No Pit So Deep: The Cody Musket Story

by James Nathaniel Miller II

  “Babe! What’s happening? Babe? Talk to me!” Seismo coughed again.

  “I’m busy Seismo! Can’t hold it much longer. I see flat terrain at ten o’clock. Brace!”

  Cody made a twenty-degree left turn, slowed the approach speed, jettisoned explosive ordnance, and prepared for a crash landing on a relatively flat plateau.

  “We’re going in, Seismo!”

  With elevator and rudder deflection impossible, he was unable to slow airspeed below 220 knots. The only communication he could send off was a screaming “Mayday! Mayday!”

  Despite the excessive landing speed, it was a successful ditching. It could have been a piece of cake, but just before the aircraft came to rest after kicking up gigantic clouds of Afghan terrain, the right wing tip collided with a large rock. This violently whipped the Hornet into a three-quarter spin and sent it careening sideways off a ridge and down an embankment. It finally came to rest, partially buried in loose sand and rocks.

  “Seismo! You okay back there?” Cody crawled out of the cockpit. Then he felt the excruciating pain in his leg and foot again. “Ugggh. I didn’t feel a thing while I was landing. Funny how adrenaline works.”

  Cody shed his helmet and then bent down to check his burns. Portions of the boot seemed fried to his skin. His movements became agonizing as he lifted himself towards Harry, who was frozen to his ejection seat.

  “Seismo! We gotta take cover! They’re gonna be all over us here in a few minutes.” Cody grimaced. “Seismo?”

  Cody helped him out of the cockpit, but as soon as Harry’s boots touched the ground he collapsed. The other two Hornets flew low over the downed jet. The noise was deafening as Cody saluted. Lima One rocked wings. Then both aircraft flew straight up into the blinding sunlight and began to circle overhead.

  Cody heard steps behind him. He reached for his sidearm and then turned around to see five heavily armed Taliban fighters standing within ten feet. These devils had just seen their comrades burned alive by American infidels from the sky. His throat tightened, and he shuddered. He had fifteen rounds in his Beretta, but he was no Wyatt Earp. He dropped his weapon and threw his hands into the air. Am I gonna die, or are they still interested in prisoners?

  The SEAL team would be able to track his location, wouldn’t they? Cody rolled his eyes left and right, hoping to see his comrades approaching. Would they come or were they pinned down?

  Harry began to move around, moaning and trying to raise himself off the sand. Two more Taliban arrived, along with five young boys who appeared to be under the age of ten.

  They placed a handgun in the palm of the smallest child and shouted something to him. He walked forward tentatively and pointed the gun at Harry’s head. The boy’s entire body was shaking. Two of the Taliban shouted at him again.

  Cody looked into the eyes of this child and shook his head “no,” pleading with him silently. The child hesitated and then, with a resolute expression, pulled the trigger.

  “No-ohhh!” Cody shouted as his knees buckled. He fell beside Seismo.

  A moment later, gunfire erupted from behind cover up on the ridge — fury with precision as bullets struck flesh and bone, knocking down five enemy warriors in front of him. The SEALs had arrived.

  Cody started to reach for his weapon on the ground, but he was immediately seized by the two remaining enemy combatants. They lifted him to his feet. One pressed a pistol to his head while the other held a large machete to his throat. They both screamed at him and at the hidden gunmen above, whose weapons fell silent.

  Cody was a human shield. These two were trying to buy time. Additional enemy fighters would arrive any second.

  Cody cleared his head. A ten-minute standoff meant certain death. He wasn’t going to stand by and be used as a tool to get himself and his would-be rescuers killed. Something needs to happen now.

  The one on his left, holding the gun, was shaking like a leaf in the wind, and a puddle formed underneath the other who held the machete. Cody smelled urine. These guys could be had.

  His heart was pounding against his breastbone. He could either die fighting or wait to be slaughtered along with his comrades on the ridge.

  As his friends remained hidden, Cody quickly executed a nifty duck, sweep, kick and spin move he had practiced several times with the SEAL team. He disarmed the gunman, distancing himself just a few feet from his captors. In a split second, as he was moving down and away, rifle fire rang out again — two deadly kill shots fired from the unseen location above. The heads of both nervous enemy warriors exploded.

  Cody sustained a cut on the side of his neck, but it was not life-threatening. Blood, brain tissue and skull splinters now covered the right sleeve of his flight suit.

  Two Navy SEALs identified themselves before appearing from behind cover. Cody knelt again beside Harry. The bullet fired by the shaky-handed boy had missed Harry’s head but had struck him in the chest. He was alive for now. The child holding the weapon had taken a fatal gunshot through the face. The other four boys were unharmed but traumatized.

  Hondo Phillips, communications specialist and sniper, and Elias Chavez, munitions expert and sometimes medic, slid down the embankment to the crashed aircraft.

  Chavez examined Harry to determine his condition. “Doesn’t look good. Head injury and a serious chest wound. He needs a hospital.” He did his best to stop the bleeding by making bandages from some of the clothing taken from the dead Taliban.

  Chavez bandaged Cody’s neck. “We need to stitch this cut as soon as we can find cover again.”

  “We’re hoping to evac the wounded sometime today if we can clear out some of these baggers tracking us,” Hondo added.

  “Nice shooting.” Cody staggered back to his feet and leaned on the downed Hornet’s right stabilizer, which had been nearly hidden by a rockslide.

  “What was it that shot you down?” Chavez asked.

  “Dunno. We got no warning. A lucky shot with some handheld weapon, a manpad, a golden BB, a fluke.” Cody’s right calf and foot felt like a thousand wasp stings. He respired rapidly, his face contorted.

  “Too low to eject?” Hondo asked.

  “It was my call. Dodging the peaks, losing control. Then I saw this plateau. I don’t know.” Cody shook his head, “Maybe I should’ve —”

  “Can’t second-guess yourself now, Lieutenant. Too late. Need to slow down that breathing. Can’t have you passing out on us.”

  Cody exhaled slowly. “I was sitting up there at angels two zero on top of the world a few minutes ago.”

  “Not so glorious as you thought, huh, Babe?”

  Cody didn’t answer. His head was pounding, his burns were barely tolerable, and the bleeding cut on his neck stung as he perspired. Each step seemed more painful than the last while they ascended back up the embankment. He tried to bring his nerves under control.

  “How far away is your hideout?” Cody would be forced to make it under his own power because Hondo and Chavez had to alternate carrying Harry — a load at 225 pounds.

  “Bout a mile,” Chavez said. “What’re we gonna do with these kids?”

  “We can’t take these little zits with us,” Hondo mumbled. “They’ll slow us down, and we’ll all buy a piece of this friggin’ wasteland.”

  “Can’t let ‘em follow either,” Chavez added. “They’ll trail us almost to our hideout and then disappear and give away our location to the enemy.”

  Hondo looked around nervously. “And something else to think about…” He turned and stared at the four frightened boys.

  “Something else?” Cody sat down on a rock, trying to stay conscious.

  “Babe, think about it.” Chavez continued Hondo’s thought. “If we let them go back, the Taliban will turn these kids into killers.”

  “And what happens if we take them with us and get caught?” Cody wrapped a towel around his head to protect against the sun, and worked on slowing his respiration.

  “They’ll torture and kill us,” Chavez state
d with conviction. “And judging from the mindset of these butchers, they’ll probably torture the kids just for going with us. They’ll call ‘em traitors.”

  “I know this is your show here on the ground,” Cody said, “but I vote we find a place to hide them.”

  “Where are we gonna hide ‘em out here?” Hondo objected. “They aren’t safe with or without us. Problem is, we need to expedite.”

  “So what are you saying?” Cody’s head was clearing.

  Chavez glanced at the kids and then back. “All we’re saying, Babe, is sometimes there are no good answers out here. We let ‘em go, and they’ll be killing Marines in a couple o’ years.”

  “Look, does either of you guys speak the language? Is there any way we can communicate with ‘em?”

  Chavez shrugged. “I don’t think so, Babe. They don’t speak Arabic around here. We can try to leave them somewhere, but they won’t stay put.”

  “I say we finish it now and get t’ell outta here,” Hondo grumbled. “They could be on us any second. They gotta be lookin’ for us.”

  Chavez snapped back, “Stand down, Phillips. These are innocent kids we’re talkin’ about.”

  “Stand down? We’re sittin’ here like — I mean it’s our butts on the plate.”

  “You’re outa line, Petty Officer! SEALs protect innocents. We don’t kill ‘em!” Chavez outranked him.

  “Yessssir!” Hondo scowled, as he forced an agitated salute and turned away.

  “Why don’t we tie ‘em up? Leave them in a secure place?” Cody took a deep breath. “When the extraction helo arrives in a few hours, we can go back and pick ‘em up and take them with us, turn them over to the Red Cross or something like that. Lemme try to explain it to them. What do you think?” He winced.

  “It sucks either way, Babe. What if the wild animals get ‘em?” Chavez stared at the four boys again who were now huddled together.

  Hondo sat alone on a rock, scanning the hills with his range finder.

  Chavez made the call. “Okay, Babe. Give it a shot. Like I said, sometimes there are no good solutions.”

  Cody tried what little Arabic he knew, but the kids did not respond to any of it. The oldest frantically pleaded and began to cry. It was useless to try to understand him.

  The men found a secluded place in a ravine and tied the four children with ropes and headbands they had taken off the Taliban. They bound them hand and foot and tied them to each other, making it impossible to escape. Despite the pleading of the children, the three men left and began the trek back toward their team’s hiding place with Hondo and Chavez alternating the task of carrying Seismo.

  They could still hear the cries of the four boys until just before they arrived at the camp. With each step, Cody wanted to go back.

  When they finally dragged into the hideout, Cody had reached his limit. He collapsed onto a large flat rock underneath a ledge. Chavez gave him a shot of morphine, then wrapped his burns and stitched the cut on his neck.

  Cody looked around. They had taken refuge at the base of a cliff that extended several hundred feet upward. It was early afternoon, and the sun had moved just behind the tops of the rocks, thus placing him in the shade. Positioned in the shadowy recesses along the bottom of the escarpment, he and the others hoped to make themselves invisible.

  “How you doin’, Lieutenant?” It was Major Simon Hendrix, commander of the mission, sitting farther back underneath the ledge. Two rounds had shattered his left shoulder and collarbone, and the resulting fall had inflicted a head injury. Morphine had slowed his speech. His face was splotched with reddish-gray mud. He wore a bloody head bandage and his dark eyes were bloodshot and puffy.

  “I’ll live, Sir. Looks like you took one through the shoulder? Hopefully, we can be outta here in an hour or so.”

  “Take another look around you, son. Reality is, this retreat is safe for now, but it’s just a matter of time. Can’t get a helo in here because of the rocks and the cliff behind us. We’ll have to abandon this location just to find a vertical landing zone.”

  Even with the morphine, the major’s voice was commanding, articulate, resolute.

  “We also have three injured now, Babe, including Seismo,” Chavez reminded. “Gonna be impossible to relocate again and avoid detection. And I can tell you for sure, Seismo won’t make it if we don’t get him to a hospital.”

  “What about the kids we left in that ravine?”

  “No way, Babe. Suicide if we go back to get them without a gunship for cover. Right now, looks like we’re gonna have to fight our way out of here. Shoot-n-scoot may be our only option, but the odds will be twenty-to-one.”

  “A Parthian shot? We gonna try it tonight?”

  “Won’t work, Babe,” Hondo spit out. “Too hazardous without the full moon, especially carrying wounded. Bullock stepped on loose rocks in broad daylight and fell thirty feet.” He pointed to the other injured SEAL, Jeffry Bullock, age 28, who was grimacing even after receiving morphine. “He’s laid up over there with a broken ankle and shattered hip.”

  “Besides that, son, you forget that the Parthian shot required horses.” Major Hendrix gutted out a smile. “And they didn’t teach that at the Academy.”

  Due to the extended mission and additional wounded, medical supplies were running low, including pain meds. Cody’s adrenaline rush now abandoned him. With morphine and the exhaustion, he fell asleep and did not awake until 0500 the next morning.

  Ne’er Saw True Beauty ‘til This Night

  Four years later —

  Houston, Sunday, July 6 — Oakland right-hander Jake Grim stood in front of the pitcher’s mound and glared toward home plate. His wiry hair curled upward from underneath the sides of his cap. His rugged beard, gnarly expression, and six-foot seven-inch frame afforded him an intimidating presence like that of a giant Neanderthal on steroids.

  Cody Musket, rookie third baseman, stepped out of the batter’s box, removed his batting helmet, and wiped perspiration from his eyes. With a full count and bases loaded with two outs, his team trailing by two runs, Cody had fouled off three nasty sinkers in a row.

  It was the bottom of the ninth inning. The crowd was on its feet. It had come down to a mind game between one of the best veteran relief pitchers in baseball and a rookie hitter who had been with the big league club only ten weeks.

  Astros broadcaster Bobby Dodge had the call.

  “…Grim stretches, checks the runners. And here comes the payoff pitch again. Musket sends a soft line drive down the right field line. It’s slicing…but it’s a fair ball! One run across! Two runs score! And now here comes Bustamante around third! The throw to the plate is off-line! The Astros win again! The ‘Stros have now won their eighth in a row as they prepare to leave town for a three-game series in Philadelphia, and then three games with Pittsburgh beginning next Friday, leading up to the All-Star break…”

  * * *

  Pittsburgh, Friday, July 11 — Musket! Musket, wake up!” Mark Stiller, Cody’s roommate, shook him by the shoulders. “Cody, wake up! You gotta come out of it!”

  “Uh, what time is it, Stills?” Cody sat up and held his head in his hands.

  “Man, it’s almost five o’clock in the afternoon. The game’s been rained out. You were losing it. When I walked in you were yelling ‘mayday’ again.”

  “Uh, did I say anything else?”

  “Yeah, you said something about some kids. You’re livin’ in a fog, man. You should get some help. What would you do if I wasn’t here? Like the other time when you got up and walked into the wall at the Marriot in Baltimore — blood all over the dang carpet, five stitches on your head.”

  “Hey, no sweat. I fell asleep. Just had a bad dream, that’s all.”

  “Yeah, right. Like the time I found you lyin’ in the hallway in Tampa and you didn’t even know where you were? Yeah, that was a bad dream too. Man, it’s been four years. Whatever happened over there, you need to get over it. But, what the hey, I mean it’s your busines
s, your life, your career.”

  Cody took a long breath, then walked over to the bathroom sink and splashed his face. “I heard about the game being rained out, so I took a snooze.” He carried a towel back to the bed, sat on the edge and wiped his face. "Gotta find something to do with myself tonight.”

  “I’m leaving right now to pick up Sandy at the airport,” Mark said. “We’re going to her aunt’s house in Harrisburg tonight.” Mark put on his cap and walked toward the door. “Get some help, Musket. You don’t trust me. I get that. But you gotta friggin’ trust somebody.”

  From the eleventh floor of the Marriott, Cody could see PNC Ballpark in the distance. An early, wet darkness had befallen the city. Still raining. Gonna be a boring night.

  This was the evening he had dreaded — his first rainout since joining the Astros. In his previous three years, in the minor leagues, he had not done rainouts well. Boredom was something he feared.

  He sat in his plush hotel room looking through the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. He flipped through the TV channels, stopping at local KDFG-TV in time to catch a sports report.

  “We turn our attention to sports now, as KDFG’s Peggy Kravchuk is standing by at PNC Park. Peggy, lots of rain today.”

  “That’s right, Cliff. And it looks like more dark clouds are on the way.”

  “Well, Peggy, tell us what to expect from this red-hot Astros team.”

  “Cliff, the visiting Astros have been ignited by the surprising emergence of rookie third baseman Cody Musket. At only five foot nine inches, he’s leading the American League in home runs and is carrying a hefty .329 batting average. He has been up from Houston’s Double-A team at Corpus Christi just since late April and…”

  He turned it off, put on a Pirates T-shirt, stepped into a pair of Wrangler jeans, and donned a Pirates baseball cap. Hopefully, wearing the Pirates gear would keep him from being recognized.