No longer armed, Slade was helpless; but his copilot was not. Slade snatched the Glock 9mm from the dead jihadist slumped in the first officer’s seat and shot his recalcitrant comrade in the forehead.
The blood and brains splashed over the unconscious captain’s face and into his open mouth. The now dead jihadist finally cooperated and lay still. Just to be sure, Slade put bullets into the other two corpses, but the captain was alive and he wanted to keep him that way; Slade shot him in the knees and the hands. The pain alone would keep him from doing anything untoward.
At long last left to fly the airplane, Slade put on his headset and dialed in 121.5 on his VHF. It was a good thing he did. Looking outside in the predawn darkness he saw the plumes of two Israeli F-16’s joining up on him. He caught the latter part of their last transmission.
“Singapore Flight 344 remain on course two-seven-zero! If you deviate from your present heading you will be destroyed!”
“Roger, Singapore 344 acknowledges, boy am I glad to see you guys!”
“Who is this?” the F-16 pilot asked, obviously surprised at the response.
“The United States of America has taken possession of this aircraft from Al Qaeda terrorists,” he explained. “Tell Ari Bernstein, your Director for Mossad that his counterpart Director Gann has a gift for him.”
“Maintain your course and altitude Singapore 344—standby,” the pilot replied.
“I’ll try, but this thing flies like an electronic brick; I hate Airbuses,” Slade said.
There was a chuckle of amusement from the fighter pilots. Shortly thereafter Slade was instructed to follow them to a military field. He landed without much trouble and taxied in to a wide empty apron of concrete. Fire trucks, hazmat trucks and armored vehicles followed Slade in and surrounded the aircraft.
He shut down and opened the exterior door. Israeli commandos stormed in, passing Slade by like water around a rock. Ari Bernstein was behind them. He held out his hand.
“I understand the people of Tel Aviv owe you their lives!”
“Mr. Bernstein,” Slade nodded formally, shaking the Mossad King’s hand firmly. “I’m just glad to be on the ground again.”
“So what do you have for me?”
Slade gave him his trademark thin, chilling, smile. “How many bombs do you think you can make from three tons of enriched Uranium?”
Ari grinned and said, “How on earth would I know? Israel can neither confirm nor deny the existence of nuclear weapons in our arsenal!”
Slade shrugged, “There’s also enough TNT to blow up every Hamas tunnel out of Gaza.”
The commando came out of the cockpit. A lieutenant reported, “They’re all dead except the jihadist pilot. He’s still alive but in a bad way.”
“Make sure he gets extra special care will you?” Slade said, meaning it in only the most diabolical of ways.
“Oh you can be sure of that; you can be absolutely sure of that!” Ari said grimly.
The commandos carried the bodies out and Ari led Slade down the stairs into the harsh lights of the tarmac. “We’re indebted to you, but I must ask, how is it you managed this? As far as the president is concerned none of this should exist.” Ari said, slapping Slade on the shoulder.
Slade winced, and then noticed a neat round hole in his wetsuit. He grimaced. “I must have caught one back there.”
“What in the world have you been doing?” Ari said, looking at the man in sudden concern.
“It’s just a bullet,” he said.
“No, no, not that; what’s this?” Ari asked, pointing to a semi-circle of slashes in Slade’s wetsuit that went from his left hip to his ribcage.
Slade all of a sudden felt woozy, “That damn shark bit me! Son of a bitch!”
Ari saw Slade turn white, and comforted him, “Now, now Slade it couldn’t have bit you on the plane! Sit down in the limousine; I’ve got a doctor right here!” He waved the paramedics over. “Slade, how long ago was it? You flew from Singapore right?”
“Right, I’m bleeding to death, the wetsuits the only thing holding me together,” Slade said weakly. He slumped into the leather seat.
The paramedic stripped the suit off one arm and took his blood pressure. He shook his head.
“That’s it right?” asked Slade. “Damn shark! I knew they’d get me!”
“No sir,” the paramedic said. “You’re blood pressure’s a little elevated, that’s all. That’s to be expected from the stress you’ve been through. By the way, the bullet’s a through-and-through. You’ll be fine.”
“To Hell with the bullet!” Slade snapped angrily. “What about the shark bite? That tiger chewed me up!”
“Well let’s see,” the paramedic said. He carefully peeled the wetsuit off Slade’s side.
“How bad is it?” demanded the tough as nails CIA agent.
The paramedic uttered a single surprised, “Whoa!”
Slade fainted.
CHAPTER 41: A Short Drop
Abdullereda Hussein awoke to intense pain in his knees, hands and face. He opened his eyes with difficulty. They were almost completely swollen shut. Forcing them open, Abdullereda witnessed a fuzzy world of light institutional green. It slowly resolved into a hospital room. A doctor and two other people were leaning over him. They wore yarmulkes.
“There we are,” said a voice in Arabic. “He is coming around.”
“What am I doing here?” he croaked, his throat dry from the oxygen tube in his nose. “Why am I not in paradise?”
A man smiled, and said, “You’re in Tel Aviv not in paradise. I’m afraid that journey will be up to someone else.” He laughed and said, “Don’t worry, you won’t have to wait long.”
Abdullereda was confused, but he didn’t remain so. Shortly thereafter the men from Mossad came. He tried to be strong but they were very persuasive and he was already weak. Soon, he told them everything they wanted to know and more. Once he satisfied their curiosity all they seemed to want was for him to make a full recovery. They gave him excellent care, he couldn’t complain, and then they informed him they were sending him home.
Reality hit Abdullereda. The humiliation! The failure of his mission! He consoled himself though; it was really the guards that failed him. He had done everything a martyr could do but actually die. Surely people would understand.
The day arrived and the Israelis gave him a nondescript grey jumpsuit to wear. Abdullereda shuffled onto an Air Malaysian flight with two escorts. They were there, they said, to make sure he got home okay. The short flight, only seven hours, landed in Kuala Lumpur in a driving rain. They got him off the airplane but instead of taking him through the terminal they took him down the jetway stairs and put him in a van, one man on either side.
“Where are we going,” he asked, but then he answered his own question. “Oh, right, we probably want to avoid the press.”
Undoubtedly there would be questions about his involvement in the jihad. However, seeing as most people were sympathetic there would probably be a time and a place for the press. Maybe he could salvage his pride. Maybe this would all work out.
Still, he couldn’t quite understand why the Israelis of all people were so nice to him. He expected to be tortured to death. It didn’t happen. In fact, he owed his health to them. He could easily have died.
The van didn’t leave the airfield as he expected but instead it drove to one of the airfield hangers.
“Why are we going here?”
“It’s the only place big enough for all the families,” said one of the men gravely.
“What families are those?” Abdullereda was truly mystified. They drove through the hanger doors and he saw hundreds of people gathered within. There were several portable grandstands and a raised central platform. The platform had a wooden scaffold mounted on top.