Deployed

by Mel Odom

  Haroun touched his fingers to the right side of his own face. “Was he burned here?”

  “He was. And on his neck and arms. The burns looked recent.”

  That was another detail that remained consistent with the stories that Haroun heard. With those burn scars, the man could have been a soldier, but he was not American nor with the United Nations. Daud had killed UN soldiers and taken an American physician from the Doctors Without Borders program only days ago.

  “Do you know that the supplies this man Daud brought to you once belonged to me?”

  “No. If I did, we would not have accepted them.”

  “But you did, and in doing that you have doomed yourselves.”

  “Not if you believe in God’s justice.”

  “God blesses only those he favors.” He smiled. “I punish his enemies, the American Satans and those who would side with them. God favors me and will give me riches beyond belief when my time here is done.”

  The old man faced him then and swallowed. “You are a vain, despicable creature, Korfa Haroun. One day you will know this, and you will tremble at the emptiness of your soul.”

  Angry, Haroun stepped back and waved curtly. In response, the pickup truck started and rolled forward, gathering speed. The old man’s calm demeanor shattered in that moment, and he cried out fearfully. Haroun gazed down at his captive. “Die, old man. Die in agony.”

  The rope slack played out and the old man jerked forward, skipping across the rocky terrain and raising small puffs of dust. His pain-filled yells and screams lost strength quickly. The pickup driver steered through the wide shallows of the tributary.

  The displaced people watched in horror. Haroun saw the fear on their faces, and he liked the look of it. They did not understand that to live well in this land a man had to be hard and fierce. Now they would never have the chance to learn such things.

  The pickup drove in a wide circle around the copse of trees. The old man fell silent, and his body bounced and careened over the ground. After a few minutes, Haroun waved the driver back. When the vehicle arrived, it deposited the torn and broken meat that had once been the old man in front of the people.

  They cried and called on God. They asked for mercy and begged for forgiveness.

  Haroun walked to them and inspected them. He saw the hope in their eyes then, and he loved the power he had over them. They were nothing, lice to be crushed underfoot, only a heartbeat removed from carrion.

  A tall boy, perhaps ten years old, peered fearfully at Haroun from under his mother’s protective embrace. Haroun approached the mother and child.

  The mother looked up at Haroun and held her son more tightly. Silver tears cascaded down her cheeks. “Please. Do not hurt my son.”

  Haroun shook his head. “I will not hurt your son.”

  “Thank you.” But even after he’d told her that, the mother didn’t relax. She didn’t trust him.

  Haroun studied the boy, noticing how thin he was. But there was something different about him too. He did not completely look away when Haroun fixed his eyes on him. “What is your name, boy?”

  The mother tried to answer for him. “His name is—”

  Haroun interrupted her. “I asked the boy. Know your place, woman, or I will have the tongue from your head.”

  Frightened, the mother looked at the ground.

  The boy met Haroun’s stare. “I am called Kufow.”

  “It is a good name.”

  “I was named for my father.”

  The pride in the boy’s tone amused Haroun. “Where is your father?”

  “He died in the city.”

  “How?”

  “Fighting the al-Shabaab devils. He was a soldier. A very brave soldier.”

  The mother reached for her child and tried to cover his mouth with a hand. She shushed him.

  Haroun laughed and took the boy’s shoulder. “I like you, boy. I am going to let you live to carry my message to this man Daud who lives with his death wish.”

  The boy fought and tried to escape Haroun’s grip. Failing that, Kufow grabbed Haroun’s hand and bit him. Cursing, Haroun punched the boy in the face hard enough to daze him. His knees turned to rubber and he almost fell. Haroun grabbed him again, this time by the back of the neck like he would a young pup.

  “Bite me or strike me again, Kufow, and I will snap your neck.” Haroun squeezed hard enough to make the boy yelp. “I can always choose another.”

  “Then choose another.”

  The boy’s defiance intrigued Haroun. “No. You are the one I want. You will not be broken so easily.” He dragged Kufow several feet away and turned back to face the people. “Take a look at your mother there, Kufow. Look at all of those people.” He knelt beside the boy. “I know you think you hate me, but your heart is capable of more hate. Much more. This is my gift to you. You shall grow up and learn to hate the American Satans and the Westerners because they have caused what is about to happen here this day. And you will also hate the man who led me to you. This man Rageh Daud.”

  Kufow said nothing.

  Across from them, the people shifted nervously, alert now to the fact that they were not through with their suffering.

  Haroun whispered into Kufow’s ear, but he kept his grip locked on the boy’s neck. “Do you believe me?”

  “It is you I will hate.”

  Haroun laughed. “Yes, but you will hate us all.” Lifting his voice, he addressed his men. “Kill them.”

  “No!” Kufow struggled to get away, to get back to his mother. There was no time.

  Machine gunners in the backs of the trucks parked near the captives opened fire immediately. The heavy machine gun rounds chopped into the people and dropped their corpses where they stood. The parched earth quickly soaked up their blood.

  After a moment, the men stopped firing and the staccato roar of the machine guns faded away.

  Kufow stood silent and shaking. Tears ran down his thin face.

  “Now, Kufow.” Haroun stood and looked into the boy’s face. “Tell me who you hate.”

  24

  BEKAH SAT ON A hard wooden bench outside the room that had been turned into a temporary morgue for the Marines who had fallen earlier that day. She felt empty and exhausted. She still wore her bloodstained fatigues.

  The images wouldn’t leave her mind. The memories of Ralph Caxton at the auto parts store and at the airport warred with the ones of him dying as she held his hand.

  Although it had been less than two weeks since she’d last seen Travis and her granny, it already felt like so long ago. The perception of that time difference made her feel even more distant from her family. There was no transition going from back home to the middle of a war zone. It felt like she had just appeared here.

  Or worse, that one of the two lives she led was just a figment of her imagination. Putting those two halves together was hard, especially when there were so many emotions attached to each of them.

  She supposed it was because Ralph Caxton was the first Marine she’d known back in the real world and then seen die on the battlefield. All of the others she’d first met back in training or on a tour of duty. They had been Marines when she’d met them. Not the young guy who had sold her a carburetor. Not someone behind that safety net back in Oklahoma.

  Bekah sipped a breath and tried to focus on the voices down the hall. It sounded like there were three or four people, but she couldn’t tell what they were talking about because they spoke in low voices.

  Footsteps approached, and Bekah leaned her head down on her raised knee, like she was catching a few winks and not going through . . . whatever it was she was going through. There was a lot of talk about military personnel coming back with post-traumatic stress disorder. If that happened to her, if she ended up with PTSD, would child welfare take Travis away from her? Could she be a fit mother? Would she continue to be someone Travis felt safe with?

  Her son knew she was a Marine. He knew she carried a gun. When he got older and realiz
ed what that job really meant and where his mother had served, how would he feel about what she had done? Bekah didn’t know. She wrapped her arms tightly around her leg and kept her eyes closed. She didn’t want to be around anyone. That was why she avoided the barracks and the mess. She just wanted to get her head clear and find a way to sleep, but she knew she couldn’t. She was too wound up.

  The footsteps passed her, then stopped. A gentle voice spoke softly. “Hey, Marine. Are you okay?”

  Bekah looked up because she was afraid it might be an officer. Lieutenant Bridger had been through the area earlier gathering dog tags and information on the dead Marines. She still owed him an after-action report that she was working on in the small notepad she carried in her uniform. Lieutenant Bridger had been typing his on his iPad, inputting information like some kind of machine.

  She’d resented him for the cool reserve he showed.

  The man who stopped in the hallway was maybe ten years older than her, in his midthirties, and wore green scrubs. He was lean and looked fit, had a nice tan, but his brown hair was scruffy and he had three or four days of beard growth.

  “Yes. I’m fine. Thank you.” Bekah wanted him to keep moving, to leave her alone till she got her head straightened out.

  Instead, he looked around, then back at her. “Are you here with anyone?”

  “No.”

  His eyes drifted over her BDUs and took in the bloodstains. “Are you one of the Marines who got caught in that ambush earlier today?”

  “Yes.” Go. Away.

  “Should you be alone right now?”

  “I’m fine. Thank you for your concern.”

  He hesitated and ran a hand across the back of his neck. He glanced at the room across the hall, and it must have clicked that this was the place being used as the temporary morgue till the bodies could be transferred to the ships waiting out in the harbor. From there they’d be returned home.

  Private Ralph Caxton was going back home only days after receiving his orders.

  The man stuck his hand out. “Sorry. I should have introduced myself. I’m Matthew Cline. One of the doctors who helped . . . who helped today when this happened.”

  Bekah stood and took the man’s hand. His grip was firm, confident. “Lance Corporal Bekah Shaw, Charlie Company, Marine Corps.”

  “Pleasure to meet you, Lance Corporal Shaw. Wish it could have been under different circumstances.” Matthew took back his hand. “You lost somebody today?”

  The bluntness of the question surprised Bekah. Back home, from someone she’d known for a long time, she could have expected something like that. But not from a stranger. And especially not under the present circumstances.

  “Six Marines died today, Dr. Cline. We all lost somebody.” Bekah regretted the edge in her voice, but she couldn’t hold it in check.

  “I know. I was attending when I lost one of them on the table, but I helped work on three other Marines who are going to be fine.”

  The casualties in the Indigo Rifle Platoon weren’t limited to the dead. Several Marines had been wounded. New Marines were going to have to be pulled in.

  For the first time Bekah realized that Matthew Cline didn’t look like the other military doctors she was familiar with. “You don’t look Marine-issue.”

  “Easy explanation for that. I’m not.” Matthew smiled. “I’m with a contingent of Doctors Without Borders brought in to help work with the IDPs.”

  In Somalia, there were numerous camps of internally displaced people fleeing the violence between the TFG and the Islamic extremist groups. And several surrounding countries were undergoing similar upheavals.

  “I was here, getting a shipment ready to go out in the next few days, and heard about the ambush. Thought maybe I could lend a hand. Before I came to Somalia, I worked ER in Boston.” Matthew shrugged. “Some people insist that’s a war zone too.” He smiled to let her know he was joking.

  “That was awfully kind of you.”

  Matthew shook his head. “Saving people. That’s kind of why I’m here.”

  “Yeah, I guess you are.”

  Matthew made a show of looking up and down the hall. “Uh, I don’t really know anyone here, and I’m kind of wound up from pulling long hours in surgery. Maybe you want to be alone right now, but I’d like a little company. I mean, if that’s okay.”

  It wasn’t, but Bekah didn’t have the heart to tell him that. Her granny had raised her to be hospitable. “Sure. This bench gets hard after a while.” She returned to her seat.

  Matthew sat and folded his arms over his chest. He was silent for a few minutes, obviously uncomfortable. Bekah wasn’t going to save him from that. He’d chosen his row, now he had to hoe it.

  “This is my first time in Mogadishu. How about you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Been anywhere else? Overseas, I mean.”

  “Iraq and Afghanistan.”

  Matthew nodded. “I’ve seen the news. Those spots were pretty rough too.”

  “Yeah, they were.”

  A brief silence stretched between them before Matthew continued speaking. “You from Texas?”

  “Oklahoma.”

  “Sounds a lot like Texas.”

  “Maybe to an untrained ear.”

  Matthew smiled. “I guess so. A lot of people think everybody in Massachusetts sounds a lot like everybody in Boston.”

  Bekah leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes. But she knew her granny wouldn’t be happy with her for ignoring the man after he’d gone out of his way to check on her. “So why come here?”

  “Mogadishu?”

  “Yes.”

  “I didn’t choose to come to Mogadishu. Not really. I wanted to do a stint with Doctors Without Borders. Kind of clear my head.”

  Bekah looked at him then. “You came to a war zone to clear your head?”

  Matthew grinned, tried to suppress it, then chuckled with good-natured humor. “I suppose that sounds a little crazy, huh?”

  “A little.”

  He sighed and leaned his head back against the wall. “You ever think you had your whole life lined out, Lance Corporal Shaw?”

  “Just call me Bekah.”

  “All right. But the question stands.”

  After a moment, Bekah nodded. It felt good talking to Matthew. Even though it was just inane, getting-to-know-you stuff, it was familiar and distracting from thoughts of Private Ralph Caxton lying cold in the next room. Bekah had always marveled at how some people could deal with death. Her granny often told her that folks didn’t really have a choice about dealing with death. It was as common and mysterious as birth. A person had to accept death and keep moving because it was bound to come.

  “I’ve thought I had my life planned out a couple times.”

  “Being a Marine was part of it?”

  Bekah smiled. “No. Definitely not. I planned to get married, have children, and make a home for my husband and kids. I enlisted in the Marine Reserve after the divorce as a means of taking care of my son. I never planned on serving overseas in war zones either.”

  “You have a son?”

  “I do. Travis.”

  “How old?”

  “He’s six.”

  “You don’t look old enough to have a six-year-old.”

  “I had him when I was nineteen. Married right out of high school. My granny said I was too young to marry.” Bekah stopped herself. “No, Granny never said that. She said that my ex-husband was too young to marry. She was right. My granny is right about a lot of things.” She looked at him. “Do you have kids?”

  “Me?” Matthew shook his head. “No. I’m not against the idea. It just hasn’t happened yet. First there needs to be a Mrs. Matthew Cline.” He looked wistful. “There almost was.”

  “What happened?”

  “Two years ago, I met a woman I thought was perfect for me. We dated. We got engaged. We planned the wedding. A week before we were supposed to get married, she called it off.”

  �
��Why?”

  Matthew hesitated, then gave a sad smile. “I had a chance to quit working at the hospital and join a group of doctors that specialized in cosmetic surgery.” He held out his hands. “You may not know this, but I’ve been told these are the hands of an artist. You put a scalpel in my hand, I can do amazing things.” He grinned. “It’s kind of hard to say that and sound modest.”

  Bekah smiled at him.

  “I gave the idea of changing jobs some thought. I could be a good plastic surgeon. I did some pretty amazing stuff in the ER.”

  “Modestly, of course.”

  “Of course. But amazing procedures nonetheless. My fiancée gave the idea some thought too. She really liked the change because it would mean seeing more of me. Better hours. Long vacations. Bigger paychecks. A nice deal all the way around, to her mind.”

  “Sounds like everything was working. So what went wrong?”

  “Me. I went wrong. My fiancée told me that, and she told all of her friends that. The more I thought about the new job, the more I realized I’d miss my old job. In the ER, I help people who really need it at the time they need it. I save lives. To me, that’s a lot better than giving someone a new nose or a tummy tuck or liposuction. I help people hang on to the most precious thing they could lose.”

  “I think that’s commendable.”

  “Me too.” Matthew smiled. “I could respect a guy like me. I look in the mirror, I’m proud of who I turned out to be. But my fiancée took my decision to stay with the hospital as a personal insult. She wanted the bigger checks, the long vacations, and the prestige of being a plastic surgeon’s wife. She stopped the wedding and broke off the engagement.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Me too. I really loved her. I guess I still do.” Matthew looked at Bekah. “How long have you been divorced?”

  “Six years. He left right before our son was born.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Bekah shook her head. “No. Billy Roy was a lousy husband. He would have been an even worse dad. I’m glad my boy doesn’t have anything to do with him. It’s better this way.”

  Matthew nodded. “Can I ask you a personal question?”

  “Have you asked one that wasn’t?” Bekah was surprised at the way her mood had changed while talking.