Into Africa
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: I own no Castles. Or Becketts. Rating: K+ for language. Time: The present day, but in an alternate universe. Into Africa
"Sure you don't want to take one of my squads with you, sir?" Glass asked. "Maybe a machine gun team or the snipers?
"No, this is a friendly visit. The jihadis haven't scoped us out yet, so they'll be laying back, looking us over."
"Do you think the jihadis even know we're here?" Dr. Beckett asked.
"Dr. Beckett, everyone in the Air Mountains knows we're here."
They worked their way slowly down the scree covered rampart and made it to the bottom without any injuries. They headed for the village which was only a few kilometers away. They hadn't gone far when the radio squawked.
"Snowshoes 6, this is 86 Base. Come in."
Castle grabbed the radio handset. "This is Snowshoes 6 actual. Over."
"We have a drone in the air above you. About five hundred meters to your front is a kid on a big rock. You'll pass right under him. Over."
"What's the kid doing? Over."
There was a brief pause. "Looks like he's eating lunch. But he has his AK by his side. Over."
"Keep an eye on him. He's probably just a sentry to keep the village warned of who's coming. Over and out." Rick handed the radio handset back to his RTO.
"Snowshoes 6 Actual?" Dr. Beckett asked.
"Snowshoes is my radio call sign. A 6 is the commander, of a company, a battalion or whatever. Actual means it's me, not my RTO or someone else answering."
Dr. Beckett grinned. "But snowshoes?"
"The Battle on Snowshoes, fought during the French and Indian War in 1757, by Major Robert Rodgers' Rangers. No relation, by the way. Everybody wants to be Big Duke 6, or Black Knight 6, or something like that. Around here, most folks probably don't know what a snowshoe is."
Rick could smell the village before he could see it. The smell of unwashed bodies, animals, human and animal dung, and smoke from burning dried dung. Then he could hear it. Sheep bleating, children both laughing and crying, women gossiping and men arguing.
Finally they could see the small village. Everyone had come out to see the strangers. Men, women, children and sheep.
The village headman, the caid, was sitting outside of a large camel hair tent. He looked aged, but was probably in his fifties. He was relatively well fed, with a dark complexion and a henna streaked beard down to his belly. He was prepared for visitors, having a plate of boiled goat set out along with some type of bottled fruit drink and a package of French cigarettes.
He was surrounded by the young men of his village, a rather surly looking lot, Rick thought. Behind the men were the women and the children. And the sheep
Lt. Diori introduced them and the caid invited them to sit. They began to talk, beginning first with pleasantries. The caid hoped that Rick had had an easy trip. Rick hoped the rains had been good. The caid replied that the rains, here in the mountains, had been good, but could have been better. As it was, the crops had been adequate. The caid regretted he could spare no food for the strangers. Rick replied that he had all the food he needed. Without mentioning numbers, Rick managed to imply that he led a powerful force. All, he said, were People of the Book and respected Islam. He hoped that there would be peace in the Air Mountains.
"Inshallah." Said the caid. If God wills it."
A small naked boy ran to the caid and put his arms around the older man. The old man proudly announced that this was his newest and eighth grandson. He inquired as to Rick's family.
"My family are all dead." Rick said solemnly, in French.
"I trust they were avenged?" The caid said.
"As God wills it." Which was something of a lie.
"But, Commander, you have a new woman and I am sure she will bear you many fine, strong sons." He leered at Kate when he said this. Kate had enough sense to do no more than blush, but Bradley began to say something. However, Sergeant Gianetti leaned heavily on Bradley. "Bad idea." He whispered in Bradley's ear.
The mention of Dr. Beckett gave Rick an opening to explain the scientific basis of their expedition. The caid was a bit shaky on ancient history, but he did understand that strangers had crossed over this land since the beginning of time. They had come and they had gone, just as this man and his soldiers would eventually leave.
Rick was about to depart when Kate began to speak. Her French would have impressed a gathering of intellectuals in Paris, but it was so far from the French patois the caid was used to, that he obviously had trouble following Dr. Beckett. And he was not used to being spoken to as an equal by an unveiled foreign woman.
Beckett explained her mission in more detail than was necessary perhaps, but by the time she was done, the caid was getting bored and was happy to see his guests depart.
"I think that went well." Beckett said.
"They didn't try to kill us right off. That's always a good sign." Rick replied.
"Really, the caid and all of his people were perfectly friendly, and there wasn't a weapon in sight. I think they rather liked us."
"Maybe, but most of the local jihadis are nomads, Tuaregs and the like. Nomads have been living by the sword, mostly at the expense of their settled brethren, for many centuries now. Just because the first village we went to was friendly is no reason to believe everyone is friendly, or that they'll stay that way. The nomads, the Tuaregs, will be around long after we're gone. And the caid knows it."
"I'm afraid you're just a born pessimist, Captain Rodgers. I choose to take a more enlightened view of things."
Rick nodded and thought to himself. And us pessimists have to worry about keeping you optimists alive. And us pessimists, as well.
As they approached the mountain, Kate could hear machinery at work. At first, she dismissed the possibility, but as they began to climb the steep scree covered slope, she was sure she knew what was going on.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" She screamed at Rick when they reached the top.
"I'm digging my command in so that we can withstand an attack." He replied coldly. "These are machine gun bunkers covering the route up this rock. That's the command bunker, "He pointed to the right and some hundred meters behind the other bunkers. "Beside it to the left is the medical bunker and behind that is where the generator bunker will be. Personnel bunkers and storage bunkers will be still further behind them. We'll start on those as soon as we finish here."
Beckett was furious. "You're digging us in? Against what? Have you seen one, even one person, who is going to attack us?" She yelled.
"Having been here a bit longer than you, yes I have seen people who have wanted to attack us. And they did. They killed people and I will not let that happen here."
"You are also desecrating an archeological site. The dirt and sand that you are so casually disturbing should be carefully examined with trowels and brushes by my archeological team. You're destroying thousands of years of history to justify your own arrogance and military ego. I will not stand for this. I'm the head of this expedition and I order you to stop this at once. At once! Do you understand?"
"Have you read the contract between Duquesne and the Republic of Niger?" Rick asked, controlling his temper.
"What?" Beckett screamed.
"The contract. It's in French, but I'm sure you can find a copy of it somewhere. Specifically, Chapter twenty-three. It states you are solely under the jurisdiction of the Republic of Niger, and that you are further subject to the orders of the Nigerien military, and the militaries of the NATO alliance, the European Union, and specifically the orders of the military of the Republic of France, and the United States of America, in all matters military, and any disputes will be resolved in favor of the concerned military. I've made a military decision and it stands. Period!"
Beckett glared at him with all her might, but he didn't react. She turned on her heel and headed for her tent, with Dr. Bradley close behind.
A half an hour later, Mr. Reed went to get Rick. "Sir, you gotta come see this."
Rick followed Reed back to the almost finished command bunker where Reed had a sniper's spotting scope set up. "Take a look through here, sir. Dr. Beckett has their satellite phone set up and she's called someone. She doesn't look happy."
Rick looked through the scope. Dr. Beckett did not look at all happy. She was stomping around her tent with the handset of the satellite phone in one hand and with the other hand, she was gesturing towards Rick's position. He watched her for several minutes until she suddenly threw the phone down, glared in Rick's direction and stormed back into her tent.
"Anything we can do?" Rick asked.
"I told the engineers and the Rangers helping them to be on the lookout for any kind of Roman archeological remains."
"And?"
"They all asked me what Roman archeological remains looked like. I have no idea. How about you?"
"Not a clue. But we do have experts over there."
"You gonna go over and ask her to drop by and watch us desecrate the place?"
"I guess. I'll take one of the quad bikes."
"Good idea. You can make a quick getaway on one, sir."
Rick rode over to the archeological dig. Dr. Beckett had heard him coming and came out of her tent at once. "What do you want? Oh, let me guess. You want us to build you a ramp so you can jump that thing over our dig."
"No, I'm trying to think of a way to help you. You could send some of your people over to us and watch while we dig and tell us to stop if they see anything of interest. A lot of the remaining work on the bunkers were working on now will be done with shovels. We're going to use the spoil to fill sandbags. You could run the spoil through those screen things of yours to screen out anything of interest to you."
Dr. Beckett was so angry she couldn't speak. She was turning red in the face. "Are you out of your mind? Do you have any idea….No, you have no idea how absurd your suggestion is, do you? You are completely…OH! I don't even know what you are, but…Just get out of here."
"I'm sorry, Dr. Beckett. My job is to protect you and I intend to do my job. I was just doing my best to help you do yours."
"Your job is to protect us? I beg your pardon, but I heard your job is to set up some kind of a CIA spy station and you're using us as an excuse to be here."
"We have an electronic listening post here. We were going to have to come here anyway, due to Senator Souder's interest. So, we might as well kill two birds with one stone."
Dr. Beckett stared at him for a long time. Rick was about to leave when she spoke.
"It's like the old joke about the crooked poker game, isn't it?"
"The what?" Rick was mystified.
"Everybody in town knows the game is crooked but they go because it's the…"
"Only game in town." Rick and Kate said together. Rick almost thought he saw a tiny, brief smile on her face.
"I won't find anything if I don't send some people to you, but I might if I take your offer. I'll have some people ready to go in an hour."
"I'll send a Humvee over in an hour then. Good day, Dr. Beckett."
"Good day, Captain Rodgers."