by J C Ryan
The bomber tumbled forward into the crater.
Rex divided the C4 into three pieces and fitted each piece with a detonator and placed it under the body; one piece each under the head, the torso, and the lower part of the body. He covered the body with some of the debris.
Rex wished he didn’t have to do his next task, for Digger’s sake and his own, but he had no choice. He went back to the spot where Trevor’s body laid and retrieved the mic, which Trevor used to communicate with Digger. The iPad was damaged beyond repair. At least he could now talk to Digger remotely if the situation called for it. He also retrieved Trevor’s SIG Sauer P226 and the three spare magazines, and stuffed it all into the canvas bag.
Rex got up and called Digger to follow him.
The two of them took position behind the perimeter wall of the property and Rex detonated the explosives.
He and Digger made a quick inspection. Rex was happy, there were now pieces of eight bodies onsite. The last body in significantly more, and much smaller, pieces than the other seven.
It was 1:53 a.m. Now to find the remaining two bombers who would give him the information about Usama’s whereabouts.
15
CRC Headquarters, Arizona, June 22, 11:30 a.m.
JOHN BRANDT HAD every confidence in his man, but after handing down the DCIA’s orders to Rex he had time to sit back and think. The nature of CRC’s work was such that they always had to be ready to swing into action at a moment’s notice. Short timeframes were not new to Brandt or his men. However, something about the abrupt about-face of the government’s Afghan opium policy was bothering him. He’d read Rex’s reports, practically begging for a chance to do something about the Afghan drug trade for the past six months or more. Brandt had personally sent those reports to Carson. But Carson gave all except one of the reports the silent treatment. The one exception was a two-word reply: “Permission denied.”
Now, suddenly, totally out of the blue, CRC had been ordered to gatecrash a drug lord/Taliban meeting, kill all the participants, and blow up all drugs found on the premises. If Rex and his men were caught, they’d face Afghan justice, or worse, terrorist justice. When Carson had called him, Brandt had only thought of two things – one, that Rex would finally get his chance, and two, that there was no time to waste.
Now that the operation was in progress, maybe even over, with no word yet, he started to wonder if he shouldn’t have wasted a little time to think things through and ask a few more questions. But the nature of the work they did and the shadow world they operated in was such that they were not expected to question the motivations for missions, only to execute them successfully.
He’d been expecting Dalton’s call any time after midnight, Afghanistan time. Normally, his sleep patterns were serene, even when he had one or more teams in the field with dangerous mission parameters. His men were the best on the planet, he had no doubt in his mind about that. Therefore, he didn’t worry like a parent whose teenage daughter was out late on a blind date. But after apprising Dalton of the changed mission parameters, despite the confidence he had in the man, something, which he couldn’t lay his finger on, was bedeviling the melatonin in his brain, making it impossible to get back to sleep.
At eleven-thirty on the morning of June 22, he began to fidget. Dalton’s call should come in any time now. Brandt downed his fourth cup of coffee of the morning, an indulgence because of his sleepless night, which didn’t do anything but make him even more jittery. He attributed his nerves to the unusual caffeine load and schooled himself to be patient. In the next half-hour, he snapped at his adjutant for no reason and had to apologize, handled a supplies delivery snafu, and began pacing aimlessly in and out of his office as noon approached.
Telling himself that Rex must be dealing with some kind of cleanup issue, he forced himself to go to the mess hall to have lunch with the teams who were onsite. He usually had his lunch in his office. Eating with the men didn’t help either. He wolfed his food down as if he had to be somewhere, stat. He mumbled what sounded like an excuse, left the table, and hurried back to his office, with his senior instructors staring askance at each other. It didn’t have to be vocalized – the Old Man was out of sorts and they knew not to ask.
By 12:30 p.m., he was pacing again. Why hadn’t Dalton called? He found busy-work to keep from panicking, but an hour later, he was about to pick up the phone to call Carson to tell him something was not right, when it rang under his hand. He snatched it up.
DCIA Carson was on the line. “Congrats on a good job!” he said, failing to announce his name.
He wouldn’t think to say who it is, thought Brandt. Damn narcissist. Aloud, he said, “Afghanistan?”
“What else?” Carson said, but he continued without waiting for an answer. “I just got word from Kabul, the COS, Chief of Station,” Carson explained as if Brandt wouldn’t know what the acronym meant. “Seems there was a huge explosion in that strange-name place Koh-e something, a couple of hours ago. Apparently at 11:40 Juliet, to be exact.
“But I guess you already know all of it, don’t you?”
Brandt cleared his throat. “No, in fact I don’t. I haven’t heard from my man as yet.”
“Hmm, is that normal?”
“No, absolutely not normal. He should have been in contact long ago but has not. Especially if it’s as you said, that there was an explosion in that area. I don’t believe in coincidence.”
“Let me see what I can do from my end to speed things up. The COS told me he has been trying to get more information, but in that place nothing happens fast. However, I think we can tick this one off as a success. Cheer up man, sounds like everything went according to plan. I’m looking forward to reading your man’s detailed post-mission report. In the meantime, congrats to your man over there on a job well-done.”
Brandt made suitable noises, just to get Carson off the line as quick as possible, but his mind was going a million miles a minute. No way would the COS have received word before Rex Dalton reported in, if everything had gone according to plan. That was not how he was trained, and that was not how he operated.
He kept his thought to himself. Maybe it was his sense of self-preservation, or maybe it was his years of experience as a spy dealing with deceit and misdirection. In either case, this wasn’t the time to blurt out his misgivings about the situation. He thanked Carson for the update and put the phone down.
Brandt now had more reason to be concerned as he stared at his satellite phone, willing it to ring. He couldn't help but start playing out all possible scenarios in his mind, concluding in the end, the least likely of them all was the one the DCIA told him about.
He was not a pessimistic kind of man by nature, but he was not stupid; he was a realist. If the mission was a success, Rex would have phoned him by now. Rex had a satellite phone with him. If he was incapable of calling because of injury or worse, one of the team members would have called someone in the CIA office in Kabul. Whatever the situation, it just didn't make sense that the COS would have gotten information through the Afghan police and military grapevine before Rex or a team member would’ve called.
There was probably only one logical inference one could draw. The mission was in some kind of trouble, and then the questions were: What went wrong? How did it go wrong? Where did it go wrong? Who was responsible for it going wrong?
Every avenue of thought led him back to one dead end, unbeknownst to Brandt, the same as Rex’s – betrayal.
The question now was who was behind that? Was Carson directly involved, or had he been duped as well? If by some miracle, Rex was alive, the next question was how would he see it, and how would he react to it?
Brandt called Rick Longland to his office. “Have a seat, Rick. I want to run something past you.”
Longland had one look at Brandt and knew something was wrong, and it was not just a niggly little problem, this was a major problem.
Brandt explained the situation, how he’d been called just about twelve ho
urs before by the DCIA, and the mission details given to him, which he had passed on to Rex to execute. Without stating his own concerns, he related the call he’d just taken from Carson.
“What do you think?”
Longland’s face had turned white. He and John Brandt were old friends. They’d known each other for more than thirty years. As the chief psychologist at CRC, his job was not just to test the agents to make sure they hadn’t lost their marbles and become a menace to society. He also had to support them and help them deal with loss, and grief, and killing human beings, nightmares, and stress such as Brandt was displaying right now.
“John, it’s obvious something’s out of the ordinary, no argument there. Difficult as it might be right now, you’ll have to wait until you have more information. I don’t have to tell you that – you know it as well as I do.
“Dalton is your blue-eyed boy, that’s no secret to me, and for that very reason, it’s necessary that you get hold of yourself and wait until you know more.”
“Yeah, right,” Brand sighed. “Easier said than done.”
“Bring your sat phone and let’s go for walk,” Longland suggested, as he could think of nothing else to say that would calm his friend down.
16
Koh-e Shir Darwaza, Kabul, Afghanistan June 23, 2:23 a.m.
REX DECIDED HE had to get back to his truck, get out of there, disappear for a while, and stay low until he could gather information about the other bombers and locate them.
Digger was sitting a few yards away, looking at Rex as if studying his mind.
“Come on, Digger, let’s go.”
Digger didn’t get up, but he looked back in the direction of the hut where they’d found the haji. He turned his head back toward Rex, yawned wide, and then snapped his mouth shut with an audible click of his teeth.
Rex was tired, discouraged, and grief-stricken. Saddled with a dog he neither wanted nor knew how to handle, he was in no mood to brook mutiny. He thought about grabbing Digger’s collar and dragging him to the truck. Second thoughts stopped him.
His own phobias left him reluctant to get that close in the first place. More to the point, he’d seen Digger take down men and he didn’t want to be on the receiving end of that treatment. Another thought quickly followed. Physical force had never been Trevor’s way of handling Digger. Rex suspected he’d blow his chances of ever working with the dog if he tried that. And if he was going to be responsible for Digger, though he didn’t yet know how that would even be possible, then the dog would certainly need to earn his keep.
Rex had to admit, Digger could be a useful ally. He certainly had been during the raids he and Trevor had visited on the drug operations so far. He’d been vital to the operation they’d just completed – Rex wouldn’t have even known the haji was out there without Digger. He could see potential. But if it was going to work, the damn dog had to listen to him and obey, not just some of the time, but all of the time. He was honest enough to understand he would also need to learn how to interpret the dog’s cues.
For now, though, Rex was certain he knew what was best. Impatiently, he called the dog again. “Digger, come!”
Digger tilted his head in that questioning gesture all dogs have. But he didn’t get up. Instead, he gave a short, soft growl, and then a sharp yip. If Rex hadn’t known the dog couldn’t literally speak English, he’d have sworn Digger had just said, “No!” From the look on his face, maybe even “No! Get lost!”
For the first time in recent memory, Rex couldn’t think of a thing he could do to resolve the impasse. If Digger had been a human team member and defied him like that, Rex would have knocked him down and showed him who was boss. He’d already rejected that tactic with Digger, but the only alternative he knew was persuasion, and he didn’t think that would work, either.
He tried. “Digger, please get in the truck.”
Digger looked away.
“Digger, get in the truck!” Shouting didn’t work, either.
When Digger still defied the direct order, Rex threw up his hands in frustration. Shit, he thinks he’s the alpha. How am I supposed to take care of him if he won’t listen to me?
“What the hell do you want from me?” he asked, certain he was losing the argument, along with his patience.
Digger got up and started sniffing around in widening circles. Rex watched, mystified. A few minutes later Digger stopped, sat down, gave a low growl to get Rex’s attention and started off back in the direction of the mud hut.
“Damn it, Digger, it’s just you and me now. You better learn I am in charge, and you have to listen to me. Come on, get in the truck, or I’m leaving without you.” Rex knew it was a hollow threat. His buddy, Trevor, maybe his best friend in the world after the year they’d spent together and all the adventures they’d had, had asked Rex with his dying words to take care of the damn dog. And take care of Digger he would, whether Digger liked it or not.
Digger must have known Rex was talking out of his hat, too. He just looked over his shoulder back at Rex as if to say, “You coming or not?”
“All right, have it your way. Shit, now I’m following orders from a dog. I must be losing my mind.” Rex soon realized he was also speaking his thoughts aloud, and if Digger’s behavior was any sign, there could be more tangos out there. In fact, he knew there were, though he thought they were out of the area by now. Digger, though, seemed determined to find them. Rex stopped talking abruptly.
He gave up and followed the dog. It had paid off last time. Maybe the haji’s companions had returned. Rex hoped so. It would save him the trouble of tracking them down later, and he thought it might be prudent to let Digger follow their scent trail before too many hours passed, as well. He’d learned a lot about Digger’s capabilities from Trevor, but he’d never thought to ask how long a scent remained viable for the dog to follow.
Had Rex asked Trevor about it, Trevor would have told him that once a dog gets a human’s scent it gets engraved in the dog’s memory. He never forgets it and will point out the human regardless of time passed. So even if the scent in the air and on the ground might be wiped out over time, and the dog might not be able to follow it, he will remember it when he encounters it again, even years later. And the dog will associate that scent with how the human treated or mistreated him or anyone of his pack. Some say an elephant never forgets; it’s the same with dogs.
But it was too late now to ask Trevor anything. He’d have to trust the dog.
As he’d thought, Digger’s destination was the hut. When Rex got there, Digger was sniffing and pawing at the bedding on one of the two bunks. He ripped the thin mattress to shreds and buried his nose in the mess, then snorted and started on the second mattress. Rex didn’t stop him. He was too busy wondering how much of the terrorist’s confession Digger had understood. It made no sense to him. Digger ‘spoke’ English, or to be precise, Australian English, not Arabic.
Rex was a little spooked at the thought that Digger could have reasoned out the meaning of the haji’s confession. Not only that, but he remembered long enough to help Rex before coming back to finish the job he’d set himself – finding everyone responsible for the tragedy. Being spooked didn’t stop Rex from being impressed, though. He decided to let the dog’s intentions play out.
“What is it, boy? Have you got the scent of the others?”
Digger looked up and gave Rex a stare with eyes that looked alert. He’d stopped tearing the mattresses apart. He gave a soft woof and began snuffling along the floor, following the random movements of the missing tangos, Rex assumed. For some reason of his own, Digger continued out the door after sniffing over what Rex could only think of as a grid he’d laid out in his canine mind. Rex followed him.
Rex decided it couldn’t hurt to make the dog think it was his idea to follow the trail. “Digger, track.”
The dog’s ears pricked back at the sound of his name, and he stopped, twisted his head back toward Rex, and yawned again. He wagged his tail, to the righ
t, and then trotted off, with Rex jogging to keep up.
What did Trevor tell me about wagging tails? To the left, happy, to the right… what the hell? He’s annoyed with me? Rex was beginning to understand that he had a lot of dog lore to learn before he’d be able to interpret all Digger’s non-verbal cues. What’s all that yawning about, anyway? Does it mean he’s tired, or is he telling me something? When people yawn, they’re sometimes bored.
Half a mile away, Digger went into what appeared to be a cave in a hillside and didn’t come out again. Alarmed, Rex called him. Rex wasn’t prepared to go into a cave where an ambush might have been waiting without a lot more scouting and maybe some backup.
A minute later, Digger came to the opening, looked at Rex with an expression that plainly said. “What are you waiting for?” and ducked back in, Rex had no choice but to follow, albeit cautiously.
Digger has never led me, us, into trouble before.
Ducking through the opening, he discovered a big, airy space that had been artificially enlarged and braced with lumber. No one was there, but evidence of recent occupation remained in the lit lanterns that gave him a good view of the space. Including, it seemed, the scent of at least one of the two men Digger was tracking. The dog was disappearing into a narrow opening at the back of the cave that looked like a tunnel.
“Digger, no,” Rex said. He thought it may have been his urgency, or maybe that was a command he was trained to follow without question. In any case, it worked.
The dog turned around and gave him a ‘why not?’ look. Rex felt a little ridiculous as he conversed with the dog, but he didn’t know of any other way to keep him from disappearing down that tunnel, and Rex wasn’t going there. Not right now. Who knew where it led? “We don’t have time right now. We’ll come back to it, I promise. Please come with me now. We have work to do.”
