SYRIAN DESERT: OUTSIDE THE VILLAGE OF DEIR EZ-ZUR

Two pickup trucks with ISIS flags moved closer and closer to the location where Zach, Tony, and Juan were sequestered under their combat burqas, the state-of-the-art stealth clothing which was designed to keep them hidden from sophisticated surveillance systems.

“Keep your heads down, and trust this equipment to do its job,” Zach said. Designed to be impervious to infrared body scanning, if it worked, they’d be fine. If it didn’t, then they were sitting ducks.

The trucks got larger and larger in Zach’s scope, and his heart was doing pirouettes in his chest. Safety off, he kept his finger on the trigger of the weapon, ready to fire in an instant. Sweat dripped off his face in the hundred degree heat, and as he checked the monitor of the RD 100 Hornet drone, he saw the battery was almost dead. He’d need to pull it back soon, or it would die and fall on the spot, alerting the occupants of the house to the fact they were under surveillance.

“Whadda’ you think?” Zach heard in his earbud from Tony. “You think they’ve spotted us? I have the man on the right in my sight. Say the word, and he’s gone. Juan, you got the guy on the left?”

“Affirmative.”

“Negative.” Zach said. “Hold your fire. Do you copy?”

“Copy that,” came the reply from Tony, followed by an affirmative from Juan.

The vehicles, several hundred yards out, came to a stop and a man got out of one of the trucks. He walked around to the back and put his hand over his eyes to shield them from the sun. He seemed to be searching for something.

“I think they spotted us.” Juan clicked the safety off his weapon and chambered a round. “You think they spotted us?” he asked again over the comm system, a sense of urgency in his voice. “I want to smoke ‘em, Zach. Permission to fire.”

“Negative. I say again. Hold your fire.”

“We have a visual on your pos,” the men heard Commander Haji say over the mic. Haji and his team at home base had been monitoring their movements from a drone above. “We don’t think they’ve made your position, but we’re going to create a diversion to pull them off you anyway.”

“Roger that. Get on it, then. If they get any closer, I’m going to give the order to fire,” Zach replied.

The man from the truck took a couple more steps in their direction, then stopped, pulled his pecker out of his pants, and started to pee.

“Ooow, man” Zach scoffed. “What’s the magnification on this scope? This is more than I can take.” He heard a couple hisses and chuckles in his earbud.

“Jesus. Come on, buddy,” Tony moaned. “Finish up and put that thing away.”

Seconds later, an explosion was heard in the distance. Looking eastward, Zach saw a ball of fire and smoke billowing high in the sky. The man quickly finished his business, got himself back together, and turned to look at the eruption in the distance. Running back to his truck, he yelled at the other man, indicating they should go. Dust flew sky-high as the truck’s tires dug into the sand, and the vehicles sped off toward the distant explosion.

Zach didn’t waste any time watching their retreat. As soon as the pick-ups drove away, he grabbed his control panel and worked to pull the Black Hornet drone back to his location. “Gentlemen, get your birds home before their batteries die,” he said to Tony and Juan. “We need to get this batch back and send in three new ones.”

Before they could retrieve their drones however, another explosion rang out. This time it was in the direction of Deir ez-Zur, right in the middle of the search area for the jihad executioner.

“Holy shit!” Juan said. “What was that?”

“Gentlemen,” they heard Commander Haji say over the comm system, “gather all your equipment and meet back at the extraction point. Mission complete.”

“Say again,” Zach asked.

“Target has been eliminated. Visual ID confirmed by the Black Hornet. RFID chip guided Predator drone to target. Package eliminated. You have movement your way, so stay covered and move to extract point immediately.”

“Roger that,” Zach said. “Okay, fellas, we gotta go. Forget your drones. They went up in flames with Jihad Joe. Keep yourself covered so infra-red can’t detect us, and let’s move out.”

THE SYRIAN sun beat down on the trio making their way to the extraction point on foot. The temperature was close to one hundred degrees, and the combat burqa added another ten degrees making the four mile trek grueling.

“Hold up, guys.” Zach stopped and put his hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath. The arid desert conditions were quickly sapping his energy.

Tony plunged to his knees. “I’m struggling,” he wheezed. “I’ve stopped sweating and feel like I’m going to pass out.”

Zach walked over to him and poured water over his head. “You have heat stroke, man. You need to cool down fast.”

Tony shook his head. “You need water, too. Save your water.”

“That’s an order,” Zach said. He offered him a drink from his camel pack. “Drink up.”

Tony downed the water and slowly rose to his feet.

“You okay, man?” Juan asked.

Tony nodded. “Yeah, I’ll make it somehow. We need to keep moving.”

Zach started pulling his combat burqa off. “Look, we can’t leave these things behind and let this technology fall into the hands of those bastards, but we have to get out of them. The heat is killing us. We’ll take our chances on being picked up on radar, but we’ll never have the strength to make it out of here if we keep wearing them.”

“Gladly!” Juan dropped his immediately, followed by Tony.

“Okay, then,” Zach said. “Drag them along with you, and let’s go home.”

Two hours later, the trio was relieved to see Masoud and Commander Haji waiting in two jeeps at the rendezvous point. Tired and dehydrated, they collapsed on the side of the vehicles.

“Here,” Masoud said, handing the men canteens of water, “drink up. Let’s get some fluids back in you.”

The recon team gulped down the water and rested a moment before feebly crawling into the waiting jeeps. As Zach sat in the backseat, he felt the onset of severe cramps in his hands, calves, and feet. By the way Tony and Juan were flailing about, he could tell they were experiencing the same thing. The hours spent beneath the heated covering, exacerbated by the long physical hike out of the desert, had taken its toll. All the men were in the throes of severe heat exhaustion.

A physician met the jeeps when they entered the forward operating base in Kurdistan. Seeing the men’s poor condition, he said, “Let’s get these men inside the air conditioning right away. We need to start them on IV fluids and lower their body temps.”

As they exited the vehicles, they were met with cheers from the people gathered nearby. Word had gotten around of the mission’s success. The terrorist responsible for the latest round of beheadings was dead, and the work of Zach and his team had made it happen.

But Zach didn’t feel like a hero. Exhaustion wracked his body and cramping was becoming unbearable. He felt faint and close to passing out. Spending hours in the hot desert under the heavy anti-detection covering, being susceptible to detection at any minute, and having to hike out of harm’s way wearing the heavy equipment, had taken both a physical and an emotional toll on him. He was too spent to feel anything at all. All he could muster was a feeble wave at the men who cheered them, as people helped him hobble into the base’s infirmary.

They led him to a cot and immediately someone slapped a blood pressure cuff on while someone else swabbed his arm, searched for the perfect vein, and inserted an IV. All three of the men were infused with a mixture of saline and electrolyte fluids. The fastest way to rehydrate and replenish the body fluids they’d lost during the twelve hours in the desert was intravenously. Cold towels were placed around their necks and over their foreheads as they lay on the cots resting.

It didn’t take long before the IV infused fluids brought renewed strength to Zach’s dehydrated body. He turned to Tony resting quietly in the cot next to him. “You doing better?” he asked.

Tony opened his eyes and responded, “Better. Oh, man. I was dying out there. And, hey, I appreciate what you did for me…giving me your water. It allowed me to make the last leg of the hike. I owe you, man.”

“Not a big deal. You’d do the same for me.” They bumped fists. Turning toward Juan, he asked, “You doing okay, buddy?”

“Doing well,” Juan replied. “They’ve filled me up so well in fact, I think my bladder is going to burst.” He signaled to one of the nurses. “Ma’am, can you unhook me so I can go relieve myself?” he asked.

“That is indeed a good sign, sir. Follow me,” she responded. “Bring your IV along with you.”

Captain Haji approached their cots. “Congratulations, men. The drones did exactly what we expected them to do. We have it on all on film. It was a confirmed kill. It will be all over the news by tonight. You men are heroes. We’re indebted to you for taking on this operation.”

With a nod of his head, Zach acknowledged the words of praise. “Not feeling much like a hero at this moment, however. For some reason, I missed the part of the briefing where we were told to expect major dehydration.”

“I’m so sorry, Ziryan,” Masoud said who had entered the room. “I’m afraid we forgot to factor in the harshness of the environment and the physical exertion involved. Are you feeling better?”

“Much better. This IV cocktail is bringing me around quickly.”

“We’re going to send you back to the comfort of your hotel in Irbil as soon as your IV drip is done, but in the meantime, we thought you might like to see the fruits of your labor.”

“Sure. What have you got?” Zach sat up on the side of his cot as did Tony. Juan returned from the head and joined them.

Haji wheeled in a TV connected to a computer and hit play. The image of a Syrian male eating a meal in a rather austere-looking room appeared on the screen. The drone moved from room to room and verified that, except for this man, the house was empty. He seemed totally unaware he was being observed, and everything looked completely normal, right up until the moment the screen went blank…the moment when the Predator drone’s missile hit the building.

“That’s it. We got you, you bastard!” Haji said, slapping his leg. “Good job, gentleman.”

“Thank you,” the three men mumbled and nodded in unison.

“Time to go home,” Tony said.

“Uh, yeah, right,” Masoud approached the group. “Go back to your hotel. Eat, drink, and rest, and we’ll talk in the morning.”

Zach signaled a nurse. “I’m on empty. Can you unhook me, please?”

The nurse took the tape off his arm, pulled the IV out, and pressed on the area to be sure there was no bleeding. She put a band aid on, and then began removing Juan and Tony’s IV’s.

Zach stood and looked at Masoud. “Talk in the morning, huh? Just what is it we will be talking about?”

Masoud shifted from one foot to the other. “Well, when you feel up to it, we have another assignment we could use your help with…if you’re willing, of course.” He looked around at the three men.

Zach didn’t respond. Turning to Commander Haji, he said, “We need a ride back to town. Do you have someone who can give us a lift?”

“Sure. Right away.” He waved to a soldier in the back of the room. “These men need a ride to town. Go and bring a car around.”

The trio followed the driver to the door. Before he exited, Zach turned to Masoud. “See you in the morning. We’ll talk.” He headed out the door and yelled back over his shoulder, “No promises, but we’ll talk.”