Firebreak

by Richard Herman

  When she was finished, the two women dressed. Shoshana felt the cool metal of the zipper against her skin and the chafing was gone. She laughed and played the model for Hanni. “Please note the color-coordinated head band and Nomex jumpsuit, the latest in fashion wear for your properly attired soldier.” She stopped, sat down, and pulled on her boots, now serious. “How silly. I remember when clothes and how I looked was everything.”

  You are glowing, Hanni thought. It’s more than just the rest and chance to shower. Something happened when you finally broke down and cried, perhaps a cleansing, I don’t know. But you are beautiful. “Come on, let’s get something to eat.”

  “Again?” Shoshana laughed. “We’ll get fat as cows.”

  “I doubt it.”

  A loudspeaker squawked and rasped, announcing they would be picked up by a bus in ten minutes. A heavy silence came down over all the women.

  Shoshana guided the APC under the camouflage netting, barely able to follow the man’s directions in the dark. Whenhe gave her the kill sign, she shut the engine off and stuck her head out the hatch, surprised how quiet it was. She glanced over at Hanni who was standing in the center hatch. “Where do you think we are?” Shoshana asked.

  “Near the front, I’m sure,” the older woman replied. “I know we crossed the border into Lebanon.”

  “It’s awfully quiet.”

  A man materialized out of the dark and spoke in a low voice. “One of you come with me. And for God’s sake, no lights or noise.” Shoshana shrugged and followed him. The man picked his way through the darkness, collecting two company commanders and their platoon commanders on his way back to the battalion’s command post. He led them down into a steep ravine and into the well-lit interior of a cave.

  Shoshana blinked in the bright light, focusing on their guide. He was a small man who made her think of a weasel. It was Nazzi Halaby. “I got the rest of them, Moshe,” he said. She followed his gaze to the man sitting on an upturned 105-millimeter shell crate. Every sense she possessed told her that there was something different about this man. He was as short as Halaby but stockily built. Judging from the uneven tan on his face, he had recently shaved off a full beard. It’s his eyes, she decided, they reach out and capture everyone around him.

  He stood and started talking in a low voice. “For you who don’t know me, I’m Moshe Levy. They tell me I’m a lieutenant colonel now, but that doesn’t matter.”

  The man standing next to Shoshana, like her a newcomer, stiffened. Then it hit her—this was Moshe Levy. The man had become a legend during the war and Northern Command had even given his battalion a special name—Levy Force. It was said that wherever the fighting was the hardest and most critical on the Lebanon front, Levy was there, holding on, counterattacking, refusing to give ground. NCOs had started asking if a new officer had “Levy’s Luck” and their commanders often reported a successful engagement by saying they “had Levy’s Luck.”

  Levy studied each person, drawing them to him. “What does matter is why we’re here.” He pointed to a map board propped up against the wall. “Brigade is expecting the Iraqi armored division facing us to launch an attack just before first light. We’re dug in here”—he pointed to a high hill thatblocked the southern end of a long narrow valley—“and they are expected to come right down the valley and bump up against us. Our job is to hold them while artillery and the Air Force chew ‘em up. Depending on what condition we’re in, we either lead the counterattack or let the rest of our brigade pass through.” No one was shocked that a brigade was taking on a division.

  A low wail came from the rear of the cave. “Shut up, Avner,” Levy said, his voice normal. The wailing stopped. “My loader,” Levy explained. “Obviously he doesn’t think head-on counterattacks will help him live to be an old man. Personally, I agree with him. So we’re not going to do it.”

  Levy used the map to lay out the way they would fight the battle. He planned to split his battalion, keeping one company with him at the end of the valley as the blocking force. The other two companies were to move up the western side of the valley under the cover of darkness, reinforce the teams holding the western slope, hide behind a ridge and wait for the order to counterattack. Instead of a head-on attack, they would sweep down onto the Iraqis’ right flank, cut directly across them, and head for the hills on the eastern side of the valley. There they would regroup and reevaluate.

  “When do we move out?” one of Levy’s older company commanders asked.

  “If the Iraqis follow their normal pattern,” Levy explained, “they’ll send three or four reconnaissance drones over us about two hours before they attack. We only let the first one get back and shoot down the others. That’s when you move out. With some luck, the Iraqis won’t know you’ve moved.”

  A second lieutenant fresh out of Armored Warfare School did not like what he was hearing. “Moshe, shouldn’t we have a better plan than that? Follow-on objectives? You have only covered the opening phase. What comes next? I’d like to have a better idea of what my platoon should be trying to do other than cross the valley.” His boyish face was serious and Levy knew that he was facing battle for the first time. They are so afraid they will run, Levy thought. One of the worst things that could be said of an Israeli officer was that he ran.

  “Don’t think in terms of what comes second, what comes third,” Levy said, a deep sadness in his voice. “Think ofthree or four options you might use when you regroup on the eastern side of the valley.”

  Shoshana could hear the beginning of a typical debate over orders. The average Israeli officer treated orders like a point of discussion that often went on for an interminable length of time. “I know what you’re thinking,” Levy said, “a case of incompetent planning.” The silence from the second lieutenant confirmed the young man agreed. “But look at the situation we are in. We are strained to our outer limits, men and tanks at half-strength, and we are counterattacking?”

  “But we have to carry the battle to the enemy,” the lieutenant parroted. He had learned his lessons well in Armored Warfare School.

  “Because we have no room to retreat, right?” Levy replied. He had heard this argument before. It was always the same, the young ones, the fresh and eager, wanted to fight by the book. He only wanted to survive. “And all our wars should be short and decisive, right? And we can never permanently defeat our Arab enemy, right?” Levy was listing basic tenets that the IDF lived and died with. “Well, look at our situation. We have carried the battle to the enemy and are in an excellent defensive position in this sector. That’s why we can take on a division with a brigade. If we hold them here while you cut across, what have we accomplished?”

  The lieutenant studied the map. “Artillery and the Air Force will have cut the first echelon to pieces and we’ll have done the same to the second echelon.”

  “And,” Levy demanded.

  Light was starting to dawn for the lieutenant. “The valley has become a kill zone.”

  “Earlier I said to consider your options when you regroup,” Levy continued. “What happens if you regroup and then attack?”

  “We engage the third echelon in the valley and could take heavy casualties as we will be at reduced strength from the first engagement and they will be expecting us.”

  Reduced strength! Levy raged to himself. Does he know what that means? They don’t teach them that in Armored Warfare School. Instead they-make them into technicians, pump them up to be warriors, and teach them not to ran.

  Instead of berating the lieutenant, Levy only asked, “Is there a better option?”

  The lieutenant was warming to it now. “Let the Iraqis’ third echelon drive into the kill zone that we’ve created, soften them up with artillery and air strikes, and then either mount a frontal or flank attack.”

  “And how do we determine who is to attack?”

  “By where the least resistance is.”

  “So what are you going to do when you reach the eastern side of the vall
ey?” Levy asked. The discussion was almost ended and the lieutenant would know exactly what Levy expected of him and willingly do it.

  “Dismount my infantry, secure our position, and since I’ll probably have lost contact during the crossover, reestablish radio contact. Oh”—now he grinned—“depending on what’s out in the valley, either lay doggo or pound the hell out of them.”

  “Keep your casualties to a minimum,” Levy said, sending the men on their way. He turned to Shoshana and saw the worry on her face. “Is this your first time?” he asked.

  “I’ve always been on the backside of the action, never in it from the very first.”

  Levy understood. “After the Iraqis’ reconnaissance drones have flown over, we can expect an artillery barrage here. So we’re going to pull back.” He pointed to a rear area on the map where the rest of the brigade was dug in. “We’ll leave a few observation and antitank teams in place until our counterbattery fire can discourage the Iraqis and convince them it’s time to stop shooting and start scooting. That’s when we move back into place. My tank is next to your APC. Just stay next to me until we need your Band-Aid.”

  “Band-Aid?” Shoshana asked.

  Levy cracked a smile. “A Yankeeism for APC ambulances.”

  The radios at the rear of the cave came alive as reports of low-flying reconnaissance drones filtered in. “There’s too many of them,” Levy said. “Cruise missiles. Warn everybody to button up and get into their NBC gear,” he ordered.

  Shoshana ran from the command post and scrambled out of the ravine. She had left her gas mask and protective clothing in the APC. Why did Levy think they might be using nerve gas now? she thought. She prayed he was wrong.

  “You are wicked,” Tara breathed, her voice husky, exciting Fraser. They were lying on the bed in his Watergate apartment, their clothes heaped on the floor. She kissed his neck and ran her hand between his legs. A shudder coursed through the man’s body.

  “You made it so simple.” She licked at his ear. Tara had coaxed him into revealing how he had orchestrated Pontowski’s election by pumping money into the campaign at critical times. All that remained was to identify the middle man who would tie it all right back to Fraser and, therefore, Pontowski. “You’re a genius,” she said and rolled over on top of him.

  Fraser was pleased with Tara’s reaction and, for a moment, the thought of marriage crossed his mind but he quickly discarded it.

  Tara decided to turn the heat up and learn the name she needed to complete the puzzle. She wanted to be finished with Fraser. She wiggled down his body and off the end of the bed. He watched her walk across the floor to the small refrigerator, mesmerized by the way she moved, the perfection of her body, her beauty. She bent over, pulled out a bottle of champagne, and disappeared into the bathroom. He could hear the sound of running water and the pop of a cork. She reappeared and stood in the doorway, steam curling from around her bare back. She beckoned to him with one finger and vanished back into the steam. He obediently followed, his breath coming in short, sharp pants.

  She guided Fraser into the sunken tub, settled him on his back in the shallow but extremely hot water, and scrubbed him down with a rough washcloth until his skin glowed. Then she disappeared for a moment, only to come back holding a small black narrow case. She sat on the edge of the tub and arched her legs over him, opening the case. She gently removed an old-fashioned straightedge razor and a small sharpening stone. With short, practiced strokes she sharpened the razor, raising her eyes occasionally from her work to glance at Fraser. She tested the razor by drawing it along one of her legs, up to her crotch, satisfied that it was sharp.

  Fraser gasped for air when Tara moved over him, straddling his big belly like she was riding a horse backward. Shetossed her hair and looked back over her shoulder at him, wetting her lips.

  “No way,” he protested, giving a sharp little buck. But she ignored him and scooted her buttocks farther up onto his chest and tightened her legs, riding him. She bent forward, arching over his legs and drew the razor along the inside of his thigh, inching it toward his crotch. Then she grabbed the waiting bottle and splashed champagne over the freshly shaved leg. Fraser gave a little twitch as she licked at his thigh. “Don’t,” he moaned. She tightened her legs, wiggled her buttocks higher on his chest, and drew the razor over his scrotum.

  Fraser was gasping for air and his heart pounding as she flicked the razor back and forth over his scrotum and wiggled higher. Then he felt the cold champagne and her warm tongue, quickly followed by the razor, only this time it was moving up his erection. “Please stop,” he begged. A momentary pain shot across his chest as she poured champagne over him and her tongue went to work. Now he could feel the razor again, or was it her fingernails? her teeth? He gasped as the pain returned, coming down hard on his chest, clamping him in an unrelenting vise, crushing him. Just before he died, he knew what Tara wanted.

  Tara felt her mount go limp and looked over her shoulder. Fraser’s bulging eyes, gaping mouth, and frozen face shocked her. She had never seen a dead person before and bolted out of the bathroom, running for her clothes. Then she stopped, panting for breath, and forced herself to be calm. She sank to the floor, not moving for almost ten minutes. Back in control, she moved through the room, straightening, arranging, deliberately leaving traces to show that Fraser had shared his bed, but that his companion had dressed and left long before he had his heart attack.

  She steeled herself and went into the bathroom. She drained the bath while she scrubbed the body and hosed it down. When she was satisfied that all traces of champagne and shaved hair were down the drain, she refilled the tub with hot water, hoping that the water would confuse a medical examiner about the time of death. Then Tara straightened up the bathroom, taking care to leave no traces that two people had shared the bath.

  Carefully, she went over the entire apartment again, making sure it was right. She scribbled a note—“Call me in the morning”—and left it on his dresser in plain sight. Then she dressed, checked the apartment one last time, and left.

  Shoshana and Hanni were in the APC when the first cruise missile hit. The low-order explosion drove both women to the periscopes as they tried to see what was going on. “Levy was right,” Shoshana said, scanning the slope in front of them. “That wasn’t a conventional warhead. It’s got to be nerve gas.” Panic was eating at her and she strained at the periscope in the driver’s position. But the eyepiece on her gas mask kept getting in the way. Hanni was having better luck with hers.

  “I count three, make that four, missiles hitting,” Hanni reported. “I don’t understand, they’re hitting the area at random. There’s five and six.”

  “Nerve gas is a wide-area ordnance,” Shoshana explained, trying to beat down the panic that was threatening her sanity. Should she tell Hanni what she knew? She decided against it since there was nothing they could do if it was the new nerve gas the Iraqis had developed at Kirkuk. “They don’t know our exact location so they saturate the area.”

  “What do we do now?” Hanni asked.

  “Exactly what we had planned to do before, only we do it wearing our masks and NBC suits.”

  The radio crackled with reports of more inbound missiles. But these turned out to be the reconnaissance drones Levy had been expecting. Another report came in identifying the nerve gas vapor drifting over the area as VR55, an old Soviet-developed nerve agent. “We’re going to be in these things for a while,” Shoshana said.

  “You sound relieved,” Hanni said.

  The harsh metallic rasp of the radio interrupted her with orders to pull back. “Moshe wants us to pull back until after the artillery barrage is over,” Shoshana said and started the engine.

  “What’s he like?” Hanni asked.

  “Not what you’d expect. He seems quiet and withdrawn, but when he talks to you … well … I can’t explain it. You just want to follow.”

  “Is he married?”

  “Oh Hanni, be serious.”.

/>   “Not for you, child.”

  Yair Ben David’s face was a rocklike mask when the first reports came in that the Iraqis were using nerve gas. Every face in the command room of the bunker was turned toward him, waiting for his reaction. “How much? Where? Type? Casualties?” he barked. “I want the answers.” He slammed his fists onto the table in front of him. The prime minister forced his anger back into the cage where he contained it. This is not the time to overreact, he cautioned himself.

  Then the answers filtered in. It was a limited attack in a tactical situation. Only six short-range cruise missiles had been used, the chemical weapons had been used in Lebanon, not inside Israel, and the IDF had been ready. More reports confirmed that it was the old type of nerve gas that the Israelis had an antidote for. “So,” Ben David said to the general sitting beside him, “the Iraqis are testing the water, gauging our reaction. But why did they use cruise missiles? I’d always expected them to use artillery or aircraft when they employed nerve gas.”

  “Deception,” the general answered. “They wanted us to mistake them for reconnaissance drones and be caught unmasked. It didn’t work. Levy’s Luck again.”

  “That man is charmed,” Ben David agreed.

  “Are you going to retaliate?” the general asked.

  “What are our casualties?” Ben David replied.

  “So far, none.”

  “Then we wait.” His carefully masked anger raged in its cage.

  The APC was moving again, this time forward, back into their original position. Shoshana was having a hard time seeing where she was going; the combination of gas mask and periscope didn’t work well for her. Hanni seemed to be doing better so they switched places and Hanni drove while Shoshana rode in the crew compartment. Then they were back under the camouflage netting where they had started as the dark on the eastern horizon broke with the first light of dawn.

  Shoshana could see movement in the valley below, moving toward them. The radio was silent.