Cushing in the Crosshairs

God, how he hated this part of the job. For two days and nights he laid in the filth surrounding him as the temperature soared to one hundred and twenty in the day before plunging to thirty at night. He sweated like a pig all day and was half frozen by the time the sun peeked over the hill each morning. Lifting his left arm slightly to relieve the pressure from his elbows, he felt the sharp jab in his side. She was letting him know he had moved too fast, and not to do it again. Taking the binoculars from his face he slowly turned and looked at the woman lying beside him. Her name was Maryam Washid, a 31 year old from Afghanistan, Kirk was about to say something ugly to her when the receiver in both of their ears hissed before a metallic voice spoke the words for which they had been waiting the last forty eight hours. The woman hissed a command back into the microphone attached to the neck of her black garment as she slowly pulled the Kalashnikov from its resting place beside her left hip.