Two seconds later, the truck rose a full three yards into the air, leaving a gaping crater instantly. Due to the force of the blast, the shockwave made the Merc somersault to the right before crashing into the crowds who were jamming the sidewalk. No one could survive that, he thought. It would take hours for fire crews to cut free their mangled bodies from the wreckage.
But the immediate aftermath was eerily calm, as if the explosion had rendered everyone deaf and dumb. Allah was Most Compassionate and Most Merciful, but He demanded the death of unbelievers. When the screaming and activated fire alarms cut through the silence, Ibrahim felt a calmness and contentment he had never known, a spiritual euphoria that he hoped would last for hours afterwards.
It was good practice for a terrorist to walk calmly away from an incident that they’d created. But, apart from the dead or injured, those in the square were either running for the exit routes, or were paralyzed with shock or fear. With the sound of the wailing of the injured in his ears, he began to sprint in the opposite direction to the bomb wreckage, feigning distress.
Ibrahim saw the white Ford Fiesta pull up at the designated place, a grocery store twenty yards down the adjacent street. As he got within a few feet of the car, the back door was swung open. The Turkish mafia had wanted to use an S series Mercedes, but he’d insisted upon a more popular and less conspicuous form of transport. He’d also ensured that no one exited the car and held open the door for him, something that could garner attention, even with the ensuing chaos around him. He got in and opened a translation App on his secure smartphone.
“No speeding,” he said in Turkish.
It was vital that he got to his destination undetected. The Amir was waiting for him and the Silent Jihad was about to begin. He was on a short timeframe, too, but speeding was a bad idea. The cops could be bribed and he had influential friends in the highest echelons of Turkey’s “Deep State”, but an enforced delay could be fatal. Some dumb cop could even attempt to make a connection. As a result, he might even be overlooked, and he couldn’t allow that to happen. He’d been reaching this point for years. Resting his head against the rear seat, he studied the folds of skin on the driver’s neck, reminding him of a slab of pork belly. He thumbed the APP.
“How long before we get there?” Ibrahim asked.
The black-suited man in the front passenger seat turned around. He had a thin, pitted face and a dropping moustache, a scar that ran from his left eye to his jaw line. “We drive you, we don’t like you. Keep you fucking mouth shut and we get there quicker,” he said in Turkish.
Ibrahim didn’t understand him, but the tone was obvious enough. He guessed the man had swapped a shoeshine kit for a switchblade years ago. He chose to ignore him. He nodded, appearing subservient.
The plan had been conceived following a report by a middle-ranking officer in Turkish military intelligence, who was in the mafia’s pocket and reported to them intermittently on any potential crackdowns on the smack trade. The officer had informed the mafia, who had in turn informed Ibrahim for the usual fee regarding relevant anti-jihadist intel, that he’d found out that the general had been working on the case for six months.
When Ibrahim had heard this he knew that that meant the general was capable of getting close. If he did, he might be able to not only thwart what had now become his raison d’être, but also interrupt or even sabotage the mission as a whole. And so he had found out what he could about the man.
Once he had he knew the general had to die. It was the only decision to make. Ibrahim had decided to do it himself. It was a risk being so close to mission time, but it was riskier to get more people involved with the assassination of a top-ranking US military official. He didn’t want any mistakes made so close to the Silent Jihad.
He closed his eyes now. It was done. There would be no comeback and he was going on to greater things. By the time he opened his eyes he told himself that he would have forgotten the general had ever existed.
Halfway out of the car door, which abutted the café and store fronts, the general had seen a white-red flash and had heard a massive explosion. Vaguely, he’d sensed that he’d been flying through the air; that he’d been cut by what had felt like dozens of razorblades. He’d landed on his back with a sickening thud, his bloody head jarring. The world had turned black.
Three minutes later he tried to blink and realized that his eyelids were heavy with, he guessed, brick dust and flecks of tarmac. He couldn’t feel his legs or his arms, but there was a searing pain in his chest. Smelling burning gasoline, he heard people screaming and the sound of sirens from fast-approaching emergency vehicles, although the noise was muted, as if he was wearing padded ear defenders. Then the competing sounds simply began to merge into a dull drone. But he could make out another distinct smell, a smell that was both sweet and nauseating. Grimacing, he realized it was his own burning flesh.
“Jesus,” he said, his voice little more than a murmur.
He tasted blood and chocked as bile rose in his throat. He did his best to keep it down but the conscious effort made his head swim. The pain moved over his body in waves. With that came the realization that his breathing was shallow and wheezy. It seemed as if his airway had all but closed over and his lungs had partially collapsed. There was no way he could move his limbs an inch.
Feeling what he took for the sun beating on his forehead, he risked opening his right eye partially. As grit made him blink repeatedly, he glimpsed the sky directly above him. It was shrouded by thick black smoke. Despite this, the heat intensified and he realized it was coming from a fire. Fearing being burnt alive, the sky began to rain red-hot ash, which settled on his face and fizzled out, and felt to him like the caress of death.
Blinking still, he sensed someone bending down to his face. He winced involuntarily, fearing the worst. The person began speaking in Turkish, a low, muffled voice, or so it appeared. Then his head was being raised. The pain in his head and neck made him clench his teeth and moan. Something was placed around his neck, supporting it. Something smooth yet firm, which, despite his dazed state, he realized was a brace.
When he was raised off the ground he felt the urge to vomit again. His head ached; his eye closed. But as quickly as the pain had risen in a crescendo, it began to abate now, the throbbing being replaced by numbness, even in his neck and chest. He felt as if he was floating and, incongruously, a closed-mouthed smile crossed his face. Morphine, he thought. Thank God for morphine, although he’d felt no prick from a needle, and that meant he might be paralyzed, albeit in one or more of his limbs.
But as he was being carried his head seemed to explode, his skull crack and shift, despite the drug. He sensed what felt like warm blood flowing from the back of his head to the nape of his neck. He panicked, his mind forming words he couldn’t express.
With that, he lost consciousness.
Tom had drawn the heavy drapes to hide the encroaching sunlight and lay asleep now on his bed, his angular face lost between two chocolate-coloured buckwheat pillows. His cellphone on the nightstand began to buzz in vibrate mode, moving around like a kid’s toy whose battery had almost juiced out. His half-limp hand stretched out and picked it up.
Yawning, he said, “Who’s this?”
“Mr Dupree?”
It was a man’s voice. Businesslike, he thought, blinking his eyes slowly like a reptile.
“Yeah, who’s this?”
“Can you be at Langley in an hour, sir?”
He rubbed his face with his free hand. “Langley? What time is it?”
“Zero one thirty,