Quest for Honor (3 page)

She was forty-two, looked ten years younger, and still had the toned body of the college volleyball star who worked as a figure model for a time before her first marriage. By the time Jim met her at the health club in Cedar Lake just after he moved to town, she’d already been through one husband and had two kids in college. A year ago she’d been divorced from number two, and now they’d been dating for several months. Jim didn’t really have a sense of where it was going, but he was in no hurry. Neither of them had mentioned marriage, and the question of children had never come up, and never would. Been there, done that for both of them. His daughter Michaela would turn twenty-five this fall. The son he never got to hold would’ve been six next winter. He liked to think it would’ve been a boy, anyway. Suzy had been only two months along…

He shook his head, trying to push the thought out. “Something wrong?” Annie asked.

“Just thinking about those pilots,” he lied. “Unbelievable.” Annie knew about Suzy, but she didn’t know about the significance of this day. He wanted to keep it that way.

He doubted whether Annie would ever really understand. She’d taken what she could out of her marriages: from the first, to a computer wizard, the IT business she ran out of her downtown Cedar Lake office, and from her second, a wealthy banker, the log home out in the country and the Jaguar in the garage. She was focused on her work first and her home second, with Jim somewhere a distant third. He knew she grudgingly respected his martial arts training, but the one time he’d told her about why he was really doing it, showed her his ever-growing library, he could tell she was not too impressed. Still, things were good with her, most of the time. Yes, he got a rush from being with her in public, and sex with her was an awesome experience.

But there had to be more than that, didn’t there?

The crowd was starting to move toward the exits now, at the back end of the large observation area on the airport grounds near the cargo terminals. Jim and Annie were in the first few ranks and as they came around a corner of a hangar, he saw the protestors on the other side of the gate.

“What’s going on up there?” Annie asked, suddenly interested.

Jim squinted to make out one of the signs they were carrying. “’Stop the war now’. Ah, hell, here we go.” He should have expected this. They were in Madison, after all, one of the most liberal cities in America, a place where aging lefties still got misty-eyed about the anti-war demonstrations they’d had on campus during the Vietnam years, and it wasn’t from remembering the tear gas. People elsewhere in Wisconsin tended to call Madison “an island surrounded by reality.”

“I’d heard they might be out here,” Annie said.

He looked at her. They were about fifty yards from the gate now. “What do you mean?”

“Well, hello, Jim, they’re anti-military, and what do we have here today but the ultimate example of the military?”
“Those guys fly those planes to keep it safe over here, so that these yahoos can raise hell,” he said grimly. Once or twice during the show, as the fighters came screaming low across the field, he’d wondered if that’s how they looked from his brother Mark’s perspective over in Afghanistan, when he and his troops were pinned down and needed help from the skies. Now he looked at Annie carefully for any reaction, but she kept quiet. They’d discussed politics just enough for him to know that she was left of center on almost everything, and one time she’d accused him of being somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun. Rather mild, really, for a woman who had a tee shirt showing Dick Cheney as Darth Vader.

There were about thirty protestors, about evenly mixed between men and women, ranging in age from early twenties to mid-sixties. “They must be upset because the president hasn’t run up the white flag yet,” Jim said, drawing a sharp look from Annie. The only real argument they’d had, so far, had been about the war, with Annie arguing passionately that the troops should be brought home right away, regardless of the consequences, and Jim just as adamant to keep them over there till the job was done, even if it meant his brother would be in danger. He knew from Mark’s infrequent emails that he felt the same way.

There were policemen at the ready, but not decked out in any special gear that Jim could see. His training kicked in and he automatically scanned the protestors for any sign of possible weapons or other trouble, just as Major Kemerovo had taught them at the Systema camps he’d attended, and he felt his breathing slow and deepen just a bit as his senses sharpened and his body relaxed. The typical Madison lefty was about as dangerous as a summer breeze, but you never knew. There was a time, after all, when they’d rioted and bombed and generally raised hell on campus and elsewhere. Until the draft had been abolished, anyway.

The cops and a handful of airport personnel were funneling the air show crowd through three gaps in the makeshift gate that led to an access road and the parking lot. The protesters were on the right, and Jim and Annie were going through the right-side gap in the gate. Had he subtly steered them in that direction? The protestors were chanting “Stop the war now!” and waving some signs, none of which dared criticize the president, who was still their hero, but there were more than a few slogans slamming the military in general and the Blue Angels in particular.

Jim was wearing an Army ball cap he’d picked up at one of the souvenir stands, even though he knew Annie hated ball caps, but he’d forgotten to bring his straw fedora from home and it turned out to be a sunny, warm day. One of the protestors zeroed in on the cap, just as Jim was coming through the gate.

“Hey, Army guy!”

The man looked to be in his forties, thinning gray hair pulled back into a ponytail, goatee, and wire-rimmed glasses, and from the size of his paunch he hadn’t seen the inside of a gym for a long time. He was carrying a professionally-printed sign: WAR IS A CRIME. BRING HOME THE CRIMINALS.

Jim was within about six feet of the man now. Annie, on his left, tugged at his arm. “C’mon, Jim, ignore him.”
“Army guy! How’d it feel to shoot kids over there?”

Jim stopped and looked at him. “I wasn’t over there, sir. I wear this hat to honor my brother. He’s over there now, helping to protect us here. Even idiots who don’t deserve it.”

Behind the glasses, his eyes were wide. Was he on something? He took a step forward and leaned closer to Jim, and there was spittle at the edges of the man’s lips. Behind him, a mousey-looking woman in braided hair tried pulling him back. “Your brother’s a criminal!” A chubby finger poked Jim in the chest. “He’s no better than—”

“Don’t touch me again.”

The man reached out and poked, harder. “Why?” Poke. “Not?” Poke. “Army guy with the criminal brother?” Poke.

“Because now I get to do this.”

CHAPTER THREE

Afghanistan

T
hey showed up
as green apparitions in his night-vision goggles, picking their way along the rocky path. Lieutenant Colonel Mark Hayes counted them: eight, nine….no, ten, here came the last one. At least two of them were carrying long thin tubes, hard to make out because the tubes weren’t radiating heat, but they had to be RPGs, old Soviet-made rocket-propelled grenade launchers that could turn a soldier’s day from bad to worse pretty damn quickly.

It was unusual for the Taliban to move at night, but lately they’d seen more evidence of enemy night patrols, the better to evade American drones. The UAVs didn’t care whether it was night or day, of course, as the bad guys were starting to find out. A drone had observed this group mustering across the border in Pakistan the day before, and rather than take them out right there, somebody upstairs had decided to let them cross the border and let Mark deal with them.

This bunch was making decent time, which was a bit surprising. The Taliban didn’t have NVGs except for the few they’d captured or stolen from the Afghans, or bought on the black market, and Mark doubted if this bunch had more than one pair, if that. They’d be on the guy in the lead, now about eight hundred meters from their position and closing. But maybe, for once, their intel had been accurate, and this was the Taliban force that was moving on the village about ten kilometers to the north. The village only had a small platoon of Afghan troops guarding it, with no armor. The nearest air support was a good half-hour away, making the village a prime target. The local
malik
had thrown in with the government and the Americans some time before and that put him at the top of Mullah Omar’s hit parade, along with the other locals who had gone over to the infidels and their lackeys. Of course it was the infidels who dug a new well for the chief’s village, who rebuilt the school and opened it to all the children, even the girls, who brought medical and dental care to the malik’s people. Mark had seen what the Taliban had done to other villages, and it wouldn’t happen to this one, not on his watch. They’d already attacked it once, and three little girls were now getting treated in an American military hospital because of it. They’d live, although their faces would be scarred for life. Maybe the SOBs who’d done that deed were in this group now, coming his way. Mark hoped so.

The intel didn’t always come in soon enough for Mark to mount an effective operation, but this time it had, and he had time to mount up a platoon from his nearest forward operating base, FOB O’Neill, about ten klicks away, and hump over the ridges to the ambush site in time to set up just before sundown. Mark had ten men with him on this side of the valley and his lieutenant, Frank Johnson, had another dozen on the other, and between them they had a good enfilading field of fire set up. Now it was just a matter of waiting for the insurgents to get close enough.

Keep coming, boys, it’s almost time for your surprise.

Mark brought his M-4 up to his shoulder and sighted on the target near the middle of the enemy column, the one between the guys carrying the RPGs. Taliban squads in the field didn’t utilize formal Western-style rank as such, but there was always one of them who was in charge, and typically he was in the middle along with the heavy weapons. He would have to go first. Even without leadership, the insurgents could be counted on to fight hard and sometimes quite effectively, if you gave them the chance. That was one of the things that had surprised many of the Americans who first came downrange in late ’01 and early ’02. Not Mark. He read up on these characters, studied their history all the way back to their campaign against Alexander the Great, even talked to ex-Soviet Spetsnaz vets who’d fought here twenty years ago. And the message was loud and clear: Do not underestimate these people. They looked like a bunch of raggedy-assed scarecrows, but they could pull a trigger, they could launch a mortar, plant a roadside bomb. There were plenty of reasons not to give them any chance when you got the drop on them. Out here there was no such thing as a fair fight. You wanted to make it unfair in your favor, as much as possible. No one-on-one Rambo crap was allowed. That only led to dead soldiers and Mark did not enjoy writing those letters home.

Time seemed to slow down. He calculated the distance, measured the slight wind, took everything into account to set up his shot, and then it was just a matter of waiting till the shot presented itself. The waiting was the worst part.

He’d done his share of that downrange, for damn sure. His third tour here, along with a couple in Iraq, meant Mark Hayes had spent precious little time back in the States since the balloon went up on 9/11. He must be in the running for some kind of medal. Did they give out anything for Most Time Spent in Hellholes Chasing Bad Guys? Well, it wasn’t as if he had a lot waiting for him back home. His folks were both gone, he hadn’t talked to his big brother in months. But there was his boy, in middle school back in Virginia, growing up with an absent father, like so many Army kids these days. Every now and then he thought about retiring, going back home. His roommate from West Point had put in his papers a couple years ago and now had a thriving corporate and personal security firm back in the States, and Mark had a standing offer from him to come aboard. It would be interesting work, with pretty good pay and benefits. It was tempting to think about that, especially on the days when the paperwork was piled up on his desk, on the cold winter nights when he was out checking the perimeter.

Next to him, Sergeant Waters whispered, “How’s it look, Colonel?”

Mark lined it up again. “Another minute or so…Spread the word, fire at will upon my shot.”

“Roger that, sir.”

Eddie. He thought of his son at the oddest times. Mark missed him, sometimes desperately, and then he would curse the Army that had kept him away from being the dad he’d always wanted to be, from repairing a marriage that had fallen apart. But he loved it, God help him. He loved the Army, and his fellow soldiers, and that’s why he’d held off on pulling the pin as a lieutenant colonel in ’07, twenty years after his graduation from West Point. He was due for a tour at the Pentagon, and it was tempting to quit before having to deal with all the political bullshit, but he figured he needed at least another year there and maybe another combat tour to get to full colonel. Retirement would be a lot better if he went out with eagles on his tabs. Besides, what else did he have to do?

Mark had never liked pushing paper, and sometimes a staff officer’s work consisted largely of covering his boss’s ass. That had been the case in his last billet at the Pentagon, and when push came to shove over a major screw-up by his commanding officer, Mark had told the truth in his report. He wasn’t going to sugarcoat the man’s incompetence and he sure as hell wasn’t about to take the blame and fall on his own sword. The result had been the general’s early retirement, but he didn’t leave before making sure that Mark’s own career took a hit, keeping him a light colonel well past the usual time for promotion.

Once again, he considered hanging it up, but his staff work must have impressed someone. When an important billet opened up on the staff of Commanding General, International Security Assistance Force, Mark’s name was mentioned and he jumped at the chance to get back into the field, his third tour in Afghanistan. It meant leaving his son behind for another year or so, but that wasn’t enough to make him want to resign. Not quite yet, especially since the General had called him into his office four months ago and asked him to take command of a battalion that had been going downhill under a do-nothing desk jockey. Out here, at last Mark had the chance to put into practice all he’d learned, and he was enjoying the hell out of it.

Just another couple dozen meters. Come to papa, Achmed, or whoever the hell you are, and get ready to cavort with the virgins.

The gravity of what he was about to do started pulling at him. He’d taken more than one man’s life during his time in the Army, and given orders that had taken many more, and most of the time he didn’t lose any sleep over it. Was that wrong? He knew guys who’d seen a lot less action than him, good men, almost paralyzed by PTSD, and the sounds of men immersed in nightmares were common in the hooches on his base and the FOBs. What gave him bad dreams, though, were the things he’d seen the gomers do. The beautiful twelve-year-old girl with her nose cut off, punished for attending school. The seven-year-old boy swinging from a tree, hung by the Tals because the boy’s grandfather had defied them. The three girls from the nearby village, their faces permanently scarred by the acid thrown at them as they walked to school. The…

They were stopping. Somebody had called a halt down there, and the insurgents hunkered down. The two with the RPG tubes swung them around, one pointing ahead to the left, the other to the right. Had somebody up here made a sound, maybe somebody over in Johnson’s position? Dammit! Mark froze, and so did his men nearby, hardly breathing. They were a good hundred meters away and well-concealed, and the moon had gone behind the clouds. The Taliban held their position for a full minute, then the officer made a motion. Mark heard a voice drifting up here on the breeze, but couldn’t make out the Pashto. Must’ve been an order to move out, because they got to their feet and started walking again, this time more slowly. The RPG tubes were still scanning for targets. Mark wanted to wait till they were safed. If one of those rocketeers reacted to Mark’s shot by firing off a panicky round, it might hit something it shouldn’t.

The gomer in the lead was traversing the kill box now. Just a few more seconds and Mark would have them where he wanted them. He wondered how many were Afghans, and how many were fighters from other countries? He’d run into the whole gamut of them over here: Pakistanis, Chechens, Saudis, Palestinians, a few more. Since the Islamists had started throwing their weight around in Egypt, he’d seen a few more of them, too. The intel people said the bastard who’d led the Katabolang strike was from some central African country, he couldn’t remember which one. Mark wasn’t in on that action, but he’d been there with the General a couple days later, and like every other soldier involved, he wanted to get his hands around the neck of that son of a bitch.

Mark sighted on the gomer who looked like he might be the leader. When they’d planned the ambush, Mark once again allowed the top marksmen in the team to draw lots for the privilege of taking the first shot. To his surprise, they insisted he take part in the lottery. He was qualified, after all, having proven it on their makeshift range, and hey, it was his birthday coming up, they reminded him. Yeah, he would be forty-six in a few days, but he could still shoot with the best of them.

He pulled the trigger on his weapon.

It was over in minutes, and when none of the enemy fighters were moving anymore, Mark gave the radio signal to advance. Frank and his men would stay in place, just in case, while Mark’s squad checked out the bodies. They did it very cautiously, because it wasn’t unknown for the enemy to booby-trap one or two of their own, but these guys were clean of bombs. A couple of them weren’t dead yet, but the medic said they were too far gone to save and Mark didn’t question the man’s judgment. In the early days the Americans would’ve worked hard to save Taliban lives, even brought in medevac choppers, but then a few of those got rocketed and some good men died trying to save these sorry bastards, so there wasn’t much room for mercy after that. Very few of the survivors ever produced usable intel anyway. The leaders, the big shots who were the brains behind the outfit, they weren’t out here, oh no. They were back safe and sound in some Pak village, or maybe a cave near the border if they had a big op going on or wanted to stay clear of the Pak soldiers who occasionally went out looking for them.

And once in a while, Americans went over the border, too. It was all top secret, but in his time at Camp Roosevelt, Mark had provided some logistical support for two different Special Operations teams going into Pakistan. Very close-hold stuff, orders directly from the General detailing what Mark was to do—and what he could not do, such as going along. Not that Mark would’ve been much of a hindrance. During his time downrange he’d worked with several different teams all over the country. His regular duties for the General required him to work with most of the different nationalities stationed here, and he’d been with Brits and Canadians, Germans and Poles, Belgians and Bulgarians. The time with the British unit, just before taking over the Rough Riders, was especially fortuitous because that’s where he met Sophie, a BBC embed, and they’d been able to spend some time together in Kabul and one great weekend in Mumbai.

As he moved down the hillside toward the kill zone, Mark tried to get his mind off the carnage for just another minute or so, and thinking of Sophie was a good way to do that. He would send her an email when he got back to the base. Last he’d heard, she was due back in country soon.

Without wasting any time, Mark had his men search the bodies for any documents, and they found a few in a pouch carried by the commander, but they might have been letters home for all Mark knew. He’d become conversational in Pashto during his time in-country but this stuff was in Arabic, and his was rusty with his last Iraq deployment five years ago now. It’d give the intel weenies back in Kandahar something to do, at least, so he put the pouch in a vest pocket and gave the order to sanitize the kill box and bug out. They gathered the enemy’s weapons and Sergeant Kittoe, the combat engineer, took them behind some rocks and set up a small C-4 charge with a five-minute fuse. Mark and his men were half a klick away when the charge went off with a loud bang. Frank and his men rejoined their column as they humped out toward the landing zone.

It had looked like most of the insurgents were Afghans or Pakistanis, although many times you couldn’t really tell. The documents would probably shed some light. Word had come down that the Iranians were getting more active, and not just in the south, near their border. ISAF higher-ups wanted to know right away if any Iranian special operators were killed or captured, but Mark and other field commanders had been told specifically not to share any of that with media people. That could mean a lot of things, but to Mark and many of his fellow officers, it meant that the politicians back home didn’t want that word to get out, maybe because it would upset the applecart of whatever negotiations were going on with the mullahs in Tehran over the nuclear issue.