Debrief

"Alicia's with Dave, Clarke."

"That idiot fop who thinks he can break into celebrity life? They won't be together much longer. If I had a nickel for every time I've heard them arguing loud enough to wake the neighbors ..."

"I know. Still, I don't like to go after other men's women. As for Erika, well, I think I want to take things slow with her."

"What? Come on, man! Those two are seriously hot!"

"Yeah, Doug," Cat agreed. "They're nice people and great actresses. I've gotten to know them a bit these past few days and they both like you. They're also into each other, although I don't think Alicia's accepted that yet. She's a bit of a homophobe."

"Right," Doug answered, throwing up his hands, "and Erika's a rebel Scientologist paladin. Both of them make me crazy."

"So get over it." Cat punched him in the arm. "So what if Alicia's a bitch? She can change. So what if Erika's religion has a bad reputation? Erika's a good person despite all that. Did you forget we have one of her people's churches on campus back in Austin? I know they're not completely bad."

"I know that too. It's kinda hard to forget they are bad as well as good, though." Doug blinked at Cat, a guess coming into his thoughts. "Wait a second. Have you and Erika...?"

"Yep," Cat confirmed, smiling. "I was with her last night while you said bye to your old girlfriend Angie. You'd better not reject Erika too long, Doug. She's very skilled." Cat smirked slyly and licked her lips, tapping her fingers on Doug's chest.

"Okay," Doug said with a wave of dismissal. "Enough crazy sex talk. I don't think I wanted to know about half this stuff. Clarke, I'm sure you didn't come in here to discuss it."

"No, man," Clarke replied, shaking his head. "It's enjoyable, but it's not why I stopped by your room. I got something else I need to share with you. Uh, is she cleared to ...?"

"Yes," Doug interrupted. "Cat's one of my Friendship initiates. She's not a high-ranking member like you or I, but she can hear whatever you want to say to me."

"Good." Clarke nodded as Cat beamed at Doug. "I think she might want to hear this too. It's a story Cat's asked me about before." He walked to a chair near the bed, took off his jacket and sat down. "By the way, Cat, your flight's been delayed. Some al-Qaeda dumb-ass threatened to blow up part of Heathrow Airport."

"Damn it!" Cat cursed, looking at Doug. He shrugged and gave her a look that said, "What can you do?" Cat nodded, then sighed and turned back to Clarke. "Is the terrorist in custody?"

"Yes, but they think he might have accomplices. All flights are grounded until Scotland Yard makes sure all their suspects are caught." Clarke shook his head. "The world just won't get out of this stupid war. I hate it so much."

"Don't we all," Doug concurred. "It's been going on since before the Middle Ages and there are no signs of stopping. It slacks off for a while and then comes back worse. I lost friends on 9-11 and I have others who are still fighting. You too, right?"

"Yep," Clarke said. "I also used to fight in the war on the front lines. That's why I'm here. You remember how we met, Deputy Doug?"

"Yes. You were in a bar on the East End nursing past sorrows. I thought Alcoholics Anonymous was taking care of that."

"It is, but there are some things I can't tell them. You've never asked me about my final mission either. Don't you want to know why I got relieved of my command?"

"No, Clarke. I figured that was your business. You're capable despite whatever happened and Keira told me it wasn't your fault. She's your longtime friend and martial arts student, so I figure she would know whether I could trust you or not. Keira vouched for you and I got to know you, and that's enough for me."

"Well, I need to tell you about my last mission anyway. I was thinking about it again tonight and I can no longer hold it inside."

"I figured as much." Doug looked at Cat. "Are you too tired to listen to him?"

"No," Cat said. "Go ahead, Clarke."

"Yeah, I'm not too tired either," Doug fibbed when Clarke looked his way. He and Cat fluffed up the bed's pillows and sat up, ready to listen. Doug grabbed the open soda can on the bedside table and took a long gulp. Clarke smiled and began his tale.

***

The Middle East. Fall 2002.

My name isn't really Clarke, but that's what most call me. The moniker was awarded during my training for the South African Special Forces Brigade. I excelled at every qualification course, so much so that my instructors took to calling me "Superman". I told them I hated that name. The other recruits were envious about it and I felt I was no one special. My only intention in doing so well was to prove the formerly racist South African government was wrong about people with my skin color. We can be great. The instructors accepted my words and dropped the nickname they'd given me. They started calling me "Clarke" instead. That title I decided I could accept.

You probably wouldn't be able to pronounce my real name. It means "wind in the valley" among my native African tribe. The witch doctor gave it to me at birth when he prophesied my destiny. I still laugh at the name today. As I said before, I'm nobody special. Why should I put on airs?

Even with my modesty, I achieved great things in life. At just shy of thirty years old I was a highly decorated officer in this planet's finest Special Forces unit. At least, that's what I used to be. I have a great job today too. I gotta forget about that job now, though. I need to revisit the past.

One year ago, I was the field leader of an elite counterterrorist force directed by the United Nations. My team was composed of soldiers and support troops from various countries around the world. Most of those who are still alive work in your club now, Doug. You know Yoshi Aoi, the Japanese chef with the soul of a samurai. Jodi Lee Nichols, the Aussie waitress who used to check out strange territory for me. Mike Hernandez, the Central American demolitions engineer who's become your disc jockey. Wouter Staal, my reliable Dutch coordinator. Contessa Winfield, the sweet sexy Irish-Italian doctor from Greenwich Village. Asher Stravjan, the albino Pole who cleans your building's floors.

Asher's a particularly interesting guy. He looks like an old man even though he's my age. That's because of his condition, as you're aware. Asher's got the genes of just about every persecuted people in history inside him. His father was a Roma Gypsy and his mother was a Polish Jew. He's albino, gay and extremely talkative. Correction, he used to be extremely talkative. You'll soon find out why he ain't that way so much anymore.

Like Jodi Lee, Asher served me as an infiltrator and scout. He spoke over twenty languages back in the day and could talk to anyone. He's also very insightful and a master of trickery. He can get close to you and become your best friend and you would never know he was planning to stab you in the back. Not that he would ever betray you or me, obviously.

Asher's been picked on all his life, but instead of letting that weaken him he's chosen to rise above it. He's very like me in that way. He's quite handsome, he sort of looks like the great action star Clint Eastwood when he's not disguised. His father's people trained him well in Gypsy stuff — you know, costumes, juggling and acrobatics. Asher is also a genius at disarming bombs and tense situations. What, you want me to move on? Fine.

There are some others on my team you don't know. Farouk al-Kharish, the Saudi sergeant. Baxter Page, the American photographer and computer expert. God only knows where those two are these days. Then there were those you'll never get to meet, like Chen Ming, my Chinese second-in-command. Also Tanya Brown, who was a sniper born to a couple from Kazakhstan and New Zealand. Tanya and Jodi Lee were very good friends. Oh, wait, you did know her? Shoot, Doug, I'm sorry. This story may be a downer for you.

I can continue? Good. Thanks. You got another soda? Thanks again.

I had many other comrades back then too, lots of men and women of diverse backgrounds. I called most of them lovers and all of them good friends. We were made up of all human divisions — sexual orientations, religions, nationalities, you name it. The only things we had in common were strong hearts, open minds, and intense military training. Almost every country in the United Nations sent people to the team. We had US Marines, Army Rangers, and Navy SEALs. There were also British Special Air Service, German GSG-9, French GIGN, you name it. The U.N. built us to be diverse and fight terrorism. We worked together very well. They didn't mean for us to break military protocol as much as we did, but we got good results so it was usually okay.

As of 2002, we had been in existence four years. I served my country for seven years as a Special Forces officer and ended up highly decorated, so the U.N. requested I lead their new elite unit. My government agreed and signed the transfer. I was still in the South African military, but I only answered to three men outside my team.

First and foremost was General George Hawkins of Her British Majesty's Army. He was a veteran of the joint U.S. and U.K. peacekeeping missions in the Middle East, where most of my team's operations took place. He kinda reminded me of the late actor Richard Crenna, if you want a physical description. Hawkins was an elderly esteemed soldier. I really respected him. He was a good leader and he was always on my side. I'm not sure what he's doing now.

Hawkins's number two was an American colonel named Luther Murdoch. That guy looked like Gary Busey, the actor who almost got the Oscar for playing Buddy Holly in 1978. Thin gray-haired little jerk, you could easily pick him out of a crowd. Murdoch was a micro-manager, a rear-echelon motherfucker. He had his own ideas for how my team should fight and didn't mind telling us. I always knew he hated me even though he never would say it. He envied that I was a great commander and soldier and he was not. There's a bunch of guys like Murdoch in every war.

The third guy I answered to is someone you know quite well, Doug: our chaplain, Ben Shapiro. Shap was a U.S. Marine captain back then. Today he's the pastor of a Baptist church in Austin, Texas where you're from. Shap's a good man, Christian but open-minded. You can tell him anything and he'll usually absolve you right off if it's a sin. He'll laugh along with you too. You've met him, right, Cat? No? Think of the great black actor Morgan Freeman in the prime of his life.

Okay, you got most of the players now. There are some others, but give me a few minutes to get to them. The mission we're concerned with was code named "Operation Sweetheart". They briefed me on it at my team's main base in the Socotra Islands off the coast of Yemen one sunny day in September 2002.

"This is where I believe Aziz is held up," Asher was telling Hawkins, Chen, Murdoch and myself. "A small village fifty clicks southwest of Kandahar."

Asher and my other scouts had been gathering intelligence in southern Afghanistan for several months. We were after Salem Abdul Aziz, also known as "the Scorpion Pharaoh". He was a Taliban mullah suspected of serious war crimes. Aziz escaped the United States' overthrow of his theocratic Afghan regime thanks to connections with al-Qaeda. Some of his worst offenses included training several 9-11 hijackers along with sponsoring numerous shootings and suicide bombings all over the Middle East. The most famous was that U.S. Navy destroyer that got hit in June 2002. Seventeen sailors died.

What's that, Doug? You say Erika knew some sailors on that destroyer? You can tell her my team and I avenged their deaths.

Aziz also burned down at least four Afghan villages during the US war with the Taliban and killed over one thousand civilians. He hated anybody who didn't follow his extreme view of Islam and punished them severely. Aziz was really the kind of mullah who makes his religion look bad.

Hey, stop frowning at me like that! In general, I have nothing against Islam. Most of the followers are okay people. Farouk and some other guys on my team are Muslim. I own a Koran too, and I read it almost as often as I read my Bible. I like how Islam says you should submit to God and let him guide you. I also like how it says God is testing you constantly and never gives you challenges that you can't pass. Islam is wonderful when it's done right, it's aided a lot of scientific and cultural advancements. However, too many people in history have done it wrong. Aziz was the kind of guy who exemplified that.

Some followers of the religion have done it right, too. My Saudi sergeant pal Farouk was a good example. He told me he always hated the constant war in his country. The idea conflicts between competing Islamic factions, intolerance of other religions, corruption, terrorism, religious police, everything. Farouk thought it all hurt Muslims more than anyone else.

He wanted Muslims to peacefully co-exist with the rest of the world and stop harming each other, but he saw no way to get that to happen other than being a good man himself and declaring a personal war against intolerance. That was why he joined the Saudi Army, to fight terrorism. Farouk wanted to build a better future for his people and figured that if he could stop enough Islamic fanatics from harming others, he could make it so. By stopping the worst of his religion's enemies, he could maybe inspire all the other followers to calm down and lighten up.

Farouk told me he wanted to be friendly towards others, let them do their thing as long as they let him do his. Farouk's thing was being a Muslim. Unless you threatened that, he had no problem with you. Farouk saw no reason to spread his religion to the rest of the world unless they wanted it. Other people had to make their own decisions on the path to paradise. Sure you might not like what someone was doing with their life, but you didn't have to try and force them to stop doing it unless they were actively hurting people for no good reason. Let infidels be infidels. It was better to make friends with them and exchange what gifts you could give each other than try to change them, Farouk always said. Who knows, you might be going to heaven together since Allah loves endless variety.

Farouk was a funny guy, very straight-laced, but a good man. The other Muslims on my team were pretty much like him.

Also pertaining to my mission was another follower of Islam, a woman who does her religion right named Deeyah. Are you familiar with her? No? She's a pop singer, born in Norway but very famous in the Middle East. Folks like the Taliban often harass her for speaking out for women's rights. She has this amazing voice and likes to make catchy dance albums about good fortune and love. Deeyah's also a real looker with a great body, creamy brown skin and long flowing black hair. She's tall, hourglass figure, dark laughing eyes ... I got a picture here somewhere. Here we go. Yes, Cat, Deeyah and I are intimately acquainted, long time past. Aziz, her distant cousin, was the reason why we met.

What, you didn't know she had a terrorist in her family? It's a common sickness over in the Middle East, I'm sorry to say. Family squabbles are the worst. Only battles about religious doctrine interpretation come close. The Middle East has plenty of both in serious amount. It has always been that way. I don't know if things will ever be peaceful in that part of the world. Pardon me for my sigh.

"You're sure the Scorpion Pharaoh is there?" Hawkins asked Asher, who nodded and bent his pointer.

"Ninety-five percent. All my sources point at the caves near this village in southwestern Afghanistan. Aziz could have moved on by now but I don't think we should ignore this chance."

"It will be your ass if he has moved on, Lieutenant," snapped Murdoch. "Your boss's also." The motherfucker pointed at me.

"Mock me all you want, Murdoch," I answered. "I think Asher's information is solid. Captain Chen, what about you?"

My second-in-command nodded agreement. He resembled that Hong Kong action star Tony Leung, the short one. Chen was very dependable, a real solid guy. He was also an ace scout like Asher and Jodi Lee.

"I vouch for Asher's knowledge," Chen said. "He's never let us down before."

"He better not now," replied Hawkins. "Deeyah's life is depending on it."

Did I forget to mention Aziz had kidnapped Deeyah? I'm sorry about that. It happened about three weeks before our briefing. He despised her, you see. A liberal Muslim female entertainer in his family was a personal insult to Aziz.

The Taliban doesn't like women getting empowered. Really, they don't. They won't educate them, they won't give them legal protection, they won't give them any advantages at all. Not only that, they want their whole view followed by the rest of the world. A famous flamboyant female pop singer like Deeyah would not exist if the Taliban had their way. A woman like you wouldn't either, Cat, and definitely not one like Keira or Erika. Also, men like you and me, Doug, would not exist. It doesn't matter to the Taliban that millions all over the Middle East like Deeyah, Muslim and otherwise. The Saudi Royal family are fans of her, and they maintain Islam's holy places. None of that counted as far as Aziz was concerned.

Deeyah was giving a concert in Dubai for the impoverished. She likes to use her art to promote charity work and peace. Aziz's militia crashed the after-party and grabbed her. The U.N.'s spies intensified their tracking of Aziz after that. We wanted to find the Scorpion before he beheaded Deeyah live on the Internet as he kept threatening to do. He was putting out these ranting blogs about how her death was Allah's will and he was going to kill her at the start of Islam's holiest time, the month of Ramadan. Cleanse the world. You see why I don't like this spawn of a goat?

You want to know what Aziz looks like? Okay, imagine the meanest Taliban motherfucker you can. Beadier eyes, and he's Egyptian. His beard and turban were really long, gray and dirty. Got it? Good.

"I don't care about Deeyah," Murdoch said. "She's just some pop singer. Aziz's capture is our first priority. If we can interrogate him, we might be able to prevent al-Qaeda's next major attack."

"Saving his hostage is our first concern, Murdoch," I countered. "Deeyah's well-known in the Middle East. People ain't gonna like it if she dies."

"These people kill their own every day, Major. Thousands of civilians have died or lost their homes and families. I don't see them complaining about that much. We're trying to help them stop it and they keep protesting and yelling 'Death to Infidels'."

"Not all of them, Murdoch. Some of them appreciate us."

"Enough, you two!" Hawkins cut us off. "We're not here to argue politics. Clarke, you need to bring Aziz in so he can face trial. We need a Nuremberg for this war and the Scorpion would be a good start. Save his hostage if you can, but if she dies, it doesn't matter. It'll be just one more crime on his record. I want her alive, my wife and I love her music, but she might make a good martyr also."

"Definitely a better martyr than all these terrorists who keep committing suicide and calling themselves holy," Asher agreed. "We live in interesting times, eh, Chen?"

My number two ignored the ancient Chinese curse. "When do we ship out?"

"As soon as you're ready," Hawkins said.

"One day to rally up and supply," I told him. "Then two or three days of transit. I'll need all sixty-five of my team. Asher, I want you to take Rashid, Jamal and a couple other guys ahead of us. Get into the village where you think Aziz is and confirm that he's there. Make sure everyone you take can pass for locals. If what I know about the Scorpion is correct, he'll have the people living in fear of him and worrying about us. They'll want us to save them but they won't seek us out. They'll shout 'Death to the Crusaders!' in the streets if Pharaoh Aziz tells them. Be careful, my friend."