn’t stop shaking his head and beaming.
“Did you create Washington, too?”
“No. He only knows what you do now.”
A laugh. Washington sat up and pounded the arm of his seat.
“There it is,” Washington said. “Can’t trust the black man. I was waitin’ for that. Shoulda never saved your honkey white ass.”
“Me, too,” Finnen said. “Morgan doesn’t think much of the Irish either.”
The plane made a slight dip, and the rolling in my stomach increased further. I looked at Khkulay.
“Why is she here?” I asked.
“During the time you were in the field,” Dunne said, “I questioned her. It quickly became obvious she would be a great asset for analysis. With her language skills and history, Langley agreed. She won’t have any trouble getting a green card. Afghans with her background are hard to find.”
“She didn’t know anything about this?” I asked.
“Not most of it,” Dunne said. “Not until now. She had no reason to believe you were anything but a knight in shining armor. All she knew was that we’d be coming to extract her at the time we did and to look out the window when she heard the Taliban loudspeaker. I had a rough time explaining to my Afghan Army contacts how to do it and why to go to the trouble of saving a girl. They almost got it right.”
Wheels within wheels. So many tricks, the Company continued to deceive even itself in the confusion and get lost in the mirrors.
Surrender. I wasn’t going to change the way the world worked. Or the Company. I sighed and sat back in my seat.
It would take a long time to digest everything we had done. I couldn’t change anything now, and it was another step away from Kansas. But there was still Khkulay.
On the plane, there were two young females I had helped set free, even if one had been orchestrated by Dunne. Nobody else knew about the third: that girl’s eyes were what drove me to Khkulay, and I couldn’t block the scene, no matter how hard I tried to keep the vision of her face away or redeem myself. I never knew her name, but his was Kazim Allmahar. He was a captain in the Afghan intelligence service and a double agent for the Taliban. Allmahar had leaked information to the Taliban about Mehtar Lam, the secret control for many of the operations taking place in the North. Lam had been beheaded and his skull paraded through Jalalabad on the end of a sharpened shovel with a sign dangling below that read “American Puppet.” My assignment was to kill Allmahar while he slept in his fourth-floor condo and leave no traces that would disturb the delicate relationship between the Afghan intelligence branch and the CIA. I had been dressed as an Afghan in sandals, turban, loose tunic, vest, and beard. If I was seen, no one would recognize me as anything other than a local.
Apartment buildings were one of my toughest challenges. Too many people and the constant threat of an insomniac roaming the corridors or stairwells. Few escape routes and no place to hide in narrow hallways. Even at 4:00 a.m., the assassin’s hour, the wrong door could open. But I had made it inside Allmahar’s apartment without being seen.
The smell of laundry, cigarettes, and the evening’s curry. Rugs on the walls in the dim light seeping from the small-balcony glass door. A tiny living room with a passageway leading down a hall. Dishes drying in a sink to the left next to a humming refrigerator.
No toys or crayoned pictures. Nothing to indicate the presence of children. My eyes were adjusted to the darkness, even though it was still hard to see through the blackness of the hallway. Halfway in, a door creaked and a figure the size of a man with two heads stepped out. As soon as he looked in my direction, I would be spotted. I fired the silenced Hush Puppy. Something fell to the floor, but it wasn’t the man. As I moved forward, my target looked toward the floor, and his mouth opened, prepared to scream. I shot him in the heart. When I checked his body, I found her beneath him. Dead. A hole between her blue eyes. Eyes I could never forget. She couldn’t have been older than five. In seconds, a woman rushed out of the bedroom and wailed; she slumped on top of the bodies and never even looked at me. I stood and ran out.
No one asked about collateral damage. No one cared but me. Not even Finnen had heard the story. It was my private nightmare. Allmahar was permanently benched from the war on terrorism, and that was all that mattered to my masters. At night, I justified the murders by reviewing the picture of Lam’s head paraded through Jalalabad and tried to excuse my mistake with that image. And the burning Towers. The guiltless had died there, too. A second meant eternity, especially when I hadn’t waited one more to make sure I wasn’t shooting an innocent just to save my life. Back in Langley, my scars would be fodder for the Company shrinks, but the second I saw her, I knew nothing would keep me from saving Khkulay.
For now, this was all too much to digest. I’d have to push it to the back of my head and wait for a calmer moment to decipher everything I’d learned. I couldn’t go pointing fingers now; not without truly understanding what had happened and why I was part of it. An hour later, resigned to history, I decided to distract myself and find out more about the woman who had so obviously steered my thoughts over the last few days.
The leather chairs swiveled to the aisle. I turned toward Khkulay across the narrow space, doing my best to drown out the bickering of Washington and Finnen.
