Prism - By Rachel Moschell Page 0,5
courtyard, as the whole surrounding area would like to see the American soldiers in Pakistani custody mutilated and dead.
But no one would expect a shot to come from this distance.
A cacophony of horns blasted from the matchbox cars snaking along below. The sound would cover the shot perfectly. Alejo shifted one leg, ever so slightly, letting blood flow back into one of his thighs that had been riding a rock for the past half-hour.
“Targets are moving towards the mark,” Gabriel said calmly. He rolled into place in the line of three men on their stomachs and positioned his gun on the sandbag. The three of them gazed through the gun scopes now at the American prisoners, blond and thin inside their bullet-proof vests. Alejo evened his breathing and willed his weak arm still.
He drew a slow lungful of air, then held it, finger exact and deathly-still on the trigger. He heard each beat of his heart echo in his ear, steady and slow. He waited until one heartbeat had just drummed, then murmured in the space between, “Now.”
Below in the Old City, the timing was perfect. An ornately-painted bus lumbering around the corner of the compound honked and belched black smoke, just as Alejo’s bullet entered the medulla oblongata at the base of the middle soldier’s skull and he slumped to the dirt in a crimson mist. The other two collapsed on top of him, the part of their brains that controls involuntary movements effectively destroyed. It took a full five seconds for all hell to break loose in the courtyard as mustachioed policemen and high-up American officials all turned up dust diving for cover.
Alejo could tell there was no need to take a second shot. He felt cold, and lowered the rifle from his eyes, staring at the dim outline of the mountains encircling the city. Still lying low, he pulled a small gray cell phone from his pocket and punched a button. Ishmael Khan, recruiter from the Prism and Alejo’s handler, would be pacing the floor in his mansion until he heard the soldiers were dead.
Alejo set his jaw, then motioned to Benjamin and Gabriel. They slunk into the tri-color apartment building and into a room filled with grimy shalwar kameezs, ammunition, and cigarette butts. Afghan-made cigarettes. This was the kind of hole Taliban fighters always frequented, and whoever one day discovered this place Alejo had set up would not be surprised to see a slew of rifles on the kitchen table next to the moldering rice and half-eaten naan bread. Everyone in Peshawar packed lead.
Slick with sweat and fine concrete dust, the three men dumped their soiled shalwar kameezs with the rest of the filthy clothes on the bathroom floor and pulled on jeans and t-shirts, the clothes of upper-class Pakistani students. With bronze skin, wavy black hair, and perfect Pashto, Alejo never had problems passing as a Pakistani on his many trips to the country. The other two guys on his team were also from Bolivia, a little lighter-skinned than Alejo but they still passed as Pakistani or Afghani.
“Death to the infidels,” Gabriel grinned, stuffing wads of tattered rupee bills into a bag around his thin chest. Benjamin and Alejo rolled their eyes.
“Goodness, I’m just kidding.” Gabriel flashed merry eyes at them and winked. “Let’s get out of here.”
The throbbing wail of a siren cut through the heat outside the apartment building, racing towards the murdered Americans. The white orb of midday sun still blazed through the murky haze of pollution over the city. And less than twenty blocks away, three lives had just been extinguished.
They were getting away. The three of them would walk through this entire maze of a city, get to the Khan’s house, and report a successful mission.
Alejo tried to tell himself he should be happy.
At least a little.
That night, the feast at Ishmael Khan’s house was bounteous. Alejo and his team sat on burgundy and ivory carpets, faced with silver platters of seared roti bread and lamb curry. Milky tea simmered in bone white porcelain, rich with sugar crystals and cardamom. The rest of his team was having the time of their life in the marble hall of the Khan’s mansion, but Alejo needed to get out of there. He made his excuses to the entire clan of Khan relatives and navigated Peshawar’s labyrinth streets back to the apartment that was always waiting for him here in Pakistan.
Alejo slammed and locked the heavy wooden door and pulled a couple of guns