Chapter 13
9.30am Afghanistan time.
Everyone in the car was silent as Twitch drove towards the city, the old rattle of the engine filling the gaps in the air.
Marc and Carlos sat in the back, their eyes gazing out at the country that rolled past the windows. Fields of dirt and dry grass bordered the road that they drove on with the occasional half-demolished brick building breaking the scenery every few hundred yards.
Jules was picking at a stray thread on her trousers just below where the rifle was resting on her lap trying to distract herself from what had occurred less than an hour ago.
The same fingers that now pulled at the thin piece of thread had driven a knife into someone's body. Those fingers had killed a person, a man.
She found herself wondering if he was a father, a husband or a brother – perhaps he had been all of those things, but no longer.
Shifting in the seat, uncomfortable with her thoughts, Jules turned and looked out the window, after all why should she care about that man?
He had a gun and was most probably a member of the Taliban. If he had found them he would have shot them without a moment's hesitation, Julia knew that. She knew that if she hadn't done what she did they would all be dead.
It was self-defence. So why did it bother her so much and why could she still feel his blood on her hands? She looked down at them now just to remind herself that it wasn't there, it was just in her head.
It was all in her head. She had washed the blood off her hands before his body had turned cold in the dirt.
They had just passed a goat wandering alone along the road, Jules staring after it with slight confusion, when a loud gruff noise erupted from the seat behind her.
Julia knew that sound well and it distracted her enough to roll her eyes and let out a small sigh.
"When are we going to get there?" Carlos asked, tapping his fingers against the window ledge where he rested his arm.
"When we get there," Twitch told him from the front seat calmly, like a father would tell his child when they began to grow irritating.
Carlos narrowed his eyes at Twitch, "Who even is this person we're supposed to be meeting? Can we trust them?"
"Commander Strong trusts them, or else he wouldn't send us there."
Everyone remained quiet.
"Would he?" Twitch frowned, his voice rising a little in worry.
"No," Julia told him, "No, he wouldn't."
Carlos leaned forward and placed his hands on either side of her head rest, "Well, just in case you're wrong-"
Julia looked at him from the corner of her eye.
"What?" Carlos arched an eyebrow, "I was just going to say that if you're wrong, I don't want to be stuck in a bloody gun fight with a full bladder, so we can pull over soon please so I can take a piss?"
Twitch raised a hand from the steering wheel, looking at Marc in the rear view mirror, "Yeah actually, that sounds like a good idea."
"Okay, pull over. But 5 minutes only," Marc told them.
"Right-o," Twitch turned the wheel and drove on to a dirt field beside the road, a dust cloud instantly seeming to engulf the vehicle on all sides.
"I don't fancy being stuck out here at nightfall." Marc explained.
"Hear, hear," Twitch cheered seat whilst Carlos remained pressed close to the back of Jules's seat.
Julia turned and regarded Carlos curiously, her brow arching in fake bravado.
Their heads were close together but there was no ounce of sexual tension between them as Carlos saw straight past her defences.
Julia's eyebrow dropped back to its natural resting position as it felt like Carlos could read every thought that had run through her head since she had killed that man.
Every wall she had built up came crumbling down around Carlos, she couldn't help it.
There were times when she may want to kill Marc but she loved him with her entire being despite everything, but that wasn't what she had with Carlos.
The love shared between her and Carlos was strictly platonic yet fierce. They had been through so much that it inconceivable that they wouldn't have a bond, a tie, there.
Carlos's hand slipped forward off the seat and squeezed her shoulder, no words needed between them.
She could see what he would say in his eyes, that it was alright. She had done what she needed to do and hearing it from someone else helped.
She gave him a small smile to let him know that he had reached her and Carlos kept his hand there for a few seconds longer before he pulled it away and sat back in his seat.
"Right, five minutes and I want you back in the jeep." Marc said as the vehicle came to a sudden halt, the tyres skidding slightly.
Carlos and Twitch leapt from car before it had fully stopped leaving Marc and Julia alone as the dust cloud settled around them.
Julia looked over her shoulder at Marc and saw that he was watching her closely.
He had seen the scene between her and Carlos and it wasn't meant not to be seen, there was nothing romantic or secretive them, so Julia just leaned back in her seat and told him that she was going to try and get some sleep.
* * *
Samantha was rushing through her office packing everything she might need away into a black leather satchel when her office door was flung open.
She looked up and saw Michael Truro stood before her, his chest rising and falling as if he had just sprinted to her office from the operations room.
"Did no one teach you to knock before entering a room?" Sam asked him, turning back to her bag as she slipped a file inside it.
"Bugger that," Michael stepped inside her office and shut the door behind him, his eyes were wild as he asked, "Is it true?"
"Yes," Sam looked him straight in the eye, "I'm sorry, but yes it's true that the Spice Girls have broken up."
Sam laughed when Michael sucked his cheeks in, trying to remain calm.
"You know what I mean," Michael snapped, "I just passed Jonathon in the hall. Is it true you're going after Ridgeway?"
The smile on Sam's lips faded away and she began to rummage in her desk drawer for something, anything.
"Well?" Michael shouted.
Sam snapped her head up, "Yes, it's true, Ridgeway will-"
"Are you insane?" Michael frowned, his voice losing its volume but what it lacked in velocity he made up for in sincerity.
"Actually don't answer that," Michael held up a hand, "I know it's true."
Sam rolled her eyes at his melodramatic behaviour, "Would you relax, I only want to chat to him."
"About a top-secret programme he founded that resulted in the death of two servicemen under his charge, yeah that should go down really well." Michael began to pace the length of her office; his broad shoulders making the room seem smaller than normal.
Sam sighed, "Michael, I've exhausted all other possible leads. Ramirez and Reynolds have seemingly fled the country and the other two men in the programme that could shed some light on it, as you said, are dead. There is no paperwork or record of any missions that they undertook."
Sam slammed a hand down on the table, "Hell, I don't even know where they did their training or what the programme was even about! Ridgeway does."
Michael watched her as she spoke.
"I'm going, Michael," Sam told him, "And you can't stop me."
Michael let out a breath he hadn't realised he had been holding, "Fine. What's your plan?"
"Ridgeway arrives in two days' time for a conference with his british counterpart. I've done some digging and he's going to be staying at the Ritz."
"So your plan is to walk into the Ritz and knock on his hotel room door?" Michael's face revealed his scepticism on her plan, "You wouldn't even get out of the elevator before you were apprehended. The security service will have that whole floor locked down."
"I know," A mischievous smile spread across her lips.
Michael frowned, "Why am I not going to like what you're about to say?"
Sam laughed as she reached into her back pocket and removed a pristine, brand-new security card with her face and a false name stamped across the front of it. She handed it to Michael.
"That friend I was telling you about," Sam smiled as she watched the truth dawn on Michael's face, "He owes me a small favour for something I did a few years ago. Not only did he tell me where Ridgeway was staying, he got me put onto his personal security detail."
There was a hint of pride in Michael's face when he handed her the card back, "I'd like to shake the hand of the man that trained you."
Sam looked at him from the corner of her eye in humour, "Go and look in the mirror then."
Michael laughed then before his face turned serious, "When you do this, I want to be there, just in case."
"I'm not your student any longer, Michael," Sam told him as she zipped up her bag.
"I know," Michael told her, "but still, if something goes wrong you're going to need someone watching your back."
Sam wasn't planning on torturing Ridgeway she just wanted to chat to him, although he was most probably under control of the state secrets act so he wouldn't be able to say anything anyway, he might let something slip that could give Sam a new direction to head in.
She had to hope.
"Okay, you can come," Sam told him, secretly pleased to be working with him again, as she headed for the door, "But you stay in the car."
Michael held up his hands in front of him, "You got it . . . boss."
Sam paused at the door and looked at him over her shoulder. There was a smile on his lips but it was soft as he gazed at her.
"I'll text you the details," Sam said and she hurried from her office, unsure what to make of Michael and trying to keep certain memories from their past from resurfacing.
* * *
The conversation in the car drifted into stunned silence as they neared the city.
The occasional outhouse they had spotted every few miles now turned into a continuous stream of houses on their right hand side, but these buildings spoke of warfare.
On one house, half of its front facing wall had been demolished in a bomb, the pile of rubble lying dejectedly at its doorstep. On another, the roof had collapsed inside and on another; chunks of brick had been torn out of it in the debris.
Twitch kept driving forward, the map leading them into the city, but he slowed down considerably.
It was early afternoon when they reached the city. Julia expected to see people on the streets, going about their daily business as much as they could, but she wasn't expecting this.
No one.
There was literally no one on the streets, the entire place felt like a ghost town and yet she could not shake the feeling that they were being watched.
Julia told Twitch and he sped up again, navigating around a few cars that had been left to rust on the roadside.
The devastation grew worse the more they neared the centre. Every few hundred yards a pile of rubble taller than a house would be spilling over into the road and it couldn't have been anything other than a building Julia realised.
She wondered how many people had been in there when it had been bombed, how many had managed to flee before the missiles hit?
Shadows began to be cast over the road as they passed into the centre, the remaining buildings acting as a maze as they wound their way through the labyrinth of wide dirt roads and narrow alleys.
Julia had passed her rifle to Carlos in the back as she navigated to Twitch.
She negotiated with Strong's handwriting once again, confirming the street name before she told them, "From here, it should be two blocks due east."
"I think we should hide the car and continue on foot," Marc suggested, "It might be a good idea to make our arrival a surprise."
"No complaints back here," Carlos agreed, the tip of the rifle resting upon the edge of the rolled down window.
A few yards down the road, Twitch found an empty garage space and pulled up underneath it.
As soon as they stopped, everyone climbed out, the humid heat wrapping around them like a warm furnace.
Resuming their positions like clockwork, Marc took the lead, an AK-47 resting in his arms, Twitch directly behind him, then it was Julia with the map and then Carlos brought up the rear with the other rifle.
They walked in single file, their shoulder skimming the wall as they placed one boot in front of the other in quick progression.
Nearing the end of a tight alley, Julia's heart was racing as they reached a crossroads a hundred yards wide, "We need to go straight across and continue down the alley."
Carlos moved up from the back as he and Marc pressed themselves to both side of the opening.
"Cover me," Marc instructed Carlos.
Julia kept an eye on their rear as Marc took the first journey across the crossroads. Jules's heart was thrumming loudly in her chest until the only other sound she could hear was the soft thud of their boots against the dirt.
"Twitch, you next," Carlos instructed as Marc reached the other side safely.
Julia moved up into the space Twitch had just vacated and looked across at Carlos, his eyes were wide and focused.
"You alright?" He asked as he turned and scanned the rooftops quickly but efficiently.
Jules just nodded.
"You know you did what you had to do, don't you? That man would have killed us if you hadn't."
"I know," Jules nodded, "That's not the problem I'm having though."
"Oh?" Carlos frowned and looked at her.
"It was easy," Julia admitted with a small frown etching into her brow, "It was too easy for me to kill him, and I don't know why. Why was it easy for me Carlos? Why?"
Carlos's eyes grew wide as he stared at her in shock.
Before he could say anything Marc called across to her. Turning away from Carlos she checked one last time that it was clear, although she already knew it would be, and hurried across the road, keeping her head low as she did so.
When she reached the other side, Marc pulling her in, he signalled to Carlos and they were soon all across and continuing onwards. Carlos avoided Jules's gaze as they headed down the alley, their footsteps echoing off the walls.
"Left," Julia told them when they reached the end, "Third house from the end."
Breaking out into a bottleneck street with tall buildings on both sides, Julia felt the tension rise in her body. This would be a perfect place for an ambush.
Stopping every few feet behind an abandoned car, Julia packed her map away into the pocket on her shoulder strap and took out the handgun from the waistband of her trousers which Marc had given her in exchange for the rifle.
It must have only been a two minute walk but it felt like a year had passed when they finally reached the house, their muscles tense with exhaustion.
Twitch stepped forward and knocked on the door after confirming it was the right one with Julia. The clothes he wore would help disguise him to any unsavoury people that may be in the house.
"Perhaps they've gone shopping," Carlos suggested when there was no response.
Twitch knocked again, "Or maybe they've gone on holiday."
Carlos sniggered a little but he kept his eyes on the road behind them when they heard a man's voice speak from inside in his native tongue.
'Who is it?'
Twitch looked at the others with wide eyes, asking for advice on what to say.
Julia and Carlos shared a look, they had to think fast.
'Who's there? What do you want?'
"Commander Strong sent us," Marc shouted back through the door.
His words were met with silence as the others looked at each other, the tension growing uncontrollably.
"We can't stay out here much longer," Carlos whispered to Julia, his fingers re-gripping the rifle when it seemed that the person wasn't going to open the door.
She began to reach into her pocket for the address. Perhaps she had read it wrong?
But even as she thought it, Julia was confident that she hadn't.
Her fingers had just closed around the piece of paper when she heard a lock being pulled back across the door.
Raising her gun, Jules walked behind Twitch to cover him although Marc was already doing it.
As the door swung open, the first thing Julia noticed was that the man's hands were free of any weapons. The second thing she noticed was that there seemed to be no one else in the room behind him, but she couldn't be sure about the entire building.
Turning to look at the man, Julia was shocked to find that he was young, perhaps only into his twenties with a frail figure. The caramel skin on his forehead was shining with sweat and neither the ragged mass of black hair on his head or the light dusting of a beard across his lower jaw did nothing to help him appear older.
He was dressed in jeans, dirty white trainers and a plain blue t-shirt that was much too big for him that it bunched slightly at his hips.
His eyes, wide and shimmering brown, looked between the four of them in shock.
"Hasan?" Julia asked him, remembering the name from the information Strong had given them.
The young boy snapped his head up to look at her, growing more confused when he saw that she was a woman.
"Commander Strong sent us." Julia repeated.
The boy suddenly turned back into the house in a rush, causing them all to train their weapons on him in an instant.
The boy froze as he saw the guns pointed at him but made it clear that he wasn't trying to do anything bad and simply began to call back into the house.
They slowly lowered their weapons again.
A string of foreign words left the boy's mouth in such a hurry that none of them could understand what he was saying but there was one word that rang a bell.
Twitch looked back at them all, "Kazeem? Did he just say-"
Jules and the others shared looks of confusion when Hasan's questions were being answered by another voice in the same native tongue.
This voice was rougher compared to Hasan's and growing louder. A few moments later another figure descended some stairs and joined Hasan at the door where he had to jockey for space beside the broad-shouldered man.
Jules stared up into the face of the man. His caramel coffee skin seemed somehow tanned and his long black hair had been cut shorter, to just below his shoulders, and pulled back into a ponytail. He no longer wore his uniform, choosing trousers and a tunic instead, but he still appeared formidable as Julia remembered him.
"Kazeem," Jules exclaimed in shock.
He saw her and smiled, all time seeming to have stood still. Julia never thought that she would have ever seen him again, when the smile died on his lips and he stood back.
"Hurry, hurry, get inside," Kazeem pulled Hasan out of the way to allow them pass.
They all filed in and the door shut behind them, their boots clipping against the tiled flooring, as darkness engulfed them except for the light that filtered in through the barred windows in the corner of the building.
"Kazeem," Julia gasped, "What are you doing here?"
"Commander Strong reached out to me and said that you may need a hand," Kazeem lifted his arms out to the side, "So, here I am."
Jules and the others simply stood in their hallway and stared at Kazeem and Hasan, unsure of how their paths had led them to this point, and what it meant for their future.