Chapter 23





“Where the hell did you two get to?” Carlos looked up when he heard them approach, pausing with a screwdriver as he re-screwed the radio together.

Marc hurried to Carlos’s side, ignoring his question as his voice rose in hope, “Is the radio working?”

Carlos gave a heavy-hearted scoff as he pushed the radio away, scratching his temple in frustration, “its dead.”

Julia stepped past Marc and knelt by Ray’s side, pressing the back of her hand to his forehead. She did not know what she was feeling for, only that her mother used to do it to her when she was ill.

She could tell nothing about his condition other than his skin was clammy and he was still unconscious.

“Marc, we need to get him out of here.” Julia did not like to think of what might happen when they did manage to leave, but they couldn’t stay here.

“Right,” Carlos exclaimed suddenly, tapping the RPG that rested by his side like a well-behaved puppy, “Where are these trucks? I want to blow something up.”

His comment injected a burst of humour into their deprived moods, Julia saw Twitch chuckle to himself.

Marc nodded, granting Carlos’s wish, “Okay, let’s-”

But Mac did not get to finish his sentence when Kazeem stepped forward, a look upon his face that instantly drew everybody’s attention.

“Kazeem?” Julia rose to her feet, “What is it?”

“I was thinking,” Kazeem told her hesitantly, his voice shy, as if he was scared to speak about it, “instead of blowing up all the trucks, why do we not take one?”

“Take one?” Twitch looked over his shoulder at Marcus.

Kazeem nodded, his eyes flashing between each of them, looking for acceptance.

Julia lifted a shoulder as the idea blossomed in her mind, “We could drive it back to the compound.”

Carlos looked up at Marc from where he was sat on the ground, “It beats sitting here another night and waiting for the cavalry.”

“Well-” Marc began to speak when Carlos pointed up at him.

“But I still get to blow something up,” Carlos informed him sternly, his other hand resting on the RPG, “I’ve always wanted to use one of these.”

Marc rolled his eyes at his friend before stepping towards Kazeem, “What’s your plan?”

Julia saw the spark of genuine pride in Kazeem’s eyes as his plan was recognised, quickly followed by fear when he realised he had just volunteered to carry it out.

And that was how, thirty minutes later, Kazeem found himself scaling down the side of a rocky hill towards three terrorist militia trucks in the middle of a desert with Marcus by his side.

Julia was perched on the hilltop, resting face-down on a flat piece of rock, with Carlos beside her, their rifles raised and ready, their eyeballs glued to the scopes.

“How much ammo do you have left?” Carlos asked, his voice turning from flamboyant to professional with the flip of a switch.

Julia looked back at her waistband and blinked slowly, trying to calm her nerves.

“One magazine,” Julia turned back to the front, “Which is currently in my rifle.”

Carlos arched an eyebrow as he shuffled on the rock, settling in, “Don’t forget your handgun.”

Julia swallowed as she suddenly became aware of it strapped tightly to her outer thigh, “How could I forget that?”

Carlos smirked, trying to keep the mood light when they saw that Kazeem and Marc were closing in on the first truck.

“Stay on them,” Carlos encouraged her as he lifted his hand and signalled to the Twitch, a few hundred yards behind them with Ray.

Julia watched the pair through her scope, turning to follow them when she spotted a man walk out from behind the trucks, walking down the left hand side.

Kazeem and Marc were just approaching around the front, he would be on them in a second.

“Hostile, three o’clock,” Julia reported as she pulled the trigger.

The rifle jolted back into her shoulder with the shot but Julia remained firm as she watched the contents of the man’s head spray onto the side of the truck sheeting.

Julia released a slow breath, feeling her muscles begin to relax once more when she saw that Marc and Kazeem were safe, when Carlos called out another one.

He shot and the terrorist hit the floor like a sack of potatoes.

Julia cast a glance at the mountains surrounding them but saw nobody.

Turning back to Kazeem and Marc, Julia spotted them grow interested in one of the trucks as they headed around the back to check what was inside.

Checking the perimeter, Julia spotted Carlos preparing the RPG from the corner of her eye as he placed his rifle down.

Turning back to cover Marc, Julia frowned when she saw him signalling with distress.

Julia pulled back from her scope, “Something’s wrong.”

“What?” Carlos shot her a pleading look before he grabbed his rifle and peered down into the small ravine.

Julia did not recognise the wild signals Marc was making but Carlos seemed to freeze beside her, “What is it? Carlos?”

“Don’t shoot at the trucks!” Carlos shouted in fear as he turned and signalled Twitch who eagerly returned the sign.

“Carlos?”

“I’m going down there,” Carlos left the RPG on the side as he got to his feet and pulled the strap of his rifle over his head.

“What- Carlos!?” Julia shouted after him, “What’s going on?”

“Just don’t shoot at the trucks!” Was the only reply he gave her as a cloud of dust and sand billowed up into her face from where he unsettled the rocks.

Spluttering against the onslaught, Julia waved the dust cloud away before she resettled herself into her rifle, vowing to kill him for leaving her.

But her anger was soon eclipsed when she saw Marc raise his rifle and shoot a hostile they had not seen, emerging from the cab of the second truck.

Peering into each cab as best she could, Julia cleared each one but she did not what use she would be if she saw someone as she was unable to shoot at the trucks.

What was in those bloody trucks?

Her mind instantly turned towards ammunition.

After minutes of waiting, Julia was ready to abandon her position and head down there to see what had the others so captivated when she saw Marc waving her and Twitch down.

And judging by the speed of his signalling, Julia guessed he wanted them down there fast.

“You got it, boss,” Julia whispered to herself as she went up onto her knees and strapped the rifle around her chest until her weapon bounced softly on her hip.

Pulling the RPG into her arms, Julia got her feet and hurried across the few hundred yards to Twitch’s position.



* * *



After what felt like climbing Mount Everest – twice! – Twitch and Julia reached the bottom, heavily ladened down with an unconscious Marine and a loaded RPG.

Setting Ray on the floor and propping him up against a wheel of the truck, Julia rested the RPG beside him and leant against the truck for support.

Breathing heavy, and their skin overheating, Julia and Twitch turned to Marc, Carlos and Kazeem.

Julia was the first to be able to gain her breath back, “What the hell’s going on? Why can’t we shoot the truck?”

“Take a look,” Marc waved for her and Twitch to follow him.

Resting a hand on her rifle, Julia hated all of this secrecy as she followed him around to the back.

A loose sheet was hanging over the side, hiding the truck’s contents from her view.

Julia frowned at the expression on Marc’s face as he grabbed the end of the sheet and pulled it back so she could see inside.

And once she did, Julia felt nauseas.

“Holy sh-” Julia couldn’t stop the words from leaving her mouth as she stared in horror.

Her mouth became drier than the desert she was standing on as her heart seemed to drop into her stomach, “How-” Julia swallowed, unable to get the words out, “How long have they been in there?”

Carlos and Kazeem joined them from around the front.

Marc stared at the dozens of children stuffed into the back of the truck, draped over each other like cattle heading for the slaughter, pure white hot rage rising in his veins.

“They were taken from villages all over the region,” Kazeem informed her with sadness as he spoke with one of the older children, their eyes squinting against the sunlight as their bodies appeared ravaged from starvation, “Their families are dead.”

“How old is he?” Julia asked Kazeem who translated to the boy, his skin holding a waxen cover with his bones visible through his thin skin. His eyes, red-rimmed, were wide and filled with fear.

“Nine.” Kazeem told her.

Julia’s lips parted in shock. She had older friends with children that age back home but this child looked no older than seven with his starved body and stunted growth.

Turning her head, Julia looked at the other two trucks, “Are they-?”

“-Yes,” Marc nodded, “They’re filled with kids too.”

Carlos’s words rung out in Julia’s mind. Don’t shoot at the trucks.

Another wave of nausea engulfed her as she thought about what would have happened if she had ignored him.

Twitch coughed, “From the look of their skin and their eyes, they’re all in varying degrees of dehydration.”

“We need to get them out of here.” Carlos agreed.

“What about the terrorists in the mountains?” Julia asked, the plan had been to lure them here.

But if they came here now, the children would surely die in the crossfire.

“We’ve got the trucks. We’ve got the children,” Marc sighed, “We leave, we drive back to base as fast as possible and get these kids some medical help.”

“Retreat?” Julia frowned as Marc walked past her and towards Ray.

“They’ll be stranded,” Carlos rationalised, “They’ll starve to death out here,” A smile came to his lips, “Poetic justice for what they put those kids through.”

Julia nodded her head, guessing he was right, when a bullet ricocheted off the truck, sparks flying into their faces.

Dropping behind the truck, Julia raised her rifle and looked into the distance where the terrorists they had been leading here, finally arrived.

Resting her head back against the frame, the sound of children screaming filling her ears, Julia cursed herself for getting blown up in the first place.

But then she remembered the children in the trucks behind her and a feeling of fate overwhelmed her.

If she had not gotten blown up, she may never have been here on this day at this precise time.

They may have never found the children and they would have been sent to a terrorist camp where their childhood and innocence was stolen from them.

With that in her mind, rage began to boil underneath her skin and Julia wanted vengeance. Not just for these kids, but for all the others that hadn’t been found.