The blade split the soft skin and muscle to bring forth a rush of blood that seemed to glow in the firelight. A second fierce chop sank deeper into the gaping muscle to separate vertebrae - the vile blood splashing up, painting the warrior’s face and chest. He delivered two more blows, until the head was cleanly separated.
Grunting with satisfaction, the warrior tossed the axe aside and grabbed the severed head by its soft locks. But his smile vanished when he looked into the glowering eyes that still seemed alive. Even the soft lips remained frozen in a taunting grimace.
Enliatu went to the fire pit. ‘
Eck tok micham-ae ful-tha
.’ He pointed to the second simmering clay bowl.
Extending the ghastly head away from his body, the warrior dropped it into the boiling resin. Enliatu watched it sink lazily into the opaque sap amidst a swirl of blood - its dead eyes still glaring defiantly, as if to promise that the stranger’s curse had only just begun.
‘I’m empty!’ Jam called over to his unit commander who was four metres away, crouched behind a massive limestone boulder.
Keeping his right eye pressed to the rifle scope, Sergeant Jason Yaeger reached into his goatskin rucksack, pulled out a fresh magazine, and smoothly tossed it to Jam. Hot metal intermingled with the discharge gases blowing downwind from the muzzle vent on Jam’s rifle. ‘Slow it down or you’re going to lock it up!’ Precisely the reason Jam had earned his nickname, he thought.
Jam ejected the spent clip, snapped in the new one.
The unit’s mishmash of Russian weapons, scrounged from a wandering Afghani arms dealer, gave each man’s rifle a unique report that helped Jason to roughly keep a count on expended rounds. Jam was heavy on the trigger of his Cold-War-era AK-74 - more pull than squeeze. The others in the unit were far more judicious with their shots.
Though the ten remaining Arab militants had superior numbers and a high-ground advantage, the art of the kill was heavily weighted in favour of Jason’s seasoned team. The dwindling ammo supply, however, couldn’t have come at a worse time. If the bad guys were to call for backup, Jason’s unit could be attacked from the rear in the open flatlands leading to the foothills. Worse yet, the enemy might slip through the nearby crevasse and head deeper into the Zagros Mountains - a rebel’s paradise filled with caves and labyrinthine, rugged passes.
Over the border and into Iran.
He whistled to Jam, made a sweeping hand motion that sent him scrambling up the hill and to the right. He fought the urge to scratch at the prickly heat beneath his scruffy beard, which, along with contact lenses that transformed his hazel eyes to muddy brown, a deep tan that could be the envy of George Hamilton, an unflattering galabiya robe, vest, and loose-fit pants combo, a keffiyeh headwrap with agal rope circlet, and sandals - had respectably passed him off as a Bedouin nomad. The other unit members had donned similar dress.
It took less than a two-count before a red-and-white chequered keffiyeh popped up over the rock pile, a Kalashnikov semi-automatic sweeping into view an instant later. Sliding his index finger off the trigger guard while matching crosshairs to chequers, Jason squeezed off three successive shots that would’ve left a perfect dime grouping on a bullseye. Through the scope he saw a pink mist and red blobs spit out behind the headscarf.
He adjusted the remaining target tally downward: nine.
Ducking from sight, he grabbed his rucksack and scrambled away just as a pomegranate-shaped grenade arced over the boulder, landed in the sand and popped. A ten-metre uphill dash brought him to a rocky hillock covered in scrubby brush. More automatic gunfire burst in his direction as he dived for cover.
While the militants screamed back and forth to one another in Arabic - not Kurdish? - Jason brought out his Vectronix binoculars and scanned the two enemy positions. The device’s laser automatically calculated GPS coordinates while recording live images on to its micro-sized hard drive.
Dipping beneath the hillock, he flipped open a laminated field map to verify the correct kill box on the grid. From his vest pocket he fished a sat-com that looked nearly identical to a civilian cell phone. He placed a call to the airbase at Camp Eagle’s Nest, north of Kirkuk. A barely perceptible delay followed by a tiny digital chirp confirmed that the transmission was being securely encrypted, just before the command operator responded with the first authentication question: ‘Word of the day?’
He pressed the transmitter button. ‘Cadillac.’
Chirp. Delay.
‘Colour?’
Chirp. Delay.
‘Magenta.’
Chirp. Delay.
‘Number?’
Chirp. Delay.
‘One-fifty-two.’
Pause. Chirp.
‘How can I help, Google?’
Even under fire, Jason had to smile. He’d earned his new nickname a few months ago, after joining the boys at the air-base for a drink-while-you-think version of Trivial Pursuit. Jason had circled the game board and filled his pie wheel without ever cracking open a beer. The other players weren’t as fortunate, but maybe that was their intention. Obtuse facts - ‘things no self-respecting 29-year-old should know’ - were Jason’s forte. What he wouldn’t do to have that beer right now …
‘We’re low on ammo. Copy,’ Jason reported loudly over the persistent rat-a-tat-tat-tat in the background. ‘Nine militants pinned down. Some light artillery. Need a gunship ASAP.’ He provided the operator with the kill box and INS coordinates. ‘Have the pilot call me on approach.’
‘Roger. I’ll have Candyman there in four minutes.’
Noting the time on his no-frills wristwatch, he slid the sat-com back into his vest and mopped the sweat from his eyes with his sleeve.
He needed to make sure that the others weren’t too close to the intended strike zones.
First he glanced over to Jam, who was now a good fifteen metres further up the slope, curled up in a gulch, cursing at his weapon’s stuck slide bolt. Vulnerable, but he was adequately covered.
Along the roadway at the hill’s base, Camel was still dug in behind a felled, bullet-riddled Arabian one-humper. For the past few months, former marine sniper Tyler Hathcock had shared a strange - at times, disturbing - bond with the beast, which, coupled with his preferred cigarette brand, helped to inspire his nickname. Earlier, Camel had used the beast as a decoy by riding it bareback down the narrow roadway to block the approaching enemy convoy. When the ambush began, he’d been trapped in the open. So he’d dismounted, shot his humped buddy through the ear and used it as a surprisingly effective shield.
Crazy bastard.
Not far from Camel’s position, he spotted Dennis Coombs - dubbed ‘Meat’ for his imposing stature that was pure Oklahoma farm boy muscle - still pinned down behind the severely strafed Toyota pickup that had been the convoy’s lead vehicle. In the driver’s seat was the slumped body of an Arab male, back of the head blown open, brain matter and gore smeared throughout the cabin, compliments of Jason’s opening three rounds delivered from fifty metres to the mark’s left eye.
Behind the Toyota were three more trucks left abandoned by the enemy. Eight dead Arabs littered the ground around them. Bobbing in and out of view over the hood of the second truck was the red turban marking Jason’s last man, Hazo. The 42-year-old Kurd acted as the unit’s eyes and ears: translator, facilitator, go-to man. Hazo was simultaneously their best asset and worst liability, since, like most Kurdish Christians, he refused to handle a weapon. All brain, no brawn - but a helluva a nice guy. Jason guessed that Hazo was in the fetal position reciting a few novenas. If he didn’t move, he’d be perfectly safe.
Jason low-crawled further up the rise. When he peeked up to survey the enemy again, he didn’t like what he saw. Behind a formidable rock pile, three white-turbaned Arabs had unpacked a long polyethylene case they’d hauled out from the Toyota before taking off for the hills on foot. The sand-coloured weapon they were now assembling had a long fat tube with Soviet markings. A fourth man wearing a black keffiyeh was readying its first mortar shell.
‘Damn.’
Jason used his binoculars to scout the airspace above the western plain, until he found the black bird twelve klicks out over the horizon, closing in fast. Two minutes away, he guessed. He’d need to buy some time before the guys with the rocket launcher got busy.
He positioned himself behind a natural V in the rock. Not the best sight line and only the targets’ headscarves were visible … but he’d make it work. With the stock of his SVD sniper rifle nestled comfortably on his right shoulder, Jason stared through the scope and took aim at the black keffiyeh. Then he sprang up slightly until the target’s angular, bearded face panned into view.
Pop-pop-pop.
The rounds hit home and pink mist confirmed the kill.
The mortar fumbled out from the dead man’s hand, rolled out of view. The three white turbans retreated from his crosshairs as they scrambled to recover it. Jason sank back below the ridge. The sat-com vibrated in his vest pocket. He pulled it out and hit the receiver.
‘It’s Candyman. Talk to me, Google.’
‘Three targets remaining in position one … guns and an RPG. Copy.’
‘Roger. And position two?’
‘Five gunmen. Copy.’
‘You’re getting soft on me. I thought we were gonna see some real action.’
‘Sorry to disappoint, Candyman.’
After pocketing the sat-com, Jason took up his rifle and rucksack then kept moving further up the hillock, hoping to get a better angle on the white turbans. But only arms and legs occasionally came into view. With limited rounds to spare, it was headshots or nothing at all. He only hoped the men wouldn’t succeed in loading the RPG-7 before the air strike commenced.
His new vantage point did, however, let him monitor the gunmen who were pinned down in the second position: four men surrounding one tall guy in the centre. Jason swung the rifle in their direction and steadied the crosshairs over a chunky Arab who was all cheeks beneath a patchy grey beard. Patchy made an abrupt move that granted Jason a clear facial on the central figure nestled in the ring’s centre. The sinister portrait Jason captured in the crosshairs made his heart skip a beat.
‘Can’t be,’ he murmured.
That hard dark face, however, and the incredible death toll associated with it, was unmistakable. What the hell was
he
doing here? The visceral urge to pull the trigger was overwhelming. But if he knowingly took down terrorism’s newest most-wanted man, he’d whip up an unimaginable shit storm. Directives were black and white for a reason, he reminded himself. Not yet. Let it go. He quickly zoomed in on the face with his binoculars and recorded the images.
Snatching up the sat-com, he used the analogue walkie-talkie channel to radio the other unit members: ‘Nobody fire on position two. I repeat: hold your fire on position two.’
The thumping rotors of the AH-64 Apache were getting louder by the second. Dropping back, Jason watched the gunship sweeping in on a direct line.
A second later, the sat-com vibrated on its digital channel and he hit the receiver.
‘That you, Candyman?’
‘Roger, Google. You ready for me?’
‘Yes, but do not, I repeat, do not fire on position two. Over.’
‘Got it. How ‘bout position one?’
Jason peeked up over the rocks, saw one of the white turbans pop up then disappear. Then the rocket tube came in and out of view. No clear shot for Jason.
‘Hydras on position one. Have at it,’ Jason replied urgently.
‘Roger that. Stay low and cover your ears.’
Fifteen seconds later, the Apache was in strike range. The laser sensor on its nosecone locked on the rock pile’s GPS coordinates. An instant later, a pair of Hydra 70 missiles launched from the chopper’s stub-wing pylons.
Jason stole a final glimpse of position one. The RPG-7 launch tube jutted out from the rock, this time with a mortar securely affixed to its tip. It was going to be close.
Ducking down, he tossed his rifle to the ground, covered his ears, and pressed his back against the mound. He watched the missiles stream in along sharp trajectories that laced the crystalline blue sky with two crisp lines of exhaust smoke - a fearsome sight.
Then Jason witnessed an equally remarkable sight: as the tandem missiles hissed overhead, the rocket launcher’s mortar sliced upward and glanced one of them - not hard enough to detonate the Hydra’s warhead, but enough to push it off its intended path.
The first Hydra slammed position one and threw a reverberating blast wave over the mound that made Jason’s teeth rattle. A rush of intense heat came right behind it.
A split second later, the second Hydra struck and the ground quaked even harder. The explosion echoed off the mountains.
Jason watched the chopper bank hard to avoid the wobbling mortar, which stayed airborne for five seconds before plummeting into an orchard of date trees and exploding in a tight orange fireball.
As he pulled his hands from his ringing ears, a tattered white turban covered in red splotches came fluttering down from the sky and landed at his feet. With it came the smell of burnt flesh.
Snatching up his rifle, Jason flipped the selector to burst. Then he scrambled down the slope, careful not to let his sandals slip on the gore blanketing the hillside. With the rifle high on his shoulder, he swept the muzzle side to side, waiting for any movement near the decimated rock pile. The smoke and dust made it impossible to see what was happening behind the second position, so he eased back, took cover behind a boulder, and waited. He scanned the area through his gun scope. No activity.