Part 3: Chapter 9
The blistering Arabian sun shined brightly against the clear blue sky. A slight breeze moved across the dune sea whipping up bits of sand past the 3 operators trekking by camel back. Ela removed her baseball cap and wiped the sweat from her brow. She squinted through the intense light to observe the endless dunes that surrounded her. The sun was so bright her sunglasses were practically useless. She readjusted the shemagh that covered her face. The air felt heavy and the smell from her camel didn't make conditions any better. Ela learned quickly that riding a camel wasn't a walk in the park and took some time getting the hang of. She tried her best to keep pace with Vanguard who led the pack from up front. He appeared to know where he was going as he followed their route on a map. Ela returned her baseball cap to her head. She turned her attention back to her drawing in her notebook. Her drawing captured a candid picture of her best friend Meghan on camelback in front of her moving alone toward the desert horizon.
"You still alive back there Liz?" Valkyrie asked.
Ela looked up at her friend. Valkyrie wore her usual combat attire except her shemagh was not only covering her head but also her face, she had her sunglasses on, and her blue t shirt was long sleeves, but they were rolled up exposing part of her tattooed arms. The Italian genes in Meghan Castello showed as her skin soaked up the Arabian sun like a sponge turning her white skin a rich bronze color.
"Skin as white as paper and extreme UV exposure doesn't mix very well. I feel like I'm about to burst into flames any second now." Ela griped.
Valkyrie laughed.
"Hang in there Casper the Ghost." She said.
Ela chuckled and continued with her drawing. Bandit, Thermite, and Thatcher were lucky Vanguard was only able to obtain 3 camels. The old men probably wouldn't have lasted 5 minutes in these conditions without developing heat stroke. Jordan would've made out okay, but the team needed them to stay back and hold down their base of operations. Bandit would try and collect more intel while they were gone.
The party pressed on through the desert cresting dune after dune keeping an eye out for Habbaniyah Lake, the location of the White Mask stronghold continuing the attacks in Ramadi.
"Only a few more miles to go." Vanguard said studying a map of the area. The location of the White Mask base that operators had interrogated out of a captured White Mask trooper was marked in heavy red ink on the map along the lake.
"Look over there! 1 o'clock!" Valkyrie said with an excited voice pointing at something in the distance.
Past the dunes the operators could see the cyan waters of Habbaniyah Lake breaking the horizon. The view was stunning.
Ela put the finishing touches to her drawing and shoved it into her backpack. She took time to admire the landscape in front of her.
"We're entering enemy territory, stay frosty." Vanguard warned unfolding his FMG 9 and loading a clip.
Ela unstrapped her Scorpion Evo from the side of her camel and set it on her lap. Valkyrie unfolded the stock of her MPX and clipped to the front of her combat vest letting it dangle freely.
The operators trekked for another half hour closing their distance on the lake. They crested a tall dune and down below in the distance they could make out a small tent city. Valkyrie pulled out binoculars and observed the tent city. She could see armed people milling around the camp. Some of them wore white hockey masks.
Valkyrie smiled underneath her shemagh.
"Looks like we found White Mask Summer Camp." She said passing the binoculars to Vanguard.
"Intel is dead on." He said looking through the binoculars.
Vanguard observed the tent city and its surroundings. They could take shelter in the dunes and observe the enemy's movements. Once they gathered enough intel, they would strike.
He handed the binoculars to Ela.
"If we get a little closer I can start mapping the base out for our preplans." Ela said observing the base.
"Okay, so we'll establish base camp here out of the enemy's sight. We start our information gathering tomorrow. Sound good?" Vanguard said.
Valkyrie and Ela nodded in agreement. The operators hopped off their camels and began to unpack their gear.
…
Ela laid at the top of a sand dune out of sight looking down toward the tent city just below her. She carefully sketched out her map of the base which was almost complete. Valkyrie laid next to her staring through her binoculars documenting Captain Anderson, the White Mask leader in the enemy camp. They would interrogate him for information once they had a strategy in place. Captain Anderson was easy to find using Vanguard's drone, Valkyrie's intelligence gathering skills, and the information they were provided with. He was the only white man with a beard on base and he loved to yell his orders in peoples faces. It was almost a dead giveaway. Today he was yelling at a bunch of Islamic State recruits for their horrible shooting skills. Valkyrie let down her binoculars and turned to her friend whose nose was buried in her notebook finishing her map sketch. Ela had to make sure every little bit of the map was accurate.
The devil is in the details. Timur would be proud if he saw the amount detail she put into the map.
Ela felt eyes on her. She paused her pencil strokes.
"Yes Meghan?"
"So… what's up?" Valkyrie asked randomly.
"I'm kind of in the middle of something Meg." Ela said returning to her drawing.
"Seriously?" Valkyrie said disgusted.
"I'm in the middle of drawing a map that's important!"
"We haven't had a genuine conversation since we started this mission."
"We're at work. You should be focusing on observation and documentation of the enemy."
Valkyrie rolled her eyes at the comment. She picked up sand and let the grains run between her fingers which tickled her skin.
"You're very high-strung Liz. You need to relax."
Ela sighed, dropped her pencil, and turned to her friend.
"High-strung? I'm high-strung?" She said narrowing her eyes.
"Yes. You are high-strung."
"Take a look around you. We're surrounded by terrorists who want to kill us. It would probably make anyone just a little high-strung." Ela said annoyed. She couldn't believe she was having this conversation right now.
Valkyrie chuckled. Ela was so easy to piss off and pissing Ela off was one of Meghan's guilty pleasures.
"But seriously though Liz what's up?" Valkyrie said sincerely.
"Nothing much just taking this mission day by day." Ela said returning to her sketch. She added her last detail.
"Same here." Valkyrie said rolling over staring at the sky. The sun reflected off the black war paint beneath her eyes.
"I feel like the faster we can get this mission over with the faster we can get home." Ela said closing her book and putting it in her backpack.
"I want to go home just as much as you do but we can't think like that."
"Why not?"
"Slow is smooth and smooth is fast. If we rush through this mission, then we'll make mistakes and then we'll have to waste our time fixing those mistakes which will add more time to our mission causing delays. If we take this slow and do everything right the first time, it'll save us time later on."
"Whatever you say Emerson." Ela laughed.
"That's what my dad used to tell me when I was on the swim team. 'Meghan remember, slow is smooth, smooth is fast! Do it right and you won't make any mistakes!' God, I miss my old man." Valkyrie said as her mind flashed back to when she was younger. She began to feel queasy at the thought. Ever since her nightmare with her father her thoughts of home made her nauseous.
"Is he still in California?" Ela asked continuing the conversation.
"Yup. Same house and everything. The man won't give it up. It means too much to him. He still thinks I'm in some SEAL unit working with the US military. I wish I could tell him about Rainbow. I hope he's doing okay. It's been way too long since I last saw him. I miss him so much…" Valkyrie's voice trailed off.
Ela frowned. Valkyrie held her father dear to her. She wished she had a similar relationship with her father too, but her father had other plans for young Ela and her older sister Zofia. The yelling, the beatings, being called a failure of a daughter because she didn't want to go to the military. Slowly being pushed over the edge. 'Why can't you be like your older sister?' Her father always asked her. She was almost glad he killed himself. She hated her father. He was the reason why their mom left and why her and Zo hate each other.
Ela could feel a roar of anger crackling in mind. The thoughts of her father always made her feel this way. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath trying to bring herself back to reality.
"You'll see him soon." Ela mustered.
Valkyrie felt the angry vibe coming from Ela.
"You finished with that map?" Valkyrie asked changing the subject.
"Yeah. It's all done."
"Alright let's regroup with Vanguard then." Valkyrie said picking up her gear. Valkyrie reached out a hand to her friend. Ela took Valkyrie's hand and she pulled Ela up nearly throwing her off the dune from her strength.
Ela gathered her gear and the two operators slinked away from the enemy encampment. They made it back behind their sand dune and reported their latest intel. Ela showed Vanguard the map. Valkyrie and Vanguard looked over the map impressed by Ela's accuracy and attention to detail.
"Very well done, Elizabetha." Vanguard complimented.
Valkyrie gave her friend a confident nod of approval.
Ela managed to crack a smile. She was happy to get the ball rolling with their objective. They'd been waiting in the desert for days watching and documenting. She wanted to act and take the fight to White Masks.
Now that they had a map and knew how their enemy operated on base, they could plan their attack.
They'd plan tomorrow.
Night settled within a few hours. The operators sat around a red tinted low light lamp in silence under the stars. The operators couldn't use any other light or make a fire in fear of compromising their position. They could hear in the distance the people in the enemy encampment yelling and cheering about something. Valkyrie sat wrapped in blankets shivering from the almost below freezing temperatures. Vanguard picked at an MRE while Ela casually drew in her notebook both operators unphased by the cold.
Vanguard noticed Valkyrie shivering and laughed to himself.
"The desert biome is such a deceptive place. In the day time it brings relentless heat but when night falls the temperature can drop below freezing. Mother Nature works in mysterious ways." Vanguard said.
"California natives never do well in the cold. In BUD/S the instructors made me do horrific amounts of calisthenics that would break most men, but it never broke me. What broke me was the cold water, cold environment, cold everything. The cold kicked my ass when I was deployed to these parts years ago." Valkyrie mustered being chattering teeth.
Ela giggled at her friend's gripes. From living in Poland most of her life she was numb to the cold.
"Try not to freeze to death." Ela teased.
Valkyrie gave Ela a trembling middle finger. Ela stuck her tongue out at her and returned her attention to her art piece.
Ela put the finishing touches to her sketch. The sketch was of Meghan and Vanguard sitting around the red lamp under the stars. The low light glowed dimly against their figures. Their tired emotionless faces staring into the lamp's soft blood red light. The stars shined beautifully above the desert sand. Ela let out a sigh and closed her notebook.
"Elizabetha, if you don't mind me asking, what do you write in your notebook?" Vanguard asked
Ela put the notebook in her backpack.
"Nothing really. Just some drawings. Things that are on my mind." She said fixing the shemagh around her head.
"I'm assuming you went to art school at some point in your life from how well you drew that map."
"Yeah I went to art school in Berlin for a while."
"What's a talented artist like you doing in a dangerous place like this?"
Ela gazed up at the stars. She had no idea how to respond to his question.
"I don't know. Orders." Was all she could muster.
Vanguard gave a slow nod trying to get a read on her emotions.
"We've done some really screwed up things here so far. How are you guys doing after all of it?" Vanguard asked.
"Fine." Valkyrie lied.
"I'm alright I guess. When I joined Rainbow, I thought my time in performing sketchy acts like what we've been doing would finally end but clearly, I was wrong. How are you holding up?" Ela said frowning
"Peachy. This stuff doesn't bother me one bit."
"How do you do it?" Valkyrie interjected.
"Do what?"
"How do you perform the atrocities we just did and not feel anything? None of this stuff bothers you in the slightest bit?"
"Not at all Meghan. The Farm trained me that in warfare, only the strong survive. People who are weak die and are forgotten. Don't get me wrong, the weak have their purpose but the people who are strong enough and good enough to take what they need are the ones who prosper. There's no more room in this world for the weak. The people I've killed were weak. Their deaths were meant to be." Vanguard justified.
"I don't understand." Valkyrie said confused.
"Its okay. You'll understand soon enough." Vanguard said reassuringly.
He picked up his FMG 9 and kit.
"I'll take first watch. You two should get some rest. We have a lot of planning to do tomorrow."
And with that he walked into the night toward his lookout post.
Ela and Valkyrie retreated to their tents unsure of what to make of Vanguard's rhetoric.