by J A Heaton
“I would not have been able to sneak by the watchman,” Daniel said. “Rex was right to leave me behind. But it doesn’t make the waiting any easier.”
Daniel paced slowly for nearly an hour before Rex reported again.
“This is Ice. Two more watchmen,” Rex said over the radio.
“Can you sneak by again?” Jones asked.
“Negative. Not even I’m that good,” Rex said. “We either wait or eliminate them.”
Daniel and the general glanced at the clock, though they knew it was past one in the morning.
“If we wait thirty minutes,” Rex replied, “then we should have just enough time to get ourselves into position under cover of darkness. But if we have any other delays…”
“We can’t risk that,” Jones said. “If you’re not in position by daylight, you guys will be sitting ducks. I’ve got a bad feeling you’re going to encounter more delays. We’ll have to take our chances. Eliminate the watchmen.”
“Copy that.”
Daniel sat down and tried to stop his foot from nervously shaking.
Rex, a sharpshooter himself, and the other Special Forces sharpshooter, a kid from Chicago named Walters, readied their long-range rifles.
They took a few extra moments to make sure there was no wind. They adjusted for the cold. At just over one hundred meters, this was a relatively easy shot for them.
The two sharpshooters synchronized their breathing, and on cue, they squeezed their triggers. Two bullets rifled through the air in a graceful arc. Each pierced the chest of a watchman. They slumped over.
Rex and his men moved in case anybody had seen their muzzle flashes. They waited, no response came.
This gave Rex an idea.
As his men stood guard, Rex snuck up to their two victims and inspected them. To his relief, Rex was certain the two men were Taliban. They weren’t merely shepherds out watching their flocks by night. And he found what he was hoping for: a grenade.
This had better be worth it, Rex thought to himself.
Rex placed the grenade on the ground and rolled his victims on top of it. Reaching under, he pulled the grenade’s pin and then threw himself down the ridge and took cover.
The grenade exploded, maiming the corpses.
Rex hoped others would think the two Taliban had either gotten in a fight or accidentally killed themselves with the grenade. Either way, nobody was going to find the perfectly placed shots from Rex and Walters.
Rex and the Rangers pressed on and soon reached a village. When he reported it over the radio, Daniel knew it was Bobo’s. It took them more time to bypass it, but when Daniel checked the clock, he saw that they were making good time.
“A little over an hour of complete darkness remains,” Jones said to Daniel.
“Passing over the final ridge,” Rex said.
Daniel had better be right about those mines, Rex thought to himself.
Rex and his men passed over the mountain ridge without incident, relieved there were no mines. After another thirty minutes, Rex radioed again.
“This is Ice. We’re setting up position outside Qaqramon’s village. We’ll wait, watch, and advise,” Rex said.
Daniel released a sigh of relief and decided that he could finally go to bed to get a few hours of sleep before his meeting with Nigora. It wouldn’t be his final meeting with her, just the last undercover.
Although Daniel’s bunk was uncomfortable, it was far more comfortable than where Rex and his men were camping out for the next day and then late into the night.
As Daniel drifted off to sleep at the airbase, Rex kept watch while his men rested. His gunsight revealed nine armed men arriving in a truck during the early morning.
Difficult, but not impossible, Rex thought to himself.
The truck that carried the armed men took on more passengers in the front cab, but it had shielded Rex from seeing who had gotten in. As it departed, Rex wondered if Nigora was in the truck and heading to the city to meet with Daniel.
Be a good girl and tell Doctor Daniel what I need to know, Rex said to himself.
Rex roused Walters to keep watch. Rex tried to sleep, but he couldn’t.
This is the worst part of war, Rex thought to himself. Waiting. I hate waiting.
Daniel stood alone the next morning in the room behind the café, waiting for Nigora. The possibility of seeing her exhilarated Daniel, despite his exhaustion after only getting about two hours of sleep.
Daniel slowly paced about the room, wondering if one of Qaqramon’s men was going to pull the door open and shoot him without any questions. He knew that’s what would happen if Nigora had been compromised.
But if Nigora came, he would be alone with her.
Daniel changed the batteries in his voice recorder, mostly to keep himself busy.
The door finally creaked open, and Daniel tensed for a moment, but then he relaxed when a darkly dressed woman carrying a handbag entered. She shut the door.
Daniel greeted her. She returned the greeting, and they held each other’s gaze as they sat down. Daniel pressed record on his voice recorder. Although she remained covered and wore padding to disguise herself, Daniel recognized Nigora’s eyes and voice.
Daniel did not have time to waste, and so he quickly explained the ambush that had nearly killed Reza and himself.
“I haven’t heard anything about that,” Nigora said. “Qaqramon wants the Iranian alive more than anybody.”
“What would be your guess?” Daniel asked.
Nigora shifted in her seat and sat up straighter. “I don’t know. Qaqramon is powerful, but he is not the only one.” She fidgeted and removed some padding used as a disguise while she thought.
“But anybody with power was at the meeting at the spring,” Daniel said. “So, who would oppose him by killing the Iranian?”
“Maybe they were trying to attack you, and not the Iranian,” Nigora suggested.
Daniel sat quietly and thought about the possibility.
But nobody knew that he and Rex were in the patrol vehicles with Reza. And if it was an attack on the American military vehicles, then he was right back where he began. It was too big of a coincidence.
Daniel decided he needed to shake things up and see how Nigora responded.
“The attack happened not long after we passed Oybek’s apartment building,” Daniel said.
Nigora sat quietly for a few moments before answering. “He certainly had nothing to do with it. He’s crippled. You know that.”
“I have to ask. Do you know more about Oybek?”
“How do you know where he lives?” Nigora asked defiantly.
“The CIA knows a lot of things. But we can’t know everything. That’s why we need your help.”
Nigora sat quietly again, her eyes boring into Daniel’s. They finally averted, and she hunched over onto the table, and her shoulders trembled as she cried.
“I need to know,” Daniel said. “What else can you tell me about Oybek?”
“He passes signals,” Nigora said quickly.
“How?”
“He doesn’t know what the signals mean,” Nigora said. “He opens or shuts certain windows in his apartment. Or he opens or shuts blinds, or turns a light on or off. Sometimes I tell him, sometimes others contact him and tell him.”
“Why didn’t you tell me before?” Daniel asked.
“We don’t know what they mean,” Nigora said emphatically. “He hasn’t done wrong.”
“The Iranian diplomat, the man who is going to buy a nuclear weapon, drove past Oybek’s windows and received a signal. Oybek did help him.”
“But Oybek didn’t know,” Nigora nearly shouted before sobbing again.
As Nigora cried softly, Daniel said, “If you know anything else, tell me now.”
“I know nothing else,” Nigora insisted between sobs. “I only know Oybek’s messages confirm one of two options. For example, if one blind is open, then that could mean to meet at one time or location. If anot
her blind is open, then meet at another time or location.”
“But you never knew what Oybek’s messages meant, and certainly not the one for Reza,” Daniel finished for Nigora.
Nigora nodded. “Only Qaqramon and the recipient know what the signals indicate. I’m sorry I don’t know more. I’ve tried.”
“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” Daniel demanded.
“I only tell you what is useful and won’t get me killed,” Nigora argued. “I’m the one who would die, not you.”
Daniel considered asking what she used Oybek’s radio for. But Daniel sensed that Nigora was on the edge of falling apart, and his heart softened. The one woman he cared for most, the one woman he had wanted safe with him for years, was sitting before him crying, cracking under the pressure of spying on Qaqramon. Nigora had suffered enough, so Daniel changed the topic.
“I saw your father,” Daniel said softly.
“What? How?” Nigora asked after taking a deep breath.
“He misses you and Oybek,” Daniel said.
Nigora cried more.
“Your father told me that the minefield on the mountain ridge separating your village from Qaqramon’s is a farce,” Daniel said with a chuckle, hoping to add some levity. “This is almost all over. At some point, I must take Oybek to the base. I’m sure it’s like you said. He must not have had a choice, and he didn’t know what he was communicating. But if he can help us, then I will get him asylum in the United States. He will be safe. And then your father, too.”
Nigora composed herself and sat up straight again. She took off her covering and revealed her face. Nigora wiped her tears away. Her face was as beautiful as ever, but a purple bruise marred her left cheek.
Daniel’s mouth opened from disgust.
Nigora said, “I am fine. Qaqramon was in a rage after you killed Aziz. I think he would even trade the nuke for revenge on you if he had to. Promise me you won’t leave the base again. It’s too dangerous for you. You know what he did to Oybek and my father. He would do worse to you.”
“Come with me now, Nigora,” Daniel urged. “You will get asylum too. Come with me to the base, and this nightmare will be over for you. It is what your father wants, too.”
“If I disappear now, then Qaqramon will know something is wrong, and then you will never find him or the nuke,” Nigora said. Nigora’s dark eyes held Daniel’s, and he knew that she was right. As much as Daniel wanted to take her away to safety that very night, she had to go back one more time.
Almost without looking, Daniel’s hand reached over to the voice recorder, and he stopped it.
“Don’t go back today,” Daniel whispered. “It will all be over after tonight.”
Nigora nodded in understanding and then said, “Tomorrow, I will go with you, and Oybek, and my father to America.”
Daniel nodded.
Nigora rose from her chair, and Daniel did the same. They stepped towards each other, embraced, and Daniel pressed his lips to Nigora’s.
19
“So, now we know why Reza passed by Oybek’s apartment,” General Jones said after he debriefed Daniel at the base. “Even though we don’t know what Oybek signaled to him. You sure she didn’t know more?”
“She’s like any other source,” Daniel said defensively. “She can only give the information that she knows. She’s not a miracle worker. It’s not as though husbands in Afghanistan share their deepest thoughts with their wives, let alone their second wife. But no, she didn’t know where the exchange will happen. Maybe Oybek’s signal told the Iranian the exchange location. If so, we need to keep tabs on him.”
“I’ve got aerial reconnaissance on the city,” General Jones said. “When Reza leaves Mazar-i-Sharif, we’ll know. And he should lead us to the exchange. Good news: Rex reported more armed Taliban entering the village, so it looks like they’re getting ready for something. Qaqramon’s village still looks like the most likely location.”
“Funny that more armed Taliban appearing is good news,” Daniel said.
“A good indicator,” Jones corrected Daniel. “And about getting Nigora and her family out of here after tonight—if we get the job done—I think it’s a good possibility.”
“Thanks for that, sir,” Daniel said.
“Remember the injured ambusher we recovered?” General Jones asked. “Looks like he’s going to survive, and the doctor woke him up earlier. A Northern Alliance translator is interrogating him now.”
Daniel followed the general into the cement structure that housed the interrogation room. After entering, they saw the survivor, barely able to sit up in a chair at a table. Cuts and bruises covered every part of his visible body. The doctor stood nearby. Daniel guessed he was about fifty years old, judging from his gray and white hair.
The translator looked at General Jones and said, “I’m asking him who ordered the attack on the limousine.”
The interrogator got up close to the man’s face. The man slumped over onto the table and tried to cover his head with his hands. The IVs and tubes in his arms tugged and pulled as he moved. Daniel noticed the concern on the doctor’s face.
Daniel could not understand what the interrogator was saying in Pashto, but his voice was intense. The ambusher did not respond.
“No luck,” the translator said.
The prisoner yelled out in pain and arched back, looking at the ceiling.
Daniel looked to the doctor who bit his tongue.
The doctor finally said, “He needs more medical attention. He might go delirious soon, or we could lose him.”
“If he doesn’t tell us what we need to know,” Jones said to the doctor, “then there are going to be a lot more people for whom medical attention won’t do any good.”
The doctor understood and reluctantly stepped back.
“I’ll have to do this the slow way,” General Jones said.
Through the translator, Jones held a conversation with the ambusher.
“Did you fight the Soviets?” the general asked. He sat across from the hurting man.
Mention of the Soviets seemed to get his attention. The ambusher nodded.
“You must have fought well,” General Jones observed. “And you still fight today. Do you have family?”
The ambusher angrily shook his head.
“A Soviet helicopter killed my wife and children,” he said. “And then my brothers. I am the only one remaining, and I will fight until I die.”
“Did you kill many Soviets?” Jones asked.
The man sat silently, but everybody listening sensed he wished he had killed more.
“As many as you killed,” General Jones said, “I killed more.”
The ambusher gave a skeptical look and then winced. The doctor stepped forward, but General Jones held his hand out to keep him back.
“You must have heard of Alexander the Great, the American who terrorized the Spetsnaz like a ghost and saved countless Afghanis? That was me. I killed all those Soviets for your wife, children, brothers, and others like them.”
“No American could know about Alexander the Great unless… You are Alexander?” the ambusher asked with disbelief. He shut his eyes and reopened them, hardly clinging to reality.
“I am. You and I both know Qaqramon is an evil man,” General Jones continued. “You must tell Alexander the Great who gave the order for the ambush. You know what happens to those who oppose Alexander. You owe me for what I did to the Soviets.”
“My brothers would never believe me if I told them I had met Alexander the Great,” the ambusher said in a daze. “A woman confirmed the ambush. But I don’t know who she is. That’s all I know.” The ambusher slumped over onto the table, and the doctor rushed to his aid.
“Nigora,” Jones said to Daniel, rising from his seat. “We need to find her. Why did she only tell you about Oybek passing signals? What about her?”
Before General Jones rushed out of the interrogation room, he paused opposite Daniel and said, “Can we trust anything she
’s told us? I don’t think she’ll get asylum in America now.”
Daniel tried to follow the general, but his legs felt like rubber, and he had to sit in a chair.
Daniel felt his whole body go numb as he watched the doctor care for his patient in a blur. Another man entered and helped the doctor wheel the man out. The doctor said something to Daniel, but Daniel couldn’t hear or respond due to shock.
Daniel was still sitting dumbly when General Jones returned several minutes later.
“Tonight is going to be busy,” Jones said. “I know it’s lunchtime, but get a bite to eat and then sleep. Crying over Nigora won’t help a thing. The patrols in the city are looking for her, but locating a specific woman dressed in a black burqa is unlikely. If she’s even in the city anymore.”
Daniel remembered she planned on going back to her village, but he wondered if she had lied about that.
“Don’t dwell on it,” Jones told Daniel. “Intelligence failures happen. We’ve still got Rex and his men in the field, and they will take care of business.”
“Yeah,” Daniel replied dumbly.
“Look at me when I tell you one last thing before you get something to eat,” General Jones said. Daniel looked up. “A lot of people might die tonight, and one of them might be Nigora. Be ready to accept that.” The general walked away.
After sitting for several more minutes, Daniel finally managed to follow General Jones’ orders. He took a few bites in the mess hall while trying to consider the possibilities. Sleep overtook him in his bunk not much later.
Reza was glad to have finally gotten out of the hellhole that was the Northern Alliance headquarters in Mazar-i-Sharif. Although he felt safer once more Iranian security arrived from Kabul, he still feared something would interfere with what he had to do that night.
The sun was setting as Reza’s car sped out of Mazar-i-Sharif towards Kabul in the south. Reza feared that a US bomber would drop a payload on him from thousands of feet in the air, and he wouldn’t know a thing until he was wiped from the face of the earth.