“They are in Kirkuk. They’re with Blackbrier now. I know that much. It should not be hard to spot them once I’m there. I know their faces. I know all their faces. They’ve haunted me for years.”
“And just how do you expect to get there? All airline traffic is shut down going into Iraq, what with the war and all. Operation Iraqi Freedom is in full swing. The Allies have captured the airport, but insurgents have the run of Baghdad. Kirkuk is a mess. To the best of my knowledge, that airport is still closed. The only way into Iraq is a military transport. Then you would have to travel with a convoy to Kirkuk through very hostile territory.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“Yes,” he smiled. “Yes, you can.”
“So you can get me on a transport?”
Demir thought a minute. “I suppose I could prepare some press credentials for you. We could make you out to be a war correspondent. I know of some people on my end that can make that happen. That should get you a seat on a plane.”
“Then I’m your woman. Let me go.”
He smiled. “That still sounds so strange to me. A woman warrior.”
“Yes,” she said, her eyes flaring. “I get that a lot.” She followed with, “I’ll need my gun.”
“Uh-uh. Can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because war correspondents aren’t allowed to carry weapons. Besides, knowing you, you’ll probably shoot someone on the way there.”
“Then I will find my own when I get there.”
“Just be sure no one knows about it.”
She nodded.
“But before you leave,” he added, “I’d like you to sit in on my talk with Maric. With what I know now, it seems he has been withholding some very valuable information. He knows the pick up point. I want to know where it is.”
“He may even know what Itsakovic looks like,” Alina said. “I think he’s seen him before, too.”
Demir smiled. “Then let us go talk with him. You may be, shall we say, a bit more persuasive than I.”
“Good,” she smiled. “I’m glad we’re thinking alike. Now,” she indicated the handcuffs, “would you mind taking these off? He tried to set me up. I’d like to talk to him with my hands free, if you know what I mean.”
Chapter 22
The flight into Baghdad was rough but uneventful. Alina had never been on a transport before and it was an experience best left to a one-time event. The soldiers lined the bench seats, leaving the odd uncomfortable crate to sit on.
Other correspondents were there, but the language barrier blocked most conversation. Alina’s false identity was shallow, to say the least. She did not know the first thing about reporting the news, so the less she spoke the better.
An American soldier dressed in full battle regalia approached her. He spoke to her, trying to be nice. Alina responded. That is when everyone knew she spoke English. After that, all the males on that plane wanted to be friendly.
She couldn’t wait to land.
Baghdad was as hot as it was loud. Shelling boomed across the city. Smoke columns rose in various locations.
The airport was abuzz with activity. Helicopters roared overhead. Fighters flew cover. It was all so deafening. She did not know how they missed colliding with the other planes landing and taking off.
“You’re going to Kirkuk, aren’t you?” a soldier asked.
She turned to him. He was of medium build with sandy blonde hair. His boyish complexion produced an effect that made him look younger than Alina suspected he was.
“You’re going to Kirkuk,” he repeated. “I overheard you on the plane.”
She nodded.
He stuck out a hand. “Name’s Corporeal Miller, but you can call me Steve.”
She shook his hand and said, “So how is it that I get to Kirkuk?”
“I’m in the group going up there. Stay with me.” He headed toward a row of waiting helicopters. “Why do you want to go to Kirkuk?” he asked. “There aren’t many civilians up there.”
“It’s where the action is. I’m the type who loves action.”
“Well, that’s where you’re going to find it.” He motioned her into a whirling chopper. “Get in.”
Soon, the fleet of six choppers clamored into the sky, skirting wide of the city heading east.
Alina leaned in close, yelling above the noise. “So tell me, why aren’t we flying north? Isn’t that where Kirkuk is?”
“RPGs,” Steve said. “Rocket propelled grenades. There’re reports of a band of insurgents on our path north. It’s why we’re swinging so far east. These babies are fast, but they can’t outrun an RPG. The insurgents have lots of them. If just one of them hits this baby, we’ll go down in flames.”
“That’s comforting to know.”
Steve smiled. He was a talkative fellow. He seemed nice, but then so did most guys when they approached Alina. She learned he was twenty-five and from Colorado, Estes to be exact. He described it as the exact opposite from Iraq. Lots of green grass in the spring—cool, with snowcapped mountains rimming the high meadow.
Still, she figured he was like most men. Be nice for a day, buy the woman a couple of drinks, and then head off to some hotel for a few hours. She wanted no part of it, so instead of talking back she did everything she could to dissuade conversation.
The ride north was smooth, if a bucket constantly clawing for the sky could be called smooth. Trouble didn’t begin until they were about five kilometers out of Kirkuk. A smoke trail streaked from the ground and hit the helicopter next to them. The craft whirled sharply left, barely missing their own. Pieces of the doomed craft flew off, hitting their rotor blades. The sharp clang of metal on metal shuttered through the chopper. Then the whole thing started to shake badly. Someone up front called out and made a sign to buckle up and hold on.
They were going down.
The scene was chaos. The pilots were calling out maydays and shouting locations. The soldiers inside yelled to one another. Despite their training, despite their rugged exterior, the men were scared.
Luckily, their chopper hit the ground on both skids. The hard landing bounced them off their seats, but nowhere close to the expected end. Everyone piled out of the stricken craft. The squad fanned out in a defensive perimeter with a sergeant barking orders.
Alina exited but stayed by the helicopter. Behind her, the chopper that suffered a direct hit burned in the desert. There was no hope for survivors in that wreckage.
The soldiers knelt on one knee. Their rifles were at their shoulder, ready to fire. They did not have to wait long.
A band of Iraqis appeared as if from nowhere, riding beat up foreign pickups from around the neighboring berm. Alina could not help but flash back to her early years when the same type trucks entered her yard.
Shots came from all directions. There was no place to hide. A soldier in the front took a bullet in the head. He toppled back, his rifle falling to the ground. In an instant, Alina picked it up and took his place.
“What are you doing?” Steve yelled beside her. “Get back there!”
Alina ignored him. Those men in trucks were not going to get her this time. With every shot she made, one went down. With every death, another memory was erased. Then her clip ran dry.
She crawled back to the fallen soldier, bullets spraying sand in her face. Every soldier there kept firing. The rebels fired back. The noise was deafening. She stripped the body of his utility belt. Jamming in another clip, she rejoined the fight.
Some of the Iraqis had found refuge behind their vehicles. They sprayed the area with random shots while the Marines returned fire with precision. She fired three times in rapid succession. Three more men went down.
And then, as quick as it had started, the battle was over. In front of her, twenty Iraqis lay dead or wounded. All of them wiped out in two minutes. But why?
“Who are you?” a man’s voice said.
She turned around to stand face to face with their lieute
nant.
“I said, who are you? You’re no war correspondent. Ain’t no journalist can shoot like that.”
“Let’s just say that I had a lot of practice growing up.”
“Well, you’re not supposed to have that weapon.” He took the rifle and handed it to the sergeant. “We managed to get hold of HQ and they’re sending out some trucks to pick us up. In the meantime, stay in the rear and keep a sharp eye.”
She nodded.
“What’s your name?”
“Alina. I come from Bosnia.”
“Well, Alina, glad to have you aboard. If you were a man, I’d be proud to have you on my squad.”
“And just why can’t a woman fight?”
“It’s the rules, sorry.”
The lieutenant walked away, rallying his men back to the chopper.
Steve pulled her aside. “If you really want to fight, there’s a group called Blackbrier. They’re civilians, basically, and they mainly pull armed escort duty, but they do get into skirmishes now and then.”
“Do you know how to get in touch with them?”
“Yeah. They’re on our base.” He gave her an odd look, squinting. “Are you really a correspondent?”
Alina did not answer. She smiled and walked away. Off in the distance, she saw the rising dust trail of a dozen military vehicles coming toward them—fast.
“Alina?” Steve called.
She turned around.
“How about dinner sometime?”
Again, she just smiled and turned away.
That night, she bunkered down with the rest of the news correspondents who sat huddled in a one-room barrack inside the air base. Bulletproof vests hung across the windows and walls. They clustered around kerosene lamps, talking in small groups.
Alina sat by herself in the corner, her back against the wall, wondering what her next move should be. Should she try to join Blackbrier? She shook her head. No, they would never take a woman without a military background. She kicked a nearby chair, frustrated by a world run by men.
“Hi!” A perky woman came up to her and sat down. “My name is Wanda. What’s yours?”
Alina regarded her a moment. Was making conversation with this woman worth the time? She shrugged. She had nothing else to do.
“Alina.”
“Where are you from?”
“Bosnia.”
“I’m from California myself. Came over here because I thought it would be a hoot.” She flipped her hair out of her eyes. “You know, like just to get away from it all. But I never thought it would be like this! I mean, like wow!”
“Like what?”
Wanda extended her arms to encompass the room. “Well, this. Like, I mean we have to live like hermits.”
“Why? Why do we have to live like this? We should be out there, with the men, finding out what’s going on.”
Wanda’s eyes went wide. “Oh, no! Like, that would be too dangerous, you know?”
“You don’t know what danger is.”
“Oh, like you do?”
Alina nodded.
“Okay, like when were you ever in danger?”
Alina was already getting fed up with Wanda. If she said “like” one more time, she was going to punch her in the face. She finally relented and said, “My whole life. I grew up during the Bosnian war. It was a lot different than what you read about in the US.”
“Oh, like I’m so sure.”
Alina resisted the urge to punch her.
“Look,” she said, “I really don’t feel like talking right now, okay? So why don’t you go over there with your other little playmates and find a plug for your hairdryer.”
Wanda looked as if she had been slapped. She retorted with, “Oh, like you know everything. There’s no power. Like, that’s why we all have these stupid kerosene lamps, you know. The plugs don’t work.”
With that, she turned and stomped away.
Alina just laid her head against the wall. No sooner had she closed her eyes than a man sat next to her.
“Heard what you did when your chopper went down,” he said. “Picking up a gun and fighting like that? That took a lot of guts.”
Alina rolled her eyes and looked at him, a tall man with a close-cropped cultivated beard and perfect hair. A television personality if there ever was one.
After a brief moment of silence, the man added, “If it were me, I’d have been hiding under the chopper. That crash alone would have scared me to death, much less a band of Iraqis trying to kill me. No way would I have done what you did.”
“Well, I suppose that’s the difference between you and me, isn’t it?”
The man stiffened. “What do you mean by that?”
“It means that I’m a fighter and you’re a coward.” She was tired of coddling these people. “You guys are in here, covering up your windows, and for what? What is there to be afraid of?”
A bomb exploded in the distance.
“There! Hear that? That’s what we’re afraid of,” the man retorted. “They go off every night, all night.”
“Well, I’m sure they don’t come within a kilometer of this place. Now go get your beauty sleep and leave me alone.”
The man grunted as he rose. “It looks like Wanda was right about you.” As he walked away, Alina smiled. She could not have cared less what these people thought of her. She had a job to do, and she needed time to think.
She was just about to lean her head back again when a man walked into the room carrying a rifle. He looked strong, rugged, handsome, but it was the gun that got her attention. She beckoned him over.
The rest of the group looked at her.
The man sat down, cradling the rifle in his lap.
“Nice gun you have there. May I see it?”
“Sure.”
Alina felt its weight. She sighted down the barrel. It was a deer rifle with a scope. Not much, but it would do for a sniper. Right away, she came up with a possible plan.
“How much do you want for it?”
“Oh, it’s not for sale. I keep this with me wherever I go. They say I’m not supposed to have this, but I’m not going out there without some sort of protection. If it comes down to it, I’m shooting back.”
Finally, someone worth talking to.
“I’ll give you a thousand marks for it.”
“What? A thousand marks? How many dollars is that?”
“I’m not sure. Depends on what the current exchange rate is, but it’s probably equal to the dollar against the euro right now.”
“So you’d give me a thousand dollars for my rifle, is that it?”
“That’s what I said.”
He thought a minute and then shook his head. “My dad would kill me if I sold his rifle. But hey, I’ve got this you might be interested in.” He pulled a Beretta M9 9mm from his coat pocket. “It’s practically brand new.”
Alina took it. She opened the slide, checking its action.
“Got any clips for it?”
“Sure do. Got two of them.”
“How much?”
“How about that thousand marks?”
“How about 500 marks, and that includes a box of ammo.”
The man thought a minute. “Okay. Five hundred is a lot of money over here. I didn’t pay anything for it. Got it off a dead officer when I was in the field yesterday. Don’t have any use for a handgun. Never used one in my life.”
“Done. When can you get me the ammo?”
“Soon as you give me the money. I have to go barter for the ammo I’m afraid, and I need money to do that.”
Alina dug into her pocket and pulled out a wad of cash.
The man’s eyes went wide. “Where did you get all that money?”
“Rich grandparents. Now, you bring me the ammo before we get going tomorrow, got it?”
He took the money and counted it. “Sure thing.”
“What’s your name?” she said.
“Mark.”
“My name’s Alina. See you in the
morning.”
She pocketed the automatic and laid her head back to rest. Mark must have got the idea the conversation was over for he soon left.
The rest of the group left her alone after that, which was just as well for Alina. She did not want to get close to anyone. Everyone she got close to wound up dead. She could not trust anyone—especially where she was going.
The morning brought a bustle of activity. Alina awoke to find everyone pulling the vests off the walls and windows and putting them on. By her side was a box of ammunition for the Beretta. She pocketed the shells and slid the gun into her back waistband. The spare clips went into her pocket.
“Where’s everyone going?” she asked a woman passing by.
“There’s been some activity in section four. We’re going to check it out.”
Alina got up and stretched her stiff muscles. The woman stopped and looked her up and down, admiring her physique.
“You look terrific,” she said. “Do you work out?”
“No, I just work,” Alina said as she followed the crowd out the door.
They filed into a waiting bus. A captain passed out a transcript of the night’s activities. The bus then transported them to the now vacated fighting area. Everyone ran for the best camera positions. Standing sometimes only a few meters apart, they read from the same transcript, reporting virtually the same thing. Alina stood in the background, shaking her head.
“Aren’t you at least going to take notes?”
She turned around to see the captain.
“I’ve got a good memory. Besides, I wanted to be here last night when the fighting was taking place. All I see now is a whitewashed report and a ton of debris.”
“Oh, so you’re one of those reporters.”
“And what kind would that be?”
“You want to be embedded with a platoon.”
“Yes!” Her eyes lit up. “Yes, that’s what I want.”
“I can make that happen.”
“Will you? That would be so nice.”
“What is your name?”
“Alina.”
“All right, Alina. I’ll arrange it.”
“Great.”
The officer left. Alina looked around and noticed hundreds of shell casings lying on the ground. It must have been some kind of firefight last night, not nearly as lame the official report indicated.
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