“I’ve given you my name,” Hauser replied, elevating his voice to be heard as the diesel engine rumbled to life. “Anything else I could say would only serve to confuse you. However, this much I will reveaclass="underline" We are the chains of God, sealing Pandora’s box for the preservation of mankind. We are Prometheus, guiding the destiny of the world until humanity is ready to ascend Olympus.”
The words sounded like a mantra; a pledge learned by rote. The truck lurched into gear, spinning its wheels for a moment before finding purchase in the loose sand. Hauser steadied himself, then shouted over the din. “Do not try to follow us, Kismet. I have done what I can to spare you, but I will take no responsibility for the fortunes of war.”
Something Hauser had said earlier now echoed in his mind. I told him he is lucky he didn’t kill you.
“Why?” he shouted as the vehicle moved away from the chamber. “Why didn’t you kill me?”
Hauser broke into unrestrained laughter; his first honest display of emotion. “Kismet, if I killed you, your mother would have my head.”
If Hauser had anything more to say, it was lost as the truck moved away, threading the narrow alley between brick structures and sand dunes. Kismet took a step after them, then stopped as rage built in his chest and arms.
He pressed the button to eject the spent magazine from the carbine, then slammed a fresh clip into the weapon, slapping it with a mechanically practiced action to guarantee that the first round would not jam. He released the bolt, advancing a cartridge into the firing chamber, then raised it to shoulder height and sighted down the stubby barrel at the receding truck. Even as his finger flexed on the trigger, he knew the shot would be a futile gesture. He might get lucky and actually hit one of the escaping killers, but the odds were not good. With a defeated sigh, he lowered the gun and backed into the now deserted ruins. The oil lamps placed by Samir and his family continued to illuminate the abattoir that was the antechamber.
The sulfur odor of gunpowder lingered in the air, but there was a new scent added to the mix — the unmistakable stench of death. He had been in the presence of the dying and recently passed, but nothing like this. He had never seen healthy, vibrant individuals so violently ripped away from the world. It took a deliberate effort for him to search the memories of his combat skills training in order to determine his next action.
Like an automaton plugged into a new program, he lurched into action, systematically moving down the row of shattered bodies. The 5.56-mm green-tip ball ammunition had not ripped their flesh apart as larger and softer lead rounds might. Instead, the bullets had stabbed neat little holes clear through the victims, lacerating intestines and vital organs, wreaking internal damage with less outward trauma than might have been expected.
Samir and the woman Kismet assumed to be his wife had both expired from their wounds, but two of the younger children and one older male still drew ragged breaths. One of the children, a girl, clung to consciousness, whimpering when he turned her over to inspect the wounds. It was enough to throw him out of his almost mechanical routine, and he felt hot tears streaking down his face. He drew out one of two Syrettes of morphine hanging from a breakaway chain around his neck and quickly injected the contents into the girl’s thigh. Her agonized moans soon gave way to shallow breathing.
He knew the morphine would probably kill her, but that would merely hasten the inevitable and with less anguish. None of those who still drew breath would survive the night. Perhaps with the care of skilled surgeons in a state of the art trauma center, the hand of the Reaper might be stayed, but here in the desert with only Kismet’s basic first-aid skills and even more rudimentary first-aid kit, it was foolish to entertain hope. He cradled her in his arms and waited for the inevitable silence that would follow her final gasp.
“Bloody hell.”
The low whisper from behind startled Kismet, but he did not let it show. Instead he turned his head slowly and saw Sergeant Higgins and two of the Gurkhas. Higgins was standing exactly where Hauser had been at the moment of the massacre, and was surveying both the carnage and the scattering of 5.56 millimeter brass casings on the floor. Higgins was solemn. “Did you do this, sir?”
Unable to find his voice, Kismet shook his head.
Higgins nodded slowly. “That’s good enough for me, mate.” His words carried the implication that Kismet’s denial might not be sufficient for the others who would eventually ask the same question. The Gurkha continued. “We’ve got to move out, sir. Something has happened. About half an hour ago, the northern sky — by that I mean the sky over Baghdad — lit up like the end of the world. I think it’s finally started.”
Kismet eased the mortally wounded child to the floor and stood. “How did you get here?”
“We ran, didn’t we?” Higgins managed a triumphant grin. “More like walked fast. We followed your tracks to the road. After that, it was trusting luck that we were going the right way and that you hadn’t gone too far.”
“Luck.” Kismet looked around the chamber, at last spying his helmet and night vision goggles. “Let’s get moving. We’re going to need the devil’s own luck to get through this.”
They filed back up the staircase with Kismet leading the way. A fourth Gurkha waited at the entrance to the ruin, a guard left behind by Higgins. With a nod to the sergeant, he fell in with the rest as they marched single file back up to the roadway.
In the still desert night, Kismet could make out the sound of a distant vehicle engine, perhaps more than one. It might simply have been the sound of Hauser’s captured truck stealing away with the prize, but they couldn’t afford to make that assumption. They were deep in enemy territory.
One of the Gurkhas approached Samir’s sedan cautiously, peering through the windows. Higgins turned to Kismet. “At least we won’t have to walk back.”
The soldier tried the door handle.
Do not try to follow…
Kismet threw off his paralysis and started toward the car. “Get away from there…”
The Mercedes suddenly split in two, lifting off the ground in an eruption of orange fire and black smoke. The shock wave slapped Kismet and the others to the ground and sucked the air from their lungs. He felt a heavy weight strike him in the chest — something warm and yielding — and reflexively pushed it away.
It took only a moment or two for the stunned group of soldiers to recover. Higgins, the most senior among the squad, sprang to his feet, sweeping left and right with his weapon. “What the fuck was that?”
The Gurkha sergeant was screaming, but Kismet could barely hear through the ringing in his ears. They had all been close to the blast, but none as close as the soldier who had triggered it.
“Singh!”
Kismet followed the line of Higgins’ shocked gaze and saw what was left of Corporal Sanjay Singh of the 6th Queen Elizabeth’s Own Gurkha Rifles.
The blast had knocked him away from the detonation site a fraction of a second ahead of the flames. The live ordnance in his equipment vest had been triggered by the shock wave, but his flak jacket had directed the force of those secondary explosions away from his torso. Nevertheless, despite escaping the force of fire, Singh’s skeleton had been pulverized within by the release of energy, and his remains were now an almost-shapeless mass of smoking fabric and flesh near Kismet’s feet. Kismet saw the streaks of blood on his own BDU blouse and felt his gorge rise a second time.
Another of the Gurkhas, the machine-gunner Private Mutabe, was down, his left arm opened to the bone by a slashing fragment of metal. The fourth soldier knelt beside the wounded African and fished out his Syrette, injecting him with a dose of morphine to dull the pain.