by Leigh Kimmel
Lieutenant Mathsden, who wasn't actually on the board but represented the absent Lieutenant Paulson, initially froze at the battalion commander's statement. As the LTC looked back down at his notes, CPT Grundvig turned slightly and caught the eye of the Second Lieutenant. The two very carefully looked at each other out of the corner of their eyes. A mental shrug was conveyed from the captain to the lieutenant, and the lieutenant's hand, flat on the table, relaxed.
The other captain on the board, CPT Gott, was looking at another piece of paper from the packet that had been prepared, regarding the acts, actions, coursework and service record of the lieutenant. "Sir, did you see this? It's the class Order of Merit list." CPT Gott was from another battalion, and as such was pretty much safe from the board president's extracurricular activities.
"What about it?" asked the LTC, clearly not interested, already writing up the board's final recommendation for the disposition of the failed student, not bothering to have asked a priori for said recommendation.
The captain frowned at the colonel's attitude as he looked back down to verify that he held what he needed. The paper in question was the rankings of the students from the course, based on test scores, evaluations and ratings from instructors, commanders and peers. Gott looked up at CPT Grundvig. "Are these the final rankings?"
"I believe so ... " Grundvig brought up the paper from his own packet and looked at the date. "Yes, yes it is," he said, before re-filing it into the packet before him. The residual frustration at the colonel's attitude kept him from saying more.
"Thanks, Red." Gott turned back to the colonel. "Sir, Paulson was ranked as lowest but five in the class of 125."
"Your point, Captain Gott?" the colonel asked, still not bothering to look up.
CPT Gott gamely continued, trying to break through the battalion commander's air of indifference. "Sir, two students were failed by the evaluators after the TDW. Those two are ranked 124 and 125. Two other students were passed by their evaluators, but still are ranked below Paulson who'd only a DNC. How can that be?" It was clear what CPT Gott saw, that had Paulson completed the course, he probably would have placed in the top percentile of the Order of Merit List, placing him as one of the top two or three students on the course.
"Who the fuck cares, Gott? The "artsy" lieutenant couldn't put up with a little weather. They should have failed his ass outright, not given him the 'did not complete'." The colonel's voice dripped scorn. "This man's Army will be happy to be quit of the little fuck." The colonel dismissed the captain's question with a flick of his head, and looked around the table again. "Anything else? Good. We yank his commission. The piece of shit second lieutenant, for however so much longer, is obviously not Army Officer material. Comments?"
The other board members looked around the table, but nobody bothered to speak up.
* * *
Six months and several AOBC cycles later, and beer bottles clinked and music played low as a group of soldiers toasted yet another one. In one corner of the room stood a much smaller group, congratulating Captain (Promotable) Grundvig on his new orders, assigning him to a line battalion in the 8th Infantry, while at the same time commiserating with him that it was an Infantry division and not an Armor one that he had to report to.
This had been going on for some time when another soldier wandered up. The group of officers nodded in greeting as the newcomer verified that he knew everyone standing there. "Gentleman," First Sergeant Timpton said, greeting the group of officers, before turning to the outgoing captain. He nodded a greeting to the man personally, and then, without preamble, said "So, what really happened, Sir?" The first sergeant did not supply any context to the question, however it was obvious that the captain would understand it anyway.
Captain Grundvig didn't say anything for the first couple of moments, as he looked the first sergeant over. Finally, he nodded, saying "You remember he was medevac'd from the TDW?"
"Yeah, I had to fill out the paperwork on that, so even after the whole thing was suppressed I still knew about at least part of it. He was in the gunner's seat when the M1's driver fell asleep and dropped the vehicle into a tank ditch at speed. Paulson took a nasty knock against the gun-sights and was a bit hazy for awhile, then passed out. He was still hazy when he came to. Plus other classic symptoms of a complex concussion, which is why they dusted him off."
Grundvig nodded. "That's right. Then the doctor in the emergency room returned him to duty, and sent him back out to the field."
There was a pause. "So what am I missing?" asked the first sergeant, but before the captain could answer, the way that the captain had said it gave him the necessary clue. Timpton blinked. "What? Immediately? Just like that?"
"Yep. The doctor, a civilian contractor, x-rayed his neck to make sure it wasn't broken, then shipped him back out to the woods. He said that there was no visible external bruising, so he assumed Paulson was making it up."
The first sergeant frowned. "Bullshit. Gun-sights are mostly padding, and I assume he was wearing his CVC helmet. It isn't outside the realms of possibility that there would be no bruising if the CVC took the impact. Happens to football players all the time." Timpton's expression darkened. "And then they pull him off the course and send him home?"
The captain shrugged off the non-com's question. "After about 24 hours, after Lieutenant Paulson had had a chance to think about it, he walked over to the chief evaluator and pulled himself off the course. He said afterwards that if the Army couldn't guarantee someone reasonable medical care in a time of peace, how could he assume that he'd get it during a time of war?"
After a lengthy pause while everyone tasted their beers to make sure they were still cold, the first sergeant said, finally, "and so they showed him the gate."
The captain nodded. "And so, as you say, they showed him the gate."
"If that's the whole story, Sir, that's fucked."
The captain shrugged again. "Maybe so. I doubt that was all of it, but the only one who knows for sure is Lieutenant Paulson."
"Mister Paulson," said one of the other officers, one who obviously knew the much of the story.
CPT Grundvig took the correction in good grace. And he grinned. By way of response, he asked "You want to hear something funny?" This was greeted by cocked heads and inquisitive looks, so the captain said, "We get all the paperwork together to yank his commission, and we send it away to the personnel department at Fort Ben in Indiana. The colonel thinks he's done his duty to the Army and his command, and life goes on. Then about a month ago, we get the packet back, saying that Paulson isn't a Two, he's a One LT. He'd actually been promoted to First Lieutenant several months before the course even started because of time-in-grade."
This caused some confusion in the group, as they tried to figure out how that could have happened.
The captain nodded, then continued. "Because he was an echo, he--"
"An echo?" interrupted one of the blackbird lieutenants in the group. The blackbirds had completed the AOBC course, but were still assigned to the training unit while awaiting their first duty stations.
Grundvig looked calmly at the lieutenant for a moment, until the light bulb burst.
"Sorry for interrupting, Sir," said the embarrassed lieutenant.
Grundvig nodded. "An 'echo' is an officer who's a pay grade of 01e, 02e or 03e, and that means the officer spent at least four years enlisted. Paulson had made Sergeant before leaving to go to college." The captain paused until the lieutenant nodded his understanding. "So, as ex-enlisted, he only needed to take the two year ROTC course and then received his commission, then had to finish his degree, which took another two-and-a-half years. He couldn't get a slot on the course for another nine months, putting him over the three year time in grade requirement. No one bothered to tell him that he'd been promoted, and when he asked about it, was told that the regs would not let him be promoted until after he'd completed an OBC, so no one bothered checking."
"I know about that reg," said one of the o
ther company commanders. "So why was he promoted before the course, then?"
"It's a new regulation. He'd been promoted before that rule came into effect."
"Oh."
"And so we have to redo the entire packet. Which means tracking down everyone who had to sign off on it, including Lieutenant Paulson."
"And that's funny?"
Grundvig laughed. "Oh yeah. We're still trying to track him down. His family says he's traveling across Europe with his girlfriend, and they'd leave a message for him at a couple of postal drops they're using, and would let him know should he call. Better: Lieutenant Colonel Feckette is about to get dinged on his OER by Colonel Ramsey, 'cause the fact that Paulson was a first lieutenant and not a second should have been noted by his command even before the course started. And best: when we finally find the peckerhead, he's going to get a paycheck covering the earnings difference between what an O1-echo and an O2-echo would have made during the course."
The officers in the group laughed dutifully, while the first sergeant nodded. "Thank you, Sir. One other question, Sir, but I will understand if you choose not to answer it."
The captain regarded the NCO for a moment, then nodded.
"What was Feckette's beef with Paulson, in the first place?"
Grundvig nodded. "Thought you'd spot that, Top. Paulson's degree is a BA, not a BS." At the first sergeant's look of incomprehension, the captain continued, saying "His degree is in French, and not something 'real' like engineering or math."
The NCO shook his head and started to speak, then stopped. Finally, he shrugged. "'Stranger Things' ... Fuckit always did strike me as missing something in the brains department. Fucking managers."
There was a non-verbal gasp from the rest of the group; hearing something disrespectful about the standing battalion commander was not expected. The senior NCO ignored them.
Captain Grundvig looked the first sergeant over. Finally, after the first sergeant failed to apologize for the implied rebuke, the captain said "You seem displeased, Top." The use of the nickname, reserved for company first sergeants, and only as a sign of respect, indicated that the captain might actually agree with the NCOs assessment of the situation.
1st SG Timpton shrugged at the implied question. "Yes, Sir. And also 'No, Sir'. He wouldn't talk to me after he came back in from the TDW, and before he left the base to fly home, and that's what bothers me. And still bothers me, too."
Grundvig frowned. "Why was it important that Paulson talk to you, Top? And what makes you think he would want to, in any case?"
Timpton nodded at the question. "Silver Lions, Sir." The first sergeant came to attention, said "Thank you for the background info, enjoy the party. Good luck in the 8th." With that, he nodded again to the captain, turned and stepped off in a crisp, concise military manner.
The captain blinked at the first sergeant's back, wondering if it was worthwhile to call the man back. Before he did, however, he realized that the first sergeant hadn't actually ignored the question. The answer, cryptic as it was, was apparently all he would get. With a frown and a slight nod, the captain tried to integrate what he knew about the first sergeant, and what the first sergeant had said. The other officers looked around at each other, as the captain finally nodded again, this time noticeably, shrugged and turned his back on First Sergeant Timpton. The answer would come, or it wouldn't. Captain Grundvig was not about to lose any sleep over it.
* * *
In theory, the man under the desk was trying to track down, test, find, diagnose and either repair or replace a damaged ethernet cable. In reality, he was using the majority of the time to look up his wife's skirt. "I see the problem," he said, carefully, loud enough to be heard by his wife. "The elastic on your cat wrappers is worn thin. When's the last time you changed them?" Because the rest of the ladies in the room were all local nationals, whose first language was not English, the probability that they would understand the comment was remote.
Of course, that probability also stood for his wife, whose first language was English English, and who would always be, by her own preference, a bit hazy on American idiom.
"Sorry?" she asked in return, bending over to look under the desk. From where she was sitting, she could see that her husband was not visible to anyone else in the room. He held a sign that read "I can see your panties." As she started to blush, he flipped it over and on the other side it said, "Wanna boink?" Before she could say anything, however, the phone on the desk above her head rang, and she disappeared quickly upwards. The man on the floor taped the flash card to the underside of the desk and resumed looking for the broken cat-5 cable.
"Political Section, Caithness Weaver speaking ... Oh, hi Carol ... My home number? Sure, I could do that, or, I could just hand him the phone 'cause he's currently hiding under my desk and making rude suggestions ... Sure, half a mo'" Kay stuck her head back under the desk. "Oi, Gov. It's for you. It's Carol."
A hand came up from under the desk and made grasping motions. "Carol from the international school, or Carol from the US Embassy?"
"Embassy," came the reply as Kay whacked the palm with the receiver.
"Ouch. And I'm not old. I'm not even, what, 37? That's not old!" The receiver disappeared under the desk, and without breaking stride the conversation changed to "Hi Carol, what's up? Yeah, sure, I'll hold." There was a pause, and then "Hello? Tom Weaver speaking."
There was a lengthy pause, interrupted only by the tall, lanky man crawling out from under the desk. He stood up and leaned against his wife's desk, and ran his free hand through his grey streaked, half-inch long hair, then carefully adjusted the pepperbox hideaway so its holster stopped pinching. Crawling around on the floor had caused it to move out of its normal position. Tom had lived in any number of interesting places over the past decade. He always carried a backup, in case the third world locals got restless or attempted a return to socialism through clumsy attempts at sharing the wealth.
There was a voiced question from the receiver, to which Tom replied "Yeah, that's me. I took my wife's name when we married." There was another lengthy pause, and the man's voice had lost some of its habitual humor when next he spoke. "Yeah, that sounds like it could be me. Do you have an SSN, last four are 3-8-2-6 ... Yep. Ok, that's me all right."
Tom's gaze went to a 'thousand-mile-stare', and he began biting his lower lip, not seeing or just plain ignoring his wife's quizzical look. "Right now? I'm doing some IT work at the Delegation ... um, the European Commission ... Sure. I'll let the doorman know you're coming ... Sure, until then, then. Good bye." Tom looked at his wife, and then handed her the phone. "That was the embassy."
While that was obvious, Kay realized that something was up so didn't point out the stupidity of what he had just said. "And ... ?" she prompted, putting her hand on his arm.
"Somebody from the military liaison detachment is on his way over. Said something about having received a telegram from Indiana for Tomas Paulson, and they tracked me down through State Department records. All those times that I'd registered with the embassy whenever the commission shuffled us off to another third world country."
"Who do you know in Indiana? And why the military liaison?"
"It's from the US Army personnel department, Fort Benjamin Harrison."
"The Army? Why for you? I mean, it's been almost ten years now."
Tom grinned wryly, the initial effects of the phone conversation beginning to wear off. "Well, if I'd stayed in, I'd have, what, over nineteen years service and be looking at retirement, so I'm not that old." Tom then shook his head like a horse trying to get rid of a fly. "Nah, no idea."
Kay looked up at the ceiling, thinking back. "You know," she said, finally, "you never did receive a copy of the final disposition of your status. For all we know, y'are still in. Maybe you are being retired. Think they'll send you a check?"
Tom snorted. "Don't even joke about that."
The ghost of a haunted look, however, couldn't be hidden from his wife. Because she kn
ew it would be there and was watching for it. Tom pushed himself away from the desk, looking away from the woman he'd married eight years previously. "Gotta go warn Igor--".
"'What hump'" interjected Kay.
"--yes haha. What hump," Tom finished, rolling his eyes for effect. Over his shoulder he said "Hell, maybe this telegram is the final disposition that we've been ignoring for the past decade. Maybe they are just writing to say that they finally got my DD form 214 unscrewed."
Kay snorted, and to her husband's back said "After nine years? Now why would that not surprise me?"
Tom stopped as he passed through the doorway, turned and leaned briefly against the door frame. "Because you work for a governmental organization, and you have a firm, grounded knowledge of what 'bureaucrazy' means?"
There was a short pause, and then the pair said "Nah!" simultaneously.
* * *
Tom looked up from the telegram, trying to figure out what his reaction was supposed to be. It was hard. Nine years ago, he had stepped out of the world that had been his since his eighteenth birthday, at the low point of what had started out to be a decent career. He'd started out as an enlisted armor crewman, serving in M60A3 tanks at Ft. Stewart, Georgia with the 24th Infantry Division (Mechanized), then later with the 8th ID(M) in Germany, achieving the rank of Sergeant. From there, he'd moved on to University and received a commission, again in branch Armor, spending the three years between the date of commission and heading off to AOBC working in the reserves with the 91st Division (Training) in California as a Company Executive Officer. His degree wasn't in his first choice, Math, it was in French because he was running out of money and he finished the requirements for French before finishing the Math. The Army itself didn't care, they just wanted to see a degree. That wasn't true for everyone in the Army, but hey, dice fall where they may.