stop. He was exhausted. Beat. But he didn’t want to stop.
He walked back to check on each of his Marines and told Barrett to change his socks. Barrett got blisters just looking at a combat boot. And Garcia made sure everybody had water.
Dodging back between two Abrams tanks that would’ve qualified for antique-vehicle plates, Garcia dropped to the ground. And as soon as his ass hit the grass, he knew he’d made a mistake. The weariness came over him like a drug. First, he’d been riding the cosmic meth; now, the downers had him.
He made himself breathe deeply. And got just fumes. The column of vehicles had come to a halt. A tank idled in front of him.
The crew had given the big boy a name, painted down the gun tube: “Compton’s Revenge.”
Garcia looked up at the turret. The tank commander was a black dude. Couldn’t see his rank. But he looked right off the block.
Probably a lieutenant, Garcia figured. The Army didn’t have standards like the Marines.
Garcia threw the TC a home-boy sign. Just to check him out.
The TC hesitated. Then he grinned big and threw it back.
Garcia smiled and nodded. They understood each other. Let bygones be bygones. Compton, Watts, they were all gone now.
Garcia gestured toward the fighting below and signed again:
The TC signed back:
The column of vehicles began to move again. The Marines up ahead rose from their spots by the roadside, rolling to their feet, top-heavy, readjusting packs and straps before gripping their rifles at the ready again.
There was no alarm, no warning. Nobody heard the drones coming in. Until they shrieked as they plunged into the column. Garcia watched the tank with the TC from Compton get hit and explode.
Two Bradleys got it farther down the slope. A burning soldier leapt from one, then fell. Marines rushed to roll him over. But he was a crisp.
The Army didn’t screw around. Say that for them. They pushed the burning vehicles out of the way and kept on moving.
All in all, Garcia decided he’d rather walk.
“For God’s sake, Avi,” Harris said, “you’ll get your chance.” He snorted to himself. “You’re going to get more chances than you want.”
“I still protest. As commander of the 10th Israeli Armored Brigade, I had the right to lead the first assault.”
Harris had to discipline himself. He needed sleep, and his temper was on a short fuse.
“That’s bullshit, and you know it. We needed an infantry-heavy force to get up on the heights. Tanks wouldn’t have gotten off the beach. The road wouldn’t—”
“And now? My brigade is still in your ships. And the battle has moved into the Jezreel.”
“First of all, they’re not my goddamned ships. Second, you know you’re scheduled to go ashore tonight. There’ll be plenty of Jihadis left for you and your men. What’s this really about, Avi?”
“I protest.” The brigadier from the Israeli Exile Force pointed at the letter he had laid on Harris’s desk. “My brigade had a moral and military right to take precedence. We’ve been treated with prejudice.”
“Jesus Christ,” Harris said, instantly wishing he’d chosen different words, “your brigade would’ve been shot to bits going up that single goddamned road. The operation would’ve been a disaster. And I would’ve been accused of using your brigade as cannon fodder. Along with sixteen kinds of anti-Semitism. And you damned well know it. Now, to hell with rank. Man to man, I want you to tell me what this is all about.”
“You have my letter.”
Harris picked up the letter and crumpled it, then pitched it toward a wastebasket. He missed. The uneven ball meandered across the deck.
“Go back to your ship. Just get your brigade ready to go ashore. You’re going to get all the fighting you want. And if you deviate one inch from your written orders, I’ll relieve you and distribute your battalions among the 1st ID’s brigades. You understand me?”
Avi Dorn saluted, turned, and marched out of the compartment.
When the hatch had closed behind the Israeli exile, Harris dropped into a chair. What in the name of God was
He took a long drink of bottled water, then went to check on his staff’s preparations to move operations to a command post ashore.
As he was ferried back toward his transport ship, Brigadier Avi Dorn closed his eyes. Shutting out the day and his personal history and the memory of his ruined nation. He just thought about Harris. With regret.
He liked Harris and respected him. And he knew that every word the general had spoken was true. But if the rebirth of Israel meant sacrificing one American general, it would not be the first sacrifice. Nor, Dorn thought, the last.
A renegade spray of salt water slapped his cheek. He opened his eyes again.
Just let them wait until the fighting’s done, Dorn thought. He wanted Harris calling the shots until the shooting stopped.
All he could taste was blood.
Teeth could be replaced, Major Nasr told himself. He’d lost a canine on the upper left and two teeth below it. A couple of others were loose. But he’d had loose teeth before. He tried to keep his tongue from testing them.
And noses could be fixed. He knew that from experience. Which is why it was bullshit that anyone could recognize him by the nose that ran in his mother’s family. Anyway, he’d had his father’s nose. Broken twice — once playing football in high school and once in Nigeria, in the most desperate brawl of his life. He still had please- wake-me-up-now dreams about that one.
Ribs, too. Just tape ’em up. As long as your lungs weren’t punctured.
Don’t think like that, he told himself. Don’t start thinking like that.
His balls hurt, too. And they’d beat him until his bowels gave out. Which, he figured, just made him stink like their entire goddamned city.
“Holy Nazareth.” Personally, he would’ve been glad to let the Ji-hadis have it. Even Jesus had packed up and left as soon as he cleared the back orders at the carpentry shop.
The police team came back in. One of them turned Nasr over with his boot. Shining a heavy flashlight in his face. Nasr had gotten intimately familiar with that flashlight.
What surprised him was how crude they were. He would’ve expected more sophisticated forms of torture. But his captors were content just to beat the hell out of him.
“My name is Gemal. I come from Sidon. I was only looking for work. In the lands Allah has given back to his people.”
The boot tip found a soft spot in Nasr’s back. And it went in hard. Twice.
Kidneys were not so easy to fix as noses.
“You shit-eating dog. Are you laughing at us? You think we don’t know who you are? You piece of filth.”
“Allah knows the truth of what I say. I swear—”
The boot went into his ribs. More blood came up. Nasr gagged, choked, finally spit out the clot. Or whatever had come loose.
“You’re a Christian spy. We know this. Speak the truth. Maybe we’ll let you live.”
“Brothers… My name is Gemal. I come from Sidon. I—”
A fist rebroke his nose, smashing the back of his head into the concrete. Nasr didn’t want to go out. To lose consciousness was to lose control.
He almost laughed. At himself. As if he were in control.
“You understand,” the deep-voiced officer said, “that we’re only preparing you. The men who will question
