“No, I didn’t. I was primarily concerned with sterilizing it.”
Dr. Lindsey shook his head slightly. “I understand, but the risk of a bite victim contracting rabies is reduced by a good, thorough flushing of the injury site at the time of the bite, prior to any type of medicinal treatment.”
“Sorry I didn’t consult my Boy Scout manual,” snapped Finch, immediately aware of the unreasonableness of his reply. “Sorry. This has been a…stressful period. Honestly, rabies is so rare here in the US that I’m really not that familiar with the treatment protocols.”
“Of course,” reassured Dr. Lindsey, whose tone took on a more cautionary quality as he continued. “Mr. Finch, you need to understand that—despite our treatment—Sean could get worse. The bite is deep, and the infection entered his bloodstream immediately. Naturally, we’ll do all we can, but…”
“How much worse could he get?” asked Finch, his voice wavering.
Dr. Lindsey shifted his gaze to the wall before looking Finch in the face again. “I’d like to be able to promise you he’ll pull through, but I can’t.”
Finch felt dizzy, and his legs became weak, almost unresponsive. “This can’t be happening. Oh, God…”
“I’d like to keep him here for at least a week, probably longer. We can monitor his progress and prevent any secondary infections. Are you okay with that?”
“Yes, whatever you need to do,” mumbled Finch. The doctor continued to talk, but Finch couldn’t focus on the meaning of his words; it seemed as if Dr. Lindsey were talking to him underwater, making sounds which could be heard but not understood. Whatever you do, just save him…
CHAPTER 5
Camp Eggers, Kabul, Afghanistan
His leg and confidence equally shattered, Alton fell into a depth of despair he would not have considered possible before the explosion. Earlier in life, Alton had overcome many hardships, but none had destroyed his resolve as this event had. The weight on his weary shoulders seemed incapable of being lifted, now or in the future.
The day arrived for Alton to visit Major Laughton, his counselor, but he couldn’t visualize any good coming from the meeting. A nurse arrived with a wheelchair. As she approached, Alton tried to swing his legs off the hospital bed but—as usual—found his injured leg virtually unresponsive to everything but pain, which lanced through it like personal lightning bolts. The lack of mobility produced a new wave of frustration and depression.
The nurse positioned her arm under Alton’s legs and gently transferred him to the wheelchair, pushed him to a table in Major Laughton’s office, and left.
Alton stared at the tabletop, feeling dead inside. Major Laughton greeted Alton and introduced herself, then waited in silence for a full minute.
“How are you, Alton?” she finally asked.
“Okay, I guess,” he replied automatically.
“I mean how are you really? Can you tell me how it’s not okay? Tell me what’s going on with you,” probed the counselor.
Alton sighed and looked up at her. The crow’s feet around her eyes and smile on her face gave her a kindly, empathetic appearance. “I don’t know,” he replied. “I feel…numb. Like a light inside me has been extinguished.”
Laughton nodded and leaned forward. “I see. Can you elaborate on that?”
Alton shifted forward in his wheelchair until the pressure on his injured leg caused him to wince and sit up straight again. “The soldiers under my command—the ones I was tasked with leading and protecting—are dead…all but two of them, at least. As for me…” He stopped and sighed. “Until now, I’ve always had a plan for my life: take care of my mom and sisters, go to college, build a career in military field cryptography. But now?…What do I work for? My field career is over. Everything I’ve worked for is gone.” He stared blankly at the wall behind the counselor’s head.
“So you’re having difficulty figuring out new goals for yourself?” asked the counselor.
“Yes--that’s it exactly. I don’t have any new ones, and…I just can’t bring myself to care. What’s the point of struggling with this every day?” he asked, motioning to his bandaged leg. “I’m never going to go back to the job I love. Who is really gonna care if I recover or die out here in the desert?”
“Alton, let’s address that. I’ve read your medical chart and your military file. You have a mother and two younger sisters in Georgia, right?”
“Yes.”
“Are you close to them?”
Alton sighed and nodded. “Yeah, we’ve always been close, especially since my dad left. That’s when I started helping my mom take care of the family.”
“You’re still taking care of them, aren’t you? You send a portion of each paycheck to them, right?”
“Yes,” he acknowledged.
“Do you talk with them often?”
“Sort of. I used to Skype with my sisters all the time—until the accident.”
“It seems like your family counts on you, emotionally and financially. You’re a role model for your sisters. Don’t you think they’re expecting you to show your strength again, to pull through this?”
“I suppose so,” admitted Alton, feeling a curious combination of resentment and relief, now that Major Laughton had poked holes in his feelings of detachment from the rest of humanity. He realized he had more thinking to do on this topic.
A week later, Alton received another visit from Colonel Parks. “How’s the physical therapy coming, Captain?” the colonel inquired cheerfully.
Alton still felt dead inside. “Frankly, sir, I think it’s too early to say. I’m barely allowed to move my leg. The docs don’t want me to rip any of the interior muscle sutures.”
“You’re completing the PT as instructed, right?”
“Yes, sir, four times a day. It feels like twenty.”
The colonel chuckled and sat on Alton’s bed. “How’s your mobility? Better?”
Alton nodded. “I can get in and out of the wheelchair, bathe, eat…” He trailed off, shrugging his shoulders.
“I’m glad to hear it, because we need you.”
Alton looked up, feeling a curious flicker of hope.
“Our Command and Control division is down a Signal officer—Smitty got promoted,” continued the Colonel. “I’m going to recommend your replacing him, beginning Monday.”
“I understand, sir.” Alton felt disappointed but not surprised. If he ever regained a command in the field, it would only occur in the distant future. C2 was the only logical choice.
“Captain, I know you’re not keen on a desk assignment, but let me assure you this is not a paper-pushing job. The unfriendlies here intercept our communications every day, and we likewise intercept theirs. We need someone with your credentials to stay a step ahead of Al-Qaeda. Report to the Command Center in Delta building at oh-eight-hundred hours on Monday. I’ll meet you there and make the introductions.”
“Yes, sir.”
As if reading his mind, Colonel Parks added, “You’ll serve there for now, but it’s not necessarily permanent. Once your long-term recovery is complete, we’ll decide what happens next.”
Mixed feelings coursed through Alton. He was relieved to finally put his cryptographic skills back to use, yet how would the desk job compare with his former field command? He didn’t view his new role with much hope. For the first time since his injury, a dim light illuminated a future path in his life, but was that path headed in the wrong direction?
CHAPTER 6
US Central Command, Army Section, Afghanistan
“Colonel Drake, you have a call on the secure line,” announced a subordinate.
Army Colonel Charles Drake moved into the insulated room used to conduct his unit’s most private phone calls. He was a tall man with an immaculate uniform, a bushy mustache, and a tight-lipped smile.
“Colonel Drake here.”
“Hello, Colonel. This is Red Snake.”
Red Snake was an agent of the National Security Administration’s
“Special Operations Command”, the division used to conduct the NSA’s most clandestine assignments. Although Colonel Drake always felt it unnecessary, the agents never used their actual names to communicate. Hence, Colonel Drake knew his NSA handler only by the pseudonym “Red Snake.”
“How are things at the NSA, sir?”
“Quite busy, actually,” replied the colonel’s contact in an even voice. “I’m assigning you a top-priority mission. The suspected Al-Qaeda training camp in sector sierra bravo niner has been confirmed. I’ll send you the exact coordinates. A drone strike is scheduled for tonight at twenty-three hundred hours. I need you to pull back all ground troops by eighteen-hundred hours. I’ll clear the airspace by twenty-two hundred hours. We want a clean shot at the bastards.”
Because the NSA designed strategy but did not execute it, its missions were carried out through second-party operatives, such as Colonel Drake and his Army Brigade. This approach minimized the risk of NSA agents falling into enemy hands and divulging the considerable strategic information they possessed.
“Yes, sir. Will our ground troops move in after the strike, sir?”
“No, we will not engage except via the drones.”
“Sir…” The colonel struggled with the decision to speak or remain silent.
“Yes, Colonel?”
“With all due respect, sir, have you considered engaging the enemy with ground troops after the strike? I realize that using only an air attack limits the risk to our soldiers, but drones inevitably leave survivors. If our mission is to wipe out all the insurgents, shouldn’t we follow up with a ground assault?”
“I appreciate your enthusiasm, Colonel, and I share your desire to eliminate as many insurgents as possible. But our orders come from the top: engage the enemy, but keep coalition casualties to an absolute minimum. We will not be in contact again before the operation. You have your orders.”
“Yes, sir.”
Colonel Drake ended the call yet remained in his chair for a minute, brooding.
“What do we have ground troops for if we’re not going to use them?” he muttered to the insulated walls. “And how can a man expect to demonstrate his military acumen if he’s ordered to sit on his hands?”
He stood to leave. The exertion of striding for the room’s exit provided little relief for his frustration. He knew that at some point, coalition forces would have to do more than just send in drones.
CHAPTER 7
Camp Eggers, Kabul, Afghanistan
Ten days after the bombing, Zach Lambert—the off-shift soldier who had escaped the mobcom blast—appeared by Alton’s bedside.
“How are you, Captain?” asked Alton’s former Staff Sergeant.
Alton motioned to his swathed leg and shrugged. “I’m alive. I’m reporting for duty at the C2 here on Monday. How are you making out, Sergeant Lambert?”
Lambert hunched his shoulders and looked at the foot of Alton’s bed. “It’s pretty tough. Sergeant Dawkins went state-side to recover, and I don’t know any of the newbies. I’m having to train everyone. And…I keep thinking back to that day. I should have been there—”
“You were taking your assigned day off,” interjected Alton. “You did nothing wrong. Only those of us inside the mobcom van had a chance to prevent it, and we failed.”
“Captain, from what I hear, no one could have prevented it. It was a typical IED—it just happened out of the blue.”
Alton could only nod in response. He knew he wasn’t to blame, but the incident still filled him with a sick dread.
Lambert continued, “They never did catch Caleb, that son of a bitch who planted it.”
Desperate to turn the subject, Alton asked, “So what’s new out in the field?”
“Well, the unfriendlies have a new bugging device. It looks like a grape, but it’s made of plastic and contains a transmitter.”
“Interesting,” said Alton, not really interested but not knowing what else to say.
“Yeah,” said Lambert, warming to the subject. “The range isn’t very far, though—only about fifty feet or so.”
“It makes sense,” said Alton. “Every street vendor carries grapes. They’re so ubiquitous, no one would notice a stray one sitting around.”
The conversation stalled as neither soldier knew how to best help the other. Eventually, Lambert piped up with false cheer. “Well, you take care, Captain. I hope you’ll be back to Gazib soon. We could use you.”
“Thanks, Sergeant. I’m glad you made it through. Take care of the greenhorns.”
As Lambert pushed through the hospital door, Alton felt his hopes and aspirations leaving with him. Lambert’s presence—and the reminder of the battlefield he represented—had made Alton uncomfortable, but he was made even more uncomfortable by Lambert’s absence. The last connection to his past was gone. Alton was left to swim in dark, fog-enshrouded waters to the distant shore of the future without knowing in which direction it lay.
As ordered, Alton reported for his first day of desk duty at Camp Eggers’s C2 Delta building. He handed his identification card to the MP on duty so it could be activated, allowing him access to the building’s secured rooms. As he waited, Colonel Parks approached.
“Good morning, Captain Blackwell. Welcome to Command and Control.”
“Good morning, Colonel Parks,” replied Alton. The MP returned the security card to Alton.
“Follow me. I’ll introduce you to your teammates.”
Alton nodded. He and Colonel Parks swiped their cards and passed through the magnetically-locked door. Alton had been upgraded from his wheelchair to crutches, which he used to travel slowly through the secured section. His thoughts wandered as he hobbled down the hallway towards the room in which he would work. Only two weeks had passed since his injury, and the concept of starting a new, desk-bound assignment continued to hold an unreal quality. He had to remind himself he was actually starting a new job. Still desensitized from his injury and the loss of his comrades, Alton approached the desk assignment stoically but without the previous enthusiasm of his field command.
Colonel Parks introduced Alton to General Mooreland, the C2 commanding officer.
“Welcome aboard, Captain,” said the general. “We need you this very moment. The Signal Company has intercepted a barrage of messages it can’t crack. Colonel Parks will introduce you to your squad, and then I’ll need you heads down on this project A-S-A-P.”
“Yes, sir.”
Colonel Parks ushered Alton into a large, open room with dozens of work spaces. He guided Alton to a section over which a “Signal” placard hung from the ceiling. “You’ll command Bravo Squad. This is Sergeant Decker…Specialist Creighton…Specialist Hines…Lieutenant Garcia,” announced Colonel Parks, as Alton nodded a greeting to each in turn. After introducing the remaining eight soldiers under Alton’s command, Colonel Parks turned to a nearby officer. “And this is Captain Dunlow with Military Intelligence. He’s your liaison to MI, to whom—of course—your decoded messages should be sent. This is Captain Graham, your counterpart, commander of the Signal Company’s Alpha Squad.”
Graham gazed at Alton. “How long’s it gonna take to get you up to speed?”
“I’ll do my best to minimize any interruption to your team, Captain,” replied Alton, a little surprised at the man’s brusque manner.
Colonel Parks directed Alton to his desk and glanced over his shoulder at General Mooreland. “I know you have a mission, so I won’t keep you from it. Let me know if I can help, Captain.” He gave a thumbs-up and strode away.
Alton turned toward his new subordinates. “General Mooreland told me you’ve intercepted a flurry of messages that use a code we haven’t cracked. Show me what you’ve got.”
While Lieutenant Garcia stepped forward, Alton lowered himself into his chair and leaned his crutches against a nearby wall. The lieutenant brought up a decryption program on the large monitor on Alton’s desk. Fortunately, C2 employed the same software Alton had used in the fiel
d. Alton stared intently as the information scrolled up the screen, the figures seeming to dance as they went. He felt a faint return of the old excitement, of executing a job as no one else could. Yet the new feeling was but a shadow of the adrenaline rush he had experienced in the field. As he continued to gaze at the screen, his thoughts started to wander back to his old command.
Alton shook his head and concentrated on the task at hand. After studying the figures for two minutes, he frowned. It was a simple substitution cipher. In his old unit, this code would have been routinely broken in minutes without the need for him to personally intervene.
Alton could hear soldiers in other C2 companies—Infantry, Armor—becoming restless. The phone on Alton’s desk buzzed. He wasn’t sure how to answer it, so he took a guess. “Command and Control Signal Bravo Squad—this is Captain Blackwell.”
“Captain, I need those messages decoded,” said General Mooreland from the other end. “As I’m sure you’ve seen, Al-Qaeda messaging has spiked. It typically reaches this level of activity only immediately preceding a strike. They’re getting ready to act, and I need to know where and when.”
“Yes, sir. We’ve cracked the code and are working to decrypt and translate the messages now.”
“Damn—already?” said the general. “Nice work. Send the messages to Captain Dunlow as they’re translated.”
“Yes, sir,” said Alton. He gathered Bravo Squad around his desk. After sending the decryption algorithm to all of the members of his team, Alton assigned a portion of the messages to each soldier for decryption. The entire set of encrypted messages was translated, decoded, and sent to Military Intelligence within the space of thirty minutes.
In another ten minutes, officers in the infantry and air support sections of the large room began shouting orders. Captain Dunlow approached Alton’s desk.
“I guess you passed along the message content, right?” asked Alton. “Al-Qaeda forces are massing in northern Kabul outside a Shiite mosque.”
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