The Last Hour (Thompson Sisters), Sheehan-Miles, Charles [reading an ebook .txt] 📗

I threw my Kevlar on, buckled my web gear and threw my pack over my shoulder, as Dylan said, “Gotta go, Alex, we’ll be back in a couple days.”

“Love you,” I heard her say through the tinny speakers.

He leaned over and kissed the computer, whispered, “Love you, too,” and then he closed it. I shook my head and chuckled.

“Worst thing they ever did was give us internet access out here,” Kowalski said. “When I was in Iraq the first time around we had to wait six weeks before we called home. Now you talk to your girl every damn day.”

Dylan buckled his helmet. “Not enough,” he said.

“Let’s move, gentlemen,” I said. The three of them followed me out of the crappy little room into the freezing cold outside. The rest of the platoon was gathering, and a few moments later we were in a loose semi-circle around Sergeant First Class Colton and Lieutenant Eggers. Sergeant Hicks stood opposite me in the semi-circle, with his fire team arrayed around him. Hicks was maybe ten years older than me. Blonde, pale skin with an Irish face, Hicks was a native of the Virginia tidewater area and had served multiple combat tours. He didn’t hide his disdain for the fact that a college kid with less than two years in the Army was a fire team leader. I didn’t let it get to me. My guys trusted me; that was what mattered.

The forward operating base was nestled on the side of a mountain two hours north of Fayzabad in Badakhshan province, which is at the freaking end of the earth, on the northern edge of Afghanistan. We had two battalions of infantry stationed here, something close to 1,200 men and a few women spread across half a dozen forward operating bases ringing Fayzabad, the provincial capitol. We’d been holed up in the base for more than a week. Heavy snowfall had made it impossible to navigate even in the Humvees. Now, it was almost blinding white across the valley, and an ice-cold wind cut right through my gear.

The Lieutenant called out, “Listen up! Our objective today is Dega Payan. You guys know the village. We’re going out there at the request of the Provincial council because an avalanche has apparently buried half the village. Our mission is to help locate people, and to get anyone who needs medical care to the Air Force—they’ll be picking them up in choppers.”

As he spoke, he spread a map on the ground where we could all see it, indicating the landing zone for the Air Force, as well as the area where they believed the avalanche had covered homes.

‘Homes’ was a relative term. Dega Payan was a tiny little village at the end of a long road that had only been opened the year before. No electricity, a one-room school, no health clinic. We’d gone there once or twice a month since arriving in Afghanistan, usually taking along an extra medic or two. The people were friendly, relatively pro-western. Lots of kids. At the news that an avalanche had buried part of the village, I felt a chill.

When the Lieutenant was finished with his briefing, Sergeant Colton said, “Men, I know this is a humanitarian mission. But you go out locked and loaded and ready to fight. Protect each other. Stay safe. Clear?”

Most of the guys shouted, “Ooo rah!”

“Load up,” Colton said.

As we moved toward the Humvees, Staff Sergeant Martin, our squad leader, approached. Our platoon sergeant, Colton, was right behind him. “Sherman,” he called out.

A florid faced man who constantly fought weight problems, Martin had been a mentor and was becoming a friend. He and Colton both had served two tours in Iraq together and one in Afghanistan before this deployment.

I stopped and faced them.

 “Do me a favor,” Colton said. “Keep an eye on Roberts, all right. He got some bad news from home.”

“What’s going on, Sarge?”

Martin looked around to make sure we weren’t overheard, then said, “Sick kid. His son’s in the hospital.”

I grimaced. Roberts had already climbed in one of the Humvees with Paris.

“He didn’t say anything,” I said.

“Yeah, I don’t expect him to,” Martin replied.

Colton added, “We got a Red Cross message this morning. We’re standing by ... if it gets worse, we may end up sending him home for a while. I just want to make sure he’s steady, all right? You don’t need to say anything to him ... just keep an eye out, make sure he’s not distracted.”

I nodded.

“All right, let’s move out. And Sherman? You’ve been doing a great job. Keep it up.”

“Thanks, Sarge.”

We split up, and I climbed in the Humvee next to Kowalski. I appreciated the reassurance. I’d been promoted to Sergeant just a few weeks before, and became a fire team leader at the same time. I hadn’t been in the Army long, and sometimes I didn’t feel up to the responsibility.

Normally we rode four to a vehicle, but ever since second platoon lost three Humvees in a firefight and got stranded as a result, we’d been taking an extra set of wheels on every patrol. So, for this patrol, my fire team was split in two vehicles, Roberts and Dylan in one and me and Kowalski in the other.

A few minutes later we were on our way, the oversized tires crunching in the snow. Dega Payan was a three-hour drive under normal conditions. In this, it was going to take all day.

“Hey Sarge?”

“Yeah,” I said. It always unnerved me when Kowalski called me Sergeant or Sarge. When we met, I’d been a PFC out of basic training, and he’d been a grizzled staff sergeant with ten years under his belt. A DUI back at Fort Drum had seen him busted back to Private.

“Do me a favor,” he said. “I can’t ask the other guys, bunch of fucking numbskulls. I need to send a pic home of me wearing this ribbon for my little girl. Can you take a shot for me?”

“Yeah, sure,”