Flames And Arrows

by Jaidev Jamwal

03:30 Hours

  28 Oct 2012

  Army HQ

  Islamabad

  The last few days had been really hectic for General Beg and his face showed it. He hadn’t had a moment of rest during the last two days and his eyes were puffy and red from cigarette smoke and endless cups of tea consumed during that period. Right after his announcement of martial law on TV, he had called a meeting to discuss his future course of action with some of his trusted army and civilian officers. He had decided to keep most of the civilian bureaucratic setup unchanged for the moment to deflect some domestic pressure. All of the cabinet ministers and senior bureaucrats were to continue their work as usual. But a few changes in the Army were inevitable and officers loyal to him reaped all the benefits in form of promotions and transfers to desirable places. For General Beg, it was a necessity to consolidate his position rather than to reward his cronies. All the promoted and transferred officers were supposed to take up their commands within 24 hours but nobody was complaining. The officers who had to vacate their posts to make way for these new beneficiaries were sure to complain, but they didn't know of it yet.

  After the meeting was over, he poured himself a stiff drink of scotch and called for his car to take him to his residence. The drive to his official bungalow took barely ten minutes on a crowded day; it was going to be even shorter in these wee hours. He finished his drink leisurely and ambled out of the front door of the building towards his waiting bullet-proof car. A body guard who usually sat alongside his driver in front seat saluted smartly and opened the back door for him. Beg got in the back seat and closed his eyes as the driver slowly eased his car out of the driveway. 22 heavily armed commandos in 7 cars and SUVs surrounded the car and escorted him.

  He felt mobile phone in his pocket vibrating signaling arrival of a new sms, but he ignored it for the moment. Nobody sent him any sms apart from his 12 years old son, but he should've been fast asleep now. He opened his eyes just minutes later when his driver stopped the car in front of the bomb proof gate of his bungalow. There was a lawn almost 70 meters across between the gate and bungalow with a narrow paved driveway joining the two. Even though all the lights in the lawn were on, those inside the house were off, except for a single bulb on the porch of front entrance.

  He yawned and took his phone out to read the message. In the meantime gate was opened and first car of his convoy started entering the premises. He fumbled with the buttons to get to message inbox and smiled quizzically when he read his son name as the sender of message. “It's a little late for the little monkey to be up. Even the lights of whole house are off.”

  He pressed the read button to open the message and his smiled disappeared at once. It was very short and read, “Bad men inside. Do not come. Send help.”

  He immediately asked his driver to stop the car. All of his convoy behind him rolled to a stop. He snatched the walkie-talkie from the guard in front seat and hailed Major Sohail riding in leading SUV of convoy. “There's a situation Major Sohail. I think my family is being held hostage inside the house.”

  “What! I don't understand sir” Sohail exclaimed.

  “I just received this message from my son warning me that some bad men are inside and that I should send help.”

  “Asif is not of prankster type. Any idea who or what are we dealing with?”

  “No. He didn't tell. I'm trying to call him but his phone is switched off. We need to act fast. “

  “Agreed General. I'm calling for additional forces from the HQ. Meanwhile we'll check the house ourselves. You stay in your vehicle sir.”

  “Alright. Hurry but be very careful. “

  “Roger that.”

  Sohail immediately gathered his men and ordered 12 of them to take positions around the house and guard the general. All the windows of the house were barricaded by grills and there were only two entrances to the house, one each in front and back. Guarded by two armed soldiers, at all times. He split the rest of his men in two five member teams, one for each entrance and decided to lead the one entering through the front door himself.

  Running towards the door he prayed that Asif was indeed playing a prank on his father for once. If he was not, all his men were in serious trouble. The bad guys inside the house must already have him and rest of his team in their gun sights all this while. Feeling of butterflies in his stomach got worse as he neared the front entrance. Two guards who were supposed to be there at all times were missing. Just then, Hav. Yaqub leading his 2nd search team informed him that there were no guards on back entrance either. For a moment he considered waiting for the backup to arrive. After all, it wouldn't take 10 minutes for them to reach here. He brushed away these thoughts from his mind. He was a professional soldier trained for all kinds of situations. Backup or no backup, it was his duty to complete the mission assigned to him.

  About 10 metres from the door he thought that he saw somebody moving on the balcony on 1st floor. He was about to hail whoever was there, when he saw a flash and heard the whooshing sound typical of a RPG-69. Before he had the time to react, the rocket smashed in to the ground right in the middle of his team and exploded. Two of his team members were blown to pieces while the rest were thrown off their feet by impact of the blast. As he struggled to get up and return fire, he heard sounds of heavy gunfire and grenade blasts coming from back of the house, right were his 2nd team was supposed to be. He shouted at the survivors of his team to follow him as he ran towards the cover behind the heavy flower pots around the entrance. This time his approach was interrupted by a hail of heavy AK 47 gunfire and remaining two commandos following him dropped dead. He himself was hit by a bullet in left leg, but managed to crawl up behind cover of a large flower pot where he lay bleeding, unable to move or fire back at his attackers.

  General Beg was watching this carnage from the back seat of his car. Ten of his men were down without even firing a single bullet. His car was hidden from the house by a row of trees and decorative bushes, but they'll provide no cover from the bullets once the intruders in the house start firing in his direction. He had no idea how many people were inside and could only guess their intentions. He only knew that they were very heavily armed and had his family hostage. Only thing he could do was to wait for backup from HQ to arrive. Till then, it'll be better if he got himself out of their weapons range.

  He ordered rest of his men to get in cars and get out of the bungalow. His driver immediately started the engine and put the car into reverse gear. His convoy, now reduced to four cars started backing up towards the gate at a high speed.

  It was time to pay back for their second mistake. They had completely forgotten about the guards on the gate. As the first car neared the gate, one of the three guards on duty fired a RPG on it killing three commandos who were in it. The other two started firing from their assault rifles. Survivors took cover and started firing back. Guard who had fired the RPG was killed as he was trying to reload it. Just then, intruders in the house directed their small arms fire towards the convoy.

  Inside his bulletproof car Beg was frantically shouting into the walkie-talkie calling for backup. Major Aslam answered him, “I'm almost at the gates of your bungalow General, but how do we get in? “

  General Beg was furious, “What do you mean by that?”

  “Your gate and boundary wall are bullet proof and bomb proof, designed to keep armed intruders out.”

  “For God's sake, just blow up the damned thing using C4 charges. I don't care if you use up whole stock. We are being shot to hell from two sides. Thirteen of my men are dead already. “

  “Understood sir. My men are placing the charges now.”

  Moments later, whole compound shook when the C4 charges planted by men of Major Aslam's team exploded. One of the guards near the gate was knocked down by the flying debris. Explosions also disoriented the third and last guard who was killed when he tried to run across the lawn towards the house.

  Remains of General Beg’s battered con
voy sped out of the bungalow premises towards the reinforcements. Aslam at once came running towards Beg’s car and saluted when General himself opened the door and got out to take a look at the reinforcements.

  “Major, you arrived just in time to save our asses. These buggers killed half of my men in minutes and still have my family. They are no ordinary terrorists.” Beg said somewhat shakily.

  “We can take out these rats easily sir. Just give us the order. “

  “Don’t be a fool. These men might be holding my family inside the house. I can’t risk their lives. “Beg snapped. “Find out what their demands are. Only then I’ll decide on future course of action”

  “Yes sir.”

  Aslam was back fifteen minutes later with the new that his men had discovered that telephone lines to the house were cut from the junction box in guard house. Within minutes, Beg received news that the lines were reattached. He himself dialed his landline number and waited anxiously as the telephone inside his house rang. He was nearly startled when someone inside the house picked up the phone. Beg started shouting at once, “Hello, hello!! Who is there? Nussarat? Is that you? “

  A heavy male voice replied mockingly, “Ah General Beg .You really have a long life. We were just about to call you.”

  “Who the hell are you and what do you want? Where is my family? They’d better be alright; otherwise you’ll regret that you were ever born.” Beg was beside himself.

  Man on the other side laughed and said, “Relax General. Your family is completely safe with us. We don’t wish any harm to them or even you. “

  “Then why have you taken them hostage and why did you kill my bodyguards?”

  “That was really unfortunate general. Believe me. If we had any choice, none of this bloodshed would have happened. Our plan was to meet you inside and persuade you to act according to our wishes in a reasonable and mutually beneficial way. Only if your boy was not so naughty so as to warn you, you’d know of our benign intentions firsthand.”

  “Shut the hell up and tell me who you are and what do you want?” Beg bellowed into the phone.

  “Well, who we are is not important General. But, what we want from you is infinitely more important. We just want you to give up one thing that you should’ve relinquished long ago “

  “What is that? “

  “Your post of Chief of Army Staff.” The voice replied in a very casual manner. But the effect on General Beg was anything was casual. He lost whatever self-control he had on himself and started shouting even louder into the phone.

  “Who the hell you think you are you filthy son of a bitch? Do you think that you can just walk into my house and force me to handover everything that I worked for all my life just like that? I have lakhs of men at my command. I control the whole country, I control the Americans. You are nothing but a sneaking filthy rat. My men will enter the house and tear you apart within minutes.”

  Man on other side of the line laughed even louder this time, “I’d not count on that if I were you. You need to understand it very clearly General that we are not ordinary terrorists. Our goal is to make sure that you give up your post with as little trouble as possible. We do have other means to persuade you apart from your family.”

  “What do you mean? “

  “For starters, why don’t you try calling General Khalid? Maybe that’ll make you see the light. I’ll call you after ten minutes. “

  General Beg was left holding the phone to his ear. He immediately broke out of his paralytic state and asked Major Aslam to contact General Khalid. Beg had promoted Khalid in order to cut down the power of General Asgar. Khalid was to assume command of Karachi garrison from Asgar who was transferred to a Nak Bundi near Afghanistan border. There his role would’ve been nothing more than that of a border guard. Orders to this effect were issued just a few hours ago in just concluded meeting.

  Aslam was back within minutes looking shaken, “Sir, we have some very bad news. General Khalid convoy was attacked just outside his house just a few minutes ago. He is missing and five of his bodyguards are dead. Survivors claim that attackers who were in army uniforms bundled him into an army vehicle and sped away. “

  Beg was speechless for a moment. “Can anybody tell me what the hell is going on? Are you telling me that some nuts not only took my family hostage and almost killed me inside my own house, but also managed to kidnap my most trustworthy subordinate? That too, right inside my cantonment?”

  Aslam shifted uneasily on his feet but kept quiet. He was rescued by ringing of Beg’s phone. It was from his house and he at once accepted the call and snarled into the phone, “What have you done with General Khalid you bastard? Who are you working for? “

  Man completely ignored his questions, “Do you realise what you are up against, General? You, your family, your cronies, nobody is safe even in your own backyard. You might wear the stars, but it’s us who control everything in this country. For your own sake General, I’d strongly urge you to give up and do exactly as we say. “

  “If I resign, who’ll take up my place?”

  “You need not worry about that General. After you retire, we’ll make sure that you lead a very comfortable retired life anywhere in the world. “

  “It’s that bastard Asgar and you work under him? Isn’t it? I always knew that he wanted my job, but never imagined that he’d stoop so low.”

  “Right now, it’s not important who wants you job. Only thing important is the safety of you and your family. After all we can’t afford to keep them tied and bound for long.” Threat in the voice was too explicit to be ignored.