Kaboom (9 page)

In the limp, ambiguous darkness of the hours between midnight and dawn, I could only discern the outline of my soldier's shape three feet away. We were on the roof of the combat outpost, overwatching the slums of Saba al-Bor, making small talk to distract from the chill of the night. Due to his contagious good nature and quick wit, Private Van Wilder had become a leader for the Joes from the day he showed up at our unit onward. I had hurled the awkwardly vague blanket question of “How are things going in the platoon, from your perspective?” at him. His quick reply had been what I should've expected—brief and upbeat.

“Would you tell me if it wasn't?” I asked with a scoff, hoping to recover from my initial statement's idiocy. Like most junior officers who didn't drip with careerist aspirations, I always liked to project myself as a platoon leader who kept it real, and I was more than aware that my first question betrayed far too much self-awareness for an army man
.
Being a platoon leader was sometimes a very lonely position, as I was stuck between an immovable force (common sense) and an unstoppable power (Higher). Luckily, my soldiers laughed along with me as I learned to navigate this murky divide, rather than resenting their platoon leadership, as I saw happen in other line platoons.

“Ehh, probably not, sir,” Private Van Wilder replied, in his terse Texan drawl. “It ain't your fault though—I just think Staff Sergeant Boondock would kill us if we didn't go through him first, you know?” I thought over his response and came to terms with the honest nature of it. After all, the bone marrow of the military was a rigid and clear chain of command that was only to be violated under the most extreme conditions. If my soldiers understood this, then I guessed I had found the answer to my initial question, however indirectly.

The same conclusion was found on the other side of the roof with PFC Cold-Cuts, albeit in a much different and more forthcoming manner. This young Gravedigger motormouthed his way through a multitude of subjects in only thirty or so minutes, including, but not limited to, why he believed America was in Iraq; why he didn't like being in his wife's doghouse; which members of the platoon he thought missed their families the most; what he
remembered from the Iraq history classes I had conducted for the platoon in the months leading up to our deployment; what he did not remember from those classes; how good his unborn son would be at high school football; how funny it was when Staff Sergeant Bulldog told him, “Damn it, Cold-Cuts, you ain't allowed to call hajjis ‘hajjis' no mor'”; why the Iraqi men were so interested in his blonde hair and blue eyes; how much he wanted to take Suge back to Hawaii with us when we redeployed; and why he could tell which Iraqi police were crooked just by looking at them. All the while he patted his crew-serve machine gun, which sat behind a drooping camo net, something that masked all the weapons' positions on the four corners of the roof.

I wasn't sure whether I needed to hug him or drop him to the ground to do push-ups when, after I announced my intention to move elsewhere in our security posture, he patted me on the back and said, “You're doing great, sir. Thanks for checking on us, but don't worry so much. We're all fine.” I managed a laugh and told PFC Cold-Cuts that I appreciated his endorsement, as I would now be able to sleep soundly at night. This unleashed a fresh set of giggles from him. I continued on with my rounds.

Judging from the snapping of his body when I put my hand on his shoulder, I could tell I had startled Private Romeo when I walked up on him. He and Specialist Flashback stood together in a comfortable silence, one that I joined them in. They were providing security to the west, over the IP station that had been overrun by Sadrist militiamen in 2004, during the Mahdi Army's initial rebellion, and again in 2006, during Saba al-Bor's sectarian wars. The only activity in front of the police station on this night was a pair of humping dogs that three Iraqi policemen kept throwing rocks at.

I thought about quizzing my soldiers on their sectors of fire but decided not to insult their intelligence—they had already pulled this shift enough times and been asked that same exact questions enough times to have their sectors memorized. Few things kill morale the way the Jerry's Kids treatment does. Specialist Flashback eventually looked over at me and asked, “The TOC [tactical operations center] driving you crazy again, sir?”

I nodded and uttered a simple, “Uh huh.” The TOC was technically my designated place of duty for the graveyard shift—a place where the telephone rang incessantly, the radios spouted like a broken water-sprinkler system, and the madness never ended. I had slipped out while three Headquarters platoon NCOs—one Puerto Rican, one Panamanian, and one Mexican—argued heatedly in Spanish about whose respective nation's females deserved
the title of “Hottest Latinas.” While certainly an appealing subject, it had lost its appeal when I couldn't follow the various points and counterpoints being made. I had subsequently sought refuge up on the roof.

“I hate going in there,” Private Romeo said. “SFC Big Country sent me in there last week to get a fresh battery for a walkie-talkie, and I almost ran over the sergeant major. He yelled at me for not shaving. I told him that we had just got back from an all-night OP and that I was going straight onto security, and then he told me, ‘Excuses are like assholes,' and that a good soldier would bring a razor on his mission. What does that even mean?”

“I think he meant, ‘Excuses are like assholes: Everyone has one,'” Specialist Flashback explained.

“Oh.” If possible, Private Romeo was even more irritated with the sergeant major's comment now. “I guess that makes sense.”

“That's the one good thing about night around here,” Specialist Flashback said. “At least it's just us Bravo Troopers at night.” He turned to me and smiled. “Wouldn't you agree, sir?”

I bit my lip and smirked. It probably wasn't too hard to discern how I felt about these matters, and with Specialist Flashback being my driver, thus privy to my more unplugged moments, he already knew the answer to his question. Now, though, I had a moment to collect my thoughts, and in the name of professionalism, I resisted the urge to be too honest with my guys. “I don't know what you mean,” I eventually replied. “The best part about nighttime is talking to Staff Sergeant Bulldog when he's trying to sleep.”

A burst of automatic weapons fire rippled through the night in the distance, toward the northeast, somewhere in the Sunni sector. We all shifted instinctively toward that direction, waiting for a succeeding burst. None came. Private Van Wilder called across the update on the radio, boredom saturating every word of the report. This was Iraq. Gunfire happened at night. Gunfire happened every night.

“And that,” I continued, “that's the other best thing about nighttime.”

Shortly thereafter, I ambled over to Sergeant Spade's sergeant-of-the-guard position at the base of the entryway to the roof. Sergeant Spade demonstrated all the traits of a model scout—an aloof and serene temperament, a set of stabbing eyes, a casual naturalness with the rifle that hung at the low-ready like a third arm, and a big wad of dip tucked deeply into one of his cheek pouches.

“You in charge of this circus?” I asked, approaching the crouching shadow.

“You know it,” came the reply, slightly slurred, due to the dip. He spat into the darkness before continuing, nodding down at Saba al-Bor. “Nothing doing, tonight, except for that shit five minutes ago. Too cold.”

“Yeah, well, it's too cold for me too, but somehow I'm still wandering around on a rooftop in Iraq in the middle of the night.”

He nodded. “This place isn't like it was the first time I was here,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

“I'm not sure yet.” He shrugged his shoulders. “Ask me again in a few months.”

“Everything good with the guys?” I asked. “I tried asking a couple of them, but all I got was the rehearsed ‘Yes, sir! Absolutely, sir!' that you NCOs teach them to say to officers.”

Sergeant Spade chuckled. “Yeah, LT, they're good. There have been some squabbles and shit, but that's normal.” His words proved prophetic. Over the course of fifteen months, there were some arguments and even a few fistfights within the platoon, but nothing too serious. Things like that were bound to happen with nineteen- and twenty-year-old kids cooped up together constantly, under the stresses of combat, for well over a year. It was usually kept in-house, with punishments doled out by NCOs who kept their understanding—and amusement—to themselves.

After leaving my gunner at his post, I walked downstairs and back outside to the front gate, where Sergeant Axel, Specialist Big Ern, and Private Das Boot were manning the main entry control point (ECP). A maze of crisscrossing razor concertina wire led up to the gate, with imposing T-wall barriers stacked on both sides of the entryway. Sergeant Axel and Specialist Big Ern leaned against a Humvee parked at the gate, while Private Das Boot sat up in the vehicle's gunner's cupola, diligently manning a long-barreled 50-caliber machine gun. His long legs forced the tops of his knees out of the hatch, and he compensated by bending his back forward, hunching over the weapon. This had not gone unnoticed by the other two Gravediggers.

“He looks like a crawdad in a tree up there, doesn't he, sir?” Specialist Big Ern said, using an Appalachian analogy I was unfamiliar with.

“Uhh, sure, absolutely,” I said. “How's it going down here?”

Sergeant Axel, still laughing about Specialist Big Ern's Carolina slang, said, “We're good, LT. No visitors since Colonel Mohammed, Boss Johnson, and all of the other sheiks left a few hours ago.”

“Right on. How much longer until the next shift comes on?”

Sergeant Axel checked his watch. “One more hour,” he said. “One more glorious hour with Big Ern and the Big Soviet here!”

Private Das Boot snorted from above us, offended, as he always was when called a Russian. “I am German and American,” he said. “Both sides of me hate the Russians.”

“Not as much as you hate the Turks, though. Right, Das Boot?” asked Specialist Big Ern. “Remember what Staff Sergeant Boondock taught us about embracing the hate!” He then threw the revolution fist—recently rechristened in Staff Sergeant Boondock's section as the hate fist—straight into the air. It was common to see said hate fist during fragos, early mornings, and long, unending nights.

Private Das Boot gave this some serious thought. “Hmm. I do not know,” he said. “That's tough. I guess they are the same?”

“What about the Estonians?” I asked. It was an honest question, as I was genuinely unfamiliar with Germany's relationship with its Baltic neighbor. Unfortunately, my history question would have to be answered another day, as bringing up the Stones led to another hot topic for my soldiers.

“I know I love that female Stone,” Private Das Boot said, a grin spreading lustfully across his face. “There is nothing hotter than a beautiful woman with a gun.”

“Get it!” Sergeant Axel yelled, encouraging our young soldier's fantasy. “Get after it, Das Boot, like the dirty Kraut you are!” Despite his front, Private Das Boot had still been too shy even to talk to the female Estonian soldier who occasionally dropped by our combat outpost. Everyone in the platoon figured he had an in being a fellow Euro and all, but none of us had any experience with Estonian women, either, so no one was too confident with that scheme. He kept saying he would give her his MySpace profile link, but such a prolific step in relationship development had yet to occur.

I checked my watch and realized I'd been gone from the TOC for more than two hours; consequently, I told Sergeant Axel to radio me if they needed anything and headed back into the combat outpost away from the pale moon and into a bastion of artificial heat. In the TOC, the three Headquarters platoon NCOs sat around playing cards, their Hottest Latinas debate apparently settled. “Everything okay out there, sir?” one of them asked. “No need to sound the alarms for the Alamo Drill?”

I shook my head and reached for the coffee pot. “Just another quiet night,” I said. “Nothing doing.”

It was the day after
the great red dust storms ended, a little more than a week after our squadron lost its first soldier to a deep buried IED in the farmlands west of Saba al-Bor. I lay in bed, staring at the wall from the top bunk, basking in the rarest of days—one in which I could sleep in. I thought about nothing and how awesome it was to think about nothing and how if life went well, nothing wouldn't be so rare anymore. The gears of my mind were just beginning to grind toward muscle movement, mainly a product of memory rather than a conscious decision, when SFC Big Country barreled through the door.

“The IA got Mohammed Shaba!” he said, staying just long enough to drop off his now empty mug of coffee. Just like that, he was gone, I was back in Iraq, and my nothingness had burst like a star cluster, illuminating all kinds of gut-wrenching, hidden somethings back into plain sight. I cursed to myself, slapped myself in the face, and hopped off the top bunk. The nothingness was now gone. Maybe next lifetime, I thought to myself.

So, they got the Ghost. Saba al-Bor's native son, a known terrorist and wanted murderer, had been a general thorn in the side of Coalition forces for the better portion of the past year. Much of his celebrity status was overblown, mainly due to his self-designated nickname, which translated to either Mohammed the Ghost or Mohammed the Shadow, depending which terp had been asked. Nevertheless, Higher had longed after this JAM insurgent in a manner that bordered on Brokeback. Capturing him was a public relations dream, if not a key strategic blow for Shia extremism in our area. The Gravediggers had already been on a few boondoggles going after him, but we were always a room away, ten minutes late, or finding his grandfather with a full piss bag but without a grandson. When Mohammed Shaba missions came down, it usually felt like we were hunting a black dog in the night. These experiences weren't isolated to just our platoon; they encapsulated all of Bravo Troop's bouts with the Ghost. And now the Iraqi army had him. Sure, I was shocked, but good for the IA, I thought. That was what we were aiming for, after all—a self-sustaining Iraqi security force.