Sunrise: Wrath & Righteousness: Episode Ten (10 page)

The sniper listened then knocked again, almost breaking down the door.

The village leader pulled it open, his eyes wide in fear, a tiny wad of spit on the corner of his dry lips. The sniper pointed his pistol at him, recognizing his face and long beard. “Where is he?” he demanded.

The
abbu Rehnuma
held his ground. “He is safe in the mosque of Allah. He is protected here. He has implored for sanctuary—”

The sniper lifted his pistol and jammed the barrel into the young man’s cheek, pushing him back. “Give the boy to me and you will live. Speak another word in his defense and you will die. It is that simple. Now where have you hidden the child?”

The young man’s mind shut down, thoughts of love and family freezing his thoughts into a paralyzed state.
My children! How I love them. All I wanted was to keep them safe. All I wanted was to be their father
—”

“WHERE IS THE BOY?” the sniper screamed after watching the young man bow his head to pray.

The
abbu Rehnuma
swallowed and looked up, his heart racing in his chest. Drops of sweat rolled down his temples. His hands trembled. His knees buckled. He almost collapsed in fear.

“Sanctuary,” was all he muttered, his voice nothing but the whisper of a man who knew that he was dead. “I have granted sanctuary to the young one—”

The sniper shot the village leader in the head.

Wiping spattered flecks of blood from his face, the sniper burst into the hallway. Turning left, he ran into the dark, green tiled prayer hall. It only took him seconds to find the child hiding there.

Grabbing the prince by the hair, the sniper pulled him out onto the street.

*******

Far above, and half a kilometer to the west, Sam and Bono watched through their field glasses as the sniper emerged from the mosque, dragging the prince by his hair.

Sam turned to Bono. “We’ve got to go!” he cried.

Bono was already on his radio. “We don’t have much time guys,” he told the team.

Hidden in the foothills around the village, the U.S. soldiers sprang into action. Most of the groundwork had already been put in place. All they needed now was to implement the plan.

Sam stared at Azadeh. “Are you ready?” he asked.

She nodded hesitantly.

“I’ll never be far away from you.”

She nodded again, her eyes flickering with uncertainty.

He took a step toward her and placed his hand upon her arm. “Remember back in Chicago.”

She nodded at him, her fear melting away.

“It’s just like that,” he said.

The Saudi king’s helicopter, a huge, white and blue Sikorsky, the largest and most expensive helicopter in the world, approached low from the southeast. Flying up the valley, it followed the rutted, dirt road that came to an end at the stone wall around the village. A thousand feet from the outskirts of the village, the helicopter’s nose rose abruptly into the sky then leveled just as quickly as the helicopter settled onto a patch of open grass. The ground around the village was wet and muddy, and there was no blowing dust as the enormous helicopter settled to the ground.

The cabin doors instantly pulled back and the twelve-man Royal Security Forces team ran down the short steps and spread out. Carefully selected, highly trained, indoctrinated to the point of being brainwashed, the RSF members were as brutal and efficient as any security forces in the world. Each of them would happily sacrifice their lives for the kingdom. Each of them would kill or torture their own children for the king. None of them had a hint of conscience any more for their entire existence was dedicated to only one cause—protecting the King of the House of Saud. Were they to ever fail in this mission, every RSF member would die, for each of them was bound by a sacred oath of suicide. Were they to fail in taking their own lives, they would be hunted down, tortured and killed, along with every member of their extended families and a viciously large number of their friends.

To say they were dedicated to their mission was an understatement that bordered on the absurd.

The foothills and perimeter of the village had already been secured with other military teams. The roads, buildings, market and mosque had been secured as well.

All together there were eighty-seven Saudi soldiers in the area now, all of them dedicated to protecting the king.

*******

The helicopter pilot kept the engines running but disengaged the rotors, allowing the blades to slow to a stop. King al-Rahman watched from the bulletproof cockpit window as the RSF team fanned out around the helicopter. When given the all clear, he moved to the steps and lopped down quickly, eager to get his target and get out of here.

Standing at the foot of the short stairs, he paused and looked around. Two of his guards were hunched down near the gate in the wall around the village, a small cut in the rock barely wide enough for a horse to pass through. Beyond the three-foot wall, he saw several bodies lying in the streets, the water-filled ruts turning red beneath their bodies. On the other side of the village, a fire was burning, smoke lifting quickly into the calm skies, the blackness driven upward by the energy of the growing flames beneath. None of the villagers other than the dead ones could be seen. The village had been cleared, the terrified inhabitants told to remain inside their muddy shacks. The chief of the RSF was standing near the front of the helicopter, talking into a radio as the king glanced left and right.

Twenty meters beyond the tip of the helicopter’s rotors, the sniper held the boy. The child was small and submissive, but the sniper constrained him as if he were a dangerous animal. The king pulled out an American cigarette, lit it, pulled a deep breath, the smoke escaping from his nose, pulled again then dropped the cigarette in the mud and started walking. Approaching the child, he bore his eyes into him. This was his nephew, son of his oldest brother, and he knew the child well.

The prince fought against the sniper’s steely grip then fell still and glared into his uncle’s eyes. There was no pretence between them now. The child knew why the king was here. His father and mother, all of his brothers and sisters, everyone he had ever cared about was dead. The young father back in Iran, Omar, the village leader, everyone who’d taken a risk to help him had been killed as well.

He was utterly alone now.

His uncle had come to kill him.

He bowed his head and waited.

Al-Rahman came to a stop in front of the prince and looked down. So much of his time, thought and energy had been extended toward this goal. He’d come so far to do this and it would bring him enormous pleasure to kill the child. But it would be more than just a pleasure; it would also bring him release. This was the last threat to his kingdom, the last human who could ever claim his crown. For this reason he wanted the boy to die, but there was more to it than that. He wanted to see it, to feel it, to be the direct cause of his death. He wanted to smell the tinge of blood. He wanted to feel the recoil of the pistol and see the spattered flesh. He wanted to know and then remember how it felt to kill the child.

He smiled at the prince and licked his lips.

There was a certain honor in the killing. It was a thing that he
should
do. He could have easily delegated the task, just like with some of the others, he could have ordered the killing done. But he
wanted
to be the one who pulled the trigger. He
wanted
to kill the child.  

A sudden chill seeped through him, penetrating to his soul and bone.

How was he going to do it? He didn’t know. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. He might just shoot him. Simple, if not elegant. Or he might kill him with his bare hands. If he were alone that’s how he’d do it, but with his soldiers all around him that would be a more awkward thing to do.

He stared into the young man’s eyes.

The prince stared back defiantly at him.

“You’re going to see your father,” Al-Rahman whispered to him.

“You’re going to hell,” the young prince sneered.

“I’m already in hell, my little prince. Once we sign up with the Master, once he holds our souls in his hands, then hell is all around us. Hell is our entire world. There is no light or joy left inside us. There is no—”

Al-Rahman stopped suddenly, catching the last words in his throat. The words had slipped out of him without thought and he was frightened at his sudden honesty.

Did it matter what he told the prince? In a few moments he’d be dead. Did it matter? Al-Rahman didn’t want to know.

Turning, Al-Rahman thought back bitterly to one of the most powerful memories of his life. Back at his palace. They were talking. After the EMP attack. The old man had spoken to him just as the brilliant morning sunlight had broken across the concrete-flat horizon.
“The truth is, my King Abdullah
,” the old man had sneered, his voice wicked and sarcastic,
“I was lying to you then. I promised you everything, but none of it is real. None of it will last forever. It will all come crashing down. We can fight and scratch and murder, we can lie and cheat and kill. We can plot and plan and muster, but we are never going to win. The sun will still rise in the morning. Light will always chase the dark. We cannot win. We never could.

“And that, my friend, is the only truth that really matters. You have sold your soul for nothing. Now welcome to my world.”

Al-Rahman thought, a dark desperation all around him, then turned back to the prince. “I’m going to kill you now.”

The young boy didn’t answer.

“Do you understand this?” Al-Rahman wondered.

The young prince shook his head, tears of fear and sadness rolling down his cheeks. Then, ashamed at his display of weakness and emotion, he gritted his teeth and held his breath.

Almost four hours had passed since the tuna sandwiches, chips and bottled water had been sent up.

Brucius was slumped in his chair, his head back. His eyes were open but his heart rate and blood pressure had slipped into something very close to sleep. Sara was stretched out on the leather couch, the deep burgundy blending with the color of her skirt, her shoes off, her blond hair falling to one side of her face. She was a truly beautiful woman. He admired her is so many ways.

Brucius knew that she was sleeping from the slow rate of her breathing and the sudden movements of her feet.

If she was dreaming, and she seemed to be, then she wasn’t having pleasant dreams.

A sudden shadow fell across the room from the bright lights in the hallway. Brucius looked up to see his military attaché standing there.

He immediately stood up.

“They’ve decided,” the general said.

The swearing in ceremony was broadcast over television and radio stations across the entire United States. Not many people would have seen or heard it, but the word would quickly spread.

Brucius Marino, for twelve minutes now the legally sworn in president of the United States of America, stood before his staff. The atmosphere inside the conference room was electric with emotion and energy. Everything was clear now, no more uncertainty in the air. All of the participants had known that they were doing the right thing—all of them had been completely committed to helping Brucius Marino retain power—but it was a huge relief to have the U.S. Supreme Court decision on their side. Their mission had been clarified. The law had spoken. The U.S. Constitution had proved them right.

The president looked around the room and for a brief moment he was so caught up with the emotion that he couldn’t speak. He tried. His voice choked inside his throat. He waited, looking down, then raised his head again but the emotion was so overpowering he simply couldn’t speak.

Taking a breath, he looked away, then turned back to the people who had risked their lives to help him. Nothing he could say would be sufficient and any attempt would only diminish what they’d done. So he didn’t even try. Instead, he focused on their mission. There was so much work to do still. “We have to get to Raven Rock,” he told them. He nodded to the engineering drawings spread out on the conference table between them. “We’ve been over all the plans. All of you know what you have to do.”

*******

Once given the command, the Special Forces units moved in on the compound with great speed, securing every entrance or passageway into the enormous underground national command post. It wasn’t an easy thing to do for there were more than a dozen entries, tunnels and cargo elevators into the compound, but there was no opposition and it didn’t take much time.

Minutes after receiving their orders, all of the exits to the command post were secured.

President Marino had ordered the military forces not to enter Raven Rock. For one thing, there was no reason. None of the conspirators were going anywhere, and Marino didn’t want the risk of bloodshed. He’d give the conspirators time to sort it out, give them time to decide what they wanted to do, which was, of course, surrender, utterly trapped in the compound as they were. Moreover, President Marino recognized that most of the military and civilian staff inside the compound weren’t the enemy; they were just doing what they’d been told. Very few of them were even aware of the conspiracy and those who were had already been identified.

While securing all of the exits from the compound, other military forces moved to control the communications grid, power sources, air conveying units, and electrical power cables. Within minutes, everything the occupants of Raven Rock needed to communicate with the outside world was under Marino’s control.