Page 41 of What is Found

“All peoples against Taliban know him,” she said, her tone shifting from forceful certainty to a kind of vagueness. “All peoples know Mac try help?—”

“If I may, ma’am?” Raising his hand, Driver softened the interruption with a grin. “Mac’s been in-country for a while, since before we got involved.”

“Ah.” Not only had he read a couple books, he’d seen12 Strong. If anyone ever made a movie aboutthiswithdrawal, he wanted Chris Hemsworth to play him. “A CIA money man? Tried getting warlords to cooperate with one another for cash?” When Driver nodded, John said to Shahida, “And that’s how you met him?”

She nodded. “My parents sell brother.Either he murdered or just die, I don’t know. I never see him again. But after—when I run away from family—I fight for all childrens be free.”

Meaning that Mac had givenhermoney? That didn’t quite make sense, but he was too tired and strung out to keep up with this guessing game. “All right, so Mac offers to help and then…what do you do? Steal the kids and return them to their parents?”

“To peoples who sell to begin with?” Shahida shook her head. “Better we take chance getting childrens out of country.”

“Away from everything they know?”

“Away from peoples no take good care of them. We use old trade routes from China through Wakhan before. Long way on foot, but peoples there good to children. Hide them in families. Some stay. Others keep going, find other place to live.”

“One of the biggest problems right now, among a lot of others, is that they can’t go through China anymore,” Driver said.

“Why not?” he asked.

“Uyghurs live at border,” Shahida said. “They Muslims, but China no like them. Want kill them. So we can no go that way.”

“Pakistan’s also a no-go,” Driver said. “Tajikistan’s just as hard. We had been moving kids out through a rescue foundation, but we’ve run out of time. The Taliban are moving into the Corridor. No one there to stop them.”

“And they weren’t there before?” he asked.

“The Pamirs are too far away, or they were,” Driver said. “It would’ve required too much manpower to go after Shahida and her operation. But now, with us Americans pulling out, that leaves the Taliban free to send troops into the Corridor.”

“What about your fighters?” he asked Shahida. “You weren’t just marching kids through the mountains with no protection.”

“Some childrens old enough to fight. Everyone else fighters gone. Poof.” Shahida spread her hands. “I no can ask them stay when they have family, peoples they need get out of country. What we no expect is bomb at Abbey Gate yesterday, and now you Americans speed up leave.”

“Weare?” He was surprised. “Last I heard is we suspend operations at midnight on the 30th, break down our setups and then boogey on the 31st, with the rest of the embassy and command personnel and the last battalion of Marines.” He bet the U.S. would simply repeat what they’d done at Bagram on July 1: turn off the lights and steal out in the wee hours of the morning and not a peep to anyone. “So who’s saying we’re not loading planes until the 30th?”

“Command,” Roni said.

“And how doyouknow?”

“Because Mac knows,” she said, evenly. “Command’s not saying anything out loud, not in public. A panic is the last thing we need, especially after today.”

She had a point. Any rumor like that could spark a stampede. Better to get the last refugeetransport off the ground and then simply shut down operations.

“Okay, that’s bad,” he said, “but the shutdown’s only happening three days earlier.”

“Doesn’t sound like much,” Driver said, “but three days translates into a lot of people. You got C17s loaded with three hundred people at a time taking off every forty-five minutes. Shave operations off by even a couple days, and you’re talking thousands left behind. We were hustling the kids in a few at a time…”

He interrupted. “Alone?”

“No, Mac has…” Driver opted for vague. “People. Let’s call them escorts.”

“And then?”

“They get met when the planes land. They get places.” Driver scrubbed away further questions with the flat of a hand. “Above my pay grade. The point is that the bomb at Abbey Gate yesterday…everything’s on an accelerated timetable. We just don’t have the luxury of bringing them in piecemeal anymore. The kids wecansave have to get in so they can be on that last planetonight.”

“And this is what you’ve been doing all this time?” He thought of the many occasions he’d passed this hangar and seen no one around at all. “Hustling kids out of the country?” When Driver nodded, he asked, “How is it that you guys are involved with Mac in the first place?”

He watched the other men lob looks at oneanother, and then Meeks said, “Mac is protecting an investment.”

“From a misadventure,” Flowers put in.

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