In the Valley

by Jason Lambright

  Paul thought that was a lot of mayhem in just one arm. And they hadn’t even covered the other weapons attachment points yet.

  “Your left arm, if you chuckleheads were wondering, can be converted to hold an M-74 so that the operator can dual gun. However, doctrine calls for the left weapons storage compartment to hold a standard 9.5 mm M-3a1 handgun mounted with an integral 125-round drum magazine.

  “Doctrine also calls for the M-241 machine gun to be carried on the left shoulder mount, the M-35 recoilless rifle to be mounted on the right shoulder mount, and for the Mk29 automatic grenade launcher to be mounted on the back mount and used as a high-angle-of-fire weapon.

  “At this school, you will be familiarized with all five mounts and associated weapons systems, but your eventual assigned weapon will be issued by your gaining units. So don’t get attached to any of them but your M-74.”

  The instructor raised that eyebrow again and panned for laughs. In the wind and wet, none were forthcoming from the miserable troopers.

  Despite the tooth-chattering cold, Paul was impressed—by the Suit, that is, not the instructor and his lame jokes. Paul thought the instructor was a douche bag with a nice warm house to go back to.

  “The M-15 Armored Combat Suit has hands whose motion mimics your hands. They are the most delicate feature of your suit. The hands can, with sufficient practice, pet your favorite cat—or smash its head to a pulp. We will spend one day doing nothing but practicing handling fragile objects with the suit’s hands.”

  The instructor didn’t bother with any lame jokes this time.

  “Your suit’s feet and legs are powerful enough to kick through a brick wall. However, there is a pain feedback system wired into the suit that enables you to use the features of the suit intuitively. If you do something that begins to stress the suit’s materials or systems, you, as the operator, will feel the suit’s pain.

  “Like I said,” the instructor added, “suit control is intuitive. Some things, though, can only be learned through experience.”

  Two weeks later, Paul was moving in overwatch by squad bounds. To an aerial observer, it looked like two groups of ten suits abreast leapfrogging each other, careful not to “mask” each other’s fires. Paul had learned that the military called any type of projectile or projected weapons “fires,” which was a lot better understanding than he had had a mere sixteen weeks earlier.

  Paul had gotten used to the tingling feeling he got when putting on his suit over his cams—kind of like putting on a civvy halo, but it took place over his whole body, as the suit synched with his nervous system and mil-grade helmet halo.

  His trauma-weave cams, helmet, gloves, and boots had special contact points that transmitted his neurochemical signals directly to his suit. Technically, he could have climbed into his suit butt naked, and it would have worked just fine. The problem with being naked was that if his suit was rendered inoperable he would be completely helpless on the battlefield.

  Also, it was just plain handy to be able to step into the suit in one’s duty uniform. The soldier’s multicam uniform and suit were made for each other. All three elements of the armored suit moving in unison—the soldier, his cams, and the suit—were a fearsome sight to behold.

  He was, frankly, reveling in the feeling of taking five-meter strides toward an “enemy” position, taking cover, watching his sector, and getting up to do it all over again. Being suited sure beat doing this movement in just trauma-weave cams with his heavy kit and rifle. The movement was the same as what they had practiced in basic and the first weeks of advanced, but it felt smoother, easier.

  He knew the suit was helping him, keeping him cool. He had the outside air turned on so that his sense of smell could add to his situational awareness. His platoon was doing this exercise at 25 kph, and they were eating the terrain away.

  Also, their suit camouflage would make their fire-and-movement exercise very hard to see for a person trying to find them without a properly keyed mil-grade halo. The suits used a special electronic paint that took a picture of their surroundings through the halo and mimicked what the halo was seeing through the reflective surfaces of the paint. The camouflage was devilishly effective.

  Today, however, the camouflaging system was turned off. In training scenarios like this, in training and doctrine command, the suits were their default color, a muddy brown.

  He wished he could have run around the mountain like this at physical training in the early morning. It seemed to him that every morning his training company would go and run the seemingly infinite distance to the mountain that dominated western Fort Sill’s skyline. After they reached the mountain, they would do calisthenics for what seemed like forever. Then they’d run back.

  He hated physical training (PT) with a passion. But this, bounding by squads with nothing to do but kill bad guys—this was awesome! He would only feel tired in his suit when the onboard systems were straining, due to the intuitive feedback system. And it took days of movement for the suit to feel a strain, unlike when he was running at PT, his lungs heaving for air.

  As a rule, the operator would give out before the suit. This explained the enormous amount of PT for trainees and for members of a line unit. On this particular morning, both the soldiers and the suits were good to go.

  His halo gave his ammunition status (fifty rounds, 6.8 mm), his food supply (empty), water (full), and charge (full). Another icon gave the micro feed (unavailable) and his commander. According to his display, the enemy bunker was 350 meters ahead, and the notional enemy was dead meat.

  Pride cometh before a fall, a wise man once said.

  As he and his squad were bounding forward to deliver the coup de grace on the bunker, he heard a whistle that turned into a shriek. An urgent red message appeared in the center of his view screen: INCOMING. Below that message there was a counter: 19…no, 20 rounds 155 mm high explosive, proximity fused: proximity fused, meaning blowing up at a set distance from the ground in the air and flinging death-dealing shrapnel in all directions.

  Shit!—flashed through his mind. What should he do? Was this some kind of horrible accident? The first round went off with a sound louder than noise overhead, and there was a white flash and a dirty cloud. His suit was thrown backward; he heard/felt the impact of something on his suit. He couldn’t believe it—someone was actually shelling him! No one had said anything about this in the range orientation brief!

  Faster than you could blink, he rolled over and started to dig like a mole into the ground with his hands and feet. Pure panic set in, followed by more explosions.

  Then his suit froze, and an OVERRIDE icon appeared in his visual. The explosions stopped. The instructor’s face appeared before him, and she spoke—it was in a tone that Paul gratingly compared to Sergeant First Henderson, back in basic.

  Paul would have thought Instructor Martinez was hot, except for that tone of voice she used on the trainees, each and every day. It seemed to Paul that the instructors must have gone through a school that taught all of them to use that same tone on the trainees. As a matter of fact, that was exactly the case. Later in life, Paul would learn all about using his voice as a tool.

  Stunned, in his hole and with his suit unresponsive to any input but what the cadre transmitted, Paul thought that maybe Martinez’s cold voice might make her even hotter.

  It was weird the shit one’s brain came up with during moments of spiritual disconnect, like this one. Instructor Martinez spoke again with her cold voice.

  “Listen up, douche bags. We arranged for a little present for you kiddies this morning because it appeared you were getting a little big for your britches. We wanted to show you something that we have told you over and over. In your suit, nothing short of a direct hit will stop you. Now you know that’s true. Every one of you has taken a hit from shrapnel and blast, and none of you are dead.” Her eyes narrowed.

  “However, I have autoprescribed sedation for two of you; after today’s exercise, we’ll pick you up. You kno
w who you are.” Paul wondered who had cracked up and what horrible punishment awaited them. Of course, if he had been thinking straight, all he had to do was look at the diagnostics for his squad mates. The range control lady, Instructor Martinez, spoke again.

  “The rest of you, stop freaking out. Knucklenuts, what does the armored infantry do when confronted by indirect fires?”

  We chorused together, “We move, communicate, close with and kill the enemy!”

  She replied to the chorus in a tone that the military calls “direct,” “Then what the fuck are you waiting for!”

  The OVERRIDE icon disappeared. His suit was live again.

  Paul felt an electric jolt course through his whole body at her words; he pushed out of the hole he had dug for himself. Consulting his tactical orders screen, he looked at the position display for the rest of his squad, and he and his squad moved out with proverbial blood in their eye.

  Artillery came screaming in again, but this time Paul’s whole squad hauled ass through the barrage. In synchronized violence with the rest of the platoon, they thoroughly destroyed the “enemy” bunker as the explosions faded off behind them.

  It was a valuable lesson, and one Paul never forgot. The suits weren’t easy to stop. This same lesson was repeated later with mines and machine guns, flamethrowers and fléchettes. Short of a sabot round, a lucky hit with a shaped charge, or an asteroid, the armored infantry ruled the battle space on the ground.

  Paul learned later what had happened to the two sedated soldiers: they were recycled to the next training company after a couple of months of therapy and psychiatry.

  Later in combat advisor school, he had to unlearn that lesson about the artillery. It turned out a soldier outside of a suit had to actually give an artillery barrage or mundane explosives respect. Trauma-weave cams were great, but they weren’t as good as a suit.

  Later, eighteen years later, Paul learned that the suit brought no advantage against some of life’s toughest challenges. The suit could armor the body, but the mind stayed the same. That was the problem.

  Third Battalion, Juneau Army, was starting to gaggle around the flat space at Firebase Atarab, and Paul was looking for Bashir, the Second Company’s commander. He had already touched bases with the colonel and Mighty Mike via halo. The colonel was, in fact, already moving out to the ridgeline overlooking Pasto Khel with the air-control bubbas. Mighty Mike said he’d be monitoring the operation via halo link from the motor pool back at Camp Kill-a-Guy.

  Paul scrolled out on his halo and saw the advisor command team humping across the little tributary of the Baradna River that ran by the firebase. So they were well on their way, suits and all. The colonel and the air-control team had agreed with Colonel Fasi, the Juneau Army battalion commander, that they would move to the ridgeline south of town to provide backup, micro support, and command and control, just in case.

  Paul and Z had stayed behind. They were moving out on foot, sans suits, with Second Company and Captain Bashir.

  Paul shrugged in his harness; the weight felt well balanced. Something Paul had learned early in his career, in about the second week of basic, was that a harness that was ill situated became an iron maiden of pain after a short amount of movement. Paul’s ritual of shrugging and making small hops accomplished two objectives: it let him know that he could physically handle the weight and balance, and it let him know if something was clicking or rattling. Now—on the firebase—was the time to find those things out, not in the middle of a combat mission.

  His equipment checked out. It should have; he had been using this same basic rig for years, but you never knew. Compulsive checks, both physical and via halo, saved lives, especially the one he really cared about—his own.

  He looked at his diagnostic on his halo, and it told him what he already knew. His left foot was developing a blister; both ears had sustained permanent hearing loss. He had also sustained several concussions and should be evaluated by an autodoc for a traumatic brain injury. Also, his left wrist was probably fractured by a blunt-force-trauma incident several days earlier.

  Wow, a whole shopping list of aches and pains. Z-man knew about the wounds and injuries, but Paul had overridden his concerns. He had told Z the night before that the mission came first. So it was. His body was telling him that he could Charlie Mike (continue mission), so he ignored his halo for the time being.

  He still wondered about his combat stress reading, which the colonel had access to. He could feel a mental disconnect from his surroundings, a feeling that he was not going to leave the Baradna Valley alive. He shunted the thoughts aside and concentrated on what he was doing. His gear and body were more or less sound; it was time to concentrate on the mission. Paul looked around.

  He spotted Captain Bashir—even without his halo, it would have been easy. He was the guy pointing at milling soldiers and speaking with his lieutenants. Good thing there were no snipers around, thought Paul.

  But then again, the bad guys would need a decent halo with night-vision capabilities to spot Bashir. It was pitch-black without mil-grade NVG gear. Paul pinged Z’s halo, looked at him, and gave the timeless command: “Follow me.” With a sigh and a grunt, Z-man stood up and fell into trail behind Paul. “All right, sir, you gonna try to get me killed again?” The question was half joke, half dreadful anticipation.

  With a laugh, Paul replied, “Can’t promise you nothin’, Z, but stick with me and you’ll do all right, as long as we move toward the sound of the guns.” As the duo moved to link up with Bashir, the plan was already in motion.

  According to the schedule hatched the night before, the colonel and the air-control group had moved out at 0145. They would make the five-klick movement to the ridgeline overlooking Pashto Khel via armored suit by 0245, in theory, and be in place to provide real-time micro coverage and fire support while the Third Battalion, minus Third Company, moved on the objective.

  “Objective” was fancy military speak for a given destination where the killing was to take place. One reached an objective via movement. And as Paul had thought so often, movement was a word in the military that guaranteed something painful awaited.

  In theory, First and Second Companies would move out at 0200 on foot. First Company would lead and split off from Second Company at a little bridge over the Baradna River. Then First Company would encircle the village to the east, and Second Company would encircle the village to the west. The plan called for Pashto Khel to be enveloped by 0500, with the attack at dawn.

  Bashir spotted Paul. He said, “My friend, Lieutenant Thompson, how are you feeling today? Have you eaten?” Always the pleasantries first with these guys, Paul thought. It was time for him to put his game face on.

  “Yes, Captain Bashir, my friend, blessings and peace upon you. We will hunt well today, God willing.” It was always best to put a feral air on when dealing with Pashtuns—it had been so since time out of mind. Whether the Pashtun was earthborn or otherwise, some things never changed.

  In a strange way, Paul admired and respected Bashir. Bashir had been fighting both the forces and other tribes on Juneau for thirty years. He picked sides as the mood took him. Insurgencies made for strange bedfellows; Bashir really hated this group of dissidents, and he viewed Second Company as his own tribal fiefdom. The Juneau Army loved to have force advisors present; they brought capabilities to the fight that indigenous forces just didn’t have. Bashir touched on this with his next words.

  “The colonel—he has moved to his position?” Bashir obviously wanted to hear a yes. With the colonel overlooking Pashto Khel, Second Company would not only have micro coverage, but also the use of the colonel’s onboard set of weapons in his suit. Paul was able to answer him in the affirmative. Bashir relaxed visibly. Looking around, Paul saw that “his” company, the Second, had shaken itself out and was ready to move toward battle.

  Just to get a perspective on what the Juneau soldiers were seeing, Paul clicked off his halo’s night vision. His view field became shockingly
dark, with only the vague shapes of soldiers lining up in order of march. Satisfied, Paul reselected night vision, and he could see his own feet again. His view clock said 0205.

  As if on cue, a series of muted commands went through the ranks, and First and Second Companies began to move.

  Bashir spoke a little more with his platoon leaders and looked over at Paul, as if to ask whether Paul had the courage to accompany his men. Paul started to walk.

  Paul looked ahead at First Company’s column. He looked for Green, the advisor team’s intel guy and the ad-hoc replacement for Mighty Mike and Stork, the medic, the usual advisor duo for First Company. Paul couldn’t see him, so he called up a micro view of the column and looked for Green’s icon. With an assist from his halo, Paul spotted him, 243 meters ahead, on the other side of the snaking column. Green was accompanying Freidag, one of First Company’s platoon leaders.

  Paul was a little worried about Green. He had been brought out to Firebase Atarab via ground-car only the day before yesterday as a replacement for Mighty Mike, and this was Green’s first basic dismounted movement, unarmored. It could be a little scary moving out with the locals outside of your cocoon. Paul should know: he had done it many times. Well, thought Paul, Green is getting a righteous baptism today—no doubt about it. As the intel guy, Green just hadn’t had as many cracks at this as Paul had had. Paul hoped Green wouldn’t start developing the shakes as well. He wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

  Speaking of a case of the shakes, Paul was good to go for the moment. Strangely, when the action started, the shakes quit. Paul wondered why that was, but the fact remained.

  Paul was finally moving. He shifted his load again and compulsively checked his halo load-out diagram: 440 rounds, 6.8 mm—check. Adequate water, stored in his back bladder—check. Rations for one day—check. Personal medical equipment—check. Three smoke grenades, all different colors—check. Two M67 fragmentation grenades—check. The list scrolled on the left side of his vision while he moved with Second Company to the outer perimeter of the firebase.