Dogs Of War Part 15

"None of that training, though, will totally prepare you for what you will feel when the action is real, when the men you're hunting are also hunting you, when you either have to kill them or let them kill you. Only that experience will teach you those feelings, and once you've felt them-and you will, there is no way not to-you'll spend the rest of your life wis.h.i.+ng you could get rid of them. But you won't be able to, and that's a cost you're gonna have to pay.

"Unless, of course, you die. Which is what this training has a chance of helping you avoid. When the craziness of combat hits you, this training and the other guys in your unit will be all that can keep you alive.

"I know you don't understand a f.u.c.king word I'm saying, but it's my job to tell you anyway. So we're going to do the only thing we can do that has any chance of helping: Practice. We're gonna practice until we get it automatic and right, until you learn how to attack and defend and stay in control while doing each.

"Johnson, you're up."

Week 5, Day 2 On my second day as the leader of Charlie squad, Minola a.s.signed us to the obstacle course and left us alone there for an hour. We had a goal time of ten minutes flat. Our previous best was a little over ten and a half, but we'd logged that result last week, so I was sure we could hit the goal this time. After three tries, though, we were sucking wind, dirty, bruised, and still 15 seconds over. "We've gotta try again, guys," I said. "We've got less than half an hour to get rid of those fifteen seconds."

Langdon, the tallest of my squad members, said, "Bulls.h.i.+t. Tell Minola we made it, and let's catch some rest while we can. Right, guys?"

Gonzalez, who was having the worst time of the group, nodded in agreement. Peters and Johnson looked down, carefully not agreeing or disagreeing, waiting to see which way it would go. I knew Gonzalez would do the right thing if I pushed him, but Langdon could be a problem. Agreeing with him meant letting the team fail. Taking it to Minola would label me as a snitch. The only way out was to make it happen.

"Wrong, Langdon," I said. "If the Sergeant says we do it, we do it. We follow our orders."

"The only thing between us and those orders being done is you, d.i.c.khead," he said. He stretched to his full height and stared down at me. "If you could stop kissing up because Minola made you squad leader, you'd write ten minutes on the score sheet and leave us the f.u.c.k alone." He turned his back on me and started to walk away.

I was not going to let this happen, not on my watch. "Fall in!" I yelled.

The other three slowly lined up and stood to attention. Langdon stopped walking but did not join them. The others were watching me, though trying not to be obvious about it.

I walked slowly in front of Langdon and stood as close to him as I could without touching him. I craned my neck so I could look directly into his eyes. I silently counted to five and calmed my breathing as best I could. "Here's how it is, Langdon," I said, slowly and clearly, never looking away from him. "I'm squad leader. You may not like it. I don't know, and I don't give a s.h.i.+t. It's my job now to lead this squad, and it's your job to be part of it. This squad is a team, and you will not let this team down, and I will not dishonor it by lying." I wanted to yell, but I kept my voice level. "This squad is going to run this course until we do it in ten minutes. We can get it this next run, or the one after that, or ten runs later, but we will get it. We can all run it together, or we can carry your worthless unconscious a.s.s on our backs while we run it. But we will do it. It's your call how."

Langdon stared at me for a few moments, then shook his head and joined the others in line. "f.u.c.k it," he said as he snapped to attention, "let's run."

"I can't hear you!" I said.

"Let's run!" he shouted.

We took our marks, and on my command, we ran.

Week 7, Day 5 At 04:30, my squad crossed the Ninth Street DMZ about thirty yards below Twenty-Second Avenue, three quarters of a mile from the southeast edge of-our compound. Cutting and tying back the razor wire took only a few minutes. No patrols were anywhere in sight. We hadn't hit the heathens in this part of St. Pete in months, and our recon teams knew they had become careless and rarely patrolled it in the early morning hours. We were due back by 05:15, almost an hour before their first patrol ever pa.s.sed this area.

Once all five of us were through, we split into our teams and sprinted to the shadows on either side of Twenty-First Avenue. I took point and kept to the right side of the street, the side on which our target house sat. Gonzalez and Peters followed on the same side, with Langdon and Johnson staying parallel with them across the street. The other five squads in our platoon were doing their first forays at the same time in different spots around the city. If we all did our jobs well, by sunrise the heathens would find themselves down six key adults, and we'd all be back at the compounds.

We were about a quarter of a mile due west from the home of our targets, a man named Sam Kaplan and his son, Tim. Kaplan ran a warehouse that was a major food and weapons depot for the heathens in this part of the city. Supplies were so tight that he was the only local with all the necessary access codes. Taking him out would mess them up for a couple days, enough time for more missions. Our briefing notes said he and his son left their house each morning about five so they could arrive well before any of their customers. Our job was to take them just outside their house and then get back home safely.

Only a few streetlights still burned in this area, and we had plenty of time to cover the quarter mile and secure our positions, so we never had to leave the darkness for more than a few seconds. Even so, we moved carefully from bush to tree to dead car to house corner, always staying spread out and in the shadows, checking for trouble at each stop. Never a.s.sume, Minola said. Take all the time the situation offers you. A few cats ran near us, and one even hissed, but no one seemed to notice. My heart was pounding and I could feel the sweat all over my upper body, but no lights came on, and no heathens attacked. Each time I stopped to check the area, I tried to take a slow, deep breath. The gra.s.s was a bit damp from an earlier rain, so the air was clear and fresh.

The only real dangers were the streets. Once we were over Ninth, we had to cross three more to reach our target. As point, I was the first to take each of them. I'd hold in the covering shadows on the near side until I had checked each house with a street view, then I'd dash across, grab the nearest cover, and check all the houses again. Only then would I wave over the others, who crossed all at once. Nothing fancy, everything by the numbers. When we were all safely over the last cross-street, I waved us down and counted off two minutes on my watch, making sure. Nothing stirred. No one followed. Time to get in position.

The target house was the third one down. I looped around the rear of the nearest house and paused to make sure Langdon and Johnson had crossed safely. When they had, I made my way through backyards to the far side of the target. Gonzalez and Peters showed up a few seconds later. I doubled back to make sure Langdon and Johnson were in position on the other side. They were. By 04:44, one minute early, I was back in my position, and we were set to strike.

Conditions were pretty good for the a.s.sault. We had enough moonlight to see the targets, but not so much we would be obvious. One streetlight shone on the same side of the street a few houses down, but no other lights illuminated the block. Some lights were already on inside the small, one-story building, which was also good for us: harder for them to see out into the relative darkness.

I replayed the plan in my head, making sure I was missing nothing. It was simple and, Minola had said, intentionally overkill because it was our first mission. Langdon and Johnson were to take the two targets from behind, Langdon on the big one, Johnson on the smaller. They were to cover the targets' mouths to stop any noise and at the same time go for their throats. Gonzalez and Peters were to lag them by a step and attack from the front. Their targets were the hearts. Two hits per target within a second or two, and they should go down fast and quiet. I was coordinator and secondary backup. We would hit them as they turned down the sidewalk, get it all over in only a few seconds, and head back to the extraction point on our side of the DMZ.

Waiting was harder than it had been in the drills, harder than I had thought it would be. The night seemed louder, busier, the longer I leaned against the house's side. Crickets, frogs, odd animal rustlings, our own breathing-every noise seemed a possible warning to our targets. The house was insulated well enough that I couldn't hear any of the activity that had to be going on inside it, and that made me nervous. At the same time, that insulation was also protection, because they couldn't hear us. I kept my eyes on the front of the house and worked on calming myself, slowing my breathing. I flashed a thumbs-up to each of the teams, and both gave me the same.

Lights in the rear of the house snapped off right at 05:00. A few seconds later, the lights in the front went out, and the door opened. Two figures, one about six feet tall and the other about my size, stepped out. The larger turned back to the door and locked it. As they stepped out from under the slight overhang of the house's ceiling the light from the streetlight down the block gave me a brief glimpse of their faces. They looked tired but otherwise normal. If they knew we were there, they sure weren't showing it. The larger put his arm around the smaller, and they started walking.

When they turned right on the sidewalk, I twirled my finger in the go signal. Langdon and Johnson, bayonets drawn, darted from the other side of the house. The sound of their boots on the sidewalk was like shots going off, and for a second I wanted to run in fear that someone would hear, but then it was our turn to move and without thinking about doing it I was waving us forward. We charged, and I could see surprise come across the faces of the targets as we appeared from the side of the house. A second later, Langdon and Johnson were on them, Langdon taking the taller and Johnson the shorter. Each had his bayonet in his right hand and grabbed at the head of his target with his left.

Everything had felt slow, but now everything sped up and we moved without thinking, the training taking over. Langdon's hand closed on the man as Peters and I were still two steps from him, but the man spun away from Langdon's grip and avoided his bayonet. Langdon stumbled, and the man kicked him and then drew a knife, not as large as our bayonets but respectable. He waved the knife at Johnson, who let go of the boy to protect his forward arm. The boy also drew a knife as he ran for his father.

Then Gonzalez, Peters, and I reached them. Their backs were now to us, and before they could turn we were there. Gonzalez went after the boy, Peters and I, the man. Peters caught him in the side, and as he turned I grabbed his hair, pulled down his head, and drew my knife across his throat. I felt it bite and catch for a second, then it came free smoothly. The man flailed as his blood spurted on Langdon, who was pulling his knife from somewhere in the man's chest. When I was clear, the man fell backward, right beside me.

I checked the others. Johnson and Gonzalez were straddling the boy, who was also down. Johnson was breathing hard and holding his left arm just above the elbow. A dark stain was spreading on his uniform. Gonzalez, his eyes looking wild in even this faint light, was cursing softly. He bent and began to cut the kid's ear.

"Tie off Johnson's arm, Gonzalez," I said.

He pulled the ear off with a slight tearing sound, then stood and showed it to us, his mouth open slightly, his breathing still ragged. Johnson was shaking but still standing.

"Johnson's arm, Gonzalez," I whispered. I grabbed his shoulder and shook it slightly. "Gonzalez."

He looked at me, and his eyes seemed to calm a bit. "Got it." He turned to Johnson, pulled an elastic bandage from his med kit, and started tying off the arm above the cut. The stain wasn't spreading, and Johnson's breathing was becoming regular, so I figured he was okay.

I took a look at Langdon. He was fine and motioned toward the man's head.

"You got the throat," he said. "Your kill, your ear."

Now I was having trouble breathing, and my arms were shaking slightly. I felt sick and hot and excited and scared and knew I had to regain control. We were alive, they were dead, and that's the best we could ask for. Langdon motioned again, then Gonzalez finished and he and Johnson stood and faced me.

"Ready," they said.

They were watching me, awaiting the word. We were exposed in the light on the sidewalk, and we couldn't afford to be there long.

I bent and drew my blade across the man's right ear. I had to saw back and forth twice, and then the sharp blade cut it cleanly free. It was damp and small in my hand. I held it up to the others, a tiny trophy dark in the gray morning, and they smiled. I was smiling, too.

I stuffed the ear in my pocket, wiped the knife on the s.h.i.+rt of the dead man, and gave the signal to head out.

When Mark was ten years old, his mother Nancy (a really wonderful person) enrolled Mark in Young Marines to provide him with male role models. In this she was successful.

Basic Training is generally autobiographical with two particularly notable exceptions: his unit didn't kill anybody, though they put a couple older guys in the hospital; and in the fictional version, he leaves out the part where the DI put a boot on his head and rubbed his face in his vomit. is generally autobiographical with two particularly notable exceptions: his unit didn't kill anybody, though they put a couple older guys in the hospital; and in the fictional version, he leaves out the part where the DI put a boot on his head and rubbed his face in his vomit.

I should perhaps add that Nancy had no idea of what Mark learned in Young Marines until she read this story.

-DAD.

Witch War Richard Matheson Seven pretty little girls sitting in a row. Outside, night, pouring rain-war weather. Inside, toasty warm. Seven overralled little girls chatting. Plaque on the wall saying: P.G. CENTER.

Sky clearing its throat with thunder, picking and dropping lint lightning from immeasurable shoulders. Rain hus.h.i.+ng the world, bowing the trees, pocking earth. Square building, low, with one wall plastic.

Inside, the buzzing talk of seven pretty little girls.

"So I says to him- 'Don't give me that, that, Mr. High and Mighty.' So he says, 'Oh yeah?' And I says, 'Yeah!'" Mr. High and Mighty.' So he says, 'Oh yeah?' And I says, 'Yeah!'"

"Honest, will I ever be glad when this thing's over. I saw the cutest hat on my last furlough. Oh, what what I wouldn't give to wear it!" I wouldn't give to wear it!"

"You too? Don't I know know it! You just can't get your hair right. Not in it! You just can't get your hair right. Not in this this weather. Why don't they let us get rid of it?" weather. Why don't they let us get rid of it?"

"Men! They make me sick." They make me sick."

Seven gestures, seven postures, seven laughters ringing thin beneath thunder. Teeth showing in girl giggles. Hands tireless, painting pictures in the air.

P.G. Center. Girls. Seven of them. Pretty. Not one over sixteen. Curls. Pigtails. Bangs. Pouting little lips-smiling, frowning, shaping emotion on emotion. Sparkling young eyes-glittering, twinkling, narrowing, cold or warm.

Seven healthy young bodies restive on wooden chairs. Smooth adolescent limbs. Girls-pretty girls-seven of them.

An Army of ugly shapeless men, stumbling in mud, struggling along pitch-black muddy road.

Rain a torrent. Buckets of it thrown on each exhausted man. Sucking sound of great boots sinking into oozy yellow-brown mud, pulling loose. Mud dripping from heels and soles.

Plodding men-hundreds of them-soaked, miserable, depleted. Young men bent over like old men. Jaws hanging loosely, mouths gasping at black wet air, tongues lolling, sunken eyes looking at nothing, betraying nothing.

Rest.

Men sink down in the mud, fall on their packs. Heads thrown back, mouths open, rain splas.h.i.+ng on yellow teeth. Hands immobile-scrawny heaps of flesh and bone. Legs without motion-khaki lengths of worm-eaten wood. Hundreds of useless limbs fixed to hundreds of useless trunks.

In back, ahead, beside rumble trucks and tanks and tiny cars. Thick tires splattering mud. Fat treads sinking, tearing at mucky slime. Rain drumming wet fingers on metal and canvas.

Lightning flashbulbs without pictures. Momentary burst of light. The face of war seen for a second-made of rusty guns and turning wheels and faces staring.

Blackness. A night hand blotting out the brief storm glow. Windblown rain flitting over fields and roads, drenching trees and trucks. Rivulets of bubbly rain tearing scars from the earth. Thunder, lightning.

A whistle. Dead men resurrected. Boots in sucking mud again-deeper, closer, nearer. Approach to a city that bars the way to a city that bars the way to a ...

An officer sat in the communication room of the P.G. Center. He peered at the operator, who sat hunched over the control board, phones over his ears, writing down a message.

The officer watched the operator. They are coming, he thought. Cold, wet, and afraid they are marching at us. He s.h.i.+vered and shut his eyes.

He opened them quickly. Visions fill his darkened pupils-of curling smoke, flaming men, unimaginable horrors that shape themselves without word or pictures.

"Sir," said the operator, "from advance observation post. Enemy forces sighted."

The officer got up, walked over to the operator and took the message. He read it, face blank, mouth parenthesized. "Yes," he said.

He turned on his heel and went to the door. He opened it and went into the next room. The seven girls stopped talking. Silence breathed on the walls.

The officer stood with his back to the plastic window. "Enemies," he said. "Two miles away. Right in front of you."

He turned and pointed out the window. "Right out there. Two miles away. Any questions?"

A girl giggled.

"Any vehicles?" another asked.

"Yes. Five trucks, five small command cars, two tanks."

"That's too easy," laughed the girl, slender fingers fussing with her hair.

"That's all," said the officer. He started from the room. "Go to it," he added and, under his breath. "Monsters!"

He left.

"Oh, me," sighed one of the girls, "Here we go again."

"What a bore," said another. She opened her delicate mouth and plucked out chewing gum. She put it under her chair seat.

"At least it stopped raining," said a redhead, tying her shoelaces.

The seven girls looked around at each other. Are you ready? Are you ready? said their eyes. said their eyes. I'm ready, I suppose. I'm ready, I suppose. They adjusted themselves on the chairs with girlish grunts and sighs. They hooked their feet around the legs of their chairs. All gum was placed in storage. Mouths were tightened into prudish fixity. The pretty little girls made ready for the game. They adjusted themselves on the chairs with girlish grunts and sighs. They hooked their feet around the legs of their chairs. All gum was placed in storage. Mouths were tightened into prudish fixity. The pretty little girls made ready for the game.

Finally they were silent on their chairs. One of them took a deep breath. So did another. They all tensed their milky flesh and clasped fragile fingers together. One quickly scratched her head to get it over with. Another sneezed prettily.

"Now," said a girl on the right end of the row.

Seven pairs of beady eyes shut. Seven innocent little minds began to picture, to visualize, to transport.

Lips rolled into thin gashes, faces drained of color, bodies s.h.i.+vered pa.s.sionately. Their fingers twitching with concentration, seven pretty little girls fought a war.

The men were coming over the rise of a hill when the attack came. The leading men, feet poised for the next step, burst into flame.

There was no time to scream. Their rifles slapped down into the muck, their eyes were lost in fire. They stumbled a few steps and fell, hissing and charred, into the soft mud.

Men yelled. The ranks broke. They began to throw up their weapons and fire at the night. More troops puffed incandescently, flared up, were dead.

"Spread out!" screamed an officer as his gesturing fingers sprouted flame and his face went up in licking yellow heat.

The men looked everywhere. Their dumb terrified eyes searched for an enemy. They fired into the fields and woods. They shot each other. They broke into flopping runs over the mud.

A truck was enveloped in fire. Its driver leaped out, a two-legged torch. The truck went b.u.mping over the road, turned, wove crazily over the field, crashed into a tree, exploded and was eaten up in blazing light. Black shadows flitted in and out of the aura of light around the flames. Screams rent the night.

Man after man burst into flame, fell cras.h.i.+ng on his face in the mud. Spots of searing light lashed the wet darkness-screams-running coals, spluttering, glowing, dying-incendiary ranks-trucks cremated-tanks blowing up.

A little blonde, her body tense with repressed excitement. Her lips twitch, a giggle hovers in her throat. Her nostrils dilate. She shudders in giddy fright. She imagines, imagines ...

A soldier runs headlong across a field, screaming, his eye insane with horror. A gigantic boulder rushes at him from the black sky.

His body is driven into the earth, mangled. From the rock edge, fingertips protrude.

The boulder lifts from the ground, crashes down again, a shapeless trip hammer. A flaming truck is flattened. The boulder flies again to the black sky.

A pretty brunette, her face a feverish mask. Wild thoughts tumble through her virginal brain. Her scalp grows taut with ecstatic fear. Her lips draw back from clenching teeth. A gasp of terror hisses from her lips. She imagines, imagines ...

A soldier falls to his knees. His head jerks back. In the light of burning comrades, he stares dumbly at the white-foamed wave that towers over him.