Authors: Robert Van Dusen
"Glad you could finally make it, Frays." the big man grumbled as Amy fell in to his left. "Did you call everybody else?"
He glowered beneath the brim of his patrol cap.
"Sorry, Sergeant." she answered quickly. "I called and left messages but nobody answered." Amy took a quick look around. There were maybe thirty or forty airmen in formation where there should be a hundred and fifty, not counting the airmen currently on deployment. "Doesn't look like they were the only ones."
Master Sergeant Emery tapped Amy's elbow, drawing her attention back towards the front of the formation. Captain Forsythe wandered awkwardly from the back exit of the building to stand before his airmen. The highest ranking people available stepped forward to fill in for their missing superiors and called their flights to attention then conducted roll call. There was an Airman First Class standing at the front of the other squadron. Amy bitterly shook her head. When that was done, Captain Forsythe gave them the command to stand at ease.
"As you have probably heard, the governor has declared a state of emergency." said the Captain as he slowly paced back and forth in front of the formation. "There is heavy rioting in south Boston and the disturbance is spreading across the river and into the suburbs." The man stopped and turned his gaze dramatically towards the men and women before him. Amy was not surprised to learn that the Captain had been an amateur actor in his youth.
"We are to draw weapons and live ammunition. Personnel qualified with grenade launchers and shotguns are to draw less than lethal countermeasures." the captain said quickly as he continued pacing. "Charlie Flight, you’ll be moving out by bus to a staging area west of the city where we will assist local law enforcement in restoring law and order to the area. You'll receive your assignments when we arrive. Now let's going!"
The response
from Frays and her fellow airmen was probably not as enthusiastic as their captain wanted, but they still filed in to the armory and began to draw their weapons and other supplies. Amy hustled out to her truck and grabbed her gear before signing out her M4A1 carbine with under slung M203 40mm grenade launcher as well as her M9 pistol. The young woman put a fresh battery in her carbine’s Aimpoint red dot sight with 3x magnification module and made sure she had a couple spare batteries not only for the sight but also the illuminator clamped onto the weapon’s hand guard. She shrugged into her body armor and buckled the pistol belt of her LCS as Sergeant Emery approached, already decked out in his own field gear. She had felt a little underdressed when she first stood next to him, as the big sergeant carried not only the full complement of gear, but a six shot 12 gauge Mossberg 590 pistol gripped pump action shotgun in a scabbard on the back panel of his LCS with nineteen spare rounds of ammunition for it on each shoulder strap. Her only additions to her basic issue kit were the Blackhawk! SERPA drop leg holster on her right thigh (a birthday gift from her parents as her unit’s standard issue drop leg holster had a flap, making drawing the pistol a huge pain when you really needed it), a Saint Joan’s medal (from Father Greg, her hometown priest) and a Combat Life Saver kit on the left side of her LCS.
The man awkwardly held the handle of two green ammunition cans in each hand. Amy took two of them, cracked the lead wire seals with her multi-tool and tugged open the cans. The two of them made nervous small talk as they pushed rounds into their magazines and stuffed them into carriers on their harnesses. Amy went back to the arms room and signed out a rubberized canvas bandoleer containing a half dozen CS grenades for her launcher which she slung across her chest like some old timey outlaw. Sergeant Emery and Frays went into the office to fill their camelbaks and canteens from the water cooler. Once they had their water, Sergeant Emery did a hands-on check of her gear and the two of them went out the back door to wait for the bus.
Amy immediately started to loathe herself for having those two cigarettes on the way in. An itching, crawling sensation climbed up and down her spine when it wasn't busy running laps and doing backflips inside her skull. It didn't help that about a dozen of her fellow airmen stood around in loose groups with thin blue clouds of tobacco smoke drifting up into the sky. Sergeant Emery was by her side. “Ya know, I almost thought that we were gonna go back to The Sandbox.” he said as he pulled a pack of Marlboro cigarettes out of an old ammo pouch on his LCS. He offered one to his subordinate who accepted it with grateful resignation. He lit hers then his with his silver Zippo before snapping the lighter shut with a flourish. “Somehow this seems a lot worse.”
“I know.” Amy said quietly as she exhaled a plume of smoke. A look of alarm passed over her face as she dug out her cell phone. “Goddamn it. I need to call my parents and let them know what's going on.” The big NCO smiled at the
surprised expression on his subordinate’s face: Frays was a two mass a week Catholic and rarely swore, though she did occasionally let a cussword slip.
Sergeant Emery nodded and moved off to talk to some of the other NCOs as Amy scrolled through the contacts list on her phone. She pressed a couple buttons and the phone started to ring. Frays nervously tapped her toe as she waited for someone to pick up.
“Hey, kiddo.” said a rough, masculine voice. Amy’s father smoked two packs a day and it showed in his voice. Amy could tell he was worried but was trying to sound upbeat. “What's shakin'?”
“Hi
, Dad. Just calling to let you know that I got recalled.” she answered quickly. The headlights of the buses to take them to the staging area came in to view at the other end of the parking lot. She frowned at the driver, willing him to give her just two more minutes. “Listen, Dad…why don't you take Mom and Carl up to the camp for a little while?”
She could not hear her father's response because the buses had pulled up right in front of her and the airmen began crowding on to each of them. “Dad, I gotta go. Tell everybody not to worry, I love them and I'll see everybody soon.” She hung up and stuck the phone back in her pocket as she boarded the rear bus.
Amy could not help but feel like she had wasted her breath telling her parents not to worry. Her dad, who had served as a tank commander in the Marine Corps during Desert Storm, would act like he was not worried (even though he was). Mom would most likely bawl her eyes out like she did when her flight got on the plane for Iraq. Carl, of course, would probably wonder what they were so bothered about. She had Brian Effin’ Emery watching her back, after all.
Amy plopped into the seat next to Sergeant Emery, her rucksack on her lap. Captain Forsythe clomped up the stairs to the bus and stood next to the driver. “I need two volunteers to drive a Humvee.” he said loudly, his voice barely audible over the din of the airmen getting settled in for the ride. Amy shrunk behind the seat in front of her and lifted her rucksack in an attempt to hide from what she knew was coming. “Alright. Airman Jacobson and...” the man surveyed the airmen in front of him “Airman Frays. Get over to the motor pool and sign out Bravo Three Four.”
Amy bit back a groan. The bus seats were way more comfortable than the Humvee, not to mention the fact that the bus had air conditioning and it was easily a very muggy ninety degrees or more outside. Frays also didn't like the idea of spending the next couple of hours trapped in a vehicle with Airman Nick Jacobson either. He was short with bad skin and just on the edge of being jammed up over his weight. Not to mention the way he sometimes looked at the female personnel when the unit got together for PT and stuff made her skin crawl. It reminded her a little too much of the way the male personnel would stare at the females in the chow hall at good ol’ Camp Freedom.
The detail disembarked, pulled their gear out of the bus's cargo hold and took off at a trot towards the high fence surrounding the motor pool. A couple of airmen from the Base Security section opened the gate to the motor pool and held it open for them while they got the Humvee ready to go. Amy opened the door and unlocked the chain securing the vehicle's steering wheel. She pulled the sling of her M4 over her head and snapped the weapon in to the rack next to the driver's seat. Airman Jacobson tossed his rucksack onto the back seat and secured his weapon as well.
Frays programmed the radio mounted to the Humvee’s dash then picked up the handset and keyed the mike. “Any station this net, any station this net, this is Bravo Three Four. Radio check.” she said quickly as she flicked the switches to turn the vehicle's motor over.
“This is Bravo One Actual.” said Captain Forsythe, the man's voice rendered somewhat tinny and distorted by the radio's speakers. “Read you Lima Charlie, Bravo Three Four.”
“Roger that, Bravo One Actual.” Amy said as the Humvee roared to life and she flicked on the headlamps. “We're ready to roll.”
Ten minutes later the convoy of buses, Humvees and Five Tons was headed east down the interstate towards the staging area. Amy occasionally spared a glance at the young man sitting next to her. He looked pale and frightened, like a scared little boy. She suddenly remembered that he had joined the unit after she had gotten back and started to feel like kind of a jerk for her harsh opinion of the guy. This was his first deployment and it might just be in his backyard. She felt around under the radio mount until her fingers found what she was looking for: a thin black wire with the male end of an audio jack on the end.
“Hey, Jacobson. Do you got an iPod or something?” she asked, holding up the wire so he could see it “Hook this into its headphone jack.”
Jacobson looked a little confused. “What?” he asked, arching an eyebrow at the woman seated next to him. “Won't we get in trouble?”
Amy laughed. “If Captain Forsythe wants to jam us up I'll rip out the same set up I put in his Humvee.” she turned her attention back to the road in front of her. “Go ahead, man. It's fine.”
Pretty soon the two of them were cruising down the road with the gentle strains of some kind of German speed metal band that sounded to Amy like someone put a microphone in a sack full of sick cats then started swinging it around their head and recorded the noises it made screaming at them out of the Humvee's speakers. This improved Jacobson's mood greatly however and he even started talking more. In fact, he turned out to be a regular chatterbox and he started grilling her about her previous deployment. Amy told him all she felt comfortable with and gently redirected the conversation when he got too close to something she felt was better left alone.
The radio squawked, thankfully cutting off the music. “This is Bravo One Actual. There's a rest stop two miles up ahead.” said Captain Forsythe. He paused and keyed his mike again. “The Dunkin' Donuts is donating coffee and donuts to emergency services personnel. We're taking a twenty minute latrine break. How copy?”
Several jubilant cries went up over the radio as the convoy pulled in to the rest stop. Amy
grabbed her weapon and hurried in as dignified manner as she could towards the ladies' room while Jacobson made a beeline for the Dunkin' Donuts. When she came out and walked back to the vehicle the younger man pressed a large cup of black coffee into her hand. “Check it out, Frays.” he said, holding up a paperboard box with a proud smile. “I scored us a half dozen fried cakes and a bunch of doughnut holes.”
She looked quickly over both shoulders and flashed Jacobson a quick grin. “Good deal.” Amy said as she led the way back to their vehicle. “Keep those out of sight until we're moving again.” Frays stopped a few paces from the Humvee, a yawn slowly building in her chest. “Would you mind driving?”
she asked as she covered her mouth with a fist and yawned.
Jacobson grinned like a kid. “Sure!” he said quickly. “I just finished up driver's training!”
Amy could not help but smile nervously at the young man's enthusiasm. “Just be careful, okay?” Jacobson seemed like a good guy but she could not help but wonder if she was making a mistake as she stowed her weapon and climbed into the passenger seat.
Sgt. Emery approached their Humvee with two plastic bags in each hand that were full almost to the point of bursting. “Hey, Frays.” he said as he handed her one of the bags through the window. “A little present from Maria. Merry Christmas, guys.” The two of them thanked him as he hurried back to the bus. The two of them divided up the bottles of soda, cans of Red Bull and snack cakes. Amy grumbled under her breath when she saw Emery's other present: a carton of Marlboro Red Pack 100s. He even included a couple Bic lighters. “He knows I've been trying to quit!” she cried, holding the cigarettes up for Jacobson's inspection. Frays sighed and ripped open the box then took out a pack and jammed it into her pocket.
“No, thanks.” Jacobson said when Frays offered him a pack. She frowned and put it back.
Figures he doesn’t smoke
Frays thought sourly as she pulled her rucksack off of the back seat and put the cigarettes inside.
The man laughed at the sour look on her face. “He's just looking out for you.” he said as he fired up the vehicle's engine. “Besides, you picked a helluva time to quit smoking.” he added in a perfect impression of Robert Stack in the movie
Airplane!
Amy cracked up in spite of herself.
Maybe ten minutes after they were down the road Amy found she was having trouble keeping her eyes open. A few seconds after that she was snoring contentedly, the paper cup still clutched in her hand. Jacobson watched her out of the corner of his eye. The
peaceable look on her face brought an uncomfortable stirring sensation in his groin. He quickly gulped down his coffee and threw the paper cup out the window. Jacobson hesitated for a moment then reached across Frays' lap and took her coffee. He allowed his fingertips to brush against her left thigh, the soft skin of her wrist before returning to his side of the vehicle. The woman mumbled something under her breath and shifted around in her seat a couple times before falling back to sleep.