The Line bo-2

by Bob Mayer

  She was only about five feet, four inches tall, but she carried herself with a swagger, her slender form bopping about as she restlessly scanned the terminal.

  The young sergeant looked uncertainly at the milling group of people.

  Boomer appreciated her predicament. If used to be easy to spot male military types by their haircut when he first came on active duty in 1981. He remembered when soldiers in his first unit, an infantry platoon at Fort Riley, Kansas, wore wigs when they went into town off duty, anything to hide the distinctive short hair of the military.

  Nowadays though, short was in and the sergeant was uncertain who to approach, her eyes flitting from man to man. She in turn was getting a few appreciative glances from some of the men.

  Boomer let her wait until his OD green bags came up the chute and he grabbed them. The sergeant took that as a cue and ambled over.

  “Major Watson?” she asked, taking in the longer-than regulation hair and civilian clothes.

  “Yep,” Boomer said, shouldering his ruck and getting a closer look at her shining dark eyes.

  To Boomer’s surprise, the sergeant grabbed the duffle bag, easily chucking the heavy bag over one shoulder.

  “This way, sir. I got my car parked in the red zone. Colonel Palk took us on a long run this morning, and I didn’t get done at the gym and everything until real late so I didn’t catch your plane coming in.”

  “No problem,” Boomer said.

  “I wasn’t going anywhere.”

  “The XO — that’s Colonel Falk — got you a room at the guest house,” the sergeant added as she led the way out of the building.

  “It’s good till tomorrow, then you’re probably going to have to go out on the economy or maybe Tripler might have something.”

  A firered Camaro was parked illegally and the sergeant popped the trunk and deposited the duffle bag, filling the trunk.

  “Put that in the back seat,” she instructed.

  Boomer complied and settled into the passenger seat. As the woman started the engine, he leaned over and stuck his hand out.

  “Major Boomer Watson.”

  The sergeant was briefly startled, then smiled, a smooth row of white teeth showing up against her dark skin.

  “Shit, sir, I’m sorry. Sergeant Vasquez. Everybody’s jumping through their ass in the tunnel and I guess my head’s kind of out of it.”

  “The tunnel?” Boomer inquired as Vasquez peeled away from the curb and roared into traffic, ignoring the bleating of horns.

  “Yes, sir. That’s where we work. A system of tunnels built at the beginning of World War II. They cut right into one of the old lava flows. It’s pretty neat. Actually there’s three tunnels altogether that make up our place. They’re all connected.”

  “What’s everyone jumping about?”

  Vasquez looked at Boomer as if he had just come from the Australian outback.

  “The President’s visit. The whole Pearl Harbor gig. Security’s going to be tighter than a frog’s asshole. Especially now that the Iraqis are making a stink again, and all that crap with the Ukrainians. It’s just a big mess. Hell, for all we know the sons-of-a-bitches have got a bomb now. There’s speculation in the paper about what would happen if one went off here in Oahu while the President was here.”

  Boomer had forgotten much of that, not that the isolated launch base in Turkey had offered much in the way of current news. The President was due to arrive in Hawaii the following week to commemorate the fifty-fourth anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. The word in the media was that he would use the occasion to make a speech concerning the MRA — Military Reform Act — that his party had just squeaked through Congress and which was awaiting debate in the Senate.

  Boomer had barely followed the heated coverage, although even a casual observer knew that the military as a whole was violently opposed to the act.

  He’d had more pressing problems on his mind the last six months, like staying alive and keeping his men alive.

  Vasquez pointed to a massive building on the hillside far above the highway.

  “That’s Tripler Army Hospital. Fort Shafter’s just ahead.” She jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

  “I guess you saw Pearl and Hickam Airfield on the way in.”

  “Yeah,” Boomer acknowledged.

  “What do you do at the TASOSC?”

  “I’m in Intelligence. I interpret imagery and do target folders. I did the folders on the radar sites that got hit by the Apache helicopters on the first day of the air war during Desert Storm,” she added proudly.

  “The first shots of the war were fired using my stuff.”

  Boomer smiled to himself. He couldn’t tell her that he’d been in Iraq on the ground long before those Apaches from the 1st Battalion of the 101st Airborne let loose their Hellfire missiles, officially beginning the war. One thing he had learned about the military: the need to feel like an important piece of the overall machine. Boomer recognized the reality that the military, by being the largest “corporation” in America, had so many pieces that almost everyone was a minor and relatively insignificant cog. And now that organization was facing major restructuring.

  “How does everyone feel about the MRA?” Boomer asked.

  Vasquez barked a short laugh.

  “Sir, you want to get in a fight, you mention those three letters around anyone in uniform. When it was the gays in the military thing a couple of years ago there were still a lot people who actually didn’t give a shit. Live and let live they thought. But there’s enough bullshit in the MRA that everyone’s got something to be ragged off about, including the total drop of the gay un acceptability thing.

  “You got the Marines about ready to bust a gut’cause of the part that wants to integrate the Corps into the Army.

  Same with all the pilots being pissed about being made into one branch.

  You name the person and the act affects them somehow. We been downsizing and cutting back for years now, and now they hit us with this! Those fucking civilians in Washington don’t understand.”

  Boomer settled back in the bucket seat and watched the countryside as Vasquez bitched on about the act, her language quite worthy of any infantry sergeant. He hadn’t been too worried about the act himself, but now he wondered if he ought to be. Even with all the cuts coming in the Army he was pretty confident that Delta and Special Operations overall would not be cut. No matter what the world situation or level of “peace,” Special Operations always had a real world job to do, as evidenced by his most recent missions in the Ukraine.

  He had heard some rumbles that the Joint Chiefs of Staff were not keen on keeping Special Operations forces up to strength while having to cut their own prized Army divisions, aircraft carrier groups, and Air Force squadrons.

  Boomer had been exposed to the regular Army’s distaste for Special Forces from the moment his infantry battalion commander had told him his Army career was over when Boomer filed a 4187 form requesting Special Forces training in 1983.

  In those days Special Forces was truly a bastard stepchild.

  There was no Special Forces branch and any officer taking an assignment in the Green Berets threw his “career track” off the beaten path. In 1987, when Special Forces had finally been recognized as a separate branch by the Army, after great pressure from Congress, Boomer had been proud to pin on the crossed arrows that adorned the right collar of his battle dress uniform. In fact, nearly every major reform in favor of Special Operations Forces had required the passage of a law by Congress, which in turn had to be crammed down the throats of the reluctant conventional military leaders.

  The other issue in the MRA that was causing a great amount of consternation was the proposal to basically eliminate the three service academies by converting them into one-year officer basic schools for all officers upon commissioning from ROTC or OCS programs. Boomer could well imagine the ulcers that was causing among most of his fellow graduates of West Point. He himself wasn’t too sure it was a bad
idea, considering the discrepancy in cost between a West Point graduate and an ROTC officer, and the small, if any, difference between the two once they were in the Army.

  The Academy had been founded when there was no other way to produce quality regular Army officers. Today that wasn’t the case. Of course.

  Boomer also had to admit that he would have had a most difficult time getting a college education if he had not been able to attend the Academy.

  In the years since graduation, though. Boomer realized more and more that he had paid for his four-year education in a currency more valuable than coin. He had paid with some of his heart and soul. He could see that most clearly when he looked at others his own age who had attended a “regular” college.

  Vasquez took an exit off the highway and was waved through the gate to Fort Shafter by an MP. A sign just inside warned all visitors that they were subject to search and that they had basically surrendered most of the basic rights guaranteed by the Constitution simply by crossing the invisible line separating the state of Hawaii from federal land.

  A military post is a world unto itself and basically selfcontained.

  Boomer had once been on temporary duty (TDY) at a remote base in Korea and had met people who had never been outside the gate into the Korean community other than passing through on a military transport bus. They lived for an entire year within the fence surrounding the compound.

  Military people were a curious combination of world-traveler — even the lowest ranking person usually having lived overseas — and xenophobic isolationist. It was not unusual for the highest-ranking general to have no idea what it meant to live in a community with people of different beliefs and occupations or have to deal with such civilian matters as having to pay health insurance.

  Boomer took in Fort Shafter, correlating it to the map he had casually studied on the plane coming in. The major populated area of Oahu ‘stretched from Diamond Head on the southeast corner of the Island, west along Waikiki and downtown Honolulu, to the International Airport and Hickam Field, Pearl Harbor, to finally Barbers Point Naval Air Station at the southwest corner of the Island. Fort Shafter was on the north side of Highway 111 which ran along all those points. The fort overlooked the airport and Pearl Harbor, with an excellent view of downtown Honolulu to the left. Shafter was one of dozens of military posts scattered about the Island and housed the Army’s Western Command.

  “I’ll take you to the guest house, sir. You can throw on a uniform and then we can head to the tunnel,” she added as she glanced at Boomer’s hair.

  They drove up to the motel-like guest house, and Boomer quickly stored his gear and changed into a set of starched BDUS. It felt funny every time he put on U.S. uniform after the civilian clothes and foreign uniforms he was used to in Delta. It was like changing part of his personality. He’d worn a uniform full-time from West Point in 1977 through joining Delta. He pulled a faded green beret from his bags and settled it on his head, checking himself in the mirror.

  The beret was the original one he’d been issued on graduating the Special Forces Qualification Course in 1984.

  He’d been told several times in the course of his career to replace the worn hat with a new one, but he’d grown attached to this one. It had gone many places with him. The green cloth had that beaten, faded look that soldiers in Special Force secretly prized.

  Vasquez’s demeanor changed when she spotted Boomer walking out of the lobby. She noted the Special Forces Combat patch on the Major’s right shoulder, and the Combat Infantry badge. Master Parachutist badge and scuba badge on his left chest. Beneath the Special Forces and Ranger tabs on Boomer’s left shoulder, he wore the unit patch of the Special Operations Command (Airborne).

  “You were in 5th Group during Desert Storm, sir?” she asked as they got back in the car.

  “No. First of the 10th out of Tolz,” he lied, automatically giving her the cover story that he’d been briefed on right after the Gulf War.

  Boomer waited for the inevitable “What did you do?” but it didn’t come, for which he was relieved. They were at the entrance to the tunnel in less than five minutes.

  Boomer looked at it with interest. A heavily vegetated lava ridge line was directly in front of them with a covered walkway leading up the side to a large vault door. Looking to his left he could see the ocean, with Honolulu off to the far left. To the right, the road ended in a housing area, behind which the mountains loomed, forming the interior of Oahu. It was a spectacular location, but it didn’t appear that there were any windows in the office to enjoy the view.

  “The XO will have to give you the door code, sir,” Vasquez said as she punched into the numerical key pad on the side of the door. There was a loud beep and with great effort Vasquez slowly swung the door wide.

  “Air pressure makes it real hard to open in the mornings,” she added as they stepped inside and the door swung shut on its own.

  A tunnel painted pale green stretched ahead for more than a hundred feet. Vasquez led the way past wall lockers and turned right at the first set of double metal doors. A larger tunnel beckoned at a right angle to the first one. This tunnel was thirty feet across and the ceiling was curved, over twenty feet’ high at its peak. Desks were scattered about and the far end was walled off with glass, curtains hiding whatever was on the other side of the door in the center of the glass.

  The home of the 4th TASOSC consisted of three main, parallel tunnels.

  Boomer was currently in the first. It housed the TASOSC’s S-1 section (administrative and personnel), executive officer, and in the far end of the tunnel, separated from the others by the thick glass wall and curtains, the TASOSC commander. The middle tunnel held the TASOSC sergeant major, the communication’s console, and at the far end, again walled off with glass, the TASOSC conference room. The third and most distant tunnel contained the Operations (S-3) and Intelligence (S-2) staffs. All the tunnels were connected by two side tunnels — one along the base, leading in from the vault door, and the other in the center, splitting each tunnel in half.

  Vasquez led the way to a desk strewn with various papers and folders.

  “Sir, I got the major,” she announced.

  A lieutenant colonel peered up above the stacks of paper.

  He was small, with leathery skin stretched tight over his bones. A thin, gray crew cut gave him the indeterminate appearance of man somewhere between an old forty and a young sixty.

  “George Falk,” he announced sticking his hand out, “but you can call me’ sir” a genuine smile indicating that he did not take the remark too seriously.

  Boomer smiled in return.

  “Boomer Watson, sir.”

  “Glad to have you. Boomer. Grab a seat and I’ll get you tuned in to our operation.”

  “See you around, sir,” Vasquez said, spinning on the heel of her spit-shined jump boots and heading off to a side tunnel.

  “I see you’ve met our resident body-builder,” Falk said.

  “What?” Boomer asked.

  “Vasquez — she competes in body building contests,” Falk said.

  Boomer twisted in his seat and watched the sergeant disappear with interest. That helped explain the way she handled his duffle bag.

  Boomer settled down into the beat-up gray chair and returned his attention to Lieutenant Colonel Falk. Boomer watched as he rustled through a stack of papers.

  “Damn, I had a copy of your orders here somewhere.

  Got them faxed in from Bragg this morning.”

  Boomer slipped a copy of his orders out of the file folder he was carrying.

  “Here you go, sir.” They were fill-in-the blank orders, assigning him to the 4th TASOSC until further notice. Typical orders for Delta Force personnel who were often sent to strange locations to do strange jobs without much notice.

  “Thanks,” Falk said, glancing at them.

  “You’re going to be with us for a while?” he asked.

  “I don’t know, sir.”

  Falk
pursed his lips.

  “Hmm. I got a call from Jim Porster on the secure line yesterday afternoon. He asked me to take care of you. Jim and I go back a long ways.”

  Boomer could tell Falk was fishing for information, but he figured he couldn’t tell the man anything more than Forster had.

  “You’re going to have to get your hair cut,” Falk added.

  “We’re not that high speed and we get quite a bit of rank coming through the tunnel. A lot of people around here get their nose out of joint about important things like haircuts and shined boots and all that,” Falk said, his own disdain for the regular Army clear.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Well, glad you’re here. We need the help. Forster told me to let you take it kind of easy, so I don’t want to overload you. What’s your area of expertise?” Falk looked at Boomer’s uniform, making the size-up all Army people did upon meeting, noting badges the way a dog would sniff another upon first meeting.

  “My primary is Eighteen,” Boomer said.

  “My secondary is Thirty-nine — Operations.”

  Falk looked at Boomer with more interest.

  “Who were you with before going behind the fence?” he asked, using the euphemism among those in the know for people who went into Delta Force.

  The original Delta Compound at Bragg had been surrounded by a chain link fence with green strips of metal sown through it to provide some degree of protection from surveillance — thus the term that had developed for people going to work there. The new compound was bigger and had a correspondingly higher fence in a more remote area of the Fort Bragg reservation.

  “I was originally branched Infantry then went S-F in’ eighty-four. I was with 10th Group at Fort Devens, team leader and Battalion S-3 for a while; then the Advanced Course then I went to 1st of the 10th at Bad Tolz in Germany, where I had another team before heading back to Bragg.”

  “Good, good,” Falk said.

  The door at the far end of the tunnel opened and a major exited. A squeaky voice calling for Colonel Falk echoed over the major’s shoulder.

  “Excuse me,” Falk said as he quickly walked away and entered the office, shutting the door behind.