Hogs #4:Snake Eaters (10 page)

N
EAR AL-KAJUK, IRAQ

26
JANUARY 1991

1630

Captain Wong cast
an eye toward the dark speck in the sky to the west as he continued to talk to its pilot over the satellite system. The Hog was undoubtedly into its reserves and ought to head back to its re-supply base. But Captain Glenon was as stubborn as the dogs he’d been nicknamed for.

“There is no need for us to call a strike in on the mosque,” Wong told Doberman
speaking patiently into the Satcom’s retro-black-plastic and steel handset. The radio consisted of the control unit rucksack and an antenna “dish” that looked like a large X fashioned from thin, flat metal blades. “If the Iraqis follow their usual pattern, they will move the missiles as dusk fall, perhaps slightly afterwards. It will then be rather easy to attack them. I would expect an approximate time of 1900 hours.”

“Yeah, all right,” said Doberman. “I’ll be back.”

Wong shook his head. It wasn’t that he didn’t think Doberman could get back in time; on the contrary, given the legendary efficiency of the A-10A maintenance crews, not to mention Captain Glenon’s own snappy manner, he could undoubtedly rearm and return with four or five minutes to spare. The Hog, however, was not a night fighter; if the Iraqis deviated from their normal pattern he would have a difficult time locating his target, unless he managed to obtain infrared Mavericks during his reload. He was also flying without a wingman— a dubious situation at best.

Wong’s
preferred solution was to request fresh air support. But it was useless to argue with Doberman, who was even more cantankerous and aggressive than the normal Hog driver. Wong had a theory that this was due in large measure to his small stature— so little place to store the bad humors the body naturally accumulated.

He didn’t bother sharing the theory with Doberman, just as he did not bother telling him that he would, indeed, be calling for another flight of bombers. Instead he wished Devil One luck.

“Yeah. Be back,” said Doberman, almost cheerfully.

Wong shook his head at the speck of a Hog in the distance, already disappearing. Then he clicked off the circuit and turned back toward the communications specialist, intending to ask him to contact the AWACS.

The com specialist had his hands spread out wide. A few yards down the hill, six Iraqis were pointing guns at them. One of the soldiers gestured toward Wong, indicating that the captain should raise his hands and step away from the radio.

It seemed expedient to comply, and so he did.

LOST A
IRMAN

F
ORT APACHE

26
JANUARY 1991

1640

A
ir Force Technical
Sergeant Rebecca “Becky” Rosen plopped her tired body down against a Spec Ops rucksack and leaned against the inside wall of the shelter. For the first time since parachuting into Fort Apache, she had nothing to do— no Hog to fix, no Army helicopter to rebuild.

Fatigue surged over her like the green
-blue waves of the Atlantic, salty and cold, numbing her feet and stinging her nostrils. But as tired as she was, Rosen couldn’t allow herself to fall asleep. The unit was evacuating south as soon as night fell; she was afraid if she dozed off now she’d never manage to wake herself when needed. So she reached beneath her jacket and pulled out the small spiral-bound notebook she’d carried with her since coming to Iraq some weeks back. Rosen had been intending to keep a journal of the deployment but until now had only made three one-word notes, each for a different day, and each confined to the weather – rain, cold, clear, in that order. Folding the book open to a blank page, she retrieved a silver-plated Cross pen from her breast pocket, sliding her callused fingertips across the smooth metal.

The pen had been a present from a college professor, and she thought of him now, thought of his classes in Shakespeare and his funny pronunciations of words, a mix of British and down-home Texas. Shoehorning her studies around her duties as an Air Force NCO, Rosen had managed to
earn a degree in English literature. She didn’t care about the degree; she wasn’t going to do anything with it. But that was the point. Poetry and big books tickled a side of her she hadn’t realized existed until a friend talked her into signing up for a continuing-ed class so it wouldn’t be canceled for lack of students.

Becky Rosen was a mechanic. She saw things with her hands, whether they were Hog avionics systems or busted AH-6 engines. She’d been fixing things since she helped her uncle rebuild a Ford high compression 302 when she was seven. The real world was physical, in your face; Becky Rosen had overcome a for-shit childhood and done well, but she’d also had her fingers mashed, and a hell of a lot of worse, along the way.

Literature, poetry especially, seemed like an exotic vacation of dreams, relief from the real world’s fumes and acid. Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Donne, Pound, Whitman, Elliot — they were far-away lands she could disappear to. The harsh rhythms of Gerard Manley Hopkins, the delicate balance of Byron, the false bravado of Dylan Thomas— all offered shelter.

“Do not go gentle into that good night,” Dylan Thomas had told his father on his deathbed.

Rage against it. Rage against the finality. Scream against your fate.

Had Lieutenant Dixon screamed in that final moment before he’d been shot?

She saw Dixon now in the dirt on the hill next to Sugar Mountain, face-down, body limp, limbs askew. He’d been such a nice kid, quiet but brave. Or foolish, maybe— he’d volunteered as a forward ground controller, working with Delta Force behind the lines.

No more foolish than she’d been, volunteering for this mission. In her mind at
the time, there was no choice— she had been the only person at Al Jouf capable of getting the Special Ops helos back together. But a lot of people might think it foolish.

Definitely. To say nothing of being against regulations and probably the law.

Not the time or place to worry about it. Rosen twisted the pen carefully so the point extended. She began to write:

Jan. 25.

Iraq. How I got here is a long story. It started –

She held the pen up from the paper. There was always a possibility of being captured. She had to watch what she said.

Rosen scratched out the words and began again:

Jan. 25.

Iraq. How I got here is a long story, to be told later. All I can say is it was a hell of a trip.

I saw a dead man today, my first, believe it or not.

I loved him.

Tears erupted from her eyes and she began to shake uncontrollably.

She loved him?

Yes. She’d never admitted it until now, let alone told him or anyone else. But they’d kissed once, a moment stolen in the dark back at King Fahd.

They’d kissed.

The only time in the Air Force that she’d really, truly felt something like that, felt the steel hooks in her gut, felt love.

One kiss, all she had.

IRAQ

26 JANUARY 1991

1640

D
ixon knew it
was a Hog the instant he heard the sound, even though the plane was so far away the sound was less than a whisper. He froze, eyes upward, exposed near the highway he’d been following. The sound faded completely, a tease or a delusion.

Except he knew it wasn’t. He saw a dot passing in the sky overhead, far overhead.

A Hog. One of his squadron mates. Had to be.

And then it was gone. He stared upwards for a long time, more than a half hour, until he heard another sound, this one much closer. He turned his head and realized it was a truck, driving toward him.

Dazed by hunger and fatigue, it took forever for him to get his legs in motion. Dixon took a step in exactly the wrong direction, toward the highway. In agonizingly slow motion he twisted his body back, clutching the rifle to his belly. He spotted a clump of low trees ahead. The ground sloped upwards behind it into a large, squat hill, half-covered with vegetation. Another hill, this one much lower and nearly all rock and dirt, lay to the left. He could see the roof of a building beyond the trees as he ran, and realized the dirt included a dusty, primitive roadway.

His side hurt, but there was no choice but to keep running. He could hear the truck on the highway behind him slowing to a stop. He threw himself down as it whined into reverse.

Had they seen him? Dixon twisted around to look. The truck was coming in his direction over the dirt road, but it was still a good way off.

He had to assume they had seen him. In any event, if he stayed here very much longer they surely would. Perhaps with the shadows he might make the low trees without being seen.

Dixon pushed himself back to his feet, stooping forward as he ran. He made the trees, still unsure if he’d been seen. The truck was on the road, moving slowly, but still coming. A small house made of painted clay or cement lay on his right, ringed by upright stubs that could be parts of old trees or perhaps abandoned fence posts. The doorway was open; it looked empty. Dixon considered running for it but changed his mind. If they’d seen him, it would be the first place the people in the truck would stop.

The dirt road veered between the large hill on the right and the smaller one on the left. Fifty yards ahead up a bald slope on the left
, an old car sat near a dilapidated stone wall. Dixon pushed his rifle but into the stitch in his side and ran for it. The ground flew behind him. Pain and confusion narrowed his vision as he dove head first over the rocks, rolling in the dust, out of breath. His chest and throat heaved. He fought against the reflex and swung around, checking the AK-47’s clip as he leaned low against the rocks.

The truck, a pickup, steered gingerly along the road, dodging rocks. It was not only new
, it looked immaculate, the white body gleaming as if freshly waxed. It stopped in front of the house.

Dixon saw that
there were only two men inside. He might have a chance if they came for him.

They didn’t. The truck lurched forward, resuming its slow crawl around the rocks in the road. It began picking up speed as it followed the path around the base of the hill to the left.

Dixon waited until he could breathe normally again. Then he eyed the house carefully. He saw something move around the back, then realized there were animals there, two dogs and a goat. The dogs seemed to be tied to one of the stubby trees; the goat moved freely, though hardly at all, grazing on slivers of vegetation.

Food.

Someone would be inside the house.

The ground went up sharply behind the building, climbing through brush. There didn’t seem to be an easy way, though, to circle around
. He’d have to expose himself by walking along the road where the pickup truck had gone.

Better off going for it. Come straight in the front door, Hog style, gun ready.

He’d kill whoever was in there. No one was a civilian as far as he was concerned. No one. That was the way he had to think, had to act, if he was going to survive long enough to blow up those missiles. Otherwise, he might just as well shoot himself now and be done with it.

He’d never do that.

Dixon slid to his knees, stretching his arms out before him. A few low bushes and some sort of dilapidated plow lay between the road and the house. Neither they nor the narrow stubs of sticks would offer real cover.

If it he were back home in Wisconsin, there’d be a farmer, a wife, a kid or two inside. Cat to match the dogs, maybe two. They’d be preoccupied, getting dinner.

Dixon pushed himself to his feet, rifle propped in the crock of his elbow. He had the gun and his wits and his hunger. He moved slowly at first, then realized it was better to go quickly; he began to trot forward. If the open field gave him no cover, it meant none for his enemies either. He pointed the AK-47 at the doorway, eyes scanning back and forth across the front of the building, aware he could be attacked from the corners or the lone window.

Twenty yards from the house, he stopped. The dogs began to bark, but he could tell they weren’t barking at him. They’d run behind the house, had seen or smelled something more interesting than him.

Dixon crouched, waiting for something to happen. The small house had no telephone wires, no power lines, no antenna that he could see. No house in America would be this small. Its walls were the color of the dirt— light brown with tinges dark brown, streaks of blood that had dried.

Something moved behind the window. Dixon raised his rifle, waited.

Nothing.

A shadow, or his imagination.

He got out of the crouch, began walking forward, gun moving slowly back and forth across the face of the building, ready.

Nothing.

The dogs had stopped barking around the back.

A figure appeared in the doorway.

It was a woman in a long, dirty white dress. She looked across the yard directly into his eyes, locking him with his stare.

Part of him truly meant to shoot her. Part of him truly realized that he had no friends here, that he could not afford to think of anyone as a civilian.

A larger part could not find the will to squeeze the trigger. He stood stock still, gun lowered to the ground.

The woman raised her right hand. His first thought was that she had a gun. Then he saw she was simply gesturing, raising both arms as if to plead with him.

For help? To come? To go?

In the next instant, Dixon dove to the ground, ducking as gunfire erupted from behind and inside the building.