The platoon has moved
through the dense forest of tall mountain pines. The four squads peel
off to establish a perimeter on a collection of small buildings
One squad was low crawling
through a roadside drainage ditch lined with ice
I'm Specialist Mark
Decker, just shy of making Sargent. My platoon was moving in to
recover some captured US soldiers from a small village in the
mountains near the border of Kosovo and Albania. These four guys were
stationed inside Kosovo and were patrolling along the border of
Albania when they got ambushed. The attackers, ethnic Albanians, had
certainly gotten eager. By attacking the US patrol and capturing the
soldiers this group of Albanian rebels had accomplished three things.
First, they got themselves REALLY noticed by US forces. Second, they
pissed off US forces.
Neither of which are good
ideas. Third, they compromised their position by bringing in a BLUFOR
tracker.
Wolf Pack, on station near
the US Embassy in Kosovo, was easily selected as the rescue team.
Most of the soldiers here were veterans of numerous similar high
speed, low drag missions, but among the newbies was me, Specialist
Mark Decker. Nobody likes being the new guy. Still, I have been given
the responsibility of the other younger new guy, Private Sterling.
My squad was selected to
take the edge of the complex that the road ran next to. There was a
mix of ice and water in the gully. The ice stabbed into my hands and
knees as I crawled. The water made my hands and feet ache with biting
numbness. Flexing my hands to fight back the accompanying stiffness
had a marginal effect. Where we were, my squad was the most
vulnerable. There was no cover here.
If someone was to walk along
the access road we'd be dead meat.
Maybe I was still too new to
this game, but I always felt a little jittery going in. It seemed to
be that something that kept me alert and aware going in. This one
was no exception, I had that jittery, butterfly feeling in the pit of
my guts. Even though my nomex gloves were already wet, I could tell
that my palms were sweaty. My skin tingled and, in an involuntary
shudder, every hair on my body was standing up.
From behind the target
buildings a flare shot high into the sky, lighting up everything as
if it were daylight. I swore at the ground, someone tripped a warning
flare. You ever hear the saying that the rule book goes out the
window when the first shot is fired? That flare was the sound of a
window breaking for us.
Gunfire exploded into the
trees from all directions but ours. The hulking shadow of a burnt out
tank was about six yards from the gully. Sarge led the way and we
sprinted, one by one, in a crouch to the tank. Someone in that old
building saw someone here and started firing. An electric charge ran
over my skin, everything tingled. This recovery op seemed to be
coming apart.
Several smoke grenades were
thrown out ahead of us to cover our movement. In the dim morning
light the air quickly turned into giant swirls of green, yellow, and
purple. The air was instantly filled with the acerbic stench of
sulfur mixed with gun powder. Bullets rained into the small street.
The sergeant barked out his orders to us, prepare to move.
We sprinted in fire teams,
two men at a time, to shadowed alcoves along the way. Each fire team
provided suppressive fire so the next one could move up. It was
almost our turn to move again.
Looking over my shoulder to
signal Sterling. I turned just in time to see someone reach out of
the shadows and grab Sterling around the neck. I leaped into the
shadows and quickly thumped into the mass of Sterling and his
attacker. Guessing, I punched my rifle stock hard into the dark
catching the attacker. With the cacophony of gunfire there was no way
to hear anything hitting the floor, but Sterling clambered up and
shouted a thank you at me. Running out of the doorway I shouted,
“MOVING!”
We were at the two story
building where intel said the captured troops were. Looking up there
was a walkway on the second floor. Sterling boosted me up. When I
turned to reach for him what I saw made me sick. My buddy was falling
over, shot several times. Yeah, I wanted to get sick. There was also
another sensation going on as adrenaline rushed through me.
“Drive on and accomplish
the mission,” I grumbled to myself as I crawled to stay below the
windows. The glass on the windows had already been shot out. There
was glass all over the walkway. It crunched and ground against my
knee and elbow pads. At the last window before the door I threw a
grenade through the shards clinging to the wooden frame. Once it
exploded I jumped in through the door and stepped to the side so as
not to silhouette myself. I started to sweep the room with bullets
when my weapon jammed. Swearing, I started to clear my weapon. From
behind a pile of sandbags, came a large man. He charged me at full
speed. The room was not that big and he was on me in an instant,
slamming me up against the wall. I smashed my rifle butt down onto
the back of his head. I continued this in rage until I realized that
he was dead on the floor, the back of his head collapsed and bloody.
There were stairs leading
down on the far side of the room. Crouching down at the edge of the
stairs I used a small metal mirror to look at the room below me.
There were several people in the room below and all with assault
rifles. I could hear the US troops hollering. I couldn't use my last
grenade on this room.
I crept down the stairs with
my rifle on my shoulder ready for a quick reaction. Once I was on
ground floor more of my platoon were coming up to the windows to
survey the situation. Somehow, things were different now. I could see
the Albanians in the room firing at my platoon, which had surrounded
the building. The captured troops were hollering something. I
couldn't hear them. Everything had gone silent. I could see that
there were things going on around me. I could see my buddies were
yelling, jumping, and pointing in slow motion. What were they
pointing at? Spinning to look around me felt like I was moving tin
thick mud. In my peripheral vision there's another Albanian. He was
coming out from behind another pile of sandbags. The pistol in his
hand coughed smoke and jumped a little, and then again. I felt a
searing heat in my side. Things started going black. The floor just
smacked me in the face! I'm being rolled around. I see Pocket Doc,
but it's all fading into darkness.
My eyes open slightly. The room is
white and it's bright. Am I in a hospital or dead? Suddenly, there's
a nurse beside me, “Take it easy, honey. You've had a rough run. We
almost lost you.” She was straightening my bed sheets.
“Sterling?” was the only thing I
could say.
“He's fine now. The boys you
recovered are fine. Now, don't you worry about anything, just rest.”
My eyes closed and I went
back to sleep. Mission accomplished.
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