Barrington, Rutledge, and Rasheed all shook hands with the young Marine.
“How’s the leg, Gunny,” Barrington asked.
“The Doc at Bethesda said I’ll be a hundred percent in a few weeks,” Dominguez answered with a grin.
“Sergeant Dominguez came by at Cold’s request,” Reskova explained, unable to suppress her irritated tone. “They operated on him today. The shrapnel they were tracing was in a position where they could get at it safely. Abe here only came when Cold was out of surgery.”
“He ordered me not to tell anyone until he was out of surgery, Ma’am,” Dominguez said apologetically. “I tried to get the Colonel to let me call you. He said no, and if the Colonel says no, then no it is.”
“I’d go see him, but Cold left orders at Walter Reed for no visitors.”
“That sounds like him,” Rutledge said. “We’re going to be pretty busy, Diane. I think we hit the jackpot. Did you pump the Sergeant here for details about the Colonel’s exploits?”
“I just brought him up here ten minutes before you three walked in. Cold probably issued orders silencing the Sergeant anyway.”
“Actually, he didn’t get a chance to cover that detail, Ma’am.”
“Sit down Sergeant.” Rutledge gestured toward his chair. “We have a little time to hear the details. I think I detected a hidden glee in the Sergeant’s tone. Could it be the Colonel was engaged in unauthorized sneaking up on Marines, Sergeant?”
Dominguez looked surprised at first. “How… oh… he did you guys too, huh?”
“Big time,” Barrington laughed. He explained the Hughes’ mission to Dominguez’ delight.
“Oh yeah!” Dominguez nodded in commiseration. “The Colonel’s a freak. He’d show up in the middle of us as if he was beamed there. We threatened to frag him. Most of us were vets from the beginning of the war. We thought we knew it all. He taught us a lot. He saved my life. That’s how he got wounded.”
“Details, Sergeant, details,” Rutledge urged.
“It’s a little embarrassing.” Dominguez sighed, sitting down again. The others joined him around Reskova’s desk. “We’d been building up for the attack way too long. When word finally came, we were really pumped. The Colonel knew the area we were going into real well so they attached him to our recon unit. The…”
“It’s pretty unusual to get an army guy assigned to a Marine unit,” Barrington observed with interest.
“The Colonel was a mystery to us. We all tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. Like I said, most of us had already seen heavy combat and urban warfare. He’s so big we joked about the best way for him to help us out would be by taking the first hit.”
The agents all laughed, with Rasheed laughing the hardest, and nodding his head in agreement.
“Yes, yes,” Rasheed confirmed. “In my unit too we thought the same thing. Always he would be in the lead. Yet mysteriously he would not get hit. He managed to keep us alive too.”
“We could tell right away the Colonel knew where he was going. It all started out by the book and then all hell broke loose. By the end of the first day we were way ahead of schedule. Our Lieutenant was a hard charger. We had tank and air support. We figured things would keep going well. That’s when we hit our first holy Mosque,” Dominguez said ruefully. “Holy place… that’s a joke.”
“These vermin are using our holiest places against your forces,” Rasheed said with bitterness. “They have been desecrated. It would be better to blow them all up into dust, along with the rats inside.”
“Ah… yes, Sir, that is how we figured it too,” Dominguez replied with surprise at hearing Rasheed say it.
“Call me Kay, Sergeant. I do not want anymore of you young men killed or wounded protecting what is no longer sacred.”
“We should put you in charge, Kay. Anyhow, the Colonel was less than thrilled when our Lieutenant told him we were to push on. It was getting dark. With all the smoke and noise he said the Mosque was a bridge too far. The Lieutenant agreed. He relayed the Colonel’s doubts, but our commander overruled him. When the Lieutenant told us we’d have to take it, I volunteered for point but the Colonel told us to hold back until he did a recon.”
“He said he’d signal us from the front of the Mosque if he thought it was safe to cross over. It was spooky quiet. We figured the enemy had bugged out. The Colonel ghosted away down this avenue in a circling pattern. When he didn’t come back after half an hour or show up to signal us near the Mosque, I urged the Lieutenant to let me take my squad and secure the front of the Mosque. He let me do it. We made it across to the Mosque without drawing any fire. Instead of securing the front of the Mosque like I said I’d do, I was so pumped, I just headed inside. A…”
“The Colonel still wasn’t in sight?” Barrington broke in to ask.
Dominguez chuckled. “That’s what we thought. I headed into the entrance. The Colonel like materialized from nowhere. I felt a hand grab the back of my pack and pull me backwards. At the same time I heard the Colonel scream for my squad to hit the deck. It was a trap. They triggered explosives inside the entrance. If not for the Colonel we would have all been dead or maimed. As it was I heard the Colonel grunt in pain from on top of me. He rolled free, shedding his stuff which was smoking. The Colonel retrieved his weapon and grabbed me by the scruff of the neck. He says, ‘get back across the street Abe and wait there like I told you the first time. Hurry up before the smoke clears’.”
“I did like I was told. The shit hit the fan just about the time we made it back. When I looked toward the Mosque, all I could see was the Colonel’s smoldering gear. They started blanketing the area with everything you could think of. When they started walking in mortar rounds toward our position the Colonel calls out the password so as not to get shot and then leads us away from the hotspot. I could see all he had left on top was pieces of his tee-shirt. Blood was trickling down into the waistband of his pants.”
“When we were out of the kill zone, the Colonel gets our radioman and calls in some coordinates. The Lieutenant signaled our medic forward and Doc patched the Colonel up while he called in targets. Air Cav blew the shit out of the places called into them. The heavy stuff was silenced. We were all sort of taking a moment. I told the Colonel I was sorry but he just shook his head. He said, ‘forget it, Abe, combat’s an inexact science, sometimes you eat the bear, and sometimes the bear eats you. He only got a taste this time’.”
“So, Cold was hit the first day,” Reskova commented. “Why…”
“I know, Ma’am,” Dominguez interrupted gently. “His neck and upper back were burned and he was carrying metal. He told Doc to layer on the burn salve he had. One of our guys, nearly as big as the Colonel, stripped off his tee-shirt and gave it to him.”
“A sniper firing from one of those minarets in the Mosque hit two of our guys, one in the shoulder, and one round almost took the Lieutenant’s head off. We tried to get an Abram’s up for support but they were cut off with rocket fire. It was dark. We were on our own. The sniper must have had night vision equipment. There ain’t no way he could have tracked us to where the Colonel led us after we took casualties. We weren’t going anywhere until morning. We were becoming a magnet for increasing fire. It was impossible to zero in on where it was coming from. The Colonel made sure we had our perimeter covered. Then he says real matter of fact, ‘Abe, keep your heads down, eat and drink, and I’ll go get that bastard who’s makin’ our lives miserable’. I started to argue with him but he was gone in that friggin’ annoying way he has of disappearing.”
When Dominguez paused, Reskova could see his face was flushed and his hands were clenched into fists. Reskova stood up from behind the desk.
“Let me get you something to drink, Sergeant.”
“That’d be great, Ma’am - anything carbonated would be fine,” Dominguez said gratefully, spreading his hands out on his legs. “Sorry, I was getting a little into it.”
“You don’t have to tell us anymore,” Ru
tledge told him, with Barrington and Rasheed echoing her sentiments. Reskova came back in with a Pepsi.
“That’s for sure, Abe.” Reskova handed the Pepsi to Dominguez, who popped the top and took a long swallow.
“It ain’t like people think, you know,” Dominguez said, almost apologetically. “Kay here probably knows what I’m talking about. I’m a Marine because I want to be. God knows what I’d be without the Corps. I grew up in East LA. The first thing I did right was enlist in the Marines. Now I have my own family. My folks are proud of me. It’s what I do and I wouldn’t do anything else even if I could. This is the first time I’ve been able to tell anyone. If I said anything to my family I’d just freak them out.”
“You’re the man, Abe,” Barrington said. “Go on with your story.”
“Thanks,” Dominguez replied, taking another swallow of Pepsi. “Anyway, after the Colonel leaves, the sniper’s still working our position over every time he gets even a glimpse of movement. Then we start hearing these screams from the darkness. Right away we know it’s got to be the Colonel. He has this great big knife he carries. He was wounding them so they’d howl. Earlier in the day when he was on scout we’d come along after he had been through, and there would be dead guys in his wake with slit throats. He’s nasty with that knife. We could tell the Colonel was givin’ those clowns out there something to think about.”
“About an hour after he left us we’re hearing a chorus of these groans, moans, and screams of pain out of the darkness. We start getting into the spirit. When one of them screams or groans, we start yellin’ ‘rah! Then comes the finale. The friggin’ sniper starts screaming. We know it’s him because the sniping stops and the screams are coming from above. Thinking of the Lieutenant, we’re really enjoying the show. Suddenly this guy’s body smacks down like a ripe tomato right into the street.”
“Dead silence, and then the Colonel yells out in Arabic from up there. One of our guys is of Syrian ancestry and he starts laughing. In between howling in laughter at every new thing the Colonel’s yellin’, Moe’s interpreting for us. See, the Colonel’s up there insulting these smucks’ manhood, mothers, and sexual preferences. The idiots start screaming back at him. Before you know it, they’re attacking the Mosque. Big mistake - not only can the Colonel shoot, us Recon Marines ain’t there as observers. After we start wiping them out like big tunas, I get the idea now would be a good time to follow up with an attack. This time I’m right. We wiped them out and spent the rest of the night in the Mosque. The Colonel recommended me for the Silver Star.”
“Good Lord,” Rutledge said in a hushed voice.
“Yeah!” Barrington added with excitement as Dominguez took a big gulp of his Pepsi. “We never hear any of this from the retards in the media. The only reason those jerk-offs are embedded with you guys is to spy for the enemy.”
“You are indeed the man,” Rasheed reiterated, shaking the smiling Marine’s hand again. “I am wishing almost to be with you and the Cold Mountain there.”
“You’re not going anywhere, Kay.” Rutledge pushed Rasheed’s shoulder playfully. “We fight the way we can. We need you here.”
“I take it the Colonel’s nickname is Cold Mountain,” Dominguez observed as Rasheed shrugged his reluctant acceptance of what Rutledge had said. “Does that have something to do with the Hughes’ case you told me about?”
“He never told you about his nickname?” Reskova asked, payback forming in a wave inside her head for being excluded from Walter Reed.
“Nope. Bocelli and I couldn’t figure out at first who you all were talking about the other night at Andrew’s. I forgot to ask the Colonel.”
“I copied the bit from Fox News on the internet.” Rutledge gestured for Dominguez to follow her into the outer office.
A few minutes later, Dominguez was standing over Rutledge peering at her computer screen as the clip of the news conference where McDaniels’ reference to the movie Cold Mountain had been aired. Dominguez was soon laughing in appreciation and having Rutledge replay it for him.
“Oh man, can I get you to burn that onto a DVD for me to take back to my unit?”
“Hell yeah, Abe, I’ll make a few copies of it for you.” Rutledge inserted a blank disc from her desk drawer.
“The guys are going to come unglued when I tell them about the Colonel,” Dominguez said excitedly.
“I bet he never told you he was raised on a Mescalero Apache Reservation.” Reskova saw surprise register on all of their faces. “I see I forgot to mention that information to my cohorts here too.”
“That explains a lot of things,” Rutledge said.
“Copy that,” Barrington agreed with a laugh.
“Yes,” Rasheed added. “I asked once about the name your helicopters carry: Apache. Cold explained in detail about the history of this warrior race from your Southwest United States. He never mentioned his having lived as one.”
“Man, that’s good stuff.” Dominguez took the three discs Rutledge handed him. “If you’ll excuse me, I have to go. My wife’s probably getting ready to call the cops on me.”
“Take this with you, Abe.” Reskova handed him a business card after she jotted down some information on the back of it. “That’s my E-mail address on the back and my cell phone number. If you guys need anything over there, all you have to do is ask. We’re adopting you guys.”
Dominguez took the card. “The Operation Gratitude and Operation Air Conditioner Moms have really helped us over there. Now, the Mom’s groups are springing up all over to support us. It helps. I’ll inform on ah… Cold Mountain whenever I can, Ma’am.”
“I’d really appreciate that, Sergeant.” Reskova shook his hand. “Take care of yourself.”
“Will do.”
“Come, my friend.” Rasheed gestured toward the door. “I will show you the way out of here.”
* * *
“I understand now why Cold wants to go back,” Reskova remarked, as she sat with Barrington and Rutledge in her office, reviewing the C.A.I.R. bust.
“If the Colonel can save even one more of those young men like Abe, he won’t pass up the chance under any circumstances,” Barrington agreed.
“I’m glad you gave him the card with your contact on it, Diane. I bet we could get something going right out of this building as far as troop wish lists. Besides, as an added bonus, Abe will rat out the Colonel for us. Funny, Cold was over there screwing around with the Marines like he did us.”
“It probably helped them a lot, just like Abe told us, Jen,” Reskova observed. “We actually managed to see a mission through without mass killings here too.”
“Yeah, but we have Cold Mountain light in Kay,” Barrington replied. “I wish you could have seen how well he pulled off our good cop, bad cop act.”
“I doubt it was an act,” Rutledge said. “Kay is a dangerous man to mess with. We’ll need to make sure we keep him within the guidelines. He doesn’t have the legend Cold has.”
“It’s up to us to make sure nothing happens to Kay,” Reskova reminded them. “If Cold ever hears they have Kay in prison, we’ll have a war on our hands.”
“Damn! I didn’t even consider that angle,” Barrington replied. “Kay would just vanish out of prison one day like he’d never been there. The only problem would be the body count.”
“Okay, so Muhyee is cooperating.” Reskova brought them back to the business at hand. “Let’s get to work on his computer hard drives and find enough so we don’t need to depend too heavily on him.”
“How about that sniper story, Diane? I bet that put your panties in a bunch, huh?”
“Your time will come, Rutledge,” Reskova said as Rutledge laughed and Barrington attempted not to. “I know how to get you. I’ll have Dreyer switch our places on the team, smart ass.”
“If we’re switching places, do I get the Cold Mountain too?” Rutledge quipped on the way out of the office with Barrington trailing her at a distance shaking his head.
Reskova gritt
ed her teeth and unclenched her hands, vowing silently never to comment on Rutledge’s digs ever again.
* * *
Two days later, after numerous attempts at asking for permission to visit Walter Reed to see McDaniels, Reskova was readying her work load so she could visit in person. McDaniels had left the no visitors order with Walter Reed administration too and did not rescind it. Sergeant Dominguez had visited McDaniels. He called her to let them all know McDaniels was up and moving around.
The C.A.I.R. bust had resulted in complete tumult within the lobbying group as their lawyers tried desperately to undo the damage. Dreyer had approved the leakage of some data involving the case to the Washington Times, which ran with it in headlines, vilifying the Council on American Islamic Relations. The team worked nearly around the clock with Rasheed doing translation duty, quickly trying to nail down tendrils snaking out from the Washington C.A.I.R. office to the rest of the country. Their findings had birthed five new teams investigating the leads and a no holds barred budget to get anything and everything they wanted.
“Just leave, Diane,” Rutledge peaked into Reskova’s office to say. “We can’t go any further with the courier tie yet anyway. Tom, Kay, and I…”
Reskova’s phone rang and she answered it formally. “Yes, he’s with our office. Please issue him a shield and send him up.”
Reskova hung up, running her hands through her hair nervously. Rutledge picked up on her actions immediately.
“Want to slip into a teddy before Cold gets up here, Diane?” Rutledge asked, bringing Reskova to a complete halt.
“How… never mind,” Reskova said, moving quickly around her desk and by Rutledge, who briefly made an effort to block her way. Reskova gripped Rutledge’s nose in a lightning fast grab. “You don’t want to do that, Jen. Unarmed combat is not your specialty.”
“Okayyyyyyyyyyy…,” Rutledge whined nasally, dancing a little in distress.
Reskova released her and Rutledge stepped aside holding her nose.
“That hurt!”
“Good,” Reskova called over her shoulder with some satisfaction. Barrington and Rasheed had already gathered at her door.
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