Complete Independence Day Omnibus, The

by Molstad, Stephen

  “The Saudis are all right,” Reg said. “A bit high-handed sometimes, but they usually end up doing the right thing.”

  Sutton wasn’t convinced. He lit a cigarette and squinted into the harsh afternoon sunlight. “We haven’t been here an hour yet and already there have been a dozen arguments, one fistfight, and now we’re being treated like bloody prisoners of war! I wouldn’t say they’re doing the right thing at all. No, things are not going well.”

  Reg didn’t answer, just watched as the man inhaled deeply on his cigarette.

  “Things are probably a bit more comfortable for whites up there in Kuwait,” Sutton said. “Too bad you weren’t able to follow your orders and get us through.” With that, the lieutenant turned and walked back to the shade of his plane.

  The blazing sun had one beneficial consequence. It made arguing while standing out in the open an impossibility. Soon, the pilots had retreated to their own mini-enclaves based on nation, still mistrustful of one another. They stretched out on the sand beneath their planes, fitfully trying to rest.

  Reg saw soldiers of the Saudi army taking up positions all around the plateau. They were armed with “handheld” SAM launchers, bulky bazooka like weapons. He could see them on the high dunes in the distance. Ready to defend against incoming alien ships. Futile, he thought.

  At one point, midway through the afternoon, a Jordanian pilot was called to the main camp. When he returned, word spread among the international pilots that the Saudis had asked him a few questions about the capabilities of the alien attack craft. The man had told them that others had been more involved in the fighting than he, particularly the British officer called Cummins, but they hadn’t seemed interested. Sometime after that, the Saudis finally brought buckets of water and boxes of crackers and distributed them.

  What news was passed among the pilots took a circuitous route. The Iraqis had made sure they were as far as possible from their sworn enemies, the Iranians. The Israelis stayed as far as possible from everyone.

  It was Thomson more than anyone who facilitated communication. He spent most of the afternoon shuffling from one encampment to the next, bringing his own fussy brand of diplomacy to the situation. No one was convinced by anything he said, but on the few occasions he stepped between arguing parties—once there were even knives drawn—he gave the frustrated pilots a way to back down without losing face.

  Unwittingly, he also provided comic relief. Most of the pilots were fluent in English, the international language of aviation, but Thomson persisted in dragging out his phrase book and tripping over elementary Arabic phrases at every opportunity. He would deliver his mispronunciations with great authority, then move on to the next group.

  Eventually, he returned to the three British planes, where Tye and Sutton lay sprawled in the sand. Reg was leaning against a Tornado’s landing gear, half-dozing.

  “Keeping eyes open and ears alert, I see,” Thomson said. He was covered in dust from head to toe.

  The two men on the ground just muttered and ignored the colonel, but Reg asked, “Any news?”

  Thomson looked over his shoulder at the various groups of pilots. “It’s shocking. Intellectually, I knew these people hated one another, of course. It’s all over the telly and the newspapers. But to witness it up close like this, it’s enough to turn your stomach.”

  Reg was no stranger to the strife of the Middle East, but this was Thomson’s first visit to the region. The colonel continued, “I was talking to those blokes from Syria, for example. Educated fellows, polite. Worried about their families, of course. But when the subject of the Israelis came up it was like I’d thrown a switch and turned them into demons or some such. They started going on about how when night comes, they were going to sneak over there with knives and sever a few heads. Quite disturbing really.” Thomson shivered in the heat. “Do you suppose we should go over and warn them?”

  Reg looked over at the large Israeli contingent and noticed they’d posted guards of their own. “I wouldn’t worry about them, Colonel. They’re used to being surrounded by unfriendly nations.”

  Thomson studied the Israelis himself. “Humph,” he said. “Looks like somebody has already warned them. Still, if I was a wagering man, I’d bet someone dies before the night is out.”

  Sutton stood, stretching. “I’d say chances are good that we’ll all be dead before the night is out.”

  Thomson ignored the remark. The portly officer ran his fingers through his thinning hair before lying down on his back in the shade. He laced his fingers over the bulge of his stomach and fell instantly asleep. The roar of a Saudi jet lifting off did not drown out his snores.

  Time passed, and the British pilots became lost in their own thoughts, speaking to one another very little. Reg scanned the airfield, hoping to catch sight of any of his former students, but saw no one he recognized. He was mystified by the behavior of their supposed Saudi allies, but was willing to wait at least a little while for more information.

  The wait ended when the burly Saudi captain returned to “Embassy Row”—as Tye had taken to calling the international part of the airfield—and sent his soldiers to each contingent of pilots with a message. They asked each group to select a representative to meet with the camp’s commander.

  “I’ll pass,” Sutton said immediately. “There’s no telling what mischief these blokes are up to.”

  “If they’re serving food, sign me up,” Tye chimed in. “I’m half-starved.”

  Sutton gestured toward the sleeping figure of Thomson. “Mr. Phrase Book over there is our ranking officer. Maybe we should wake him up.”

  Reg was a more logical choice to act as representative because of his years of working with the Saudi military. He was the only one of the Brits with the first clue about the political dynamics of the region, but he felt certain the Saudis weren’t ready to hold a serious meeting so he leaned back against the landing gear. “I don’t know what’s worse,” he said, “the colonel’s snoring or the growls coming out of Tye’s stomach. You go on ahead, lad, and if they’re serving bangers and mash, bring us back a doggy bag.”

  Without waiting to hear Sutton’s response, the gangly mechanic left to join the other representatives. Sutton turned away with a petulant shrug and returned to his spot in the shade. “Fine,” he said.

  Reg lay down on his back and closed his eyes. But before he could drift off to sleep, a harsh Saudi voice startled him. “Englishman, wake up.” The burly captain was looming over him. “Is your name Cummins?”

  After a glance down at his name tag, Reg smiled up at the soldier. “Yes, I suppose I am.”

  “You will come with me,” he said impatiently, and when Reg didn’t leap to his feet, he added, “Immediately!”

  The two Brits exchanged a look. Sutton was alarmed. “I’m thinking it cannot be a good thing that he knows your name. I wouldn’t go if I were you. Could be trouble.”

  As Reg stood and brushed the sand from his uniform, the Saudi repeated, “Immediately!”

  Sutton scrambled to his feet. “You don’t have to go anywhere with this damn towel-head, Major. He’s got no authority over you.”

  Reg grimaced at his compatriot’s ugly remark. “Sutton, don’t worry. I’ll go.”

  When the captain turned and began leading the way, Sutton caught Reg by the arm. ‘Take this,” he said, showing him the pistol concealed in his waistband.

  “Thanks just the same,” Reg said with a glance toward the dozens of heavily armed Saudi soldiers around the airfield. “I doubt I’d have the chance to use it, even if I wanted to.” With that, he moved off to join the representatives moving toward the Saudi camp.

  As the group made its way between the white tents that served the base as barracks, Reg took special note of the civilians milling about, women and even a few children. The women were covered from head to toe in long skeins of black fabric, the abayas dictated by Muslim custom. Regardless of the temperature, Saudi women were bound by law to cover themselves lik
e furniture in an abandoned house. It was a custom Reg found personally distasteful, but one he’d come to ignore.

  The representatives were marched past an open-sided tent crammed full of radio equipment. About a dozen technicians sat at their stations under a low roof of camouflage netting. They all turned and stared inquisitively at the foreign pilots.

  A Jordanian pilot walking just ahead of Reg and Tye gestured toward the radio tent. “We should make friends with those men over there. Maybe they can tell us what’s happening out in the world.”

  Tye took this immediately to heart. “Hello, gents,” he called to radio operators with wave and a smile. “Any word from England?” The Saudis merely stared back at him. In the time-honored tradition of English speakers everywhere, Tye tried again, speaking slowly and in a louder voice. “WHAT… IS HAPPENING… IN ENGLAND?”

  The only result of this was that the other dozen pilots walking with him began shouting questions of their own, mostly in Arabic. The Saudi captain barked an order, and the group moved on.

  “That’s not exactly what I had I mind,” said the Jordanian.

  “They weren’t picking up anything, anyway,” said Reg. “Otherwise, they would have been too busy to stare at us.” There were several small cargo planes scattered about the center of the camp, but by far the largest object in sight was an American-built C-130A cargo plane. It towered above the others, its great bulk providing shade for a dozen or so tents pitched beneath its one-hundred-foot height. The tail section had been raised on its hinges, allowing direct access to the belly of the plane. A squad of soldiers casually guarded the interior, sitting around the top of the landing ramp. They, too, stared at the bedraggled group of pilots, while tightening their grips on their AK-47s.

  Finally the pilots came to a large tent at the very center of the Saudi camp. A noisy gas-driven generator provided power to the air-conditioning system cooling the tent’s interior. A soldier stationed at the entrance seemed to have as his sole responsibility ensuring that the flap stayed closed. The tent had originally been white, but, like the others, was now coated with the tan brown dust of the surrounding desert. The hook-nosed captain roughly ordered the pilots to halt.

  “That bloke’s got a red-hot poker jammed up his rear, doesn’t he?” asked Tye, eliciting a few chuckles. “Where exactly does he think we’d be wandering off to?”

  “They are trying to show us how strong they are,” answered the Jordanian, without emotion.

  “Well, I wish he’d just lift something heavy above his head and have done with it,” Tye replied. “It’s too bloody hot to stand around in the sun. I feel like a slab of bacon that’s been left in the skillet too long.”

  He looks it, too, thought Reg. The pale mechanic’s skin was beginning to turn the same shade as his flaming red hair, and his shoulders were slouched. The sun was literally shrinking him.

  Tye glanced around with half-closed eyes. The shade on the eastern side of the tent attracted his attention. “Why can’t we wait over there?” he asked loudly.

  Reg smiled. “I suppose you could try to walk over there and find out.”

  Tye considered the idea. “Say,” he asked hesitantly, “don’t they still stone people in this country? Cut off their hands and all that business?”

  Reg shrugged. “It’s a harsh place.”

  “Actually,” said the Jordanian, eyeing the shade, “that’s not a bad idea. Let’s go and wait in the shade. We’re all brothers here. No one is going to shoot us.” He stepped out of line and began walking slowly toward the spot. The Saudi guards lowered their rifles at him, ordering him back. But he continued moving, hands in the air, speaking in a friendly tone. “The sun is making us ill,” he explained.

  They tried to block his path and push him back toward the others, but the Jordanian bulled ahead, eventually pushing his way past the last guard and sitting down in the shade. The other pilots followed his example, ignoring the threats and warnings from the soldiers. Once they had all seated themselves along the side of the tent, the corporal who had been left in charge of the situation tried to save face by yelling, “No more moving! I order you to sit down and stay where you are!”

  The pilots looked up and down the line at one another and, for the first time, shared a smile. It was a small victory, but it was something. Tye stretched out his long, tired legs and turned to the Jordanian. “This is much better. Cheers!”

  “Yeah, that was a pretty good move,” said the Israeli representative, adjusting his thick eyeglasses. “Now ask them to bring us some Cokes, and maybe some sandwiches.”

  The Jordanian and the Israeli introduced themselves to the Brits. The Israeli’s name was Yossi. His voice sounded like gravel and he had a shock of short black hair. The black-plastic frames of his glasses dominated his face. He seemed about Tye’s age and Reg thought he looked more like a math student than a fighter pilot. Although Yossi had a friendly demeanor and even cracked a few jokes, he never smiled.

  The Jordanian, Edward, was closer to Reg in both age and height. He, too, was friendly with the Brits who sat between him and the Israeli pilot. Except for Yossi’s initial comment, the two of them studiously avoided speaking to one another.

  Tye pointed to the small green, white, and yellow patch sewn on to Edward’s flight suit below the Jordanian flag. “What’s that insignia?” he asked.

  Edward glanced over at Yossi. “Ask your Jewish friend over there,” he said. “He knows what it is.”

  Yossi looked at the patch. “It means he’s a Palestinian. Half the Arabs in Jordan are Palestinians and the king lets a few of them join the armed forces so the others can feel better about themselves.”

  Tye, always more interested in machines than politics, turned to Reg for clarification. “Palestinians and Israelis don’t get on very well, do they?”

  Yossi answered instead of Reg. “Arabs are like Gentiles,” he said. “You’ve got bad ones and you’ve got good ones.”

  Edward snorted. “And the only good Arabs are the dead ones, right?”

  “Hey, look, I got no problem with you,” Yossi shot back, pointing a finger. “Israel, Jordan, whatever. We don’t even know if they exist anymore, but if you want to carry on old fights, I’m ready.”

  Edward laughed again. ‘Take a look around you. You’re not in Tel Aviv, my friend. You should watch your tongue out here.” He gestured broadly at their surroundings. “These Bedouins have a saying: A night in the desert is long and full of scorpions for the man who does not belong there.” He flashed Yossi a smile that managed to be simultaneously cheerful and threatening.

  The large Saudi captain emerged from the tent with someone Reg guessed must be Faisal. He was a dark-skinned man in his late forties and had flecks of gray running through his carefully trimmed beard. The long, cream-colored robe he wore loosely over his military uniform made him look like a sheik. He seemed completely relaxed, even jovial, as he strolled away from his tent, speaking in a low voice to the captain, but Reg sensed that he could be a dangerous man.

  The two men ambled to an open spot in the sand where they were met by a soldier who handed them a pair of rolled up mats. At the same time, one of the radiomen approached from the communications tent carrying a portable Sony stereo.

  A different soldier threw a bundle of mats toward the pilots, and several of the men casually stood up to take one. “What’s going on?” Tye wondered aloud.

  On all sides, men began to spread the mats on the ground. The soldiers guarding the pilots laid their weapons aside and knelt in the sand. The radioman pushed a button on the stereo and the musical voice of a prayer leader, a muezzin, filled the air. All of the Saudis and most of the international pilots prostrated themselves on their mats, bowing their heads to the north.

  “Oh, now I remember,” whispered Tye, “Islamic people have to pray five or six times a day, don’t they? And they all face that same city, what’s the name of that place? Mazatlan! That’s it, they all pray towards Mazatlan.”


  “Mecca,” Reg corrected him. “They face Mecca, the Holy City.”

  The muezzin’s song, rich and clear, rang through the camp and echoed off the surrounding hills. All of the Muslims in the camp, soldiers and civilians, prayed together, and a feeling of tranquility fell across the plateau, stilling the most warlike of hearts.

  Tye rocked back and forth as he listened to the singing, then leaned toward Edward. “That’s actually quite beautiful,” he said before narrowing his eyes and giving the Palestinian the once-over. “Hey, why aren’t you praying with them?”

  “Because I’m a Christian,” Edward replied. “Why aren’t you?”

  When the prayers were over, the hook-nosed captain and the man in the cream-colored robes stood and continued speaking quietly to one another. From their gestures and glances, it was clear they were discussing what to do with their unexpected guests. They appeared to take special note of Reg and the Israeli representative, Yossi. After a few moments, they walked toward the strip of shade where the pilots had planted themselves. Reg and the others labored to their feet and dusted themselves off in preparation for the meeting.

  “Welcome!” shouted the burly captain sternly. “Our most respected leader, Commander Ghalil Faisal, welcomes you. But he warns you that this place is a military facility of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, governed by the laws of the Holy Koran.” As the captain spoke, Reg and Faisal stared at one another, sizing each other up. “The Saudi people are famous for their generosity,” barked the captain. “Our supplies will be shared with all of you. Our bread will be your bread. You will receive tents, food, and water.”

  “All of us?” asked Yossi in his raspy voice.

  The captain gritted his teeth and looked away from the Jewish pilot, offended by his very presence. He glanced toward Faisal, who returned a barely perceptible nod.

  “Our commander has declared that the old battles are over. The hospitality we show to our Muslim brothers and our friends from the West will also be offered to the Zionists during their temporary stay in our country.”