“At four in the morning, Corporal O’Dwyer?”
“Come again?” Jinny buckled in and adjusted her headset. “What was that, Sir?“
“The grin, sniper lady, what’s with the grin?” he yelled.
“Getting beat up by rotor wash is like facing a Kansas blizzard in the middle of the day. Feels like home, Sir.”
“Roger that. We are down three. Who are we waiting for?”
“At my six, Sir—Laughlin, Keats, and Devereaux.” Jinny low-fived Huck, the last to board, and then proffered a thumbs-up to the lieutenant. “Delta team all present and accounted for, Sir.”
“Okay, Ollie, we’re all here, let’s fly.”
“Roger that. I have the controls. Renegade 1-1 lifting off.” Warrant officer Bernie Oliver glanced at his second in command for verbal confirmation, then throttled up, and teased back the collector. The Apache lifted American treasure into the pre-dawn as gracefully as a weather balloon freed of its tether, and the door rolled shut. Everybody grabbed strap and settled back for the ride.
Both the weather and conversation deteriorated within the hour. The sortie was scrapped, and the bird returned to nest at the base, but Jinny had hatched a better attitude. Her soul–both body and spirit–had buckled in for the long haul, determined to see the job “through new eyes,” as her mother had encouraged. The transformation hadn’t been easy. Every sortie, real or imagined, rented space under the corporal’s skin until a vacancy occurred permitting it permanent housing in her memory bank. Some deposits were dicey, others horrific; some days she felt like she was drowning, even while hunkered down eighty-five hundred feet above sea level. But after achieving a mission objective, she seemed to catch a wave of hope and ride its crest to a safe harbor—a helipad at the center of Eagle Camp. And every time she touched down she thanked God above for safe passage. Every time.
It was true that from the Ferris Wheel in Kabul Jinny still couldn’t see Kansas, even on her best days, and so she chose to focus on her band of brothers, for whom she’d sacrifice, even her life, to protect. Thank heavens for gentle Huck, always willing to listen. He’d reassured her that nothing worthwhile—like, for example, staying alive—ever came easy. Jinny knew Huck relied on her like a brother does on his older sister, but she never forgot that she and Huck, like Conor, bore an invisible expiration date, probably inked on the backs of their necks.
“I can’t believe my eyes. Mama Mia! Manna from Kansas.” A crumpled blue envelope addressed to CPL Virginia O’Dwyer, APO 9320, Battle Company 1-32, Infantry, Kabul, greeted her umpteenth visit to the post office. Telephone conversations with family were rare, and while satellite transmissions collapsed the distance between Kabul and Kansas, letters trumped phone calls. Even homogenized letters could be gulped down again and again and never spoil. The torn envelope, taped at one corner, looked like it had been run over by a tractor; or perhaps the mark had been left by the turtle who shuttled mail to the base. Water had softened, even blurred the sender’s inked handwriting, but its recipient could hardly wait to taste its tender tidings. Jinny pressed the welcome salutation to her lips, pocketed it near her heart, and reported for duty.
“Has my team boarded yet, Lieutenant?”
“We’ve got mission critical problems to solve, Corporal, so standby. Ollie hopes they’ll get us in the air by 1100.”
“Two hours?” Jinny was elated but tried not to show it. Not wanting to draw attention to herself, she quick-stepped two hundred yards in the direction of the north gate, looking for a familiar prompt—a red flag extending from its outrigger above a fire-hose and pump on the left side of the wide corridor. Jinny made an abrupt left turn, disappeared from view, and broke into a dead run for thirty yards. She pulled up, put her hands on her hips, caught a breath, and looked up at the stenciled AF3226. “Home at last.”
Numbered rows of twenty-five-foot long, double-stacked corrugated steel containers—resembling boxcars minus the wheels—lined the west side of the base for a hundred yards, north to south. Jinny had slipped between two stacks into what she affectionately called Thrush Hollow–just a narrow gap wide enough to permit passage. The ground was puddled, and so she steadied her buttocks on the bottom rung of the steel ladder, welded to the west corner of the double-decker. She sliced open the envelope with a Gerber-LMF knife, leaving its contents uncut by the army, but always homogenized by Gemma, who kept much to herself. “Dear Jinny, . . . “
Quietude collapsed. Short spurts of automatic rifle fire—probably fourteen rounds in all—erupted in the north-south facing corridor thirty yards away. Jinny pocketed the letter under the Kevlar flak jacket shielding her torso and listened. Except for her own heartbeat, all she could hear was someone running flat out. As the studded footfalls drew nearer, she pulled her HK-VP 9 mm, racked a live round into the chamber, released the safety, and pressed her lean body against the cold steel container.
A whistle blew. “I’ve got two men down! Two men down! Medic! Medic to quadrant D-3,” plead a plaintive soldier. “The shooter’s Afghan military, armed with an AK-47. He’s running toward the north gate. Shoot to kill.” Jinny knew she had to move—up and now. She holstered her weapon, grabbed and scampered up contiguous welded ladder rungs to the top of the double stack. Another shot rang out.
Jinny frog-walked the width of the damp, rusty container but was still too far from the broad corridor to see anyone approaching from the south. Eight feet separated her from the next double stack. She stepped back a few paces, took a running leap, and landed like a cat. After repeating the leap three times, she dropped to her belly and propelled herself forward with her elbows and knees until the north gate caught her eye in the distance. Then she saw him on the far side of the corridor—a wild-eyed, Afghani soldier—his weapon in hand as he zig-zagged among stacked pallets of fifty-gallon plastic drums across the way. Jinny brought her semi-automatic into the prone firing position.
The bogey, ducking and running, occasionally poked his head up and paused to listen. Otherwise, all Jinny could see was the barrel of a rifle making right and left turns. It reminded her of a frightened pheasant running between rows of growing stalks of wheat.
Soldiers warily approached from the south, heard but not yet within sight of either the runner or Jinny. She estimated the distance between her and the lone gunman—still hidden from view—at 50 yards. Too far away for a nine mm round to bring him down.
Outside to the north, four Hummers raced down Butterfly Boulevard, crushed gravel, and swung to a stop broadside of Gate B, ready to confront the threat. A fifth jeep, carrying a mounted fifty caliber machine gun on its back, slid sideways, lost traction, and dismembered the gate. The MP standing nearby jumped up and down; engines shut off, and troops piled out to take up defensive positions. A similar, though not identical scene played out at Gates A, C, D. Meanwhile, a lone CH-47F Chinook tandem rotor helicopter bit chunks out of the sky and lifted from the ground to one thousand feet, hovered, and then slowly paced back and forth, it’s manned, pintle-mounted fifty-caliber machine guns—both port and starboard—locked and loaded.
Just how many bogies are we dealing with? Jinny wondered after the chopper was airborne. All I can see is you, mister, and you need a personality adjustment. No wind to correct for, but you’re a small target from fifty yards with a handgun, especially a pea-shooter like this. If I miss or call out your position, you’ll spot me, and I’m toast. If I don’t take you out, innocents may die. Decision time, O’Dwyer. Time to choose. Right time, right place. She eyed the large label on the stacked barrels behind her hidden adversary. The man’s rifle came up; then his head appeared like a target popping up at a carnival shooting gallery.
“Perfect.”
Jinny’s breathing shallowed; her heart rate slowed. Still in the prone position, she extended both arms forward, gripped her weapon, urged a finger through the trigger guard, took aim, and rapidly pumped seven rounds into a container of cooking oil. A quart-bottle-sized-hole released the chemicals which glug-glugged on the Afghani soldier. He shrieked, not knowing what gooey potion was oiling both his weapon and his resolve. The squad sweeping the area saw Jinny, then the target. Jinny immediately drew fire from one frightened, trigger-happy grunt, who persuaded her to flatten like a slice of cheese—but not yet Swiss cheese. The squad leader yelled, “Mouse, she’s on our side!”
Jinny climbed down and watched the slick-skinned Afghani emerge from the dousing, saturated with Saffola Oil , hands on his head, and a bewildered look on his face. Surrounded by the squad of soldiers, he was hastily thrown to the ground, zip-tied, and led away for roasting. Ruffled but not rattled, Jinny had drawn friendly fire from the safest place in Northern Afghanistan. A tap came to her shoulder.
“ I see you terminated the life of one fifty-gallon drum of cooking oil today. Sorry you had to stand here and watch it bleed out. Good shooting, Annie Oakley.
“Thanks, Sergeant Broshinsky.”
“Got any new holes in your BDU, Corporal?”
“No Sergeant, I’ve been checked out and am good to go. Has the chopper been repaired?”
“No, and that’s the good news. The bad news is, Corporal, well, you know the drill, clean up this mess and get to mission brief at 1530. We’re going sightseeing tomorrow.”
“Any word on the injured men, Sergeant?”
“The word’s ‘alive,’ but I hear they’re both going to make it, at least parts of them. Long recovery ahead. They’re both kids like you, dammit. Well, not like you, Annie.” The sergeant removed his helmet, scratched his head, and then pulled the helmet back over his large ears like a right tackle anxious to rejoin the huddle. “The boys will fly on to Ramstein for treatment, then home to heal. Their assailant, on the other hand . . . I won’t go there.” He patted Jinny’ arm. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Yes, Sergeant.”
“Okay then, hop to it.” Broshinsky turned to leave. As he walked away he complained to himself, “Heal hell! Part of what they’ve gone through won’t heal, it’ll just scab over; but at least the boys will be home.”
Home. Absent a quiet bedroom, a solitary barn, or a Quail Hollow, Jinny collapsed on her bunk. She retrieved the damaged blue envelope from her pocket as one would a lift a blanket from a newborn’s bassinet. Empty.
“No, no, no.” Flexing fingers pressed deeper into her pocket. “Yes, yes, yes.” She retrieved three treasures, one piece at a time—the letter, a two-verse lullaby written on a small piece of parchment, and a black and white wallet-sized photograph. The photo lacked color, the lullaby lacked accompaniment, and the letter had been homogenized. Gemma had kept her problems to herself, but Jinny sensed all was not well on the western front.
Gemma, two children, Uncle Al, and a few seasonal workers were struggling to ready for spring planting. This Jinny knew. Gemma recounted nothing of the toil–both emotional and physical–required by farm life without Caleb’s steady hands and tempered leadership. Jinny knew this, too. Gemma wrote nothing about her deteriorating relationship with Albert, who barked orders, gnawed on his sister, bared his yellow teeth at niece and nephew, and then skipped town at the worst possible times. But Jinny knew this, too.
Clarence Saperstein, a red headed gentleman farmer-real estate broker over in Abilene had approached Gemma and made an offer on one hundred acres of the O’Dwyer spread. This Jinny had not known. Clarence wanted the half adjoining his property–including the stumps–to the east of the red barn. The offer looked fair to Gemma, the buyer was an honorable man, he could pay cash, and on down the road the sale would help put the kids through college. Gemma thought seriously about giving the deal a handshake, but Albert wouldn’t have it.
Cold darkness enshrouded the camp, but Jinny—her mail pressed close to her heart—fell asleep to the handwritten memory of her Grand-mama Llewellyn singing, A Kansas Lullaby.
“One, now two eyes close to sleep. Not much time for counting sheep. On to dreamland soon you’ll fly. Mama’s here, Pa-Pa’s close by. Mama’s here, Pa-Pa’s close by.
“Dream along dear, soon you’ll see, Kansas grain grown tall and free. Up above’s a moon-lit sky. Mama’s here, Pa-Pa’s close by. Mama’s here, Pa-Pa’s close by.”
When Jinny awoke to darkness, she stowed her memorabilia in a thin waterproof container and dropped it in a boot for the night, unaware of what awaited on dawn’s doorstep.
“Corporal. . . . Jinny O’Dwyer. Wake up. Rise and shine.” Sensory neurons fired, motor neurons sparked, and Jinny landed on all fours—down but up.
“Please, Sergeant, tell me I didn’t sleep through reveille!”
“Roger that, it’s 0330. Major General Brendon Robertson is on the line from Kandahar. Get over to the com building. Hop to it.”
“What? Who you say?”
“Jinny, there’s a Major General on the phone! No time to yawn; and remember,” he whispered, “we lift off at 0700.”
“Okay, thanks Sergeant.” Bufford Broshinsky—the six-foot, well-rounded teetotaler from Tallahassee—zipped his coat and walked away blowing between and rubbing his hands together. Jinny pushed up, sat on the bunk, and quickly pulled fatigues over her woolen socks and pajamas. While planting ten toes in her boots, a thought sprouted in her mind. Robertson, a major general now? Why is he phoning ME in the middle of the night? Please tell me it has nothing to do with the FBI. “I need a shower.” She bowed her head, offered a silent prayer, and snugged a helmet over her ears. Neglected shoe laces whipped at her ankles as she exited the Quonset hut and stepped into a cold, moonless night, expecting to slog her way to the distant communications building in the dark.
A groaning engine signaled the approach of a ride, but it was nothing like the pumpkin-shaped carriage drawn by four dapple-grey stallions Jinny could have easily imagined. Seventy-one horses dodged around the corner sounding like a jeep, looking like a jeep, and complaining like a jeep, its blackout lights barely illuminating the fog. It whined, ground, and sputtered to a stop.
“Prince Charming, I presume?”
A voice grunted, “O’Dwyer?”
“Yes.”
“Climb in.” Jinny doubled her right fist and hopped aboard all in one motion.
“What’s up?” Plainly you’re not type cast as Prince Charming. The soldier behind the wheel ignored the question, shifted into drive, and the engine died. After a few electrical shocks to its system, the Willey-made jeep sparked back to life, but its driver seemed to have none. The ride was so herky-jerky that both Jinny and her chauffeur nodded like congregants attempting to stay awake during a boring sermon. Cigarette smoke made the cold night stuffy. Jinny held her breath for two hundred yards, catching intermittent breaths from the window like a freestyler swimming laps. The jeep stopped abruptly in front of the communications building—the antithesis of a grand palace—and its antsy passenger vaulted to the ground. “Thanks for the lift.” No response. The jeep coughed, stalled, started, and crawled away on all fours.
Wooden stair treads— uninviting, warped and icy—lay between Jinny and the cinder-block communications building, painted the same color as the ground—white. Its narrow, vacant windows reminded her of where she had been interrogated back at Fort Sill. She teased the metal handrail with a finger but pulled away before it stuck to her skin. Flashback: Conor’s tongue frozen to a pole in the schoolyard during recess.
“Oh, Conor.”
A lonely light, shielded from above by a hooded fixture, hung above the door. Jinny looked up at the globe, “Cheer up, at least you’re not being swarmed by mosquitoes tonight.”
The door stuck. Jinny shouldered it open with a heave-ho and knocked PFC Charles Chunkworthy to the floor inside. “Charlie, Charlie, Charlie, I’m sorry.”
“Here, take this Corporal; he can scoop himself up, I suppose. What took you so long?” Seated before what looked like a studio display of TV monitors neatly embedded in the wall, the nearest of two communications specialists brusquely handed Jinny the telephone receiver, caught her eye, and flickered a staid smile. He turned back to business and elbowed his next-door neighbor who had fallen asleep beneath earphones. “Wake up, Ralph, you won’t want to miss this.”
With the phone to her ear, Jinny swung around to offer a hand up to the downed dough-boy, then hesitated. “Hello? Hello, this is Corporal O’Dwyer.”
“I know who you are,” replied the befuddled Bostonian as he batted her hand away, lost his balance, caved, and drew attention from the technicians.
“Woe, Private Chunkworthy, if you want to nap, pull up a chair. Staring at these screens will put you out in minutes; just ask Ralphy.”
Ralph rewarded his co-worker with a high-five and unabashedly oogled Jinny.
Chunkworthy huffed and puffed to a sitting position. Indignant at having been decked, he pried himself off the floor, brushed off his fatigues, picked up his helmet, and stomped out the door flapping his gums, spewing vulgarities, and totally forgetting why he’d been summoned to the communications office.
Jinny plugged her left ear and ignored the seated soldiers. “Corporal O’Dwyer here.”
A strained voice two hundred and eighty-four miles away responded, “Corporal, this is Major General Brendon Robertson calling from Camp Kandahar.” Jinny could hear what sounded like plastic packing bubbles being pinched. “Hang on a second.” He muffled the phone. “Go see what’s going on. . . O’Dwyer, listen up, this will have to be fast.”
“Yes Colonel, did you say, ‘be last’? I mean excuse me, Major General Robertson, congratulations, Sir, and could you speak up?”
“No Corporal, listen up. Your field promotion to staff sergeant is being confirmed to your CO by DOD as we speak. Do you copy?” Jinny hitched herself up on a counter and her boots dropped to the floor. “By my recommendation and because all hell is breaking loose over here, you are, also by order of the DOD, sniper qualified and assigned as designated marksman to Bravo Company. Expect to be upgraded with an M-110 Semi-Automatic Sniper System and assigned a spotter.” Robertson’s tone suggested he was reading from a memorandum, but he wasn’t. “This advancement should have been approved months ago.” The receiver crackled like tinfoil. “Hang on, I’m not done. God bless, soldier. I mean that. You’re the best damned . . . who let you in here? POP. POP. POP. POP. POP. STATIC.” Dead line. No dial tone.
“Excuse me Corpsman, I’ve been cut off. Something’s gone haywire in Kandahar. I thought I heard gunfire. Any idea what’s going on?”
“Corporal, put on your boots, walk to the door, and vamoose,” replied the corpsman coldly as he retrieved and jammed his headphones over his small ears.
Jinny hastily commenced lacing up her boots. “Oops right boot, wrong foot,” she tittered nervously. After righting the wrong, she hustled out the door, letting it slam behind her. Ralph salivated aloud, “Yada, yada, yada. Hey Merkley, why would a major general be phoning a heart-stopping corporal? Do you think he’s sweet on her?”
“Mind your own business. Kandahar’s gone to situation critical. Get Lieutenant Colonel Howard on the line.”
As Jinny dashed toward quarters, her promotion and re-classification jumped out of a warm fax machine at Eagle Camp HQ and landed on top of a small stack of official communiques waiting to be sorted and read. A few were quickly stamped and handed to the acting base commander, Lieutenant Colonel Mack Howard. He had the phone to his ear and had been up all night pacing the floor. He glanced at, initialed, and forwarded notification of Jinny’s rank advancement by runner to her platoon leader, Lieutenant Randy Staley.
Without warning, the Colonel blistered the innocent black telephone receiver with profanity before body-slamming it on the desk. “Our kids need help, big-time. First Herat, now Bagram’s under attack again, Brendon has been shot in the stomach, and I’ve got nobody to send south. When’s DOD going to . . .”
“Sir, my screen says Kandahar’s under attack.”
“I just said that, Tonto. When are you going to grow ears?”
“Should I alert your staff your and inform MTAC?”
“You spend too much time watching TV. You’re in the army, Crazy Horse, not the marines, not the navy. Get command and control on the line and get my team up here like ten minutes ago.”
“Sorry, Sir. Yes, Sir. On it, Sir.”
Lieutenant Colonel Howard thumbed through each remaining faxed page as if he were frantic to find a Playboy centerfold or a change of assignment. He stopped and did a double-take. His eyes saucered. “What in the Sam Hill?” Repulsed by the photo, he barked, “Are you the ugliest creature I have ever seen or what? Billie Joe Quagmeyer: AKA Karim of Kandahar. Did somebody under Robertson’s command write this up and Photoshop this face just for me? IS THIS SOMEBODY’S IDEA OF A JOKE?” he boomed. “This monkey looks like he just won a Bigfoot look-alike contest. Get Major General Robertson on the phone, pronto, Tonto. Savvy?”
Corporal Irvin Stevens, a full-blooded Blackfoot, replied, “But Sir, they’re under siege down there, and Major General Robertson has been wounded and taken to the hospital.”
“Well of course he’s been wounded, don’t you remember I just told you that? Listen up, Chief Little Britches, I’m going to burn down your wigwam if you don’t stop questioning my orders.”
Whatever you say, Kemo sabe. Corporal Stevens stiffened and turned red–well, redder– but maintained a modicum of self-control. The Colonel stared down at him, wadded, and stuffed the bulletin in a wire basket on the floor.
“Now get him on the phone.”
Stevens leaned over, picked up, and quietly unwaded the bulletin. “Sir . . . I already read this. I’m the one who stamped and passed it on to you. It says Quagmeyer is on the loose in our district; it says before coming to Afghanistan he served time in Mississippi; and if I remember right, it states that he’s wanted by the F.B.I. on an arson charge. Yes, see right here.”
“You’ve accounted for everything but the face,” huffed Howard. “Cancel the call. Is my staff on their way up here?”
“Yes, Sir.” But please, I beg you, General Grunt, retreat and close the door before you light your peace-pipe. I was born in Los Angeles.
Colonel Howard slapped Billie Joe’s crumpled photo from his assistant’s hand, squinted, and read aloud as he strode toward his glassed-in office. “So, he and his pal, Jonny Ray Cranston are wanted for what? But how in the blinkity-blank-blank can they be defectors when they were never in the Army? I think Brendon Robertson needs to stop smoking peyote.” He read on. “‘Billie Joe Quagmeyer is wanted by the FBI? He and his gang were captured after killing an MP on his way back from leave in Kandahar.” Howard stopped, turned, wadded, and fired the bulletin from the three-point line, hitting his assistant in the head, and then cursed. “Now, while driving him toward my house they’ve lost him, and DOD wants me find and babysit this hood and his band of merry men until they can be shipped home.” Howard’s self-discipline buckled. “I’ll summarily execute the whole bunch and be done with it, if I have my way.”
“Sir, satellite photos confirmed they are headed our way.”
“Unwrap that photo again, put a thumbtack through each eyeball, find the traitor, send him home, and let him audition for the Walking Dead. What has this man’s army come to anyway? Send my staff in when they get here.”
The six-foot three-inch colonel lit up a cigar, lumbered toward his glassed in office like an overweight giraffe, and clipped his scalp on the door jamb. After slamming the door behind him, he bit his tongue long enough to open the door, retrieve two flattened fingers, close the door, and drop into a chair. His staff arrived in time to hear him curse, see him retrieve a bottle of Jack Daniel’s from a drawer, grab it by the neck, and gulp, gulp, gulp.
“Are you sure you wanted to see us, Sir?”