by Deacon Rie
Stephen addressed the men with the cognitive capability of a fraternity pledge on his bid night, "Really guys? Didn't I just leave this place?" His slurred mumbling went unheard and unheeded.
Reality briefly snagged him from the stupor and Stephen became conscience of the situation unfolding around him. Soldiers had a strong grip under his armpits and were hastily dragging his body out of the southern part of the building. But it was so bright, completely unlike the hallway from moments ago. The pain in Stephen's back started to let up, or maybe it was just numb. But the pressure on his chest was overwhelming to the point where he couldn't catch a full breath. Without warning, the soldiers broke into a makeshift trot and a tsunami of brilliance and warmth washed over him. He closed his eye and groaned in pain. His head was bouncing around when he caught sight of Mayweather moving alongside them and peering at Stephen with a look of shock.
Mayweather pulled a radio mic up to his mouth and shouted to the soldiers carrying Stephen while at the same time blasting orders to someone else. If Mayweather was good at anything, it was multi-shouting.
"They got ‘em both. That's it. Roger that, they got our guys. I repeat. All men are accounted for." Mayweather listened intently to the radio's chattering response which was too low for Stephen to hear as he passed by them. Mayweather then looked over his shoulder and shouted, "Affirmative Gunny! I say again, affirmative. You are good to go. Get your men out of there and bury those bastards!"
The two men were still dragging Stephen at a steady but far from gentle trot. Watching the scenery of destroyed buildings pass by his vision, Stephen's eye expanded to get a good look at the tan colored M1A2 Abrams tank idling in position. The seventy ton armored juggernaut held its 122MM gun trained directly at the building they had just pulled Stephen from. He chuckled to himself at the realization of where the new door in the southern hallway had come from.
Tilting his head awkwardly, Stephen looked back toward the building and saw several Marines evacuating the building. Once they were clear, the tank released a heart-stopping thunderous clap. The tank crew delivered three sequential rounds into the four-story building before it completely collapsed on itself. Stephen craned his neck to see a glimmer of the rising dust plume emerging from the collapse.
He smiled and said under the weight of his hampered breath, "Good bye, crappy little building."
He hadn't much liked that building and the hospitality had been somewhat less than pleasant. Groggy and disoriented though he was, Stephen looked upward and caught the eye of a dirty-faced grunt who couldn't have seen his twentieth birthday yet. Stephen smiled at him and squeezed the Marine's arm with a deep expression of the overwhelming brotherhood he felt for the man at that moment. He wanted to speak but Stephen still couldn't take in a full breath without choking on a cough.
He wanted to rest but the men pulling him seemed hell-bent on dragging him over every rock in Iraq before finally laying him between a tall building and a grouping of chest-high concrete walls, known as Texas Barriers, for cover. Without hesitation, a guy who must have been a medic ran over and immediately began buzzing around him. Lights were being flashed into his eye, water sprayed his face and a barrage of questions flooded him from multiple directions as the medic ran through a field diagnostic to assess his condition. Two other soldiers were hesitantly moving around him when he felt a sudden release of the constriction that had been hindering his breath. Looking down, Stephen was shocked to see the top of Waters' uncovered head resting on his chest.
Mile 12
"Look at this son of a bitch! You hear me? I said, look at this Hooah son of a bitch!" Stephen could hear the rhythmic escalation of Mayweather's taunts long before he could actually see him but he had no doubt the platoon sergeant was strutting.
"Lantz! You sure as hell do like attention, don't you?" Mayweather stood directly over Stephen and laughed.
"Mayweather…," Stephen coughed through the debris he had inhaled and struggled to get the full sentence out. "Glad… you didn't leave…"
"Well, hell. We couldn't let you have all the fun on this wonderfully fine day."
"Really, no kidding. Thanks brudder." Stephen couldn't bring himself to sarcasm and his lip was beginning to numb. "I didn't think we would…"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever. Don't you go getting all soft and squishy on me now." Mayweather interrupted. "Besides, I happen to know how often you shower. And ya' see, the Geneva Convention has all these rules and types about cruelty to the enemy." Stephen thought this guy was having way too much fun for the middle of a war zone. He really did love this world. His own mind drifted aimlessly for a moment and Stephen's eyelid began to droop closed.
Mayweather leaned down and gave a firm pat to the side of Stephen's face. "Hey, hey! No sleeping there, squad leader. You see any pillows here? This ain't no nap time."
Stephen wondered if the man was trying to keep him conscious or if he was that desperate for an audience to laugh at his corny humor.
Once he confirmed that Stephen's clear eye was wide open and locked onto him, Mayweather stood up and continued, "Like I was sayin', the Geneva Convention. I mean, what's CNN gonna report when they find out we left our own little weapon of mass destruction in that building?"
Stephen sighed and resolved that Mayweather was never going to miss a beat. Regardless of what was happening around them, this man would not pass an opportunity to yank a chain. He really seemed to have no capacity for knowing when to shut up. Stephen looked up at him and squinted to see Mayweather's silhouette, which was only partially blocking the sunlight. He had to push out deep breaths to push out the words, "You know… an asshole... you are." There was no sarcasm there. Stephen was speaking the honest truth about his good friend but it only emboldened Mayweather to respond with his signature wink and that overconfident click from the edge of his mouth.
“You just hang in there Yoda. Doc is on the way.” Mayweather stood tall and looked around at the battlefield carnage with the calm satisfaction of a suburban dad proudly surveying his lush green lawn. "Ah, I tell ya, Lantz. It may not be napalm in the morning, but it still smells like luvin to me!"
Stephen peered up at the man in continued disbelief and spoke slowly, "There sum-thing seriously wong with you. You shood. Need to get checked out too."
Stephen winced as a tow-headed medic with a pale face and bursting blue eyes peered into his own moderately opened eye. "Hey brudder, you mind gibbin me a rundown on how I'm holding up?"
Normally reserved on making explanations but conscious that shock was a real threat to his patient at the moment, the medic accommodated Stephen's concerns, "Yeah, sure. Sergeant, you've got an obvious concussion so you're probably feeling pretty shook up right about now. Several lacerations to your face, including a split lip which is why you’re talking with half your mouth.” The medic gently pressed his fingers along the ridges of Stephen’s cheek and skull. “I'm not seeing any signs of broken bones in your face. But you're going to have some pretty attractive bruising there."
"Bullshit! That's the way he looks every morning." Mayweather cracked in, clearly less concerned about the risk of shock than the medic was.
Despite his youthfulness, the medic remained immune to Mayweather's ongoing banter and gently applied a touch of pressure to Stephen's leg. "There's a bullet wound in this leg here and it's cracked your femur bone. We have an exit wound but the femoral artery didn't get hit so the wound is not critical."
"You gonna need to stick, I mean, stitch that up?" Stephen asked, while noticing that his tongue wasn't moving at the right pace and he became aware of how much he was slurring his own words.
"Not unless you're looking to get benefits as an amputee." The medic quipped, "No, we're not going to stitch anything in this contaminated environment. We'd just be making a little home for some nasty infection."
"I'm good!" Stephen allowed his head to drop back against the barrier, "Pass on the stitches."
We'll get you back to the med site and they'll do
the full clean and closure. I've got pressure locked on the leg to stop the bleeding. It’s a quick job and it'll hold, but I want to come back and redress this. Right now, I need to get back to Corporal Waters over there and make sure he's still stabilized. When the aid team lands to get Waters, I'll come back over and check on you." He must have questioned Stephen's awareness because the medic leaned in and peered up into his face. "You copy, Sergeant?"
Stephen peered through his squinted eye and nodded, "Yeah. Good copy. Of course, make sure Waters is good."
Someone else said something too hard for him to hear. Mayweather was starting to kneel down next to Stephen when he glanced over his shoulder and stood to grab a radio being handed to him, "Yeah, let me call it in."
Stephen looked up at his friend and cracked a smile. All around, he could still hear gunfire. It sounded to Stephen as if the .50 caliber machine guns on that M1 were getting some good use. In the midst of everything, that sound made him smile. Mayweather was looking in the direction of the gunfire and responded, "Roger that, Horseman 6. This is Venom 2-7, over."
Stephen picked up on Mayweather's use of the commander's call sign and knew their little soiree was grabbing some high-level attention.
"That's correct. Venom 2-1 has been recovered. Both men are alive and accounted for, over."
Alive. How good it was to hear that word. Waters would certainly need a lot of work, but both of them were alive right now and that was already more than Stephen had hoped for just minutes before.
"Correct. Yes. Roger that. We still have combatants occupying nearby buildings. They're using small arms and mortar rounds from multiple elevated positions. Yes. No. Not to worry." Stephen could tell Mayweather was becoming agitated by the curt way he responded to the barrage of questions.
"We won't. Roger that, you have my word we won't drop all the buildings in this city. Yes. I understand we'll probably have to clean up our mess here." Mayweather paused to hear what was clearly good news. He responded with resounding enthusiasm. "Absolutely! Gunships would be very much appreciated." Mayweather covered the mic on the radio and with a smile bigger than his face would allow, he mouthed the word ‘Apaches' to Stephen.
Stephen was pretty sure the mother of all migraines was making her way into his brain. Showing signs of a struggle, he mustered a limited respond with raise of his thumb.
"Roger that." Mayweather confirmed, "Yes, we grabbed Sergeant Lantz. Affirmative. No, they had to enter the building. The Marines found him unresponsive but he appears to be coming to now." Mayweather nodded his head to Stephen in a back and forth in an annoyed motion with an expression that imitated teenage rebellion. He focused at the ground next to Stephen and continued to answer the senior officer's interrogation. "Negative. Sergeant Lantz grabbed Waters. Yes. That's accurate. Correct, I did say he was unresponsive. No. There's only one man here named Sergeant Lantz. Yes. Well, Sergeant Lantz had the wherewithal to bind himself to his teammate and fasten their LBE harnesses together. Our men didn't have to go looking for Corporal Waters because Sergeant Lantz already had him. No, Sergeant Lantz was unresponsive. It took two men just to get them out of there."
The explosion of a mortar round rocked the earth in the near distance and Stephen knew Mayweather's adrenaline was spiking. "Say again? Say again, Horseman 6? I'm sorry. Did you ask why?" Mayweather listened intently before standing tall and smiling.
The smile was too big. Stephen knew the platoon sergeant had just popped a filter and the conversation was about to go south.
"Why… why you're asking me? Because he's one hardcore ass-kicking son of a bitch, that's why!"
Almost immediately, Mayweather quickly caught on that a bit too much of his personality may have carried over the line and sheepishly followed up with, "umm… I mean, he's one hardcore ass-kicking son of a bitch… sir." Having enjoyed his moment of outburst, Mayweather turned away to privately finish his conversation and prepare for the tongue lashing which would come from his multiple breaches of protocol.
Stephen looked to the opposite side and saw Chelp, Hilton and Hooper. The young medic was behind them attending to Waters. Chelp had a wrap over his head and Hilton had already been fitted with a makeshift sling on his arm. Each had a mask of blood and Iraqi desert blended into their complexions. Stephen tasted his own blood again as he smiled and winked the one eye he could open, "You guys… you look like shit."
Chelp quickly shot back, "Ready to go back in when you are, Sarge!"
Less enthusiastically and sucking in air through labored breaths, Hooper grunted with a nod to Chelp, "I think this mountain of dog turd over here cracked my sternum."
Chelp unsympathetically laughed at Hooper, "That's alright; you can say what you want now. Eventually, you're gonna name your first born after me."
"My first born? Maybe a kidney stone." Hooper responded.
"How 'bout a dog?"
"Deal."
"Hooah." Chelp confirmed.
Hilton's deep voice overtook the rushed triage location, "And think, this heart, all evil shed away. A pulse in the eternal mind, no less. Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given; her sights and sounds…"
"Hilton!" Pausing from the task of securing their perimeter, Tomlison looked up from behind the scope of his rifle and leaned across the injured bodies of his squad mates. "Hey buddy, you do realize you're American and not English, right?"
Shifting from the stoic poet to his muscle-head persona, Hilton angled his head toward Tomlison and responded with his intimidating deep bass tone, "It's Rupert Brooke, you uncultured dolt."
"I'm just saying," shrugged Tomlison as his eye returned to his scope. "You're an American… who happens to be of African descent… fighting through a desert in Iraq while quoting old dead guys from England."
"Hell," chimed in Hooper. "What's one more country? Hilton, please continue."
Nodding to Hooper and bearing a proud smile, the poet continued. "…dreams happy as her day; and laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness. In hearts at peace, under an English heaven."
Stephen smiled at the bond his men shared. They had all made it out of that hell-house. Perhaps, not in one piece, but they had all made it out and made it out together. He rested his head against the concrete and soothed his wounded lip with his tongue to ease the dryness.
Paroled from his report to command, Mayweather returned to Stephen and the others. "Damn! I tell ya. Apparently, Colonel all-up-my-ass just wants to stay informed. At least that's what he calls it. But since when does a combat zone SitRep get packaged with a proctology exam!"
"I heard it was standard operating procedure. You should be grateful he didn't have you turn your head and cough." Stephen slowly responded with a squint, though whether the stabbing pain above his open eye came from the sunlight or something internal, he couldn't tell.
"You see what happens when they put a silver bird on a dirty leg's shoulders." Mayweather routinely took every opportunity to openly mock a commanding officer who hadn't attended Airborne school.
"Sounded to me like you were having a good time." Stephen gave a straining smile even though the medic's pain medications were not keeping up with what was certainly an approaching bulldozer in his head.
Mayweather leaned down towards Stephen's head to meet him eye to eye. "Seriously, Lantz. That stuff you pulled in there, going back for Waters and all, fighting off those rat-bags and taking it to them man-to-man. And then strapping your boy to your own chest? Brother- that is some serious, high-speed, low-drag action hero shit, right there! I'm telling ya. You should absolutely be thinking about Ranger School."
"No, thanks." Stephen waived a dismissing arm.
Mayweather pressed on, "I'm telling ya. After this place, sixty-four days of sunny Fort Benning will be a vacation. Seriously though, it'll change ya forever."
"Oh, I don't doubt that. They tell me you used to be good looking."
Mayweather's laugh peaked beyond his lungs as he rose to his feet. "Now? Now he has joke
s? Hey Doc, no more morphine for this one. Just give 'em another rifle and throw him on the next block!" Mayweather started walking away but he was still having an all out party and looked around to survey the day's work with satisfaction. Calling back to Stephen he said, "Hey, don't go nowhere. I gotta check in with our new buddies in heavy mech. Waters there has a pretty serious head injury so they're calling it an immediate triage."
Stephen was aware of the Army's triage procedures which gave priority to injuries which threatened life, limb or eyesight. Waters must be in pretty bad shape.
Mayweather continued, "Which means you get to tag along. I heard they were almost done waxing your limo for that nice, smooth and plush ride back to Margaritaville. I'd join you buddy, but you know, there are a few of us who are going to have to stick around and get some work done today." Mayweather gave his classic wink and click of the mouth to indicate he was saying goodbye to his injured friend.
Mayweather had only taken a few more steps when the all too familiar streaking pitch of a mortar round creased through the clear blue city sky.
"Incoming!" Someone shouted and bodies began to scramble.
The errant round slammed into an upper floor of the building directly behind them. The explosion ripped apart the building and rained chunks of concrete down on their makeshift medical site. Stephen was lying on his back when the round hit and between his injuries and the ultra-strength painkillers coursing through his body, all he could do was raise a single arm above his head in a vain hope of protection. With his one good eye he looked between his fingers to see several large blocks of concrete directly above him descending too fast for him to register.
He was still looking at the rocks when Stephen felt the forceful shove hit him hard from the side. Mayweather's body slammed onto his torso skidding Stephen against the concrete barrier, into the ground and pressed his cheek deep into the jagged dirt. Mayweather squeezed Stephen from all directions in an attempt to cover as much of his body as possible. Wincing from the pain of the small gravel stones imbedding deeper into the side of his face, Stephen was unable to move. A second later he felt a powerful impact as if a pro wrestler had launched himself from the top rope onto Mayweather's back. Then another impact. And another, until Mayweather's grip went limp.