Gnash

by Brian Parker

  Jamie sniffled. “I’m sorry. I can’t control my emotions these days. I just got suddenly so panicked that you were going to leave me for her and that the baby and I were going to be all alone, and that I’d lose your family who’ve been so nice to me, and...”

  He started to say, “Are you crazy?” but he changed it to, “That would never happen, ok? Okay?” he said as he gently cupped her chin and looked into her eyes.

  “Okay,” she nodded. “What are you going to say to her? I mean, that’s a huge deal that she might be alive.”

  “I don’t know. This is almost overwhelming. I mean, if it’s her, then she must have gone through some crazy stuff to survive what went on in Washington. Also, if it is her, she’s apparently married since she signed her email with her maiden name in parentheses. But I don’t want to get my hopes up that she survived if it’s not her.”

  “Okay, let’s assume that it’s your Emory Perry, the girl you were engaged to. Just take it from there and we’ll work through whatever comes up,” Jamie encouraged while she wiped her cheeks with the back of her sleeve.

  Grayson nodded and hugged his wife. Reba smiled, giving Jamie a wink as she did so. While he typed the response to the email his mother’s darning needles clacked in time with the keys.

  ***

  10 March, 1359 hrs local

  The Riverwalk

  San Antonio, Texas

  Jamie buttoned her shirt and placed the baby over her shoulder to burp her. Grayson smirked as the baby belched loudly. She was born two weeks ago and both he and Jamie were showing the battle scars of new parents. They each had dark circles under their eyes, slurred a little when they spoke and carried a dazed look that said they’d gotten very little continuous sleep in a long time.

  The restaurant was still busy, even though it was beyond the normal lunch hours, but on the Riverwalk businesses had learned that there were no normal times, it was always either extremely busy or totally quiet and it was hard to predict what would happen on a day-to-day basis. Right now, the city was filled with tourists from both the United States and Mexico for the anniversary of the Battle of the Alamo, which was only a few days ago.

  The group’s appetizers sat partially eaten on the table where the waitress had placed them less than five minutes before. Everyone had eaten slowly, not wanting to accidently eat something that the nursing mother might have wanted, but couldn’t eat while the baby was feeding.

  Jamie smiled at everyone and laid the now sleeping baby in her infant carrier. “See, I told you. She only eats for a few of minutes then she’s knocked out for hours,” she said as she reached for her glass of wine. She’d have to pump and dump in order to clear the alcohol from her system, but it was worth it after ten months of not having anything to drink.

  Emory grinned at her former fiancé and said, “She is absolutely precious. I’m so glad that you’ve finally decided to get married and have a family.”

  “I know, right?” he said ignoring the little barb that she sent his way since he’d never committed to a wedding date with her. “I was really scared that she’d be ugly or have a cone head or something, you know. Hell, there were times that Jamie had nightmares about her being born a zombie, but she’s perfect, our little angel.”

  “That’s right, you were in Indianapolis when the attacks occurred out there, right?” Hank asked.

  “Yeah, we were pretty much at ground zero there. Jamie and I met when her sister, Jessica, was killed in the city, that’s why we decided to name the baby after her,” Grayson said as he reached over and gently stroked baby Jessica’s head.

  “We were lucky, we got in with a good group of people and were able to survive for almost six months surrounded the entire time by what the government calls the Type Two zombies. I’ve read on the internet that there was another type up in D.C. near you guys that were really smart and nasty. Did you ever run into any of those?”

  Hank and Emory glanced at each other. As part of the government’s requirements to retire, he’d been sworn to secrecy about his career in Delta and had to sign a rock-solid non-disclosure agreement. The agreement was pretty standard for operators who left the community to pursue other things, but they were particularly concerned about the zombie situation and the presence of two types of zombies. It was almost comical to him; he’d helped to literally overthrow foreign governments, trained armies and secretly assisted nations, including his own, to neutralize threats to their political stability, but the defining moment of his career centered on the events of his last year of service.

  “We heard the rumors too, but I never saw anything other than a bunch of dumb zombies that wanted to kill me,” Hank said.

  “We’re still worried about cancer from the radiation, but we can’t let the past dominate our future right?” Emory said in an effort to change the subject. “So with that in mind, Hank and I are expecting too, I’m about two months along, but it’s still really early so you guys are the first ones people we’ve told.”

  “Aww, congratulations you guys. That’s wonderful,” Grayson said raising his beer for a toast.

  “Any thoughts about where you’re going to settle to raise your family?” Jamie asked.

  “My family is from Tallahassee, so we’re gonna try to set up someplace near them and I’ll get some half-assed job to bide my time,” Hank said.

  “And my website can be run from just about anywhere. Plus, you know how much my family drives me crazy, that’s how I ended up on the opposite end of the country from them in the first place. So with the income from my site and Hank’s military retirement, we should be pretty well off down in Florida, even if he doesn’t do anything worthwhile with his time,” she said with a light elbow to her husband’s ribs.

  Grayson took a drink from his beer and eyed Hank over the rim. He tried to determine if the man was good enough for her. Probably not, there were few who would be, but he was glad that she’d found someone that made her happy. “So, Hank, Emory told me that you’re retired from the Army. What did you do while you were in?”

  “I was Special Forces for a while, worked primarily in the Middle East. Before that I was a medic,” he said nonchalantly. “You know, pretty standard Army career, nothing special.”

  Grayson picked up his beer and held the neck out towards Hank, “Bullshit. You’ve got a story, I can feel it. Hopefully I’ll get to hear it one day.”

  “Maybe one day I’ll be allowed to tell you,” he said with a wink as they each tapped their bottles together and took a long swig.

  EPILOGUE

  15 April, 0836 hrs local

  Karakoram Mountain Range

  Afghanistan-Pakistan Border

  Kestrel stared at the rising sun and tipped his nearly empty canteen up to get the final few drops of water. His teammates gathered loosely around him and waited for their extract bird. He’d led the SOG team for a almost a year since the night they attacked the mountaintop stronghold where Wraith was killed. Since then their operational tempo had increased faster than at any time that he could remember in his almost twenty-five years in the special operations community.

  He was tired in his body and weary in his soul. He’d done so much for his country, but he wondered if it accomplished anything? Of course, he knew that his team of good guys was out here on a weekly, sometimes daily, basis arranging meetings in Jannah for the bad guys and that almost every mission meant that there was one less radical who would attack the West. But what did it actually accomplish? For every terrorist fuck that they killed or snatched out of the mountains for interrogation, five more seemed to erupt from the ground.

  It was a never-ending cycle and he’d lost his zeal for field work. Maybe it was the fact that since he was in charge of the entire team now, he felt like every severe injury and death was his responsibility and since his teammates were following his orders, each one impacted him deeply. Maybe it was his age; he was closer to fifty than he was to forty and his knees and aching back forced that thought to his mind
every day. Maybe he might want to settle down somehow and begin a family, if there was a woman out there who could handle him. Hell, maybe he was just sick of washing other people’s blood out of his clothes. Whatever it was, he knew it was time to hang it up before his mind fully checked out and he got people killed.

  He’d applied for a transfer back to the states and it had gotten approved. He knew he’d never make it as a desk jockey, so he signed up to teach at the Company’s SERE[38] course in the Mid-Atlantic region and got accepted. The Agency was great about recognizing burnout and providing options for their personnel. He had about three years to go before he was eligible to retire from federal service without being medically forced to do so. He would need to do some deep soul searching during his down time between training rotations to see if that was the option he wanted to take or if he wanted to keep going.

  One thing was for sure: He had more than enough mental crap going on upstairs to keep the Company’s psychologists busy until he did finally retire.

  END

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Brian Parker is currently an Active Duty soldier who lives in Texas with his family. As an avid reader of all genres of literature, he has dabbled for years with writing, but this is his first completed manuscript.

  * * *

  [1] HTML - HyperText Markup Language is the main language used in creating web pages.

  [2] BWI – Baltimore Washington International is an airport in Baltimore, Maryland that is used for a lot of military flights on civilian airlines.

  [3] HQDA – Headquarters, Department of the Army

  [4] NCO – Noncommissioned Officer, the term used to describe enlisted leaders in the rank of Sergeant (E-5) through Sergeant Major (E-9).

  [5] The G-8 Nations are Germany, Italy, Japan, France, Canada, the United Kingdom, Russia and the United States.

  [6] A-E Drive – The semi-covered interior paved road that completely circles the Pentagon between the C and D rings.

  [7] Jannah – Islam’s concept of Heaven

  [8] HAZMAT – Hazardous Material

  [9] VX – VX is a deadly chemical nerve agent. Typically it is in liquid form and has the feel and consistency of motor oil. Due to its viscosity and low evaporability, it was primarily used as an area denial weapon and remains effective for several days. The liquid is absorbed through the direct contact with unprotected surfaces.

  [10] Delta, officially, the Army Combat Applications Group, they are the highest trained Special Forces soldiers in the U.S. Army.

  [11] NCOIC – Non-Commissioned Officer in Charge. A generic term used to identify the highest ranking Enlisted person in a military organization, regardless of the size of the element.

  [12] Det Cord – Detonating cord. A thin flexible tube filled with explosives that can be wrapped around objects.

  [13] SCAR – MK17 Special Operations Forces Combat Assault Rifle, 7.62mm rifle variant used by U.S. Special Operations Forces. It’s a lightweight magazine-fed heavy assault rifle versus a belt-fed heavy machine gun, like the M-240 used by conventional forces.

  [14] DEVGRU – United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group, the most elite group of Navy SEALs, often referred to as Seal Team Six. DEVGRU operators are Navy SEALs who have completed all the standard SEAL Qualification Training as well as the vaunted Green Team training for DEVGRU.

  [15] Direction Centrale du Renseignement Intérieur – The French intelligence agency, similar to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.

  [16] PAMAS G1—The French-produced version of the Beretta 92 service pistol.

  [17] Qishr – Ginger coffee, a popular drink in the region.

  [18] DelMarVa – A term used to describe the Delaware, Maryland and Virginia region of the Eastern United States.

  [19] LZ – Landing Zone

  [20] Hooligan Tool - A forcible entry tool used by firefighters and law enforcement for quickly breaching many types of locked doors. Typically made up of a handle that terminates in a three-headed design which consists of a claw, a blade and a tapered pick.

  [21] Special Operations Group (SOG) is one of the direct-action groups within the CIA’s Special Activities Division.

  [22] NSA – National Security Agency

  [23] Neptune Spear was the codename for the mission that led to the death of Usama bin Laden.

  [24] CQB – Close Quarters Battle or Close Quarters Combat (CQC)

  [25] Green Team is the six- to eight-month long Operator’s Training Course for applicants to DEVGRU.

  [26] PNVGs – Panoramic Night Vision Goggles, they have four separate imaging tubes which increase the user’s field of view to about 120 degrees, versus the 60 degrees that regular NVG’s issued to military troops achieve, as well as the standard ability to amplify ambient light which allows the user to see in the dark.

  [27] MRE – Meal Ready to Eat, prepackaged, shelf-stable and self-contained meals designed for military use consisting of about 1,200 calories each. There are currently 24 different menu options available.

  [28] MGRS-Military Grid Reference System, the standard military grid system used by NATO forces for location.

  [29] Apache AH1 is the UK nomenclature for the advanced Apache Longbow attack helicopter. The same airframe is designated the AH-64D in the United States.

  [30] Endocarditis – Inflammation of the inner layer of the heart, usually affecting the heart valves.

  [31] Osteomyelitis – Infection and inflammation of the bone marrow.

  [32] USASOC – U.S. Army Special Operations Command. The parent command for all U.S. Army special operations forces, which is subordinate to USSOCOM, the U.S. Special Operations Command that ultimately controls every special operations force from all the services.

  [33] 160 SOAR – Special Operations Aviation Regiment. The 160 SOAR is headquartered at Fort Campbell, Kentucky and provides aviation support for USSOCOM.

  [34] Dry hole – Special Operations term for when an operation against a target results in either no contact or the entity that they had intended to target was not present.

  [35] JSLIST suit – Joint Service Lightweight Integrated Suit Technology. The military’s current version of a nuclear, biological and chemical protection suit, it can be modified for different threat environments.

  [36] RSM – Regimental Sergeant Major

  [37] JP – Justice of the Peace

  [38] SERE – Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape, similar to the courses taught to military Special Forces and aircrew.