Jack Coughlin - Running the Maze

“Are you their leader?”

The man stiffened. How could there be any question of his authority? This sergeant was a stupid man. “Yes. I am Sayyid, and my leaders have ordered me to secure this place. I will now take control. Are you Hafiz… Sergeant Hafiz?”

Hafiz looked down at his boots for a moment, studying the ground, the bowed head indicating subservience. Why couldn’t this have been easy? Why did these people refuse to cooperate? “Insh’Allah,” the sergeant said. God’s will. He reached behind him and pulled the modified Makarov 9 mm pistol from the belt holster, swung it up, and fired directly at the nose of Sayyid. The back of the man’s head blew off in a crimson curtain of bone, brains, and blood, and Hafiz fired again before the body hit the ground.

He looked over at the Taliban fighters. Suddenly, they were paying attention. Hafiz held up his left hand, palm outward, to signal them to remain still, then planted a boot on each side of their fallen commander’s body and methodically emptied the remaining ten shots of the magazine into the corpse. Streaks of crimson glistened on the ground as Sayyid’s body bled out. Turning away from the bullet-riddled corpse, Hafiz walked over to the waiting group, clapping a new clip of ammo into his pistol as he moved, his eyes killer cold.

“ Allahu Akbar, you motherless pieces of dung,” he snarled. “You work for me now. Get in line.”

THE RAIN HAD PASSED over during dinner, and Lady Pat and Beth went for a slow turn around the deck so Pat could smoke one of her little cigars. The doctors insisted that Sir Jeff be in smoke-free environments, and the portable oxygen tank that was always near him made it necessary for her to smoke outside. The women had put on sweaters against the chill. The clouds were breaking up, and moonglow found openings to color the moving water as the Vagabond cruised along northeasterly.

“Your brother, Joey, sounds like a dedicated man,” Lady Pat said. “I’m sorry things ended so badly. Your mother must be devastated.”

Beth looked up but could not see any stars. “It was almost his destiny, his karma, as the Buddhists would say. He preferred to help the helpless in some of the world’s worst cesspools instead of making a lot of money and living well anywhere in America. He measured himself against the evil of the world, and that led him into trouble more than once.”

“Still, it is a sad thing.” Pat exhaled a puff of smoke that was surprisingly fragrant, like flowers. “Now you have been pulled into his world. Are you certain that you want to go on this adventure? I would advise you to leave it to the professionals.”

“Pat, I have no choice. Joey saw something in that valley that only I would recognize, and I’m not even sure what it is. Kyle says the job is doable, with minimal risks, and I am a professional, too.”

Lady Pat threw back her head and laughed. “Kyle and Jeff would consider fighting a saber-toothed tiger with their bare hands to be a piece of cake. They live for the rush of it all. You’re not really like them, Beth. Very few people are, even within the special operations forces. Still, if I have to see you go off on this errand, I prefer that you have Kyle as your partner. He’s the best, and he even admits that you’re pretty good. That is a very high compliment.”

“I work hard at it, Pat. Always trying to break through the glass ceiling, you know? Because I’m petite and pretty, men won’t treat me as an equal.”

“The eternal story, my dear.” They paced on in silence until they reached the stern, then looked back over the churning wake behind them, glowing with green phosphorescence. “You haven’t asked the question.”

“What question?”

“About Kyle and Jeff and me.” Pat smiled. “You must be curious why someone as sophisticated as I, a lady of the realm, would have anything to do with a foul little mongrel like him.”

“He gave me a synopsis on the way in, Pat, but it’s really none of my business.”

Patricia threw the remains of the cigar overboard. “Do you know how hard it is to find a true friend in life? What started as a simple business deal, when Kyle was sent over to advise Jeff on a new weapon, unexpectedly grew into a deeply personal friendship among the three of us. As you said about your brother, maybe it was our karma. No one was trying to make it happen, which is probably the only reason it worked. We did not really need him, and Kyle didn’t need anybody. Yet he slowly filled a gaping hole in our lives, and we acted as surrogate parents to him. As the company grew over the years—Jeff turned out to be an even better businessman and financier than he was a soldier—so did our relationship, until we became quite the odd family. Kyle is invaluable to us now, and we love him to death. We always try to lure him away from the Marines, but he refuses. The Pentagon stays happy because it gives the U.S. special access to the Excalibur products, and as you see, we provide the occasional spot of help for some operations.”

“Are you telling me that Kyle can choose between being a jarhead gunnery sergeant and living in this sort of luxury, and he stays in uniform?”

“Yes. Someday, he will retire and come into the business as a full partner. In the meantime, he is a member of the board of directors and a vice president. When Jeff and I die, Kyle inherits the company.” Lady Patricia looked sideways at Beth. “Did I mention, darling, that he is extremely rich?”

Beth thought in silence for a moment. “I don’t care about his money, or his private life,” she said. “From the moment we met, he has been an insufferable enigma. We’re barely friends, Pat. He can be cold and abrasive and rude one minute, and the next encouraging and understanding. All I want from Kyle Swanson is to get me into that valley in Pakistan and then get me out again.”

SERGEANT HAFIZ TRIED NOT to overthink the task. The Talibs were unimpressive substitutes for real soldiers. They were courageous if untrained jihadists, but tribal. He divided the remaining eighteen men into three groups of six and assigned each team to be led by one of the ISI regulars who had been watching the Djinn at night. Since the man who was the evil spirit would now be sleeping soundly during the dark hours, those few soldiers could be switched to lead the new irregulars.

One group would be on patrol, and the second in reserve, while the third rested. They would rotate every six hours. Sleep pulled at his eyes, and Hafiz went to the basin and washed his face, forearms, and hands clean of the fine grit that caked into every crease and wrinkle. A final radio check with the new squad leaders told him that all was quiet outside, so he headed for his bunk and a few hours of rest. He had learned long ago that sleep deprivation dulled a leader’s abilities. The inspectors from the New Muslim Order were due to arrive tomorrow, and he had to be alert.

Just as Hafiz was drifting off, Mohammad al-Attas snapped awake. He was in his own bed, wearing only boxer shorts and bandages, and the lights were off. He smiled broadly into the darkness and got up, as if pulled by a friendly hand. Fools! Did they really think the Djinn would be an easy prey? He clicked a switch on the wall, and the room filled with such brilliance that he bent double to cover his eyes, moaning with the pain until he could reach out and turn it off again, plunging the room back into restful, familiar darkness.

Why was he so sore? Oh, yes. Ghostly images slashing at him emerged as a real memory; evil creatures with sharp claws and teeth had tried to devour him until he fought them off. Then he remembered the hospital and the drugs, and coming back to life behind the masquerade of being a mere human again, the weak little engineer who was liked and respected by everyone, feared by none. The Djinn could withstand pain; it had a delicious taste that proved he was real, that he was alive. The thick dreams induced by the morphine had been a tumble of terrifying characters that loyally followed him as they scourged the earth with fire and blade. Once he had rested enough to move beyond the grasp of the heavy narcotics, the Djinn pretended to take the pills offered to him in his weak body, then threw them away.