War Torn
Page 19
‘You’ve been hit,’ he said. His voice was strangled and urgent. Streaky looked at his sergeant and saw shock carved into every crevice. Dave was already old: probably in his late twenties, Streaky thought. But now he seemed ten years older even than that.
Streaky watched Dave’s face cave in a little as he searched for the wound. He knew that, as far as a sergeant can be close to one of his men, Dave was good mates with Jamie. Personally Streaky found Jamie a strange geezer. He was posh and apparently he had been to college and he obviously should have been an officer but for some reason he had wanted to be one of the lads instead. Streaky had meant to ask him why, when the moment was right. Now it seemed he might never have a chance.
Jamie wordlessly pointed to the place and Dave gently readjusted Jamie’s position so they could reach the wound without twisting his body. Dave’s face was frightening Streaky Bacon now. He needed his sergeant to be hard. Invincible. And instead Dave was showing signs of shock because his mate was hurt, just like anyone else.
Dave glanced at Streaky.
‘Don’t just sit there staring, get the fucking medic!’ he snapped. But the medic was already climbing into the Vector. Streaky was the first to see the deep tear at the bottom of Jamie’s body armour. He pointed to it. Dave swallowed.
The medic pushed Streaky aside.
‘OK, I’ve got him,’ he said. He was trying to release Dave back out there again. But Streaky could see that Dave, although he was certainly needed outside, did not want to leave Jamie.
‘Get someone on the gimpy!’ Jamie said weakly, his eyes closed. ‘They’re closing in on us, I could see it from on top.’
‘It’s too exposed up there, everyone has to come down,’ Dave said, and he gave the order.
The medic took off Jamie’s armour and pouches and webbing, handing them to Streaky who put them down carefully, almost reverently. When the medic crouched to examine Jamie’s back they could all see the massive swelling appearing on the right side.
‘You’ve been hit.’
‘I know that.’
‘You’re a lucky boy. I think it was a high-calibre round. I’d say it’s a 7.62mm.’
‘He’d be dead if one of them hit him,’ Dave said, his face still a caricature.
‘I’ve heard of them bouncing off,’ the medic said. ‘The ceramic plates inside this body armour are amazing.’
‘Maybe I am dead,’ Jamie said weakly. ‘And you’re all dead too.’
‘Not me,’ Streaky said. ‘I’m still here—’
There was a huge crash outside the Vector.
He added: ‘I think.’
‘So we’re all dead and something the bishop forgot to tell us about heaven is that it’s one long fire fight with the Taliban,’ Dave said.
‘You’re winded and a bit shocked and you’re going to have one helluva bruise. But you’re alive,’ the medic told Jamie.
‘You could have fooled me,’ he said.
‘And,’ the medic added, ‘you’re a lucky man. A few centimetres higher and it would have been right through your neck.’
‘Just stay sitting down quietly,’ Dave told him.
‘Well, if I’m alive I’m OK to get back on the gun so give me my kit.’
‘Oh, no, you’re not OK,’ the medic said.
Dave was already carrying the GPMG down and setting it up on the ground outside.
‘Get a belt loaded,’ he yelled at Streaky, a command which was causing Streaky some panic when Jamie staggered out of the Vector. His exposed body drew a burst of fire. He didn’t so much duck as fall behind the gimpy.
‘You probably should sit inside, mate,’ Dave said gruffly.
‘Don’t talk shit.’ Jamie sorted out the belt for Streaky and edged Dave away from the machine gun. Dave watched him for a moment then the boss arrived at their side.
‘When the fuck is the air support arriving?’ Dave asked. ‘Because we’ll soon be standing here with nothing to throw at them but bottles of water.’
‘We’ll have to slow our rate of fire to make it last longer,’ Weeks said.
‘They’ll notice and move in.’
‘They’re already moving in,’ the boss shouted back, over the whoosh of an incoming RPG. ‘If we get really low then we might have to try blowing up the IED and exiting forward over the bridge.’
‘No!’ Dave shouted back. ‘They’ll have left an IED on the other side too.’
Binman appeared from behind the Vector to help Jamie with the machine gun and Streaky returned to the fire fight with renewed energy.
‘Slow your rate of fire!’ Sol ordered him a few minutes later. Streaky nodded and paused and then forgot. Now the machine gun was back at work he tried to keep his rifle firing almost as fast, which was impossible of course, but made him feel more effective. He paused at last, his weapon burning in his hands. He looked around. So where exactly were the flipflops?
He watched enemy rounds bouncing like hailstones, threshing the leaves and dust into something like fine confetti. He searched for muzzle flashes. He listened. He decided the flipflops must be everywhere. He swallowed. They were heavily outnumbered. And if they weren’t surrounded yet, they soon would be.
As the fight intensified, Streaky saw the boss push the woman interpreter into the back of the Vector. She obviously didn’t want to go but she climbed inside and Streaky glimpsed the medic in there with her. Everyone else, including Dave, including the signaller, including the boss, was outside firing back at the ambush.
Mal vacated a prominent firing position to refill magazines and Streaky stepped into it. He swallowed, raised his weapon, released the safety and started to fire once more. When he stopped, he watched a round bounce along the track in front of him and estimated that it had come from a tree only about fifty metres away. Fifty metres! He fired at the high branches of the tree. No body fell but, all the same, it felt good to have something to fire at. He fired again and again and again to make sure.
On every patrol so far, Streaky had submitted to a sense of helplessness. He didn’t think about what he did. He followed orders. He didn’t know where he was, in what direction they were driving, how far from the base they were or what the reason for their mission might be, even if the boss had tried to explain it. He just expected other people to tell him what to do.
Now, with his hands hot from his weapon, the smoky, sulphuric smell of the battle filling his nostrils and its noise all around him, his senses were heightened and so was his understanding. He understood that the enemy was to the rear and on two flanks. If they succeeded in moving forward of the convoy then the Vectors would be totally surrounded. That was a thought so uncomfortable it was enough to induce streams of sweat all of its own, separate from the sweat induced by carrying a lot of kit in sweltering heat, separate from the sweat of the battle itself.
I’m weaker in emotion than in arms and fire aim
The smoke I’m inhaling isn’t keeping my mind sane,
It feels like rehydration’s a better soldier’s game . . .
On Streaky’s left, Angus was firing rapidly. Streaky tried to copy him. He fired round after round after round. You could lose yourself in firing. It was as though you ceased to exist and your body became a part of your weapon. It was good to think of yourself as a weapon. It made you feel invulnerable. It made you feel like a killing machine.
When at last he paused there was a rap forming in his head.
We’re pinned down
It’s a sin to frown, I wish I could grin but it’s grim in this town
No houses no streets no shops and no women
Just choking on the smoke and no joking I need water,
water water water . . .
What rhymed with water?
There was the sodium glare and the crash of an RPG, so powerful it made Streaky duck. With his head down, words inserted themselves into his brain.
Water . . . daughter, sorter, halter . . . no good, none of them, not one of them was any good.
‘Cover!’ Dave roared.
But the grenade fell short and firing resumed.
‘We’re short of ammo,’ Dave told everyone. ‘Watch and fire. Watch and fire. Conserve ammo.’
Streaky didn’t hear him.
Water, transporter
Good rhyme.
Water, mortar
Yes! Even better!
Water, slaughter!
The best! Despite the battle all around him, Streaky smiled.
Nearby, the boss was asking over the radio when the air support was coming. It sounded as though they were giving him the brush-off because the fragments of his reply Streaky could catch were: ‘. . . outnumbered . . . supplies . . . seriously overexposed . . .’
There was a pause.
‘And when will it be available?’ the boss demanded.
Binman’s face appeared, chalk white and smelling of vomit.
‘Shit,’ he said to Streaky.
‘Listen, bruv,’ Streaky said, ‘I was going to sick up and then I started firing and I felt a lot better when I had something to do and now I’m loving it. I just keep on firing, that’s what I do.’
But Binns rolled his eyes in his white, white face and did not speak. The medic climbed out of a Vector to take his arm.
‘Come on, sprog,’ he said to Binman. ‘You’re in shock. And I’m not surprised. Your sarge says you’ve never done this before. It’s what they call a baptism of fire.’
Binns was getting into the Vector just as the woman interpreter jumped out.
Streaky sneaked around the side of the Vector to fire more rounds, very quickly. He began to feel confident despite the knowledge that nothing they had done, not the constant rattle of their machine guns or the full force of their small arms, lessened the enemy’s strength. In fact, the Taliban firing positions were getting closer. They seemed to be moving in around the sides of the Vectors now so that even crouching behind the vehicles you could feel exposed.
Nausea gripped Streaky again. If the flipflops slipped forward of the Vectors, 1 Section would be completely surrounded. He knew there was an IED up there. He hoped it was enough to keep the Taliban back. Involuntarily he glanced towards it and saw a shadow flicker through the distant undergrowth. Streaky came from the vertical world of high-rise flats in Wolverhampton and he was alert to any horizontals. Here was something the wrong shape moving swiftly through the woods. He readjusted his position to see it better.
Someone next to him was raising their weapon too. It was the woman interpreter, with her SA80. She had seen the shadow and was taking aim. Suddenly anxious to beat her, Streaky fired again and again, as fast as he could. The shadow fell.
‘We’ll never know,’ said the woman, ‘which of us did that.’
Since she had only fired a few rounds, Streaky thought it was certainly him. But he smiled at her anyway. She smiled back.
‘What are you doing?’ the boss thundered behind them.
‘Using our weapons,’ said the woman. ‘We saw the enemy trying to sneak forward.’
‘Just slotted a flipflop!’ Streaky said gleefully.
For some reason the boss didn’t seem to share his excitement. ‘Get over the other side, will you, and slow down the ammo rate,’ he snapped.
Streaky could hear the conversation as he went. The boss said: ‘Asma, I asked you to stay in the Vector. The OC prefers women not to engage in frontline fighting.’
And the woman was saying: ‘Frontline? Where the fuck is that? They’re all around us!’
Streaky ran across to the back of the other Vector. He glanced behind him at the woman and saw the boss trying to persuade her to return to the wagon. Then he slipped into a firing position and started again. He let round after round rip into the nearby trees and undergrowth. If there was any living thing there, it must soon be dead.
What rhymed with enemy? Absolutely nothing. It was impossible to find a word in the English language that rhymed with enemy.
He saw an RPG flying high overhead. He stepped behind the Vector, watching the grenade’s bright, graceful arc. It had a sort of beauty. Dave saw it too. He knew, from its height and its trajectory, exactly where it was going to land. He shouted: ‘Cover!’
Some firing continued but everyone who’d seen the RPG sailing towards the river, including the enemy, stopped and waited. And then came the explosion.
Streaky felt the heat of the blast wave and the force of its punch in his chest. He was blown against the side of the Vector. The ground rocked, the world rocked and, when he looked up, the sky was rocking too. It was breaking into a thousand tiny pieces and falling on their heads. Some men were flung to the ground, others threw themselves there. A few grabbed the Vectors for security, but the Vectors were rocking with the shock too.
Streaky was on his stomach, helmet down.
Enemy . . . destiny! Yes! It wasn’t perfect but it would do. The two words worked well together. Enemy, destiny, yes.
Branches, leaves and plants were still flying through the air, smoke rose upwards in a steady column from the riverside, and it felt like minutes before the world began to steady itself. Even the enemy was quiet.
The silence that followed the blast brought with it a small window of calm. And then the firing started again and most of 1 Section understood at once that the enemy had used the distraction to move still further forward.
Dave shouted: ‘Fix bayonets!’
Streaky’s heart sank. Bayonets were what you used when the enemy was just a few metres away. Bayonets were what you plunged into people’s bodies while you looked into their eyes. He fumbled with his, trying to imagine what it would be like to run at a man and shove a bayonet into his chest. He thought he might not be able to do that.
He tried to scramble to his feet, fighting against the weight on his back which kept dragging him back down. Finn, who had managed to remain standing through the blast, grabbed his hand to help him. Streaky saw the boss helping the woman to her feet. The blast had thrown the boss on top of her. Or perhaps he had thrown himself there to protect her.
‘We now have a way out,’ the boss said to Dave, his voice full of dust.
‘No,’ Dave said.
‘There’s a bit of a crater but we can get round it and over the bridge!’ Weeks insisted.
‘No!’ Dave repeated. ‘There’ll be more.’
‘More what?’
‘IEDs. On the far side of the bridge.’
‘The enemy is now extremely close. I mean, I think there are some only twenty metres away,’ the boss said. Dave didn’t reply. He kept on firing. Streaky did the same. But a few minutes later, he heard Dave and the boss arguing again. It seemed they had been told an Apache was arriving and the boss wanted to put down smoke now.
‘No!’ Dave said.
‘The pilots will need it,’ the boss insisted.
‘Too soon!’ Dave said.
‘But surely we—’
Dave interrupted him. ‘No, no, no! If we put smoke down now we’ll just get a load more incoming. I don’t have time to explain!’
The urgency in his voice made Streaky increase his rate of fire.
‘How many times,’ the boss roared in his ear, ‘do I have to tell you we’re running out of ammo? Use less, for Chrissake!’
‘Oh yeah . . .’ Streaky slowed his rate a fraction.
At the sound of a rhythmic, distant thudding, he felt relief flood through his body. It was almost over. He’d been both surrounded and outnumbered in an ambush and it was almost over at last.
Enemy fire was ceasing a little. 1 Section immediately eased their firing too. The bonds that had glued them to their weapons began to loosen.
‘I’ve never been so fucking happy to hear a rotor blade,’ Finn said, his voice filtered through dust.
‘OK, now smoke,’ the boss said,
glancing at Dave.
‘Wait . . .’ Dave said. ‘Mini flares are a lot better.’
Sol explained: ‘Smoke hangs around for too long.’
‘It gives every Tom, Dick and Harry Taliban our position,’ Dave said. ‘Just make sure you’ve got the pilot’s attention . . .’
When the helicopter was chopping up the air overhead, they sent up a flare.
Remaining alert to catch any fleeing insurgents, the men watched the massive metal bird begin its hunt from the sky. Two scrambling, anxious figures jumped from trees that were only ten metres from the Vectors.