Sabotage: Beginnings Read Free Page A

traitors is the youngest?” he pointed at a man who appeared to be in his fifties. They all looked eternal, so it was impossible to tell. “Him?” he jabbed a finger toward that man.
    “Sunni, yes, he is the youngest of the council.” Al bin Tosk replied.
    Ben moved with reinvigorated momentum. He sensed the end game—he’d played it out too many times before. He snatched Sunni and strapped his reedy hide to a small tree. Horror exploded in Sunni’s expression. Ben noticed the Al bin Tosk, their brave man of honor, had pissed his salwar. He looked like an infant who’d just messed his jammies.
    Al bin Tosk protested, but in reality it was his insolence that caused what would happen next. He’d be the last of them to go. Tension ramped up, as did Ben’s desire for satisfaction—operational and sexual. Everyone was stricken in disbelief as Ben jerked and directed Al bin Tosk and the two remaining council tribesmen into the tiny grove of trees. They were all fastened immobile against the trunks with the bite of cloth and leather straps.
    Their meeting location had been carefully selected by Ben to be strategic as well as symbolic. Atop the ridge just north of the Khojak Pass, about eighty kilometers northwest of Quetta in Balochistan, their carcasses would be found within a day or so because of the mountain’s popular ridgeline passageway. It was the best way to travel between Pakistan and Afghanistan—especially for terror networks looking to avoid boarder checkpoints.
    As the black-bag scientist back in the States had trained him, Ben began the process of killing. His goal was no longer information gathering—it was perception control. He’d been taught that people have a small window of opportunity to tell the truth about what they know. Once that window was gone, effort was wasted.
    The next phase involved making a statement. Otherwise, the CIA would appear weak or merciful. Ben had become indifferent about killing enemies of the United States. What he hadn’t anticipated was the extra benefits that came with the freedom to operate on a level unaccountable to any one else. The stark reality that if he were captured, his nation would disavow knowledge of him, stirred a thirst for living his life with a real sense of finality.
    Al bin Tosk was now a victim of Ben’s thirst. He fainted for the fifth or sixth time. Ben enjoyed slapping him harder each time until he regained consciousness. Actually, Ben couldn’t wait to get his hands on him. By now the eldest tribal leader was begging to talk but it was too late. Ben’s gut had become filled with the flavor of flesh he’d devoured from the last two men. He reveled in the fact that his delight in cannibalism horrified Sunni and Al bin Tosk. It would help make Sunni’s message to his tribe that much more vivid.
    “Just get it over with. Kill me now.” The old man still assumed he had the authority to give orders.
    Ben had stripped the three men completely naked earlier. Now he jammed his bloody KA-BAR into Al bin Tosk’s left thigh. He heard—and felt—the scraping thud as it embedded into the large femur bone. Al bin Tosk passed out. Again.
    Another bruising slap to the face, and Al bin Tosk muttered through swollen lips and cracked teeth, “I’ll tell you. Just let me free.”
    Coward. I hate cowards. Die with honor.
    “I’m going to allow Sunni to go free after I kill you. He will tell your people what he witnessed. Someone from your tribe will tell me the truth.”
    His loosened jaw wobbled side-to-side, “Kill him instead. I’ll go back and tell my people. They won’t listen to him,” Al bin Tosk pleaded.
    Sunni’s eyes opened wide. Ben assumed it was at the news he’d be freed but it should’ve been over how cowardly his senior mentor was.
    “What a horrible leader you’ve turned out to be. You offer to sell out Osama bin Laden, your country’s benefactor.” He twisted the blade’s tip deeper into the man’s thigh. Al bin Tosk