Chapter 1

Unedited Needs proof reading and editing still, might be a rough read - you are warned

There are some things you don’t wish for your worst enemy; Having a nice comfortable shit interrupted by a fire drill. Coming home from work finding the woman you thought loved you and everything going great, sleeping with another man. Your car breaking down 200 miles from home on the first day of your vacation. Having chest pains at an age where it most likely means your death, then waking up in the middle of the woods in the middle of nowhere.

I am retired Master Sergeant Benjamin Davis, US Army. I also retired from the Dayton county Sheriff’s Department as a Reservist Deputy doing part time dive recovery and TRU work.

I was a late bloomer in High School, I went from 5’10” to 6’4” my senior year. If anyone ever tells you they grew anywhere near that much, know two things: One, they were uncoordinated as fuck, it isn’t easy learning how to walk when your height changes. Two, they weren’t the popular kid. Tall linky skinny kids were not popular in my high school no matter how funny I tried to be.

I had a fascination with the Army from an early age. Every year I was a soldier for Halloween, that was back when you could go door to door on your own.

See, my momma had it rough, she fell in love with promises to get married, then got pregnant. She did get married, but their just aint that many job opportunities for a colored man that young in the late seventies to raise a family on, so he joined the Army. He ended up dying after a year due to an undiagnosed heart condition. So I was born and raised outside Fort Bragg, North Carolina, being told my father was a war hero. I was lucky in one sense, all the racial shit I heard about growing up, I never seen first hand. My momma work at least two jobs, her main job on base, and that kept me in a decent neighborhood, sheltered from the worst of it.

Some kids grow up dreaming of being a policeman, or an astronaut, for me it was always a soldier. I did okay in school, okay in sports, but was never great in either. That was fine though, because a soldier didn’t need straight A’s, and didn’t need to be able to dunk. My major problem was my growth spurt, not being able to walk, let alone run, without tripping over my own two feet. I read about the Rangers in 10th grade, in 11th grade I signed up for the Rangers with my mother’s consent. Of course my momma didn’t really like it, but she knew college wasn’t really in my future.

Growing up outside a base, my local recruiter had a unique opportunity to offer recruits, being so close. I was able to meet real soldiers, and actually did PT (physical training) with them numerous times as a junior and senior in high school.

I went to basic training at Fort Benning, Georgia. It wasn’t that hard, the learning stuff was really dumbed down so even an idiot could grasp it. I was a decent shot with the rifle. My hardest part was learning how to run with my still growing body, but it wasn’t terribly difficult.

Now if basic wasn’t that hard, Airborne school was a joke. I mean the learning part was okay, but the physical part, well I got out of what little shape I gained from basic. The hardest part about jumping out of an airplane was the landing ... okay, no more jokes.

RIP was right after Airborne school, the Ranger Indoctrination Program. Think of it like tryouts, we did a lot of really hard PT, had to memorize a bunch of stuff, and got constantly harassed and tested. So long as you didn’t quit, and had a modicum of common sense, you got through fine.

I shipped out to Fort Stewart, Georgia for my first home in the Army. You could say I arrived there bright eyed and bushy tailed as a tall skinny black kid. It was 1995, cell phones were pretty common by now. Michael Jordan was still a big deal. NASA was still flying missions. Microsoft was selling Windows 95. Everyone loved Mariah Carey, I mean sure she was hot, but come on.

I met my squad, first thing they did, was take me to AAFES to put a bunch of gear on store credit. Next thing we did was goto GNC and buy 6 tubs of protein mix, and a bunch of other stuff. I did normal PT in the mornings with everyone else, and if I wasn’t training, I was in the gym working out. That first year I went from 195 lbs to 230 lbs, which is a lot if you are unaware. I did it so much, for so long, it just became normal for me. When others would chill and go play playstation, I went to the gym. That is also how I met my first wife, at the gym I mean.

Now racism was never really a thing for me, I mean it was there in the back of my mind, and I knew it happened to others, and cops made me nervous. Growing up on and near a base surrounded by soldiers, I knew some people was racist, but it never bothered me. Basic training was pretty mixed, Airborne school I was one of five in a class of 250. In RIP I was the only one, and at my first duty station I was the only one in our company except for the platoon sergeant of 2nd platoon. Some might say blacks are lazy or unmotivated is why there are so few in socom, but I think it has to do more with how much racism they are exposed too. I think the more they are exposed to growing up, the less likely they are going to trust the system, and definitely don’t want to do anything dangerous in that system. However my first real exposure to racism was getting put at attention and getting my ass chewed out and screamed at by a Colonel for checking out his daughter and her friend while they were at the gym. Besides interrupting my sets, and getting screamed at in front of everyone by an ignorant asshole, it didn’t really bother me. He wasn’t in my chain of command, so he could peacock all he wanted due to his rank, but really he and his daughter shouldn’t have been in a Ranger gym anyway, this was holy ground, not a place for a POS leg. Of course that wasn’t the end of it, her friend was hot.

Three days later I was called to my COs desk and basically told to forget it ever happened, and drive on, it is the Army way of saying: Private First Class Davis we, the US Army, are terribly sorry and appalled by the blatant display of racial prejudice that occurred to you on our property in front of several witnesses. My only response was “Sir? Would it be possible to get that girls number? She was way hot.” He laughed and told me to get the fuck out of his office and do 50 push ups. That meant we were still cool, and I wasn’t upset about it.

I guess I should mention the atmosphere of socom, the culture maybe, or might be more like the difference between socom and regular units. This is all hearsay of course, I have never been in a leg unit before, but this is how it was explained to me. Regular Army was like a job, they goto work and do there job to the minimum amount they need to do that job to get a satisfactory review, then go home and drink a lot of beer. Socom, or special operations command, includes the Rangers, Special Forces, Navy Seals, and several other units that you need clearance to even know about. We are competitive with each other in spirit, but in reality, we are family. We goto work in the morning, do our job to the best of our ability, holding nothing back, then we give a little bit more to make sure the next guy is setup for success. We go home at night thinking about how we could have done better, and what we should be doing now to increase our success at work tomorrow. Basically I mean we give a shit about our job and those we work with, so we dedicate ourselves to being the best we can be, and working hard to achieve the level of professionalism required to not only complete our mission, but to complete our mission and then have enough gas in reserve to complete any side and subsequent missions, god willing. A personal driving force for me is never letting down my battle buddy. That could mean being sharp and fast enough to cover his ass, or it could mean carrying him 10 clicks if he got wounded. I am there for him, and I know he is there for me. It is quite a difference between someone just stamping their stub in a time clock, and someone living and breathing a job 24/7. Keep in mind I was still at my first duty station, I was 18-19 years old, and still hadn’t matured.

In reality, well, what I will learn later ... all that is true, but you kinda get used to performing at a certain level. Think of it like this; American football has the same rules and mechanics at all levels, but when you take a High School superstar and put him in a college game, he is rather mediocre at best. Again take a college football superstar and put him in the NFL, he is again mediocre at best. Each level has a certain intensity of play that is a step above. I would put it like this, Army reserves and National Guard are like a High School, regular army is a little more intense similar in comparison to college ball. Then socom is another intensity level higher how the NFL would compare. It isn’t so much that it is a better unit, it is the concentration of so many people trying so hard to be the best at what they do.

Another analogy; National Guard be like “Hey, lets go have some fun this weekend and shoot some guns!”. The regular Army be like “Lets go to the range and shoot expert with our weapons.” A socom unit would walk for 6 days to a range, pickup a random weapon out of a pile and shoot expert.

Enough putting down the leg units. I wont bore you with my first romance either, lets just say there is a type of girl that gets wet talking to a guy that is a ranger, add to that he is black and it will piss off her daddy, and you have the basics for my first wife. Obviously it wasn’t true love, she was hot and would put my pecker in her mouth, it was good enough.