by Richard Fox
Abdullah held his hand against the spreading welt on his face. His father was a fool, an old man with no appreciation of the world beyond the Qarghuli tribe. Someday he would be gone, and Abdullah would show everyone what a great sheikh could do. He’d show them, and no one would get in his way.
The mess hall at Patrol Base Dragon was a meager affair. A few particleboard picnic tables over bare concrete floors could sit almost two platoons at a time. The chow line congregated at the cook’s station, where he used an ice-cream scooper to dole out meals cooked months ago and vacuum sealed for transportation around the world. Pallets of shelf-stable milk and rationed sodas were available in a storage closet, which stank of rotting corn syrup from a burst case of generic soda. Open cases of individually wrapped muffins, cakes, and processed carbohydrates provided dessert.
Ritter carried his paper tray, festooned with mixed vegetables and bow tie pasta swimming in oil, to an open table. He grabbed a banana-flavored milk and sat down. He pondered how this milk remained unspoiled when it was exposed to the 120-degree temperatures for weeks at a time.
“We sure do eat good. Don’t we, sir?” Young and Kovalenko sat across from him.
“Better than a ham slice from a meal ready to eat, I suppose,” Ritter said.
“You remember that egg loaf they gave us back in two thousand four? That was the only hot meal we had for months,” Young said.
“There was some variety. Sometimes there were chunks of hot dog mixed in.” Ritter scooped a bit of the pasta onto his fork. It slid off and fell back onto the plate with an unappetizing plop. Egg loaf might not be so bad right now, he thought.
“Now, sir, I’ve spent a great deal of time convincing this young lieutenant that our first tour was nothing but fifteen months of misery. Don’t ruin it with tall tales of hot dog bits in the egg loaf.” Young laughed and proceeded to eat his pasta with little hesitation.
“Is it true you would take Route Irish in an unarmored Humvee?” Kovalenko asked Ritter.
“He believes all my stories but that one,” Young said through a full mouth.
“What do you know about Route Irish?” Ritter asked.
“It was the deadliest road in Iraq—more IEDs than any other place in the country. We had to figure out how to defend it for an exercise at the officer’s basic course,” Kovalenko said. “We figured you couldn’t guard the entire route from the airport to the Green Zone without a brigade worth of Soldiers, fixed defensive positions, and plenty of drones.”
“A good assessment. I believe there are several Iraqi interior ministry units guarding the route these days,” Ritter said.
“That true. We took the route a few times to pick up Soldiers from the big hospital there. Much nicer now,” Young added.
“Taking the route in unarmored Humvees, which we did, was high adventure. The windshields weren’t bulletproof, so the overpressure from an IED turned the glass into a shotgun to the face. No roofs, no doors. We had to jury-rig pintle mounts for the machine guns,” Ritter said. The austere conditions of yesteryear seemed to impress Kovalenko.
“Time for a story; there we were.” Young’s head bobbed up and down with pent-up laughter.
“Not again.” Ritter moaned.
“There we were—no shit—Lieutenant-at-the-time Ritter sitting in the front seat with me, driving in our plastic Barbie car through Route Irish. We were the lead vehicle for the squadron supply convoy. We took a couple of potshots on the way over, and I was a bit agitated.” Young pulled a toothpick from a shoulder pocket and cleaned his teeth.
“A bit?”
“Not now, sir. This is my story. So we get to the airport and there’s a big ol’ line of hajji trucks waiting to get in. Naturally there’s an access lane for coalition vehicles, so we can skip all that shit. Bunch of kids milling around the stopped trucks, and one of them throws a Coke can right in front of our vehicle. I hit the brakes, because I thought it was a grenade,” Young continued.
“You distinctly said—”
“Without missing a beat, Lieutenant-at-the-time Ritter draws down on the little shit and is about to shoot him in the moments of life we have left. But then I see the can rolling in the breeze and shout, ‘It’s empty.’ Just that close to killing someone for littering. So Ritter shouts some very creative Arabic at the kid, and we move on with our day. What was it you said after that, sir?”
Ritter ate a mouthful of pasta to mask the moment it took to make up a reasonable lie. He chewed slowly, then said, “I said, ‘I’m going to be mad at myself for the rest of the day. I don’t know if it’s because I almost shot someone for nothing or that I had a legitimate kill and I was too slow to take it.’”
He stood and tossed his plate into a garbage bin. He grabbed a box of Pop-Tarts and left the mess hall.
Young remained in his seat as Ritter left the mess hall. A frown formed on his lips. “That ain’t what he said. He said…‘One less collateral-damage death on my conscience.’”
“That’s odd. Who did he kill before that?” Kovalenko asked.
“No one. We were all still slick sleeves.” Young thought hard; adrenaline always played hell on his memories. “Huh, I never thought of that.”
“Probably best not to pry.”
“That’s right, sir. We don’t never ask about kills. If a man wants you to know about his kills, he’ll tell you.” Young ripped open a plastic baggie of carrot cake. “Besides, Ritter never talks about the past.”
Chapter 16
The Iraqi morning promised misery. A wet haze clung to ground, gifting anything and everything with a sheen of moisture guaranteed to turn the atmosphere into a sauna with the addition of direct sunlight. There would be no respite after the sun vanquished the haze; the day’s temperatures would creep higher and higher. Turret gunners would complain that a hair dryer blasted an inch from their faces as their convoys screamed down the highways, stretching from Kuwait to Mosul.
Three gun trucks left Patrol Base Dragon in those early hours, as much to beat the heat as to catch the Iraqis in the open. While Soldiers would decry the average Iraqi for his acute lack of sophistication and education, Iraqis weren’t stupid. Thousands of years of civilization in the sweltering heat had produced a comfortable schedule. The early mornings were a time for limited business and some work. The insufferable midday was never a productive period; it was best not to work hard in temperatures eager to inflict heat-related death. The evenings were social times. This cycle left little time for work, which baffled and infuriated the Soldiers’ Western minds.
Ritter wished they were heading out on a dismounted patrol. He sat in the “suicide seat” of his Humvee, the right rear passenger seat; it was so named because the gas tank was directly beneath him. Statistics assured him that in the event of an IED, his odds of survival were poor. Part of his mind kept tugging at his attention, pointing out the similarities between this Humvee and Jennifer Mattingly’s vehicle.
Didn’t this smell the same way? The infrequent beeps of radio transmissions, the low roar of the engine, the thankful whine of the air conditioner—just like last time! If the exact same IED went off under this Humvee, he probably wouldn’t even register the explosion before it crushed his skull into the roof. Maybe the helmet would mitigate the injury to his skull and pass it through to his neck and spine. What would cause more panic? The realization that he couldn’t feel his body below his shoulders or that he was burning to death?
Ritter bit his lip, using the pain to refocus. He was in the second vehicle, but the convoy spacing was enough that looking through the windshield was worthwhile. A cluster of mud huts surrounded an upcoming intersection. Several of the homes bore small satellite dishes, mounted to the roofs like alien flowers.
“Sir, we call this area ‘the vice,’” Kovalenko said from the front seat, Jennifer’s seat.
“Haven’t had an IED here in over a week. Should we be nervous?” said the gunner through the Humvee’s internal radio. Ritter had sought out and introduced himself to his
gunner, Sergeant Greely, before the mission. Not knowing the name of the man who would send 50-caliber rounds into the enemy on his behalf was unacceptable. Ritter felt sorry for Greely, who was exposed to the elements in the turret, his once-fair skin no match for the Iraqi sun.
A little girl, probably no more than five, shifted from bare foot to bare foot next to one of the hovels. Her unkempt hair formed a mane around her head and brushed the top of a man’s shirt she wore, it covered her from her neck to her knees. Ritter pulled a Ziploc bag of hard candies from his cargo pocket and tapped them against Greely’s leg.
Greely locked down, then grabbed the bag.
“Sir, are you kidding me?” Greely said through the radio.
“No, throw some to her before it’s too late,” Ritter said.
Greely scooped a handful of the toffee- and cinnamon-flavored candy and hurled it toward the little girl as their vehicle rumbled past. Even through the inches of armor and the headphones, Ritter heard the girl’s squeal of delight as she snatched up the pieces of candy, holding them close to her chest. Ritter watched her through the tiny window of his door for as long as he could. She waved a filthy hand toward them before he lost sight of her. For a moment, there was joy.
“Sir, we normally don’t do that sort of thing for the Iraqis,” Kovalenko said.
“You’ve been hit in this area before, right? If you throw her some candy every so often, she’ll always be waiting near the road for you. When she’s not there, then you’ll know something’s wrong,” Ritter said. That was part of the reason. Giving a poor child a reason to be happy, a reason not to hate him or the armored trucks that crossed her doorstep, was the remainder.
“Using that little girl as an IED detector? That’s cold, sir.” Greely spun the turret toward the village as they passed through.
Ritter keyed his microphone. “A couple of pieces of candy are a lot cheaper than the alternative.”
They stopped a hundred yards from the livestock market. Calling it a market was a bit generous. Half a dozen light trucks lined a road intersection, their cargo beds carrying wire mesh cages stuffed with chickens. Braying goats jostled for space in the cargo trucks as a herd of sheep mingled between the trucks. A large blue spot of spray paint helped their shepherd delineate them from other herds.
The sheep kept their distance from a white truck with the rear hatch down. A severed lamb’s head perched at the end of the bed. Fresh blood stained a piece of cardboard beneath the head. An Iraqi man with a meat cleaver lounged against the truck. He waved to the eight American Soldiers and their interpreter as they approached.
They walked in a staggered formation, several yards apart on either side of the road. This was supposed to be a friendly operation, but tactical concerns were always paramount. The separation minimized the damage from a single IED or the chance that the same burst of gunfire would catch more than one Soldier. Shelton then signaled a halt with his raised fist and looked over the market through a scope dummy-corded to his armor.
“Nothing like the smell of farm animals to get the day going,” Kilo said from the rear of the formation. Their three Humvees waited in the distance; each had its turret manned, and the drivers outside the vehicles were pulling security.
Nesbitt wrinkled his nose at the lamb’s head. “Christ almighty, that is nasty. Why do they do that shit?” he asked Kilo.
“So you know the meat is fresh,” Ritter answered. He pulled a stack of handbills from his pocket and thumbed out a few dozen copies. He had two handbills; one bore O’Neal’s and Brown’s photos along with a phone number and a promise of a generous reward in Arabic. The other was a wanted poster for Samir and Karim, the other IED maker from the kidnapping; same phone number, significantly less reward.
Ritter watched as Shelton and Ali, his interpreter, spoke with a knot of Iraqi men near the market. Shelton had the same handbills, but none of the Iraqis would take them.
“Sir, why aren’t you up there with Captain Shelton?” Kilo asked.
“I’m in reserve. If someone has something worth sharing, I’ll talk to them. Seems the locals aren’t too keen on your ’terps, Sergeant…White Knife.” Ritter read Kilo’s name tag as he answered.
“Kilo, sir. White Knife, whiskey kilo, Kilo,” the sniper said, explaining how the army’s phonetic alphabet had led to his nickname.
“Got some kids approaching,” Nesbitt said.
Two boys in ankle-length dishdashas gingerly approached them. The taller of the two boys waved to them and said, “Mister, mister!” If there was one English word Iraqi children knew, it was always mister.
“I’ll handle this,” Ritter said as he pulled two pieces of candy from his pocket and stepped toward the boys.
“Ooo, he’s handling this,” Nesbitt whispered to Kilo. Kilo brandished the back of his hand at Nesbitt, who promptly shut up.
“Hello, what are your names?” Ritter asked in Arabic. The boys stopped as if they’d run into a force field.
“Why do you sound like a Saudi?” the older boy asked.
“I lived in Saudi Arabia when I was your age.” He held out the candy.
“Are you a Jew? My father says the Jews are the only Americans that can speak Arabic. They learned it from the Palestinians they have in their jails,” the boy said. He took a step back from the candy, as though it were poisoned. The boy’s conspiracy theory wasn’t anything new to Ritter. He’d heard wild theories from Arabs across the Middle East, and Israel was always responsible for every misfortune.
“Hurry up and tell him, Mohammed,” the younger boy said.
“I am not a Jew. I learned all my Arabic from school teachers. What do you want to tell me?” Ritter lowered the candy and took a knee, now at eye level with the boys.
“There’s a dead person in the canal.” Mohammed pointed to a line of man-high reeds growing from the canal.
It wasn’t O’Neal or Brown; the corpse’s long black hair told them that immediately. The body floated facedown in the canal, his hands tied behind his back with twine. The corpse’s light-blue shirt rippled with the passing current. The body was stuck among the reeds opposite where Shelton and Ritter stood.
“Does this happen a lot?” Ritter asked.
“Nope, this is our first murder,” Shelton said.
Channing trotted to the canal side, a plastic hook attached to a length of rope in his hand.
“Here’s the command wire pull,” he said. The tool, a cylinder of steel with three metal hooks welded to it, was meant for combat engineers to remove razor wire obstacles. The hook had been repurposed, due to a distinct lack of terrorist razor wire, to yank the long wires running from IEDs to their firing points. Captain Shelton had a new task for the hook.
Shelton took the hook and ran a length of rope, enough to clear the canal, then tossed the hook over the body. The hook landed in the water and stretched the line tight over the body as it sank. Shelton backpedaled up the canal side and pulled the line. The hook snared the shirt as Shelton reeled in the body, pulling hand over hand. The shirt formed a blue wake over the body; scabbed-over gashes marred the body.
Shelton used the rope to pull the body a few inches out of the water. He held the rope taut and motioned to Channing. “Pull him up here.”
Channing took a step forward, then balked. “Sir, I…Can I get some rubber gloves from Porter? Who knows how long that guy’s been in there.”
Ritter couldn’t see the look on Shelton’s face as he slowly turned his head toward Channing, but he was sure it wasn’t pleasant. Ritter slid down the steep embankment, his feet breaking against the body.
There was no rotten-milk smell of death to the body, and the flesh looked firm. Ritter, wearing only his light combat gloves, reached under the body’s armpits and gave it an experimental pull. The entire body was stiff as a board. Its legs were frozen as they dangled in the water, forming it into an L-shape.
“With this amount of rigor mortis, I think he’s been dead for ten to twelve hours,” Ritte
r said as he grabbed handfuls of the body’s shirt and dragged it up onto the road. Ritter twisted the body to lay it on its side; he needed to either do that or leave it propped up on its head and feet in the most horrific yoga pose imaginable.
The man was in his early twenties. A few prodding boot taps to the pockets yielded no identification. The bare flesh of his chest and back bore oblong bruises but no obvious cause of death.
“Ever seen him before?” Ritter asked. Shelton shook his head.
Ritter pulled a digital camera from his shoulder pocket and knelt beside the body. Black hair matted the face like branches from a bare tree. Ritter moved the hair away with the tip of a pen but stopped when he uncovered the body’s temple.
“Hmm, that’s funny,” Ritter said. He brushed hair aside, unveiling a hole that was the diameter, if not a bit wider, than his pen. A mélange of black-and-gray matter curdled just below the lip of the hole. He rotated the body to check the other temple.
“Spill it, smart guy,” Shelton said.
“They killed him with a power drill, which is really odd given the area. Do you have any Shi’a around here?” Ritter asked.
“Shi’a? No. They’re all southeast of here in Yousifiya and Mahmudiyah. And you’re crazy—that’s a bullet hole,” Shelton answered.
“A bullet that caliber would have gone straight through his skull. We see the drill kills in Baghdad, Sunni on Shi’a sectarian violence—that kind of thing. Extrajudicial killings like this are territorial. Drop the kill where you don’t want the other sect to live.” Ritter snapped a photo of the corpse’s face, then the bound hands.
“Just call it a murder, Ritter. We keep it simple out here,” Shelton said. “Extrajudicial killings” was a new buzz phrase from the Iraq war; it played the news wires better than “murder” or “ethnic cleansing.”
“Sir, look who just showed up.” Channing pointed at their perimeter, where Sheikh Majid spoke to Lieutenant Kovalenko through Ali; Majid’s hands and arms gesticulated toward the body. Abu Ahmet stood a few feet behind them, peeking around Kovalenko.