Operation: Sahara

-Banks-

They fled up the stairs towards where Wilkins waited above, into the dark, imagining the black bodies of the beasts of hell at their back, thinking at any second to be plucked away into a death of a thousand cuts. Any daylight that made its way into the temple floor far below was thin and diffuse up here and they ascended into increasing darkness and shadow.

When they reached Wilkins’ position Banks felt cold fresh air on his face, and saw, for the first time in long seconds, a hint, a merest glimmer, of light ahead.

“This way, lads,” he shouted, and ran full pelt towards the light.

He reached a rock wall within five yards and saw light beyond a narrow cleft ahead. He forced himself into it, having to turn side on to pass through. For a horrible second he thought he might get stuck; if he’d had a beer gut he might be there yet, but with some degree of straining he was able to finally push through onto a wide open cliff-top ledge under blazing sun looking out over desert dunes far below.

Wiggo and Wilkins emerged at his side seconds later. They stood back, weapons raised but despite some frantic scrambling and scratching from the far side, none of the beetles made it through.

“Looks like this is how the old soldier must have got out,” Banks said.

“Aye, I think you could say that,” Wiggo said dryly. “You need to see this, Cap. Wilko, watch our backs.”

Banks turned to Wiggo to see him look down at a desiccated body sitting against the canyon wall to one side of the crack they’d just come through. It wore the red serge of a Victorian soldier, but obviously wasn’t the one who’d written the journal. Banks knew immediately who this must be. He had a bullet hole between his eyes and a hastily scribbled note tucked into his tunic. Banks took it out and read it aloud.

“For desertion and abandoning his command in the face of the enemy. The sentence is death.”

“Now we know why the auld lad didn’t live off the story in his dotage back home,” Banks said.

“He shot his C.O.?”

“Aye, and I’d probably have done the same in his place, but don’t go getting any ideas, Sarge.”

“So the auld lad made it this far. Then what?”

They studied the ledge and quickly found their answer. A precarious cliff track wound away down below them to where the cliff met the desert. Way off on the horizon to the east, Banks saw a darker patch of land that could only be the oasis. On the other side of the ledge an equally steep track led farther up the canyon. Banks realised that he was near to dropping; such a climb was out of the question without some rest, and looking at Wiggo and Wilkins he saw the same tiredness in their features that he felt in himself.

“There’s our escape route,” he said, pointing down the cliff, “but first we find Davies. We told him to go high, so we’ll be heading up. But not until we rest up.”

Wiggo looked like he wanted to complain but Banks stopped him with a raised hand and pointed to the cliff.

“Be my guest, Sarge. But that’s our way up, and yon’s a perilous track. If your legs are anything like mine they won’t take you very far before you fall off. It’s a long way down.”

Wiggo finally saw sense. Banks kept watch on the thin crack they’d come through while the sergeant and Wilkins got a brew of coffee going.

“Davies is a smart lad,” Banks said when Wiggo handed him a mug. “He’ll find a place to hunker down until we can get to him.”

“It’s a big city, Cap,” Wiggo said.

“Aye, but you ken what the Scottish are like. We can find a countryman or a bar in any city in the world.”

“If I get a vote, I’ll settle for both.”

There was no recurrence of the scrambling from beyond the crack in the cliff wall that led to the temple but Banks felt exposed out in the open on the ledge. He sent the others to a patch of shade that was developing near the upward cliff path as the sun passed over the top of the hill and put himself on first watch while they tried to catch forty winks. He stood with his back against the cliff face, alert for any sound behind him, smoking a succession of cigarettes and looking out over the desert.

He felt just about as tired as he’d ever been, and although they’d each eaten some field rations with their coffee, he knew it wasn’t really enough to replace the energy they’d been expending since first finding trouble at the oasis. That felt like a thousand miles and a lifetime ago already.

And we’ve still got all the way back to go to get safe.

He pushed that thought away. The rescue was a busted flush but he had a different priority now; he had a man separated from the squad and in danger. Davies was all that mattered.

To try to turn his mind to other matters he looked again at the dried out body sitting against the cliff face. He had no pity for the dead man; being left to sit alone on a remote cliff ledge with no one to know his fate was no more than he deserved. He’d committed the cardinal sin in Banks’ mind. He’d abandoned his squad at the time of their greatest need. Banks meant what he’d said to Wiggo, he would have given the officer the same fate had he been there back then, and walked away without a qualm. The squad was his life; to let them down was the greatest sin he could imagine.

He fell into the half-watching, half-asleep reverie again, looking out towards the oasis but seeing old campaigns in his mind, from Baffin Bay to Antarctica, from Siberia to the Amazon and across other deserts in Syria and Mongolia. And now here. Would he too end up on some forgotten clifftop when, as was probably inevitable, something finally caught up with them?

He made a vow to himself that, if that ever happened, he’d ensure the squad was free and safe before he let anything take him and, standing there on that high ledge, he threw his promise out to whoever or whatever gods might be listening.

Wilkins spelled him after two hours and three and a bit hours later he woke, not quite refreshed but at least rested well enough that he felt that the climb might be possible. He had a coffee and a smoke with the others then turned his attention to the cliff path. Now that this side of the mountain was in shadow it looked even more dangerous and forbidding than before, but at least they’d be ascending away from the full heat of the sun. That was one of the few plus points.

But Davies has been up there for a long time alone now. Time we were going.

Five minutes later they were on their way.

Banks took the lead as they began their ascent.