Champion

Chapter 4

10????MAR13 LOCAL

Approximately 2.5KM SW of ANA Lower Observation Post (OP) Jubai, Donga Province, Mukavia

There was a rock poking him in the face.

Also, his scalp felt like a million angry fire ants were crawling through his hair and biting him. And his head was pounding worse than the most painful migraine he had ever had. But, yeah, at the moment the most significant thing he could think of was there was a rock poking him in the face.

Why was a rock poking him in the face?

David wracked his throbbing skull for the answer to this conundrum. He was on a mission...something bad happened...he took a nap?

That wasn't right.

He had gotten knocked out. Wile E. Coyote had attacked them with ACME TNT.

Nope, still wrong. His team didn't have the Roadrunner in it. Can't blame the bird though, there was no reason for the Roadrunner to be in Mukavia. Wait a minute, Mukavia! He was on mission in Mukavia. The donkey, The Kid, THE IED!

David groaned as he rolled over to get away from the rock poking in his face, and cracked his eyes open. The light hurt his head even worse, but he needed to figure out what was going on. The first thing he saw was Mother, slumped over a rock ten feet away. As he continued to scan about he saw Hollywood, lying on his side, the Mk 48 on the ground in front of him. Further down the trail he saw Doc's body lying over Pappy's, where they had both died in the second surprise attack of the day.

David quickly turned his focus to the surrounding area. The three insurgents up the hill were still there, and they were definitely dead. Next, he checked the trails in both directions, but couldn't see movement either way. Finally, he looked down in the valley. It looked peaceful. A handful of Mukavians were walking back and forth along the roads and amongst the fields, but there was nothing hurried or fearful about their movements. Moving his head with caution, he cast his gaze a little closer and saw a puddle of blood on the ground where he had landed earlier. Realizing he probably had a head wound, he crawled slowly to the nearest rock formation that would best cover his movements from the valley and further up the mountain. Once there he took off his gloves and gingerly removed helmet. Pulling out his signal mirror, he checked to see how bad the damage was.

His helmet had saved his life, or damn near taken it, depending on your interpretation. A high velocity round had clipped the edge of the helmet in the back, and had then deflected it around the inside surface. The round had burrowed a trail across half his helmet before lodging in the interior side wall. The Kevlar weave was torn and deformed on the edge where the round had slipped in, and had bulged out the right temple where its path had finally halted. Checking himself in the mirror David discovered a path of clotting blood in his hair.

Looking at his watch he realized it was almost noon, and nearly four hours had passed while he was knocked out. He hoped the clotting would take care of the wound, but he also knew head wounds bled the worst. So he decided to treat it just in case. Opening his Individual First Aid Kit (IFAK), he looked for materials to care for the wound. Tearing open the package of Quick Clot infused sterile gauze; he carefully wrapped it around his head and taped the ends once he was finished. Closing the IFAK pouch he then put his helmet back on. It wasn't comfortable, but it would keep the bandage in place. It also might end up saving his life again today.

Self-aid complete, he went to check on the bodies of his teammates. Mother was draped across the rock he had been using as cover. As David got closer he noticed that Mother had been shot in the throat. From the sizes of entrance and exit wounds he surmised that Mother had been shot through the back of the neck, exiting through the jugular by a high caliber rifle round. Looking at where and how his body lay, David realized that the round had come from the south eastern edge of the village, 500 to 600 meters away. Looking that direction he saw a few houses scattered about, and realized a second shooter, or group of shooters, had been watching their team from one of the houses the whole time.

Next he moved to Epps' body. The captain had been shot four times, once in each leg, once in his left arm, and lastly in his left shoulder. David checked for a pulse hopefully, but found none. Epps had bled out, unable to treat all four wounds on his own. David stared at the guts of Epps' IFAK strewn around his body, shame and rage welling within him. His captain had died alone, needing his help, while he lay unconscious and useless twenty feet away. Unwilling to look at Captain Epps' body any longer, David walked further down the trail to Doc and Pappy. Doc had multiple bullet wounds on his body, and David refused to count them all. He had died trying to save his teammate, but had failed. The burst of AK fire that killed him had also killed Pappy.

Walking another twenty feet further down the trail to the final member of the team, David saw the body of Sergeant First Class Bragg next to the body of the interpreter Khan. He realized the team's other interpreter for this mission, Haseeb, was missing. He hoped the man had run off during the fighting, but suspected he had been a part of it. David had never felt totally comfortable around any of the interpreters, but he hated working with Haseeb. The man always reminded him of a ferret.

Moving back to his rucksack, he keyed his radio's mike to see if anyone could hear him now, but the radio wouldn't key a signal. Thinking the battery may have died he opened his rucksack to inspect it, and saw that the first burst of AK fire that had just missed him had hit something. His radio had a bullet hole in it, and small broken bits of electronics had been blown out the back of it. Tossing his rucksack down in disgust, he unclipped his rifle from his vest, and pulled the sling from his pocket. His little custom rig for his rifle worked great for a Fires Observer, who needed both hands free to call fire missions, but would also have to drop everything in a second to be able to return fire. Unfortunately it meant his rifle always got in the way if he wasn't holding it; and right now he had work to do.

Slinging his rifle over his back, he reached down and grabbed Bragg by his rucksack shoulder straps. He had to drag the deceased NCO along nearly forty feet of rocky trail, but refused to stop until he was resting next to Epps. He wondered why he was now thinking of them by name, and not nickname. He realized that he never really liked the nicknames Tongue-Punch and Hollywood. They were the products of crassness and jealousy respectively. He reflected on this as he dragged Doc's, and then SSG England's bodies back as well. Doc was just Doc. No one called him Specialist Simmons. Finally David stood next to Lieutenant Hilliard's body. No, he was still Mother. He cared about everyone on the team, wanted to see everyone succeed, and protected his team with his life. He would always be Mother to David. Unhooking Mother's rucksack, he lifted his teammate into a fireman's carry. He refused to drag his friend through the Mukavian dirt.

After laying his final teammate with the rest, he collected Mother's and Epps' rucksacks, setting them next to their motionless forms. Kneeling next to his fallen team he said a quick prayer, beseeching God to guide his friends to the next life and grant peace and comfort to their families. Then he wracked the patchwork pieces of his damaged brain to figure out a way out of this mess. Thinking deep thoughts was hard as hell when your head felt like it was being crushed in an industrial vice.

David thought about the mission plan. His team had been out of contact for over four hours, and their route was well known. By now aircraft should have been sent to find them, and had certainly seen their position. The QRF that responded to the attack on the lower OP should have already made it to his position. Where the hell are they? Did they get held up? Maybe the attack on the lower OP was bigger than I thought, David thought to himself. They don't even know I survived.

Realizing he needed more information, he decided to return to the lower OP and try to pick up a signal on one of the smaller MBITR radios as he got closer. He wouldn't go all the way in - he had no idea what he would walk into if he did - but he had to get close enough for radio range at least. He gathered what he would need to move back to the lower OP. He knew after six months in country most insurgent contact was at five hundred meters or greater. Before today he doubted there had been a firefight inside three hundred in years. Looking at his M4 and M9 he realized he was carrying the wrong weapons for a lone soldier strolling through the hills of Mukavia. He needed more range.

He looked over at Mother and Bragg. Bragg's M14 was deformed from the explosion, the scope shattered. Mother's rifle was a better choice. David had qualified with that exact rifle not two months ago. He picked it up, pulling back the operating rod and opening the breach. There was a round chambered, and the bolt moved smoothly. Closing the breach he hit the magazine release and checked the mag. It was mostly full. Pocketing it, he pulled a fresh mag from one of Mother's front vest pouches, and loaded it into the rifle. Mostly full wasn't full, and a full mag was how he was going to start this walk. Looking back at Mother and Bragg, he debated whether the M14 and two mags were enough. He doubted it. Then again he didn't exactly want to haul any more weight. His rucksack was too damn heavy as it was.

Casting his eyes towards the bane of his existence, he realized it didn't need to be that heavy. Pulling it toward him, he opened it and tossed out the PRC-117F radio with the bullet hole through it, and the eight spare 5590 batteries inside. Then he tossed all the food and water out of his bag, keeping two water bottles and two MREs. That was about forty pounds he didn't need any more. Besides, he still had three quarts of water in his Camelbak®.

Next he looked at the gear and equipment resting on the ground around him and his team. He needed to replace his M67 fragmentation grenade, and more ammo for the M14 was a priority too. Replacing his missing frag with SSG England's, he thought about the Mk 48. It was a dominant weapons system on the battlefield, but the 7.62mm linked ammo for it was extremely heavy and he wasn't sure how many rounds were left. Epps had been firing it pretty heavily when he went down.

Deciding it couldn't hurt to check; he picked up the weapon from beside Epps' body, and immediately noticed there was no ammo in it. Flipping up the feed tray, he racked the charging handle on the side and slid the bolt back to inspect the firing chamber. Everything looked good, just out of ammo. Setting the weapon down, he crouched over SSG England's rucksack and opened it.

On the very top lay twelve 7.62mm link 100 round ammo belts in tight rolls.Damn, he thought to himself, Pappy over packed too. Pulling out four, he decided to load one into the Mk 48 and carry it. He also grabbed ten M14 mags from Mother and Bragg, and the six M4 mags in Epps' chest pouches. He realized that the weight didn't balance out; when he loaded the extra linked ammo rolls and magazines in his rucksack. He was carrying more than he had before, but he was also going downhill now. He would rather have too much ammo, than run out now that it was just him. Thinking of this, he grabbed the last three frag grenades off of Mother, Bragg, and Epps, stowing them in his trouser pockets. Then he grabbed Epps' and Mother's M9s as well, tossing one in his ruck and tucking the other into the side of his IOTV. Lastly, he strapped his M4 and Mother's M14 to the top of his rucksack. Now he could suppress any enemy he came upon with the Mk 48 initially, then drop behind cover and switch weapons if he had to.

Thinking about his past briefings and responsibilities, he did his final duty for his team. Going from teammate to teammate, he pulled one of their two dog tags off the chain hanging around each one's neck; then he pulled the blood chit each one carried from their left sleeve pocket; and finally he removed their helmets, connecting the small Firefly strobe and 9V batteries that each one wore on the back. The strobes would light up like signal flares to any passing aircraft with night vision.