“Paper’s gone.” Tom casually put the butt of his AK into his shoulder.
Everything was as they’d left it, except the note was no longer wedged between the wiper and the windshield.
How the ambushers could have had possession of the map, let alone the photo, was a mystery Mike couldn’t fathom. The discussion to and from the cache had been heated at times, but one mostly of confusion.
On the cab of the same truck as before, his feet settled into the same dent he made previously. Mike scanned the area, rifle in one hand, the other shaded his eyes. Nothing, but he kept at it. They had to be nearby.
“Hey.” Tom’s arm reached out.
Al and Julia rose from behind a mound three hundred meters to the north.
AK, cradled in his arms, Mike climbed down. “Now that I know they’re safe, I’m looking forward to hearing what Al’s going to say.”
“Like, not everything is as it seems.” Tom placed the extra guns in the cab of the truck.
“Mm-hmm.”
Back in Tajikistan, Mike knew parts of the brief were left out for whatever reason, and he didn’t care. All Mike knew was he was getting closer to his goal, and if Al and Julia wanted to keep some of the information for themselves, so be it. They didn’t have to tell him shit, except where Hotak was. But, now they were compromised, and worse, the bad guys apparently knew who they were, and they were coming, which was going to seriously screw with his mission. That wasn’t going to happen.
Al was all smiles as they approached their Haji clothes wadded up in their hands. The expressions on Tom’s and his faces should have given it away, but no, they kept coming. Julia had lost her shell-shocked look. When they split up, she looked like she was on the edge; now, she appeared no worse for wear. A puzzle for another time, if she recovered that quickly, though Mike’s estimation of her went up a few notches. She was over the initial shock. Maybe she thought that was the worst it was going to get. If she did, she had a hard lesson coming. Either way, he suspected whatever was coming was just a preamble. She said something to Al as they walked, he replied, causing her to laugh out loud. They looked as tired as Tom, and he felt.
Al waved as he got closer, relieved the two men were safe. Their smiles dropped when they recognized the looks on Mike and Tom’s faces.
“Rough one, huh?”
“You could say that.” Mike pushed off the truck, an undercurrent of anger in his voice.
Al took a step back. “What’s up?” He and Julia exchanged looks, all hints of relief gone.
“One chance and one chance only,” Mike growled, crossing his arms. “Did you two hide anything from us? Did you withhold any information or keep us out of the loop for some bullshit need-to-know reason?”
Julia froze her mouth open.
Mike looked at her, caught in a lie or surprised at the question. He couldn’t tell.
Al stepped back another step, his hands up palms toward Mike and Tom. “Whoa, what’s going on?”
Neither man answered.
“No,” Al said forcefully. “No, absolutely not. You know everything we know.”
“He’s right,” Julia said. “We didn’t and wouldn’t have withheld anything from you guys.”
Mike and Tom glanced at each other. Mike pulled the map and photo out of a pocket. “Can you explain this?”
Al took the photo. His eyes widened when he saw himself and the other two men. “Uh oh.”
“Yeah, uh oh,” Mike said.
“What?” Julia took the picture. She frowned. “I don’t understand?”
“We took this and a map off one of the bodies." He pointed at the map and photo. "They knew we, specifically us three,” he pointed at Al, Tom, and himself, “were coming down this road. And they had orders from someone to kill us.”
“But,…”
Al handed the picture back. “It isn’t that great a surprise, I guess, not ideal, but maybe I should have expected it. Someone who works at the base, one of our Afghani Commandos, hopefully not an American, is taking pictures of people coming off arriving planes or,” he took another look, “entering our compound and passing them on to the enemy.”
Mike took the picture. “That doesn’t explain how this picture got here or how they knew we were coming down this road.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“You can see.” Tom reached out and took the map. “Where we might have been a bit suspicious, the thought occurred we hadn’t been fully briefed.”
“I get that.” Al looked at Julia and then back at the two men. “We gave you everything we know. That’s a guarantee.”
Julia shook her head up and down and said, “The only other thing, and I hesitate to mention it.”
“Please mention it,” Tom said.
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Al stepped up. “It’s kind of ridiculous.”
“I.” Julia took a breath and started over. “Hotak built an, I don’t know, let’s call it, an operations center for his drug business in the Tal Bez. That’s one way I was able to track him. Anyway, some of the equipment he smuggled into to build his center was unusual. It’s unusual to me, anyway. My forte isn’t drug labs. But much of the equipment was very technical, expensive, and curious. The gist is that Hotak built a very high-tech lab for whatever reason, for whatever his plans are for his drug business.”
“And,” Al added. “He built it in the middle of nowhere.”
“Why he built it, we can only guess, but he does have a large portion of his opium transported through the Tal Bez Valley.” Julia shrugged. “The Director had some of the anti-drug teams take a look at what Hotak was doing. They didn’t have any good answers either.”
“We don’t know who received the picture and set the ambush up. We can focus on Hotak, but we don’t know if he set this thing up.”
“Come on, Al,” Mike said. “Who else could it have been?”
“Was it him, maybe, probably, I don’t know. The Tal Bez is where we’re going, but I don’t know.”
“Something’s not right,” Tom said.
“Clearly.” Mike watched for any signs of deceit from Al or Julia but couldn’t find any. “Something’s not right. I just don’t know if it’s you two, Hotak, or the both of you.”
“No bull, you know what we know. We Haven’t left anything out.” Al paused, his eyes on them. “Are we good?”
Mike and Tom traded nods. “We’re good. For now.”
Julia sighed. “What do we do now?”
“Good question,” Tom said. “You’re the one who’s supposed to be in charge.”
“Hey.”
Al stepped forward. “That’s a low blow.”
“Low blow? Look at this, we’ve barely been on the ground a couple of hours, and the mission’s fucked. We’re fucked.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Yeah,” Mike said. “We do. They know who we are, the route we’d take, and they almost certainly know where we’re going, the Tal Bez.” He picked up a phone. “And someone has called this phone four times now, no doubt trying to get a report of what happened. It’s been a little bit since the last call. By now, they've concluded that no one is going to answer, and the ambush didn’t work.”
“So,” Julia stared pointedly at Tom, steel in her voice. “I ask again, what do we do now?”
It took a lot to stare down a man as big as Tom, and he was always ready with a usually tactless comeback, but this time he stayed quiet. Mike’s opinion of Julia went up another couple of notches.
“Tell them.”
“We suspect whoever called is,” Tom relaxed and pointed north up the road, “is going to send someone to check up on things, and we’re going to blast them when they do.”
“That will solve our most immediate problem, not dying on this road. Our gear is gone, we can’t call for extraction, the locals will turn us in for whatever reward is now being offered, the bad guys want us dead, and any direction we go, we’re screwed.”
“Not any direction,” Tom said.
“I’d like,” Mike said, ignoring Tom, “to take a prisoner, but we don’t speak the lingo, so…”
“We could take a prisoner to Cpt. Amadulah,” Tom said. “He’s only a couple of hours drive from here.”
Mike cocked his head annoyed. “I don’t want to.”
“Maybe it’s worth going.”
“It’s been a long time. Who knows what he’s up to now? He could have been turned.” Mike’s eyebrows lifted as he spoke. “I don’t know if we can trust him anymore.”
“Come on, Mike, you know better than that,” Tom smirked. “You know Amadulah would never turn to the dark side. He’s one of the good guys.”
“What?” Julia looked at the two men.
Mike's grimace offset Tom’s smile. Al shrugged. He had no idea. “Okay, we’ve heard the name Cpt. Amadulah mentioned several times now, what gives?”
“Go ahead, troublemaker.” Mike waved his hand at Julia and Al.
Tom laughed at Mike’s discomfort, pushing their predicament into the background.
“Go ahead, tell them.”
Tom rubbed his palms together. “This is a sorted tale of woe about a poor down on his, luck Afghani boy…”
Mike’s voice rose over Tom’s. “Can we skip the theatrics and keep it fact based?”
Tom chuckled. “Spoilsport.” He faced Julia. “Anyway, Cpt. Amadulah was an actual Captain in the Afghani Army. He was in the U.S. training at Ft. Benning when the Russians invaded. When he completed his officer and infantry schooling, some nice men from the CIA came down and asked him if he wanted a job. The Army he had been a part of was disbanded or had joined the Soviet cause. He was a criminal to the Afghan government. As it turned out, Captain Amadulah did want a job. He went back and joined the Mudj and fought with honor and distinction. Fast forward to ten years ago." He slapped Mike’s shoulder. “We’re on patrol one day, and these three pickups flying Afghan flags drive up to our trucks, and out pops Captain Amadulah. He speaks perfect English, tells us about his past exploits, and then invites us to his compound. Mike ends up building a relationship with him. They had a special bond, you could say.” Tom grinned.
Before Mike could interrupt. “Amadulah provided us with great intel, and we helped him out of a couple of sticky situations with some of the local warlords and the local government.”
“I did do that.” Mike shrugged, his head dropping to the right. “He was a pretty good guy.”
“So Amadulah finds out we aren’t staying until the war ends. That’s not how the U. S. Gov. operates. He does everything he can to get us to stay. One day, he invites us to his compound for dinner and says he has great news. We think it’s the location of some of our HTV’s.” Tom sniffed an amused smile on his face. “We’re climbing out of our trucks, and Amadulah walks out of the main house, followed by a pretty girl.”
“Wait,” Julia said. “How do you know she’s pretty? I thought all the women wore burkas.”
“Good catch,” Mike said. “Women wear burkas. Girls don’t.” Mike pursed his lips. “They don't have a period, so they’re not ready to be women, so they don’t have to cover their faces.”
“Don’t steal my thunder,” Tom said in mock anger. “The girl walks up to Mike, hugs him, leans back, and says, “One, two, four.” She smiles a big toothy smile and runs back into the house.” A big grin spread across Tom’s lips. “Evidently, Amadulah had her learning English. If only I had had a camera. The look on Mike’s face when she hugged him was priceless.”
Al and Julia both smirked at Mike.
“That night at dinner, Amadulah told us the real reason we were there. He was marrying off his daughter to a fine man who would be a great addition to the family.”
Al started to laugh. “Oh, shit.”
“You guessed it. Amadulah thought Mike was the best thing since sliced cheese, so he wanted to keep him around. How better but to marry off his daughter? Mike had it all, a fine wife, farmland full of hearty crops, and a quaint little home on the banks of a muddy river.”
“Right, she was way too young then, and she’s way too young now. That farmland of hearty crops was acres of marijuana and opium. That quaint little home was a dirty mud house a hundred meters from the river and constantly threatened to be flooded every spring. And no, so don’t ask, I didn’t marry that girl.”
“Cpt. Amadulah was pretty disappointed and a little peeved,” Tom said sadly. “He said the next time we returned, he would ensure the girl was still available and ready for Mike. He wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
A broad smile spread across Julia’s face. “So what happened?”
“Tal Bez happened a few weeks later,” Mike said. “Which Amadulah didn’t warn us about, and his info was always solid. It’s always nagged at me. After Tal Bez, we put up with a bunch of static from higher, and then we rotated back to the States. We never went back to talk to Amadulah.”
“It was all very frustrating for me.” Tom’s face turned serious.
“How’s that?” Julia said.
“I’ve never been a best man before. Mike spoiled it for me.”
“Haha, very funny,” Mike growled. “If we’re all done skipping down memory lane, we got an ambush to set up.”