The soldiers stop at about thirty meters from the rough shelter. The shaft is just a half-rusty metal-sheet, supported by three piles of stones that seem to defy physics, standing up for some miracle. Behind it, not far away, a half-charred jeep lies on its side. One of the rear tires is burning feebly. Other tire tracks fade out in the distance.
“Jennings, take a look around here”, orders Seagull to the crew of the other vehicle. “We are going after their tracks, join us as soon as you finish the inspection here.”
The Humvee with Seagull and three other soldiers moves on, quickly moving away toward the low rocky hills that pierce through the sea of dunes in the distance.
The other team exits the vehicle, the soldiers fan out moving cautiously.
They quickly notice a series of dark spots on the ground and a large number of bullet shells.
Christer Black is the most minute of the four soldiers exploring the scene. He’s a clean-face, good boy. Despite his surname, his impeccably combed blond hair, so light to be almost white and his ice-colored eyes, have earned him the nickname of Ghost. The man bends down to pick up one of the shells, sensing its weigh in his fingers and sniffing it. “It’s from a machine gun. There was a firefight here, not more than one or two hours ago”, he communicates to his colleagues who meanwhile have moved in a fan-like fashion and are about a dozen meters ahead of him.
One of them notices a video camera, still fixed on a tripod with its legs sprawled on the ground.
Black walks toward the group, when a familiar sound catches his attention.
He turns around, raising his weapon instinctively.
The boy observes the creature just a few meters away from him with a surprised face, then he smiles, lowering his rifle.
A dog watches him, whining and wagging his tail. The animal appears uncertain. Almost as he wanted to approach but hesitates for fear.
“Hey, come here”, says Christer, crouching on the ground to appear smaller and reassure the dog.
“Black, what have you said?”, one of the other marines shouts promptly. He’s a black with a massive body, whose face is swollen on one side by a clump of chewing tobacco. The Humvee stands between them, and from where he is, he can’t see the dog.
“There’s a dog, Ralph.”
“A dog here in the desert?”, replies the other, while getting closer. “Be careful, that beast might be rabid.”
“More than you?”, the boy jokes. “Relax man, I was born in the Mississippi’s fields, my father used to bring home every stray dog he met. I grew up with them, and I can recognize the rabies symptoms. It’s likely that he was with the men who were here, he must be dead thirsty, poooor boy.”
The dog lets out a yelp as the other soldier approaches, snuggling with his tail between his legs.
“Easy, easy… You are scaring him… Go ahead, Ralph, I’m coming soon.”
The other lets out a grunt in response, then walks away spitting a long dark stripe on the sand.
Black tries to get close to the dog, who meanwhile rolls on his back in a sign of submission, still wagging his tail. The boy crouches to pat the dog’s belly, while the animal licks his gloves letting out delighted whinings.
“Good boy”, says Black with a smiling face. At these words the dog stands, pricking his ears and staring at him. Then, confirming that he has understood what the soldier has just said, straightens to raise on his two back legs, giving a remarkable proof of balance. Black also stands up, more and more intrigued by his new friend.
“That’s a good boy”, he whispers as he takes the two front legs of the animal, who licks his hands in that improbable ballet.
Then the dog walks suddenly away with a jerk and stops to sniff at the ground about twenty meters away. He starts digging in the dusty desert sand.
What’s up now?
The boy looks at the animal raising a small cloud of sand while digging. Ralph’s hoarse tone bites behind him. “Hey Ghost, forget that little bastard, we have a job to do!”
“Cooomiiing”, is Black’s reluctant reply. The boy starts heading for the other.
Anyway, after a few steps he feels a tap on his left calf, accompanied by a familiar moan.
The dog is just behind him, and seems to have found something that he settles at his feet. The boy is surprised about the behavior of that dog that he has just met. He crouches down to pick up the object, shiny with saliva. It’s an oddly shaped stone.
The dog gets up on his hind legs, barking at the boy, then steps back on all fours and takes off, stopping after about three meters. He looks at the soldier again, barking.
“Ah, you wanna play… That’s fine boy. Just a few drills, okay?”
The soldier throws the stone away, while the dog rushes to take it back.
On the other side of the camp the others go on with the inspection.
“Seems they took to their heels in a hurry”, says one of the soldiers, crouching to inspect a rifle, an old AK-47. “They left here their magazines… bags of supplies… plus their weapons…” Then pointing at the camera: “…and that one.”
“Stu, check if there’s something saved in its memory. If we are lucky we might understand what happened here”, says Jennings, the team leader. “Ralph, where’s Black?”, he shouts out to the soldier that is twenty meters away, busy checking the half-burned jeep lying on its side.
“He stood back guarding the car, Gold. I’m checking this area.”
Meanwhile, Stu fiddles with the camera. “It won’t turn on, maybe the battery is dead.”
“Check it, maybe there is still a memory card inside.”
“Yeah, just doing it… Well well well, here it is, eight gigabyte.”
The marine plugs the card into a tiny tablet that he pulled out from his backpack, and he browses the menus, finding several recordings. “There are a number of movie files, minor stuff… Wait! Ooh this is quite interesting…”
Others turn their eyes towards the soldier who examines the recording with an insane grin on his face.
“Ralph, come and see!”
“What’s up?”
The other seems not to have heard him. He keeps his eyes on the screen, in a demented laugh.
“Holy Mother of God, look at those boobs…”, he starts suddenly. “You may hang your rifle at those nipples!”
“Come on, Stu! Stop clowning!”, echoes Jennings. “Check the other files. See if you can find out what happened here!”
The soldier obeys with a grimace, scrolling through the various recordings. After a long moment he launches the playback of the second-last recording.
Stu observes the footage on the tablet’s screen, recognizing the makeshift camp where his team is right now. With some differences: the jeeps, which are visible in the background, are two. In the foreground a scene already seen other times fills with dismay the heart of the man. “Fuck! Oh fuck! Jennings! Jennings come and see!”
“If this is still some bullshit I swear that you are going back to the base walking, Stu”, replies Jennings while joining the other soldier. However, his expression changes when he sees what happened in that place less than an hour before.
“Damn it, Stu, set the volume up to the max!”
There’s an old man, his face is emaciated, with sunken eyes and long white hair, despite the top of his head being bald. His mustache is exceptionally long, he is kneeling a few meters in front of the camera.
Behind him, two armed men, one with his face concealed by a black cloth wrapped around the head which lets out only his eyes. The boy whose face is visible has an assault rifle on his back and reads a sheet of paper like it was a parchment. He speaks Arabic and sometimes tries to express himself in a broken English. The other man wears dark clothes, he’s just behind the prisoner, and holds the collar of his jacket from behind. In the background they hear a dog barking and showing up briefly on the screen. The animal barks and growls furiously, about one meter before the hostage. One of the men shouts something and moves as to kick the animal, which dodges nimbly and keeps barking loudly. The footage shows a third man, who grabs the dog and walks away taking him out of the scene. The movie goes on for a few minutes, while one of the two robbers goes on with his ranting. The elder prisoner responds occasionally, addressing the men with a series of insults.