by Mel Odom
The footage continued to roll. The mountain of a man dealing with the tide of men coming at him from both sides worked like a machine. He talked briefly to each man in turn, covered the man’s face with a big hand, and dunked him.
“Most of the soldiers have to hurry back to their posts,” Danielle said. “In the beginning, I’m told Corporal Baker simply came here on a water detail assigned by Sergeant Gander. When one of his crew asked to be baptized, Baker granted that request. Other crews from the U.N. peacekeeping forces and the Turkish army were on hand getting water as well.”
The camera view pulled back and shifted to show a broader view of the stream. Hundreds of men lined the hillsides.
Remington swore in disbelief. What had Goose been thinking by leaving Baker in place instead of taking the man into custody?
The camera view tightened on Danielle Vinchenzo again.
“Some of the men consented to talk to us,” Danielle said. “Although most preferred their experience here today to be kept private.” She turned to look off-camera and gestured to someone.
A soldier wearing the familiar baby blue headgear that identified the United Nations peacekeeping teams stepped on-camera with Danielle. He was big and young and nervous and soaking wet. Deep scratches showed on the left side of his face.
“This is Corporal Flannery O’Doyle of the Irish contingent of the United Nations peacekeepers,” Danielle said, turning to the man. ”Corporal, I’ll only take a few minutes of your time. I know you’ve got to get back to your unit.”
“Yes, miss. Me an’ the boyos, we’ve been powerful busy.” O’Doyle looked slightly embarrassed. When he smiled, he showed a gap between his two front teeth.
“This assignment hasn’t turned out as you expected.”
Sadness touched the young corporal’s face. “No, miss. I lost three of me mates this mornin’, I did. Good men. All of ’em.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Corporal.”
“Yes, miss. Thank you, miss.” O’Doyle put his hands behind his back at parade rest.
“What brought you here?”
O’Doyle looked over his shoulder, squinting slightly against the sun to the west. The deep scratches on his face showed more. “I heard about a man baptizin’ in the stream, miss. An’ I had to come.”
“Why?”
The big Irishman shrugged. “I was raised Presbyterian, miss. I already been baptized once. When I was just a wee lad. Me ma, she saw to that. She was a right stubborn old lady when she put her mind to it, she was. An’ she puts her mind to it often.” He pursed his lips. “But I never saw to gettin’ baptized on me own. A decision like that, why it seems like it ought to be left betwixt a man an’ his Maker, you know?”
The camera tightened on O’Doyle’s face. He stuck his chin out, obviously having trouble speaking.
“This mornin’, after that ferocious battle, all them men dyin’ an’ them bombs droppin’ from the air, why it was like—” O’Doyle pursed his lips and sucked in a quick breath. Tears glittered in his green eyes. “I held one of me mates when he died this mornin’, miss. That’s just somethin’ you don’t forget. But as I sat there holdin’ him, feelin’ him goin’ away from me, I felt like God hisself put it in me heart to get right with him. To come to him on me own two feet.” His voice broke.
“And you heard about Corporal Baker,” Danielle prompted gently.
“Yes, miss. I did. An’ I asked me sergeant if I couldn’t come out here an’ get right with the Lord. He sent me on, he did. An’ I got here an’ Corporal Baker, why he rightly baptized me.” O’Doyle looked at Danielle. “I tell you, miss, I haven’t felt like this in me whole life. I feel like I done been reborn. I come up outta that water, an’ I knew everythin’ was gonna be okay.”
“You mean with the coming battle?”
O’Doyle shook his head. “No, miss. We got a powerful lot of fightin’ ahead of this. Our commandin’ officers, they all tell us that. I don’t know if I’ll make it back home or not, but whatever happens, I know it’s gonna be all right.” He touched his wet uniform. “I’m not alone anymore, miss.” He nodded back out at the stream. “Me an’ these men what’s here, them what has had God hisself speakin’ into our hearts, why we’ll never be alone on this battlefield again.” He shifted his assault rifle over his shoulder and touched his blue beret.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, miss, I gotta get back to me unit.”
“Of course, Corporal,” Danielle said. “Thank you for sharing that with us.”
“Miss,” O’Doyle said with deadly earnestness, “if you go through somethin’ like that back there, bein’ saved in the Lord, I mean, you’ll find you just gotta tell somebody. It’s too big to just keep all to yourself. I’ll pray for you, miss, that God will keep you safe in his sight, an’ that you’ll make your own peace with him.” Without another word, he turned and trotted away.
Danielle Vinchenzo appeared to have been caught off guard. She fumbled the smooth transition back to the camera. “This is Danielle Vinchenzo, on special assignment for OneWorld NewsNet, where a miracle is taking shape on a battlefield.”
The news channel switched back to the anchor, and the stories moved on to the disappearances that had taken place around the world.
Remington tapped the touch pad and broke the television feed. He leaned back in his chair and stripped the earbud from his ear. Anger swirled through him. He swore.
The mission had fallen apart. He’d been used by the CIA and didn’t know the full extent of his culpability in precipitating the attack, had been in command of the rescue mission that had ended up scattered across the hardpan. His first sergeant was allowing a crazed corporal to baptize the men of three armies while the event was filmed for an international audience.
Remington didn’t want to hear about it when the joint chiefs learned of the baptisms. He rubbed his face. More than anything, he needed a win. And to get that win he knew he needed to start putting his foot down and take command of the unit that Goose had let slip through his fingers.
And Remington was going to start by putting an end to the nonsense taking place in that stream.
Turkish-Syrian Border
40 Klicks South of Sanliurfa, Turkey
Local Time 1623 Hours
Goose parked the Hummer along the ridgeline overlooking the stream where the baptisms continued. He’d managed to send three chaplains to aid Corporal Baker, drawing from those who manned the triage center. Instead of allowing himself to be relieved, Baker had continued with his work. Seven other chaplains from the U.N. forces and the Turkish army had joined them.
Singing continued to fill the streambed area.
Thankfully, Goose noted, the woman reporter for OneWorld was absent. With Remington stepping out into the field himself, Goose really didn’t want her around to witness what he knew was going to be a confrontation.
Feeling the pain of his knee from the driving, Goose stepped from the Hummer. He leaned against the vehicle and stretched the knee out carefully. He’d had similar injuries in the past and had worked through them. The stretching didn’t help. What he needed more than anything was rest, a good meal, and eight hours of sleep. Soldiers won wars on supplies like that.
Instead, Goose reached into the pocket of his BDUs and took out a packet of analgesic tabs. He popped the tabs into his mouth, not happy about having to use them because the aspirin in them also thinned the blood and would make any wounds he received bleed more and be harder to staunch.
But being able to move was top priority. He was infantry, after all, not air force or navy. He fought his battles on his feet and he needed two good legs.
He took the canteen from his hip and drank the tabs down in two long swallows. For a moment, he remembered how he and Chris sometimes filled one of his canteens with Sunny Delight—which Chris always called “power of the sun” because he quoted commercials that caught his eye—and “camped out on safari” in the backyard for an hour or two at a time. Chris’s vivid
imagination always created ferocious beasts, which they tamed or trapped, or swamps filled with alligators, which they avoided. After while, alligators!
Joey never hung out there with them because he didn’t want to get caught crawling around on the ground to avoid vultures and dragons, but Bill Townsend had. Bill ended up getting to be Chris’s horse or camel or elephant a lot. When Joey had been not quite nine, when Goose had married Megan, the backyard had been Wrigley Field or Dodgers Stadium or Fenway Park or Turner Field. Megan had gotten to be the cheering section and umpire, just as she’d always been the “girl” Chris had insisted they rescue from the beasts in the jungle.
A wave of homesickness passed through Goose. He wanted to be back home with his family, to sit at the kitchen table and watch Chris playing in the backyard, to catch a ball game with Joey and work on whatever was creating a rift between them, to have dinner with Megan.
And Goose wanted Bill back here with him.
He pushed the thoughts away and concentrated on the action taking place in the stream. He made himself drink more water. That was one of the things he was pushing on all his troops. Perspiration was the body’s cooling mechanism, and drinking water provided the raw materials to get the job done.
A Jeep pulled away from farther up the stream’s edge. As the vehicle drew closer, Goose recognized Captain Tariq Mkchian in the passenger seat.
The Jeep pulled to a stop in front of the Hummer. Goose saluted.
“At ease, Sergeant,” Mkchian said as he stepped from the Jeep.
“Yes, sir.” Goose replaced his canteen on his hip.
Mkchian took off his sunglasses and wiped them free of dust. He put them back on and looked at the stream. “It’s an amazing thing, isn’t it?”
“What’s that, sir?”
“Belief, Sergeant. Belief.”
“Yes, sir.”
Mkchian looked at him. “I’m surprised to see you here. I’d heard you were here earlier.”
“I was.”
“And you’re back now.” The statement came across as a question.
“Yes, sir.” Goose wasn’t going to tell the man that Remington had ordered him to be there or that the captain intended to put an end to the baptisms.
“I’ve also been told Captain Remington is en route,” Mkchian said.
Goose said nothing.
“My spies, you see,” Mkchian said, “are everywhere.” He grinned as he said it.
Goose knew that the statement was offered in jest, but he also knew that the Turkish captain would have been a fool not to monitor the activities of the Rangers.
“So I had to ask myself,” Mkchian said, “what Captain Remington would be doing out here. He has been very adroit at managing intelligence, supply, reinforcements, and renegotiating satellite reconnaissance even though it involved the introduction of the OneWorld NewsNet people among my men.”
Goose shifted uncomfortably on his injured knee. Neither sitting nor standing helped with the pain. Only being in motion to some degree helped alleviate the gnawing sensation and the throbbing.
“The only answer I came up with,” Mkchian continued, “was that Captain Remington wasn’t happy with the events that are currently taking place here.”
Goose didn’t comment.
“I, on the other hand,” the Turkish captain said, “was raised Christian. That’s surprising in a country that is 98 percent Islamic. However, many people don’t know that Christianity was the chief religion in this country before Islam came in with the Seljuks when they took Jerusalem in 1071.”
“Their taking Jerusalem precipitated the Crusades,” Goose said. Mkchian smiled as if in pleasant surprise. “A student of history, Sergeant?”
“My dad was a Sunday school teacher back home, and after the Korean War, he got his doctorate in history and taught college for a while.” The university job didn’t keep Wes Gander from being a simple man, though. “My dad showed me how Bible history intersects what they teach in public schools.”
Mkchian nodded. “My family—according to my father, who takes great pride in these things—insists that we can trace our Christianity back to the early people who first lived in these lands.” He looked toward the stream. “This event is an unexpected thing, Sergeant, but I believe it is a good thing.”
“Yes, sir.”
“But your captain doesn’t think so?”
“You’d have to ask him, sir.”
“I’ll do that, Sergeant.” Mkchian looked at Goose. “In the meantime, I’ve noticed that your leg is troubling you.”
“I’m getting by.”
“Nonsense. You’re in pain. I noticed that earlier and took the liberty of getting a medical kit. Have you ever had a cortisone shot before?”
“Yes.” In the past, he’d needed a few cortisone shots to keep that knee functioning.
“I have cortisone. If you’ll allow my aide to treat you. I assure you that he’s trained to deliver shots like this.” Mkchian smiled. “I took a round through my left shoulder a few years ago. The shoulder had to be reconstructed. It still troubles me from time to time, and I have found cortisone to be a good thing.” He gestured to the Jeep driver. “Tonight, when we pull back from this border, I would like knowing that you are as able as you can be. To me, such a course of action makes sense because I will in part be relying on you. What do you think?”
Goose hesitated only a moment. “Yes, sir.” He knelt with difficulty and unlaced his boot. He pulled his pant leg up and bared his swollen knee.
Mkchian frowned as Goose hoisted himself up on the Hummer’s rear deck so his leg would dangle freely. “That knee is in horrible shape, Sergeant.”
“Yes, sir. It’s not the first time I’ve damaged it.” Goose breathed out and then took slow breaths, pushing his mind past the pain that felt like a rusty bear trap had seized hold of his knee when the corporal gently worked his leg. He continued breathing through the pain of the shots as the man stabbed the needle deep into his knee. Thankfully, the cortisone was mixed with a local anesthetic and the pain relief was immediate.
“You realize that the cortisone will take the pain away,” Mkchian said, “but does not reduce the damage or the amount of damage you can unknowingly do to it.”
Goose lowered his pant leg, tucked it back into his boot, and pulled the laces tight. “I know that from past experience, Captain. Thank you.”
“It is my pleasure. When we get to Diyarbakir, you should have that knee looked at.”
“I will, sir.” Goose stood on the leg and tested it. The knee felt numb, like it was a long way away, but he felt his foot just fine.
An engine sounded over the ridgeline. A handful of seconds later, Cal Remington arrived in an RSOV with a full complement of Rangers.
Goose stood ramrod still and saluted. “Sir,” he barked.
Seeing Remington in captain’s dress still somehow seemed odd after all these years. Goose could remember when they were both coming up through the ranks, both of them breaking in one second lieutenant after another, only to see them go or transfer. But the recognition of the chain of command was immediate.
“Sergeant,” Remington said gruffly and fired off a salute while on the move. He looked over Goose’s shoulder, and Goose knew exactly what the captain was looking at. “I didn’t know we were hosting a revival.”
“No, sir,” Goose replied. Ever since Remington had gotten hold of him, told him he was coming out, Goose had known what the captain was going to want to discuss.
“If we’re not,” Remington snapped, “then tell me why I’ve got a Ranger corporal and three army chaplains hip deep in water handing out baptisms like there was a fire sale.”
“Things got out of control, sir,” Goose responded.
“Out of control? Sergeant, when things get out of control, you’re the first man I expect to put them back under control.”
“Yes, sir.”
“That’s lip service, mister.” Remington stood toe-to-toe with Goose, glaring down a
t him.
Goose knew anger was the most volatile emotion Remington had. In every other department—love, fear, curiosity—he seemed cool, almost dispassionate. Remington and Bill had never gotten along, and Goose had often had to argue on Bill’s behalf to keep him with the 75th.
“Who assigned those chaplains to be there with Baker?” Remington asked.
“I did, sir.”
“Why?”
“Because I thought it would speed up the process, sir.”
“How about ending the process, Sergeant? Did that cross your mind?”
“Yes, sir, it did. However, that seemed to be an unattainable objective, sir.”
“First Sergeant,” Remington growled, “that’s the last thing I want to hear from the man I put in command of my troops.”
“Yes, sir.”
Remington glared out at the stream. “Those men are slowing down my operation.”
“No, sir,” Goose said immediately.
Remington turned on him in an instant, shoving his face within inches of Goose’s. “What?”
Goose met Remington’s gaze full measure. For a moment, just the barest hint of a moment that didn’t last long enough to cross the line between non-com and officer, they were just two men again.
“The operation has not been slowed, sir,” Goose said. “If the captain will check the ops parameters on the mission he has assigned, he’ll find that the 75th—despite the loss of manpower and materials—is forty minutes ahead of schedule. The rifle companies are going to be ready to bed down before sunset, sir, instead of working into the night as we had predicted. We will be able to cover the no-man’s-land much more effectively.”
Remington cursed and drew back. “Those men need to be removed from that stream, Sergeant.”
Before Goose could reply, before he could even figure out what he was going to say, Captain Mkchian spoke up.
“Captain Remington, if I may interject.”
“You may not,” Remington said, turning on the Turkish captain. Immediately, the men with Mkchian spread out around their commanding officer. Mkchian appeared to take no offense.
