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  DEAD OF NIGHT

  Copyright © 2020 by Blake Banner

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

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  Chapter One

  Under a black sky, pierced by icy stars high above the Sulaiman Mountains, we lay shivering, waiting. Then the soft crackle in my ear and the quiet, gravelly voice of Sergeant Bradley, the Kiwi.

  “All right, move in. Move in for the kill, boys.”

  There were four of us in the patrol. We pulled down our night-vision goggles, the world turned a strange, eerie green and black and we scrambled at a crouching run, moving fast and silent across the sand and loose stones. I was at the back. Ahead of me, scattered at irregular distances, with their C8 Carbines across their chests, were: The Sarge—the big, bearded New Zealander—at the head. Behind him, fifteen feet to the left, was Jones, six foot six of solid black, Welsh muscle; then Skinner, ten paces to his left, small, wiry and lethal, from the East End of London. As at home in a tavern in Senegal as he was in a pub in Whitechapel, as long as he was drinking beer, he didn’t care who he had to fight.

  And then me, Bauer, the Yank. I had their backs.

  We moved silently, with startling speed over the cold sand, driving uphill, over loose gravel and rocks, among the boulders and the small shrubs. Soon the vast wall of the mountain had blocked out the sky and the small stars ahead, and we were clambering, more slowly now, up a narrow path forged over centuries by cloven hooves and sandals.

  After fifteen minutes of climbing we came to a small plateau where scattered, gnarled cypress bushes stood, twisted, tortured silhouettes among the stunted rosemary bushes and the thyme. Here Jones and Skinner peeled off and vanished noiselessly among the shadows. Bradley and I continued along, half-crouching beside the path, keeping low.

  Soon, at the northern end of the plateau, the terrain on our right began to climb again, steeply toward a jagged system of ravines and peaks. Bradley dropped on his belly and began to crawl. I followed suit. My own breathing was loud in my ears, and just ahead I could hear the soft slither of Bradley’s camouflage on the dust. A nocturnal bird cried out and from far off came the howl of what might have been a wolf, or a dog.

  And then we saw it and froze: the tiny, green glimmer of light from a flame.

  Bradley’s voice crackled softly again: “We have eyes on the cave. Light visible. Do nothing. Either they are not expecting company, or this is a trap. Please confirm you are in position.”

  Jones came back.

  “Affirmative, Sarge. We see the light.”

  Bradley signaled me over and I crawled up beside him. He pointed at me, pointed to a small copse of gnarled bushes fifty or sixty feet from the cave and directly in front of it, and touched his eyes with his two fingers in a victory sign.

  I moved off at a crouching lope, taking irregular steps and occasionally dropping to a crawl. The air was freezing, but I was sweating with the exertion and the weight of the Bergen on my back. I kept my mouth covered with a thick, woolen scarf, not so much because of the cold, but to conceal the telltale clouds of condensation that could give a sniper a target.

  I came to the crop of twisted cypresses and crawled in among the trunks. I raised my goggles, pulled the C8 from my shoulder and peered through the nightscope. Six guys in Taliban dress sitting around a fire, eating and talking. They were at the entrance to a large cave. I spoke softly into my mic.

  “Six Taliban at the mouth of the cave, eating. I see assault rifles against the rocks. Looks like we are not expected. I see more light inside the cave.”

  Bradley’s voice came back: “OK, boys, close in to ten yards. Bauer, on my word, you open fire. Jones, Skinner, we close in from the sides. Bauer, fuck’s sake don’t shoot us.”

  There was no acknowledgment. It wasn’t needed. We all knew what we had to do.

  I began to crawl, easy, relaxed, keeping my limbs loose, keeping my head and my shoulders down. At thirty feet I stopped. Now I could see the targets clearly, sitting cross-legged, gesticulating at each other as they spoke. I took my scope and focused on the nearest weapon leaning against a rock. It was an AK47. At that distance, with the scope, I could see the selector set high to the safety position. By the time its owner reached it and flipped to full auto, they’d all be dead. These men were not expecting to be hit tonight. This was not a trap.

  I breathed into the mic: “Bauer in position. Nearest weapon six feet from nearest guy. Safety on.”

  Bradley’s voice came back without hesitation.

  “OK, Bauer, kill them. Repeat, kill.”

  Nine times out of ten spraying an area with fire is wasteful and ineffective. Slugs from an assault rifle spray wide, and after a few yards your bullets are passing harmlessly between your targets. Short, concentrated bursts of two or three slugs are more effective. That is, unless your victims are in a small, confined space. In which case, due to ricochet, your thirty rounds are multiplied by ten and become three hundred rounds bouncing unpredictably in all directions.

  The stone nook in which they were sitting, to get shelter from the icy desert breeze and keep in the warmth of the fire, was just one such confined space. I aimed at the head of the nearest guy, sitting with his back to me, and muttered, “Just not cricket, old chap,” in a fair imitation of a British officer. Then I opened up.

  After the fifth round had exploded from the barrel the weapon was dancing in my hands like a hooked fish and I was struggling to keep it centered on the target. After a couple of seconds the magazine was empty and the small stone alcove was strewn with badly injured, dead and dying men. To the right I could see Sergeant Bradley sprinting toward the fire, and on the left Jones and Skinner closing in.

  I pulled out the magazine and rammed in a new one, scrambled to my feet and ran the ten paces to the scene of the slaughter. A couple of cracks, like firecrackers, rang out in the night: one of the guys finishing the job, confirming the kill.

  By the time I got there they’d taken up positions, on one knee, covering the deeper entrance to the cave proper. I knelt beside the Sarge and he signaled me forward with his left hand.

  I ran four steps to an outcrop of boulders and peered around it. I could see a large opening in the cliff face, ten feet high and about twelve feet across. Orange light wavered on the left-hand wall. I signaled Bradley to follow. He came up beside me and had a look, then pointed to a cluster of rocks beside the mouth of the cave. I made a dash and ducked in b
eside them while he covered me.

  Now I couldn’t see the inside of the cavern. All I could see was the black sky above, the narrow passage of sand I had just crossed and the cluster of rocks fifteen feet away, where the bodies lay. Soft, flickering amber light touched it, and in that light I saw Bradley turn back and gesture. A couple of seconds later Jones and Skinner had joined him. Then, with a brief scuffle of boots in the dust, one by one, they crossed the sand and joined me.

  For a moment we remained motionless, listening. We exchanged looks that said none of us could hear anything. The Sarge got on his belly and wormed his way to the edge of the entrance. After a moment he rolled on his back to look at us and gestured me and Skinner to the far side, and Jones to join him.

  In that configuration, we moved into the cave. The floor seemed to have been largely cleared of rocks and gave the impression of being frequently used. The firelight we’d seen was coming from a couple of flaming torches that had been wedged into cracks in the rocks. They were positioned at a dogleg where the passage turned left and disappeared from view.

  We moved, quickly and silently to the bend where the torches were, and Sergeant Bradley dropped on his belly again, wormed his way along and peered around. I followed suit, keeping in the shadows.

  It was another long passage, ascending slightly. The midsection was in shadow, but at the far end you could see light spilling from some kind of cavern, and we could just make out the soft murmur of voices. Bradley pulled us back and spoke quietly.

  “If the intel is good, that’s Mohammed Ben-Amini in there, the fuckin’ Butcher of Al-Landy, plus three mullahs and maybe a dozen men. Her Majesty’s MoD has politely requested, if it’s at all possible, we bring Ben-Amini back in one piece so they can give him a fat pension and a big house in Surrey, and spend the next ten years pumping him for information. So, if you can take him alive, please do. If it gets too hot, plug the bastard. Let’s go.” He held up three fingers. “Flashbang, grenades, carbines.”

  We spread out and moved down the passage at a silent run, avoiding the few rocks that littered the sand. At six feet from the end, where it turned right and opened out into the firelit cavern, Bradley stopped and raised his left hand. He dropped to his belly for the third time, crawled a couple of feet and peered in. He grinned malevolently, pointed at me and jerked his thumb. I pulled a G60 stun grenade from my belt, yanked out the pin and hurled it into the cavern.

  There was a metallic clank, a second of silence, then sudden shouts and an almighty flash of three hundred thousand candles of light and one hundred and sixty decibels of detonation. We were ready; four grenades followed and exploded in rapid succession.

  Then we moved in, carbines at our shoulders and goggles to protect our eyes from the dust. It was carnage, a charnel house. Six men lay partially dismembered around a large fire. Two were mullahs, the other four were Taliban fighting men. A seventh man lay beyond the fire, clutching at his belly, his lips pulled back over his teeth, weeping and crying out. Skinner shot him in the head. We moved on, walking quickly, scanning left to right, following a narrow path among boulders. Two men in white robes, one on his knees, vomiting, the other lying facedown with his hands over his ears. I double-tapped twice and shot them both.

  Voices up ahead, crying out, shouting and weeping. The cave was growing darker as we moved away from the fire. We switched on the flashlights under the barrels of the carbines. The Sarge began to run. We kept pace. Nine men came into view. They were sitting and kneeling in the dirt, waving their arms and shouting at us. A couple struggled to their feet. Most were holding their hands up. The beams of light from our weapons played over them. They looked confused, scared, concussed from the explosions.

  Bradley shouted at them in Arabic to drop their weapons. A couple of them dropped and prostrated themselves facedown in the dirt. One of them, dressed different to the rest in a red jacket, was on all fours trying to walk away. The other six were variously on their knees or trying to get to their feet, shielding their eyes with their hands. I knew they’d gone deaf and couldn’t hear what Bradley was shouting at them. He shouted again, louder, and a couple of the guys getting to their feet took aim at the lights they could see bobbing toward them. The cave exploded with automatic fire. It was over in two seconds. They were all dead. All except Mohammed Ben-Amini, the Butcher of Al-Landy, who, dressed in his red jacket, had adopted the fetal position and was weeping convulsively.

  I slung the carbine over my shoulder, pulled my sidearm and stepped over to him. He squealed like a stuck pig as I grabbed his collar and dragged him to his knees. The Sarge, Jones and Skinner gathered around and I shoved his face toward his dead comrades.

  “Hey, Mohammed, you speak English?”

  His face was screwed up and he was babbling incoherently. Jones stepped forward with his canteen and poured a little water over his face. Mohammed spluttered and looked up. Jones offered him the canteen.

  “Here you go, boyo, have a drink. Relax.”

  His terrified eyes swiveled to Bradley and then to me. I jerked my head toward the canteen. He took a swig and wiped his mouth with his wrist. I repeated, “You speak English?”

  He nodded. “I speak some. Little.”

  He showed me what a little was with his thumb and index.

  I nodded. “We saw what you did to the village of Al-Landy. We were there...” I gestured at the four of us. “And we saw...” I put my fingers to my eyes and moved them around. “We saw what you did.”

  He made a crying face and spread his hands. “It was will of Allah! They were kafir, bad, not good believers. My men...” He gestured at his dead men. “My men had God’s anger in their hearts...”

  “You murdered fifteen children. Five of them were babies. You cut off one man’s head in front of his wife and his kids. You raped the women and the little girls, and then you killed them...”

  He leaned forward, appealing to me. “That man, he taught blasphemy. Sharia demands justice.”

  I roared, “Blasphemy? He wanted to buy a TV for the coffee shop!”

  It was like he didn’t hear me. “And the women...” He reached up toward my face, “...they had been with men…”

  “They were raped!”

  “They allowed themselves to be raped, they did not fight… All of them, the whole village was touché! Touch by shaitan!”

  There was a moment of silence. Skinner broke it by speaking what we were all thinking. “And this bastard is going to live out the rest of his fuckin’ life in luxury in Surrey, in a five fuckin’ bedroom house, while my mum and dad live on a basic pension in Essex.” He looked around at us, one by one. “That seem right to you?”

  Jones shook his head. His voice was deep, quiet and melodious, and full of menace. “My brother, Ewan, still works at the mine in Blaentillery. It’s bloody hard work, I can tell you, backbreaking, and he barely makes enough to feed the kids and pay the mortgage. So no, not really...”

  I looked at Bradley. He sighed, “Come on, lads, this is the British Army. We’re soldiers, not judges or executioners. We do as we’re told. Let’s get this bastard back to base and send him off to Kabul.”

  I didn’t move. I could still see the terrified eyes of the little four-year-old as this son of a bitch took aim at him. Every moment of the massacre was moving through my head in slow motion, every blast of automatic fire, every slash of the blade, every scream, every child. I held Bradley’s eye, but he couldn’t hold mine. Jones and Skinner didn’t budge either. They just watched him, until Jones finally said, “Hey, Sarge, don’t you need to piss or something?”

  Bradley growled, “I can piss in the cave, Jones.”

  “Ah, no, but it’s not healthy, see, Sarge? Too much ammonia in a small, cramped place, without appropriate ventilation, see? Best to piss outside. More healthy.”

  Bradley knew what he was being told—to piss off, as Brits like to say. He didn’t like it. He was old school, and I’m pretty sure that if it had been anybody else but this son of a
bitch he would have stood his ground. But he wanted this bastard punished as much as we did. So he sighed, pointed at us in turn and said what he had to say, even if he didn’t mean it.

  “But I want this man alive and well when I get back, you understand?”

  I nodded. “Don’t worry about it. We won’t do anything you wouldn’t do.”

  Skinner spat elaborately on the ground. “Not unless he does son-fink really stupid, like.”

  Jones nodded. “Yeah, boyo. Not unless he does something really, like, stupid.”

  There was a footfall. We all turned at the same time, weapons cocked and in hand, beams of light playing over the rock walls.

  A voice rang out, loud, an American voice, edged with malice and with humor.

  “The British Army does not make war on women and children, or on prisoners. It is reassuring and rewarding to hear the voice of the British trooper on the ground upholding those great values of civilization.”

  He stepped into the circle of light from our flashlights. I knew him: Captain Bill Hartmann, currently attached to Delta Force, but nobody knew where he originated. Most assumed he was CIA. Right now he had four men behind him in full battle dress, armed with HK416s.

  He smiled at us each in turn. “Hail, dear allies,” he said. “Well met. I have to congratulate you on a superb job. But you guys look tired. Why don’t you let us take it from here?”

  Bradley stepped in front of Mohammed and squared his massive shoulders.

  “This man is our prisoner and he is coming back to London with us.”

  Hartmann's smile was a thing you wanted to stamp on. He shook his head and said, “No, Sergeant, he’s not. We are taking him back to Washington.” He pointed a finger at Mohammed. “I suggest we get this piece of shit outside and you talk to your colonel on the phone. He’ll give you your new orders. We have a couple of choppers waiting. One of them will take you back to your base. Think of it as a small thank-you, for services rendered.”

  I still had my P226 stuck to the back of Mohammed’s head. I said: