Chapter 1

Cresting the hill, I looked down on a hive of activity. The typical spring round up. This was a scene repeated for over 125 years. Cowboys, not much changed from their predecessors. Herding, roping, and branding cattle. I guess that if the politically correct crowd cared, they wouldn’t call us cowboys. Probably something stupid like bovine care technicians.

Myself, I was returning from another time-honored activity. I had just spent the last 6 months at the high-country line shack. The line shack wasn’t exactly a chicken coop. A 30-foot trailer, with a generator for power, satellite tv and internet, microwave, all the comforts of home. Actually, better than home. Since I was retired, thanks to the gulf war, I had been living out of my truck camper, looking for a place to settle down.

Me? I’m Matt Reynolds, late of the 101st Airborne, Pathfinder. Wounded during Desert Storm and then medically retired from service.

Kuwait was the end of my army career and the start of the next chapter of my life. During Desert Storm I was assigned to the quick reaction force for the division, when word came down that the intel weenies wanted some prisoners. A couple of media types had reported some easy pickings and my team was detailed to bring them in.

As soon as the Blackhawk dropped us, everything went to hell in a hand basket. We had been dropped right in the middle of a republican guard operational area.

I immediately got on the radio and requested, read demanded, extraction. We were safe enough at the time, all the Iraqi firepower was trying to sink the moon, shooting at imaginary helicopters. But I knew it was only a matter of time before they started looking for us.

When I radioed for help, I was informed that not only was extraction going to be awhile, but we were ordered to hold in place. To add misery to misfortune, air support also wasn’t available. Seems an Iranian patrol boat was a little too close to the fleet. The Navy wasn’t going to do anything until that situation was resolved. Which meant waking someone in DC, who had to wake someone, who had to,,, well you get the idea.

I pulled my team in tight and explained the situation. I didn’t mince words with them. I felt our odds were slim at best. The only thing I could think of was that the best defense is a good offence.

I had a good view of the Iraqi bunker, and their security was almost non-existent. My idea was that we take the bunker. Then we would be in a safer position inside than outside with our asses hanging out.

We took the bunker, and in the process, I picked up some lead in my leg. The team ended up with various medals. I was sent to Germany and then the states. The surgeons were able to fix most of the damage, but they decided that my military career was over.

As a side note, the intel weenies wanted to have me drawn and quartered. They seemed think the I blew their nice neat operation. My saving grace was #1 my team backed me up during the debrief, #2 the radio traffic recording didn’t get accidently erased. And last but certainly not least was the Iraqi 2 star general, a full colonel and a command and control section taken prisoner. It stuck in their throats, Schwarzkopf himself said I’d done good.

After I was medically discharged, I was sent to the VA for rehab. After rehab I started drifting around looking for a home. The bar t ranch was one of the stops on my search, actually the best so far. The work was hard, but paid well. And I was out in the open. Cities were definitely not on my list of places to settle down.

For the last 6 months I had been at the line shack. It had been me and Shadow. Plus, my appaloosa mare Margarite and mule Jughead. I didn’t mind the solitude so much. I didn’t have to deal with people and wasn’t spending any money. Between my wages and the army retirement, I’d saved up quite a bit.

Shadow was my best friend. While I was in the VA physical therapy program in Tacoma, I ran into a guy that was running a pet therapy project. He would bring in puppies for some of the PTSD patients. It was supposed to mellow out the more violent guys, and bring out the guys that were withdrawn. He also trained these same dogs up for the police and military. Shadow was the runt of the litter, and was going to be put down. When I picked him up we immediately bonded. During the next 6 months, with that pro’s help, Shadow trained up to a good working dog, and my best friend.