by Connor Black
“Dilbert have anything?” he asked. Dilbert was the call sign Sterba had christened Chen with in Thailand, much to her dismay. It was interesting that he switched to that now, and I sensed it meant he felt we had just gone operational.
“She’s found some calls that make her think there’s a connection outside of Tanzania. Looking into it now.”
“Over there,” Sterba said, pointing to a small path that let roughly in the direction we needed to go. I put the pack on and followed.
After a few minutes of making our way through the bush, he said, “Check six.”
“I think the baddies are ahead of us, Sterbs.”
“Not the baddies I’m worried about.”
I checked behind us. Nothing. “What are you worried about?”
He stopped and turned to me. “In case you haven’t noticed, Hillary,” he said, using the call sign I had inherited in Afghanistan, “we’re in the bush in Tanzania. Ever occur to you why so many tourists come here? Do you remember Kahembe saying, ‘It is rather easy to dispose of bodies here’?”
Well frankly I had been more focused on finding bad guys. But now I saw what he meant, and the feeling didn’t exactly fill me with warmth.
“Yeah,” he said, nodding. “Lions, cheetahs, leopards. And plenty of other things that go chomp-chomp.”
I took the opportunity to move past him on the path.
“My turn to take point,” I said. “They always go for the straggler.”
After ten minutes or so, we found a small, flat patch that gave us visibility to the petrol station across the road. We settled in, slowly adjusting branches to make sure we were adequately concealed. We lay prone next to one another, each with a pair of field glasses, scanning the petrol station and main road.
“I don’t have anything, Joe,” I said after several minutes.
“Give it a little time.”
The station was of average size, with three bays for the workshop, all of which were closed. What must have been the cashier’s office was attached to the right side of the building, and had only a door. Some sort of sheet, or perhaps paper, covered the window in the top half of the door.
I scanned from left to right, studying the station. The fence surrounding the property had largely fallen down, allowing for some entry and egress points on foot. There appeared to be space behind the station which would have allowed vehicles to enter the workshop bays from either side of the structure. Out front, the pumps had been removed, but a large portico and the concrete pad below remained.
The surrounding area, where customers once pulled in to check the air in their tires before embarking on safari, was packed dirt. And while the scattered sprigs of weeds announced the station as well past its time, there appeared to be some recent tire marks.
As I was scanning, a shape appeared on the flat roof.
“Contact. Roof, left side,” I said.
Sterba shifted to look as the figure approached the edge of the roof. It was a man, holding what looked like an AK-47. The roof was recessed slightly, so the edges of the building formed a solid railing and only allowed us to see him from the stomach up, but it was enough.
The sentry came to the edge and scanned the road. He adjusted slightly, leaning over to check the immediate grounds. It was clear the portico below him was a problem.
“The pad under the portico is his blind spot. He doesn’t have the angle to see directly underneath,” I said.
“No. But he does,” Sterba said, pointing out a new sentry. “Right side. Low.”
I moved to glass the lower right side of the building and saw the shadow of another guard rounding the building. The silhouette of a barrel was clearly visible above his shoulder.
“OK, this is the location we’ve been looking for. Notify Kahembe, and I will update Dilbert.”
“Wilco,” Sterba said, pulling out his phone to contact the Lieutenant.
I took a quick scan from left to right and then brought out my phone to call Chen. There was a message from her on the screen. Naseeb on his way to pick me up and take me to the police station. Keep me updated on your progress.
I called, and after a few rings was sent to voicemail. I tried once again with the same result. Sterba did get through, and I heard the tail end of his conversation before he closed the line.
“Kahembe will be notified that we’ve found a possible location for the bombers. I’ve asked that they come in quietly from the west, and notify us when they’re ten minutes out.”
“No answer from Chen,” I said, considering this a moment as there was no reason for a member of the team to go off comms. I tried Naseeb, as we had periodically throughout the morning. Again, there was no answer.
“Nothing from Naseeb either,” I said. Collecting my thoughts, I made a decision. “Police are on the way. Naseeb is giving Chen a ride back to the police station, and she’s only been off comms for a few minutes. The threat here is our priority. We stay, observe, and collect as much information as we can on the objective.”
Sterba remained prone, his field glasses on the petrol station as he replied, “Roger.”
We settled into a routine, scanning and calling out movement. The dirt road between our position and the petrol station was the northern lesser used of the two main roads west of Arusha. Most of the tour groups used the road just south of us to reach destinations like Tarangire and the Serengeti, going from the airport we’d left earlier today. Traffic on this road was mostly supply lorries and a few safari outfits taking customers north into Kenya.
The sentries didn’t seem to have a set patrol schedule. We still had only seen two guards, and their intervals were sporadic at best. We were able to see some variances in light and shadow behind whatever blocked the door’s window, which let us know that someone was inside. Problem was, we couldn’t tell if it was a dozen bomb-wearing lunatics or a cat finding a nice place to have a nap.
As I watched, I couldn’t knock the feeling that something was strange about Naseeb picking Chen up. He’d been hired as our fixer, but was oddly unavailable this morning. Then suddenly, he appears and picks up Chen. Why was that?
I voiced as much to Sterba.
“What I want to think,” he said, “is that Naseeb slept through his alarm, had a little action with the missus, and then decided to turn up for work. He sees a message from Dilbert, which is a more attractive proposition than ours, and goes right to her.”
“Mmmm,” I replied, not liking the explanation. Even if it was a more realistic happenstance, fixers are generally in the business for the money. And when money, specifically money from the generous hand of Uncle Sam, is flowing, they tend to err on the side of more attentiveness than less.
Suddenly, the pieces began to come together. I pushed back from the shrubs into the small clearing and withdrew my phone.
Sterba sensed my urgency, but stayed in place. “Jackson?”
“Sterbs, why was Naseeb so fired up at the bakery?” I said over my shoulder.
“Because we found the phone.”
“He found the phone,” I corrected. “And what stood out about that phone?”
“Well, I think the fact that it was used to trigger a bomb that killed eleven people tends to make it special.”
“We didn’t know that at the time. Think about when you saw it sitting there in the stacks of flour.”
Sterba was silent for a second while he reconstructed the moment in his mind. “Jesus,” he finally said. “It was clean.”
“Exactly. Everything else in that back room was covered with a dusting of flour. Those sacks come in and out all day. They’re opened and poured. Even if the Ashas clean diligently, there will always be a layer of flour dust everywhere.”
“So Naseeb’s carrying the phone used to detonate the bomb. He sees an opportunity at the bakery to throw us off the scent, and plants it as he walks in from the back.”
“Exactly,” I said again as I tapped the green call key on the phone.
Back in Virgini
a, Landon Clark’s cell phone rang. He picked up on the first ring.
“Jackson,” he said. “How are things going?”
“Fine, Landon. No time for a sitrep now. Can you get me coordinates on Chen’s phone?”
“Yes,” he replied. “Give me ten minutes.”
“Landon, we may not have ten minutes. You gave us agency phones. Can’t you just flip a switch and have her show up on my phone?”
“It’s not that easy, Jackson. There’s a protocol here.”
“Do what you can. Chase out,” I said and closed the line.
Sterba had his field glasses pointing left. “We might not need Landon’s help. Vehicle approaching. Looks like Naseeb’s.”
“Why would Chen have him bring her directly to the target?” I said, more to myself than Sterba.
11
Naseeb’s white Land Cruiser turned into the petrol station at pace and skidded to a stop under the portico. A cloud of dust followed, obscuring the vehicle momentarily. When the dust cleared, Naseeb was outside of the vehicle and opening the back door. He was animated, shouting something we couldn’t quite hear. Finally, he reached in and yanked the passenger out.
It was Chen. Her hands bound, and unstable from the pull, she fell hard to the concrete. He reached down and pulled her up, then immediately raised his hand to strike her across the face. Chen was able to get her hands up to deflect the blow. But Naseeb’s speed belied his pudgy build. His hand immediately drew back and delivered a blow to her stomach that doubled her over.
Seeing this sudden display of violence, one of our own team being assaulted, triggered an instant reaction in both of us. The adrenalin pumps kicked in, our muscles tensed, and we were instantly on our feet. I had drawn my weapon and I knew Sterba had his 1911A1 at the ready.
While our position had been good for observation, it was tactically terrible. We were forty yards from Naseeb’s vehicle, and the dirt road separating us had absolutely no cover. With only side arms the distance was too great for a precision shot on Naseeb given how close he was to Chen. We would need to break cover and take our chances of being seen. Both of us immediately knew this. But to both of us, it didn’t matter. Our singular focus was a teammate in trouble.
“Going straight in,” I said. “Take right.”
Just as we broke through the foliage, a lorry passed from left to right. As I hit the shoulder of the road to take advantage of the passing truck’s dust cloud, I saw the driver look at me. The whites of his eyes rounded like saucers at the sight of two men with weapons drawn suddenly popping out of the bush. The rattle of the engine increased, and it belched black smoke as the driver did his best to get away from the mad wazungu.
Halfway across the road, I heard the distinctive low boom of Sterba’s .45. A guard that had come around the right side of the building fell immediately.
At the sound of Sterba’s shot, Naseeb spun and saw us crossing the road. He immediately grabbed Chen and ran for the shop door. He held her close, and I still did not have a shot. I was sending a round into the door to slow them when I noticed movement at the top of the building. The roof guard’s AK peppered the ground around me with fire until I reached the cover of the portico, allowing Naseeb to drag Chen inside.
Another barrage of rounds came from the roof, peppering the dirt patch to the right of the station. The guard, no longer having a line of sight on me, had switched his aim. Sterba dove for the meager cover of a small pile of rocks.
I shifted right, coming out from the cover of the portico with my weapon trained up. The guard, in a tactically inadvisable position, was leaning over the edge, completely focused on Sterba. I set the front sight on his head, brought the rear sight up slightly to get a perfect line, and squeezed off a single round. The guard’s head snapped left, and he instantly collapsed. I stepped back, putting one of the portico’s columns between myself and the building, and nodded to Sterba. Ideally, we’d breach the building together.
Just as Sterba got to his feet to get to the side of the building, the window next to the door shattered. The muzzle of an AK poked through and sent a long burst at my position. The column took a fair portion of the fire, though I could feel the disturbed air as rounds bracketed me to either side.
I took a quick look to see that Sterba had made it to the side of the building, using the corner as cover. I pointed to the window and received a nod in exchange. He took three steps to the front and sent several rounds into the window. At that angle, he wasn’t likely to hit them, but I only needed their heads down for a second. I broke cover and ran for the door, hitting it at full speed with my shoulder.
Since it had a window, I knew it wouldn’t be too strong and a shoulder would do it, as opposed to a thicker door that would require a boot just below the knob. But I didn’t expect it to be so sun damaged and flimsy. The goddam thing broke like a thin piece of balsa wood and I careened across the room into an old metal desk.
And it so happened that Sterba’s cover fire had sent the guard into such a state of fear that he had run to the desk as well. We ended up less than two meters apart, enough for me to see his face was covered in beads of sweat.
I had landed on my side, and had to bring the SIG across my body to have a shot. The guard saw me reach for my weapon and, not having the time to pivot his AK around, swung the stock hard towards my face. Craning my neck, I made sure it missed my face by a fraction of an inch. But it did make contact with the SIG and knocked it cleanly from my hand.
His follow through left him turned slightly. I swept a leg across the back of his knees and he went down. I cocked my left elbow and drove it like a jackhammer into the side of his face. There was a terrible crunching noise on the concrete floor, and he immediately went still.
As I collected my weapon, an engine started in the workshop. I rose to see a silver van crash straight through one of the closed garage doors and turn right towards town. It happened with such speed, violence, and noise that I could not tell who was driving, but I guessed it was Naseeb.
I needed to stop that van, and raced for the door I had just blown through. As I approached, the doorframe was peppered with bullets, one passing so close to my ear that I could feel the heat of the round. There was obviously another guard that had come around the opposite side of the building.
I quickly drew back. He was expecting me to come through the door standing and was likely aiming at chest level, so I dropped to my stomach. I peered around the bottom of the doorframe, my head and weapon low. Just as I adjusted my sight picture and sent a round downrange, he let off a quick burst of fire. I ducked back into cover, knowing my shot had gone wide.
His gun went quiet, and I took another look around the doorframe, this time higher up. He was reloading, and having some trouble inserting the magazine. I took careful aim and fired, taking him in the shoulder and immediately rushing down to kick the AK out of his reach. I pushed him to his stomach, ramming my knee into the base of his spine. As I pressed his head into the dirt with one hand and checked for weapons with the other, he shouted venomous curses in Swahili. I noticed that his jeans had white pockets sewn into the back. It was one of the men who had planted the bomb.
Behind me, vehicles skidded to a halt under the portico. I turned to see two police cars, with a third just behind. An officer came out of one, weapon drawn and pointed in my direction. He shouted something in Swahili. And by tone alone, I knew he wasn’t asking if I’d like a coffee.
“Stop pointing that thing at me and cuff this guy. We still have to clear the building!” I shouted.
He stood frozen for a second, before responding, “OK, good!”
Sterba jogged towards us, and I met him at the destroyed door.
“Any sign of Dilbert?” he asked, hoping as I did that she wasn’t in the van that had blasted out. By now, several crucial minutes had passed. On the edge of town as we were, it would have taken only a few minutes for the van to disappear into the mass of people, traffic, and buildings. The time delay from
that last attacker had ruined our chances of pursuit.
I shook my head, and we went through the building at a rapid pace, clearing the garage and open space behind the building. There was no sign of Chen. But still we moved with haste, sprinting back into the garage where Kahembe and some of his men were gathered in a corner of the large space. Having cleared that side of the garage, I knew exactly what they were looking at: a nice and tidy row of a half-dozen artillery shells. The exact type we suspected had been used in the bombing of the hotel.
“It appears that Miss Chen found the bomber’s camp,” said Kahembe.
“She did, Lieutenant,” I replied. “She also found the bomber. It was Naseeb, and he just tore out of here with her in a dala dala.”
His face turned ashen, and he immediately barked an order to one of his men.
“Wait one, Lieutenant,” I said. Turning to Sterba, I indicated that he should check the shells to see if they were armed or booby trapped. The last thing we needed was one of the young policemen detonating the stack and turning us all into mince.
Sterba ran off, and Kahembe asked, “What were the markings?” I knew that he meant the names, decals, and decorations that adorned every dala dala.
“It was silver, with a large circle on the side that was filled half red and half blue. A white line went through the middle. I didn’t see a name.”
Kahembe turned again to his man, who was now on the radio. He added detail to what was surely a be on the lookout order. He nodded to me, indicating the alert had gone out, and I went to the side of the room where Sterba was crouched down near the artillery shells.
The garage had, for the most part, been emptied whenever it had been abandoned. But a few tools were scattered about, and a spare tire leaned against the wooden pallet that held the shells. Several policemen surrounded Sterba, two taking notes as he quickly explained how to disarm the shells.
When he had finished, he stood up and looked at me. Kahembe joined us.