People of Struggles

By Tibor Gergely

In 1992, a year after the ‘Desert Storm’, Saddam Hussein declared a terrorist war on each country involved in any form in the fights against Iraq. In Hungary, two terror groups swung into action. One of them captured some German tourists in the Eger castle. When at night, the Hungarian Counter Terrorist Special Force First Lieutenant moved off on his mission to Eger, he entered a time portal en route and found himself in a parallel universe in the year 1552. His way to the castle besieged by Sultan Suleiman’s powerful armies was fateful. Stephen Dobó, Chief Constable of Eger castle and his barely two thousand men faced the military power victorious thus far of the largest empire of the time.

This is a story in commemoration of them. Of the two thousand Hungarians, their patriotism, courage and self-sacrifice forcing the Turkish imperial forces to fall back.

Strands of ruthless battles, bloody sieges, love and altruism run through the whole of the novel to finally allow formulating these few lines with their interior meaning you may not divide into eras, since it never loses its validity.

 

If a sense of grief wash over you about what does the future hold

and you're so scared,

then be aware of that your strength resides not in your arms,

but in your soul!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tibor Gergely
• Release date: Jun 10, 2020

Book preview

Tibor Gergely

Translated by

Jenő Pirovich

© Tibor Gergely 2009

Translated by

© Jenő Pirovich 2020

Cover image:

©       Bertalan Székely: Women of Eger

Tibor Gergely

People of struggles

/The 20th century characters in this book are fictitious persons, any analogy with real persons may only be a chance occurrence. On the other hand, the medieval passages are built on a historical basis, so the characters acting therein are one-time real persons, whose fate evolved in the way described. But whether it happened in this way or otherwise ... WHO KNOWS?/

BUDAPEST 1992

I tried to get through my apartment door with two full shopping bags in my arms, rendering attraction like a circus acrobat, combining the art of a Chinese equilibrist, an Indian contortionist and a French magician. I felt all sweaty by the time, I managed to fish my keys out of my pants pocket and was at last able to flee into the cool living-room, where a pool in combination with a small dribbling fountain surrounded by tropical flowers tried to ease the awful heat of August. In the kitchen I got rid of my overloaded plastic bags and taking my dinner, an almost-cold hamburger and a can of coke with me, I went down to the basement. The thought if I should tidy away perishable milk products still made me freeze for a moment, but then I rejected the idea by the principle that Eh, we have time for that yet. In the basement, I furnished a pleasant bachelor cave, striving to make it as cosy as I could, since I spent almost all my spare time therein. Then, I pointed at a deep armchair and while balancing my food on my way to the set target, I had to pass a huge aquarium, the continuation of the above pool, where coming together by the glass, various ornamental fishes stared at my dinner in mesmerization. Their begging is so spectacular that more experienced individuals would scatter fish food with two handfuls to them, however they can no longer cheat me. They begged as well as if stuffed themselves just before with delicious mosquito larvae. So I reached the armchair, followed by their reproachful glances and swinging the hamburger in front of their nose with tease, I set down with my long legs crossed, by which I won the protest of the worn springs. At long last, I could start eating! To begin with, I spattered the carpet with some ketchup. I always take care of keeping things clean – to avoid having to clean up –, so I bent down quickly to rub the stains that spoil the deep Persian carpet, whereby enriching the collection with a few drops of mustard. While I was there and took a closer look, I did identified a few grains of corn on the cob between the long fibres. This could have got there from the last pizza.

Nothing to do, I grew quite downcast, cleaning the apartment will soon be inevitable.

Is it any wonder that the food in my mouth became bitter? Anyway I was discouraged that my dish got cold. How on earth can the food get cold at thirty-six degrees? I lapped up a sip of Coke. It surpassed all my expectations. It was much warmer than I expected! Yeah, heat is not lost but transformed. While I nibbled the cold hamburger and sipped the warm coke on it with a sour face, I turned on the TV the size of a steamer trunk.

Though there were two bottles of Champaign chilled in the fridge for the incredible event, if with nothing better to do, somebody visits with me, yet I held by that lovely sticky warm nectar. Cause I don’t drink alcohol by principle … plus by means of a glass, neither! Even some say it is not healthy, makes you fat, etc., I feared for myself in the least of leaving this world for Coke-sipping. As Deputy Commander of the Hungarian Anti-Terrorism Special Forces set up a half year ago, I had the least chance for this.

Our commando was put in action more and more often. Violence has increased, criminals become more desperate. And while to the present, we had trouble only people of our own country for the most part, from now on, we had to take into account new threats.

A year after the ‘Desert Storm’, Saddam Hussein declared a terrorist war on each country involved in any form in the fights against Iraq. That's what he was trying to get the allies to lift UN sanctions. The media worldwide was full of actions committed by terrorists. Day by day, it was shown on TV when dozens of people are dying due to various terrorist acts.

Just now in Italy, charred victims were pulled from the wreckage of a plane got shot down. In the peace of my room, this storehouse of horrors, the image of innocently murderer children knowing nothing about the reasons seemed remote and incomprehensible. When will this end, if ever? Whether is it possible to end the taking of innocent human lives some day?

While being deep in meditation, my pager started to beep. I glanced at it to see, Alert State 10. The next moment, is was on the phone. No 10 means an immediate threat to life!

First Lieutenant Gregory I said in the phone, when I was put through.

Lieutenant-Colonel Shaphar I could hear the voice of my commander from the end of the unlisted line.

Reporting, Sir! What happened?

What we could expect for days. The Iraqis! They captured a ten-storey building and threaten to blow it up with everyone inside, if their demands are not met.

What about UN sanctions?

They're, God damn them! We will live to pay for having sent those few doctors during the Gulf War.

Where did it happened?

Block of flats in Khadjlaw street, Kishpesht.

That is on the other side of town!

I know... Hurry up!

Leaving the sad rest of my lunch behind, I run upstairs to the living room and in two minutes after the alert, I sat in my car with my kit packed in a sports bag. A sky-blue Lamborghini Countach is not the most ordinary vehicle, but its speed and power may save lives sometime and that’s what really matters. When I left, the thought still came to me that the milk I had forgotten on the table most likely got spoiled, but then my car raced right away with screeching tyres toward its destination, where the evil reared his ugly head, giving further evidence of never-ending torture of the innocent. And though my full attention had to be focused to get through the crowded city fast but safely, I asked myself subconsciously: How it all began? Yeah, how for me …?

***

It occurred in the year 1976. I was wearing just my age of ten and thanks for the enthusiastic support from my friends, this wearing has grown to a spectacular extent. Just in those days, cherry was ripening, so we were found on a neighbouring cherry tree in one of the afternoons by the owner of the tree, who didn’t take kindly to our chewing of all his cherries. What is more, he definitely resented! He made us aware of this very clearly, since he forced us into an exhausting running exercise by his thorny stick. So far he was the most unrelenting fruit tree owner, we've dealt with, though we did not understand why has was so angry, since there will be fruit to harvest in next year too. As a consequence of his steady persistence, we reached a small forest nearby, where then we dispersed skilfully, shaking off the furious man definitively.

Breaking well away from the others, I threw myself into a thick bush to get my breath, when peeking through the leaves, I noticed an amazing thing. In my surprise I stared open-mouthed, what should not have been done in the bush, since some lingering beetles settled inside immediately, believing that the place is a kind of comfortable cave. Spitting on the casual visitors, I kept watching the black-suited figure, who trained with a sword all by himself here, deep in the woods. With a real sword! And this man, whose face I couldn’t see, because he had a hood on, wielded and span that sword with amazing dexterity, as if it has grown out of his body like a limb rather than would be a lifeless piece of iron.

I don’t know how it’s happened, but I found myself standing there a few yards from that man and being in constant amazement of his magical wizardry, while a question had wanted out so badly all the time.

Who are you? I put the question to him finally with childish rudeness, completely ignoring the greeting as a thing inopportune just now.

Probably, he was well aware of my stay there, when I took the first deep breath under the bush, because even not interrupting his exercise, he replied with no surprise in an absolutely neutral tone of voice.

Ninja.

Ninja? I asked, while turning to me, he made a large circle with the sword.

Yeah answered and set the blade one inch from my nose.

That was the deal!

He took off the hood and out of that unfriendly hood, the face of a young man grinned at me by no means unfriendly. A man about six feet tall, aged 25, black-haired, cheerful-looking, rugged.

Do you know what it means? he asked.

Yep I retorted promptly, though this confidence rested on rather incomplete bases.

All my knowledge about ninjas was limited to a movie, what we had seen on one of my friend’s birthday. His father was the party secretary in my village and in those days they were the only one we knew with a video. It is true though that we watched the movie so as to share our attention between the screen and the intently listening countenance of the birthday boy’s father, since he was not able even at the cost of the greatest effort to lick off a piece of gateau plastered to his face, but I definitely remember that how we bemoaned it when a ninja assassin killed one of the main characters.

This is not exactly true he said, after learning what I am basing my knowledge on.

Until now, it was not a test job, but if you want, I will memorize it for tomorrow I snapped resentfully.

Uh, right! Don’t get yourself worked up! I was just wondering whether you care about it?

I didn’t say that I don’t care.

Well then … you can find me here every day.

Indeed, he was there in every day and so was I after that. Initially, I went to him just out of curiosity and I watched from under a tree, how he practices with the various weapons, either a sword or a bow and sometimes a knife or throwing star called shaken, and in the meanwhile, he was very pleased to hold explanations to me. He told me quite a lot about everything and I listen to him with as much interest as joyfully he presented.

I learned that his name Khalman Chingher and only just come home from Japan, where their parents serviced on a long-term mission, working at the Tokyo embassy. There he became a ninja that is a stealth man in English. As early as from childhood, he practiced ninjutsu and looked it in all regards. Using his chiselled muscles, he practiced breath-taking exercises with the greatest ease, which would have done credit to an acrobat.

Sometimes, he asked me to help him in this and that. In the beginning, I returned his arrows shot to an archery target, then he showed how to hold the knife before throwing it, then I found I was being trained in sword fighting. He gradually introduced me to the strategies, but he could get me to wish more knowledge and after a while, I didn’t want to go to watch him, but to be taught by him.

Years had gone by and I enriched my knowledge in combat more and more joyfully. I learned karate and my reflexes developed so that I was able to catch an arrow shot, use the bow like a sniper, hit even a tossed piece of wood with my throwing star and I was defeated in fencing by my master less and less times. I learned the art of disguise and making fire or smoke bombs. Little by little, the onetime small child grew to become a six feet athletic man and a skilled ninja with steely muscles and hard bone, being flexible and fast like a snake.

Perhaps for the sense of adventure or stupidity, both of us joined the Death Commando in 1986. This elite unit was originally organized in France and was more difficult to gain admission to the ranks, as to the infamous Foreign Legion. Its name may have been derived from that everyone who could not stand the training died. Sure, there were many of them!

During the first months of the inhuman training, operation of all the modern firearms was drilled in us and if until that time, we had practiced the ancient martial art, then we had to learn the contemporary warfare after. That’s where we have been acquainted with the Japan Satsugai. We attracted his attention, because we were far more interested in bow and sword as the most up-to-date machine-pistol. He was a Samurai descendent and as such, was also more interested in the weapons of ancient times. When we could, we practiced together and learn from him of the bushido.

After the training, we participated in combat missions. First, we search for guerrilla troops in the rainforests of Congo, where in permanent twilight between trees in thickness of a house, not only the guerrillas, tropical diseases and wild animals, but native hunters too constitutes a danger. It was not uncommon that whole patrolling squads disappeared forever and we have not found even their bodies, because these woodsmen hunting with poisoned arrows preferred to eat the bodies of their enemies.

It was truly a refreshment, when we were getting transferred from this dank hell to Southeast Asia. But the combat situation there was not better, either. And after all, I lost two of my friends in a bloody battle fought against the Red Khmers. A thing against which they were unable to defend themselves killed them. Machine-gun projectile. Khalman died instantly, Satsugai in his last words still presented me with his more than 200-year-old samurai sword, the katana inherited from his ancestors. When I pulled it from its scabbard, it diffused brilliance around itself and its razor sharp blade snipped the arm-strong tree branches like jack-straws. Its perfect machining was the result of a life’s work.

Losing my friends was a big blow for me. Until now, we tried to defend each other to survive, however after this, I had to manage on my own. Eventually, it succeeded. After four years of torture, fourteen of us were left.

Out of five hundred!

After this, I was a bodyguard of a prince in Oman. I used my earnings there to buy an apart man and a sports car, then joined the Special Forces.

***

The streets in front of the blocks of flat has been sealed off with barriers. A huge crowd billowed around the police guards, since the surrounding houses were also evacuated due to a possible explosion. I shouldered my way through weeping relatives and scrambling journalists to the first policemen, who gave me clear directions after producing my identity card. The ten-storey building, which I entered, was similar to a crawling ant-hill. Police officers, plainclothes detectives, technicians went about their business. At the door I received further information from my unit, so I went up the stairs accordingly, since the lift was out of order. I wasn’t worried about the mass of people, they didn’t know where I belong to. And they will not see my face on my way out, anyway. We also had to be vigilant about our safety!

On the third floor, two commandos stood guard. Only Special Forces members or those with special authorization could go any higher. From there, even the lift was running! One of them thoroughly looked through my card. His companion kept his Uzi on me as long as he started speaking: Right. Eighth floor.

When entering the apartment made available to us, a camera with 800mm zoom lens, directed to the opposite building ca four hundred yards away immediately drew my attention to itself. On the related huge screen, it was easy to see the wording Dumb Les scribbled on the bottom of a Bon Jovi poster on the wall of the apartment being at the same height as we were. Inside the room, members of the commando arrived before I came lounged around. Their commander, Lieutenant-Colonel Shaphar stood nearby the screen.

Hallo, First Lieutenant! cried out to me. I think we are going to have an eventful day.

Damn it, who made it so I replied. Has something happened?

Nothing. The bigwigs are still arguing. They will call us in the last five minutes and we can get our ass in gear again Paulo Raise grumbled, who was wiping his favourite crossbow on a drab seating unit.

What is it, pretty boy ensign, you don’t agitate because recently you had to run a few yards, do you? a deep baritone mixed with monotonous clicking was audible from the corner couch.

Why would I agitate, when I played a running wild animal for the honourable gentlemen to be able to disarm those few kidnappers unhurriedly.

You referred to my bullet-shot Kevlar vest as to disarm unhurriedly? Lieutenant Chaba Coash asked in the midst of further clicking.

That bullet will not cause more damage to you as this steady clicking in my ears. Why have you to reload it before all actions?

Safety first!

If you want to live in safety, why do you become a bonze in Tibet? Sub-Lieutenant Peter Bratchko joined the teasers, while relaxing his feet on the coffee-table in front of him.

An infinitely elegant figure appeared to put and end to this argument.

What, weren’t you going to be here? one of the Barkho brothers asked George Tsiglel, who had just entered. The two twins, Zorlee and Les huddled up next to Bratchko.

I am invited to the birthday party of my niece. My mother will get riled up, if I won’t be there in time.

Maybe we should call your mother to settle this thing with the Arabs Coash suggested.

If you knew my mom, you’d find out, you didn’t even tell nonsense.

And what birthday will the miss celebrate?

She is one and a half years old now.

Do you celebrate half-birthday too?

I said you don’t know my mother. She has five sons and eight grandsons. At last, this only one was born a girl, so she expect the family to come together every half year.

Your home may be kept in beautiful order Paolo Raise wondered."

You know... Nights, my father turns over in bed on a word of command.

So it’s no wonder you escaped to here I said sympathetically, then I took my G-11 machine-gun from among the weapons laid out upon the dining table, set down next to Coash and began to unpack my equipment from the sports bag I brought with me. There was a Browning 9mm Parabellum with its thirteen-round magazine – this item including fifty projectiles without sheath for the machine-gun represented an adequate firepower in missions and a spare magazine was added to each of them – one throwing knife, two throwing stars called ‘shakens’, one thin steel wire with hardwood handle serving as a so-called garrotte, which I brought with me from the ‘Death Commando’ and at the end, a samurai sword, the nice arched katana.

May I touch it? Zorlee Barkho asked and began to caress the black velvet scabbard of the sword.

Be careful not to cut yourself! I warned him.

How afraid you are for it he said with resentment, since he knew that I hold this arm dear.

Peter. I’d really appreciate, if you get your feet off the table Lieutenant-Colonel Shaphar said. We promised the owner to return the apartment in good condition. So take care of tidiness, if you don’t want to clean up!

Georgie Tsiglel couldn't be silent.

Please stop, boss! Poor thing, he couldn’t even afford this at home. What’s the missus think about?

In fact, Bratchko was married alone in the troop. That was all he replied to Tsiglel's yapping: The lieutenant’s right! But I’ll let Julie know that next time, it won’t be necessary for us to wait for her with the favourite daintiness of her, if going to see us about by one and a half day.

Hereupon, Georgie threw himself at Peter’s feet with a theatrical gesture. Enthusiastically kissing his shoes, than exposing his legs to his own head, he begged Peter. Don’t do this to me! I promise I’ll not gobble up all the poppy seed pancakes! I’ll leave at least one for you.

A grinning face appeared in the door at a height of about five feet. Seven terrified voices pealed out: Stop! Manuel, wipe your feet! Sergeant Manuel Koosha was the only one, who did not live in the capital. As a practical joker, there was only one thing he couldn’t abide, if his name was teased. Nobody taunted him, because he was an excellent fighter, which was factually witnessed by his flattened nose. He pulled his soles on the mat resentfully and in the meanwhile, looked at the outcome for control. Is it worth rushing to help them? he muttered. They think, there is always dog shit on my shoes, because I am a countryman.

But when he threw himself down next to Tsiglel, his mysterious grin was on his face again. You! he gave him a poke. I have been routed out from beside a woman like that and with his thumb up, he indicated what he was thinking about.

Are you stupid? You’re happy about that?

Of course! I was just wondering how to get rid of her. In any event, looks like you haven’t come from the tomato field.

Give me a break! Do you know what I’ll get from my mother, if I miss the family party?

Your mother too is involved? Oops, then you’ll get really in trouble!

There you go… It’s just what I needed… that you comfort me.

Well, now that everyone’s here, we might as well get started the lieutenant-colonel said and went on when faces turned to him interestedly. So, this morning around eight o’clock, ten terrorists broke into the house across the street and loaded the people found at home up on the eighth floor and above. They rigged the eighth floor with explosive and threatened that if their terms are not met, they will explode the upper floors of the building together with themselves and the hostages. Experts believe that this dose of C-4 is apt to blow the top of the building off like a hat. Through the camera, we can have a good view of the detonator installed in the apartment across the street.

In fact, the box installed on the doorjamb was in front of us, as if it could be only some meters away.

A detonator is not a complicated structure, it would be easy to turn it off, if someone gets there. Here you can see two six-inch wires delivers a firing impulse from the marker to the detonator. Next to the red button used for triggering the explosion, there is a small microswitch to disable the device. But a wireless remote switch that one of them always carries is also attached. It is enough to push the button on it for the whole building to break into pieces.

What would happen, if a sniper shoots the wires off?

"Sorry, we are not sure which is the main wire. And the two may not be shot off, since running one inch next to each other. This is why the action shall be divided into two parts.

Firstly: the detonator shall be turned off.

Secondly: hostages shall be rescued.

We don’t have much time! The terrorists have contacted at noon on the dot and they’ve given us time until three to do something. I don’t know what arrangements politicians are making, but I want them to have a final plan by two o’clock."

Is their positions known? I asked.

"We know them. They've chosen a good building. Only two staircases without communication. Next to it about fifty yards to the right, there is also a ten-storey building, but nothing in front