Thomas Greanias - The Promised War

The big Judah Division soldier, Salmon, immediately greeted his hero. "Caleb," said Salmon. "Last of the old ones."

"You'll get there, son," Caleb said, glancing at Deker and Elezar. "If our friends here don't fail us."

Caleb was nearly as tall as Bin-Nun, with deeply tanned and weathered skin. His clothing was different than that of the tribal commanders-he wore no body armor or sword-and he had a quieter air about him than General Bin-Nun or Kane the Kenite. But his flint-sharp, probing eyes seemed to miss nothing, and he clearly commanded the same respect as the two other "old ones" with the Israelite army's rank and file.

Caleb unrolled the parchment beneath the flicker of the oil lamps. It was a map of Canaan, the "Promised Land" to the ancient Hebrews, which would later be called Palestine and which Deker knew as modern-day Israel.

Caleb then stretched a long, muscular finger, flecked with age spots, over the map. He pointed to a city about four kilometers away on the other side of the Jordan. It was bounded by Mount Nebo to the east, the Central Mountains to the west and the Dead Sea to the south.

"Jericho," he said. "'City of the Moon.' Its Hivite inhabitants call it Reah, and themselves Reahns. Its strategic location allows it to control the trade routes through many cities of Canaan. As a result, Jericho is the perfect base from which to destroy or capture enemy convoys. Unfortunately, there is no way to conquer Canaan without first taking out Jericho. And we can't take out Jericho without destroying her walls."

Caleb looked up from the map, first at Elezar and then with unblinking eyes at Deker, holding his gaze until he seemed sure that Deker fully felt the essence of his mission: namely, that he and Elezar were to spy out the area, infiltrate Jericho's defenses and blow up the walls. Because, come hell or high water, tens of thousands of Israelites were going to invade the Promised Land.

"Then give me my magic mud bricks," Deker said in halfway decent ancient Hebrew and with his own unblinking gaze. "We'll be on our way."

But Caleb, who understood him perfectly, eyed him coldly. "No magic mud bricks. You are to spy out Jericho and come back with a report first."

"Only a report?"

Deker looked at Elezar for some help here. But Elezar responded only with a pained look on his face. Now was not the time to show off fluency in ancient tongues, his expression implied, or question orders, or do anything to delay their crossing.

"We'll want several plausible lines of march to the city," Caleb said, speaking directly to Elezar now, peer to peer. "And a full assessment of the fortifications and walls. Any weaknesses? Any way under or over? Most important, we need you to gauge the morale of the people of Jericho, especially her troops. They're now under the command of an Egyptian mercenary, General Hamas."

"Hamas?" Elezar said out loud with a start, echoing Deker's thoughts.

"You've heard of him, then?" Caleb said. "An evil monster who executes any officer who fails him with his own blade, but only after he feeds their children to Molech before their eyes."

"What's the king's name?" Deker asked Elezar directly in English. "Hezbollah?"

Elezar frowned at Deker, but Caleb seemed to pick up the gist of the question.

"Alakh is the provisional king," Caleb said. "It is said Hamas dispatched the king before him, and the one before him too. There is no royal family, only wealthy landowners whose taxes secure the troops who defend their holdings."

Deker heard a grunt from behind as Salmon, seeing their utter ignorance of the region's geopolitics, leaned over to Achan and quipped, "Angels of the Lord."

Caleb then handed Elezar a folded piece of papyrus. "One of our spies, before he died, intercepted this for us on the trade routes. It's a communique from Hamas to the kings of southern Canaan."

Elezar translated the text for Deker. "Hamas is asking local city-states for a consignment of the following weapons: 3,000 bows, 1,500 daggers, 1,500 swords and 50 additional chariots," Elezar told him in English.

"Sounds like he knows Yahweh is coming," Deker said.

Caleb said, "That's enough weapons to equip six thousand troops, more than twice the daytime population of Jericho and almost ten times the number of its men in uniform."

"But he's not asking for troops," said Elezar, handing the scroll back to Caleb. "Just weapons."

"So, where is Hamas finding the extra bodies?" Deker asked.

"Something else for you to find out," Caleb said. "There are rumors that Hamas has some kind of shadow army of demons ready to wipe out any invader who breaches Jericho's walls."

A shadow army, thought Deker, suddenly on alert. It sounded suspiciously similar to the phrase legion of demons that his superiors in the IDF often used to refer to the secret fail-safe he had buried beneath the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Like Jericho's so-called shadow army, the Israeli fail-safe was a weapon of last resort, the ultimate self-destruct mechanism that would wipe out Jews and Arabs alike but ultimately ensure the survival of Israel.

The Israeli demons were contained inside a replica of the Ark of the Covenant that the IDF had code-named "Pandora's Box." Deker once knew what exactly was inside the box, before military hypnotherapists inflicted reverse-regression treatments on him to make him forget what he had buried. Indeed, the only image or feeling that he still could recall about the fail-safe was that it was very ancient. He also suspected it was a bioweapon of some sort. But such a device would be well beyond what General Hamas and the armies of Jericho were capable of developing.

Suddenly, Deker felt self-conscious of his thoughts, worried that he shouldn't even be thinking about the Israeli fail-safe or acknowledging to himself that it even existed.

For a split second Deker wondered if the wall of time and space was as porous as Elezar thought, and his sixth sense tingled, as though he had spotted a glitch in the universe. Then it was gone and he wondered if he had sensed anything at all.

I have to get back to Jerusalem, he reminded himself. Have to stop the attack and prevent a wider war.

"Deker!" said Elezar, breaking his trance. "Pay attention."

Deker refocused his eyes as Caleb presented him with a couple of thin bronze tags: passports of some sort, it appeared. The Israelite veteran then unrolled a long leather strip with jewelry and amulets pinned inside. Two more wraps sat on the stone table.

Young Achan let out a low whistle.

It was quite understandable. Deker figured there was probably two or three million U.S. dollars' worth of gems and precious metals in those jewelry wraps, and it made him wonder if he and Elezar were really going to walk out of there alive.

"You cross the Jordan tonight dressed as jewelry traders from the east. Kane the Kenite has prepared your cover here with passports and jewelry. Before daybreak, you will cut through the barley fields and olive groves on the other side of the Jordan. The road to Jericho is wide and well traveled. Hamas has reconnaissance chariots that regularly patrol it. You will join the road after the last checkpoint to Jericho, so that the main gate will be your one and only inspection. If you pass, you're in."

Elezar nodded, and it seemed they were done. But then Salmon slammed his fist on the stone table.

"This is not the plan," he nearly shouted at Caleb, the words hanging in the night air. "Achan and I were supposed to cross the Jordan and join the barley workers, bring the harvest through the gates of Jericho, spy it out and come back."

"Yahweh works in mysterious ways, Salmon," Deker said, and helped himself to the two other wraps, tucking them inside the folds of his tunic.

Caleb sighed and looked at Salmon. "It is what it is."