Whisper

by Tal Bauer

  David’s smile, the way it crinkled his eyes, carved furrows into his face, made Kris’s bones weak. Out of everyone in the room, David burned the brightest, laughed the loudest, transfixed Kris in ways he couldn’t describe. He almost couldn’t breathe, watching David. The thin air of Kabul seemed too weak, too light, to contain all that David was. He was exhausted—they all were, worn through from six weeks of war—but there David was, hamming it up with his team.

  Kris fled before breakfast was through. He couldn’t take it, couldn’t take David’s effect on his heart.

  George found him a few hours later. “We’re going to head over to the US Embassy. Want to come?”

  George, Kris, Jim, and Phillip hopped into one of the trucks they’d driven from Bagram. Ryan drove, and they wound their way through Kabul’s bustling streets to the boarded-up embassy.

  The embassy had been locked up for fifteen years, closed and abandoned after the bloody civil war started tearing Afghanistan to shreds following Soviet withdrawal. Ryan cut the chains off the front door and broke through with an axe.

  The seal of the United States lay under a thick carpet of dust, welcoming them into the gloom. Pictures of President Reagan and Vice President George Bush hung on the walls, and rotary telephones still sat on desks. Broken picture frames and glass covered the marble floors.

  Kris stooped to pick up one photo, half buried in dirt and the dust of decay. President Jimmy Carter watched over a casket, his head bowed.

  “Ambassador Dubs’s funeral.” George spoke over Kris’s shoulder. “He was murdered in Kabul. Kidnapped under suspicious circumstances, supposedly by terrorists. The Soviets forced their Afghan puppet government into a rescue mission, despite the US wanting to negotiate. Dubs was executed when the rescuers stormed their hideout. His death, and his kidnapping, was never fully explained. But his murder poisoned our relations with Afghanistan for decades. We withdrew completely.” George sighed. “He was murdered in February of ’79. By that autumn, the communist government of Afghanistan was in shambles, the country was in open revolt. In December, the Soviets invaded Kabul to prop up their communist allies. We, naturally, wanted to fight communism and avenge the death of our ambassador, and provided covert aid to the enemies of communism: the Muslim fundamentalists.”

  “Bin Laden came to Afghanistan in 1980.” Kris felt his stomach turn, felt it knot. “All this—” He nodded to the photo, the time capsule of the embassy, perfectly preserving 1979. “—was part of why he set off down this path. He was so enraged by the Soviet invasion of Muslim lands, and the signing of the Egypt-Israel peace treaty. He was furious, lashing out. He wanted to fight the enemies of Islam, and we helped him. And then we dropped Bin Laden once the Soviets pulled out. And we became the enemies. It’s all a vicious cycle, isn’t it?”

  “‘What a tangled web we weave…’” George smiled sadly. “But we’re not the arbiters of the world, Kris. We’re just here to gather intelligence. Our job is to see, to listen, and to know. It’s not up to us to shape the world.”

  “But here we are, fighting a war.” Kris brushed the dust off Dubs’s funeral photo. He set it on the edge of the ambassador’s desk, propped up against the rotary telephone and next to an old cigarette ashtray. “And everything we’ve done here? What you just told me? We absolutely shape the world. We’ve made all of this, everything, happen.”

  “Is that a bad thing? Would the world be better if it were more American?”

  He thought of Khan by firelight, asking for American help yet convinced it would all end in betrayal, the same end to the same song replayed a thousand times in the Arab world. And of the Shomali, the dusty, blood-soaked drive to the capital. Corpses blown apart, mangled body parts strewn across cratered roads. The women whose hands had shaken under their burqas, walking outside unaccompanied for the first time. The thousands who had been murdered by the Taliban, and the village of bones he and David had found. The shape of a child’s rib bone in David’s palm.

  “War is hell, George. No matter what.”

  “Some things are worth fighting for.”

  “That’s what everyone says.”

  Footsteps echoed on the marble, drawing close. “War makes men.” Ryan, his hands propped on his hips, glared at Kris. “It defines a man. He’s at his most connected with himself. And of course this is worth fighting. There’s nothing more just and right than exterminating these murderers. They deserve everything that they get. And more.”

  “Ryan, did you cut your way into the old CIA station?” George ignored Ryan’s outburst. The old CIA station was housed in the basement of the embassy, and it had been abandoned at the same time as the withdrawal.

  “It’s empty. Some old cash in the safe, but they burned everything before pulling out.”

  “Good. Then there’s nothing for us here. State will take over the embassy when they arrive.”

  “We’re suddenly the most popular people on the planet.” George smiled ruefully at the team, back at their new station. “Everyone is coming to visit. CENTCOM is sending a huge deployment of humanitarian aid. We’re keeping the lead in the Bin Laden hunt. Islamabad station says their sources claim they have a credible lead on Bin Laden. We need to see if it pans out. If they’re right, we have to strike.

  “Ryan, I want you and Jim to head east. You can’t go alone, though. East is al-Qaeda country. This morning, a group of armed fighters slaughtered a village where the men had decided to shave their Taliban-mandated beards. We may feel safe in Kabul now, but you step one toe to the east, and you’re in a world of hurt without the right kind of support.”

  He turned to Kris. “What do you know about the eastern provinces? Are there any warlords affiliated with Khan that we can turn to? Whose loyalty we can buy?”

  Kris blew out a long breath. “I’ll ask Khan for an introduction. You’re deep into Pashtunwali in those regions, though. No matter how much you pay, you’re going to run smack into their tribal code. If Bin Laden is hiding in the tribal areas, he’s going to rely on Pashtunwali to shield him, especially from infidels such as us.”

  “We have to try. See what you can do.”

  Kris nodded.

  “And I want you to head to wherever the Shura Nazar are keeping their prisoners. They captured al-Qaeda training camps, bases, and fighters. I want them interrogated, as soon as possible. We need to know what they know. We need to dig up everything at the camps. Everything they were up to.”

  “George, may I take Sergeant Haddad with me?”

  “Can’t be without your little friend for even a day, can you?” Ryan grinned. Jim chuckled once, but sucked in a breath and shut down immediately after.

  It had been seven hours since breakfast. Not that Kris was counting. “Medical care in the Shura Nazar is minimal at best. They’re not going to spare anything for captured al-Qaeda fighters. They didn’t even bury them on the Shomali. If we bring medical care, they might be more willing to talk.”

  “Good thinking.” George nodded. “I’ll let Palmer know we need Haddad for this. Let’s get moving.”

  He and David were guided to a bombed-out warehouse in a dark and destroyed sector of Kabul. Broken windows let in snow flurries and icy wind. It was too cold and dry for the snow to stick, and it felt like a thousand blades hitting his skin. The al-Qaeda fighters were kept in shipping containers with holes drilled in the sides. They stayed in the dark until pulled out by Shura Nazar guards for Kris to question.

  Kris’s stomach turned as the first prisoner came to them. He had a shrapnel wound on his face, over his cheek and curling up to his forehead. Blood and pus matted his head. His face was swollen, his eyes glassy.

  “He won’t be able to answer any questions. Not until he’s recovered,” David said softly.

  “Offer him medical care. It’s what we can do.”

  The man was Saudi, and he gratefully accepted David’s offer to clean and bandage his wounds. He sat stoically through it all, never once flinching. He seemed surprised
when Kris revealed he and David were from the CIA. He claimed he had been studying the Quran in Afghanistan and had been caught in the war. That he was innocent.

  “You were in Afghanistan studying the Quran?” Kris asked in Dari.

  The Saudi frowned, confused. “What did you say?”

  Kris switched to Arabic. “Why come to a Dari-speaking country to study an Arabic text?”

  The Saudi said nothing.

  Kris and David sent him back.

  Word spread that the interrogators were giving medical aid. They had dozens of volunteers willing to speak, scores of young fighters lining up for David’s care.

  Man after man repeated the same line: that they were in Afghanistan to study the Quran. That they had lost their passport. That they had never heard of Bin Laden.

  There simply wasn’t any reason for Arabs, Chechens, Chinese Uighurs, Burmese Muslims, or Central Asian Islamists to be in Afghanistan other than as fighters. Certainly not hundreds of them studying the Quran in a language the Quran wasn’t even written in. How had all these students been so grievously wounded by bombs and bullets? Weren’t they supposed to be studying?

  Al-Qaeda had prepped their people well, giving them the same line to use in detention. As long as no one broke, their answers were impenetrable, and without any actual hard evidence—impossible to come by in a warzone—their answers couldn’t be challenged.

  David patched them as best he could and sent them back to their cells.

  Kris kept questioning each fighter. He could recite their answers now, and he mouthed along with their protests as they delivered the same line again and again.

  Until an older Yemeni sat before him.

  “Why were you in Afghanistan?”

  Silence. Kris frowned.

  “I came to fight the infidels,” he said slowly. “The Americans. We knew they were coming for the Sheikh.”

  “The Sheikh? Bin Laden?”

  “Nam.” David had stitched together the Yemeni’s face, plucking out a bomb fragment. Stitches ran up his cheek, down his throat. He’d narrowly avoided death. Kris’s eyes kept drifting to the stitches, squiggly lines that moved when the man spoke, like he had two mouths, two voices.

  “Where is the Sheikh now?”

  “He is waiting for you. Where he killed the Soviet infidels. He will kill you, too.”

  “George, Bin Laden is retreating to Tora Bora. Where he fought the Soviets in ’87 at Jaji. If we don’t stop him now, he can slip over the border to Pakistan through the mountains.”

  “This lines up with our intelligence, too. We’ve got reports coming in from on the ground that Bin Laden was seen heading east to Jalalabad. Dining with tribal leaders. Praying at a mosque in Jalalabad with the Taliban governor there. He left in a convoy of trucks and jeeps that stretched a mile long, they say.” George pointed to the map Ryan had tacked to the wall of their station’s command center. Bin Laden’s sightings were pinned in a row, stretching east from Kabul toward the border with Pakistan. “There’s also a news report of a convoy of trucks passing through the village of Agram. Qurans in one hand, AK-47s in the other. Multiple nationalities.” George handed over an article from the Times. Some reporter had trekked all the way out to Jalalabad for the article.

  “This reporter is lucky to not have been killed.”

  “It matches what we’re getting from the sources on the ground.” George fingered the pins, moving east, and then south through the Agram village and Nangarhar Province. He kept going, and his finger ended up dead center on Tora Bora against the base of the Spin Ghar mountains straddling the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. “Where are we on getting support from Khan to head east?”

  Kris sighed. “Khan and Fazl have been dragging their feet. They’re content in Kabul. They want us to take care of the south, and the east, and al-Qaeda. They think their work is done.”

  “We helped them get here.” George’s eyes flashed. “Kris, you have Khan’s ear. His trust. Use your relationship with him. Get us the support we need to go after Bin Laden, before he slips away!”

  Chapter 10

  Kabul, Afghanistan

  November 22, 2001

  “Listen up!” George bellowed over the mess of bodies stuffed into one of the bedrooms at their CIA station. True to George’s word, Kabul—and Kris’s CIA station—had turned into the hottest place on the planet. The station was buzzing, electric with energy and trilling satellite phones and bodies moving in and out at all hours of the day. George had peeled off his core team and pulled them into a tiny bedroom. “The men in this room are going on the hunt for Bin Laden.”

  Silence, instantly. The hushed voices, the whispers, the side conversations, stopped.

  Kris stood next to George on a rickety chair. Palmer and his team were there, along with Jim and Ryan.

  “We’ve pinpointed Bin Laden’s movements. He’s headed east-southeast. He’s moving with a large contingent of al-Qaeda fighters. Kris has secured the allegiance of a warlord in the east, a man named Shirzai. He’s been paid handsomely to help us set up what we’re now calling the Eastern Alliance. He’s gathered together some friendly warlords of his own, and they’re laying the groundwork for our entry into Jalalabad.”

  “Isn’t Jalalabad where those journalists were murdered?” One of Palmer’s men called out.

  The Taliban had melted into the countryside and the mountains following their withdrawal from Kabul, turning to wraiths. Roving bands of fighters moved outside Kabul, swooping down on roadways and villages and serving swift retribution.

  “Yes. A van of six journalists was stopped by what we believe are Taliban- or al-Qaeda-affiliated fighters. They were marched off the van and executed. Jalalabad and the rest of Nangarhar Province are white-hot right now. Filled with fighters. But we’re on the move. You will be Team Bravo. Shirzai has sent his deputy, Naji, to Kabul. When he arrives, you all are deploying with him to Jalalabad. The Eastern Alliance has already started working in Nangarhar and Jalalabad. They’ve pushed back on the fighters there. They, and you, will fight your way to Tora Bora and find Bin Laden.”

  Excitement thrummed through the tiny room, exultation mixing with exhilaration, with adrenaline, with the thrill of the chase, the hunt. They’d come to Afghanistan for this reason: to exterminate Bin Laden and al-Qaeda, make sure they could never attack the US again. Kris could see it in everyone’s eyes, the commitment, the finality. They’d put their boots on the ground in Afghanistan less than two weeks after September 11. They would be the ones who saw this through to the end.

  Naji arrived just after noon. He had four trucks with him, filled with fighters, everyone dressed in a mishmash of kameezes and fatigues and turbans. Every fighter had an AK-47, a bandolier of grenades, and at least two knives. These were not the organized, professional fighters of General Khan and the Shura Nazar. These were mercenaries, tribal fighters under a true warlord’s banner.

  Palmer and his men loaded up one of the trucks and climbed in. Ryan tried to talk to Naji, but he didn’t speak anything other than Dari and Pashto. “Kris!” Ryan waved him over, irritation flooding out of him. “You need to stick next to Naji. Translate for us.”

  David jogged over before Kris slid into the front seat of Naji’s truck. His face was hard, expression fixed, eyes cutting through every man around them. He leaned into Kris, growling into his ear. “Be careful.” His hands flexed, clenched, at his sides, like he wanted to reach out.

  Kris grabbed David’s arm. He felt David’s trembles through his layers. “I will see you in Jalalabad.”

  David nodded once. Palmer shouted, calling him back. Running backward, David kept his eyes on Kris until the last moment, until he climbed into the truck bed.

  Naji spoke in gutter Dari, the kind of slang and street lingo a gang member back in the US would use. It took Kris a while to catch up with him, but he followed along with the map Naji had, tracking their route east and into the mountains. It looked like a short trip. They would be off the road befor
e dark.

  The drive lasted all day, and well into the night.

  Switchbacks and curves that pushed the trucks to the edge of dirt tracks, roads that careened around mountain passes, washed-out sections of mud that had collapsed under snowfall, and rockslides that blocked the pass slowed them to a crawl, and then to stop when they had to clear the road. Each time the convoy stopped, Palmer’s men were up and armed, scanning the road, the hills, the valley, anywhere and everywhere.

  Finally, they crept into Jalalabad.

  The city, like the mountains, the countryside, everything they’d driven through, was gray. Surface-of-the-moon gray, alien-landscape gray. Like all life had been sucked out of the land, and only an endless stretch of desolation remained. Narrow streets crowded stone homes together. Limp power lines sagged across alleys, and some hung torn and frayed on the dusty streets. Fires burned on street corners, and men huddled around the flames. Their eyes stared from beneath their flat wool caps, gazes dead and cold.

  Once, Jalalabad had been one of the most beautiful cities in Afghanistan. Lush with greenery, it had been an emerald in Central Asia, a Shangri-La of Afghanistan. Now, it looked like the dark side of the moon, inhabited by refugees of the fall of Earth.

  Armed men stood on every street corner, glaring menacingly at the trucks as they rumbled through the city.

  “These are our men,” Naji said. “We control this city now.”

  “What about outside the city?”

  Naji didn’t answer.

  He drove them through the winding Jalalabad streets and turned south, out of the city. The sun slipped behind the Spin Ghar mountains, behind sheets of ice and snow along the peaks. The countryside plunged into darkness, more quickly than Kris was used to. There wasn’t a hint of electricity in Nangarhar Province, not a light bulb for miles and miles. The truck’s headlights flickered and faded, stretching to the dusty road just in front of their tires and no farther.