The Traiteur's Ring (11 page)

Get your friggin’ head in the game, bro.

He needed to be a professional – now more than ever. This was a big op, and these guys were not a bunch of teenagers led by a small group of washed-up tribal militia. These guys were top-of-the-food-chain and would have real security. His team had learned a few times in Iraq that the religious zealots protecting the serpent’s head would fight to the death and had no problem dying if it meant they could take a few of the Great Satan Infidels with them. He had seen Mujahedeen surround themselves with suicide bombers who wore explosive vests twenty four hours a day. He really needed to get iced and try to focus.

Ben ran through the timeline and plan for the breach of their building again. He felt his mind drift back to the villagers and sighed.

I just wish I knew they were alright. I need to know my little girl is safe.

Send them a heart message if you must.

Ben felt struck, not by the sound of the elder’s voice in his head (he almost expected it), but by the fact that he knew exactly what that meant. He closed his eyes and reached his mind out. For a moment, he felt a little like he floated up in the air inside the helicopter, and he could almost feel his words as they swirled around him and drifted out the door. Ben opened his eyes and for a moment saw a cloud of tiny bluish fireflies bouncing beside him, just outside the door of the helicopter. Then the lights, his heart message he knew, spread out and away from them and dove down towards the jungle below.

I am here, Jewel. I am here, and I am thinking of you. I want for you to be safe.

He had no idea when he had decided her name was Jewel, but it fit perfectly – his little Jewel from the jungle. He felt the band around his heart again. Another feeling filled his head like hot water and spread out over his body. He didn’t hear it – he actually felt it inside of him.

I’m home, father. I am safe in our home until you come for me.

Ben gasped at the sensation of the words as they rattled around inside his head and chest. He had no time to absorb it, however.

“Five minutes,” the voice in his headset cut out Clapton’s instrumental blues, and Ben leaned out the doorway. In the distance, he thought he might see a small glow but he couldn’t be sure. He snapped his NVG’s back into place, but saw nothing new. Around him he could feel the stir as his teammates checked their gear and weapons one last time. Ben felt around his own kit for grenades and magazines and checked his pistol in proper place on his right thigh. Then, he pulled his rifle from its combat position on his chest to a point just below his right armpit. Last, he slipped a finger into the small pouch with his iPod and clicked it off. He was ready.

The plan called for an offset fly-by by half the force to mask the hover of the two breacher team helos as they fast roped into the jungle a kilometer from the target. Those helos would similarly cover the insertion of the rangers just at the perimeter on the side of the village farthest from the three target buildings. Helicopter activity might be concerning but was common enough to hopefully not be alarming to the targets. Ben watched the grey-green images of his fellow SEALs as they got into position for the insertion. Chris would be the rope master and sat now with his feet against a large green bag which contained the thick, coiled rope for his side of the helicopter while Jackson from Charlie platoon sat in the same position on the other side. 

“Two minutes.”

Ben flexed and relaxed the muscles in his upper body and then pulled a second pair of leather gloves over his combat gloves to protect his hands as he slid down the large rope. He would be second out behind Reed and then Lash, Auger, and finally Chris would follow. Five other SEALs from Charlie would simultaneously fast rope down from the other side of the bird. The entire insertion would take only a few seconds.

“One minute.”

Ben reached across himself and unhooked his safety lanyard from the metal cleat beside the door. He folded the lanyard one-handed and tucked it into a belt loop on his pants and then shifted his body towards Reed who already stood half way up on one knee in the doorway.

The helicopter nosed up sharply and then settled into a hover as Chris kicked hard and sent the rope bag out the door. Reed grabbed the rope with both hands and slipped out the door into the darkness. At the same time Ben grabbed the rope in a two-handed grip close to his chest, counted one-one thousand, and followed Reed out with Auger’s shoulder already against his back.

Ben looked down the rope through his NVGs to make sure he didn’t come too close to Reed and seeing he had plenty of room, relaxed his grip a little to increase the speed of his slide. Reed landed just before him and moved quickly to the left, then dropped down on his belly. Ben hit a second later and moved right, took a few paces and dropped onto his own belly on the soft jungle floor and began to scan his side of the perimeter over the sight of his rifle. He felt rather than saw the other three SEALs spread out behind him before the crash of the rope as it was cut away from the helicopter. Seconds later the beat of the rotors faded away, and the silence engulfed them. It was strange after the hour of turbine whine and spinning blades from their ride in. Ben continued his slow scan of his section of the jungle around them and saw nothing.

The heart of the evil is here, Ben. Stop them here, and help us be reborn.

Ben shook his head, and the old man’s voice faded away. He squeezed his eyes tightly and then scanned his sector carefully. The three minutes passed like ten.

“Viper lead – clear.” Chris’s voice seemed a loud interruption in his right ear.

“Two,” Lash followed.

“Three, clear,” Ben said.

“Four.”

“Five.”

There was another pause, and Ben knew that Chris checked in with the other two team leaders. Ben continued his scan through his NVGs. A soft sound, barely more than a breeze in leaves came to him. Not a breeze, though, he felt sure. It sounded almost sing-song, and he strained to hear it better. He closed his eyes, thinking he would give his mind only the sound to think on for a moment. It seemed for the world like a whisper – or more like lots of whispers. They were high-pitched, like children whispering in the dark.

–
watching–

That word seemed so clear.

“Ghost and Mustang are clear.” Chris’s voice startled him back, and he nervously and quickly scanned his sector again.

Goddammit, keep your head in the game. Focus on the job before you get the whole team killed.

“Up on me. I have point. Two-by-two,” Chris’s magnified whisper commanded. Ben rose to his feet and spread out from Reed and followed their leader through the jungle towards the target. Twelve minutes and they would be in position.

Ben used every bit of mental energy he possessed to stay on his job. At times, he had to force away the childlike whispers that seemed now to come from all around him.  After a few moments no more thoughts or images sneaked into his mind. He scanned his sector of the jungle as they moved silently and swiftly to the edge of the village. His mind finally wrapped completely around the task at hand, and in what felt like moments, he took a knee a few yards right of Reed and peered at the three small buildings set off from the rest of the village. The grey image in his NVGs looked blurred by the white light that seeped out from beneath the doorways and through the windows.

Shitty light discipline. They have no idea the hell that is about to rain down on them.

He could hear far away muffled conversation and laughter. The building closest to them was their target, and he re-ran the breach plan in his head as they waited for the other two teams to swing around into their positions and check in. Then, they would confirm that the Rangers had the village, and they would go.

He tightened his hold, not in fear but excitement, on the pistol grip of his rifle. He and Reed would come in from the back while Chris and Auger came in the front. Lash would enter from the rooftop doorway that all these little houses seemed to have (and satellite imagery had confirmed would be on this house) after clearing the roof. In Iraq that had always been a two-man job as there seemed always to be fighters asleep on the roof. Here that seemed uncommon, and a predator fly-over only a short time ago confirmed no thermal images on the roof.

“Mustang and Ghost are ready,” Chris’s voice whispered loud in his right ear. “Positions.”

Ben and Reed moved quickly but silently towards the back of the house, rifles up and ready, and eyes scanning around through NVGs. To his right, he saw Lash move to the wall without any windows and take a knee to assemble the long, telescoping pole with large nubs on the sides that would serve as his ladder. Seconds later he disappeared over the ledge of the roof.

Ben and Reed knelt on either side of the back door, and Ben watched as Reed quickly placed a small, shaped charge of explosives over the door knob. Aware that his pulse pounded in his ears a little, Ben took a couple of long, slow, deep breaths to a four count – tactical breathing just like the Navy had taught him. By the time Reed nodded at him the pounding had disappeared and the hint of tunnel vision had dissipated, as well.

They waited for what seemed like forever.

“Viper – go, go, go,” Chris’s voice hissed in his headset.

They both turned their heads as Reed pressed a button on the small box in his hand, and the charge exploded with a dull WHUMP! Then they were both on their feet and crashed through the destroyed doorway just as another muffled explosion marked their teammates entry through the front door.

Ben moved left and spun on his left foot to clear the corner behind him without thinking. His mind registered the man seated on the floor, his AK-47 assault rifle in his lap. The face showed total surprise, and the man made no attempt to raise his rifle. Nonetheless, his front quarter still uncleared, Ben squeezed twice on the trigger of his rifle. He then spun forward without waiting to see the results and moved deeper into the room.

Ben shut out the panicked hollering – the words were meaningless to him anyway – and worked his scan around the room. A robed figure with long dark hair sprinted away from him towards the front of the house, and Ben shot him twice in the back. The man dropped to his knees and kneeled there, arms up over his head, and Ben’s mind filled suddenly with the face of Little Jewel. Behind her, he saw clearly the piles of bodies in the smoke-filled village. Ben squeezed the trigger again, and the kneeling man’s head collapsed on one side in a puff of red and white mist. He pitched forward onto what remained of his face.

Desecraters of the Living Jungle.

He stepped over the body and moved forward only vaguely aware of Reed to his right. He knew Reed shouted something at him, but it sounded like anger rather than fear or concern, and he continued to move forward.

“Three – we need prisoners!” the voice sounded harsh, but Ben couldn’t seem to make Chris’s words matter.

“Two’s on the stairs,” Lash’s voice announced in his right ear.

Ben moved farther left, away from the stairs in the center of the room to open up Lash’s field of fire.

Then his head exploded.

At first, he thought he had been hit by enemy fire, but after a second he realized what he felt in his head seemed more like a horrible noise, piercing and painful, and he wondered where it came from. He nearly dropped his weapon to grab his head with both hands. Instead, he dropped to a knee and steadied himself, his weapon somehow still up at his shoulder though he could barely see to fire.

LEFT—HORRIBLE—DIE—SATAN—WHY?—NOW—RUN—OUT—DOWN—HAND—GOD—CLOSE—HEAD—GOD—HEART—FOOT—NOW—NOW—OUT—GOD—GUN—CHEST—STAIRS—GOD—WINDOW—KNEE—RIGHT—DOOR—GRENADE—DOOR—GOD—SATAN—

Grenade?

Ben squeezed his eyes shut which seemed only to make the white light brighter, but made some sense of the one word that seemed to matter, more from the tone of the foreign sounding voice than the word itself.

“Grenade!” he screamed out to his team, and his vision cleared. He scanned madly about the room. He saw his teammates dropping to the deck at his call and then in the far right corner spotted the owner of the word.

The man pulled his arm back, and Ben flipped the selector on his rifle with his right thumb from single-shot to three-shot auto and squeezed. All three rounds found the same target, and the man’s head exploded in a cloud of blood, grey, and bone, and he collapsed down on himself like a pile of laundry. The Grenade bounced once beside him and then exploded, just as Ben dropped face-first to the deck.

The concussion and noise knocked the breath from him, but he stayed oriented enough to hear two more things:

FLOOR–MAN—ALI—DEATH—KILL—GOD—KILL

Which all seemed to come as nearly a single word in a foreign tongue that he could still understand somehow, and:

Behind you, Ben.

From flat on his stomach he could not rise and turn in time, so instead he rolled onto his back and raised his rifle in one motion, just as chucks of concrete exploded where his head had been. He sighted and squeezed just as Auger’s voice came to him.

“Ben, watch out!”

Then, the three rounds hit the bearded man twice in the chest and once in the throat and he pitched over backwards, slammed into the wall behind him, and crumpled dead to the floor.

He heard two more rifle shots, the sound more like nuclear explosions in the small space and then a moment of silence.

“On your face, motherfucker,” came Lash’s voice.

A second later came Reed’s voice, the words strained and soft, and Ben thought his own heart would stop at the sound.

“I’m hit, guys. Fuck – I think I’m hit real bad.”

“Doc,” Chris’s voice hollered, and Ben heard a panic he had never heard from the officer since he had met him. “Ben, hurry. It’s Reed – it’s bad.”

Ben forced the cloud out of his mind and moved towards the voice, unsteady at first, but then the strength flowed into his arms and legs. He already pulled the blow out kit from his cargo pocket as he knelt beside his best friend.