"The parameters of our mission. I just got word from forensics. About Trevor."
Payne nodded, realizing what that meant. Deep down inside, he'd hoped Schmidt was still alive, but he sensed that wasn't the case the moment he saw all the blood. There was simply too much of it. But now tilings were official. His former student was dead. Killed by unknown forces for unknown reasons. Which meant this was no longer a rescue mission. It was something far worse. A homicide investigation.
Jones continued. "Schmidt's team, including himself, consisted of four men whose DNA was on file with Colonel Harrington. Forensic testing proved it was their blood. And they found so much of it, there's no way any of them could've survived."
"Anything else?"
"They found three additional samples. Strike that. Three recent ones but no names. And not in the main cave but one of the back chambers. That's where the prisoners were kept."
"So Sheldon admitted it was a prison?"
Jones nodded. "If you think about it, it makes sense. It's far from America but close to North Korea, which is our biggest nuclear threat. This location gave us deniability and a lot of freedom when it comes to persuasion. No one was looking over their shoulders."
"And what was Schmidt's role?"
"Sheldon claims he was running it."
"The mission or the torture?"
He shrugged. "Maybe both."
Payne winced at the news, instantly thinking back to the years he'd spent with Schmidt, all the training, all the missions, and wondering where he'd gone wrong. If he'd gone wrong. The life of a Special Forces soldier was a complex one, an equal mix of aggression and discipline, humanity and brutality, always searching for a peaceful solution in an ultraviolent world. Balance was difficult to maintain, nearly impossible, which was one of the reasons why Payne was glad he got out when he did. While he still had a sense of honor. While he still had control.
But some soldiers weren't nearly as fortunate. Sometimes tragedies occurred that pushed them too far over the edge, causing them to lose track of their humanity. Their morality. Their ability to tell the difference between right and wrong. And when that happened, the military usually did one of two things. Either they counseled them on their behavior, hoping to cure it. Or they gave them a change of duty, hoping to exploit it.
And that's what happened to Trevor Schmidt.
An incident changed his life. And the military took full advantage.
According to Colonel Harrington, Schmidt had acted heroically during a mission gone wrong. Bad intel caused his squad to be dropped in the middle of occupied ground, surrounded by the enemy, yet Schmidt led his men to safety without any fatalities. Many injured, but none dead. A modern-day miracle. They were airlifted to Taif Air Base in Saudi Arabia, where they were treated at Al-Hada Hospital, a Saudi facility that catered to Westerners. To boost morale, families were flown in from the States to the Al-Gaim Compound, where they were allowed to stay while their loved ones recovered. Anything, Schmidt had argued, to help his men get better.
On the day of the incident, he had loaded up a shuttle bus with all the family members-wives, parents, girlfriends, even a couple of kids-and driven them to the hospital. His men were quartered in a separate wing, one that offered privacy from the regular patients, allowing them to talk freely about their missions without being overheard. Security was posted outside their doors, and every time the shift changed, the new guards swept the wing for listening devices. Far from perfect, but it would have to do until his men were healthy enough to be transported home.
Schmidt parked in a secured lot and herded everyone toward the front entrance, where they were greeted by another member of his squad, one of the uninjured ones, who led them into the building, through metal detectors, and past security. Schmidt made sure each of his men was doing well before he got back on the shuttle bus and drove to Taif, where he had a meeting to discuss what the hell went wrong with his last mission and whose head was going to roll. Someone had to pay for the fuckup that nearly killed his squad. He'd make sure of it.
Unfortunately, the meeting lasted less than three minutes. Schmidt barely had time to open his mouth when the conference room started to rumble. The floor began to shake. The walls began to quiver. Thunder ripped across the sunny sky. Everyone in the room was a seasoned veteran, so all of them knew what had happened. There had been an explosion. An attack of some kind. The only questions were where and why.
The amazing thing about war is that there can be silence in the middle of so much noise. Phones started ringing and people started shouting, a cacophony of sounds that rose above the distant rumble of a building collapsing to the ground, but Schmidt heard none of it. Not a single sound after the initial blast. As if his brain had hit the mute button.
Just like that, something inside him clicked.
Chaos swirled around him as he walked down the corridor. Alarms going off. Soldiers running everywhere. The anger from a moment before had been replaced with a temporary numbness, a stark realization that his current life would be over the instant he walked outside and saw what had been destroyed by the blast. How many squad members had been killed.
He paused at the door, his hand resting on the latch, trying to soak in his last few seconds of hope before he was overwhelmed by a thirst for revenge that wouldn't be quenched until he punished every last person who was responsible for this tragedy.
Until he squeezed the life out of all of them.
Finally, as if accepting his own fate, Schmidt took one last breath, then stepped into the brutal heat of the Saudi sun, where he stared at the hospital that burned in the distance.
The flames igniting his rage within.
16
Kia sat next to the old man, no longer fearing him. His name was Dong-Min Kim. After she explained who she was and why she was there, he apologized several times for attacking her with a pitchfork. She brushed it off like it was the type of thing that happened every day, but Kim knew better. He wasn't the least bit delusional, as she had first feared. He was actually clearheaded and caring. The stereotypical village elder.
The two of them talked in Korean, everything light and conversational. Nothing about the fire pit, the cave, or what had happened during the past week. Those were topics she wanted to save for Payne and Jones. Instead, she talked about her childhood on the army base near Seoul, explaining how blessed she was to be exposed to so many cultures at such an early age and how it gave her a head start on her current career. By age ten, she could speak four languages.
Kim was impressed by her accomplishments, especially her world travels. In all his life, he had never left the island of Jeju. Not even to go fishing. As a young boy he had nearly drowned while learning to swim, and after that he had an intense fear of the sea, which prevented him from going anywhere. No boats. No planes. No traveling of any kind. Instead he poured himself into books, learning the ways of the world from the comfort of his own home. Unfortunately, that was the main reason why he was so outraged by the presence of the cave. He rarely strayed from his village, yet the dangers of the world kept finding him there.
With a wave of his hand, Payne caught Kia's attention. She excused herself from Kim and walked into the backyard, where Payne and Jones were waiting by the fire pit, the smell of smoke still filling the air.
"Is he lucid?" Payne asked.
Kia nodded. "Very. He knows exactly what's going on."
"Good. We're hoping he can tell us what happened. Any advice on how to approach him?"
"Sir?"
"Will he be receptive to my questions, or should you conduct the interview?"