The Sinai Directive

by Rick Jones

  “As for that, my dear, that will be a topic for discussion over breakfast.”

  Angelika, who stood before Faruk who continued to maintain his cheesy grin, turned and left the office with Abesh close on her heels.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Jabal Maqla

  Jabal al-Lawz Mountain Range

  The Bangladeshi was the first man to enter the subterranean level with Ahmadi right behind him. As the extremist group entered the chamber one by one through the tube, Amal Purakayastha was investigating the footprints. The unadulterated prints in the center of the sand were made by sandals. Those that skirted these prints, however, were created from military issued boots. By his estimate, there were six operators.

  Ahmadi joined the Bangladeshi’s side. “How many?”

  “Six.”

  “No more?”

  “Only six.”

  The meandering corridor had deep, shaded pockets of darkness. But the multiple holes in the high ceiling filtered shafts of light. All Ahmadi’s team had to do was follow the footprints in the sand.

  “And the footprints in the middle?” Ahmadi asked the Bangladeshi.

  Purakayastha had his theory since the patterns proved to be sandal wear that had been memorialized in sand that was as fine as talcum powder. Were they the footprints of Moses that had gone untouched for more than thirty-five hundred years? Or was it simply the footprints of someone who was indigenous to the area that led the military unit forward? Purakayastha didn’t know for sure.

  The Bangladeshi shrugged. “Unknown.”

  “Definitely not military wear.”

  “It could be from a Saudi guide,” he answered. “Maybe.”

  “What about the military set of prints?”

  The Bangladeshi examined the prints further. He did not recognize the unique brand of soles that were often given to certain military issue, since the imprint in the sand had an exclusive symbol: that of a papal cross. It was nothing he was familiar with. “I can tell who they don’t belong to,” he answered. “It’s not the CIA or the Mossad. Nor are they U.S. government issue, meaning that whoever is ahead of us is not an American unit.” He cocked his head to study the prints in the sand, the stamps with the odd symbol of the papal cross. It was obviously neither the Israelis nor anyone else who may have had an interest. Perhaps the easiest answer was that it was a privately commissioned group of treasure seekers, like Ahmadi and his team. As a former member of the BSOF, he had come to realize that tracks were like fingerprints that were exclusive enough to be traced to a particular brand that was marketed solely to certain operators, military or otherwise. But a papal cross as the unit’s symbol? This was something he had never encountered before in the field.

  The Bangladeshi stood up and looked down the tunnel that was spotted with thin rods of incoming light that filtered down through gaps in the ceiling. As long as they had daylight, they would also have a way forward. “They’re close,” he told Ahmadi. “This team. And as long as we have sunlight,” Purakayastha pointed to the multiple tears in the ceiling, “then we should find what we seek.” What he didn’t offer Ahmadi was his concern that the point of the breach was only made possible with the use of a military-grade explosive.

  Zahid Ahmadi looked over the set of footprints and tracked them into the tunnel ahead. Gathering his team and informing them that Allah had seen them this far, Ahmadi assured everyone that their god would also see them to victory. While moving his unit forward, they had callously disturbed the footprints of Moses that had been timestamped in the sand for more than three millennia.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Tunis, Tunisia

  Removing those who are complacent was always the easiest part of an operation. Those who guarded the turrets and the front entryway were testament to that fact. Once the frontline guards had been neutralized, the five-man team of the Sayeret Matkal pressed forward until they reached the stronghold’s portcullis, which was a pair of metal doors.

  To the left of these doors was a touchpad screen. Sneh, who gestured to one of his teammates to bypass the code, watched his operative sling his weapon over his shoulder and approach the screen, the commando removing his blade. After he toyed with the tinted glass display with his knife to remove the panel, he exposed a pair of motherboards and hard drives that were embedded into the stone wall. Removing a remote scanner from his cargo pocket, the operative quickly attached a dual set of clips to certain parts of the board and booted up a prearranged program to hack into the system. At the top of the remote scanner was a rectangular window to display LED readouts. As numerals scrolled within this window at blinding speed, the unit was reading the boards database and sequencer. As soon as the remote discovered a fixed number that was a part of the code, it would freeze and lock up on the screen.

  X X X 7 X X

  After retrieving the first number, the numerals began to surface quickly on the display.

  X 5 X 7 X 6

  Two seconds later:

  2 5 X 7 X 6

  A second after that:

  2 5 6 7 1 6

  With the code now complete, the doors automatically unbolted.

  The hidden bars inside the metal doors began to retreat from their circular sockets to unlock the gateway. The noise was a series of loud clicks and ratcheting, the gears protesting. After a number of internal clicking within the metal panels, the doors began to swing inward.

  One by one the members of the Sayeret Matkal entered the compound that was filled with wartime goods, then scattered with their weapons raised to eye level. Using their scopes as visual guides, they maneuvered their assault weapons from left to right and from right to left, with everyone searching for a target to lock onto. But targets were not to be had since the area was too quiet, too vacant. If Yosef Sneh understood one thing about military combat, such silence could also be thunderous.

  A moment later, the first enemy shot rang out.

  * * *

  Emerson Brandt was watching the interior monitors when the red bulb on his console lit up. The front gate was in full swing when it shouldn’t have. Switching to exterior shoots of the stronghold though mounted CCTV monitors, he saw a hostile detachment infiltrating the compound.

  Brandt leaned into the screen. “And whose little boys do you belong to, I wonder?” he murmured out loud to himself.

  To his right was a red plunger, which was to be depressed in cases of emergency.

  Emerson Brandt used the heal of his hand to pound the button home.

  * * *

  Deep inside the stronghold were the sleeping quarters, Rec and Mess were located, spiraling lights flashed in warning. The running banks of overhead fluorescents dimmed so that the warning flashes took precedence. From this, Faruk’s hired mercenaries immediately galvanized themselves into action by grabbing their weapons and, after they had trained hundreds of times for this particular scenario, began to take their posts. They had practiced repeatedly over time until their actions became an instinctive and involuntary act, until their programming had become as natural as breathing.

  They ran down the corridors, the hallways, the men fast and speedy to engage and conquer.

  What they didn’t know, however, was that this league of fighters were not simple marauders who looked to steal goods to bolster their fledging terrorist factions. They were about to go up against the Sayeret Matkal, who were arguably one of the best the world had to offer as a fighting force.

  As Faruk’s mercenaries took position on an upper tier that overlooked the facility with their assault weapons, they waited silently for the hostiles to walk right into the spider’s web. One by one as the members of the Sayeret Matkal walked into the motor pool that housed Combat Reconnaissance Patrol Vehicles, Tuning BRDMs, 8-wheeled BRT-60’s, and a number of Soviet tracked vehicles, it was John Cannady, the unit’s team leader, who opened fire with a pair of well-placed shots.

  * * *

  Two rounds struck Serge
ant Caleb Fisher at center mass, which would normally have been perfect kill shots, if not for his dragon-skin body armor that took the blows. Fisher, from the impacts, was lifted and knocked to the concrete floor. After he skated a few feet on his backside, he was able to roll and take cover underneath one of the Patrol Vehicles. Nevertheless, he had sustained a few broken ribs despite the vest.

  Clenching his teeth in agony, Fisher gave Sneh a thumbs-up, telling him that he was good to go, in spite of his white-hot agony.

  Acknowledging Fisher with a quick nod as the rest of the Sayeret Matkal took cover, the sudden silence was alarming. Sneh realized that these operators were seasoned vets who knew enough not to waste ammo with random fire that would deplete their supplies. He also realized that while some of these mercs waited in the wings to keep them pinned down, others would be converging on their location to hem them in.

  Sneh spoke into his lip mic to Chayal Two, who was Fisher. “Chayal Two, hang back to provide support as best you can. Chayal Three and Four, open up the sky with your launchers. Chayal Five will go left to intercept the left-side hostiles. I’ll take the right. On my count. Three . . . Two . . . One.”

  Every supplied man of the Sayeret Matkal was weaponized with the newly designed 40mm grenade launcher that took the place of the M203 GL, which had been used by the Israeli Defense Force. It had a sleek design and a side-tilting breech for loading longer 40mm medium velocity ammunition, and a good tool to have under such extraordinary conditions.

  When the countdown reached zero moment, Chayals Three and Four rose up and sent off a dual pair of timed shots.

  After discharging the grenades, which made whoomph sounds as they left the barrels, Chayals Three and Four took immediate cover knowing that revealing themselves would draw immediate fire, which predictively happened as a barrage of gunfire ricocheted off the vehicles around them. But as the launched grenades corkscrewed their way towards the upper level that overlooked the lower tier, as Faruk’s mercs recognized what was coming their way and moved to take flight, the fired shells went off with deafening explosions.

  A pair of fireballs bloomed and rolled in colors of red and orange, as smoke within the flames escaped the mushroom heads began to rise ceilingward. Bodies were lifted and sent reeling over the banisters to take trajectories to the cement floor. The carnage was devastating and brutal, the force behind the blasts pitching those through the air like wind-tossed ragdolls, with these mere objects having no control over the power that was hurling them far and wide.

  Screams filled the room, nothing but cries of agony. Faruk’s mercenaries were raining down on the vehicles and on the pavements with less-than-conventional landings, their bones smashing upon impact as soon as they hit the concrete. Others simply thudded. And just like that the upper tier was gone, the landing having vanished within this explosive mayhem.

  As blood pooled and fanned out along the floor in halos beneath the bodies, Yosef Sneh immediately went to the right side of the compound and Chayal Five to the left, each trying to intercept the mercs who were trying to flank Sneh’s team.

  With Chayals Two, Three and Four maintaining watch to keep Chayals One and Five safe, their encounters were far from over.

  * * *

  After John Cannady advanced down the right-side of the staircase from the upper tier, he saw the grenades cross the distance in short order and explode in unison, with both explosions being well-timed and placed. Fire erupted with madness as bodies lifted and pinwheeled through space, most dead before they landed on the concrete below. The upper tier that overlooked the facility, where he had just been, was gone, the landing nothing but ragged edges of broken concrete and twisted rebar.

  Cannady laid low when he reached the halfway point of the staircase he was descending, realizing that these guys were not novel to the art of combat at all. This was an experienced force of elite fighters who came prepared with high-end artillery.

  Now that Canady’s means of retreat were taken from him, he had no choice but to descend to the lower level to confront his enemy. But when Canady turned to begin his downward journey, he saw that his fate would soon rival those who had died before him. At the bottom of the staircase stood a soldier who stared Canady down with piercing eyes, along with the point of his weapon.

  Canady lowered his assault rifle and raised his hands in surrender. “I’m just paid to guard this compound,” he told the militant. “I’m not paid to get killed. I’m more than happy to walk away from all this.”

  “The nukes,” Sneh began. “Where are they?”

  Cannady gave the operative an odd and quizzical look. “Nukes?”

  “Where are they?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “The suitcase nukes.”

  “We don’t house suitcase nukes. We never did.”

  Sneh appeared frustrated.

  And then from Cannady. “Look, take what you want. All I ask is that you let me walk away.”

  Sneh, however, shook his head in doubt. “One, I think you’re lying about the nukes. And two, you shot one of my men. But what I’m about to do is because you work for Abesh Faruk, who is a madman disguised as a businessman.” Directing the point of his weapon, Yosef Sneh set off a burst of gunfire.

  Rounds stitched across Canady’s chest and abdomen, the wounds opening and paring back like the blooms of rose petals, the force then sending the man to the steps where he lay unmoving. Sneh, falling back, went to join his team as Chayal Five went to confront his opponent.

  * * *

  Chayal Five was feline silent as he moved into position, the soldier an apex predator on the hunt. He moved with stealth and grace and with practiced efficiency that had been honed down to an elite process of tracking prey.

  When he reached the bottom of the stairwell, he discovered that the staircase was empty. To his left he heard a footfall, something soft and light, but not entirely imperceptible. And there was another to his right—a second subject? With that sixth sense that all good soldiers are entrenched with to sense approaching danger, Chayal Five realized that he had become the centerpiece of their attention. They were closing in on him from the front and behind, the pair remaining unseen.

  Chayal Five quietly ducked beneath the massive frame of an 8-wheeled BRT-60 and took to a prone position, his weapon ready. With controlled breathing, the Israeli commando waited with saintly patience.

  More footsteps, though light, were moving closer with each passing second, with one coming from the left and the other from right, to squeeze him in.

  Chayal Five curled his finger around the trigger.

  One set of legs up to the knees appeared around the BRT-60, which was summarily joined by a second set. By their shuffling movements, Chayal Five knew they were searching for him after they most likely assured themselves that they had him locked in, the two now mystified by Chayal Five’s sudden vanishing performance.

  The Israeli commando directed his weapon and set off a shot to the kneecap of one, the patella shattering from the round and sending the hostile immediately to the ground. In a subsequent move he took out the kneecap of the second man, who fell screaming to the concrete floor. Since there was no greater pain than that of a shattered knee outside of a gut wound, Chayal Five immediately sent off two more muted shots to close out their agony. Bullet holes magically appeared in each of their foreheads, the two dying with surprised appearances.

  Into his lip mic, Chayal Five whispered, “Chayals Five to Chayal One, means achieved. Hostiles neutralized.”

  “Copy that. Reform.”

  Sliding his way out from underneath the massive vehicle, Chayal Five went to regroup with his team.

  * * *

  The bodies of three dead mercs who were flung from the upper tier were now lying on the main level. With the three taken out by Chayals One and Five and the four at the gates, that was a total of eleven kills. Intel, however, stated that there were twelve, meaning t
hat a threat still remained inside the facility.

  From behind a parked vehicle where the team had gathered, Yosef Sneh said, “Chayals Three and Four will seek out the remaining threat and will terminate without prejudice. He’ll most likely be in the Control Room on the second level. Find a way up. I, along with Chayals Two and Five, will look for the nukes. Keep in mind, people, that this arsenal is one-hundred-thirty-thousand square feet, meaning that we have a lot of ground to cover with minimal time available. Keep eyes and ears open. Always assume that there might be more than the twelve hostiles reported.” Then to Three and Four, he said, “Go.”

  As they departed from the unit in search of the twelfth man, Sneh looked at Chayal Two who took the double impacts. Not only was he beginning to blanch, but blood was forming at the corner of his lips, meaning that he had sustained internal injuries that were more than just a few broken ribs.

  “Are you good?” Sneh asked him.

  “I have a good hour in me. I can do this.”

  “Canvas every corner inside every room. Suitcase nukes don’t take up a whole lot of space.”

  Chayal Two nodded. “Copy.”

  Splitting away from each other, Chayals One, Two and Five went in search of the weapons.

  * * *

  Emerson Brandt had seen everything play out on the monitors before they went dead. The raiders had minimalized a highly trained contingent of fighters within less than three minutes. Secondly, they were equipped with high-end weaponry not bought from black markets. These launchers were a unique brand created specifically for the use by special forces. As far as he knew, the Tunisian government had no such forces who could overwhelm. This group was a foreign unit of elite commandos.

  Onscreen, when the grenades went off and the fire balls erupted, and just as the bodies on the upper tier were being ripped apart and flung haphazardly through the air, the monitors winked off, the system dead. As a guaranteed protective measure, he contacted the Tunisian Armed Forces. It was a designed association between the reigning president, his forces, and Abesh Faruk. It was a containment procedure created to stem the overpowering breaches by foreign entities, so that the money flow from Faruk’s hands into the hands of the Tunisian president could remain steady. Within fifteen minutes, a number of the president’s forces would overwhelm the facility. All Brandt had to do now was to dig in and hold off the hostile faction until they arrived.