by Mark Mannock
“Then it’s likely that our people have no idea that the vice president has been kidnapped by terrorists,” I observed.
“Yes, Nicholas, it is most unlikely that they will be aware of that,” said Jumaa.
“As I said, communication,” said Greatrex. “But how?”
The room reverted to a frustrated silence.
Several minutes later, I said, “I have an idea. It’s the original longshot, but there may be a chance.”
“Pray continue, oh enlightened one,” said the big fella.
“Well,” I began, “restricting online networks is relatively straightforward for a government. We’ve seen that many times before. On the other hand, blocking electronic communications beyond the cell-phone level requires strategic targeting. They’ve blocked the embassies and they’ve blocked this hotel because the vice president’s team would have had a strong comms set-up in place.”
“Go on,” said Greatrex.
“Where else would we find such a powerful communications set-up in Khartoum?”
No reply.
“If it hasn’t been destroyed or blocked by the terrorists, it will be sitting at the Khartoum International Airport,” I said.
Greatrex smiled.
Jumaa looked perplexed.
“Yes, I’m talking about the vice president’s ride: Air Force Two.”
The three of us sat on the front seat of Jumaa’s aging white Toyota Land Cruiser. The streets of Khartoum appeared quiet. A dusty silence hung over the city, dampening its usual vibrance. I wondered if the country’s political unrest had become so routine that the move to ‘shutdown’ when there was upheaval was positively habitual.
Jumaa’s plan to get us out of the hotel showed brilliance in its simplicity. He had brought enough food into the hotel to feed a small army, so that’s exactly what he did. After setting up a table overflowing with food at one end of the corridor outside our room, he invited the guards to feast. They obliged. Having strategically set up two comfortable chairs facing the small table of food but away from the direction of our rooms, Jumaa ensured that the guards’ attention remained distracted.
While the guards ate, Greatrex and I slipped quietly along the corridor and into the stairwell. The downward journey turned into a long, spiraling trek as we did our best to mute the loud echo of our footsteps. We padded down the treads as silently as possible. When we reached the bottom, Jumaa was waiting. Our guide knew his way around the hotel and after following him through a series of corridors and the expansive commercial kitchen, we arrived outside before we knew it. And parked right in front of the door was Jumaa’s Land Cruiser; it was as though he had planned all this ahead of time. The more I got to know this man, the more I realized there was no end to his resourcefulness.
“If we are stopped by anyone, let me do the talking,” Jumaa had instructed. “There are enough Westerners in this city that we can explain you away as airport maintenance staff being called in to work at the airport. It won’t fool anyone for an extended period but should give us enough time to do what we need to do.”
Greatrex and I didn’t argue.
Feeling very exposed as we drove along one near-deserted street after another, I sensed relief when Jumaa finally announced, “We are almost there.”
As we turned off the appropriately named Africa Street, an array of army vehicles parked up near the arches of the terminal complex came into view. The military had evidently taken over the airport.
“Surely this is going to be too difficult,” I said. “If the army is everywhere, we’ll never get to the plane.”
Jumaa then veered right.
“This is the VIP section of the airport. It is most likely that your vice president’s plane will be in this area.”
He stopped the car outside a large industrial-looking building, its bland corrugated-iron walls towering above us as we climbed out. Apart from the intense midafternoon heat, the first thing that hit me was the lack of soldiers within sight in this part of the complex.
“This is strange,” said our guide as we walked past a series of maintenance related buildings. “I would have expected to be stopped and questioned by now.”
“There’s no way the army would have just ignored the VIP section of the terminal?” I asked.
“Not a chance — the army is experienced in closing down this facility. It has happened many times before, but not usually when the United States’ vice president’s plane is here.”
I nodded.
“This just doesn’t seem right,” Jumaa added.
We turned another corner and found ourselves standing at the edge of an expansive section of tarmac. Two high-end private jets stood idle, glistening in the sun. Neither one was Air Force Two. On the far side of the tarmac, another oversized hangar dominated the skyline.
“We will try in there,” said Jumaa.
Three minutes later, our luck ran out again. The hangar was empty.
“Follow me,” said our guide.
As we rounded the building on its east side, another hangar appeared before us. Its enormous bulk suggested it was big enough to hold a commercial jet, but its closed doors blocked any view inside. As we stepped forward, all eyes on the hangar, we virtually tripped over the motionless body of a Sudanese soldier lying on the ground. He lay at an awkward, unnatural angle. Blood seeped out of a bullet wound in his head, suggesting he’d been alive only minutes ago. Now he was clearly dead.
“Crap,” said the ever-observant Jack Greatrex.
“This is not good,” said Jumaa. “I’m thinking the army does not have control of this area of the airport.”
I was about to ask, ‘Then who the hell does?’ when the first round of bullets echoed in a machine-like thunder across the tarmac, penetrating the tin wall just above our heads.
“Down,” I yelled. Nicholas Sharp: stating the obvious.
The three of us hit the ground, clumsily struggling as we crawled our way back around the corner.
More bullets kicked up a trail of chipped concrete in front of us as we retreated.
“I’m betting the vice president’s plane is inside that hangar,” I said. “We need to find a way in.”
“I’ll double back around and try for a rear entrance,” said Greatrex.
“We are unarmed, and they have guns,” observed Jumaa. He looked surprised but not frightened.
“Hold that thought,” I said.
Before anyone argued with me, I leaped around the corner and dove down beside the dead soldier. My hands reeled as the radiant heat of the tarmac burned my skin. As if on cue, another round of gunfire echoed loudly above my head. I reached over the lifeless body and frantically wrestled the soldier’s Helcher & Koch G3 rifle from his hands before taking aim and returning fire in the general direction of our attacker. Using my own fire as cover, I got up and sprinted back around the corner of the hangar to join the others.
“Well, now we have a gun,” I announced.
Jumaa just stared at me, a look of disbelief on his face.
“Don’t ask,” said Greatrex, no further conversation.
I gave Greatrex five minutes to find his way around the back of the building before I leaned cautiously around the corner and fired off a few more rounds.
“You wait here,” I said to Jumaa as I took off across the tarmac, the wheels of the closest plane offering the only protection in sight. More gunfire erupted, but zigzagging made me a difficult target. When I made it to the plane, I noticed that the sniper had located himself behind the side door of the hangar, still some distance away. It takes one to find one.
Greatrex had better come through. I moved off, launching myself toward the wheels of the next parked plane a good eighty feet away — it felt more like eighty miles when the sniper opened up again.
I’d almost made it when suddenly a stream of bullets hit the tarmac directly in front of my running feet. Then the same thing happened directly behind me, shards of concrete spraying everywhere. With nowhere to go,
I became imprisoned by the gunfire. In one brief instant, the situation had become irretrievable.
I dove to the ground as I waited for the next hail of bullets to tear through my skin.
Then the gunfire stopped. I raised my head to see Greatrex standing at the side door where my would-be sniper had been. I saw a body lying at his feet. I didn’t hesitate. Back on my feet, I ran like all hell in his direction.
“I figured I was done,” I said as I took cover behind the office door next to the big fella.
“While he fired at you, I managed to get the drop on him,” said Greatrex, indicating in the direction of the fallen gunman.
“Next time you be the target,” I chuckled, amused but maybe also a little serious.
I looked at the dead man lying at our feet. He wore a long, white, loose-fitting collarless, and now bloodied robe. A galabiya. A similarly white skullcap clung tightly to his head. Typical Northern Sudanese clothing. But the most important takeaway was that his attire was not military uniform. While Greatrex took his gun, I searched him for identification. He carried none.
“He’s obviously not with the SAF,” I said.
“I’m thinking perhaps the breakaway Islamic terrorist group that Jumaa told us about,” said the big fella.
“That means he will probably have some friends around here somewhere.”
“After that volume of gunfire, the SAF soldiers at the main terminal will most likely be on their way here as we speak. We don’t have much time before this place becomes a hellhole of destruction,” he said.
Without saying more, we both turned and stepped through the hangar door into a small office area. At least now we both had weapons, which gave us—literally—a fighting chance.
There was no one in the room, but two doors led off the area. I indicated for Greatrex to take the door on the left while I moved right. Before I even got to my allocated door, Greatrex had his open.
“Damn and shit,” he exclaimed as he waved me over.
“Damn and shit indeed,” I said as I stepped toward him and look over his shoulder into the small room.
A pile of dead bodies lay haphazardly across the small room. Some wore SAF uniforms, some wore the distinctive dark suits of the Secret Service, and a couple were dressed in US Air Force uniforms. I presumed these to be the pilots of the vice president’s plane.
“In case we had any doubts,” I said, “these bastards are playing for keeps.”
The bile rose in my throat, but I saw no point standing there mourning the loss of life. We needed to move, and quickly. Both Greatrex and I had been trained to partition our emotions under pressure. Soldiers are good at building emotional walls, but not so good at tearing them down.
As we strode toward the other doorway, the big fella stopped and turned to me.
“Why are the terrorists here?” he asked. “I assumed they’d be as far away from Khartoum as possible by now.”
“I’ve been thinking about that since the first round of gunfire,” I responded. “The only thing that makes sense to me is that they came here for the same reason we did. I reckon they want to use the comms center on Air Force Two as a way to directly notify the authorities in the States that they have Vice President Blake.”
Greatrex nodded.
We reached the next door.
“On my count,” I said. “One, two, three.”
Greatrex pulled the door open with one hand while holding up his newly acquired weapon in the other. I went low and moved through the doorway with my rifle, scanning the area. To my relief, there was no barrage of gunfire to greet us. Then I wondered why.
The gigantic hangar stood silent. Once we realized we were safe—for now—our attention focused on the gleaming Boeing C-32 sitting in the center of the space. The gleaming white-and-blue coloring at once recognizable as the vice president’s plane, Air Force Two.
We stayed in the doorway for a few seconds, effecting a visual reconnaissance of the large space. We saw no one. It occurred to me that if the terrorists had been and gone, why did they leave a man guarding the building? Eventually the penny dropped.
“I’d put money on the fact that they are inside the plane and didn’t hear the gunfire outside,” I said.
“VIP aircraft can be well soundproofed,” said Greatrex. “It makes sense.”
“Okay,” I said. “Decision time. Do we move forward and confront these bastards, even though we don’t know how many people are aboard, or do we beat a hasty retreat? There will be other ways to make contact stateside.”
We looked at each other.
“There’s no choice to be made here,” said Greatrex. “Getting one of these people to talk may be our only way of finding out where the VP is being held. Besides, we need to make contact with the outside world now.”
Damn his patriotic logic.
“All right,” I said. “Forward it is.”
We split up. Jack made his way toward the rear of the aircraft, using the aviation equipment scattered around the hanger as cover. I did the same, heading toward the nose of the plane.
We met at the stairs on the far side of the aircraft; the only way in.
“This may get ugly,” said the big fella.
“Let’s go,” I said. “If we make it to the top of the stairs, you go aft, I’ll go forward.”
With that, we silently climbed the stairway.
Air Force Two is not laid out like a normal passenger plane. As we peeked into the entrance way, we could see a corridor leading to a larger cabin at the back. I reasoned the comms set-up would to be toward the front, near the cockpit, so I headed that way. If a firefight ensued in this enclosed space, I figured that greater numbers wouldn’t necessarily be a big advantage for the terrorists. At least that’s what I told myself as I stole forward.
I made it almost halfway up the corridor when a toilet door on my right suddenly opened. I had nowhere to go. A large man, also wearing the traditional galabiya, stepped in front of me. He saw me straightaway. Fortunately, I’d had a second’s warning. He had none.
The man began to reach into his robes, I quickly reversed my rifle, raised it and shoved the butt into the side of his head with as much force as I could muster in the confined space. He staggered sideways, clearly stunned. Before he responded further, I swung the butt again, an upward motion hard into his chin. He crumpled. He was unconscious before he hit the floor.
Greatrex had heard the noise and appeared behind me. I reached down to see what my opponent had been struggling to reach for under his robes. I pulled out a large khanjar, a fierce enough knife to take my head off with a single swipe. Thank God the man hadn’t got to it in time.
“Let’s work as a unit rather than separate,” whispered Greatrex.
I nodded.
We crept silently up the corridor before coming to a closed door at the far end. We heard voices coming from the other side; Arabic, and the tone sounded agitated. I didn’t understand the words, but it was obvious several people occupied the room ahead of us.
“This is it,” I said. “We go in together, firing. If there’s room, I’ll go right, you go left. If there’s no room you go low, I’ll go high. Try not to shoot me.”
My calm exterior belied the seriousness of the situation we prepared to face.
“One, two, three!”
After Greatrex turned the handle, I kicked the door open.
It took me less than a second to realize that we were totally outgunned. At least six men in the room, with most of them clutching Kalashnikov assault rifles tightly in their hands. The two who didn’t hold guns huddled over a complicated-looking communications system, their rifles lying on the bench next to them.
We had no choice but to fire quickly and decisively. I took out the two men on the right. Double taps into each of their chests. As discussed, Greatrex fired left. It was like a scene out of Pulp Fiction; noise and blood assaulting the senses, men yelling, screaming… and dying.
A man at the far end of the room reacte
d quickly and got a shot off. Taller than the others, slightly further away, he was clearly more focused. Fortunately, I had pushed forward and to my right after my opening barrage and his shot went wide. Before he managed another shot, Greatrex took him out with a short burst straight into his face. The bloodied corpse collapsed in a crippled heap.
Greatrex had the automatic weapon. He fired at the man sitting at the desk. The first rounds virtually took his arms off as the target died in a pool of blood and metal. The whole firefight took less than ten seconds. The last terrorist remained sitting at the comms desk, his hands on the surface in front of him. He looked at us without moving. His eyes kept darting to the Kalashnikov sitting about a foot to his right.
“I wouldn’t,” said Greatrex.
The man probably didn’t understand the language, but he appeared to understand the meaning of Greatrex’s tone. His shoulders seemed to slump in resignation. Then suddenly he leaped to his feet, yelled something we didn’t understand and threw himself toward his weapon. He died before his fingers touched the gun.
“That didn’t need to happen,” said Greatrex, who had just fired the shot. “It was pointless.”
“Just think about those dead bodies in that room back there,” I nodded in the direction of the office. “I wouldn’t call it pointless — more like justice,” I said.
“And justice is what you will face,” said a sullen voice behind us. “Weapons on the ground… Now!”
Greatrex and I turned our heads around slowly. We didn’t want to make any movement that could be misunderstood. A tall, dark figure stood in the doorway. He was breathing hard, but his hands were steady. They were holding a Kalashnikov. The gun swept a lethal arc between Greatrex and me. We put our guns on the carpet. As if we had a choice.
“You have caused an unexpected and needless delay to our task,” he began. His voice resonated in a deep, calm tone, his English accented, but faultless. His simmering anger appeared to build like an approaching tempest as he surveyed the damage we had caused. “I don’t know who you infidels are, nor do I care. I see you have murdered several of my brothers. That was undeserved, although they will be accepted into Paradise as they died carrying out God’s glorious work.”
