The Identity Mine

XXII

‘Warner!’

Ethan heard the voice from the distant periphery of his awareness, pulling him in along with the unwelcome embrace of a throbbing ache that permeated his skull. Something jabbed him in the chest and he sucked in a lung full of air as he bolted upright and bright pain lanced behind his eyes.

‘Take it easy.’

The voice soothed him and he felt the gloved hands of two Navy SEALS supporting him, one with a rifle guarding them and the other with a water canteen that was offered to Ethan. He drank from it gratefully and suddenly the pieces of his memory reconnected themselves and he looked at the SEALs in shock.

‘Lopez?!’

‘We haven’t found her yet,’ the soldier replied, ‘but we have prisoners and we don’t think Nassir can have got far. You’re lucky his people didn’t shoot you in the head where you lay.’

Ethan nodded. ‘Gunfire would have exposed them, and they probably didn’t have time to hang around.’

‘Neither do we,’ the SEAL replied. ‘We’ve wasted enough time looking for you so get off your ass and get moving. We’ve got work to do.’

The canteen was snatched away and the SEALs marched off. Ethan hauled himself to his feet and followed them at a jog back toward the village where the Seahawk helicopter was now landed on the beach, its rotors spinning slowly as the pilots awaited the SEALs gathered on the beach before them.

Ethan could see that in the soldier’s midst, on their knees and with their hands behind their heads, were a small knot of ragged looking Somalians surrounded by a captured cache of weapons. Nearby, four more prisoners were hauling bodies down onto the beach. It took only a few moments for Ethan to realize that the SEALs had suffered no losses during the assault, but that there were at least a dozen Somalian dead lying on the cold sand as the dawn glowed weakly across the sky.

‘Any injured?’ Ethan asked the team leader as he held the back of his head in one hand and winced at the pain.

The SEAL’s commanding officer shook his head.

‘No casualties in our team. Twelve hostiles eliminated but our main target remains at large.’

Ethan looked down at the captured militants, all of them staring at the sand with their hands behind their heads. He looked up along the bluff, beyond the village to the deserts that stretched away into the empty wilderness. Abrahem Nassir, if he had been present in the village, could have travelled no more than a few miles at best, assuming he had a vehicle.

‘Can we track them?’

The commander shook his head.

‘We can’t be seen over this country in broad daylight,’ he replied. ‘Even ignoring the international implications, the threat from shoulder — launched rocket propelled grenades to our helo is too great.’

Ethan knew that such basic weapons could be lethal to low flying helicopters no matter how advanced they may be, and the Somalians likely possessed them in spades.

‘I want Lopez back,’ Ethan said. ‘If Abrahem escapes I can pick his trail up later but I’m not leaving my partner here.’

‘We’re not here to babysit the two of you,’ the commander snapped back. ‘She knew the risks. It’s her problem now.’

‘Would you leave one of your men out here?!’

‘My men know the risks also and would take care of themselves.’

‘And if an American woman turns up on the Internet, held captive by Islamist militants who claim she was abandoned here by American soldiers? How do you think that will go down with the folks back home?’

The commander sneered at Ethan. ‘I’ll let Congress deal with that.’

‘Give her a chance. If we can’t locate her in the next ten minutes, I’ll stay behind and find her myself.’

The SEAL offered Ethan a grim smile.

‘Your funeral, pal,’ he said and then glanced at the prisoners. ‘I’ve got an idea.’

Ethan waited as the SEALs ordered the captives to their feet. The SEAL commander seemed to scan each and every one of the men before him, assessing them with a practised eye, before he picked three of them out.

‘Cut the rest loose.’

‘You’re letting them go?’ Ethan asked.

‘Kind of,’ the commander replied.

To Ethan’s surprise, many of the toughest looking men were freed and left standing on the beach as the SEALs dragged the three prisoners chosen by their commander back toward the Seahawk. The helicopter’s engines began running up again as one by one the SEALs filed back inside, the Somalians forced to lay on the helicopter’s deck as it lifted off.

Moments later three of the SEALS opened fire on the Somalians still on the beach below them, dropping them instantly in a hail of bullets as the Seahawk climbed away.

Ethan strapped himself in and watched as the SEAL commander talked to the pilots and the helicopter swung out over the ocean and headed south, climbing swiftly. The side doors had been left open, offering a vertiginous view of banks of misty cloud that soared past and then the helicopter broke free of them, climbing ever higher. Ethan guessed they were at five thousand feet before the helicopter levelled off and the SEAL commander spoke to their captors.

‘There will be no negotiations,’ he snapped, shouting above the roar of the engines and not bothering with a local dialect. ‘I know that you can all understand me. You will tell me what I need to know or you will not leave this helicopter alive, understood?’

The three captives stared sullenly into the middle distance, their heads pressed against the metal deck and rifles pinned against their skulls.

The commander pointed at one of them. ‘Him first.’

The SEALs hauled one of the Somalians to his feet, the militant unsteady as the helicopter rocked on the wind currents. The SEAL commander glared into the militant’s eyes.

‘Abrahem Nassir. Where is he going and what does he intend to do?’

The Somalian smiled, his teeth yellow.

‘Alluhah Akbhar,’ he snapped. ‘God is great!’

The SEAL commander smiled grimly back at his captive. ‘Not great enough to get you out of this!’

The commander nodded and without warning another SEAL yanked the militant backwards by the collar of his ragged shirt toward the open port door alongside Ethan. The Somalian’s smile withered into panic and he opened his mouth to scream something, but the cry was lost as the SEAL commander jabbed his knuckles into the Somalian’s throat. The militant’s eyes bulged and he staggered backwards, his hands flying to his throat as the SEAL by the open door, one hand gripping a safety rail, hurled the Somalian out the side of the helicopter. The Somalian flew backwards out of the Seahawk and into the air, his eyes and mouth wide open in an expression of terminal horror.

Ethan stared transfixed as the militant spiraled down toward the clouds below them and then vanished, his fate sealed. For some reason, perhaps to veil the fact that he was witnessing a cold — blooded murder, Ethan recalled his own parachute training and his knowledge of what would happen. The militant would reach terminal velocity in a few seconds, well over one hundred miles per hour. At that speed, hitting the water far below would break every bone in his body as effectively as if he had hit concrete.

Ethan looked back at the remaining two captives, who were both staring wide eyed on the deck where they lay at where their companion had recently vanished into oblivion.

‘Him,’ the commander pointed.

The SEALs hauled another of them to his feet, and this time the man started babbling immediately, tears flowing from his eyes.

‘Qeycad!’ he whimpered. ‘They are going to Qeycad!’

‘What’s there?’ the commander demanded.

‘A bush plane,’ the Somalian replied miserably. ‘Abrahem is to be flown to another country and out of Africa, that’s all I know!’

The SEAL leaned close to the terrified militant. ‘What does he intend to do then?’

‘I don’t know,’ the Somalian wailed. ‘They didn’t tell us everything! They paid us to protect them, that’s all!’

‘Where did he come from?’ the commander demanded.

‘Iraq,’ the Somalian said. ‘Basra, I know that much. They said he was from Basra.’

The commander looked at Ethan, who nodded. The information was likely legitimate if the Somalian knew that Abrahem was from Iraq. But it also meant that Abrahem would once again vanish.

‘Do you know where Abrahem Nassir intended to go after Qeycad?’ the commander asked, his tone more reasonable.

‘They didn’t say,’ their prisoner replied, his voice trembling. ‘They just wanted to pass through the area.’

‘How did they arrive?’

‘A boat, from the gulf. It left immediately.’

‘You’re doing very well,’ the commander growled at his captive. ‘At this rate you may even live. Who was he travelling with?’

‘An old man named Tariq, who arrived here the day before.’

‘He was from Iraq too?’

‘Yes, a sheik, very powerful. We did everything he said. He had a lot of money but I don’t know where it came from.’

‘A benefactor,’ Ethan said, speaking for the first time since they had taken off from the beach. ‘Where there’s money, there’s a trail.’

Ethan realized that the helicopter was turning gently, the dim light streaming in through the windows changing angle as the Seahawk flew over the coast once more, this time heading inland.

‘Did they have vehicles with them?’ the commander demanded.

‘Yes,’ the Somalian replied, ‘two trucks.’

The commander turned to Ethan. ‘Qeycad is ten clicks from the coast.’

‘How long was I out?’ Ethan asked.

‘I don’t know, but it only took us a few minutes to find you. The helo’s are equipped with infra — red sensors that spotted your body.’

Ethan nodded as he tightened his harness. ‘They could have travelled three or four clicks by now, half way to the town. If they get there we won’t be able to find them.’

‘And if we’re identified over Somalian airspace it’ll be my neck on the line back home!’ the commander snapped. ‘And it’ll be much worse if we get hit.’

‘Just get me close enough,’ Ethan insisted. ‘I’ll do the rest.’

The commander forced the Somalian to his knees in the helicopter and turned to his troops. There was no spoken command needed, they simply responded by reloading their M–16’s magazines and preparing once more for combat. The commander checked his watch.

‘Fine,’ he said to Ethan. ‘We’ll drop you in on them.’

Ethan nodded as he felt the Seahawk suddenly plunge into a rapid descent. Ethan’s stomach lurched into his chest as he saw the commander listen intently to something the pilot was saying.

‘We’ve got two trucks,’ he reported. ‘One headed north, the other west, and we only have time…’

‘To get one of them,’ Ethan finished the sentence. He slammed a fist on his knee and cleared his mind. Abrahem would want to escape, so he would likely be heading west toward Qeycad. Sending Lopez north would provide the diversion and time he needed to make good his escape, so in theory Ethan should pursue the northern vehicle.

But if Abrahem was as cunning as Ethan suspected he may be, he might try to make off with both his escape and a prize: Lopez. All or nothing, the course of a man without compromise.

Ethan looked up at the commander and hoped against hope that he was right.

‘We go west.’