Now it was the Big Man’s turn. He led me up the stairs to the roof, where the water carrier placed me in a snug corner that gave me cover from the regime along with a view of the whole top of the building. The water carrier ducked back down a few steps as the Big Man crouched and crept to the center of the roof with a homemade hand grenade. He’d let me hold the explosive, which was about one-quarter the size of a stick of dynamite but heavy, being packed with nails and bolts. As he lit the grenade, I raised my camera and just held my finger down on the button again. It took a second for the fuse to catch, and once it did the Big Man stood there for a moment watching it burn, waiting, so the enemy wouldn’t have time to toss it back after it landed. As he cocked back I watched on the camera, one frame at a time, until he launched it onto the rooftop of the building where the regime boys were holed up.
BOOM! The sound tore through my ears, but my finger never left the button, especially once I saw him pull another explosive out of his pocket and light it up. This time I was able to capture the grenade in midair after it left his hand while he was in full swing, arm flung in an arc across the sky. By the time we heard the second explosion we were all hurrying back down the stairs, but the noise left my head ringing nevertheless. I couldn’t understand how these guys could still hear.
Emerald Eyes was waiting for me at the bottom of the steps, black scarf still wrapped neatly around his face, holding a machine gun that probably weighed more than he did. I am no gun expert, but it looked like an M60. Behind Emerald Eyes was a scene I’d missed on my way to the roof. The wall to the outside had been completely blasted away, revealing an unobstructed view of what looked like a city square—probably a beautiful sight before the air raids began. Now there wasn’t a structure left that was salvageable, just looming orphaned walls and mountains of the same sand-colored rocks that used to make up the buildings. At one point a jihadi appeared seemingly out of nowhere, strolling through the wasteland like it was just another day at the office.
After the water carrier once again set me up in a safe corner, he and the Big Man stepped back while Emerald Eyes took up his position and got ready to fire. It was dead silent. He placed his back to the wall next to a hole they’d made, and then picked up the massive gun, rested it across the opening, and swiftly squeezed the trigger. Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat! The sound was ten times more deafening than an AK, but being that one hand was holding my camera and the other the button to shoot, my ears were left bare while everyone else covered theirs. Emerald Eyes was jerking all over from the kickback, but he held on and showed no fear, knowing that the bullets could be returned any second. He fired off two bursts like this, and then we fell back without any response from the regime. By now my leg had completely stopped shaking.
Not too long after we got back to the hot stove, the Big Man and Emerald Eyes advised me that it probably wasn’t safe to stay after how they’d just antagonized the enemy, and said I should go. I didn’t want to leave yet, but when two straight-up suicidal killers tell me a place is not safe, I listen.
I made my way back to headquarters a few blocks away to spend the night, escorted by the water carrier. After looking at my work and taking into account how long I had been in Syria, the places I had been, and the fact that I had received not one scratch the entire time, I figured it was best to head home to see what I could do with the photos I had while they were still relevant. I was a lightweight and I knew it—no training, no big media organization backing me up, and no connections except the ones I’d made myself. I was relying solely on my instincts to keep me alive and learn the job, and now those instincts were telling me to get the hell out of there. The next day, the sheikh my fixer had introduced me to arranged a ride back to Turkey with a cab driver I had met several times before. His name was Abu Mohammad and I was a fucking idiot for getting into his car, but I figured after eighteen days of persistently not getting shot, what could go wrong on my way home?
I’d finished my last cigarette by the time the driver came back out to the car, and as the cab cruised down the road outside Aleppo on the way to the border, I tapped at my phone to bring up some tunes. I looked up to see us passing the main entrance of the infantry school in al-Muslimiya, which the FSA had taken from the regime shortly before I arrived in country. Suddenly a silver Jeep Cherokee cut across from the oncoming lane, forcing the cab to stop short.
“Whoa!” I yelled. I was grinning, thinking we had just averted a serious accident. Then three men jumped out of the Jeep now blocking the road,
