The Siege

by Damien Lewis

  Thick smoke still billowed from the VIP Villa’s shattered windows, but there were no flames anymore. If, as I suspected, the Ambassador had been trapped in the Villa’s safe room, there was no way he would have survived the firestorm that had swept through this place. In that kind of inferno he’d have lasted no more than a few minutes, before the heat and the fumes overcame him.

  Yet the doctor at the 1,200-Bed Hospital had said that he was still conscious when he arrived. Maybe when the fire had hit, his close protection guys had got him onto the roof, where Dave and Scotty were making their heroic stand. I scanned the rooftop, searching for signs of life. I was dying to see just the hint of a head popping up with an M4 and loosing off a burst of rounds.

  But with the heat of the inferno below them, just how hot would that concrete roof have become? Presumably unbearably so, especially if you were crouched low or lying prone and trying to fight off the bad guys. So maybe Scotty, Dave, and the rest had been driven off the roof by the fire and the heat, and into the very arms of the enemy? Maybe that’s how they’d lost the Ambassador? I just didn’t know.

  I stared at that rooftop willing for a head to bob into view. This was the exact place where I’d said to Jeff they should site a .50-caliber heavy machine gun, to put down fire onto the main gateway. The exact spot. One .50-cal up there would have been enough to cover the entire compound. It might not have saved the Embassy from being overrun, but its raw firepower would have bought the guys time to evacuate the Ambassador, and maybe even get reinforcements in.

  I scanned for movement. I prayed for something. Anything. But there was none. My thoughts now were the blackest they had ever been. I kept watching the roof, praying for a figure to pop up and put down fire onto the Shariah gunmen below. The cowardly bastards seemed more intent on looting some sick “souvenirs” right now than in doing any fighting. I just couldn’t believe that all of the Americans were dead, or worse still—taken captive.

  I knew it was suicide to do so, but I pushed onward through the orchard to my left, then moved out even farther into the open. I needed to get a look into the Villa entrance itself, the place where I presumed the Ambassador had all but met his end. I don’t know exactly why, or what I hoped to achieve. I was clutching at straws here, unable to accept that very likely my American friends had all been killed, and that I had done nothing to stand with them.

  There were loads more gunmen here, and gunfire. Muzzles spat fire among the eerie glow of gutted buildings. Shadowy figures were loosing off long squirts of tracer into the night sky, presumably to “celebrate” their “victory.” The fuckers. I was burning up with hatred and with rage. I wanted to level my scavenged AK and start dropping them—double taps to their heads until I ran out of rounds.

  I took several more steps until I was at the very entrance to the VIP Villa. The heat was scorching, the doorway a mass of thick, roiling smoke. The huge ornamental vases that had lain to either side of the doorway had been smashed to pieces, their remains trampled underfoot. There was no way that I could push any farther into the wall of heat and smoke. There was nothing more I could do here.

  I turned to leave, but as I did so I froze: a savage cry rang out in Arabic: “Hey! You! We kill them all! Death to America! Kill them all!”

  I’d been so focused on searching for any survivors, I’d missed how close some of the Shariah fighters had got. The figure was yelling at me from no more than ten yards away. The evil bastard seemed to be waiting for me to join in the chanting. Well, fuck that.

  He stared at me, his eyes wide with bloodlust. He seemed drunk on the power of the gun. He thrust his weapon toward me: “Tal! Tal! Tal!”—Come here!

  I had a split second in which to make a decision. My only possible exit route was back the way I’d come, which would involve running one hundred yards or more across the compound and over terrain that was crawling with the enemy. There was no way that I could make it, especially as so much of it was open ground. I’d be a dead man if I ran.

  I turned and started walking toward the Shariah gunman. Calm it, Morgan, calm it, I told myself. He doesn’t have a clue who you are.

  He was silhouetted against the fire, and I had the glare in my eyes. My face would be fully illuminated, and I had to pray he didn’t notice I was a foreigner. He had his AK grasped in his right hand, but hanging by his side. I figured I could get the drop on him. That wasn’t my main worry. It was all the other bastards yelling and shooting it up behind him—those who would come to his aid.

  “Temam,” I called out to him. “Temam”—You okay?

  I was trying to sound as calm as I could, but I was having to yell to make myself heard above all the gunfire. His eyes were bulging and I could tell how hyped up he was and how very much on edge. I had to seize the initiative.

  “Gitlag. Gitlag,” I called across to him—Let’s talk.

  We stepped closer, maybe three paces separating us. For a split second I stared into his face. He was young, in his early twenties, but his features were obscured by a thick growth of beard, plus some kind of head wrapping. His robes seemed to be soaking wet, and I could only imagine he’d doused himself in water so he could dash in and out of the flames. Searching for my friends, to try to find and kill them.

  As we eyeballed each other I could detect the first signs of suspicion creeping into his gaze, the first hint of worry that I wasn’t one of his kind.

  Without a moment’s warning I brought my weapon around in a crushing blow, striking him exactly where I wanted—on the side of the face, just above the eyes. The butt smashed into his temple. It was a noiseless blow, but I felt his bone crumple and crush under the impact. With barely a whimper his legs buckled and he fell, almost as if he’d been shot.

  Luckily his finger hadn’t been on the trigger, for he might have fired off a few rounds involuntarily as he went down—and then the Shariah mob would have been upon me. A thick pall of smoke blew across us. I bent to inspect him. One side of his face was caved in; his eye socket was broken, and most likely his jaw, too.

  I was about to turn for the cover of the orchard when I realized that maybe I could use this guy. I could question him. Gain vital intel. Where the fuck are the Americans? What have you done with them? Where the fuck have you taken them?

  I squatted down, but there was thick blood pouring from the guy’s face and ears now. He looked halfway dead; unconscious, certainly. There was no speaking to this one, that was for sure. I’d been with him for maybe thirty seconds, and I had to get going before I was spotted. I stepped away and melted back into the shadows of the trees.

  As I did so I practically fell over something on the ground. I glanced down. Another body. This one was wearing a proper chest rig, complete with pouches for extra ammo, magazines, and grenades. For a moment I feared it might be Scotty, Dave, or Sean. I used my boot to roll the corpse over. I saw the thick black beard, plus the Afghan-style robe beneath the chest rig. It was another of the Shariah fighters, and his body was riddled with bloodied bullet holes.

  Dave, Scotty, and the others knew how to shoot, that was for sure. I hunkered down beside the body in the shadows. It felt good to know one of my guys had got the better of this bastard. I had a sense of what I had to do now. I couldn’t believe the Shariah Brigade had slaughtered all of the Americans. They’d want to take some at least alive as high-value hostages. They’d parade them on the Internet. Use them as bargaining tools to push for some sick concessions from the U.S. government. Maybe ask for $50 million in ransom.

  It made sense that they’d have taken at least some of my American friends alive—and that meant I had to take one of them at least alive and beat some answers out of him. I lay in the dark and waited. Gunfire echoed back and forth across the compound, but I figured it was the wild eruptions of celebratory fire, not sharp aimed bursts. I couldn’t just shoot one of the enemy. I needed him alive, and my aimed shots would draw the rest of them.

  Figures flitted back and forth, some drifting closer to me
in among the smoke. I tensed to strike, readying myself to bring the butt down on one of their skulls, then drag him into the bushes. But just then a wave of thunderous sound rolled across the compound. It sounded as if an entire convoy of Dushka-toting vehicles were pouring fire into the Embassy via the smashed gate at the front. I saw big chunky rounds tearing down walls, slicing through metal and ripping trees apart.

  Once you’ve heard a Dushka, you never forget it. I knew who these new attackers weren’t: they weren’t an American Special Forces unit come to the rescue. Only rebels and militias used the Dushka. What the hell was happening?

  It sounded as if a rival force was trying to take the Embassy. As the fire tore into the ground and ripped into the exposed fighters to my front, they started breaking for cover and coming my way. Firing short, aim bursts I started to fall back through the trees. I kept hammering away with the AK and melting backward until I was almost out of rounds.

  The intensity of the incoming fire from whoever was attacking just kept increasing. They seemed to be drawing closer. I did the only thing I could now: I turned in the opposite direction and began to race through the cover of the orchard. Bullets chewed up the trunks and branches all around me as I tore along, but I wasn’t stopping to see who was doing the shooting anymore.

  I had one last objective to achieve before I could get the hell out of here. I headed for the rear gate—the one that lies to the southern end of the compound, behind the VIP Villa and the dog kennels. I was pounding through the trees, ducking under low branches and with leaves whipping my face. I knew if I stuck close to the dividing wall that ran down the center of the compound it would lead me directly to the rear entranceway.

  It came into view.

  My heart leapt: the gate was open.

  It was wide open, and one of the Embassy evacuation vehicles—an armored Toyota Land Cruiser—was gone. At last. At last a real, tangible glimmer of hope. If one of the Embassy escape vehicles was gone, maybe some of my American friends had made it out of here alive? Who else would have known how to disable the fuel cutoff, so as to start the vehicle? But how could anyone have escaped in the Toyota, if the Ambassador was lying dead in the 1,200-Bed Hospital?

  I’d seen several of the Embassy vehicles shot up and burning fiercely at the front of the QRF building, but I hadn’t bothered to count how many there were. My mind had been on other things. Even so, I now knew that at least one of the Mission escape vehicles was gone, and after the hell that I had witnessed here I finally found cause for a glimmer of hope.

  Since the rear gate was open and unguarded I grabbed the opportunity and slipped through onto the road. I was now back at the position where Massoud and I had been challenged by the Dushka gunner a few hours earlier—but right now all the action was at the opposite end of the Embassy compound, and the entire highway appeared to be deserted.

  I turned right and headed west, away from the Mission. After fifty yards I found some cover: the rear gate of a neighboring compound. I sank into its shadow, taking up a position behind the small concrete barrier that blocked the gateway. I pulled out my mobile, called Zahid, and told him to drive around to where I was.

  My legs felt like jelly and I knew the adrenaline was pissing out of my system now. I told Zahid to put his four-way hazard lights on, so I could see him coming, for his sedan looked like any other vehicle in this city. As I waited I kept watching my arcs for the enemy. But as I scanned the night, half my mind was on that SUV evacuation vehicle that had exited the Embassy’s rear gate, and who might have driven it out of there.

  Three minutes after I’d exited the rear gate I spotted Zahid’s vehicle. I dashed out from my place of hiding, they saw me, accelerated, and I ripped open the rear door and dived in.

  “Thank God,” Zahid exclaimed. “We thought you’d been taken.”

  “No, mate, I’m still here,” I panted, breathlessly. “But let’s get going. There’s nothing more we can do.”

  As we drove away from the danger zone Zahid had news for me. While I’d been fighting my way into the Embassy compound, he’d managed to speak to some of the Shariah Brigade gunmen who were milling around outside. No doubt about it, I couldn’t fault the guy’s bravery or his front, not to mention his loyalty to us all.

  “They said all the Americans are dead,” Zahid remarked, quietly. “They have all been killed.”

  I felt my heart lurch. “Did they give any numbers?”

  Zahid shook his head. “No, no—no numbers given.”

  “Well then, they’re talking shit,” I snapped. “Total bollocks.”

  I was trying desperately to keep up a brave front here, for in spite of what I was saying I was starting to believe it myself now. After all that I had witnessed inside the compound, I couldn’t believe that any of my American friends had escaped alive. But I really didn’t want to believe that they were finished, hence my venting on Zahid.

  “Listen, Zahid, I would not want to be a Libyan when the Americans wake up to all this tomorrow morning.”

  “What do you mean?” he asked

  “I mean I wouldn’t want to be a Libyan when the Americans realize their Ambassador has been murdered. America helped you get Gaddafi out. You’d never have done it without them. And you’ve just gone and slaughtered some of the key people who helped you do that. A lot of Libyan bad guys are going to go very missing very soon now, ’cause the Americans will have their Special Operations forces on the way . . . And you know what, I’ll be the first to cheer them on.”

  Zahid had gone very quiet. I knew I was venting, and very much taking it out on the wrong person. Zahid was one of the good Libyans, as tonight’s events had proven. But I was in a very bad place in my head right now; I was burning up inside.

  The car was quiet the entire drive back to my beachside villa. We pulled up and Zahid and Hamid dismounted and came as if to join me.

  I held up a hand to stop them. “No, no, guys. That’s it for tonight. You need to get home to your families, and I need to be on my own.”

  The two of them watched me all the way to my villa entrance. I went inside, and without a backward glance I closed and locked the door. I slid onto the floor, my back to the wall, buried my head in my hands, and started to cry. My emotions were tearing me apart. In my heart I just knew that all the guys had to be dead, just like Ambassador Stevens. I cried for each and every one of them, and for all the other good people who had died on this dark and fucked-up night.

  The worst thing was that there were no bodies—apart from that of Ambassador Stevens—so I presumed the Shariah Brigade had got them, and that they’d parade them through the streets come daylight. Either that or some of the guys had to have been captured. I dragged myself off the floor and onto the sofa. Between the tears I began to relive all the memories, as images of the good times flitted through my head.

  I remembered the time Dave, Scotty, and Silvio had caught me speaking Welsh. I was on the phone to Robert about something and they’d overheard.

  “Hey, man, what the fuck’s that you’re speaking?” Scotty had demanded.

  “Yeah, what is that shit?” Dave had asked.

  “It’s my mother tongue, Welsh. Like people who come from Wales speak Welsh.”

  “Oh, man, is that like Gaelic? Like they speak in Ireland?”

  “Is it the fuck like Gaelic! Breton, Cornish, and Welsh are similar, but Gaelic it is not. Welsh has got bugger-all to do with the Paddys.”

  Welsh has such a distinctive sound to it, it’s impossible to confuse it with Italian or French or Spanish or just about any other European language. I was pretty much used to people staring at me whenever I was speaking it. But the reaction of the guys at the Mission—it had been priceless.

  Silvio knew all about Wales and the Welsh language. He called it “the Land of Myths and Dragons.” But he’d never actually heard anyone speaking Welsh before.

  “Anyhow, guys, don’t you worry so much about Welsh,” I’d told them. “You lot need to learn t
o speak English first. I’ll give you a lesson later on today. Let’s get you up to speed on the Queen’s English, so at least people can understand you.”

  “Fuckin’ asshole,” Scotty had growled.

  But everyone had been laughing.

  Amazingly enough, Scotty had a degree in Mandarin, which was part of the reason I loved teasing him about his English. Dave had taken a good few days to work me out and get accustomed to the British sense of humor, but once he’d done that, we’d been inseparable. Dave had told me how he’d served alongside British soldiers in Iraq, and he described how wrong their humor had been. At first he’d thought they were all messed up, but by the end of that Iraq tour he’d learned to laugh at the humor, even though it was way out of line.

  One night the guys had watched a London gangster movie called RocknRolla. When we met the next morning Jeff and Scotty kept going: “All right, guvnor, you mug?” It was obviously some Cockney slang they’d picked up from the movie. I’d told them I didn’t have the faintest clue what they were talking about.

  Dave had been chuckling away at it all, but when the kidding was done he’d said to me: “So, buddy, tell me some more about Wales.” He’d seemed fascinated by the country, its long history of struggle and its ancient traditions. And it had been a quintessentially British greeting—“All right, mate?”—that had become our collective catchphrase. That’s how the guys had greeted me in the mornings.

  The recollections tortured me, yet in a strange way they also seemed to help. With memories like those I couldn’t believe that the guys could really all be gone. I flicked on the TV news. There on BBC World was a breaking news story, the bulletin flashing across the screen: “U.S. Consulate in Benghazi Attacked by Protesters.”