Karl's last flight, part 5

Karl's last flight, part 5
©2006, Basil Sands

The road trip had been rough.  Kharzai and his men had taken Karl through a tunnel that seemed to lead deeper into the mountain in which they had their cave hide out.  The tunnel ended in another cave after about a hundred meters.  This cave opened up to the north west side of the mountain.

As soon as they entered, Liam and Gilles went to one corner of the cave and tugged at what seemed to be a dark wall of stone.  A large black tarp fell to the ground revealing a dirty red, four door  Nissan SUV. 

The back of the SUV contained two 20 liter cans of petrol and a several plastic water bags.  Karl put his survival bag in the back with the other equipment and they took off.  Each man also carried a weapon and spare magazines of ammunition.  Karl still had his pistol in his belt.

The evening sun was slowly descended to their left.  This meant they were headed due north.  Liam lay his head back and was snoring softly while Kharzai kept watch and Gilles drove. 

It was 10 pm before they stopped in a nearly empty stretch of land, they had been driving for three hours.  The only sign of human life in this dark desert area was a small mud building, standing by itself on the rocky terrain.  Liam ran into the building, only to return 30 seconds later. 

"We're good to go," he said briskly, "at least we were an hour ago according to the message."

Karl assumed that the building must be a message drop area they used to communicate with their comrades in arms. 

Kharzai confirmed this, "That little hut is basically our answering machine.  I am sure you've seen things like it in the movies.  One spy leaves a mark on the wall pointing a certain direction, the next comes in and makes a scratch on another pre-selected wall, maybe a piece of grafitti or a word.  We decipher the code, the enemy thinks it is just a scratch and a piece of grafitti.  Anyway, the message Liam read tells us that within the last hour, our field unit had verified that residence two was safe for us to enter. "

"So how large of a rebel group do you gents have here?" Karl asked.

"Oh I'd say we have a few hundred actives and a potential group of thousands of recruitables.  Plenty to stir things up a good bit and keep the Ayatollah's minions busy for a while."  Kharzai replied.

"As long as the leaks are stopped."  Injected Gilles.

"Yes, well, leaks are always and issue in this kind of work.  But don't worry…we'll catch him, or her as the case may be." Kharzai took on a dramatic old-fashioned radio voice, "Because the good guys always get their man!"

"I thought it was the Canadian Mounties who always get their man." Replied Karl.

"Oh yeah, that is their saying isn't it.  Dang!  We don't have any Canadians with us.  Looks like we're screwed!"  Kharzai smiled with a mischievous, almost childish expression.

They drove another hour into the desert and came upon a small town.  All the lights in the town were off as far as Karl could tell.  For that matter, it didn't even seem that the town had electricity at all.

As they pulled into the town, they rolled down all of the windows in the vehicle and drove slowly, each man held his eyes wide open, keeping his weapon just below the window, ready to leap into action.

Gilles stopped the Nissan.  Kharzai got out and shouted something in Farsi. A reply came back and Kharzai looked back into the SUV with a smile.

"We're in business fellas."  He said as he shut the door.

As Liam rose to get out of the SUV, a loud, sharp crack broke the stillness of the night.

Kharzai slammed forward into the side of the vehicle, his lips still smiled as his eyes glazed over.  He slid down the side of the SUV to the ground as Liam fired a return burst from his MP5 and leapt back into the open door. 

"Drive! Drive!"  he shouted as Gilles smacked the transmission into gear and floored the accelerator.  Gunfire erupted from several open windows as they quickly sped through the town.

Karl was wide eyed and gripping his pistol but at this speed he was unable to identify any targets to fire at. 

"What about Kharzai?" Karl shouted

"He's dead!" replied Liam

"How do you know that?"

"He's dead, his spine was blown apart!"

"There must be something we could do!  I mean we can't just leave him behind."  Karl shouted.

"Are you a surgeon?  There isn't a hospital for a hundred miles from here.  There is nothing we could've done."

They sped down the road as fast as the vehicle could carry them over the rough roads.  Another hour had passed before they stopped, this time in the mountains again, Karl judged it to be about 40 miles to the east of the town where Kharzai had been killed.

Gilles parked the SUV in a small opening between outcrops of rock. It was a little past midnight.  The stars shone brightly over head in the clear desert sky.  It almost felt like being in space, Karl thought, with no city lights to diffuse the glow of the stars.

Liam stormed back and forth swearing at the world. 

"Who turned us over! Who in the world turned us over!" 

He was furious but Gilles looked calm, almost disconnected from the situation. 

"They had the code in the message house." Liam continued, "They had the reply for Kharzai's question. They had everything laid and were expecting us.  What happened?  Who turned us in?"

Liam then dropped to the ground sitting with his back against the Nissan, and put his face in his hands.

"You know how this business is Liam," Gilles replied, "It could've been anyone from the old man at the number one house to the goat herd boy at Navallat.  It may even have been that girl Kharzai has been seeing in Tarfil.   Now with the war started, this is the time they'd want to stop us. The question must now ask is, who can we trust?"

He looked at Karl, then back at Liam, "We know the organization has been compromised.  We cannot just stroll into any town now and expect to get things rolling."

Liam glanced up at the stars, "Yes, I know.  There is Faisel.  We can contact him.  He is one the few we can trust for sure.  Faisel or Esther, either of them I know we can trust."

"Most likely," Gilles showed no emotion in any he said.  His voice carried a deep melancholic tone that was at once depressing, and unsettling. 

There was a long silence.

Karl said, in a quiet, almost whispered voice, "So what do we do next?"

Liam leapt to his feet as if his mourning was done, his attitude changed back to that of a determined warrior.

"On to war.  There is nothing we can do for Kharzai, he is dead.  He had no documents or any thing with him so there is nothing compromised that wasn't before they got him.  We go to Faisel and let him know, if he doesn't already, then put together a plan to organize whoever we can and proceed as ordered."

"Are you sure Faisel is a good place to go?  He may be trustworthly, but his nephew…I simply have no faith in him."  Gilles still had the monotone voice, but his face took on a more serious demeanor.

"Manoosh can be trusted, this I know.  Let's get moving so we can be there before dawn." 

Liam went to the back of the SUV, grabbed a can of petrol and started filling the tank.  Gilles grabbed some food from the back of the vehicle before they took off. 

As they got in the vehicle, Liam handed Karl the MP5 submachine gun that Kharzai had left on the seat. 

"Here, you may need this.  Keep it below the windows, in case anyone is looking at us.  When we come to a town with tall buildings cover it with that blanket."

Karl took the weapon in his hands and felt its dreadful weight.  It had an extra magazine attached to the side of the one that was already loaded.  This facilitated rapid reloading during a fight.  Each magazine held 30 rounds of 9mm ammunition.  The weapon, fully loaded, weighed about 12 pounds. 

He sat back in the seat of the Nissan and let out a breath. 

It was 4:30 am.  The darkness was like a black blanket that refused to knock the chill off the desert morning.  The stars sparkled with feathery light across the expanse of the sky, as if beckoning him to leave this insane world.

As the SUV lurched forward into the pre-dawn journey, Karl wondered how long he was going to stay alive in this new career.

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