Chapter 2125 - 863: Final Decision! (Part 4)

He paused.

"Tell the people we have in Washington to start releasing the news."

The other side froze. "What news?"

The Boss smiled lightly. "Say the President ordered military action in the Middle East to divert attention from the impeachment case. Say he sold out the interests of the American people to save those Jewish lives."

There was silence on the other end for a second.

"Boss, that equals—"

"Equals what?" The Boss interrupted him, "Equals getting the Americans to fight among themselves. Once they start fighting, there's no time for war. No time for war means the Squid Man is truly finished."

He hung up the phone, stood up, and walked to the window. Outside, Moscow's night sky was pitch black, and in the far distance, the red star of the Kremlin was flickering.

This chess game was nearing its end.

10 PM, Washington, Capitol Hill.

The emergency meeting had been going for three hours. The Speaker hammered the gavel, trying to quiet the bickering members, but no one listened to him.

"The President has sold out America!"

"We can't watch the Squid Man die!"

"This is diversionary!"

"This is the Third World War!"

An elderly Republican senator stood in the aisle, brandishing a freshly printed CNN press release. "The President ordered troops without notifying Congress first! This is unconstitutional! This is dictatorship!"

The opposite Democratic Party senators slapped the table and stood up. "Iranians bombed Jerusalem! The Squid Man is on the brink of destruction! Are you still arguing about procedures?"

The noise of the quarrel grew. The Speaker's gavel snapped, and he threw the broken halves onto the table and turned to leave the chamber.

It was quiet in the hallway. He stood by the window, looking in the direction of the distant White House. The lights at the White House were still on, and the President was still inside.

He didn't know which side he should stand on. But he did know one thing—this country was tearing itself apart.

11 PM, outskirts of Tiberias City, Squid's last defense line.

Avi Ben Abraham—not the brigade commander already dead at the Golan Heights, but his brother, the Lieutenant Avi Ben Abraham with the same name, the last commander of the remains of the 188th Armored Brigade—leaned against a Merkava with broken tracks, staring at the dark slopes to the north.

His unit had twelve people left, one functioning tank, three mortars, and less than twenty bullets per person. The ammunition would last for ten minutes.

The communications soldier crawled over. "Lieutenant, the General Staff has ordered—hold on for another twenty-four hours. The Americans are close."

Avi didn't turn around. He looked at those slopes, at the shadows moving in the dark. The Syrians were gathering, at least a battalion.

"Tell the General Staff," he said, "when the ammunition is gone, we'll use stones. When the stones are gone, we'll use fists. When the fists are gone—"

"We'll use teeth."

The communications soldier said nothing. Then he stood up, patted the dust off himself, and returned to his post.

At midnight 0:00, the Syrians launched the seventh attack of the night.

The tank's gun muzzle spewed flames, shells landing on the Squid's positions, sending up columns of black smoke and dust. Infantry followed behind the tanks, holding AKs, shouting "Allah is great," charging into the trenches.

Avi stood beside the immobile Merkava, holding the M16 with only ten bullets left. The first shot took down the foremost Syrian soldier, the second took down the second, the third, fourth, fifth—

After the ten bullets were gone, he reversed his grip on the rifle, attaching the bayonet.

The Syrians had already charged into his face.

The first man's bayonet plunged into his left arm, he clenched his teeth, his right hand drove the bayonet into the man's belly. The second man smashed him in the face with a gun butt, he fell down, then got up again, stabbing the bayonet into the second man's thigh. The third man's bullet pierced his shoulder, he knelt on the ground, watching the fourth man charging at him with a bayonet.

Then, the fourth man suddenly froze.

A bullet entered the back of his head and emerged from his forehead. He fell down, collapsing onto Avi.

Avi pushed aside the body and saw an elderly white-haired man standing at the edge of the trench, holding an old M14.

That was his dad.

Yitzhak Ben Abraham, fifty-three years old, a veteran of the 1973 Yom Kippur War. He drove for three hours from his home in Galilee, bringing that old gun from the battlefield to find his son.

"Dad—" Avi's voice caught in his throat.

Yitzhak crouched down, looking at the gunshot wound on his son's shoulder, at the bruises left by the gun butt on his son's face, at his son's eyes that were still shining.

"Don't talk," he said, "I've come to fight."

He stood up, holding the M14, aiming at those moving shadows in the dark, shooting one bullet after another. Each shot hit one, each shot killed one.

After seventeen bullets, he had slain seventeen Syrian soldiers.

The eighteenth bullet jammed.

He squatted down, trying to eject the jammed bullet. A Syrian soldier charged out from the corner of the trench, bayonet drawn, rushing towards him.

Yitzhak didn't evade. He stood up, using the jammed rifle to block the bayonet, the two wrestled together.

Avi struggled to stand up, dragging his crippled left arm, picking up a bayonet from the ground, stabbing the Syrian soldier in the back.

One stab. Two stabs. Three stabs.

The Syrian soldier fell. Avi fell to his knees, gasping for air.

Yitzhak stood, looking at his son covered in blood, at his son's still trembling hands.