The Mullah's Storm

by Young, Tom

  “If you fail to do this,” Marwan continued, “I warn you a storm is coming. A blizzard like you have never seen on your soil. One greater than the storm that has grounded your aircraft in Afghanistan. One greater than the storm you witnessed that day in September.

  “In the name of God and His fearsome justice, I caution you to consider my words carefully.”

  The video operator lowered his camera. Parson let out a long breath. So they would not kill him now. But two weeks? They’d kill him eventually, and the waiting would be horrible. If they’d killed him during the first taping, it would be over by now. Twenty seconds or so.

  All of the Taliban fighters filed out of the room except Marwan.

  Parson tried to remember his training. Establish a bond. Make them see you as human. Not that it had ever worked with jihadists before.

  “Where did you learn such good English?” Parson asked. He wanted to sound in control, but his voice quavered.

  “England.”

  “Is that where you’re from?”

  “You are a good soldier,” Marwan said, “albeit an enemy of God. You are using what you’ve been taught. Excellent. But it will not benefit you and this harlot. I think we all know how this ends.”

  Parson felt his bladder start to let go, and he clenched his muscles to stop it. The warm liquid soaked into the seat of his flight suit. His heart raced. So did his mind.

  He tried to think. How can this motherfucker read my thoughts? What the hell was he doing in Britain? It doesn’t matter, Parson decided. No use. This all leads to that bayonet, agony, gouts of blood.

  He tried hard, but he lost it. Parson inhaled with a sob, then bit his lip to keep his breakdown silent at least. Tears ran down his face and dripped onto his clothing. Gold looked away, her shoulders heaving.

  “Phase One,” Marwan said. “Despair.”

  “Go to hell,” Parson said.

  “Not likely. You will certainly see it ahead of me. But before you go, we will talk more.” Marwan left Parson and Gold alone, joining his men in the next room.

  Parson had always felt that his most important prayers had gone unanswered, so he’d given up talking to God. What was the point? But he prayed now. To wake up from the nightmare. For deliverance. For a bullet instead of a blade. He closed his eyes hard and repeated all of it silently, nodding his head all the while.

  His wrist hurt so much that he would have cried from pain alone had the pain not been overtaken by dread. My lot in life, he thought. Pain and now failure. Because I can’t fucking think and move fast enough, a horrible death. And as far as the mission goes, defeat snatched from the jaws of victory. The mullah should be under interrogation by now. Instead, Parson thought, that raghead gets honored as a returning hero, his stature magnified.

  Parson could tell the sun was going down only because the light went grayer. He saw no shadows lengthening; the snow and fog allowed for none. Just an insidious gloom that eventually took over completely. Chant of Muslim prayers next door. Growl of turboprops overhead. The HC-130 was looking for him, surely calling for him on the radio.

  Parson remembered that he’d reported his position, but he dared not pin hopes on that. Ceiling remained damn near zero. Aircraft could orbit over his position all day long and do him no good. In this weather, no one could see the strobe he’d left outside except from the ground.

  He considered the life he might have had, a future ripped away like leaves in a hurricane. Parson hadn’t ever given much thought to his own death, and he’d certainly never pictured anything like this. He’d heard of the stages people go through: denial, anger, bargaining, acceptance. That must happen in more normal settings, he thought, because he felt it all at once. One moment shaking with fear, the next moment unable to comprehend it, the next in a rage.

  After a time, two of the insurgents came back in. One held an AK on Parson while another tried to feed him rice. In the flickering of an oil lamp, Parson watched the dirty spoon approach his mouth. He had no appetite, and he forced down only a few bites. That went against his training for this situation. Eat when they feed you, he’d been taught, because you don’t know when you’ll get food again. But he just could not make himself. Gold didn’t eat, either.

  When they were alone again, Parson said, “So they plan to keep us alive for a while.”

  “Not for long,” Gold said.

  Parson stared at the floor. “What happened to the family?” he asked.

  “I’m pretty sure they killed them. I heard shots.”

  I brought this on them, Parson thought. Might as well have shot them myself.

  Footsteps interrupted his mourning. Marwan entered the room, carrying one of the family’s wooden chairs. He placed it on the floor and sat in it with his legs crossed as if he were about to take tea. No bayonet, Parson saw. Not yet, then.

  Marwan took a notepad from the pocket of his field jacket and began scribbling.

  “You’re doing well,” Marwan said as he wrote.

  “What?” Parson asked.

  “Your composure. I’ve seen people in your situation reduced to incoherence.”

  “Does that disappoint you?”

  “Not at all,” Marwan said. “In fact, I have come to believe your faculties make you too valuable to behead. That’s why I’m here to offer you a proposal.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “If you do two things for me,” Marwan said, looking over his reading glasses, “I promise you and the harlot a quick and painless exit from this world.”

  “What are they?”

  “First of all,” Marwan said, “it is my distinct honor to be your speechwriter. You will make a statement for my camera confessing your indiscriminate bombing of Muslim villages.”

  Marwan held his pad so Parson could see the page. In precise, flowing script, it began: “My mission was to take as many Muslim lives as possible. These aerial murders came as part of a larger campaign to crush Islam in a new Crusade. I must now ask the forgiveness of God and His people, the faithful of Islam.”

  “I fly cargo,” Parson said.

  “Come now, Major. Surely you understand psychological operations.”

  “That’s why I won’t do it.”

  “Oh, I think you will. I don’t enjoy using the blade, but I have done it in service of Allah. Some of my men, however, relish it, and they know how to do it slowly.”

  Parson looked at Gold, who stared out into the dark through a window of oiled paper. No cues from her at all.

  “The other thing I need you to do is to make a radio call,” Marwan said. “When the weather clears, bring in your helicopter. I will video its destruction at close range. Psychological operations, you understand.”

  “Forget it.”

  “I thought you’d say that at first. I will give you until the morning to take a decision. At that time, we will shoot a video of one kind or another.”

  “Fuck you.”

  Marwan folded his notepad and picked up his chair.

  “Choose well, Major,” he said.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Parson sat awake all night. He watched Gold stare at the floor. Sleep deprivation gummed his thoughts; he could not concentrate on any line of logic. He still heard aircraft engines thrumming overhead from time to time, but the plane might as well have flown in another dimension. Parson saw no way it could help him now. Nothing registered clearly in his mind except fear and resolve, in that order.

  “What are you going to tell him?” Gold asked finally.

  “That I won’t do it.”

  “Good.” Gold looked squarely into his eyes. “Good.”

  “I’ve gotten enough people killed already.”

  “You didn’t kill them.”

  “Still. I won’t give him a helicopter crew,” Parson said. “Fucking raghead.”

  “At least we’ll go out doing the right thing,” Gold said.

  “No one will ever know it.”

  “Doesn’t matter.”
r />   “Do you believe in heaven, Sergeant Gold?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  She didn’t even have to think about that one, Parson realized.

  The window went from black to dark gray, the only indication of daybreak. Large snowflakes struck the oilpaper pane and disintegrated, piling on the sill like ground glass. Parson knew he would never see the sun again.

  Footsteps. Parson felt a droplet of sweat fall from his armpit down his side.

  Marwan entered, again carrying his chair and notepad. He placed the chair next to Parson and stood with one foot on its seat. Marwan studied his notepad, resting it on his knee. Parson noticed the guerrilla leader’s hands. Ropy veins. Some kind of class ring. A Breitling watch. What the hell kind of terrorist was this?

  “Have you taken a decision, Major?” Marwan asked. “I have crafted quite a statement for you.”

  “I can’t help you.”

  Marwan peered over his glasses at Parson. The look turned Parson’s blood to ice.

  “Really?” Marwan said. He closed the notepad. “That is indeed a pity. I did not wish to hear your screams today.”

  Marwan kicked his chair, and it clattered against the wall.

  “Shaheen!” he called, striding out of the room.

  It will be over soon, thought Parson. It will be over soon.

  He felt weak and frail. In his career he had seen what metal, either sharp-edged or high-velocity, could do to the human body. During an Iraq deployment he had helped transport the remains of civilians killed by a terrorist raid in Kirkuk. Black, dripping bags in the cargo compartment. All hopes, dreams, intellect, and talent gone, leaving nothing but slack and torn flesh. Decades to build, moments to destroy.

  Parson felt sweat roll down his back. His legs began to shake. I’m gone already, he thought. None of this matters, because I’m already dead. I’m not even here.

  Strange sounds came from outside the room. A snapping or cracking sound. Someone exhaled hard, with a grunting moan as if punched in the gut. Thuds, like someone falling. Something smacked against a wall, like a rock thrown hard. Another crack. Snap.

  “Get on the floor,” Gold said. She jerked to the side and fell over in her chair.

  Parson looked at her, puzzled. Had she lost her mind in fear?

  “Muhammed?” a voice called.

  Whack. Thud.

  “Get down!” Gold shouted.

  Parson jerked to his left and fell. His head banged the hard dirt floor. Automatic-weapons fire crackled all around him.

  The window burst open. Dust fell from a row of evenly spaced pockmarks that appeared in the wall. Another rip of automatic fire. Screams. Shouts in about three languages, including English.

  A metal object sailed through the torn window and bounced across the floor. Parson grimaced, waited for the shrapnel.

  The explosion knocked him dizzy. Dust choked him. When he opened his eyes, a trickle of blood dripped from his nose onto the floor. No other injury. But the flash-bang grenade had deafened him. Parson coughed and squinted, tried to make sense of what was happening. Bound to his overturned chair, he could not even roll over.

  A guerrilla ran into the room. He grabbed Gold by the back of her chair. She struggled to kick and bite. The ropes kept her from doing any damage. The man dragged her from the room and out a rear door. Parson spun himself around with his legs, tried to keep sight of Gold. She was gone.

  Another insurgent stood over Parson, leveled a pistol, shouted silent words.

  The guerrilla’s head erupted in a spray of blood and brains. The man fell beside Parson, decapitated except for his lower jaw.

  A soldier stood in the doorway, holding a shotgun. In what seemed like slow motion, he pumped the Benelli. A twelve-gauge hull ejected, spun to the floor. The man wore the fatigues of the Afghan National Army, with a snow camo overcoat. He turned to his left, fired again. Recoil jolted the Afghan’s cheek and shoulder. Parson did not see the target. He did not hear the shot, either, only the ringing in his ears from the flash-bang.

  The man motioned for Parson to stay down, then disappeared. Parson saw boots and legs run by the doorway. He heard what seemed like far-off drumming of rifle fire.

  Another man appeared in the doorway. “Are you hurt, sir?” the man yelled. Parson barely heard him.

  Still stunned, Parson looked at the man’s uniform. Subdued U.S. flag patch. ISAF patch on the other arm. Bars of a captain. The officer carried an M-4 rifle painted in three-color desert pattern.

  “There’s another American,” Parson yelled. “A woman. They took her out the back.”

  The captain turned and ran to the rear door, dropped to one knee, fired two shots on semiauto. Fired once again.

  “Clear,” shouted someone outside the room.

  “Clear.” Another American.

  “Clear!” Afghan accent.

  “Clear, bullshit!” Parson shouted. “The woman. Where is she?”

  The captain came back into the room. He drew a Yarborough knife and cut the ropes that bound Parson. Two quick strokes. Parson rolled away from the chair, onto his back.

  “Did you get her?” he asked. His limbs tingled as the blood returned. Parson turned onto his side, rose up on his knees.

  “They put her across a horse,” the captain said. “I think I hit the horse, but it kept going. Couldn’t risk another shot when they got too far away.”

  Parson struggled to his feet. Why was this bastard just standing here talking?

  “They’ll kill her,” he shouted. Parson felt his chest throbbing, animal panic. “Let’s go now! We have to follow them.”

  “We’ll never run down bad guys on horseback, sir,” the captain said. “And they’ll want to keep their hostage alive at least for a while.”

  “Who are you?”

  “My name’s Cantrell. Special Forces.”

  “Captain Cantrell,” Parson said, “I’m giving you a direct order.”

  “Listen to me, sir,” Cantrell said. “We’ll do all we can. They have wounded, and some of their horses are wounded. They won’t go far.”

  Parson realized Cantrell was right. All his instincts told him to try to rescue Gold now, but a mad dash might just get her killed. When you wounded a dangerous animal, you didn’t immediately tear into the brush looking for it. You gave it some time for its injuries to bleed and stiffen. Then you went after it.

  And sometimes it still got away.

  “I can’t lose her, too,” Parson said, palms out to his sides. Sweat began clouding his vision. He stumbled backward against the wall. Could not seem to find his balance. His limbs were numb from the hours he’d spent tied to the chair. He slid back down to a sitting position. He put his head in his hands, elbows on his knees. Rocked as if in a zealot’s prayer. “My crew is all dead,” he said. “Everybody on my plane but her. Her and that raghead.”

  “What raghead?” Cantrell asked. “Sir, you’re not making sense.”

  Parson stared at the commando. Bearded face, desert camo baseball cap turned backward. A patch of duct tape on Cantrell’s shoulder bore hand lettering in black marker: “O+ POS.” A stranger, Parson thought. Not an enemy, but not a friend. All my friends are gone.

  The shotgun-toting Afghan came back into the room. Same guy who’d blown the insurgent’s head off a few minutes ago.

  “Just this one?” the man asked.

  “Yes,” Cantrell said. “They carried a woman hostage with them. We take any alive?”

  “Negative.”

  “There was an old man,” Parson said. Function. Try to think. “A high-ranking mullah. We were flying him to Masirah.”

  “Gone,” the Afghan said. “I believe he is wounded.”

  “One of those knuckleheads was picking up a camcorder when I nailed him,” Cantrell said.

  “Where did you come from?” Parson asked.

  “We were on patrol, and we’d holed up because of the storm,” Cantrell said. “We got word about you on the satphone. We headed toward your
last known position and saw the strobe.”

  The only thing I did right, thought Parson. He tried to stand, felt light-headed, lowered himself to one knee. He held his wrist and grimaced. Exhaustion and stress closed over him like waves over a drowning man. Nothing to breathe but guilt and despair. All dead but me, and I have failed. Parson looked at the floor. He could not make his eyes focus. Everything turning dark.

  HE WOKE TO FIND his feet up on someone’s pack as if he’d been treated for shock. He looked at his watch, but he had no idea what time it had been when he lost consciousness.

  “How long was I out?” Parson asked. He struggled to get up, but he felt currents in his stomach that shouldn’t have been there.

  “Just a few minutes, sir,” Cantrell said. The captain lifted Parson’s head and offered him a canteen. Parson took it, hand shaking, sipped. The water tasted like purification tablets.

  A Green Beret medic gave him a shot of morphine. It burned a little going in, then spread warmth through his bloodstream like the opium chew from the Hazara woman, only stronger. He felt detached from his pain, as if it belonged to someone else. But the anguish was still all his.

  The medic splinted Parson’s wrist, then uncapped another needle.

  “Antibiotic,” the medic said.

  Parson shrugged. He felt the cold steel, but no sting.

  “We have to get Sergeant Gold back one way or another,” he said. “I don’t want to think about what they’ll do to her.”

  “We will follow them at the proper time,” the Afghan said.

  “That’s Captain Najib,” Cantrell said. “My guys are supporting his unit.”

  Parson didn’t know what to make of that. The Muslim was in charge? Najib nodded to Parson. The man looked a lot like Marwan, only younger. His black beard was trimmed closely. Najib’s English was as good as Marwan’s, but he spoke it with his own native accent. His choice of weapon, that inexpensive Italian shotgun loaded with buckshot, suggested to Parson a soldier who wanted to get close to the enemy and do a lot of harm. Had to give him credit for guts, at least.

  Parson rose to his feet, steadying himself against the wall with his good hand. His vision turned gray, as if he were hypoxic. He remembered the feeling from altitude chamber training, colors fading with lack of oxygen. But the hues came back as his circulation returned. Not that there was much color to see. Splatter of blood on the floor and wall. Brass ammunition.