Trapping Zero

For three days they had been kept in the basement of a desert compound, bound at the wrists and kept in the dark, both literally and figuratively.

Bachar had spent those three days waiting for their inevitable fate. These men were most likely Hamas, he realized, or some offshoot thereof. They would torture and eventually murder him. They would record the ordeal on video and send it to the Israeli government. Three days of waiting and wondering, dozens of horrid scenarios playing out in Bachar’s head, felt just as tortuous as whatever plans these men had for them.

But when they finally did come for him, it was not with weapons or implements. It was with words.

A young man, not twenty-five if he was a day, entered the subterranean level of the compound alone and turned on the light, a single bare bulb in the ceiling. He had dark eyes, a beard trimmed short, and broad shoulders. The young man paced before the three of them, on their knees with hands bound in front of them.

“My name is Awad bin Saddam,” he told them, “and I am the leader of the Brotherhood. The three of you have been conscripted into a most glorious purpose. Of you, one will deliver for me a message. Another will document our holy jihad. And the third… the third is unnecessary. The third will die at our hands.” The young man, this bin Saddam, paused his pacing and reached into his pocket.

“You may decide who will carry out which task between yourselves if you wish,” he said. “Or, you may leave it to chance.” He bent at the waist and placed three thin lengths of twine on the floor before them.

Two of them were approximately six inches long. The third was trimmed a couple inches shorter than the others.

“I will return in half an hour.” The young terrorist left the basement and locked the door behind him.

The three journalists stared at the trimmed, fraying lengths of rope on the stone floor.

“This is monstrous,” said Avi quietly. He was a stout man of forty-eight years, older than most still working in the field.

“I will volunteer,” Yosef told them. The words spilled from his mouth before he thought them through—because if he did, he would likely hold them behind his tongue.

“No, Yosef.” Idan, the youngest of them, shook his head firmly. “It is noble of you, but we couldn’t live with ourselves knowing that we allowed you to volunteer for death.”

“You would leave it up to chance?” Yosef countered.

“Chance is fair,” said Avi. “Chance is unbiased. Besides…” He lowered his voice as he added, “This may be a ruse. They may still yet kill all of us anyhow.”

Idan reached down with both bound hands and scooped the three spans of rope in his fist, gripping them so that the exposed ends appeared to be the same length. “Yosef,” he said, “you choose first.” He held them out.

Yosef’s throat was too dry for words as he reached for an end and slowly pulled it from Idan’s fist. A prayer ran through his head as an inch, then two, then three unfurled from his enclosed fingers.

The other end fell free after only a few short inches. He had drawn the short rope.

Avi heaved a sigh, but it was one of despair, not of relief.

“There you have it,” said Yosef simply.

“Yosef…” Idan began.

“The two of you can decide between yourselves which task you will take,” Yosef said, cutting off the younger man. “But… if either of you make it out of this and return home, please tell me wife and son…” He trailed off. Final words seemed to fail him. There was nothing he could convey in a message that they would not already know.

“We will tell them you boldly faced your fate in face of terror and iniquity,” Avi offered.

“Thank you.” Yosef dropped the short length to the ground.

Bin Saddam returned a short time later, as he had promised, and again paced before the three of them. “I trust you have come to a decision?” he asked.

“We have,” said Avi, looking up into the face of the terrorist. “We have decided to adopt your Islamic concept of hell just so that we have a place to believe you and your bastard lot will end up.”

Awad bin Saddam smirked. “But which of you will go before me?”

Yosef’s throat still felt parched, too dry for words. He opened his mouth to accept his fate.

“I will.”

“Idan!” Yosef’s eyes bulged wide. Before he could say anything, the younger man had spoken up. “No, it is not him,” he told bin Saddam quickly. “I drew the short rope.”

Bin Saddam looked from Yosef to Idan, seemingly amused. “I suppose I will just have to kill the one who opened his mouth first.” He reached for his belt and unsheathed an ugly, curved knife with a handle made from a goat’s horn.

Yosef’s stomach turned at the mere sight of it. “Wait, not him—”

Awad flicked his knife out and across Avi’s throat. The older man’s mouth fell open in surprise, but no sound came forth as blood cascaded down from his open neck and spilled onto the floor.

“No!” Yosef shouted. Idan squeezed his eyes shut as a piteous sob burst from him.

Avi fell forward onto his stomach, faced away from Yosef as a pool of dark blood seeped across the stones.

Without another word, bin Saddam left them there once again.

The two remaining endured that night without sleep and not a single word passing between them, though Yosef could hear the soft sobs of Idan as he mourned the loss of his mentor, Avi, whose body laid mere feet from them, growing ever colder.

In the morning three Arabic men entered the basement wordlessly and removed Avi’s body. Two more came immediately after, followed by bin Saddam.

“Him.” He pointed to Yosef, and the two insurgents roughly hauled him to his feet by the shoulders. As he was dragged towards the door he realized that he might never see Idan again.

“Be strong,” he called over his shoulder. “God be with you.”

Yosef squinted in the harsh sunlight as he was dragged into a courtyard surrounded by a high stone wall and thrown unceremoniously into the back of a truck, the bed covered by a dome of canvas. A burlap bag was yanked over his head, and once again he found himself plunged into darkness.

The truck rumbled to life and out of the compound. Which direction they were traveling in, Yosef could not tell. He lost track of how long they had been driving and the voices from the cab were hardly distinguishable.

After a while—two hours, perhaps three—he could hear the sounds of other vehicles, engines roaring, horns honking. Beyond that were street vendors hawking and civilians shouting, laughing, conversing. A city, Yosef realized. We are in a city. What city? And why?

The truck slowed and suddenly a harsh, deep voice was directly in his ear. “You are my messenger.” There was no mistaking it; the voice belonged to bin Saddam. “We are in Baghdad. Two blocks to the east is the American embassy. I am going to release you, and you are going to go there. Do not stop for anything. Do not speak to anyone until you arrive. I want you to tell them what happened to you and your countrymen. I want you to tell them that it was the Brotherhood that did this, and their leader, Awad bin Saddam. Do this and you will have earned your freedom. Do you understand?”

Yosef nodded. He was confused at the content of such a simple message and why he had to deliver it, yet eager to be free of this Brotherhood.

The burlap bag was torn from over his head, and at the same time he was shoved roughly from the back of the truck. Yosef grunted as he hit the pavement and rolled. An object sailed out behind him and landed nearby, something small and brown and rectangular.

It was his wallet.

He blinked in the sudden daylight, passers-by pausing in astonishment to see a man bound at the wrists thrown from the back of a moving vehicle. But the truck did not stop; it rolled on and vanished into the thick afternoon traffic.

Yosef grabbed his wallet and got to his feet. His clothes were filthy and soiled; his limbs ached. His heart broke for Avi and for Idan. But he was free.

He staggered down the block, ignoring stares from citizens of Baghdad as he headed towards the US embassy. A large American flag guided his way from high upon a pole.

Yosef was about twenty-five yards from the tall chain-link fence that surrounded the embassy, topped in barbed wire, when an American soldier called out to him. There were four of them posted at the gate, each armed with an automatic rifle and in full tactical gear.

“Halt!” the soldier ordered. Two of his comrades leveled their guns in his direction as the dirty, bound Yosef, half-dehydrated and sweating, stopped in his tracks. “Identify yourself!”

“My name is Yosef Bachar,” he called back in English. “I am one of three Israeli journalists that were kidnapped by Islamic insurgents near Albaghdadi.”

“Call this in,” the commanding soldier told another. With two guns still trained on Yosef, the soldier approached him warily, his rifle cradled in both arms and a finger on the trigger. “Put your hands on your head.”

Yosef was frisked thoroughly for weapons, but the only thing the soldier found was his wallet—and inside it, his identification. Calls were made, and fifteen minutes later Yosef Bachar was admitted entrance to the US embassy.

The ropes were cut away from his wrists and he was ushered into a small and windowless office, though not uncomfortable. A young man brought him a bottle of water, which he chugged gratefully.

A few minutes later, a man in a black suit and matching combed hair entered. “Mr. Bachar,” he said, “my name is Agent Cayhill. We’ve been aware of your situation, and we’re very glad to see you alive and well.”

“Thank you,” said Yosef. “My friend Avi was not so fortunate.”

“I’m sorry,” said the American agent. “Your government has been notified of your presence here, as has your family. We’re going to arrange transportation for you to get home as soon as possible, but first we’d like to talk about what happened to you.” He pointed upwards where the wall met the ceiling. A black camera was directed downwards, towards Yosef. “Our exchange is being recorded, and the audio of our conversation is being fed live to Washington, D.C. It is your right to refuse being recorded. You may have an ambassador or other representative from your country present if you wish—”

Yosef waved a tired hand. “That’s not necessary. I want to speak.”

“Whenever you’re ready then, Mr. Bachar.”

So he did. Yosef detailed the three-day ordeal, starting with the trek towards Albaghdadi and their car being stopped on a desert road. The three of them, he and Avi and Idan, had been forced into the back of a truck with bags over their heads. The bags were not removed until they were in the basement of the compound, where they spent three days in darkness. He told them what had happened to Avi, his voice quavering slightly. He told them of Idan, still there in the compound and at the mercy of those reprobates.

“They claimed to have released me to deliver a message,” Yosef concluded. “They wanted you to know who was responsible for this. They wanted you to know the name of their organization, the Brotherhood, and that of their leader, Awad bin Saddam.” Yosef sighed. “That is all I know.”

Agent Cayhill nodded deeply. “Thank you, Mr. Bachar. Your cooperation is greatly appreciated. Before we see about getting you home, I have one follow-up question. Why would they send you to us? Why not your own government, your people?”

Yosef shook his head. He had been asking himself that ever since he had entered the embassy. “I do not know. All they said was that they wanted you, the Americans, to know who was responsible.”

Cayhill’s brow furrowed deeply. There was a knock at the door to the small office, and then a young woman peered in. “Sorry sir,” she said quietly, “but the delegation is here. They’re waiting in conference room C.”

“Just one minute, thank you,” said Cayhill.

In the same instant that the door closed again, the floor beneath them exploded. Yosef Bachar and Agent Cayhill, along with sixty-three other souls, were incinerated instantly.

Just short of two blocks due south, a truck with a dome of canvas stretched over the bed was parked at the curb, a direct line of sight to the American embassy through its windshield.

Awad watched, not blinking, as the windows of the embassy exploded, sending fireballs into the sky. The truck beneath him shuddered with the blast, even from this distance. Black smoke roiled into the air as the walls buckled and caved, and the American embassy collapsed in on itself.

Procuring nearly his own weight in plastic explosives had been the easy part, now that he had unquestioned access to Hassan’s fortune. Even kidnapping the journalists had been simple enough. No, the difficulty had been obtaining falsified credentials that were realistic enough for he and three others to pose as maintenance workers. It had required hiring a Tunisian skilled enough to create fake background checks and to hack into the database to enter them as approved contractors allowed access to the embassy.

Only then could Awad and the Brotherhood stow the explosives in a maintenance corridor underneath the Americans’ feet, as they had done two days prior, posing as plumbers repairing a burst pipe.

That part had not been simple or inexpensive, but all well worth it to meet Awad’s ends. No, the easy part had been slipping the high-tech detonation chip into the journalist’s wallet and sending him on his way towards what the foolish man thought was freedom. The bomb would not have detonated without the chip in range.

The Israeli had, essentially, blown up the embassy for them.

“Let’s go,” he told Usama, who directed the truck back onto the road. They skirted around parked vehicles, the drivers stopping right in the middle of the street in awe of the explosion. Pedestrians ran screaming from the blast site as parts of the building’s outer walls continued to collapse.

“I don’t understand,” Usama grumbled as he attempted to navigate the choked streets full of panicking people. “Hassan told me how much was spent on this endeavor. All for what? To kill a journalist and a handful of Americans?”

“Yes,” Awad said pensively. “A select handful of Americans. It came to my attention recently that a congressional delegation from the United States was visiting Baghdad as part of a goodwill mission.”

“What sort of delegation?” Usama asked.

Awad smirked; his simpleminded brother did not, or simply could not, understand—which was why Awad had not yet shared the full extent of his plan with the rest of the Brotherhood. “A congressional delegation,” he repeated. “A group of American political leaders; more specifically, leaders from New York.”

Usama nodded as if he understood, but his furrowed brow said that he still was far from comprehension. “And that was your plan? To kill them?”

“Yes,” said Awad. “And to make the Americans aware of us.” As well as aware of me. “Now we must get back to the compound and prepare for the next part of the plan. We have to hurry. They will be coming for us.”

“Who will?” Usama asked.

Awad smirked as he glanced through the windshield at the burning wreckage of the embassy. “Everyone.”