The Unpredictable

by Tom Avito

  The thick darkness of the night was gradually losing its consistency, slightly fading away in the East, permeated by a dim glimmer of soft light. He would have loved to stop and bask in the beauty of the dawning day, as he’d often done in very different situations; but this was neither the place nor the time for old melancholies, he couldn’t indulge the thought that he was only the result of his fortunate past, rather he had to convince himself that he was one of the causes of his own certain future.

  He soon found himself at the limit of the village he’d imagined shortly before. A good sign, as he’d hoped, it was Sendal, the last Iranian stronghold, some forty kilometers away from the Iraqi border. Perhaps he was getting closer to the end of that unbelievable and absurd story, to the outcome of his own will and of the fate written by destiny’s hand. He’d underestimated the various facets and the consequences of his own choices, yet that’s how it is, when you pray for rain you must expect mud too. Only when Sara had revealed to him that he was going to become a father had he realized, too late, that he was neck-deep in mud. This was the final hand of the deadly game he’d been playing, it was time to lay his last cards on the table, but his greatest concern was now the belief that his opponents around the table had changed or switched places.

  The placidity of the winter morning reigned supreme in the small town of Sendal, when he walked in along the main road coming from north. Growing fear clouded his mind, as his certainties wavered and his faith in the people he’d relied on crumbled. His attention was blinded and the situational awareness was completely lacking.

  An off-road vehicle appearing from the road perpendicular to the one he was walking suddenly jerked to a halt a few meters away from him, two men armed with machine guns threw themselves out of the vehicle and ordered him to climb off the dromedary. Lady Luck was no longer smiling at him, all his efforts were being made vain by a moment of dejection and recklessness. He had no choice, the soldiers’ weapons gave him no escape, so he obeyed in silence.

  “Get down on your knees! Hands on your head!” One of the two men shouted at him.

  He climbed off the dromedary and knelt on the dirt road, as he went down so did his hopes, plummeting into an abyss of desperation. His hands were behind his head and he was looking down when he caught sight of the majestic silhouette of a third person climbing out of the vehicle.

  “Well, well, well. So we meet again, my Swiss Exploration friend!” Bagheli’s unmistakable voice boomed like a funeral bell.

  He didn’t have the strength to look up, he saw the Minotaur’s feet treading the dirt in front of him, then everything disappeared.

  CHAPTER 19

  Sendal (Iran), 01/18/2012 10:00 A.M.

  -“Sendal”-

  The blunt, strong blow hit him at the nape of the neck without a warning; he was completely unprepared to receive it. It was as if all of a sudden he’d been deprived of his vital energy, someone had pulled the plug and he went out like a lightbulb.

  The green field, magically tinted purple by blossoming lavender, looked endless. He was lying on the soft grassy surface and watching her come closer, ecstatic. Sara was running towards him, bursting with joy. Her sundress, a light pastel yellow, fluttered around her as she ran. But something in the vision was warped, discordant. She was pregnant, carrying their future heir, it was foolish of her! He wanted to tell her not to run, to be careful, but the words didn’t leave his mouth. He tried and failed to shout louder, she kept on joyfully running towards him. He decided to move towards her and beg her to be cautious, but his body remained on the ground, motionless, unable to react to any stimulus. He tried again, his hands were paralyzed, he struggled to free them until a piercing pang in his head gave him the clarity he needed to understand that he was lying on the back seat of the white off-road vehicle, still in the middle of the road in Sendal.

  He kept still as reality slowly made its way back into his mind. The first man got in and sat in the driver’s seat, then the second man opened the rear left door and sat next to him, carelessly pushing his legs off the seat, clearly thinking he was still unconscious. Nino remained as limp as a stuffed puppet.

  As soon as the driver started the engine, the door next to him opened and Bagheli climbed in.

  “Is the bastard still out?” The Minotaur asked the man in the rear seat.

  “Yes.”

  “Wake him and make him sit up,” he ordered.

  The man grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled on the dirty burnous, now blood-stained due to the wound at the back of his neck. He yanked Nino up into a sitting position, his head still hanging, he couldn’t control its movements.

  “Wake up, pig!” The man shouted at him, pushing him around in the attempt to make him come to.

  Nino opened his eyes, all he could manage was a painful groan. He wasn’t pretending, his head really gave him the impression that everything around him was moving, but the car was still; it took all his effort and concentration to slow down the vortex of images that surrounded him.

  Bagheli put his head out the window and said to someone: “You stay here, look around, the others must be here too.”

  “The Wharzes. They’re doomed!” He thought.

  He was devastated by the thought of letting them fall into the hands of that pack of wolves again, but he was in no position to help them, he couldn’t even save himself for that matter.

  “Doctor Avito, are you ready to talk to me? What have you been up to these past few days?” The Iranian asked ironically.

  The off-road turned around and got ready to leave the village of Sendal; the Minotaur was aching to get his revenge.

  Bagheli was the head of the VEVAK’s Personal Security Team, he’d been given the task of keeping the Wharzes safe and making sure that the program the professor was working on could carry on without hindrance. The recent events, the two attacks, the break-in in the Andimeshk residence and the scientist’s escape with his son, were putting at stake not only his place in the services, but something completely irreplaceable. The wrath that was devouring Bagheli had pushed him through his ruthless hunt, his sixth sense had also detected Nino’s involvement when he’d disappeared into thin air on the night of the attack at the villa. Having caught him must have given Bagheli a sense of fulfillment that would only reach its climax upon capturing the Wharzes. If he hadn’t succeeded shortly, his head would have had a hard time remaining on his neck, and rather than being commended for resisting an incursion by the special forces of who knew what country, he’d find himself to be the only culprit to hold as a scapegoat for the scientist’s escape.

  The car had just left the village, heading north. Nino didn’t know exactly how much time had passed since the lights had gone out in his head but he knew that, where they were heading, he wouldn’t make it through a single hour in the sweet hands of the enraged Iranian.

  Here the white dusty road ended, making way to a compact asphalt that would allow the wolves to travel speedily towards their lair. Nino was beat up and handcuffed. He caught sight of the large truck speeding to their left; as soon as the driver in his car engaged the first gear and got ready to merge onto the main road, he played his only card.

  He instinctively kicked the driver’s arm with his right leg, extending it between the two front seats. Unexpectedly quickly given his physical state, he managed to pull his leg back in time and lie down on the seat again. The car swerved, out of control, the truck driver was caught by surprise and veered left, at that point the crash was inevitable and violent. He covered his head, curling up into a ball, as the truck hit the front left part of the vehicle, making it turn over twice. The force of the impact was such that the driver and the passenger in the rear left seat instantly lost their lives.

  The tangle of metal plates held butchered meat inside. Someone, however, was still breathing.

  He felt fuzzy and confused but the simple fact of having been able to prepare for the impact a fraction of a second before the others had allowed him to survive. He
still had one big effort to face: his left leg was trapped between the remains of his guardian’s body and the driver’s ripped seat. He didn’t know whether it was still in one piece, but the pain he felt when he tried to move it around and free it didn’t bode well. He gritted his teeth and pulled harder; after an excruciatingly painful stab that blinded him for a moment, he understood that his leg was free at last. He managed to sit up and touch his shin, hoping he wouldn’t feel the bone sticking out of his flesh. It didn’t seem so bad - it was probably just a compound fracture that wouldn’t stop him entirely. He went through the pockets of what was left of the man sitting next to him, his hands drenching in blood. Then he found something. He picked up a cell phone and keys. He also took the Tokarev from its holster and tried to crawl out of the bloody metal trap.

  Groans of pain came from the front seat of the car; he had to get out of there immediately.

  The truck driver came to their aid, desperately trying to open the front door and help the person who was moaning incessantly.

  The rear window had exploded and the deformed opening was just barely large enough for him to slide through, pushing himself out - a strenuous task due to his smarting leg. It took him a few minutes to make it out, as sharp pieces of metal got caught in his clothes, ripping his skin together with the fabric. As the truck driver focused on trying to save Bagheli, he remained seated on the pavement for a moment, leaning his back against the car’s carcass. Without letting go of the Tokarev, he picked up the keys and tried to use the smallest one to open the handcuffs that were tying his hands up.

  He was free, beaten up but still alive, his jailers had gotten the worst of it. If the car had swerved left rather than right, he’d be the in the same shape as the Iranian next to him. A shiver ran down his spine, mingling with the pain in his battered leg.

  “My dear Amir, you’re right, it is best to be born with a bit more luck than brains!” He recalled what his dear friend had often said to him.

  He managed to stand up, shifting his weight onto his good leg, and walked over to the truck driver who was kneeling by the car and had managed to pull Bagheli out almost to his waist. The Minotaur was tough, he was fighting the pain and trying to push himself out of the car’s trap.

  Nino knew what he had to do.

  “Stay on your knees and put your hands on your head,” he ordered the truck driver.

  “What? We’ve got to get him out. The car could catch fire any moment now!” The man replied.

  “I guess I didn’t make myself clear. Put your hands on your head or I’ll blow you up!” Nino added, loading up the gun.

  The driver realized he was not kidding and obeyed the order.

  The Tokarev’s barrel was aiming straight at Bagheli who, despite the spasms and the pain, was glaring at him with pure hatred. Now all he had to do was pull the trigger and put an end to his controversy with the Minotaur. The solution was simple, but by no means easy: he wasn’t a murderer, he could never kill a man in cold blood. He couldn’t live out the rest of his days with the burden of having taken another life.

  “Fuck it!” He cried out.

  His index finger hesitated and moved away from the trigger. He moved the barrel that had been aiming at Bagheli’s forehead, took a deep breath, then leaned against the car and violently hit Bagheli in the head with the gun’s grip. This time, it was the Iranian who went out like a lightbulb.

  CHAPTER 20

  Sendal (Iran), 01/18/2012 12:00 P.M.

  -“Sahal el-Din”-

  Using the handcuffs that had been tying his hands, he cuffed the truck driver to the remains of a suspension that had been dislodged from the car upon impact. This would give him the chance to walk away from the vehicle, at a slow pace due to the weight of the metal piece he was dragging, allowing him to escape the fire that would likely break out. At the same time, it prevented the man from running away to ask for help, alerting the military forces in Sendal, which was just five kilometers away. Bagheli was still unconscious, still partly caught in the metal wreck, perhaps the car driver would take care of him, but ultimately the Minotaur’s fate was the last thing on his mind, he’d already spared him too much. After checking that there were working no radio transmitters or cell phones, he limped away from the place of the accident.

  On that strip of asphalt that ripped the landscape in two all the way to the horizon, it was uncommon to see more than a few vehicles drive by throughout a whole day, they would have been real lucky to receive help in a short time. This time, more than ever before, destiny would be the one to decide the fate of a few men, his own and Bagheli’s first of all.

  He walked, trying to support himself with the metal rod that had once held up the off-road’s hood; his fracture might not have been compound but the pain he felt everytime he lay his foot on the floor, putting as little weight on it as possible, was becoming more and more unbearable. He wanted to reach the wadi, steering clear of Sendal, then he would walk upstream and reach the gully where he’d left the Wharzes, hoping he’d find them there, alive and well. He had to hold on to his hope and keep moving as fast as he could, because sooner or later the truck driver and Bagheli would be rescued and then all hell would break loose.

  He had acquired a new cell phone, but he could no longer trust those who had sent him to Iran and then likely betrayed him. They had tried to crush him and the Wharzes to dust without the slightest qualm. He couldn’t reach any other conclusions: the only ones who had known for sure that they were in Shahrak were the CIIS people, whom he’d texted asking for help.

  He walked for about an hour. The presence of pebbles and rocks on the ground didn’t make his slow progress any easier, but at last there was the wadi, in front of him.

  “Of course! You’re my only hope,” he cried out loud, captured by a glimpse of sudden hopefulness. Maybe not all was lost.

  He had to find a spot where he could climb down, but the first thing he had in mind was to make sure whether his new, crazy idea could be was feasible.

  He sat down with the help of his makeshift crutch; the fabric of his trousers stretched over his knee, swollen to the size of a rugby ball, like a tight tensoplast bandage. Eery apparently simple movement turned out to be troublesome and painful.

  Since he was a child, Nino had shown a peculiar skill, he was gifted with an exceptional photographic memory, so much so that his parents were concerned that it might be an early symptom of autism. He could remember lyrics, numbers, sometimes whole paragraphs having them seen just once. When something caught his attention, his mind acted like a real digital camera.

  He remembered it by heart, it was printed in his synapses just as it had been printed at the bottom of the email signed Salah al-Din. That phone number had been recorded and stored indelibly in his mind.

  He could flip through his neural photos after a long time and recover the information he wanted.

  But now he needed a validation, an aid to believe in himself strongly. He pulled out his phonebook and went to the letter “A”, he was always very accurate in these things and certain that he’d jotted it down.

  The boost he’d been looking for arrived, because the number he’d written down perfectly matched the one in his mind.

  He pulled out the cell phone he’d found inside the crashed vehicle and dialled the number.

  “Hello?” A man’s voice answered in perfect French.

  “I’m a friend of Amir’s, please forgive me but I urgently need to speak to him. I have a very important message for him.”

  “Yes, I know Amir, he told me someone might call asking for him. Who are you?” The man on the other end of the line asked.

  “You can tell him I’m a friend of Salah al-Din’s, but I really need to talk to him immediately, please,” Nino replied.

  The line was disturbed, if he got disconnected it might have put an end to his last hope. He didn’t wonder how he’d been able to place the call, he didn’t ask himself anything, when he’d heard the French voice answering, h
is heart had sped up like a dragster taking off for a ¼ mile.

  “Give me a minute, I have to step into the offices of another oil company next door.”

  “Alright. Make it quick, I’m begging you.”

  “Sure, sure.”

  The man realized how serious the moment was. Nino heard quick steps and frenzied voices across the cell phone.

  After endless moments he heard his friend’s voice.

  “Who’s speaking?”

  “Sorry, but I don’t have time for pleasantries. I’m in deep shit! I need your help,” Nino began.

  “What’s going on? What can I do?” Amir replied alarmed.

  “Listen to me. I’m near Sendal, Iran, thirty kilometers from the Iraqi border and fifty from Al-ʿAmārah. Not just that, I have two friends with me…”

  CHAPTER 21

  Sendal (Iran), 01/18/2012 8:00 P.M.

  -“Thick as thieves”-

  The pain had become unbearable, but it would have been even worse if he’d stopped to rest the muscles, tendons and ligaments in his injured leg, because it would have been impossible to start walking again cold. He dragged his leg behind him as he could, the slightest contact with the small irregularities in the ground made him wince in pain but he carried on, pushed by an almost mystical energy that came from the belief that he had almost made it. If luck stayed by his side for a few more hours, the escape route he’d identified would be accessible and then the last frames of this unreal adventure would mark a happy ending. Some might say that luck is something to be conquered, something to earn with obstinacy, so that it can notice you and reach you; others believe that everything is written and all you must do is learn to wait to receive her much desired kiss. Nino, just to make things clear, decided to run towards her and try to seduce her.

  He walked on along the wadi’s bank, because climbing down into the canal would be an arduous task and because he’d never be able to climb back up in case of need.