Read Personal Protection (A Spider Shepherd Short Story) for Free Online Page B

better than to chew on an arachnid.’
    Rusty grinned at Spider. ‘Is he serious?’
    ‘I did it once, for a bet. During jungle training.’
    ‘What did it taste like?’
    ‘Like a spider. What do you think?’
    ‘I was hoping like chicken.’
    Shepherd laughed and shook his head. ‘No, definitely not chicken. The trick is to burn the hairs off with a flame. That stops it sticking in your throat.’
    They bedded down for the night.  The following day they resumed their long, slow haul through the dunes, eventually arriving in the area of the oasis towards sunset.  They raised the camera pole to survey the area.  On the high resolution screens they could see thousands of date palms planted in orderly rows and interspersed with small gardens of exotic fruits and vegetables.  There were even gardens of exotic blooms flourishing in the shade of the trees and a shaded pool of water, but they also spotted several patrols of heavily armed men.
    ‘We’re in the middle of the desert, miles from the nearest watercourse,’ Geordie said. ‘Where the hell does the water come from for all this?’
    ‘Out of falajas,’ Rusty said. ‘They’re circular-section, stone and mud watercourses running underneath the sand.’
    ‘Like water mains?’ Jimbo said.
    ‘Yeah, but bigger, they’re more like sewer pipes. They were built by either the Assyrians or the Persians in the dim mists of time, long before the birth of Christ.  They were designed to bring water from the mountains, where it’s plentiful, into the desert. It meant the Bedu tribes could survive in the most arid areas and set up agricultural communities.  They were built to tolerances of a drop of one yard over a thousand yards, allowing a gentle flow of water all year round.’  
    After dark, using the thermal imaging camera, they began to realise how difficult a task they had set themselves.  Cutting through the foliage they could see the body heat of a man slumped against a date palm in the middle of the oasis, the ropes securing him showing up in the thermal imaging as thin black lines across his body.  He was closely guarded by two men with AK 47s and other weaponry. 
    ‘They might kill him at once if they detect a threat or hear an attack,’ Shepherd whispered. They withdrew to consider their options but Shepherd could not see a solution to the problem until a thought suddenly struck him. ‘Those falajas you were talking about, Rusty,’ he said. ‘Is there any way to access them?’
    Rusty nodded. ‘Sure, there are stone slabs every few hundred yards, like modern drain covers. They allow access to shafts leading down into the falajas, so that the Bedu can get water or get into to the tunnels to remove blockages and repair damage from roof falls.’
    Shepherd grinned. ‘Then that could be our way in. Let’s take a look.’
    Rusty and Shepherd set off to recce the falaj a couple of miles from the oasis. After searching for a few minutes, they saw a flat stone slab, its rectangular shape making it stand out against the sand and gravel of the desert floor. They slid it aside and found themselves looking down into a narrow vertical shaft, some twenty feet in deep, with a series of rough hand- and foot-holds carved out of the shaft walls. At the bottom, Shepherd could see the glint of running water.
    They replaced the slab, hurried back to where the rest of the team were waiting and quickly formulated a plan.  ‘I’ll infiltrate using the falaj,’ Shepherd said, ‘but if we all try to go in that way and are detected we’ll be caught like rats in a trap. One grenade or burst of fire will take us all out. So you guys lie up on the edge of the oasis and wait until you hear me open fire. I’ll take out the two guards on the sheikh, and then try to hold off the rest of the Chechens long enough for you to arrive and finish the job.’
    Shepherd set off at once so that he would be in position by dawn. He climbed down into the bottom of the