Honor, page 2
Windfall
E. CHRIS AMBROSE
Sar-e-Pol Province, Afghanistan
2004
Grant “Chief” Casey alerted immediately to the murmur of an unfamiliar voice under the many peaks of their camouflage tent. A stranger arriving at the Unit camp under cover of darkness could only mean trouble. A single hooded lantern illumiated the heart of the tent past the rows of sleeping men. Grant stepped carefully between the feet of his fellow intelligence operatives to find out how he could help.
Gooney—Sergeant Anthony Gonsalves, not that anybody called him by name since Grant gave him a new one—glanced over, eyes narrowing. “Go back to bed, Chief.”
Grant hadn’t picked his name, either. He considered obedience and decided to press his luck a little longer. “What’s the emergency?”
Clad in standard desert fatigues with the lightning bolt emblem of the Special Forces Weathermen, the stranger looked him over, maybe trying to reconcile the oversized handle with the lean young man before him. Grant still resembled the tribal high school track star he had been a few years back, copper skinned, dark eyed, beardless. Grant returned the perusal, claiming the title he hadn’t wanted.
Blue eyes, sandy hair, the opposite of the ambiguous skin tones of Gooney’s Special Forces Intelligence Unit who aimed to integrate seamlessly with the local population. A trickle of blood oozed over the stranger’s right ear. Weathermen deployed before anyone else, calling the landing windows, making the invasion possible without much back-up. That took a certain kind of character, willing to operate unsupported, behind enemy lines.
Never thought he’d look up to a weatherman before he joined the army. Grant gave him a smile.
Across the little gathering, Nick stood listening, his dark skin rendering him nearly invisible, just the way the sniper liked it.
Then Gooney flashed a grin. “Maybe Chief wants a bedtime story? Legendary treasure, lost to time.”
The weatherman’s jaw tightened. “That’s just campfire talk. A fairy tale.”
“What treasure?” Grant asked.
“Templar gold,” Nick said. “Somewhere close.”
Grant frowned. “The Templars’ last stand was in the Mediterranean. They didn’t have any strongholds west of the Dead Sea.”
“Well, aren’t you the history buff,” Gooney said. “Should’ve called you ‘Prof.’ The way I heard it, a few Templars escaped with their Syrian allies, and booked it to the wilderness with as much gold as they could carry.” Gooney shrugged. “Like you said, campfire stories. Boobytraps and knights in shining armor. Go to bed, Chief.”
In a clear, urgent voice, the weatherman said, “Stay.”
Gooney gave a shake of his head, like Grant was an insect he wanted to shake off. “Suit yourself.”
“Yeah. So,” the weatherman continued, “if we don’t get the transmitter running, half the ops in the area get disrupted, and there’s a storm coming in.” He wiped a smear of blood off his forehead, casting another look at Grant. “I just need one guy. Extra pair of hands.”
Gooney pursed his lips, then said, “How many were in the ambush party?”
“We got five.” He swallowed, blinking a few times. “If there were others, they didn’t stick around.”
Not grabbing guns and ammo or taking selfies with dead Americans? Didn’t sound like the insurgents Grant knew. The back of his neck tingled. Predisposed to like the weatherman, to want to help—but the guy’s story, his demeanor, didn’t quite add up. What really happened out there, and to whom?
“Do you need a medic?” Gooney asked, as Grant said, “Where’s your partner? Thought you guys always traveled in pairs.”
The guy swallowed again, acknowledging Grant’s question with lowered eyes. “Dead as far as I know. I couldn’t take the time to search.” He brought his attention back to the CO. “The transmitter’s the key, Sergeant. Give me one guy, we get it done quick and quiet. God willing, we’ll find out what happened to Mike, but there’s a lot of lives depending on that antenna.”
Tales of treasure and a suspicious character, not to mention a mission-critical task? “I’m in,” Grant said. “If I can help.”
“High risk, half-assed plan—of course you’re in. You want him, Preacher, you can have him.” Gooney sighed. “But not alone. There’s too much at stake.”
The weatherman straightened. “All due respect, we can’t make this a full-scale op.”
Telling Gooney how to do his job. Predicting some turbulence there, weatherman. Of course, Gooney had confirmed Grant’s assignment. Maybe just to get rid of him.
Gooney offered a tight smile. “Agreed. The four of us. You two head in and make it work, Nick and me take cover in case your al Qaeda buddies circle around. Any sign of movement, we split. All of us.” He pointed at Grant. “Get your kit, meet at the stable.”
“Yes, sir.”
Could be the fastest he’d ever obeyed the sergeant. Kalashnikov over his shoulder, knife at his waist, radio tucked inside his tunic, Grant wound his turban as he walked, leaving enough tail to drape his lower face. Dawn barely edged the ridges around them, a complex landscape of gullies and plateaus, the occasional ruin, the occasional cave full of enemy combatants. The night watch gave him a nod on the way by, and a few more members of the Unit, awakened at Gooney’s need, took over the day roster.
The “stable” occupied a deeper gully with a precious trickle of water at its heart. A dozen horses shuffled restively at their pickets. Grant’s mount pricked its ears at his approach, and he took a moment to scratch the sweet spot on the horse’s chin as the other three men entered the gully, Gooney whistling softly.
At first, Grant assumed he whistled to soothe his own horse as they tacked up, but the tune triggered an old memory that sent him back to the rez in Arizona: his grandmother’s caregiver hunkered down, watching antique Westerns on a black-and-white set.
“What’s the tune?” Nick adjusted his stirrups longer, frowning. Hard to get it right for a guy that tall.
“You don’t know it?” Gooney’s eyes flared in the gray light. “’Have gun, will travel reads the card of a man,’” he sang softly, tucking his rifle into the holster on his saddle. “’A knight without armor in a savage land.’”
“Some fifties shit? You’re older than I thought.” Nick tightened his saddle girth and swung up onto his mount, looking every inch the local warlord.
“’A man called Pal-a-din,’” Gooney sang, cutting out a few bits. Just as well.
The weatherman met Grant’s eye over the back of his horse. “He always like this?”
“Pretty much.” Grant flipped his reins up, and mounted. “What’s your name?”
“Tom Calvin. They call me Preacher.” The weatherman—Preacher--fumbled with his turban, not used to the level of cover they perfected in the Unit.
“Grant Casey. Chief. I didn’t choose it.”
Preacher’s lips quirked. “Do we ever?”
“But seriously,” Gooney said, “I learned the song from this movie, ‘Stand by Me,’ based on this Steven King story where four guys go out to find a body.”
“Cheerful,” Grant said. “Is that how you see this mission going?”
Gooney glowered. “That’s not my point.”
“Implies you’ve got one,” Nick observed, and the others smothered their laughter. Nick didn’t talk much, but when he did, look out.
“It makes me think of us, have gun, will travel? Knights without armor? Funny thing, though. When they sing it in the movie, I thought they were saying, ‘a knight without honor,’ and I was like, what kind of a knight is that?” He shot a glance toward the weatherman. “Sermon’s over, Preacher, how’d I do?”
Preacher shook his head. “You’re the only guy in-country still cares about honor.” He’d gotten a bandage on the scalp wound; seemed unhurt otherwise in spite of the hail of bullets that presumably took down his partner. Did that make him lucky? Deployed less than a year, Grant had already lost enough people to feel that word take on a slippery aspect. What kind of luck left a man alive when his buddies went down?
“This storm we’re predicting—”Preacher pulled into his saddle—“it’s gonna blow in hard, a lot of sand. Our boys need to get their heads down. That’s the gospel we need to spread.”
They rode out in silence, Preacher in the lead, toward the ridge and the redoubt where the transmitter should be. From a distance, they’d look like any other group of insurgents, a small armed force, on their way to some larger objective. Maybe even to rendezvous with the crew that took out the weatherman’s partner.
Given it had been dark out. Given ambush by a larger force. Given the rough terrain…what kind of man left the scene when his buddy went down? Maybe this Preacher was just that dedicated, knowing that his mission—setting up weather intel for the rest of the forces—mattered more than the life of any one man. Or maybe Preacher was after something else entirely. The guy’s strongest reaction hadn’t been to questions about the ambush or about his missing partner.
Grant asked his mount for a little more speed, and the horse delivered, drawing alongside the weatherman. “You heard of this treasure before?” He scanned ahead and to both sides, his glance flicking easily from ridges to shadows, looking for movement, or the glint of a gun.
Preacher snorted. “There’s always rumors out here. If it’s not the Templars, it’s the Saracens, or some golden Buddha.”
“I’ve heard that one,” Grant agreed. From a monk who’d sworn to conceal it, but he wasn’t about to say so. “But I haven’t been out here too long.”
“After you’ve seen some real action, you start dreaming about stuff like that. A real golden ticket.” Preacher’s glance turned speculative. “I get the feeling you’ve already seen some things.”
“Some.”
Preacher gave a knowing smile. “Enough to convince your CO that you’re a handful.”
“What can I say, I’m precocious.”
“I like a man with some initiative.”
Dawn cast jagged shadows over the rough terrain, merging Grant and Preacher’s shadows into a long, single mount with two riders, just like that old Templar symbol: two knights on one horse. Given the enemy they fought, and the location, he heard a lot of Crusader references out here—but like the man said, didn’t take long before the delusion of chivalry fell away.
Beyond their craggy plateau, Grant traced an ominous line of darkness that lingered in spite of the growing light. Sandstorm weather. “So when civilians make small talk, they talk about the weather. What do weathermen talk about? Other than lost treasure, of course.”
Preacher chuckled. “Sports, mostly. Politics, when we’re not in a war zone.” He glanced back to the other men a few lengths behind. “The treasure’s intriguing, though, don’t you think? Fame, fortune. Something better than the GI bill.”
“That’s for sure.” So he had been thinking about it, more so than his stiff reactions would imply. Interesting. “What would you do, suddenly rich?”
“Change my name and ditch my creditors.” Preacher laughed again. “Get a place in the islands and live like a king, what—”
Grant put up a hand, and Preacher broke off immediately. Grant gestured toward the rising slope and the narrow track of disturbed sand coming down. Hoofprints. “Yours?” he spoke barely loud enough to be heard.
With a nod, Preacher turned in that direction, pushing his mount to dig in.
Grant leaned forward in his saddle, shifting his weight to ease the horse’s burden as they followed. No sign yet of an al Qaeda presence.
A low wall of dressed stones emerged to one side, rising from the sand, then dissolving into it as if it had run out of strength. The ridge moved steadily upward, a promising location for the transmitter placement--and for anybody who wanted to keep an eye on the surrounding territory.
More dressed stones lay tumbled to one side, and a few bullet casings glinted, fingered by a shaft of sunlight stretching through a narrow defile. Grant flashed a gesture downward, then an open palm. Entering the danger zone. Behind, the other hoofbeats slowed, then turned aside, starting upward on a track to parallel the defile.
Preacher glanced back. “Looks like they’re going for higher ground.” Then he half-turned in his saddle and pulled out a compact hand-held case.
Gooney and Nick already towered above them, starting to disappear beyond the ridge.
“Sergeant!”
Grant flinched at Preacher’s yell and glanced around again. Any local insurgents would’ve heard that for sure.
The riders paused, and Gooney’s face looked stormy. Probably worried about the same thing. But Preacher wasn’t. Interesting.
“Catch!” Preacher tossed the case upward, and Nick snatched it from the air. “When you get up there, find a clear view and take a reading on the storm, distance, bearing, and speed. Just click it open and aim. Might take a few minutes to warm up.”
With a silent salute, Nick tucked away the tool, then they moved on, scanning for insurgents.
“Transmitter’s ahead, right?” Grant confirmed.
A nod. “Not much further. There’s a tower.”
“Seriously?”
“Small one. It’s pretty well hidden. Perfect location for the weather station.”
Hard to tell, given Preacher keeping ahead of him in the narrow track, whether other horses had come this way. Preacher’s mount whickered uncertainly, but Grant’s horse stayed calm, suggesting it wasn’t the scene but the rider that made the other man’s horse uncomfortable. Preacher nervous because of the ambush from the night before? Maybe or maybe something else.
“Your CO’s a bit of a prick, isn’t he?” Preacher’s voice drifting back.
“You could say that.” Gooney hadn’t been happy with Grant ever since he bestowed the nickname that stuck.
“Ah, we’ve just met, I shouldn’t talk. Just seems like you two don’t get on well.”
“As long as we both do our job, it doesn’t bother me.” Not as much as the rising walls of the ravine, or the chiseled evenness of the stone. His hands chilled in the shaded corridor. “How’d you find this place?”
“Recon flight with a Raven. You seen those? It’s like a little drone. Camera and sensors, no weapons.”
Their road continued to slope upward with the walls rising to either side, an artificial slot canyon carved into the stone a few hundred years ago--but by whom?
“I had to work with a CO like that once, got on my last nerve, I swear to god,” Preacher said. Grant chuckled.
Talk of dreams, the seduction of wealth, and now the animosity between him and Gooney. Preacher was moving through the textbook on HumInt 101, how to get the mark to trust you. Chapter one, establish rapport based on mutually held feelings or beliefs. The question was, why? What did he need Grant for, if not to be his extra hands?
Their hoofbeats thumped into the soft sand on the canyon floor. A few tufts of grass sprouted on the leeward side while the low moan of the desert wind rose steadily overhead.
Grant’s outstretched fingers to one side brushed along the wall and his stomach tightened. He couldn’t hear Gooney and Nick’s horses any more. How far would they have to skirt around up there? What if the sensor Preacher gave them were just another distraction?
Reaching into his tunic, he toggled his radio, listening for an answering tone to let him know they heard. Nothing. He pulled it out. Ready light, check, but no signal.
“Radios don’t work much down here. Another reason we need the transmitter running.” Preacher pointed. “Don’t worry. We’re here.”
An arch carved into the stone bridged the two walls overhead.
“You can see why we had to check it out, right? If you’ve got any curiosity, you’d have to.”
Still reaching for a handle he could use to manipulate Grant. Had to admit, the guy might’ve found it.
Grant halted his mount, taking in the scene with a quick sweep. Relief carving on the arch, nearly lost to shadows. Beyond that, the walls opened out to reveal a round building topped with rough crenelations, rock-cut like something out of Petra, thrusting beyond the mouth of the canyon on a knoll.
To the right, the land dropped off to the plateau and ravines below. Those ridges and spires likely camouflaged the site from any other vantage point. Also making it hard for Gooney and Nick to plot their course. How rough was the ground up there—and how long would it take for their back-up to respond if Grant needed them? The lack of growing sun in spite of the hour heralded the approaching storm, and thick sand mounded against the wall suggested the site’s exposure to the weather.
“I’m surprised this place isn’t already buried in sand,” Grant said.
Preacher chuckled. “I wondered the same. You see the shape of the canyon mouth, how it spirals toward the building?” He traced the arc with his hand. “The direction of the prevailing winds make the tower seasonally accessible. When the wind’s blowing the other way, it’ll clear the pathway. When it shifts, like now—”he curved his hand in the other direction—“a good storm will cover the whole place. Took some clever SOB’s to carve that canyon.”
They dismounted, dropping the reins, trusting their mounts. Circling left, Preacher hissed a breath, and Grant slipped the rifle from his saddle before he followed. This side of the pathway led to a dead end where the building wall emerged from the stone of the canyon. Bullet casings littered the area.
No windows. Right against the canyon corner, sand partially obscured the doorway. A pair of sandal-clad feet stuck out. A body, face down on the threshold.
Grant’s rifle was already in hand. “This your ambush?”
Preacher nodded. “The transmitter’s on the roof.” He stepped over the body and ducked through the door. “Come on.”
With another scan of the canyon walls behind them, Grant moved cautiously to the door. A square window opposite gave dim light to the interior. Another man lay face down, two sprawled against the wall. Another form resolved into a body still wrapped in blankets beneath a staircase of single stones protruding from the wall and circling up to a trapdoor above. Several bullet holes pierced the old wood of the ceiling.
