SEAL's Embrace (5 page)

When the six-foot-two man reached him, he cupped his hands. Caesar stepped onto his locked fingers and was lifted up to the top of the wall. Laying flat over the top, he glanced over an empty courtyard. When nothing moved, he reached a hand down to Irish who grasped it and scaled the wall.

Caesar slid over and dropped to the ground on the other side, careful to land softly. He slipped his NVGs in place and hunkered low, looking for movement. After a moment, he pushed the NVGs off his face and approached a ladder on the outside of the structure leading up to the top. Handing his rifle to Irish, he pulled his knife out of the scabbard on his belt and clamped it between his teeth.

One quiet step at a time, he eased up the ladder to the top of the building, and stepped onto the roof.

The sniper sat on his haunches, a rifle in his hands, his head tilted forward. Asleep.

Caesar eased up behind him and reached for the man’s head with one hand, his knife in the other.

Before he could grab the man’s Lungee turban, the sentry woke with a jerk and swung around his gun.

Caesar kicked the weapon out of his hand.

Crying out, the guard threw himself at Caesar.

Dodging the attack, Caesar yanked him around and locked his arm around his neck, cutting off his air. He held the smaller man off the surface, feet dangling until his struggles ceased. Then he dropped the man to the rooftop, removed the magazine and the bolt from the man’s weapon and tucked them into a pocket.

“Rooftop clear,” he said into his radio headset, and he hurried back down the ladder to the ground.

Irish nodded toward the door to the structure he’d just descended.

Standing clear of the entrance, Caesar pushed open the door. He fit his NVGs in place and dropped low before peeking around the corner. The room they stepped into was empty except for a sleeping mat in one corner. The only other room was empty, as well.

When Caesar emerged, he saw Tuck and the rest of the team had entered the village.

Caesar, Irish and two others took the left side while Tuck, Sting Ray, Gator, Fish and Dustman checked the buildings on the right. From what their contact had relayed, the men were being held in the center of the village in the largest structure with a rounded top.

Moving quietly through the streets, the team worked their way past several darkened buildings, sticking to the shadows, making little or no sound. As Caesar neared the center building, he stopped and waited for Tuck to come abreast of his position.

Light shone around the edges of the doorway and angry voices sounded inside. A guard squatted near the door, leaning his back against the mud and straw outer wall, an AK-47 lying across his knees. He rocked back and forth as if struggling to stay awake.

Tuck motioned Dustman forward. “Take the guard. Nacho, cover. I’ll go in first.”

Dustman edged along the base of the wall, his knife in hand.

Caesar raised his rifle to his shoulder and aimed at the guard. If the guard saw Dustman before he reached him, he wouldn’t get off a round before Caesar plugged a bullet between his eyes.

Dustman made the corner of the building without being spotted and had just started along the wall toward the guard when a man stepped through the doorway and spoke to the guard in short, clipped tones.

The guard pushed to his feet.

Dustman, already committed, ran the last five steps and plowed into the two men, knocking them to the ground. Swede and Tuck converged and dispatched the two men.

The noise generated in the struggle apparently drew the attention of the men inside. Two men in the
Perahan Tunbans,
or baggy pants and long shirts, of the region rushed the door, carrying AK-47s. When the first man cleared the doorway, Tuck yanked him to the side.

Swede reached in and pulled the other one out. Both men were killed with a quick slice of a knife across the throat, severing their vocal cords before they could cry out.

Tuck and Swede entered the building followed by Caesar and Irish. Dustman, Fish and the others held back, ready to enter if the going got rough.

They followed the voices down a short hallway and burst into a room, where two Taliban men held up a German soldier between them while another used the butt of his rifle to slam into the prisoner’s face. Three other German solders lay on the ground at the center of the room. Several Taliban men sat in a broad circle watching.

Tuck fired, hitting the man holding the gun. The other two dropped the sagging captive and dove toward the sides of the room.

Shots rang out.

“
Bleibt unten!
” Tuck yelled, warning the Germans to stay down. Not that the soldiers were moving.

From the brief glimpse Caesar got of the prisoners, they’d been beaten to within an inch of their lives,
if
they were still alive.

Tuck and Swede dove left, firing at the Taliban men on that side of the room. Irish and Caesar dropped, rolled and came up firing at the men on the right.

Highly trained and experienced at close combat, the SEALs eliminated the opposition one by one.

“We have a truck load of trouble a couple miles out, headed our way.” Big Bird reported. “Damn. I spot a man running toward them.”

“Take him before they see him,” Tuck ordered. “Any injuries to the team?”

No one responded.

Tuck nodded. “Good. Grab a German and let’s blow this popsicle stand.”

Caesar bent to one of the enemy, the scar on the man’s cheek triggering an image in his mind of a photograph he’d seen recently. “Hey, I’ve seen this face.” He bent to touch his fingers to the base of the man’s throat. “He’s alive.”

Tuck leaned over the man. “Fuck. That’s Hassan Turbani or something like that. He’s pretty high up the food chain of Taliban leadership.”

“Hassani Turabi.” Caesar remembered the name and the picture he’d seen on the Al Jazeera news station. “He’s the bastard responsible for the deaths of our six U.S. soldiers that were paraded before the cameras and then beheaded last fall.”

Irish pressed his rifle muzzle to the man’s head. “The son of a bitch needs to die.”

Tuck’s hand shot out. “Wait. They still have four U.S Army captives hidden away somewhere in the hills. He might know where. Bring him along.”

“I’m not carrying him,” Irish said, lifting one of the Germans in a fireman carry. “After what he did to our guys and these Germans…”

“Shooting him would be too easy,” Swede said, his jaw clenched.

“Save him for our intel folks,” Tuck insisted. “Our soldiers need every chance we can give them.”

Though the action went against everything he stood for, Caesar threw the man over his shoulder and headed for the door. They had to get out of the village before the truckload of Taliban got there first.

Dustman entered the building and collected the fourth German. Dead or alive, they had to get them out.

The five men emerged from the building to the sound of gunfire.

“Sniper on that rooftop.” Fish pointed to a spot where tracer rounds lit up the night. Bullets hit the dirt at their feet, encouraging them to move faster. “Gator’s on him.”

A moment later, the gunfire stopped and Gator ran to catch up to them. With Fish, Sting Ray, Hank and Gator covering for them, the team made it to the entrance to the village.

“Tuck, I’ve got your back, there have to be fifteen or twenty of them loaded into the back of that pickup,” Big Bird said. “And I didn’t bring my rocket launcher.”

The men ran with sluggish steps, hampered by the dead weight of five injured people.

“Holy shit! They have an RPG! Get down.” Big Bird shouted into their headsets.

As one, they dropped to the ground, Caesar and Sting Ray bringing up the rear.

A round slammed into the ground behind them, the explosion rocking the earth.

Shards of shrapnel pierced the air and something ripped into Caesar’s lower back, buttocks and thigh, a momentary flash of heat.

“Go, go, go!” Tuck shouted. “Before he loads another round.”

Caesar staggered to his feet, and looked over his shoulder where Sting Ray had been. He lay on the ground, moaning, his hand pressed to his side. “Sting Ray’s been hit!” He started to throw the Taliban man on the ground, but Dustman beat him to Sting Ray, looped the man’s arm over his shoulder and half dragged, half-carried the man up the hill.

Caesar pushed on, his legs wobbling beneath him as he climbed the hill.

Just a little farther
.

His mind focused on making the helicopter, images of Erin popped up in him thoughts, a reminder of all he had to live for, all he had waiting for him to return to camp.

Just a little farther.

The men topped the hill and let gravity hurry them down the other side to where the helicopters had landed.

A few feet from the chopper, Caesar’s left leg gave out, he dropped the Taliban leader and crashed to the ground, face first. The jolt made him see stars and gray fog settled around the edges of his vision. He tried to rise, but his legs wouldn’t cooperate.

Tuck and the other men loaded the Germans on board the helicopters.

“Wait,” Caesar tried to cry out over the noise of the engines and blades thumping the air. His voice was weak, his body weaker. If they couldn’t hear him and if each person thought he’d gotten on the other craft, they wouldn’t know they’d left him behind until too late.

Again, he tried to get his feet under him but his muscles wouldn’t move. Twenty yards, that’s all he needed. Twenty yards and he’d be on one of the choppers.

One of the helicopters lifted off, hugging the nap of the earth, and swept away.

Caesar clawed at the ground, inching himself toward the remaining chopper. At the rate he was moving, the chopper would leave before he got there.

‡

H
is legs basically
useless, Caesar gritted his teeth and focused on crawling to the helicopter, dragging himself along the rocky ground, one agonizing foot at a time. Movement to his rear made him look back at the silhouette of a large man carrying a rifle on a bipod. Pain stabbed through him like a red-hot poker, blinding him. When his vision cleared, he focused on the big man standing beside him.

Big Bird leaned over him. “Nacho, you need a hand?”

Relief flooded him and Caesar nearly wept for joy. “I could.”

The big man flung his weapon over his back. “Got a man down out here,” he said into the headset. “Make that two.” Big Bird scooped Caesar up in his arms and carried him to the chopper, laying him out on the floor of the craft beside an injured German.

As soon as his backside touched the floor, he experienced excruciating agony. When he tried to roll over, he nearly blacked out. He ground his teeth, forced himself to his side and lay still until the dizziness receded. His lower back, buttocks and thigh went numb. Thankful the pain had disappeared, he didn’t think beyond that, just concentrated on breathing.

Dustman loaded the Taliban leader into the same craft, none too gently.

“Gotta go!” the pilot yelled.

From the corner of his eye, Caesar caught a glimpse of the truck full of Taliban. The vehicle had stopped and the men on board had all jumped down and ran toward the Blackhawk helicopter, firing their weapons.

The helicopter shuddered and then lifted off the ground. Within seconds, they were high in the sky, well out of range of small arms fire.

As the corpsman, Fish went to work on the wounds he could see and treat. The noise of the aircraft drowned out anything he might have said. When he got to Caesar, he rolled him over and grimaced. “Can’t help you there, buddy. The surgeons will have to pick out the pieces. At least you’re not bleeding like a stuck pig. Want something for the pain?”

“No. Take care of Sting Ray.” Caesar didn’t bother to tell him that he was feeling no pain. Like Fish said, not much they could do in the back of the helicopter.

“Sting Ray is coming around. He’s got a few bits of shrapnel embedded in his skin, but he’ll be okay.”

“Anyone else?” Caesar asked.

“No, we’re all accounted for and alive. The Germans are in bad shape. We’re lucky we got them out when we did or we’d have been carrying them out in body bags.”

Knowing his team was okay, Caesar relaxed and closed his eyes, the roar of the engine lulling him to sleep.

The flight back was the longest and shortest flight Caesar could ever recall. Floating in and out of consciousness, he tried not to worry about the lack of feeling or the fact he couldn’t move his legs, preferring to succumb to blessed sleep.

Caesar didn’t wake until the craft landed with a jolt on the tarmac at Bagram Airfield. Ambulances stood in a line, medics, hospital staff and volunteers converged on them as soon as the skids touched down.

The Taliban leader was last in and first out, loaded onto a backboard and transported to a waiting ambulance. When they came for Caesar, Fish stepped into their paths.

“Load him on his side, he’s got shrapnel wounds to the back, buttocks and thighs. Possible damage to the spinal cord.”

At those two words, Caesar’s heart skipped several beats and plunged to his belly. Spinal cord injury could lead to paralysis. Was that why he couldn’t feel his legs? He prayed they were wrong and wished for the pain to return. Pain meant you were still alive and able to feel.