Nicole’s God—or Jesus, I guess—if You’re really there, I could use some help here. If You get me out of this, I promise to really listen to Nicole next time she talks about You. Protect me, but most of all protect my men.

The squeak of brakes cut through the quiet night. He heard a lot of activity from the truck but couldn’t see past the glare of the headlights. However, in front of the truck, he saw four officers exit the jeep. Nir could hear them talking, but he couldn’t understand their Persian words.

Four soldiers appeared in the light and began moving forward while the officers and the rest of the troops took positions of cover behind the vehicles.

Wait for it, Nir thought. Let them get closer.

When they were three meters away, Nir fired, and one of the soldiers dropped to the ground with most of his neck torn away. Instantly, four more shots echoed, and the rest of the lead squad went down. Without pausing, Nir directed his rifle at the vehicles and began firing. The IRGC men shot back, and Nir’s face was peppered with chips of stone.

He ducked and wiped the dust from his eyes. When he looked back over the wall, he spotted a low target alongside the jeep. One shot took the soldier in the hip and put him on the ground. A second shot finished him off.

Two grenades flew from the opposite side of the sheep pen. One landed near the officers, putting three of them down. The second was perfectly thrown toward the transport truck’s external fuel tank. A fraction of a second after the grenade blew, the truck did too. All gunfire from the IRGC soldiers stopped.

“Doron, Dima, clear the area.”

“Root,” they said. Nir saw them up and moving toward the burning truck, rifles ready. Moments later, he heard two shots, followed seconds later by another double tap.

“Cleared,” said Dima. “All hostiles are down.”

“Collect whatever weapons and ammo you can salvage, then get back,” Nir said. “This was the easy round. Anybody bleeding?”

“Just a little.” Nir looked over and in the light of the fire saw blood smeared across Yaron’s forehead.

“My arm got tagged, but it’s just a graze. Lost a little flesh is all,” Doron said.

“How you doing, Lahav?” Looking to where the analyst had been shaking, Nir was surprised to see him with his Jericho 941 in his hand, looking around the wall toward the truck fire.

“It’s really different from Assassin’s Creed.”

All the guys laughed. Nir said, “Yeah, just a bit different from a video game.” Noticing Lahav’s slide was locked back, he added, “You may want to change your mag.”

“Oh, yeah. Thanks.”

“Get ready, everybody. The rest should be here any moment.”

Chapter 30

CHAPTER 30

20:15 / 8:15 P.M. IRST