Into Darkness (15 page)

The Tunisian
was ready for his suicide mission. Mukhtar’s imam had spent the morning with the Tunisian, directing him through ritual prayers, shaving his entire body below the neck, and wearing the pure white martyr’s shawl. Naturally, the whole process was caught on camera for future propaganda. Al-Qaeda’s media teams would edit the raw video with Islamic music and multiple angles of the blast from the Tunisian’s final act. The video would go online to generate donations from wealthy Arabs and inspire more suicide bombers to join the cause.

Mukhtar gave specific instructions that the filmmakers not record the imam giving the Tunisian a shot of tranquilizers or plying the young man with alcohol. Sober suicide bombers had a nasty habit of choosing to live as they approached their targets.

The cargo truck’s frame sagged from the tons of ammonium nitrate fertilizer mixed with diesel. Loops of det cord, plastic explosive in tube form running through the bags of homemade explosive, would blow the truck into vapor. The Tunisian’s target, an Iraqi police station in nearby Ramadi, would cease to exist less than an hour from now. Mukhtar couldn’t wait for the comparisons to the Oklahoma City bombing. This weapon was just as powerful, and its blast would propel Mukhtar into the next rung of al-Qaeda’s hierarchy and blow a building full of traitors to hell.

Mukhtar’s men burst into cheers as the Tunisian left the prayer room, flanked by the imam and Hamsa, each helping the stoned bomber make his way to the truck. The cameraman kept pace with the Tunisian and signaled to two men waiting by the truck’s cab. The two men, who’d traveled with the Tunisian from Africa into Iraq, hugged the bomber and kissed his cheeks. The bomber’s eyes swam in the cocktail of drugs that kept his mind and body depressed and too lethargic for self-preservation.

Hamsa pried the other men from the bomber and shoved the Tunisian into the cab. Mukhtar knew the other men would beg him for their own martyrdom mission; that was the whole reason they’d come to Iraq. They’d demanded to be part of the Tunisian’s mission, but he wasn’t going to waste willing suicide bombers.

The Tunisian said a prayer and started the engine. The al-Qaeda men cheered again as the Tunisian shifted the truck into gear and drove toward the exit. The Tunisian knew his route and the other cameramen standing by to film the attack. A single phone call was all the cameramen needed to move into position.

Waiting at the exit, Mukhtar opened his cell phone. There were several text messages with attached photos from one of his spies. He waved at the approaching truck as the first photo downloaded. He did a double take as the photo finally displayed. His eyes remained locked on his cell phone as he stepped in front of the truck and held up a palm to stop it.

The Tunisian fumbled with the wheel and groped for the horn. He honked once, but Mukhtar didn’t move. The truck’s worn brakes squealed as is slowed to a stop inches from Mukhtar’s hand.

The al-Qaeda men murmured as the mob migrated toward the standoff.

Mukhtar closed his phone and opened the passenger door. The Tunisian looked at him in a near panic.

“But I’m ready to go,” he said in a slurred voice.

“You have a new target,” Mukhtar said. “Do you know the way to…No, of course you don’t.” The Tunisian had been kept in isolation since he arrived and had left the compound only when the imam showed him the route to the Iraqi police station, promising paradise and plenty of virgins the entire time.

Mukhtar leaned out of the cab and scanned his men. He pointed to Yousef and waved him over.

“Yes, Mukhtar?” Yousef said.

“The target has changed. Get in and navigate for the martyr,” Mukhtar said.

Yousef took two steps back before bumping into Hamsa, who grabbed Yousef’s upper arms with meaty hands.

“But, Mukhtar,” Yousef babbled as his brain created an excuse, “I haven’t said the martyr’s prayers. I…I…I’m not prepared religiously to be a martyr…yet.”

Hamsa squeezed Yousef’s arms against his body and pushed him toward the truck.

Mukhtar shook his head in disappointment. Offer paradise to a man, and he’ll want to finish his tea first. “You don’t have to martyr yourself. Get him within sight of the target and then walk home.”

Yousef sighed in relief and smiled. “What’s the target?”

Mukhtar pulled Yousef into the cab and told him.

Hamsa pushed the gate closed as the rolling bomb left the compound. Mukhtar stood beyond the threshold, his open cell phone still in hand.

“Mukhtar, why did you change the target? The
emir
for all of Anbar Province sent us the martyr and money to build the bomb. He wants that police station destroyed. What are we going to tell him?” Hamsa said.

Mukhtar handed the cell phone to Hamsa and said, “Providence.”

Hamsa looked at the picture on the cell: Abu Ahmet standing next to an American officer. “Abu Ahmet? Why are we using a sledgehammer to crush that fly? We can take care of Abu Ahmet with half a dozen
mujahideen.
”

“No, my friend, not him. The Anbar
emir
gave us the weapons, but Allah gave us the target. He is here. The man that killed my wife and daughter,” Mukhtar said.

“May Allah grant us victory,
inshallah
,” Hamsa said.

“Get your men. Sheikh Majid is consorting with the Americans. We will show him what happens to traitors.”

Abu Ahmet cast a net into his man-made pond. The pond, a rectangle of waist-deep water, could host hundreds of carp. He’d had so little time to tend to his fish farm since the Americans invaded, but every so often he craved
mazgouf
, carp slit and cooked over a wood fire. Two adjacent bone-dry plots of land, their perimeters made from high banks of packed dirt, had been fallow since 2003. Once, all three produced fish for the restaurants lining the Tigris River in Baghdad’s Abu Nawas neighborhood. Not for the first time, he wondered if any of the shop owners were still alive and whether any would buy from him again if this war ever ended.

“Daddy, look at that big truck!” Jasim said as he pointed down the road leading to their home.

Abu Ahmet looked up and saw a cherry-red truck with white siding. It rode low from whatever enormous weight it carried, churning dirt in its wake as it drove toward him. He instantly recognized it from Mukhtar’s compound.

He knew that if that truck was coming for him, he was as good as dead. There was no escape from a bomb that big. So this is the end, he thought.

He knelt down and hugged Jasim, who flinched as his father’s arms pressed against his bruised body.

“Don’t look, son,” Abu Ahmet said. He pressed Jasim’s head into his chest and waited for the end as the truck rumbled closer. At least the end would be quick.

Jasim squirmed as the truck came closer and closer, then drove right past them. Abu Ahmet pushed his son out to arm’s length, then looked at the departing truck.

“You’re acting weird,” Jasim said.

Abu Ahmet scrambled to his feet, his face contorted in confusion. This made no sense. What was down that road for al-Qaeda to blow up? Sheikh Majid’s home was in the opposite direction, and the tribes south of his home were no threat to al-Qaeda. He connected the dots a moment later and pulled his cell phone from his pocket along with the flyer the American lieutenant had given him at the canal.

He keyed in the number from the flyer, then hesitated. If he did nothing, the American base was doomed. He could avenge Samir without lifting a finger. He looked toward his home; his daughter stood on the doorstep. She locked herself away every time he was home and begged him not to kill her through the old wooden door. If the Americans could help him…

He cursed and dialed the number. He looked down at the bewildered Jasim and said, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Don’t forget that.”

Jasim shook his head at his ridiculous father and went back to tossing pebbles into the dry fish pond.

Specialist Nesbitt hated tower guard duty. He didn’t mind the monotony of hours sitting on his duff as the sun and heat squeezed him dry of sweat. The threat of an insurgent sniper didn’t faze him. The machine gun nest atop the main house had plenty of camouflage netting to screen him, plus the Iraqis couldn’t hit anything more than a hundred yards from them without divine intervention. It was the climb he dreaded.

An old wooden ladder was the only way up and down from the tower. Nesbitt gritted his teeth as he climbed up the splintered rungs, waiting for the ladder to give way beneath his feet. The added weight of his armor, rifle, and a small backpack full of pogey bait made his anxiety worse. Nesbitt reached the top of the ladder and pulled himself into the sandbag-and-lumber box that was the guard tower. Nesbitt’s foot caught against the ladder as he slithered in. He yanked his foot loose, causing the ladder to skid against the lip of the shack as it slowly slid away.

Nesbitt shot his arm over the edge of the shack and caught the ladder before it crashed to the ground. He rebalanced it against the shack and said, “Shit like this is never in the recruiting videos.”

Private Thomas, manning the M240 machine gun, smacked his gum as he took his attention away from the road leading to the patrol base.

“You get ’em?” Thomas said.

“Hello to you too, asshole. No, I didn’t need any help just then.” Nesbitt sat in the second white plastic chair in the tower and opened his backpack. He pulled out an individually wrapped apple-and-cinnamon muffin and handed it to Thomas.

Thomas frowned at the muffin. “Dude, that’s not blueberry. I specifically asked for a blueberry muffin. Go back down there.”

Nesbitt flung the offending muffin at Thomas’s face. “War is hell, ain’t it?”

Thomas picked up the muffin from the floor and opened it. “Did you at least get the right Rip It?”

Nesbitt pulled one of the energy drinks from his bag, the flavor obscured by his meaty fingers. “Complain one more time, and we’ll see how many of these I can ram right up your—”

“What’re they doing?” Thomas said as he shifted his body behind the machine gun. Nesbitt looked beyond the concrete walls and saw a large, red truck stopped at the intersection leading to their base. One of the truck’s doors opened, and a man jumped from the cab and ran down the road away from the truck and the patrol base at an impressive speed.

“That’s damn peculiar.” Nesbitt grabbed a radio from the floor and keyed the mike. Nothing. He keyed it again. No sound at all.

“Did you check the batteries when you got up here?” Nesbitt asked.

“No, that’s supposed to be
your
job. Ah shit, he’s coming this way.”

The truck transitioned from the paved road to the dirt road leading to the patrol base.

“Should I light him up?” Thomas’s jaw went into overdrive, his gum smacking like the machine gun he longed to fire. He racked the charging handle back and chambered a round.

“Not yet.”

The truck slowed to a crawl as it approached. Nesbitt made out the driver. Dressed in bright white clothes, he was constantly checking his rearview mirror. “I think he just took a wrong turn,” Nesbitt said.

Ritter burst from the operations center, a cell phone to his ear.

Nesbitt leaned over the side of the guard tower. “Hey, sir. We got a big-ass truck coming in.”

Ritter’s eyes widened as he froze in place. He took a quick glance at his cell phone, then screamed, “Shoot it! Shoot it right now!”

Thomas shrugged and fired. The M240’s bark announced panic and action to the patrol base as the first five rounds found their target. The truck’s windshield shattered as the bullets tore into the cab. The truck slowed but didn’t stop.

Thomas fired a longer burst; the recoil pulled the barrel skyward as a red tracer round passed over the truck. The truck ground to a halt, steam pouring from a perforated radiator. The driver’s door swung open, but there was no sign of the driver. Nesbitt’s unprotected ears rang with tinnitus from the shots as Thomas reset the machine gun for another burst.

Nesbitt grabbed him by the shoulder and yelled, “Cease fire!”

Thomas nodded but kept his weapon trained on the truck.

Nesbitt leaned back over the parapet and saw Ritter curled into a ball, tucked against a HESCO barrier.

“Sir, he stopped!” Nesbitt called down to Ritter.

Ritter poked his head out from his arms and got to his feet.

Thomas’s shots kicked the patrol base into an angry hornet’s nest of motion. Soldiers in varying stages of dress and armament poured from their rooms to their battle stations, all demanding answers and instructions.

Captain Shelton, wearing his armor over his Army physical training uniform and pistol in hand, ran over to Ritter. “What’s going on?”

Ritter, Shelton, and a half dozen Soldiers ran to the idling truck. Shelton glanced in the cab to ensure it was empty, then crept up on the driver. The truck reeked of ammonia and diesel. The Tunisian used his arms to drag himself along the dirt road. His bullet-riddled legs wouldn’t move, slowing his retreat from the truck. He pulled himself another half arm’s length, like an infant grasping for his or her first bit of movement. Then he slumped to the ground.