Into Darkness (28 page)

“Why Eric? Why the wait? Everything this guy has is perishable. As soon as the Saudi banks open, his buddies in Riyadh will empty the accounts, and we’ll have nothing. If he knows where the missing Soldiers are, Mukhtar will move them—”

“The missing Soldiers are no longer the primary focus of this mission,” Shannon said with a heavy sigh.

Carlos’s fists balled in anger. “Who the hell made that call?”

“The brain trust at Langley has low confidence that we can effect a successful rescue or even a recovery of their remains, given the amount of time that’s passed since their capture. The Program directors want Ritter back in the fold. They want him back in Caliban permanently.”

Carlos thought over the new marching orders. “I don’t get it. The kid’s good, but his skills aren’t unique or irreplaceable.”

“It is useless to question the Program directors—you know that,” she said.

Carlos agreed but kept his mouth shut. Shannon was the only one with access to the directors, and for all his years in the Caliban Program, they’d never explained the rationale for any of their directives.

“How is Ritter interrogating this guy going to bring him back?”

Shannon’s lips twitched with a smile. “Oh, I have a few ideas.”

“I think I got something,” Kilo said as he looked through his scope. “On the road, eight hundred meters.”

Ritter looked through Morales’s binoculars—the spotter was away on an unenviable task—and saw a black mass on the road. A faux fog of microscopic sand particles kept him from making out any further details.

The sandstorm had finally abated half an hour ago, ending ten hours of total darkness and isolation. After the intrusion of the two insurgents, the rest of the night had passed without incident. Channing, the radio man, had worked nonstop to regain contact with brigade headquarters, to no avail. The trail edge of the storm was probably still over headquarters, blocking communications.

“What do you see?” Ritter asked.

“Uh...it looks like a donkey cart with a couple of people on it,” Kilo said.

“Keep an eye on them,” Ritter said. The cart must have started out from the al-Qaida-controlled village to their south. Everyone there knew where the Americans were holed up; there was no way that cart was approaching them in ignorance or by accident.

Ritter crossed to the other side of the room and looked out the window. Kovalenko and a security element had dragged the bodies of the two insurgents behind the home. Shortly after their deaths, the bodies had defecated and stunk up the first floor. Young had wanted to drag the bodies into the storm, but Kovalenko and Ritter had shot down that idea. No need to have Soldiers stumbling around in the storm and risk leading more insurgents to their base with a light beacon. Ritter had the bodies dragged into the courtyard and waited for the storm to break to move them farther away.

Morales and Kovalenko carried one of the bodies by the wrists and ankles, then unceremoniously tossed it into a shallow irrigation ditch. A Soldier stood next to the ersatz grave with a shovel they had found in the courtyard. Ritter opened the window. “Lieutenant! Get everyone back inside. We might have company.”

Kovalenko gave Ritter an exaggerated nod.

Ritter turned away from the window, but his gaze caught on the distant building, where they’d found the Syrian woman and her family. Black smoke lingered in the air around it as it smoldered from the explosion the night before. While he would never know the truth, Ritter guessed some of the insurgents in from the wrecked technical vehicles had waited for cover from Kilo’s sniper rifle, then tried to make it back to friendly territory. They’d gotten disoriented in the storm, then found their way to the now destroyed home.

How had they set off the suicide belt? Ritter wondered. He was sure they’d find a few more bodies in the house if they had the time to search it again. The two survivors had left the burning home and found their way to a new sanctuary, and their journey had ended on the tip of Ritter’s Applegate-Fairbairn combat knife. Ritter shook his head; he almost had sympathy for their ordeal. Almost.

“Sir, you’re the intelligence guy. What the hell does this mean?” Kilo said. Ritter picked up the binoculars and tried to find the donkey cart. “Some guy is leading the cart, and it looks like there’s a woman in a
burka
on the cart…and a couple of blue barrels behind her.”

Ritter found the cart and confirmed what Kilo had seen. The woman, sitting slightly hunched over, was holding something in her arms. The something squirmed, and Ritter saw a little, olive-skinned arm reach up to the woman’s face.

“She’s holding a baby,” Ritter said.

“The guy leading the cart? He’s got a fucked-up face, like he’s retarded or something.” Kilo shifted against his firing position. Ritter wasn’t sure whether it was from discomfort or nervousness. Ritter focused on the cart driver, whose face bore the common signs of Down syndrome.

Kovalenko and Morales stormed up the stairs. “What you got, sir?” the lieutenant asked.

Ritter got him up to speed as he handed the binoculars back to the spotter.

“What do you think is in the barrels?” Kovalenko asked.

“Explosives. That’s what I would send in their place,” Ritter said.

“Sir,” Kilo said, his voice almost pleading, “let me give them a warning shot. I know that’s not SOP, but maybe they’re just lost or something.”

Kovalenko shook his head and drew in a breath to deny the request, but Ritter’s hand on his shoulder stopped him.

“Hold on, Lieutenant. Tell everyone to hold their fire,” Ritter said. Warning shots had a tendency to spark more accurate fire from less-informed Soldiers. There was always one guy who didn’t get the word.

Kovalenko didn’t move for a moment, as if to protest, but left without a word.

A minute later Ritter gave permission for the warning shot. Kilo’s round snapped over the approaching cart. The disabled man leading the cart waved his hands over his head, then tried to turn the cart around. Bursts of machine gun fire came from the al-Qaeda village. Errant bullets kicked up puffs of dirt near the cart. The man turned the cart back toward Ritter’s building.

“OK, they’re definitely coming right for us,” Morales said.

“Sir, what’re they thinking?” Kilo asked.

“They think we won’t fire on a woman holding a baby or a disabled guy, and those explosives will get right to the gate and blow us all to hell,” Ritter said.

“We don’t know that they’re explosives,” Kilo said.

“Kilo, I want you to—”

“No, sir! If I hit the guy, the bullet will go straight through him and hit the baby. Any round I shoot will probably hit the barrels too and set the whole thing off.” Kilo rolled onto his side, his brown eyes wide with fear. “They don’t want to do this. They’re all noncombatants. Innocents!”

“Plus, if he hits the guy, the woman can lead the burro right to us,” Morales added.

“I know, Sergeant Kilo. That’s why I want you to shoot the donkey,” Ritter said with force.

“The donkey?” Kilo asked.

“You stop the donkey—you stop the cart. That’ll give them a chance to get away,” Ritter said.

Kilo nodded slightly as he absorbed Ritter’s explanation, then settled back behind his rifle. “Yeah, I can make that shot,” he said.

“Hurry. The chance of al-Qaeda setting them off gets higher with every step they make,” Ritter warned.

Kilo adjusted his scope. “Windage?”

“Steady.” Morales waited as the cart rumbled through a rough patch on the dirt road. “Send it!”

Kilo exhaled until his lungs were empty, timed out a pause between his slowing heartbeats, and squeezed the trigger. The crack of the bullet destroyed the morning. It took less than a second for the round to close the distance.

“Miss! Shot went left,” Morales said. The near miss did nothing to dissuade the approaching cart.

Kilo blew out a quick breath and refocused. He fired again.

Morales watched as the donkey fell forward, tipping the cart onto its side. The woman and the child spilled into the dirt. The woman cradled the child under her body as the barrels thudded to the ground next to her. She struggled to her feet and ran back toward the al-Qaeda stronghold, her child clutched to her breast.

Kilo pulled his head from the scope to get a better look at the unfolding scene.

“Good shot, Kilo.” Ritter said.

Kilo returned to his scope. The donkey’s rear legs thrashed in the dirt. The kicks slowed before ending with a final shiver. The disabled man was bent over the dying animal, his arms wrapped around its neck. The man’s mouth was open in a wail as he shook the donkey, trying to bring it back to his feet. Kilo told himself he couldn’t hear the man’s cries at that distance. But he heard the cries of a simpleton who’d lost his only friend in the world. The cry of a child who had discovered a pet lying dead in the road.

During his time in Iraq, Kilo had killed at least ten men. He had never given the lives he took a second thought, but there was grief for the beast he’d just killed and the pain he’d inflicted on the man who might never understand why his donkey had to die.

Kilo, his face contorting to keep back tears, looked up at Ritter. The intelligence officer knelt next to Kilo and placed a hand on his shoulder.

“I know,” Ritter said.

“Sir! We’ve got through to an Army unit in Ramadi. They’re sending a Chinook to get us the hell out of here,” Channing said as he stuck his head into the room. A single Chinook could carry every Soldier in the building. Finally, some good news.

“Anyone want to hang around? Let’s get the hell out of here,” Ritter said.

The Chinook kept its dual rotors spinning as the men of Dragon Company ambled out of its cavernous interior. The blown dust dissuaded the welcoming party waiting for them at the company landing zone. Dragon Company Soldiers, who weren’t on the mission, conspicuous by their relatively clean clothes, mobbed the returnees, no doubt demanding details from men who wanted nothing more than to clean up and eat a hot meal. Ritter and Kovalenko stood in the exit and counted as each Soldier passed them. They’d counted each as they embarked in Owesat, but a double count was always warranted and necessary. No Soldier wanted to stay on the wrong side of the river, but more than one Soldier had been left behind on a landing zone during the history of Army air-assault operations.

Kovalenko flashed his count to Ritter with his fingers; the whine of the rotors made speaking futile. Ritter nodded and motioned for Kovalenko to head down the ramp. Ritter took a step to follow him, but the crew chief stopped him with a hand to the chest. The chief shook his head and handed a three-by-five card to Ritter. It read, “
They Want You in the Green Zone.”

Ritter didn’t need to ask who “they” were. He gave the card back to the chief. The rotors picked up speed as the helicopter prepared to go airborne, and the rear hatch elevated.

Kovalenko spun around to look at Ritter. He raised his hands in confusion. Ritter shook his head and waved good-bye. Before the hatch closed all the way, Kovalenko gave Ritter a salute. Ritter returned the salute as the hatch shut with a hydraulic hiss.

Atif didn’t know what time it was or where he was. The hood over his head kept him in darkness, and he was chained to a hook in the floor beneath his seat; both hands were handcuffed to metal semicircles protruding from the table in front of him. The blue-eyed, bearded American had asked him a few perfunctory questions—that must have been hours ago—and the last interaction he’d had with his captors was when he relieved himself in a bucket. He passed the time calling for a Red Crescent representative and rehearsing his story.

The isolation didn’t bother him, nor did all the time that had passed. He had to hold out until Saturday morning. Once the bank in Medina opened for business, his accounts would be emptied, and the
zakat
“charitable” donations for jihad would be safe. He drummed his fingers on the tabletop, savoring every second that passed as an incremental victory.

He heard the door to his room open; two sets of footsteps came in with a gust of fresh air. Someone walked around the table and stood directly behind him, while he heard the other pull back the chair opposite from him.

“I need to pray! The United Nations conventions on the proper treatment of detainees and your laws of land warfare require you to—” he stopped talking when the man behind him yanked the hood off his head. Atif blinked hard as his eyes adjusted to the bright lights of the room.

The American officer from Owesat sat across from him, the same officer Mukhtar had warned him about. He was filthy; dirt and sand had invaded every pore and fold of skin on his exposed face and hands. His uniform top pressed flat from the weight of his body armor, and seafoam stains of salt from evaporated sweat crept across his uniform. His upper lip twitched as he stared daggers into Atif.

Atif struggled to look over his shoulder to the man behind him. Rough hands twisted his head back toward the officer.

“My name is Ritter, and we have much to discuss,” he said.

“No, we don’t. I am just an anthropology student working on my dissertation.”

Ritter pulled a manila folder from beneath the table and slammed it on the table. He opened the folder and looked over the first sheet, a sheet with a picture from Atif’s Saudi Arabian passport and writing in Arabic.

“Your true name is Atif bin Kamal al-Wadhi. You handle finances between a series of Islamic charities in Saudi Arabia and Haider Hussein Mohammed al-Janabi, a man we both know as Mukhtar. You pay insurgents to attack Americans. If their attacks manage to injure or kill, you pay extra,” Ritter said.

“This is preposterous. You have no proof of anything, and I refuse to discuss this any further,” Atif said. He would have crossed his arms if his hands hadn’t been shackled to the table.

“You’re wanted in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for material support to terrorism, treason, and”—he paused to read from the paper in the folder—“and homosexual acts.” Atif’s jaw dropped at the final charge. How did they know? “Conviction for any of those crimes is punishable by beheading,” Ritter continued.

Atif sputtered before saying, “You’re trying a file-and-dossier approach on me. I won’t play along with this any longer until I’ve exercised my right to pray and speak with a representative—” A massive paw of a hand thumped onto Atif’s shoulder from behind. A finger ran from the top of Atif’s neck to his collarbone with a terrifyingly slow intimacy.

“No, Atif. You have no rights here,” Ritter said. His eyes glinted with malice, hinting at what was to come. “Now that we’ve finished with the pleasantries, let’s get to business.” He pulled Atif’s laptop from a bag and placed it on the table. He pushed the power button and spoke as it booted up.

“You will tell me the correct password for the encrypted files. You will give me the bank account information for every place you have
jihadi
money. You will give a full accounting of the donors and charities you use to launder the money. And you will tell me everything you know about the Soldiers Mukhtar kidnapped,” he said matter-of-factly.

Atif stared at Ritter for a heartbeat, then burst into laughter. The chains around Atif’s ankles rattled as he attempted to stomp his feet.

“You think you can hold out until the banks open—I appreciate that. If you were in the custody of the Army, your plan would certainly work. You don’t understand your situation here with me. So, time for an education.” Ritter turned his attention to the man behind Atif. “Carlos? Hand, please.”

Carlos moved to the side of the table and placed his meaty hand on the back of Atif’s right hand, keeping Atif’s fingers extended. Carlos kept his body at an angle from Atif, his other hand hidden behind his body.

“What is this? You can’t—”

Ritter clicked open the encryption program guarding a folder on the computer. He turned the computer screen toward Atif. “Let’s start with the password. This is your last chance to cooperate the easy way. Choose now. Choose wisely.”

Atif spat at Ritter; the glob of spit almost made it across the table.

“Finger,” Ritter said.

Carlos pulled a ball peen hammer from his belt and slammed it down on Atif’s index finger.

The finger nearly burst from the impact, spraying tiny blood drops onto the computer screen. Atif screeched in agony as he looked at his ruined finger, jagged bone exposed beneath the torn skin. He struggled against his restraints, his instinct to press his injured hand against his body denied.

Ritter showed no emotion as he waited for Atif’s cries to fade into a whimper. Atif dropped his head to his chest, averting his gaze from the ruined finger.

“Atif, the password,” Ritter said.

Atif refused to look at Ritter but mumbled a fourteen-digit code.

“Are you sure?” Ritter asked. Atif nodded.

“Carlos, finger,” Ritter said. Carlos destroyed Atif’s middle finger with a hammer blow. Atif screamed so loud and so long, he nearly hyperventilated.

“Atif, I had some of the best computer scientists in the world examine the flame-out protocol before we began. They figured out that the password is sixteen characters; any more digging on their part might trip the protocol. Tell me the correct password, or he’ll take two fingers next time.” Atif looked up at Ritter, his eyes burning with hatred.

“If you cooperate, we might—
might
—let you go. You’d be a free man in Saudi Arabia, but a free man with no right hand. You’d eat and wipe your ass with the same hand. I know Saudi Arabia well enough to know that such a handicap would make you an instant pariah. I’m not sure you could make it on the streets of Riyadh as a beggar.” Ritter tapped a dirty, but otherwise pristine, finger on the laptop.

The two ruined fingers pulsed blood with every heartbeat. Atif felt the blood’s warmth spreading under his hand as he imagined what this psychotic American would do to him next. Slowly and deliberately, he gave the sixteen-digit code to Ritter. Ritter listened but made no move to enter the code.

“Where are the captured Soldiers?” Ritter asked.

“What?” The new line of questioning surprised Atif enough that he forgot the pain in his broken fingers for a moment.

“Do you have trouble hearing in your right ear? We can fix that. Carlos?”

Carlos let go of Atif’ hand, which he tried to close into a fist; the exposed bones poked into his palm. Carlos wrapped a gigantic arm under Atif’s chin and clamped a hand on top of Atif’s right ear. Atif tried to wiggle free, but he was a kitten in the jaws of a wolf.

“It takes seven pounds of pressure to rip an ear from the skull,” Ritter said as Atif felt a vise grip the top of his ear. “Where are the captured Soldiers?” The vise started pulling the top of Atif’s ear toward the ground.

“I don’t know!” Atif squealed. The pressure on his ear increased. “Mukhtar had them in a white truck! He stopped at the house where you found me and got rid of the two
mujahideen
that were in the truck with him. He was alone when he took them to the south. I don’t know where he took them, but it was far. It must have been close to the bridge in Jurf-al-Shakr. He never spoke of them again, and I never asked.” The pressure on his ear stopped growing, but it felt a hair’s breadth away from ripping off his head.

“How do you know that?”

“His gas tank was nearly empty. I…I have to keep track of benzene usage. It’s so expensive on that side of the river.”

“What is the password?”

Atif repeated the sixteen-digit code. Ritter entered the code, then gave a nod to Carlos, who released Atif’s ear. Atif tried to press his abused ear into his shoulder as Carlos pried the fingers of his right hand open, ready for another strike.

Ritter took his time scanning through the many documents in the open folder. He raised a hand and made a quick “come here” motion toward a camera tucked into a ceiling corner. He turned his attention back to Atif. The man who had questioned Atif earlier came into the room and left with the laptop. Ritter turned his attention back to Atif.

“For every lie, you lose a finger. After you run out of fingers, we will find something else to break. Now, tell me where to find Mukhtar.”

Ritter watched the ensuing interrogation of Atif on the security camera feed. Atif’s hand was bandaged, the white gauze soaked through with blood. Carlos stood behind the new interrogator, who had Atif walk him through the financial data in the computer, the ball peen hammer perched in the crook of an elbow. He hadn’t needed to use it a third time.

The pack of baby wipes gave Ritter the chance to clean up. He’d gone through two dozen wipes and removed most of the dirt and grime from his head to his waist. Shannon gave the door to the room a quick knock as she opened it enough to peek inside.

“Got a minute?”

Ritter opened the plastic on a pack of new undershirts. The feel of something clean against his skin made him feel like a new man. He sat on one of two swivel chairs in front of the wide-screen TV streaming the interrogation.

“His information panning out?”

Shannon slipped into the room and handed Ritter a bottle of cold water dripping with condensation. She took the other seat and crossed her legs.

“It is. We’ve got a freeze on the accounts, and the Saudi
mukhabarat
will be waiting at the banks to pick up anyone who tries to access the money,” she said. Ritter snorted. Saudi intelligence used interrogation techniques that would make what he did to Atif pale in comparison. Ritter didn’t look at Shannon as they spoke.

“How much?”

“Almost four million dollars. Not a lot in comparison to the hundreds of millions we spend on the war every single week, but...it’ll put a crimp in Mukhtar’s operations,” she said.

Ritter remained silent, rocking the chair a few inches from side to side as he watched Atif on the screen.

“You haven’t lost your touch. Good job in there,” Shannon said.

On the screen one of the analysts shook his head and pointed to the screen. The analyst glanced over his shoulder to Carlos and nodded. Carlos stepped off the wall and readied his hammer. Ritter and Shannon heard Atif’s protests through the walls. A muffled thump was followed by another thump, and Atif’s protests transformed into a wail of pain.

“It was so easy,” Ritter said, as much to himself as to Shannon. “After all those years away from the Program, doing things aboveboard as an intelligence office, I thought there’d be some cognitive dissonance before Carlos and I maimed him. Nothing. No empathy for a man in pain. No cares for my oath as an Army officer.”

“We wouldn’t be where we are now if you held on to something so useless as a conscience,” she said.

“And where are we now? We don’t know where Mukhtar has our Soldiers. Do you think they’re still alive?”

“Does it matter?”

“No, it doesn’t matter. We never leave a fallen comrade behind.”

“I’m not a Soldier, but I understand that. Mukhtar remains the key. Atif gave up the locations for our old adversary’s safe houses in Baghdad. Now we smoke him out.” Shannon outlined her plan to capture Mukhtar, a plan Ritter could find no fault with.

“Abu Ahmet is a problem,” she said. Ritter’s heart rate sped up. He’d kept the revelation that Abu Ahmet was responsible for Mattingly’s death to himself. If Shannon suspected Ritter was holding out on her, his life would become very complicated very quickly. Ritter finished his water and collapsed the bottle against its base, then screwed the top back on and used the vacuum to keep the bottle compact. He was stalling, and he prayed Shannon didn’t pick up on it.

“What kind of problem?”

“Our source in his tribe says Abu Ahmet will turn on us, specifically your compatriots at Dragon, when Mukhtar is no longer a problem. Given that Abu Ahmet has been a valuable asset thus far, I suspect the source is playing us with poison-pen information. You’re the guy on the ground. What do you think?”

Ritter felt fate’s hand enter the equation. This was his chance to balance the scales between him and Abu Ahmet.

“This is what we’ll do about him,” Ritter said.