"The Dark Wolf - Ignited" Part III

by Author Laree Dervinskas

Somewhere in Iraq, February 2004

The War on Terrorism raged across Iraq, Iran and parts of Saudi Arabia. Suicide bombers popped up all over the Middle East. In Kuwait, Baghdad and even Jerusalem, American and Iraqi citizens alike feared for their very lives. The U.S Military kept pushing forward, in an effort to neutralize the upheavals. Many a soldier died with his comrades in an unexpected vehicular explosion, killing many innocent people nearby.  

Maj. Ian Todd “Dark Wolf” Bradford and the Wolf Pack fought one bloody battle after another across the desserts of the Middle East. Their jobs were to Search and Destroy. Their Mission: To free any and all POW’s and destroy any and all compounds and buildings they were to come across. Taking prisoners and releasing their own Men were also part of their job description. And to hunt down certain prestigious, Iraqi targets and take them out. By any means necessary. 

The Dark Wolf and his men fought mightily against a people so insensitive that they would send their own women and children out in front of them. Using them as shields. After three years of fighting and over two hundred successful missions the Wolf Pack had a dark reputation that preceded them from city to city. The Dark Wolf, Jackal, Coyote and Hyena were well known, their names uttered in fear and trembling. The name Wolf Pack sent people scurrying for their very lives. Their faces unseen, yet their names meant death and destruction. Women and children had nothing to fear from the Wolf Pack and they knew it. But, it didn’t stop them from hiding in the darkness and keeping to the very shadows The Wolf Pack itself existed in. 

Beaten and bleeding and on his knees. Shackled between two whipping posts, Maj. Ian Todd “Dark Wolf” Bradford crouched shivering on the ground. His head bowed in defeat upon his chest as his blood flowed easily from many cuts and abrasions to pool on the sand around him. For twenty one days, he had been beaten, tortured and abused as he was held captive in an Iraqi Prison Compound. Now, about to be executed, his life passing before his eyes he knew there was no way out! This was the end! It was over! Here, in a foreign country, thousands of miles from home was where he was going to die. He would never see Carrie or his beloved Bradford Estates again…..