Interruption

Kyle slowly floated up from sleep to an awareness of the sounds and smells around him.

As Sulaiman al-Idris, he was at home in a bedroll, in the desert, in his robes pulled tightly around him. As Kyle, the American boy, there was still a faint jolt of transition from comfortable sleep to the harsh surroundings of rock and rough cloth and rugged horizon. His body was well-accustomed to sleeping where his childhood friends would have found nothing but wakeful discomfort, but it was on waking up that the change from what he had known to the life he knew here was most acutely uncomfortable, even if only for a moment.

The light of dawn was barely a bar across the eastern edge of the sky, and inside the tent it was more of a hint of lines and edges than it was a visible illumination. Sulaiman could make out the flap to the east, and some huddled forms nearby, or perhaps they were just packs and gear piled around him.

Huzzaini was not nearby, his sleeping patch a concavity. He was probably outside lighting the stove and heating water for their morning coffee. A conduit for information back to the leadership of their band, but not a faithless man, Sulaiman thought. He had been a strong support and a courageous comrade on the battlefield in many a firefight, even if he understood that his first job was to keep an eye on the American, Kyle, whatever Sulaiman the mujahadeen might do. They each had a sat phone, and some of Huzzaini's conversations were not within his earshot, but Sulaiman was content. Truth and proof each had their own tests, and time would reveal all to Allah. Always.

It was not time yet to get up and break camp, but that time was coming. Sulaiman was usually an early riser, even if not as early as Huzzaini. Today, after the rigors of the passage over the last mountain range, it felt good just to stay in the sleeping bag an extra fifteen minutes or so.

With the mountain chill, he had kept his clothing mostly down in the foot of his bag, and without getting out, he began the contortionist writhings to get his outer clothing on. Completing that, he slid himself up and out, sitting in the top end of the bag while swiveling his hips about until he could push his feet towards the flap, and reach out in the dark to the felt location of his boots, tugging them on and lacing them back into ankle-bracing security.

Sulaiman pushed his booted feet out the flap, and wrenched himself upright just outside of the tent, reaching behind to pull down the zipper and quietly close it for those inside, when he stopped.

In the pre-dawn light, all around the bowl in which sat their trio of tents, were robed and rifled fighters, cocked and ready, all looking directly at him. Directly before him, a single figure, at port arms, for whom Kyle did not need light to know was Huzzaini. They stood and looked at each other for some time.