In Between God and Devil Read online

  The space between the ceiling and his back was less than two or three inches, with the Vatican Knight often finding that his back scrapped along the ceiling with no room to space, unless he deflated his lungs to give him an inch to work with. Worse, he found his shoulders hampered at times, the walls too close, making him wonder if he should abort the mission. But after taking measured and calm breaths, he continued.

  There were moments where the chute opened amply to give him maneuverable space without touching the walls or the ceiling, only to come across another skinny tube for which he would have to labor through. And since time was becoming of the essence, he struggled to move himself into position and hit his earbud. “Kimball.”

  After a long lapse where Isaiah was about to repeat his call, he heard, “Go.”

  “This is taking too long,” he told him. “I’m not sure if I’m halfway through.”

  “Move as fast as you can,” Kimball told him. “Trust me on this. This hillside is about to blow in less than fifteen.”

  “What?”

  “This entire cave system is a weapon’s depot. We set the charges to take it down. This entire camp is about to blow.”

  “Copy that.” Without hesitation, Isaiah shut off his earbud and moved as fast as he could along the chute.

  * * *

  “Kimball.” It was Isaiah coming over his earbud.

  With Shari in his arms, he placed her gingerly on the ground and tapped his earbud piece. “Go.”

  “This is taking too long. I’m not sure if I’m halfway through.”

  “Move as fast as you. Trust me on this. This hillside is about to blow in less than fifteen.”

  “What?”

  “This entire cave system is a weapon’s depot. We set the charges to take it down. This entire camp is about to blow.”

  “Copy that.”

  After closing contact, Kimball stared down at Shari. In sleep she would have been beautiful, he thought. A Sleeping Beauty who needed that kiss by a prince that would awaken her from a deadened slumber. The awaiting lips that needed to be kissed, the woman in need of resurrection, Kimball looked over her with fawning eyes that wondered what they had shared together in a different lifetime.

  Then looking at his GPS, he noted the time: 08:15 and counting.

  Lifting Shari and holding her close to feel the heat of her body, Kimball made his way to where the lead team held their position.

  But it was the countdown of his GPS timer regarding the Semtex he was most worried about. In his mind, he knew exactly the countdown of the timer within the crate.

  . . . 12:24 . . .

  . . . 12:23 . . .

  . . . 12:22 . . .

  Cradling Shari so close that her head rested against his chest, Kimball sprinted through the final leg of the tunnel.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  Jeremiah took position behind an outcropping stone that stood out from the wall. It was a perfect vantage point to see the hostiles without fully exposing himself. Jonah and Noah joined him, though they discovered outcroppings of their own, though they did not provide as good a shield as Jeremiah’s.

  Approximately one hundred feet down the passageway from their position sat a radical kill squad ready to take on all comers. The problem was, however, that they also had the same barriers and the same outcroppings of stone to hide behind. Grenade launchers would have been perfect to disband the unit, but not here. Not when the ceiling could come collapsing down around them.

  Jeremiah pressed his earbud. “Isaiah, what’s your twenty?”

  “Moving as fast as I can. I’m going to guess about fifty to sixty feet away.”

  “Copy that. Notify when you make daylight.”

  “Copy.”

  Jeremiah made quick eye-to-eye contact with Jonah and Noah, then nodded, the gesture relaying the message to ‘ready up.’ They were about to go to war.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  The timer inside the Semtex crate—in red LED numbers—continued to count down.

  . . . 11:36 . . .

  . . . 11:35 . . .

  . . . 11:34 . . .

  CHAPTER FIFTY- FOUR

  When Isaiah was about thirty yards away from an opening that was smaller than a manhole, the tunnel opened large enough for a man to stand, though he would have to bend mightily at the waist to keep from hitting his head on the ceiling. When he reached the amoeba-shaped opening, the Vatican Knight wormed his way through and found himself standing beneath the canvas of a night sky.

  Raising his weapon to eye level to see the landscape through his night-vision scope, he spotted the ‘Gateway’ through the lens, as well as the four mounted heads that maintained a macabre watch over the entrance.

  In the seventy yards of land that divided Isaiah from the opening, the Vatican Knight quickly made his way across the terrain and stood post to one side of the hollow with his back against the stone wall, listening. The heads stared at him through filmed-over eyes and from mottled faces. Moving closer to the entrance he could hear the soft whispers of voices, the language Arabic. Hunkering low, Isaiah slipped inside and stayed along the edge of the cave’s wall. Looking through the lens of his scope, he counted off fourteen hostiles who were dressed in black attire to match their surroundings and hiding behind the outcroppings of stones.

  Slowly and carefully, Isaiah withdrew from the cave and engaged his earbud. Then in hushed tones, he said, “Jeremiah.”

  “Go.”

  “I confirm fourteen hostiles,” he said.

  “Yeah. And they’re all behind barriers. Approach on our part would be difficult.”

  “I see that. I’m going to come up from behind in flank maneuver to neutralize a few. Once I manage cover, move forward and take new ground after I engage. I will keep them busy from my position. When the team is within range to target the hostiles, let me know so that I don’t get caught in the crossfire.”

  “Copy that.”

  Killing his connection by tapping his earbud, Isaiah returned to the cave and stayed close to the wall. As he made his way forward with his footfalls soundless against the grains of desert sand, he set his weapon over his shoulder and removed his knife. In here, a muzzle flash of gunfire would flare as bright as a starburst, alerting everyone.

  Flexing his fingers to better his grip around the handle of the knife, Isaiah moved close to two radicals who had their backs to him. They were posted behind a stone, the two talking to one another in whispers. Each possessed AK-47s. About ten feet ahead of them was another who was alone but stationed to the right of the sentinel pair.

  Isaiah moved in with the knife ready, a shape that moved within the darkness as if he was a part of it. When he was within arm’s length of his targets, Isaiah reached out slowly with his left arm, and then in an instant too quick to realize, lashed out to cup a hand around the guard’s mouth on the left to muffle his cries, while coming across with the knife and burying the point deep within the throat of the second man and then twisting, the man dying instantly. As Isaiah was removing the knife from his opponent’s neck with one hand, he gave a violent twist with the other and snapped the neck clean, with the pair dying in unison and the action taking less than three seconds.

  With the kills silent, Isaiah softly laid the bodies behind the stone and made his way to his next target, someone who appeared to be sleeping because his back was against the wall and his head leaning downward. But when the terrorist reached up to scratch an itch by his nose, Isaiah knew that he was very much awake. Leaning against the wall was his AK-47.

  Isaiah moved through the shadows like a feline who had its eyes on the target. His movements were fluid and graceful and silent, a shadow within shadows that went unseen. When Isaiah was close enough to his mark that he could have taken a seat beside the man without the target knowing that the Vatican Knight was there at all, Isaiah raised his knife and slammed the point of his KABAR home by piercing the man’s temple and driving the blade deep, a clean and effective kill. The terrorist was
never able to register the moment of his death, his execution was that quick.

  Wiping the man’s blood clean from his blade by erasing it along the dead man’s clothes, Isaiah continued to move forward. He was now hunkering behind a sizeable stone that stood from the wall, a place to secure himself. Removing his assault weapon and using the scope to see down the length of the tunnel, he noticed six more. They were positioned in a straight line and was something he could not take on individually as a fighter.

  Leveling his weapon, Isaiah knew that he had no other option other than to let the sparks fly. The six should be an easy takedown, he thought, since his advancement would be one of surprise. It was the other five he worried about, those who would have time to respond and retaliate. But that would be Jeremiah’s predicament to handle.

  Tapping his earbud, Isaiah uttered, “Jeremiah.”

  “Go.”

  “Get ready to move forward in five . . . four . . . three . . . two … one.”

  Isaiah stood up with his weapon raised to eye level and moved forward. He drew a bead on the target to the far left and set off a burst. The tunnel lit up with staccato bursts of light as Isaiah sent off bursts of suppressed gunfire. Through the lens of his scope he could see the bullets stitch along the backside by the way his shirt was blooming at the impacts, and by the way the holes pared back along their edges.

  He quickly moved on to his second target and set off another burst, the Vatican Knight advancing as he drew immediate beads that set off more muted rounds, all striking their intended targets with quickness and accuracy. One by one the terrorists jerked and spasmed against the penetrating rounds. It was as if they were receiving charged volts instead of mercury-hot lead. As soon as they fell once their lives had been smashed from their bodies, Isaiah became the target of retaliation as AK-47s went off in the distance, the tunnel lighting up with heavy bursts of light. Bullets caromed off the surrounding walls and kicked up dirt at the Vatican Knight’s feet, with Isaiah’s reaction swift as he dove behind the rock. Bullets continued to impact with the wall above and around him, the rounds homing in.

  Feeling bits and pieces of gravel rain down on him from the bullets chipping the rock wall, Isaiah hit his earbud. “Jeremiah,” he cried over the noise, “you’re up! Make it count! Things are getting a bit heavy over here!”

  “Copy that.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY- FIVE

  Jeremiah and company had watched it all from their position. The tunnel had lit up with fireworks as Isaiah had promised, while the Vatican Knight advanced on his opponents to carve a way out. They could see the technique of Isaiah moving the point of his weapon from left to right, sighting and clipping his targets in short quick bursts and slight movements, rather than strafing.

  What happened next was expected as the forward team of terrorists realized that their position was being compromised from the rear, so they took immediate action with their attention focused elsewhere.

  Then over Jeremiah’s earbud: “Jeremiah, you’re up! Make it count! Things are getting a bit heavy over here!”

  “Copy that.”

  Taking the wedge formation with Jeremiah serving as the absolute tip of the spear with Jonah on one side of him but slightly behind, and Noah on the other, the Vatican Knights advanced with their MP-7s at eye level and pressed ahead.

  The AK-47s continued to go off, but in the opposite direction. Two extremists who were less seasoned stood up from cover and shot their weapons wildly. As soon as they did, they each received a round to the back of their heads with both dropping as fast as falling rocks.

  That left three.

  The Vatican Knights pressed ahead, searching.

  The AK-47s continued to go off, but more out of desperation and urgency rather than calculated measures of gunfire. Then when Jeremiah’s team heard nothing but clicks, they knew that the weapons had gone dry, the ammo wasted.

  Rounding the boulders and surrounding the remaining three, the Vatican Knights assigned the point of their weapon to an individual, with the terrorists tossing aside their empty weapons and throwing their hands up, the sign of surrender universal.

  Noah ordered them in Arabic to remove the fabric from around their faces to expose themselves, which they did. Boys, teenagers, kids hardly old enough to discover the enchantment of falling in love. Here were a few of the conscripts who had been forced into this tragedy.

  Jeremiah, who lowered his weapon, told Noah to translate.

  “Tell them to go home. Tell them to go back to their families.”

  Once Noah translated, the boys remained unmoving because they were obviously terrified. They had seen the beheadings of those who absconded.

  “Tell them they’ll be fine. Tell them those responsible for their situation are gone.”

  Again, Noah translated. And all it took was for the first boy to rise and take flight, with the others following. They would find their way home to their villages and see the markings where their parents had been buried, then weep while wondering if others would come to whisk them away to join a war they didn’t ask for.

  Jeremiah tapped his earbud: “Isaiah, conscripts will be running by your position. Let them go.”

  “Copy that.”

  After Jeremiah informed Joshua to move the assets forward, Isaiah went to the cave’s mouth and watched the boys get into a truck and drive west. Looking skyward, Isaiah watched countless numbers of pinprick lights twinkle in the vastness. Then he looked east of his position, realizing that the battle wasn’t over. There were more extremists in the tunnels, more conscripts, but they were at the opposite end of the system that was a few clicks away.

  One by one the hostages began to emerge from the maw. Doctors Mayne and Gregor, with their scrubs heavily laden with dust, along with the nurses, moved into the open as if it was something novel to them. They scanned the area with a newfound appreciation of their freedom, of their liberty, something they would never take for granted again. Father Savino followed, the man also appearing appreciative with a God-given smile as he looked to the Heavens and gave a sign of the cross. The only ones left in the tunnel system, however, as a doomsday clock wound down, were Kimball Hayden and Shari Cohen.

  Jeremiah hit his earbud. “Kimball, we have the assets and we’re heading to the extradition point.”

  There was no response.

  CHAPTER FIFTY- SIX

  Kimball gave up his earbud unit in exchange for Shari’s night-vision monocular, which he wore as he wended his way through the tunnels with Shari in his arms. He had heard the gunfire, though it sounded distant and muted. And as he carried Shari, he took periodic glances at his GPS by his elbow. He was making gains with no obstructions or the contesting of enemies. According to the monitor, he had less than three hundred yards to go. The timer also read zeros across the screen, meaning that the time to secure the assets had ended. Either the Vatican Knights did, or they didn’t achieve the means. But none of that mattered as Kimball ran on the timer in his head. The Semtex control unit was winding down to its last four-plus minutes.

  Kimball ran as fast as he could with the cargo in his arms, at least one hundred twenty pounds worth.

  . . . 03:46 . . .

  . . . 03:45 . . .

  . . . 03:44 . . .

  Up ahead, the tunnel appeared less absolute in darkness as the feeble light from the crescent moon began to filter in.

  As durable as Kimball was, the strength that motivated everything he did, and the endurance of a body that often refused to quit when other bodies did, he began to feel his muscles tiring. He had carried the woman a great length on legs that had once been so severely damaged that the physicians entertained the idea of removing them. Suddenly the opening seemed too far, an unconquerable distance to close in time.

  . . . 03:33 . . .

  . . . 03:32 . . .

  . . . 03:31 . . .

  His knees were on the verge of buckling, his gait suddenly choppy.

  And then a hand rose with soft fingers caressin
g his cheeks.

  “You can do this,” Shari told him with a weak voice. “I believe in you.”

  When Kimball looked down at her face to see a light smile that spoke volumes of her belief in him, as she continued to stroke his face with gentle touches, Kimball discovered a force in him that was all-consuming and something latent. His knees no longer buckled as an untapped power rejuvenated him not from the hidden source of driving adrenaline, but from the heart. Immediately the woman in his arms felt as weightless as a down pillow, and his legs surged forward like pistons to close the gap between them and safety.

  . . . 03:07 . . .

  . . . 03:06 . . .

  . . . 03:05 . . .

  “Almost there,” she stated sluggishly. And then her hand fell slowly away.

  I got you, Kimball kept thinking like a mantra in his mind while running and considering that these moments could be his last.

  . . . I got you . . . I got you . . .

  . . . I . . . got . . . you . . .

  CHAPTER FIFTY- SEVEN

  The moment Kimball exited the opening and found himself surrounded by the hideous decoration of severed heads; he knew he made it. Immediately the Vatican Knights surrounded Kimball as he fell to his knees with Shari still in his arms. Jeremiah voiced his concerns about Kimball not responding to his earbud, whereas the doctors tried to separate Shari from his hold, something Kimball was unwilling to do.

  We’ll take care of her, they told him with their voices sounding odd and drawn out. Weeeeee caaaaaan heeeeeelp heeeeeer. Giiiiiive heeeeeer toooooo ussssss.

  Reluctantly, Kimball handed Shari over as the doctors immediately tried to provide aid.

  Then Kimball turned to the cave’s opening to see nothing but blackness that was absolute.