The Transport

On Tuesday night, July 26, in insurgent-controlled territory in Herat, Afghanistan, 8 soldiers-like individuals with an M4 Carbine were sneaking in inside what seemed to be an abandoned warehouse. The 8 soldiers were divided into 4 groups entering from north, south, east, and west sides of the warehouse. The team leader says, "Don't forget the mission, secure the package and get out. Do not engage in unnecessary confrontation." The team responds with agreeing silence. As the team leader first enters one of the doors, he sees a guard who's smoking a cigarette and he quietly grabs the guard by the mouth and quickly stabs him in the neck, instantly killing the guard without any noise. The team leader says " Sentry down. On guard, guards seem to be on high alert. Take them down quietly if possible. Nick Lia, I need Vision here". It is revealed that the team leader was talking to two snipers a mile away from the warehouse. "Boss, the next sentry is 3 to 4 meters away from your right and Wade, you have a customer from the 2nd floor and 2 meters away from your left." The team leader easily takes out the guard that was mentioned by Nick and Wade signals his partner to take out the guard from the 2nd floor while he takes care of the guard from his left by stabbing him in the neck, instantly killing the guard. "Lia? Any news?" says the team leader. "I have 2 more rooms to check. Just give me 3 minutes." says Lia while checking all the rooms in the warehouse using the scope of her rifle and a drone. The team leader takes a deep breath and informs his team, "You heard her, 3 minutes. Just keep from being seen and we will-", the team leader was interrupted by Lia shouting. "No snail, don't go there!!". One of the team leader's soldiers was seen by the guard from the 2nd floor and shouted "muKHil" as he shot the soldier named Snail, hitting him in the chest and his legs. Snail was pulled behind the building post by his fellow soldier and partner and said, "Snail is hit!! I need cover!!". The team leader quickly runs to the post behind Snail's shooter and shoots the guard at the back of his head and says, "Wade and Tanya give Yoko cover while she gives Snail First Aid. Tony and Wardo, with me. Lia, give me the 2 remaining rooms, I will check them myself". Lia responds, "It's a downright corner in the basement, 2 rooms facing each other.". The team leader responds while shooting "Copy". As soon as the 2 snipers receive the response, they quickly get up and move to a much closer spot to the warehouse and set up their rifles. The team leader asks while mowing down insurgents "All set??" Nick and Lia reply "Yes, Boss". The team leader hides behind a wall to reload while his 3 subordinates keep on firing on the insurgents. The team leader gives orders saying, "Nick, Lia take out all the birds on the 2nd floor while Wade and the others give Yoko cover. We will get downstairs and we can go home. Do not take unnecessary risks and have each other's backs." The whole team responds for the first time, "Yes Boss!!". "Yoko?" The team leader lastly says with a grin on his face. "Boss?" Yoko replies while giving Snail first aid. "I need to beat the s**t out of him, so please don't let that i***t die." Yoko smiles along with the rest of them and answers "Yes, Boss". The team leader reaches the entrance to the basement with more than 15 insurgents shooting like its new year. the team leader and 3 of his subordinates hide behind a wall to keep from being shot and says "Flash bomb!" and one of his subordinates throws a flash bomb in the basement and starts shooting all the insurgents dead. " The three of you stay here and guard the entrance, make sure we can get out once I get the package". 3 of them responded "Yes, Boss". As the team leader heads for the basement, there are 4 rooms in it, but he checks the first 2 rooms as he enters to make sure that there are no other insurgents that might try to shoot him from the back as he reaches his target rooms at the end of the basement. The first room he entered was the insurgents' command center, a number of TV screens with CCTV footage, piles of guns and ammo, but no one was around. Seems they're the ones they shot at when they tried to take the basement. The next room he entered, the team leader was shocked by the things he had seen, enough to make him open his eyes open wider than the usual way and slightly vomit in his own mouth. Inside the room, he sees 4 insurgents, but not just any insurgents. 2 of them were insurgent commanders Noor Abdul Qahhar and Tamir Akbarkhan, both notorious for torturing and killing civilians, especially women and children, while the other 2 were high-ranking political officers whose well-known s*x offenders in the country. But the team leader was not shocked because of these people. He was shocked by seeing 3 naked women who were clearly dead being tied in a very disturbing and s****l way together in one bed and at the left corner of the room, there were more than 5 obviously dead naked bodies of women piled together like dirty laundry. The team leader was weakened in his knees and lost his grip on his gun when seeing these horrifying images. Deep in his thoughts he is saying "There are people like this in the world?". When the team leader entered the room, the 2 high ranking officials and 2 commanders were naked and sacred with only hand guns available, they knew that they would die if they tried to do something reckless to the soldier who had an M4 Carbine in front of them. That's why one of the high ranking officials who can speak a little English pleads for his life by saying, "Please, don't kill me. I will give you money, land, women. Everything! Just don't kill me." But the high-ranking official sees the soldier being shocked and seems to be out of his own mind by seeing the bodies in the room. The official realizes that this will be his chance to live by killing the soldier in front of him and shouts "Shoot him!!!". The 2 commanders who had the handguns raised their guns to point at the team leader, but the 2 commanders were already dead before their guns could point to the head of the soldier. The high ranking official was shocked because of the gunshots and blood splatter of the 2 commanders on his face. Their death was so fast that he could not see the commanders being hit by the bullet in their faces. He had just realized that the commanders were dead when he looked on the floor and saw one of the commander's horrific faces that had a hole the size of an apple and blood everywhere. In front of him was a soldier pointing a .500 Magnum Revolver at him. The official was so scared that he pissed himself crying and begging for his life by saying "Please, don't-". The team leader did not let the official finish his sentence and just shot him in the face and went to the next room. The next room he enters is empty, no personnel, no dead women, no guns, totally empty. So he decided to go to the next and last room in the basement; as he entered he was welcomed by a gun pointed at one of the hostage women. The person pointing the gun tries hard to speak in English by saying "Do not move, I will kill this person!". The team leader raises his hands and says "Okay". The Insurgent said "Drop Gun!!!". While dropping his M4 Carbine, the team leader realizes that there's only 1 insurgent in the room and calmly says "Just Yes or No. Okay" while looking at the woman hostage. "Are you from WHO?". The woman realizes the question and quickly answers "YES!". As soon as the woman yelled "yes", the team leader was fast enough to pull his .500 magnum revolver out and shoot the insurgent directly in the head, instantly killing him. The woman sees the dead insurgent's disfigured face due to the gunshot he received from the soldier and she instantly goes to the children and hugs them to prevent them from seeing this horrifying scene. While hugging the children, the woman sees a hand being offered to her. A hand that seems to be offered to help her to stand up, a hand given to her to rescue her from this nightmare, a hand given to her to take her away from 8 days of captivity, a hand to help her end hers and other captives 8 days of suffering and physical and mental abuse they experience from their captors, a hand that will take her to her family. As she reaches for the hand, she remembers everything that happened from the beginning. Zy Angela Tan, a Half Chinese and Half Australian doctor from the World Health Organization who organized and funded a Medical Mission to help Women and Children affected in the civil war in Afghanistan. The high ranking official at WHO was against this medical mission since the battle with the government together with the countries from the west against the Insurgents is at all time high and deadly for civilians, but she insisted on going there, saying that the soldiers are not the only ones affected in this war but also the women and children, who are also civilians. Due to her insistence, she approved to do the medical mission but with 2 other male doctors. Only her and those 2 doctors who volunteered are from Israel and Lebanon. When they arrived in Afghanistan, they were greeted by both Afghan and US soldiers thanking them for their help and 4 other doctors from Syria and Afghanistan insisted on joining them. They agreed and started treating all wounded, from soldiers to civilians. On the third day of their medical mission, they were done for the day and decided to have some rest. Some of the doctors decided to go to the city hotel, which is guarded by soldiers, but 3 female doctors, including Zy, decided to stay because of the children who couldn't be moved and some children who were orphaned because of the war. While having their dinner, they were shocked by gunshots and explosions. A soldier told them that an Insurgent unit with a number of 400 people had ambushed their base and they would remove all military personnel and all civilians as much as possible, telling them to also move. While helping the children, Zy, together with the 2 other doctors who decided to stay, were taken as hostages by the insurgents. They were taken to Herat, the old base of the Insurgents that no one knows, because they knew that they could use a foreign doctor for future negotiations or for ransom. 3 female doctors and 6 children were taken to the Isurgent base and, in their 8 days of captivity every day, different women from different regions were taken there for the soldiers to be abused sexually and physically, for them women are toys to be played with. They had direct orders not to sexually assault the foreign doctor, but Zy was never exempted from the punches, slaps and other physical injury given to her by the insurgents. Especially when these people tried to harm the children, Zy would give her body for them to hurt just to protect the children. For 8 days with minimal food and water, she endured all of this hoping that one day a person would come to end her suffering, their suffering. That's when someone reaches a helping hand for her for the first time in 8 days, she had tears in her eyes. When Zy reached the hand of the soldier, she was about to thank him for saving her. But instead of holding her hand, a bracelet was put on her wrist and the soldier said, "That's a Tracker. We cannot afford to lose you in this extraction. If you get kidn*pped along the way, make sure they don't see this. You understand?" Zy was shocked because this person was not offering his hand to help her, he was asking for her hand to put a tracker in case she got lost or got kidn*pped again. Zy in her mind saying "This soldier is an asshole." After the tracker was put on her wrist, she was asked "Can you stand? Can you walk?" and she replied "Yes" and then the soldier told her, "Carry the kids who can't stand or walk, stay behind me and you only move when I say so". She agrees with him by nodding. She stands up and picks up the kids. She hears a yell from the soldier by saying. Zy got irritated and yelled back at the soldier, "I'm sick of you telling me what to do!! Can't you see that these kids are traumatized by what happened, especially when you shoot someone in the face in front of them? That's why I need to carry some of them because they are scared." She looked at the soldier as she yelled. The team leader walks towards Zy and calmly tells her near to her face, "I can't get you or these children out of here if you're just gonna slow me down. These children can walk by themselves if you tell them that we are getting out of here. If you're just gonna slow me down, I'm gonna carry you out myself by knocking you unconscious while these kids run behind me. I don't give a s**t whether these kids die along the way. My mission is to get you out of here alive. Even if the next time you wake up is by your daddy's side as long as your alive." Zy was shocked at first, not by what the soldier said but because of his eyes. His beautiful brown eyes, but it's obvious that his eyes have sadness in them. Not just any sadness, it's full of misery, suffering and regret. She realized that she had been staring at him for too long and yelled out, "You really are an asshole!". The team leader replied, "I don't give a s**t what you call me, as long as I get you out of here, I can go home myself." She pouts and whispers " Narcissistic, Self-absorbed d**k!". The team leader says "What?" and she replies "Nothing! Let me talk to the children first so we can get out of here." As she talks to the children to ask them if they can walk, the team leader reloads his gun while saying, "I have the package. How's Snail? Okay, ready for extraction, we will head out in 2 minutes. Make sure everything is clean." Everyone replies, "Yes, Boss" . As they exit the basement, 3 of the team leader's subordinates are waiting at the basement's entrance. The team leader immediately asks "Is everything ready?". Wardo replies, "Yes boss, Wade and Tanya are waiting outside. Yoko and the others went ahead to get transport. The Device has been planted, we have 18 minutes." The team leader nods and says, "Okay, we need to get out of here fast. Make sure that everyone is accounted for, because once we get out of the entrance we are not going back. Let's go". They immediately left the basement entrance and outside, Wade and Tanya are waiting. "Everything Okay?" Wade asks. "Yeah, She is packed.", the team leader replies. Wade then leads the way and says, "Our ride is up ahead, 5 mins from here. Snail's vital is normal, the i***t will survive.". They run and quickly reach the Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion waiting for them and immediately the leader says, "Lia, let's go." and Lia replies as she flies the helicopter, "Yes, Boss". As they leave the area, Zy and the children see the base of their captors blown up from the helicopter. An explosion was so massive that it lighted up the dark night. As the children watch the explosion, the team leader says to them, "You will have no reminder of this tragedy because everything has been blown to pieces." The children look at the soldier, not understanding a single word he is saying, but one person starts crying. It was Zy, the only doctor left alive. The only adult who survived this horrifying tragedy, cries like a child. When the kids saw her crying, all of them also started crying, like they understood that everything would be okay from now on. The moment she heard the soldier, tears rolled down her eyes and she started crying because of relief and regret at the same time. She is relieved that she can go home now, but she is also blaming herself that she is the only one who survived. As she was crying, a beautiful Asian woman consoled her, rubbing her back and saying, "Just cry it out. Don't worry, we have 45 minutes until we arrive at the camp. Just cry it out if it will make you feel better." As she keeps on crying, Yoko offers her water as she starts drinking. Lia the pilot asks, "Boss, now is the time, don't you think?" The team leader looks around and sees all of his subordinates are looking at him. He just smiled and says "Let's go home and have a drink.". As the team leader finishes that sentence, every soldier in the helicopter cheers and shouts in relief. Talking about what kind of food they will be eating, what kind of drink they will be drinking once they are home. Zy was shocked at what happened because she thought that they were having a good time while she and the kids were crying. She looked at Yoko. The Asian soldier said, "Don't worry, we are not making fun of you. It's just our lucky phrase every time we finish a mission. It gives us something to look forward to when we get home". Zy wanted to complain but she felt immediate tiredness, it seemed all the fatigue from the 8 days of captivity wanted to come to her body and she just wanted to sit still and be quiet. It's been 20 mins since they left the warehouse base of the Insurgents, the children are sleeping and the soldiers are talking. The team leader felt unease during the helicopter ride. His 0.500 Magnum Revolver felt heavy and hot like a frying pan as he was feeling this uneasiness. Zy vomits inside the helicopter without any reasons. Wade says, "Hey! That's nasty, we have a patient that has an open wound. Aren't you a doctor? What's wrong with you?" Yoko tells him "Shut up Wade! Miss? Are you okay? You want more water?". Zy was about to answer but the team leader spoke loudly immediately. "LIA? HOW LONG TILL WE GET TO THE CAMP? WADE, WARDO, NICK LOOKOUT FOR ANY PROJECTILE OUTSIDE". The soldiers, who were having a good time earlier, immediately put on serious faces and looked outside the helicopter. Lia replies, "4 to 6 minutes boss, What's wrong?". The team leader ordered them. "I don't know, something feels off. Just be on guard." Everyone replied "Yes, boss" as they put on their game faces like they're gonna storm another abandoned warehouse. After they replied to the team leader, the speaker on the helicopter made an ear-splitting sound for 3 seconds and after the sound there was someone breathing on the speaker for another 3 seconds. After that, a maniacal laughter came. The team leader asks, "Where is this frequency coming from?" Tanya, the co-pilot, replied, "We don't know. It transmitted on its own." The man who was laughing, the speaker started talking, "Relax, I'm not gonna shoot you down. You have something that I want. Well, I guess I should say someone." He continues to laugh maniacally and says, "I know it's JESTER who extracted her. I was just late for a few minutes. But you're not gonna be able to protect her from now on HAHAHA! I will give you 1 week to give her to me. Bring her to Ingracia (a dictatorial country in the far north with very cold weather) and I will consider this issue FORGOTTEN. If not, all of you will burn." The person laughs maniacally again as the transmission fades. Everyone was confused as to what had happened. The team leader looks at Zy and asks her, "Who are you?".