Using binoculars, Tariq was studying the infidels in the van when he saw the driver’s forehead explode in a spray of blood and flesh. As he refocused he saw the passenger’s head fall forward, even though the body remained upright, the seatbelt holding it in place. Tariq immediately scanned the dunes, but the sniper was invisible.
He whispered to his brother, “Go to the base. Inform Nasim the CIA plane is on its way. We will smite the infidels here, masha’allah-Allah’s will.”
“But we’re not supposed to be here. We’ll get lashings.”
“Trust me. Nasim is the one who first pointed the plane out to me. He will understand. Go!”
His brother nodded and ran down the dune. Tariq remained on his belly, studying every weed, every pattern in the sand, dreaming of being that sniper, hidden like a scorpion in the dunes.
He watched and waited.
Camille reloaded, expecting to see the jet at any moment. No plane arrived. A half hour passed, then an hour, but still no plane. “Maybe they’re not coming,” Pete said, the first thought she had volunteered all day.
Chapter Sixty-Nine
“I know that the Americans have brought people back to Uzbekistan from Bagram Airport in order to be interrogated and that those people have been brought back by the Americans, on American planes, with American personnel.” Murray [former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan] says there’s no doubt western intelligence knows the information it’s getting is gained under torture,[and] as Ambassador he sent a [British] Embassy official to the US mission in Tashkent to make sure. “She reported back to me that the CIA Chief there said yes, you’re right. I guess this material would have been obtained under torture.”
– Foreign Correspondent, ABC-TV [AUSTRALIA], March 29, 2005, Ambassador Craig Murray, as interviewed by Evan Williams
Gora Muruntau, Kyzyl Kum Desert, Uzbekistan
Hunter looked outside the window as the Gulfstream descended. The landscape made him feel even farther away from home, farther away from Stella. The desolate valley looked like what was left long after the flames of hell had burned themselves out. The desert floor was scarred with the biggest quarries he’d ever seen, gashes in the earth stretching for miles and miles. The open pits themselves were terraced swirls of lifeless dirt, switchbacks into the depths. The sand and rock cleaved from the ground had been dumped in mounds of rubble that were collapsing back into the abandoned pits. The earth had been gutted and the innards left to rot.
Uzbekistan was where the Earth came to die.
Once they were inside a high security facility, he knew they would have little hope of escape and none of rescue. Rubicon would never allow him to come out alive and he would much rather die fighting on a desolate runway than from torture or neglect. Taking over the Gulfstream was his only chance. He stretched as best he could, given the plastic cuffs on his wrists and ankles. His body had to be ready when they de-planed. If he and the other prisoners could find the right opportunity, maybe even one of them would survive. They were an even match with the guards-four prisoners, four guards. The flight crew seemed to stay huddled inside the cockpit, probably some well-paid flyboys who understood that the less they knew about their passengers, the safer they were. As long as the pilots weren’t directly endangered, he doubted they would aid the guards in a rumble.
He knew he could trust the skills of Miller and GENGHIS and he was certain they would jump in if an opportunity presented itself, but he wasn’t so sure about Ashland-or whoever he was. With Hunter’s luck, the bastard would be the only one who came out alive.
As the plane banked, he spotted the landing strip and a vehicle waiting to meet the plane. He couldn’t see how many were inside, but his clenched gut told him the odds had just gotten a little worse.
“Plane at eleven o’clock, turning into the wind to land,” Pete said, kneeling in position a little behind Camille, to her right.
As Camille searched for the plane, she thought she saw Pete check her sidearm. The sparse desert terrain made it unlikely that someone could approach them without notice, but it never hurt to be vigilant. She reached to her right leg and made sure that her new Spetsnaz combat knife was in its thigh holster.
“Wind twenty-five to thirty knots. Verify,” Camille said. The blowing sand felt like a hard rain, scratching at her face.
Pete looked through her scope. “Verified.”
Camille added a click to the right to compensate for the wind.
The small jet taxied to a stop in a sand-covered part of the tarmac, on the edge of the range Camille had anticipated. Iggy had the better position. The additional meters would add several mils of inaccuracy to her shot, but that would be more than made up for because at that distance the bullet would be silent, friction from the air having slowed it enough to lose the crackling sound it made traveling at the speed of sound. She could get off multiple rounds before anyone noticed or could triangulate her position-not that she had any intention of breaking her perfect record: one shot, one kill.
“Range me to the airframe,” Camille said.
“Eight-two-five.”
“Negative. Eight-five-zero,” Camille said. “Verify.”
“Negative. Eight-two-five. Check your dope.”
Camille checked the settings, but was sure they were correct.
The plane sat on the runway while the engines spooled down. After five minutes, the airstairs were lowered and a man appeared in the doorway, a mil dot above Camille’s crosshairs. He was blond, average build and had what looked like a Russian version of an M4 at his side.
“Radio Iggy. First target acquired.”
Tariq had learned a thing or two about stealth in the training camp, not that he really needed it. Whoever the sniper was, he was focused upon the runway, not Tariq approaching from behind. As he crept closer, he saw a white jet coming in for a landing.
The hot desert air took Hunter’s breath away as he stepped through the jet’s doorway, tactical scenarios running through his head. Whoever was picking them up was smart enough to keep a distance. A meter ahead of him, a guard stepped from the stairs onto the tarmac, looking around, his eyebrows knit.
Something was wrong.
Camille watched through her scope as the first prisoner stooped, exiting with the top of his head pointed at her. He looked up and she saw his face.
Hunter-thank god.
She caught sight of the second prisoner climbing down the stairs.
GENGHIS?
Pete took a long, deep breath, but it didn’t clear her head. Her body dripped with sweat. Camille had been good to her, but Joe Chronister was not a man who bluffed. He would make sure the unsolved murder at Fort Bliss was reopened with new evidence that would send Pete to prison for life. She couldn’t go through that.
Pete cocked the Makarov.
Hunter saw no cover, nowhere to run. The landing strip was between dunes with so little microterrain, the sand looked like it was in constant motion. He was actually surprised they hadn’t swallowed the landing strip. The lead guard keyed his radio, calling for the absent greeting party. Something wasn’t going according to plan which meant the guards were off-balance, even if for a few seconds. Hunter flashed a glance at GENGHIS, who seemed to already be inching into position behind one of the guards.
Camille saw GENGHIS edging closer to her objective, but the shot was still clear. She inhaled deeply to steady herself, then exhaled. The shot felt good, so she slowly squeezed the trigger and fired. The recoil jerked the sight. Without a breath, she acquired the next target.