“What the hell is going on?” asked Big Jack.
“We surprised them. We fired an RPG into a gas drum in the terminal just as the bastards were entering it. We’ve killed or disabled about half of them. The rest are regrouping. They’re getting behind their trucks. I can see at least one RPG launcher from here. They’ve got the high ground now. Where the fuck are those planes?” snapped Richard.
“We’re two minutes away,” said Sebatier over the communications link. “Look, we’ve got all kinds of armaments here. We’ve got Sidewinders. We’ve got AMRAAM’s, we’ve got Vulcan Canon. But how far are you from the enemy?”
“About 70 or 80 feet,” said Richard, quickly realizing the problem Sebatier and the other pilots were facing.
“This is not going to work. If we fire anything, you guys are at risk. We’re a minute away, but if we let go with missiles, if we fire anything, we’ll take you out with the bad guys,” said Sebatier. “You’ll be nailed by friendly fire.”
“Here’s what we do,” said Richard, “and we’ve got to do it fast. You’re coming up behind the terminal. The bandits are in front of the terminal and we’re on the other side of them. The four of you will make one hell of a racket if you go over the terminal at Mach 1.7. How low can you fly?”
“Well, it ain’t responsible flying, but the landscape is pretty flat. We can get down to 50 feet or so,” Sebatier answered.
“Do it,” said Richard, as he watched the leader of the Bedouin group casually attach a grenade to the end of his RPG launcher. “For God’s sake, do it now! Go max speed! Do it now!”
Richard quickly explained what was going on to Payton, Clinton, and McMurray. “Cover your ears, boys. In less than 20 seconds we’re getting four Super Hornets low and at Mach 1.7. The bandits here will tip over with the sound and surprise of it, and then we go for them. The trick will be to cover your ears, and then pick up your rifles the instant the sonic boom passes over us. They’ll be temporarily deafened and confused. They won’t hear our rifle shots.”
Major Payton saw them first. Four dots on the horizon, coming up behind the smoldering terminal. The terrorist leader was still smirking, slowly bringing his RPG launcher level with the ground. He obviously thought he had the Americans where he wanted them, and was looking forward to the imminent carnage.
“About ten seconds, guys,” Payton said, watching the robed warrior casually poke around the corner of one of the Jeeps with his fully loaded RPG launcher. “Nine, eight…”
At that instant, Richard, even with his less-than-perfect vision, saw them. The four Super Hornets were growing shapes low on the horizon, behind the terminal, moving at an incredible rate of speed. On the ground, the Arab leader of the group was serenely taking aim, smiling. He was the picture of arrogance, smirking with perceived victory, and utterly oblivious to the four F-18’s bearing down in the sky behind him.
Suddenly an ear-splitting roar shattered the still desert air. Payton, McMurray, Clinton, and Richard had their guns down and fingers tightly stuck in their ears when the Super Hornets screamed by. They were less than 50 feet above the desert sands — a high-risk maneuver allowed only because of the desperate situation. They were so low that a long wake of sand kicked up from the desert floor as they flew over. The sonic boom that followed was so powerful that what was left of the burning terminal shuddered and collapsed. The Darfur warriors were completely unprepared for the incredible scream of eight General Electric F414 engines, each one generating more than 40,000 pounds of thrust. They dropped their weapons. One panicked and ran. The leader looked instantly upward, which exposed his face to the full force of the sonic blast. Payton and his men were ready. All took aim and fired, and then fired again. The ear-shattering force of the sonic boom had temporarily robbed the desert bandits of their hearing, as planned, and they did not hear the rifle shots. They saw their friends falling dead, struck by unheard and unknown weapons, and were frozen in place. Within ten seconds it was over. All the enemy warriors were dead.
“Did you get that, Mr. President?” asked Richard. “That’s what our fly-boys sound like at Mach 1.7.” He relayed what had occurred to those listening to the call, holding the phone so that the rest of his crew could listen in.
Captain Sebatier came back on the line. “Two more Night Hawks are on their way. They should be at the airstrip to pick you up in 15 minutes.”
“Thanks, guys. We’ve got wounded to look after,” said Payton. “By the way, Captain, that was one hell of a fly move. You should try that over the Potomac sometime.”
“Hell, let’s do it over the Hudson or LA. That was a blast,” replied Sebatier.
With that, the battle of Yarim-Dhar was over. The rush of victory abated as Richard saw the four dead, and the two wounded. They won, all right. Some victory, though. He could already feel the omnipresent headache increasing.
10
A rusting door deep beneath the Inzar Ghar fortress opened, and the dead-eyed Hamani Lowki, accompanied by a small phalanx of guards, strode into the damp, dark cell area. There was no natural light here; the only illumination came from one small, low-wattage ceiling bulb. Two of the guards had brought powerful flashlights with them, which they now used to illuminate the prison dungeon. There were a total of four cells, with two or three prisoners in each. A total of 11 prisoners, in various stages of mutilation.
Hamani looked around in expectation, feeling himself to be in a particularly good mood. Today he would be finishing off an old patient, and then commencing work on a new one. As is the case with all individuals who enjoy their work, Hamani would have performed these chores for nothing. The handsome paycheck he earned, in American dollars, was just the icing on the cake.
“Those two,” he told his men, pointing to two of the prisoners. “Bring those two wretched bastards along to the Operating Theater. We have a special assignment for the day.”
He whistled a happy tune to himself as the guards opened the cell where two prisoners, Darius Petroni and Zak Goldberg, were kept imprisoned. Petroni had been an occupant of the dungeon for almost two months, and the experience had nudged him, day after day, off the coil of sanity. He was, at this point, also unable to walk.
Petroni screamed when he saw the door swing open. The guards merely smirked at him. He was handless, and had only one foot, in which every individual bone had been crushed by a collection of small hammers. He had been pierced, flogged, flayed, and desecrated in a hundred different vicious and callous ways. He was now nothing more than a ghost of a human being, his body mutilated and his face unrecognizable. It was a wonder that he had any sanity left. No one had ever lifted a finger to help him, or to alleviate any of the pain. The guards had minds similar to Hamani’s, and enjoyed watching the master at work. Some even considered themselves his students.
As he watched them walk in and grab the subject of their current attentions, Zak’s adrenaline spiked. He had been told by the other prisoners what it was that lay beyond the door. He had heard the screams, and listened in shock and fury to the horrifying tales of the others. He could hardly believe that such things were still done. But he himself had seen such torture performed in many training camps and prisons over the past four years. He’d attempted to harden himself against the sights, knowing that if he failed to live up to his cover story, he would be discovered. That task had been far easier when he wasn’t the next one in line for the torture chamber.
Since he’d regained consciousness to find himself locked in this dank cell and awaiting Hamani’s attention, he’d tried to come to grips with what was to come, and to build some sort of protection for himself. He’d had training as an undercover agent, and had been taught how to build a wall in his mind, to separate his mental self from his physical self, to take his consciousness out of his body to protect himself and the information he carried during possible torture. But every time he came close to achieving this separation, he would look up and see another prisoner, another example of what was in store for him.