A Cold Day In Mosul (16 page)

The group received stares on the streets, probably because of their bruised and gaunt faces. They skirted the few militants they saw, ducking into alleys or shops along the way, and made their way back toward the apartment whose courtyard served as their base of operations. Finding the building proved tricky without GPS, given the size of the city. They had to ask the locals for directions several times, but eventually they found the proper neighborhood—the profusion of potholes, open sewers, and scabrous dogs were a dead giveaway. The Land Cruiser wasn't anywhere nearby, unfortunately, as they had left it on the other side of town near the black site.

Ethan was the first to spot the carefully-placed network cameras that marked the base. Situated atop the cinder block fence that surrounded the courtyard, the cameras seemed intact—a good sign. Even so, the operatives split up and performed separate surveillance detection runs, rendezvousing back at the apartment ten minutes later.

"No tails," Ethan said. "Nor any signs of watchers. Though you never know with all the canopied balconies around." He indicated the apartment building across the street.

"Noted," Sam said. "Get to it."

They waited for two civilians to walk past; when the men were gone, Ethan, William and Doug hauled themselves over the cinder block. Sam remained outside to keep watch. Ethan and the others gathered their backpacks, collected the tiny network cameras dispersed along the perimeter, then rejoined Sam and made their way out of the neighborhood. There was no reason to believe the original location had been compromised, especially since nothing had been touched, but Sam refused to take any chances.

They bought some street food with the money stash they'd retrieved. They went all out, splurging sixty US dollars on four servings of
quzi
—a curried lamb served over rice—with falafel balls on the side. 

Roughly four blocks from the previous base, Sam picked out a set of three apartments that shared a common courtyard. The doors and windows were boarded up, the grounds unkempt—a good sign.

Ethan did a quick circle of the block. Satisfied that they weren't being watched, he returned and jumped the fence with the others. He landed in a messy yard of dried grass and weeds. An industrial wooden spindle lay abandoned in the center, stinking of cat urine.

The group unloaded their belongings in the far corner of the courtyard, behind a pair of date palms. Like the terebinth tree of the previous location, the palms shielded the operators from the boarded up windows that faced into the courtyard.

Sam unencumbered herself of the hidden rifles and magazines, and then helped set up the tiny network cameras along the cinder block fence. When that was done, the group set to devouring the quzi.

Ethan finished his meal first and retrieved the medkit from the stash. He cleaned his nail beds with saline fluid, sprayed them with antiseptic, and applied dressings. The exposed bed of his pinky finger seemed a little swollen—maybe infected. He'd just have to clean and disinfect it daily, and hope the raw tissue didn't get worse. He'd have it looked at by a specialist when he returned to civilization.

He replaced his shoes and gloves, took a capsule for the diarrhea, then passed the kit to William. He and the other operatives proceeded to dress their wounds in turn.

When that was done, they cataloged their remaining equipment: backup smartphones and laptop; the Iridium Go for satellite Internet; the medkit; and duct tape. There weren't any radios, or USBs with secret RC components, and they had no munitions other than the AKs they'd snatched during the escape. Sam promised to arrange a supply drop at the earliest opportunity.

"What's that in the ground?" William nodded at a series of holes someone had dug near one of the trees.

Sam glanced up from the laptop she'd taken from their stash; on the display were the video feeds from the cameras.

"Those are wells," Sam said. "Residents dug them throughout the city when the tap water became undrinkable."

William walked to the edge of the holes. "Look dry to me."

"Probably why these apartments are empty," Sam said.

"You know," Doug said. "I've figured it out."

"Figured what out?" Sam had returned her attention to the laptop.

"You planned the whole episode back there from the start."

Sam's brows furrowed. "I did?"

"Yes. You wanted to get captured, because you knew it would draw the sheik out. Taking down senior Islamic State leadership, that's part of our overall objective in the country, isn't it?"

"Well sure, but—"

Doug spoke over her. "So you let them capture you, knowing we'd come get you, and that they'd take us, too. And then when the sheik came out of hiding to execute us, you knew we'd terminate him during our escape."

He grinned widely, obviously joking.

William wasn't so amused. "We almost died, bro."

"Yeah, but we didn't."

"No thanks to you," William complained. "Dragging your ass back there."

"Hey, when you're tortured, drugged and starved for a week, it kind of gets to you, you know?"

"Wasn't a week," Ethan mumbled.

"What's that?"

Ethan glanced at Doug wearily. "I said it wasn't a week. More like three days."

Doug produced his backup smartphone from the stash and activated the screen. He showed Ethan the date. "Today's the fifth. It's been six days since we were first captured. You've lost your sense of time, bro."

Ethan shook his head incredulously. "Six days? No wonder."

Sam set aside the laptop.

"Obviously I didn't plan any of this," she said. "I have to thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for coming to get me. All of you. You went far above and beyond the call of duty. I'll see that you're awarded the agency's highest honors."

"Don't want no medals," William said. "Just doing my job, ma'am."

"As were we all," Ethan said, meaning it.

Sam smiled. "If you hadn't acted back there, Ethan..." She shook her head. "I had nothing. Nothing. For the first time in my life, I was going to watch one of my operatives executed in cold blood, someone who was like a son or brother to me, and there was nothing I could do. Nothing. I've never felt so helpless. It was worse than anything I've ever experienced. Worse than torture."

Ethan reached out and gripped her gloved hand, careful not to brush her fingernail areas. He had no words of comfort for her. There weren't any you could say to that. But holding her hand, looking into her eyes, it was enough.

Sam released her grip and retrieved the Iridium Go. She popped in the battery and activated the device by swiveling the thick antenna skyward.

"Looks like it still has a substantial charge," she said.

"The buildings might block the signal," Doug told her.

After a moment she shrugged. "The Wi-Fi is showing up."

She connected the laptop to the Wi-Fi and started sending emails, a whole bunch of them, typing rapidly. Ethan wondered if it hurt, given her lack of fingernails.

"Get in touch with any assets you have in the Middle East," she said. "Through shared emails, phone, what have you. Tell them to go into hiding until we can arrange new identities for them. While we don't know who we gave up and who we did not, our phones contained a treasure trove of contact information."

"But all that data was encrypted," William said.

Sam smiled sadly. "Yes. But you're assuming we didn't reveal our passwords under duress. The interrogators would have pushed the hardest for that knowledge. In fact, I'm convinced we'd still be in custody if we hadn't given that up, with interrogations ongoing." She looked downward, and exhaled deeply. "Though almost everything else is a blank, I do remember one particularly harrowing session. They hauled the three of you in front of me. They held 9-mils to your heads. They said they would execute you if I didn't give up the password to my phone. I couldn't stand by... I couldn't let them do it. So I gave it up. Gave it up. They broke me."

Everyone was quiet a moment.

"They broke all of us, Sam," Ethan said.

She finally glanced up. "My point exactly. Which is why we have to assume our phones were compromised. And why we have to contact every asset in the region."

William frowned. "The Islamic State only controls portions of Syria and Iraq, with a small cheerleading section in Libya. Seems like a lot of work to get in touch with assets outside those countries."

"It is," Sam agreed. "But we can't be sure the Caliphate won't share or sell any intel they've gathered with other terrorists groups such as Al Qaeda or Al Nusra. Then there's the little matter of the Siberian Laika."

Ethan sat back. "The Siberian Laika?"

"I haven't heard that name in years," Doug said.

"That's a species of hunting dog, isn't it?" William said. "A hound."

"Yes," Sam said, typing rapidly. "And it suits him. He's been hunting me for years. He was present at the interrogations. Mine at least. I remember his face only fleetingly, between sessions, but he was there."

"Are you sure you didn't hallucinate?" Doug said.

"He was
there
," Sam insisted.

"I still don't know who this Laika is," William said.

Sam glanced at him. "A known mercenary for hire. Currently works for Victor Bogdanov, a black marketer and weapons dealer whose specialty is the Middle East. He got his start smuggling European luxury cars into Iraq via Jordan. He was arrested by the Jordanian government in 2002, spent most of the Iraq War behind bars, and after he got out he used the contacts he made in prison to expand into arms dealing."

"Middle Eastern prisons," Doug said with a shake of the head. "The breeding grounds for the worst terrorists and criminals."

"Yes, anyway, he vanished from our radar in 2006, temporarily emerging in 2010 when he hired the Siberian Laika along with other Russian ex-Special Forces who'd lost their jobs with the disbanding of the Spetsnaz GRU. Victor apparently wanted in on the burgeoning private military and security industry, though he offered his services not to CEOs and prominent business people but to terrorists and dictators. After 2010 he showed up as a blip here and there, mostly in the aftermath of hits executed by his personal hunter killer team.

"Victor will dump any intel the Laika has gathered onto the black market, probably splitting the profits with the Islamic State. I probably don't have to say this, but the man has just moved several notches higher on our hunt and kill list. He's near the top right now, actually."

Ethan retrieved his own backup smartphone from the stash. "He's going to dump all our intel onto the black market, you say? That could set us back years in the region."

"Perhaps," Sam said. "Perhaps not. We're not the only people out here—there are other operatives running networks of their own, from multiple intelligence agencies. But regarding us personally... well, if the Islamic State had kept us imprisoned, or succeeded in the execution, then you're right, we would have lost our collective spy networks. But since we're free now, once we've arranged new identities for our assets it should be business as usual. I'll need you to send me the identity, means of contact, and intel grade for every last one of your assets, of course. I'll have people on the ground arrange new identities for those who qualify. Once that's completed, I'll forward the new identities your way."

"Sounds like an expensive operation," William said.

"It's always expensive when operatives of our caliber make mistakes," Sam said.

William shot her a roguish smile. "And you get to expand your network with our own hard-earned assets along the way."

"The benefits of being your boss," Sam said.

"I'm not sure I'm entirely comfortable with that," Doug said. "What happened to the compartmentalization of information? Safer for the assets that way."

Sam shrugged. "It's your choice, of course. If you'd rather have them go into hiding, or risk a lynching, then by all means keep the data to yourself."

"You mentioned only those who qualify will be given new identities," Ethan said. "What's that mean, exactly?"

"I think you know," Sam said quietly.

Yes, he knew. Sam's team of analysts would be arranging new identities for only a select few assets—those who had given them the most valuable intelligence. The rest would be left to fend for themselves. That selection criteria would probably be based on the intel grade Ethan assigned each asset. He resolved in that moment to give them all high ratings.

He focused his attention on his phone. He had a lot of messages to make. Might as well get started.

"What's the plan for the next week or so?" William said. "We lay low in Mosul for a few days, then hit the countryside for an extract?"

"Leaving the city will be tricky," Doug said. "They'll be looking for us at every checkpoint. The city limits will be locked down tight."

Ethan glanced up from his phone. "We can't leave the city. We're not done here yet."

"Sure we are," William said.

Ethan frowned. "What about this Victor Bogdanov that Sam mentioned? We can't just sit back and let him get away with all of our classified data."

"I'm sure Sam is assigning other operatives to him even now," Doug said.

"You make it sound as if there are a whole lot of other operatives out there," Ethan said. "Just waiting to be given work. Somehow I doubt that. We might be the only ones in Mosul at the moment."

Doug glanced at Sam for confirmation, but she said nothing, consumed as she was by the laptop. "Sam. You've been pretty quiet. What are you thinking? We pursue this Victor? Or we start planning our exfil? I can get in touch with JSOC and set a time and place for the extract right now." He started typing into his smartphone.

Without looking up from the laptop, Sam raised an arresting hand. "We're not leaving. Not yet."

Doug paused, pressing his lips together. He looked a little peeved.

He's forgotten that he's not the one in charge anymore
, Ethan thought, holding back a smile.

"So we're going to hunt down this Victor?" Ethan said eagerly. He wanted payback.