Parker's Folly (7 page)

“Next time don't forget to bring your own ammo and we won't have to, Jar Head,” the Airman shot back. Rivalry between the services often led to the exchange of insults, and sometimes bar fights.

“Knock off the chatter and get the lead out, Marines,” yelled the Gunny, ending the inter-service banter. “Thank you, Lieutenant. Hmm, sixteen hundred rounds of linked and 5,040 rounds in stripper clips, I wonder who they think we are going to fight out here?”

“Not my department, Sergeant,” the Air Force Officer called as he climbed back into the idling Humvee.  “Good luck, whatever it is.”

Rodriguez waved at the departing fly boys and started walking back to the Osprey. “Corporal Sizemore! Where are my Marines?”

The beefy Corporal stepped around the front of the aircraft and shouted back “Kato and Doc White went off in search of some snow cones or something, Gunny.” Referring to PFC Herman “Kato” Kwan and HM2 Belinda “Betty” White. The Marine Corps has no medical personnel of its own, relying instead on the United States Navy Hospital Corps for medics and doctors. Technically, corpsman White was not a Marine but a Navy sailor. Her rate and rating were Petty Officer 2nd Class and Hospital Corpsman, the medic equivalent of a Marine Sergeant.

Hospital Corpsmen serve as enlisted medical specialists for both the Navy and Marine Corps. Navy corpsmen, traditionally called “Doc” by Marines, are highly skilled and are often deployed in the absence of a licensed doctor as Independent Duty Corpsmen. In fact, White, with skills in demand in the civilian market, was the only one in the squad who was leaving the service voluntarily. She had also volunteered to come on the air show mission, seeing it as a last, safe adventure before leaving military life behind.

Before the rise of
irregular warfare
and
low intensity conflicts,
corpsmen wore a red cross armband and went unarmed. Nowadays, when corpsmen accompany combat units they dress in the same uniforms as the Marines around them so as not to present an inviting target to the enemy. They are armed and virtually indistinguishable from regular combat Marines, except for the extra medical equipment they carry.

“Find 'em. Now!”
I got a bad feeling about this,
the Gunny thought to herself. “Feldman, Washington. Go find the Lieutenant, I sense a large turd heading toward the fan.”

“Belay that, Gunny. Here comes the LT now,” Cpl Sizemore yelled over his shoulder, and then hustled off toward the concession stands in search of the two missing squad members.

* * * * *

The MV-22 had just finished a short taxi to the active runway, getting clear of the milling airshow crowds in front of the hangars. The flight crew was running down their pre-flight checklist and throttling the engines up to full power, testing them before taking off.

After getting Lt.
Merryweather and the two lost sheep back on board the Osprey, the Lieutenant was briefed over the radio by some officer at the Pentagon with the Gunny
listening in. Evidently
the Chair Force had detected a nuclear bomb, or nuclear rocket or a nuclear
something
in an old blimp hanger somewhere west of San
Angelo. Since West Texas was the asshole of nowhere, the nearest military unit to this threat to national security was her pathetic little band of Marines, commanded by the befuddled Lt. Merryweather.

“Sir,” the Gunny said to the LT over the Osprey's intercom. “If you would like to stay in touch with HQ on the radio, I'll brief the men.”
Please, let him take the bait.
The last thing she need was this REMF confusing her Marines with some scatterbrained John Wayne speech.

“Uh, yes Sergeant. That would be fine.”  Merryweather was a communications officer, stationed at Goodfellow for crypto training—he was in over his head and he knew it. He was more than happy to let the Gunnery Sergeant handle the taking of the objective—and dealing with the men.

“Thank you, Lieutenant.” She handed the intercom headset back to the Osprey's loadmaster, who was standing beside the LT.
Thank God for that, at least he isn't one of those over eager, get everyone killed types. The Gunny made her way back to the squad, seated along the sides of the cargo area on canvas backed, fold down jump seats. The Marines all looked up at her expectantly,
awaiting
The
Word
.
Heaven help us, I think we are about to be slipped the big green weenie.

“OK, heads up people. We are en route to a ranch about 35 minutes from here where we will take and hold a large hanger. The hanger is approximately 500 feet long by 150 feet wide. We will enter through doors on the southern side, which are hidden from the ranch house by the hanger structure. Once inside the building, we will secure any scientific apparatus, aeronautical vehicles or, I shit you not, rocket ships we find.” The last statement brought a number of exclamations from the squad. Ignoring their questions Rodriguez forged ahead.

“HQ does not know what kind of stuff we will find when we take the hangar, but the rumor is that some old coot is building himself a rocket ship. Regardless of what we find, we will secure the building and hold it until relieved by federal officials who are en route to the target site.

“We will be going in hot, so fill your magazines from the ammo cans the Zoomies brought us.” The squad was armed with M4A1 Carbines, a shorter and lighter version of the old familiar M16A2 assault rifle. Since they were out to impress the locals at the air show, they had been issued Special Operator versions of the carbine with the Close Quarters Battle Receiver (CQBR) upper and CompM2 red dot reflex sights. Most had forward handgrips but Sizemore and Reagan snagged weapons with M320 grenade launchers mounted under their barrels. Unfortunately, the fly boys didn't have any 40mm grenades for the launchers, but they still looked mean.

Washington, because of his size, was issued an M246 Squad Automatic Weapon, or SAW, a light machine gun that could use standard 30 round magazines or belted ammo. With a 200 round magazine attached a SAW weighed more than ten kilos, add a couple of spare mags and it took a large Marine to haul it around. In all, the squad looked ready for action, but the magazines they carried in their vests were empty and only there for show. Until now.

“OK, Sizemore, Reagan, pass out the ammo,” they were setting closest to the ammo cans. “I want everyone to have a full ammo load when we go in. Don't leave none of it behind. And Corporal, distribute the extra SAW mags among the riflemen. You never know when you're going to need more ammo and we will not be able to run back to the Osprey to fetch more.”

Standard 5.56mm ammo came in ten round stripper clips, three  clips to a cardboard carton, four cartons to a 4 pocket bandoleer, for a total of 120 rounds per bandoleer, which also included a speedloader for getting the rounds from the stripper clips into a magazine. Seven such bandoleers were packed into each M2A1 ammo can. Each squad member was carrying eight or ten 30 round magazines that needed to be filled using the 10 round stripper clips. The Marines got busy filling mags under the watchful eye of the Gunny.

Rodriguez loaded her own mags and then stuffed a number of three clip cartons into her vest pockets. She also loaded her 9mm side arm—the Zoomies had been kind enough to include 10 preloaded magazines for the standard 9mm Beretta. After a moment's hesitation she turned to the Lieutenant who was now sitting next to her. “Pistol ammo, Sir” she explained, handing him four of the magazines. He quickly shoved the magazines into his vest pockets and turned back to the face the cockpit.

At that moment, the Osprey pilot began a short roll take off.
Well, here we go, and I thought this was going to be a nice boring mission.
The Gunny sat back and closed her eyes. As the Osprey cleared the runway, the pilot, probably showing off for the air show crowd, jinked hard to starboard and gave the big tilt-rotor her head. Several Marines were still in the process of using speed loaders to fill their mags when the sudden maneuver took them by surprise. Sanchez somehow managed to lose a full clip of ammo, spilling the loose rounds onto the deck of the cargo compartment.

The pilot jinked again, like he was flying a combat mission, and the rounds rolled across the deck. “Secure that ammunition, Marine! You think this is a fuckin' school bus, Sanchez?” the Gunny bellowed.
Well that made it official, the goatfuck was turning into a cluster-fuck.

Ascending the three steps to the interior of the “mess,” the tour group gazed upon what looked like an upscale lounge and restaurant. The room stretched from one side of the ship's hull to the other, the walls curving upward at either side to a high ceiling with hanging accent panels. A sinuously curving bar divided the dining area on the left from the lounge on the right. Small overhead trac lighting set an intimate mood and, in the far corner, a baby grand piano completed the effect. JT panned the room with his camera and Susan commented. “Looks like the passengers will be riding in style, this is plush.”

“The owner is partial to jazz music, fine dining and he really enjoys drinking,” Lt. Curtis said with mock solemnity. “Here, let me show you something you might want to film.” Moving over to the bar, the First Officer reached behind the counter and threw a switch. On the starboard wall a large oval window uncovered, like the nictitating membrane retracting over a raptor's eye. As with the
‘
glass
’
bow of the ship, the window comprised a number of individual curved transparent panels, separated by thin arcing silver strips. The interior of the hangar could be seen through the art deco window panes.

“Wow, that's fantastic,” JT said, walking farther into the room, panning at the same time.
This was more like it,
he thought. He had been worried that the whole ship was going to be nothing but cargo space and boring hallways. “Just imagine having a drink at the bar while the rings of Saturn slide by outside.”

 “Why Mr. Taylor, you sound like you would like to come along.”

“Don't encourage him. He has a Master's degree in astronomy,” Susan interjected, causing the First Officer to cast a reappraising look in JT's direction. “Besides, then I'd have to find a new camera man and good ones are very hard to find.”

JT was oblivious, enraptured by the idea of standing in front of that window, peering out at the Universe. “Come on, Miss Susan, you wouldn't want to be on board for the first flight? It would be the scoop of the century.”

“I think I would rather be on the
second
flight, JT.” Susan smiled at her cameraman to show she was just teasing him. It was
then that
she spotted the strange figure heading toward them from the front of the lounge. “I think we have company,” she said to the others.

As the figure drew near, the person in question proved to be a short, wiry man with weathered, Sun darkened skin. He was wearing a jumpsuit much like Lt. Curtis, except his was dark blue. On his head was a matching dark blue baseball cap with a strange insignia on the front. His age was indeterminate, but he was definitely not young. A wrinkle creased Lt. Curtis' brow as she turned to face the approaching little man, her hands clasped behind her back.

“Chief Zackly, what mission lends such urgency to your steps?”

“Egh?” The man in blue halted in front of the First Officer, his self absorbed trance broken. “Oh its you, Ma'am. I got a couple o' shitbirds rattling around on the lower deck. Must'a been on board when the Captain told the rest it was beer o'clock. Damn civilians!”

Lieutenant Curtis inclined her head toward the two news people standing to her right. Again she did the Mr. Spock raised eyebrow trick. The figure in blue braced, coming to attention.

“Beg pardon Ma'am,” the little man nearly shouted, “no offense intended.” Then added more softly, “Captain said I gotta' get 'em off the ship, Ma'am.”

“Yes, of course Chief. Carry on.”

The little man resumed his journey aft, leaning forward as if against a gale. “That was Chief Zackly, the senior boatswain's mate, ... well actually, he is the only boatswain's mate.”

“He doesn't seem to hold civilian's in very high regard.” mused JT, “and what's a
‘
shitbird
’
?”

“It is a derogatory term for shipyard workers used by Navy enlisted personnel. We had been running some power system tests earlier and the Captain told the construction workers they could leave for the day”

“OK, now that makes sense. Beer o'clock I understood.”

“I'm surprised he didn't salute you, Lieutenant,” Susan added.

“The Navy does not generally render the hand salute indoors. Because we work in tight quarters, constantly having to salute would be far too disruptive. Besides, this is a civilian vessel. Let's continue on to the bridge and see if the Captain is free for your interview,” the First Officer said, closing the large view port and then indicating the way forward.

The pilot of the Osprey signaled that they were 15 minutes out from the objective. GySgt Rodriguez sighed a deep, inward sigh.
How could this have happened on her last weekend in the Corps?
Drug out of a nice warm rack at o'dark hundred to lead a squad of screw-ups on a dog and pony show mission at an air show, only to have the mission turn into a real air assault, with live ammo. Commanded by a Lieutenant who was really a crypto clerk, she and eight washouts were about to assault a gigantic hangar in the middle of the West Texas scrub.
Well, never a dull day in the Corps.

“OK Marines, listen up. We are 15 minutes from the objective and this is how things are going to work. When we disembark, Corporal Sizemore, take Feldman, Washington and Kwan to the Left. You will be with Lieutenant Merryweather. Davis, Reagan, Sanchez and White, you're with me on the right. We will fan out and secure the LZ. If there is no enemy contact, we will proceed to the doors on the side of the building, assuming they actually exist” They were working off of intel from old construction plans some REMF had dug out of the Navy archives.