Spirit Mission

by Ted Russ

  Chinook 458 stopped rising.

  “Rigging looks good. Keep her coming, sir.”

  Pete pulled power. Her systems hummed faster as her engines produced more torque to drive the rotor blades, which were increasing their pitch to bite more air to create more lift to get us and the pickup truck flying. It’s disconcerting to pull power in an aircraft like a Chinook and not gain altitude.

  “Load getting light.”

  Pete pulled in more power.

  “Load is off the ground. Bring her up five more. Good. Load at ten feet.”

  She bounced as she hovered. I read the torque. “We’re at ninety percent torque. All indications normal.” She wasn’t at her limit, but she was burdened now. A low-frequency vertical bounce ran through the aircraft, as if she was feeling out the pickup truck the way a weight lifter adjusts their grip on the bar.

  “Load is ready to fly.”

  “So is 458. Hover check complete.”

  “Roger that. Let’s go.”

  We began to move forward. She shuddered and vibrated as she accelerated through twenty knots and passed through effective translational lift. ETL is the point where a helicopter outflies its own rotor-tip vortices. The swirling air at the edge of the rotor disk reduces lift. It’s a negative factor in hovering flight, but at about twenty knots the aircraft outruns those wingtip vortices and starts to fly through clean air. Once through the transition, 458 started to climb out over the desert without Pete adding any more power.

  At a hundred feet of altitude, Pete nosed her over to increase our acceleration.

  “How does the load look?” he asked.

  “Load’s flying well. Steady with no oscillations.”

  A pickup truck is dense. It wouldn’t be a problem in flight. More dangerous are the light, aerodynamic loads. They do some weird things as the aircraft gets going.

  “Okay. I’m going to bump up to one hundred and twenty knots.”

  Our Chinook settled into the flight, and I checked the navigation computer. It was about fifty minutes to the LZ. I looked east. No moon yet, but it would be up soon.

  Zack patted me on the shoulder and headed aft. “Just like old times, Sam. Grab your balls and jump.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  AUGUST 1989

  “So, you jumped out of airplanes, went to Europe for two weeks, and spent six weeks bossing around recruits doing army training. I mean, really, who had a cooler summer than you, cadet?”

  Stephanie leaned back in her chair and took another sip of wine, enjoying the warm and breezy night. Her housemates were gone for the weekend, and we were enjoying a last night together before I reported back to West Point. Europe had been great. My second rotation to Fort Benning, as a drill cadet, had been hot and boring. Grudgingly, I’d learned how well-oiled a machine West Point was. Infantry basic covered half the training in twice the time as Beast Barracks. Stephanie had consumed my thoughts through it all.

  “It was all right.”

  “It was all right?” She narrowed her eyes. “What’s wrong, Sam?”

  “Nothing. Just tired.”

  She got up from her chair, poured herself more wine, and walked over. “Relax. Your body language is killing me.” She leaned over and gently ran her hands through my short hair. She moved them softly down my neck and then rubbed my shoulders. With a tolerant, slight smile on her face, she stroked my arms, and I suddenly realized they were crossed tightly in front of my chest. She grabbed each hand and tugged my arms apart, and I couldn’t help but smile as I noticed that my legs were also tightly crossed. She caught me smiling and cooed, “There you go.” She nudged my knees apart. “It’s like I’m uncoiling a loaded spring.” She settled herself into my lap and nuzzled her head into my neck. I put my arms around her and squeezed softly.

  “What’s wrong, cadet?”

  “I missed you, and I know I’m going to miss you more this coming school year. I’ll realistically see you, what? A handful of times?”

  “I’m here in your lap, Sam. Why are you focusing on the rest of the school year, which hasn’t started yet?”

  “Don’t you think about it?”

  “Sure I do, but I don’t let it ruin what’s happening right now. You’ve got to relax. I just want us to have a good time together.”

  “That’s what this is? Just a good time?”

  She squeezed me harder. “Stop trying to fight with me.”

  I could feel myself ruining the night. I hesitated.

  “Sam, you chose the military. You chose West Point. I didn’t. Don’t start resenting me just because I made a different choice than you. I really like you. I want to see more of you. I want you in my life. I miss you when you’re gone, but, yes, I’m living a different kind of life right now. You’ve got to stop trying to come up with a map or tactic to deal with this or you’re going to ruin it.” She kissed my neck gently.

  The next day, I returned to West Point.

  * * *

  When we reassembled for the start of the academic year, E4 was happy to learn that the barracks renovations had been completed. We moved back into our beloved Lost Fifties.

  “Lord, it’s good to be home,” said Zack, my roommate for the semester. “I hate those long-ass hallways of Mac Long Wing. Absolutely no privacy. Feels like a prison. The Lost Fifties is more, I don’t know. Intimate.”

  “Yeah. Intimate. Exactly how I would describe the barracks at West Point,” I mumbled.

  Zack and I alternated between hazing the new plebes and sharing our stories from the summer with our classmates. Cow summer had been our first extended time away from West Point out in the “real army.” It gave us our first meaningful interactions with ROTC cadets, Officer Candidate School graduates, and all kinds of soldiers. As we digested our experiences together, a common realization percolated through our class: West Point is the longest and most grueling route to get into the U.S. Army. OCS, ROTC, enlisted. These routes are unlike what we were going through. Basic training is only eight weeks long. OCS is only twelve. We were astounded to learn how thoroughly our ROTC contemporaries were enjoying real college experiences during the year, then mimicking what we did for a few weeks during the summers. A joke. One that we envied terribly. But a joke.

  No one came close to the four-year, highly regimented, minimum-security-prison insanity that we had ignorantly signed up for and continued to subject ourselves to daily. Combine this with our other major summer learning—that being a West Point cadet pretty much earned one only ridicule out in the real army—and we felt truly stupid.

  We realized that the joke was on us. It wasn’t that our route was better than ROTC or OCS commissioning tracks; it was that our route sucked so much more. It was ridiculous. Worse than a joke, we were the butt of an inane comic opera. One that had so warped us that the realization actually made us proud. We had chosen the hardest path, one that everyone else thought was ridiculous, and it conferred zero advantage. None. It was actually a handicap in some ways. One that painted West Point commissioned butter-bar lieutenants arriving at their first units with a centuries-old cliché: that they are unique cocktails of arrogance, idiocy, and ambition. And still, we were proud. Probably more proud than we had been up to this point, and more determined than ever to see it through. Together.

  Most of us would not have come to West Point had we known what it was really like, but the academy had us now. And in those moments when it got to us, when we weakened and considered leaving, it was because of our friends that we stayed. We had been through too much together. We couldn’t leave each other. We would not quit each other. Period. “Fine,” we said. “We’re going to finish it anyway. And fuck you, too.” For the rest of our lives, we would remember how much stupid shit we put up with together. We finished what we started. Outsiders would never understand. We finally were members of the long gray line.

  And the long gray line resists change. We respect the old ways. Much of what we regard as ridiculous we maintain because it is rooted in centurie
s of continuity that has served the country well. The craziness has worked for more than two hundred years. We are scared to fuck with it. So when we arrived back at West Point to find that, for the first time in history, a female had ascended to the highest-ranking position in the Corps of Cadets, a shock ran through the long gray line from end to end. There was a female cadet first captain, and it didn’t go over well.

  * * *

  Females had entered West Point almost fifteen years earlier, so for my friends and me it was a nonissue. We may not have always liked it, but we could not imagine the place without them. It just seemed logical. As Creighton said to guys who complained, “There are women in the army, gentlemen. You might as well make peace with it here.”

  The peace was not always easy, though. The implementation of separate physical standards created friction and unfavorable comparisons. During summer training, the differences could be stark. Female cadets usually couldn’t march as far as fast with as much weight. It was always noticed.

  Then there was the inevitable social status conferred on the female cadets due to their fewer numbers. They made up only about 15 percent of the Corps. No matter how homely, in the cadet area they got a lot of attention from some of their lonely male classmates. This created even more friction, both from spurned suitors and from those who resented the attention and the perceived attitude female cadets acquired as a result of their scarcity.

  There were some good ones, though, and, when they were good, they were twice as good as we were. We realized over time that they had it harder than we did, that the females sacrificed more to be cadets than we did. In addition to all the things male cadets sacrifice, women give up more of their identity. However co-ed West Point tries to be, men dominate. Always will. So it took something special to be considered good: an Athena in cadet gray.

  An additional burden for Emily and the other women was the constant unwanted high-level attention they received. At least once a semester they were pulled aside to participate in a congressional study of females in the military or an academic panel on women in leadership positions or some other high-visibility talkfest. These august panels usually served only to further isolate the women. Emily hated them. “I wish people would just let me get on with being a cadet,” she griped to me.

  Sometimes it got worse than congressional committees. I was secretly ashamed and humbled when Emily told me about some of the hazing she’d been subjected to as a plebe. Isolated, spit on, and physically intimated, she’d faced worse than I ever had, and she had never complained or turned in the perpetrators.

  But the appointment of a female first captain changed the issue from one that each cadet faced to one that the Corps as a whole faced. My friends and I were bombarded by the protests of old grads and old-fashioned cadets. “The first captain is the Corps’ symbol. Our representative,” they protested. “The first captain is supposed to be the toughest, strongest, smartest, most squared-away cadet in the whole Corps. Now, for us, that is a damn female! Do you realize that the Citadel and VMI don’t even admit women?” They were inconsolable.

  On our other flank, we faced the unyielding certainty of our leadership that it was time.

  The whole thing was a hassle. “Let’s just get on with being cadets,” Emily said.

  * * *

  Later, at dinner formation, I looked over the new plebes in the company. They were miserable. The blacktop of North Area radiated the heat it had stored all day from the mid-August sun. The plebes had sweat through their shirts and pants. Disgusting.

  Mike Morris paced in front of his three plebes as he interrogated them. All three of them popped off with plebe knowledge as Mike nodded.

  I picked a plebe in my platoon at random. “Mitchell. Start ‘The Days’!” I said sternly.

  “Sir. ‘The Days.’ Today is Sunday, twenty August 1989. There are five and a butt days until Ring Weekend for the class of 1990. There are thirty-four and a butt days until Army defeats Wake Forest at Michie Stadium in football. There are one hundred and eleven and a butt days until Army beats the hell out of Navy at the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey. There are one hundred and twenty-one and a butt days until Christmas leave for the United States Corps of Cadets. There are one hundred and eighty-four and a butt days until One Hundredth Night for the class of 1990. There are two hundred and ten and a butt days until spring break for the upper three classes. There are two hundred and eighty-one and a butt days until graduation and graduation leave for the class of 1990, sir!”

  “And how about the class of eighty-nine-point-five, beanhead?” said a familiar voice approaching behind me.

  “I heard you were back.”

  “Indeed, Avery. I am back,” said the Guru with his customary flourish. His face was tan, and his curls were pressing the limits of regulations again. It made me smile.

  “I couldn’t believe it when I heard you were allowed to return to E4.”

  “Yes, well, with Eifer gone the enmity toward me among the tactical department has mellowed. In fact, I believe some of them appreciate my sense of style. Excuse me a moment, my friend.” He winked at me as he stepped by and in front of the plebes. He made a show out of bending down to read Mitchell’s name tag and then stepped back around to me and said in too loud a voice, “Cadet Avery, do these newly minted plebes belong to you?”

  “Yes, they do.”

  “Do you mind doing me a favor?”

  “Of course.”

  “Would you please tell them that at the first formation of the day, I would like to be greeted with a shortened version of ‘The Days.’”

  “Sounds reasonable. Preferred format?”

  “I think something along the lines of ‘Sir, “The Days.” Today is whatever the date is, there are however many and a butt days until graduation for Cadet Stillmont, third-generation United States Military Academy cadet, survivor of Captain Eifer, and future armor officer.”

  “I like it. You guys get that?”

  “Yes, sir!” they said in unison.

  “Good. Starting tomorrow, the first plebe in the squad to see Cadet Stillmont will pop off with it. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Thanks, Avery. It’s the little things, you know.”

  “No problem. It’s good to see you.”

  “Good to be back. Gonna do my time, graduate, and head on down the road to Knox.”

  “Well, I hope the time didn’t mellow you, Guru. Wouldn’t be fair to the new plebes or to those of us who have come to depend on you so much.”

  “I hope you’ll find me to be a more circumspect Guru. I can’t weather another slug. But don’t fret,” he said. “I still have work for you.”

  TWENTY-FIVE

  0104 HOURS, 2 AUGUST 2015

  “Ten minutes to the LZ, Zack.”

  “Roger. Ten minutes.”

  We flew the next minutes in silence. The angry radio call from Brick earlier demanding that we return to base had been an unneeded reminder of what we faced if we made it back. It was good to have actual mission demands push him out of my mind. I could picture the activity in back. Hurried, but not frantic: Zack and Turtle and his six commandos concluding final checks on their equipment and one another, Crawford hanging halfway out of the hellhole monitoring the load, Thomas and Wilson checking their weapons, ensuring that the ammunition belts were properly fed. Miniguns had a frustrating tendency to jam, so you could never check them enough. In just a few minutes, hundreds of essential items would be swiftly and silently checked off by the operators and aircrew.

  The operators would be anxious to get off the Chinook. I understood this well, having been attached to several ground units over the past few years as a liaison officer. I loved to fly them, but Chinooks are not a fun way to be delivered to an objective. There is no visibility. The small portal windows in back are worthless, and the ramp is typically shut to keep the ever-present desert sand to a minimum. It feels like wallowing in the back of a submarine. Landi
ng on the objective, you feel like Jonah spit from the whale, rather than a soldier assaulting from the sky. Most operators would rather be sitting on the side of a Little Bird, which is ridiculous because you are totally exposed, but at least you can see what’s coming and shoot back.

  “LZ in sight,” said Pete.

  “Roger. I’ve got it, too. Three minutes,” I announced.

  “Roger. Three minutes,” responded Zack. He would pass the time to everyone on his team.

  “Why don’t you take this landing, Pete? I haven’t done a dusty-goggle landing in a while.”

  “Come on, sir. It’s like riding a bike.”

  “I’ve spent too much time drawing lines and circles on maps in the TOC. I’m not even sure I can ride a bike. We need to nail this one. You take it.”

  “Suit yourself. I have the controls.”

  “You’ve got the controls.”

  “I’ve got ’em.”

  Pete took the controls and started a deceleration, lifting our nose up slightly as he lowered the collective. Airspeed began to bleed off. Having a sling load meant we couldn’t execute an aggressive assault-landing profile to minimize our time and vulnerability on the approach. We would have come to a hover above the LZ and slowly lower the pickup truck to the ground. Not the optimal tactic when you’re trying to get in and out of an area undetected.

  Just as important, Pete and I had to be sure we didn’t break the team’s vehicle when we put it down.

  The Chinook shuddered as we continued to decelerate, and the load began to swing slightly.

  “Load height twenty-five feet. Oscillating five feet fore and aft,” said Crawford from the hellhole.

  “Power at seventy percent,” I announced. As the Chinook lost the aerodynamic benefits of forward flight, it had to work harder to fly. The imagery on our displays showed 458’s speed and height above the ground as a huge rotor-driven dust cloud enveloped us. Like all large beasts of burden, 458 was not happy about being worked this hard. She let us know, bucking and shuddering more obnoxiously as she decelerated below ETL. “Power at ninety-one percent.” Shedding the last couple of knots of airspeed, she transitioned to a laborious hover. With a sling load, it was easy to overtorque during this phase of the flight.