Time Flying (35 page)

Later, I reflected on how brave and insane it had been for the Iraqi soldiers to keep shooting at us, when this small band of Iraqi grunts, armed with AK-47s, a few hundred rounds of ammo and several hand grenades, found themselves confronted by two American Apache gunships and a Blackhawk, in all probability, filled with Special Forces troops looking for blood.

Screw brave, let's go with insane.

The rounds kept whipping by in both directions as I ran, with my pilot and best friend hanging over my shoulder, dead, the Iraqis behind me shooting at everything else. A small constellation of sparks jumped from the side of the Blackhawk as some AK-47 rounds hit the body of the helicopter, at the same time a pair of Hellfires lurched away from one of the Apaches. Almost as if the missiles were a cue, three crouched figures jumped out of the Blackhawk and start sprinting toward me. None of them were in uniform, the first to hit the ground wearing fatigues, with sunglasses and a baseball cap turned backwards. He veered to my left, advanced a few yards and kneeled, raising his M16 carbine, outfitted with a fore grip and fired, sighting through a combat scope. Another of the men veered to my right, and grabbed some cover behind a rock, kneeling and firing  what looked like a heavily modified H&K G3. The third figure made making a beeline straight for us, and he wasn't wearing sunglasses or a hat, but had a checkered
shemagh
scarf around his neck and what appeared to be at least two weeks of beard. This Special Forces Operator shouted something at me, and motioned with his hand for me to get down, but I wasn't about to slow my pace toward the Blackhawk.

With all the noise and chaos, I guess it’s surprising the sounds of the rounds hitting Pat's G suit bladder, opening the trapped air pockets registered in my ears. I didn't have long to think about what it meant though, as somehow, out of nowhere, amid flying lead, the smell of cordite and the sound of several jet helicopter turbines, a huge Iraqi soldier came up behind me out of nowhere, holding an enormous two-by-four which he swung at me. The unseen lumber-wielding Iraqi connected with the back of my head, and for a fraction of a second, I thought who brings a two-by-four to a gunfight? before everything went…

The song sounded familiar, even though I couldn't quite hear it, as if I walked down a hallway, passing an apartment with a radio playing inside. Just as I seemed to pass beyond the point where the sound disappeared, I recognized the tune as “Rubber band Man.” Hadn’t I been listening to that song recently, I thought? 

I smelled flowers, the sharp, moist fragrance almost overpowering me, as I strained to understand where I was and how I came to be there. Warmth spread through my body, but didn't seem to be radiating from any single point. The fleeting thought of being in the tropical forest in Hawaii again floated by, and heard the crystal-like sound of my own laughter. My thoughts drifted, whether for a second or for a hundred years, I couldn't tell. I found I'd been trying to visualize the structure of cause and effect, and frustrated in a weird, happy way, because there had been a time when I could draw the symbols of cause and effect and show how they interacted. 

I know this doesn’t make any sense now, but did when I was inside the thought. I wish I possessed words to explain it all.

Then, I wanted to sleep. So I did.

FOURTEEN

Return

The first thing I became aware of seemed to be an insect buzzing around my ear, which later proved to be the transformer for some electronic device plugged into a wall socket not far from the head of my bed. An intense light pierced my eye, which blinked, unable to withstand the onslaught. A decidedly Middle Eastern face, olive colored skin and a dusting of beard, formed as it moved away. 

As my sight fully returned, and the face disappeared, a darkened room took shape around me. Not much light emanated from the few, inconspicuous fixtures scattered throughout the room, but it also became apparent I had been under the influence of some narcotic. Several minutes passed before I saw anyone, but there was activity just outside my range of vision. The restraints that held me were snug, but not painfully so, and I wondered if some pain medication was still in my system. Why would the Iraqi doctors waste painkillers on an enemy combatant? Whatever the answer to that question, this was not a good situation, not good at all.

Pat's death came back to me in a rush, bringing with it some of the pain the meds had been holding back, as well as the memory of the weight of his body across my shoulders as I carried him toward the evac chopper, and the air pressure of the .50 caliber MG rounds whipping past me, in search of my pursuers. I had said a word of thanks to the designers of the Browning machine gun for their skill in creating a weapon so powerful, yet so accurate and reliable that a gunner could fire past me without hitting me, as I dug into the hard packed desert running hard for safety. But the designers of the AK-47 were pretty good, too, and I remember the sounds and pressure of rounds hitting Pat's G-suit bladder, and other parts of him as well. He had already been dead, but the fact that these bastards would fire on me while I carried a wounded or dead comrade, infuriated me. It was then I realized it hadn't been a fast Iraqi with a big two-by-four who had whacked me across the back, but a round from an AK. My mind, not wanting to process getting shot in the back, filled in the blanks and created a huge man with a two by four. I didn't remember anything after getting hit, except the confusion and wondering about what had happened. Well, warmth. I remember the spreading warm sensation, but nothing more.

As I tried to figure out how, with two Apache attack choppers, the Blackhawk, with its door gunner making his .50 cal Browning sing, and at least three serious looking special forces operators bent on retrieving me and Pat, I ended up a hospitalized prisoner of war. The Middle Eastern face returned, appearing above me, a smile that seemed weirdly genuine on his face. But when he spoke in heavily accented English, the reality of my situation came back.

“Well, hello, Mr. Girrard,” he said, reaching in his lab coat pocket for something, and then turning back toward a table out of my field of vision. When he returned, he smiled again, shining a small flashlight into my eyes one at a time. He said, “Follow the light with your eyes.”

I decided against cooperating, choosing instead to hold his gaze as the flashlight arced from left to right and back again. His smile changed from confident to concerned.

“Are you able to follow the light, Mr Girrard?” He asked again. His English good, if accented, he had to be no more than 28 or 29 years old, five years or so younger than me, his deep olive skin smooth and blemish-free, through the one or two day growth of beard starting to sprout. Yea, I'll bet you haven't had time to shave,
Hadji
. Been keeping you busy,haven't we? From the first time I experience the Gulf War, as a civilian watching on CNN, I remembered the A-6 pilot shot down over Baghdad, roughed up a bit and made to tape a criminal confession played on television all over the world. I knew his name, and had found his squadron information. Operationally, my being here probably wouldn't change events enough to keep his ordeal from happening in this timeline, so I was determined not to give the Iraqis two forced video confessions from A-6 pilots.

I held the Iraqi doctor's gaze a moment longer before responding.

“Fuck...You.”

I'd seen my share of war movies, most of which included at least one interrogation scene, and my response a pretty standard one in this situation. A captured American officer insulting the enemy doctor treating him wasn’t standard at all in real life. In fact, our training stressed being professional and polite, respectful of officers and doctors, but given the fact these people had killed my best friend, and apparently shot me in the back while I was carrying his body to the evac chopper, I wasn’t feeling much motivation to be respectful, or even polite.

The doctor's response didn’t remind me of a scene from any war movie, though. I expected either a flash of anger, or a resigned acceptance at my insistence on playing the tough guy, but got neither, as the young doctor recoiled a couple steps, confused and intimidated by the anger in my voice. Despite the fact I was restrained and unable to move at all, he kept his distance, but didn't leave the room. The startled expression on his face changed to concern, his eyes flashing toward something above and to my left, which I later discovered to be a panel showing my vital signs. Regaining his composure, he returned his attention to my face and asked “Are you uncomfortable, Mr Girrard? Are you having a lot of pain?”

“It’s Lieutenant Commander Richard Girrard, doctor,” I corrected, and gave him my serial number, all the information the Geneva Convention required me to disclose. “The term 'mister' is only appropriate for you to use in reference to me if you're in the United States Navy, which I assume, you are not.”

“No...I am…not,” the doctor replied slowly, the puzzled expression returned. “I’m sorry, I didn't realize you were...in the Navy.” He consulted a few pages from his clipboard and before turning to leave, said, “My apologies, sir.” He left my field of vision, but was talking to someone, moving away at the same time, the sound fading. Though I couldn't make out what he said, it seemed to be in English, not Arabic, which struck me as slightly odd.

The doctor returned a few minutes later, not saying a word, his eyes not meeting mine. My peripheral vision revealed him checking the IV device by my bed, faint beeps indicating he was inputting some information into the device. Within a few seconds, a fog begin to descend, and I thought how nice it would be to close my eyes for a few seconds...

The room was lighter when I once again became aware of my surroundings, the noise level higher as well, and I could tell from the light it was daytime. My sleepiness melted away, and I realized I could move my head a bit, though I remained restrained in the bed. I turned to look out the window to my left, and observed it was a clear day, vivid blue sky and puffy white clouds visible through the vertical blinds. The tops of leafy trees ended about halfway up the window, and I calculated I was probably in a room on the second floor of the building.

Wait a minute. Leafy trees? I looked again. I couldn't tell a maple from an oak tree, but didn't believe either variety grew in Iraq, or anywhere else in the Middle East, for that matter. What the hell?

“You're awake,” came a familiar voice. A voice as familiar to me as my own, but one I hadn’t heard in 15 years. “How are you feeling, hon?”

My head turned to the right, my mouth wide open in disbelief, as I gazed at her beautiful, long, deep chestnut brown hair, framing a perfect face.

Molly.
She was alive, which meant I was back.

Molly was alive.

Later.

Alone again for the first time since I woke up to see my wife looking down on me. Once the shock of seeing her subsided, the stress and fatigue on her face, all because of me, was apparent. After being notified of my accident, Molly had flown to Cincinnati, hardly sleeping during the three days I lay unconscious. My waking up and telling the doctor, a young resident from India, I was a Naval officer and that he should “fuck off” didn't reassure my wife everything was OK.

She accepted my disorientation excuse for the moment, but I would have to figure out how to explain to her everything I had been through. My mind still regarded my memories of the alternate timeline my apparent death in the Iraqi desert had caused me to leave as legitimate, and the memories of being in Cincinnati and San Diego as distant. The more I thought about them, the more real and recent they seemed, but not at the expense of the other memories. My brain seemed to be working to compartmentalize the two sets of memories and let them co-exist. How that worked itself out would be interesting to watch.

Being with Molly again was wonderful, the memory of watching the news reports of her death in Saudi Arabia still raw, though. She told me Samantha would fly to Cincy from San Diego in a couple days,, which made me even happier, filling the empty part of my soul caused by my losing Aaron and Michael, my songs in the other timeline, and of course, Amanda. I pushed those thoughts away for now, promising myself I would deal with them later. Jesus, I thought. What was I doing flying combat aircraft in the Gulf War?
How stupid.
That wasn’t me. And Pat...

Night had fallen, by this time, making the trees outside the hospital window disappear. They were getting greener and budding, but I could still almost taste the grime and dust of the desert though, the shock of waking up so far from there still keeping me unsteady. I'd been back to my life here a few times in my second trip through the seventies, eighties and first part of the 90s decades, usually thrown back when under extreme stress. My trips back, only a few seconds long, never seemed permanent. This time though, I had been back for several hours, with no impression I was going anywhere at all.

I began to accept that I wouldn't be returning to the other timeline, because I had died, shot in the back by an Iraqi soldier while I tried to get to the evac chopper. I’m guessing the Apaches covering our escape probably chewed up every enemy combatant in a 100 square mile area after they realized they had missed one of them before I decided to make a run for it, bit it was cold comfort. I smiled slightly, however, without any sense of guilt, when I thought of what small pieces those Army Apache drivers probably left of any Iraqi in a uniform. If I had any way to learn the name of the guy who shot me in the back, I thought, I'd find him in this timeline and shoot him. The one here probably escaped being shredded by the Apaches, but he would be the same guy.

All nonsense, of course. My mind wandered, still trying to reattach itself to the other timeline, the world I had spent the past 15 years in while unconscious in this hospital for three days. The other timeline was gone to me, though. The trip back here I had made through dying was a one-way. Which was fine, I realized as I turned my head to greet Molly as she came back into my little section of the ICU. Her eyes still showing exhaustion, but her smile radiant. She reached out to hold my hand as she said, “They're moving you out of ICU into a private room, hon.” She squeezed my hand. “The doctors say you're doing great,” Molly continued. “No sign of Traumatic Brain Injury, the swelling has gone down, so your concussion isn't a problem anymore. You didn't lose much blood.”