Chapter 32

Flashback – Jack – Undisclosed location

Most people wrongly assume that scout snipers get to run around shooting people all the time. That's just not the case since we take the scout part of the mission very seriously. Many times we infiltrate a place to gather intel and the last thing we want is to be seen and we are never allowed to be captured...

We moved slowly and stealthily down this fucking goat path where it was hot as hell and the wind kicked up dust everywhere. I sneezed and Banzai whispered, "Jack! Take another damn antihistamine and stop making so much noise. You know what will happen if we're caught since we're not supposed to even be here."

I was fucking miserable! I had a bad head cold and it felt like my sinuses were going to explode. Since we arrived in this God forsaken, bass-ackwards, goat herding country it had been hot as hell during the day and then cold as a cemetery at night. Why the fuck anyone would live here was beyond my comprehension.

I whined, "Well what the hell happened to that country club mission to Russia you told me about."

Banzai countered, "Jack, right now in Moscow the high temperature is about minus twenty Celsius. At least here it's warm during the day. Quick, someone's coming."

We slipped off the side of the trail, hunkered down in our ghillie suits and became one of the worthless scrub bushes that somehow survived in this fucking desert. Once again Banzai's keen eyes saved us, because a few minutes later a RG (Republican Guard) patrol passed by so closely that even with my head cold I could smell the bastards. Well that's not quite true. Since my nose was filled with concrete, they made my eyes water but I couldn't really smell them. But perhaps it was the head cold and all the damn dust that just made everything worse.

I didn't fucking care if it was -40 in Moscow right now since I would have rather been there than here. At least there I would have vodka and the sexy as hell Russian women. I felt another sneeze coming. I tried to stop it but...

Flashback – Banzai Ben – Undisclosed location

Son of a bitch! Jack just sneezed again! I got ready to attack the fucking RG patrol, but once again we got lucky - because of the wind they didn't hear us. Jack was a RPITA when he got sick. He was worse than a fucking baby and he'd been sick from almost day one when we arrived. He tried to blame it on the weather, but I was sure he picked it up from some sweet young thing he met right before we left. And I used the word sweet in a very generous manner; personally I thought she was an ugly skanky ho that looked like she'd been rode hard and put away wet – many times over. But she was young and willing and Jack was able and that was about all it took.

But he was right, this place was a far cry from Russia! I had my sights set on going there and I had heard that was where we were supposed to go and even bragged to the Major about it. Then he laughed and explained how, 'Old intel is no intel'. The next thing we knew we were headed here to the fucking desert! Where we weren't supposed to be and where if we got caught no one would admit we were here, to recon weapons that they weren't supposed to have. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out this was a mission to identify targets as a preparation for taking those targets out. So far we'd been lucky because we hadn't been caught, no thanks to Jack. Even though he had rank on me, I made a decision.

"Jack, with your damn cold, you're a detriment to this mission. We're moving you further away from this path and you're going to hunker down and take those damn drugs I've been trying to get you take for the last three weeks."

I knew he was really sick when he didn't complain. Besides, Jack was hiding something from me and I wasn't sure what. Yeah, when you work with a guy for this long, you can tell when they conceal something. According to the maps, which sure as hell haven't been perfect, there's supposed to be a ravine about half a click away. I made a beeline towards it, checked to make sure Jack was following but found he wasn't wiping out our tracks. However I noticed it was windy enough I didn't have to scold him for that. Yeah when he got sick, he also got sloppy.

We found the ravine. It looked perfect so I bedded Jack down in the ravine, marked his location on the GPS and maps and ordered, "Take those damn drugs, stay in your ghillie suit and sweat this cold the hell out. Whatever you do, keep a low profile because I sure as hell don't want you getting caught, not in your condition. If I'm not back in two days, bug the hell out because I will have been captured."

He just waved his hand at me and said, "Looks who's telling me how to be a Marine." I shook my head and left, made sure to follow our path in and wiped out our footprints. Damn he was a cranky old bastard when he got sick. I hated to leave him, but someone had to finish this mission...

Flashback – Jack – Undisclosed location

Damn! I never thought Banzai would leave! When he left, I got up stumbled about 5 meters away and took a leak, it burnt like hell and had some blood in it. Yeah the skanky ho got me on both ends, because not only did I get the head cold from her, I also got a case a clap from her and let me tell you V.D. is nothing to clap about.

I hated being left here alone, but I knew I couldn't go much further so Banzai did the right thing. I went back to where he left me, pulled out my medkit and began to fix both ends. Whenever I take medicine I subscribe to the philosophy of 'that which doesn't kill me makes me stronger.' Besides as sick as I was I would just as soon be out of it until I was either better or dead. So I gave myself a hell of a dose of everything, laid back and felt myself relax...

Flashback – Banzai Ben – Undisclosed location

When I left I knew Jack hated it, but it was better than getting caught which would have happened if he continued with me. They dropped five teams in here, three from the Army and one Seal team and from what I heard on the nightly reports, we and the Seals were the only ones left. But there were no prisoners from the other teams. When you went into a country like this, carrying Israeli equipment capture was not an option.

Yeah that reminded me, I'd better make sure the M89SR¹ rifle I'm carrying hadn't gotten full of sand and jammed again. Who the hell made a semi-auto sniper rifle anyway? So far we had avoided detection so I hadn't had to fire this piece of shit weapon, but I wanted to make sure it was working if I needed it. Even though it was based on the M-14 it was still more prone to jams than my M-40. My M-40 was like a Timex watch: It took a licking and kept on ticking. Plus this piece of shit felt like a fucking toy because it used a bullpup² design. Because of the design flaws, I'd seen guys lose part of their face when a bullpup failed. I stopped, performed a function check and I was glad as hell I did...

¹ M89SR - a gas operated semi-automatic sniper rifle, currently produced by Technical Equipment International (TEI), an Israeli company based in Tel Aviv.

² Bullpups are firearm configurations in which the action is located behind the trigger group and alongside the shooter's face, so there is no wasted space for the buttstock as in conventional designs. This permits a shorter firearm length with the same barrel length for improved maneuverability and reduced weight.

No there wasn't a problem with this piece of shit, however there was another damn RG patrol and these guys SA (Situational Awareness) was extremely high which told me I must be getting close to my objective. I patiently waited for the patrol to pass, moved back onto the goat trail and headed toward what was thought to be a chemical weapons plant. Now that was scary shit: Getting killed in a fair fight or even by another sniper was one thing but being gassed – that was a pussy-assed way to kill a person.

My goal was an area of higher ground where I could get eyes on the target, hopefully without being seen. I left the goat path, and bushwhacked my way towards the higher ground. I reached the far side of the dune, crawled towards the top, peeked over the crest and – Shit! This really sucked!!!

Flashback – Major M – Mission C&C

This mission was necessary but it was also the absolute worst mission to send teams on because the chance of survival was in the single digits. I hated sending in my Sgts., but they were my best team and if anyone could live through this mission, they sure as hell could. That was because they had a really quirky way of adapting and overcoming obstacles that worked like magic for them. And also Sgt. Blaine seemed to be the luckiest person on the planet. I counted on these facts to get them in and more importantly bring them back alive.

We'd already lost all the other teams that went in. The Seals were the last to go and from the intel we had, they went out in a blaze of glory and destroyed the hell out of a weapons cache after they were discovered. The place would be radioactive for years.

I waited at the appointed time for the message from my team. No, this wasn't the old fashioned radio contact, this was a high speed burst of uploaded data which contained GPS coordinates and pictures. Then they were sent a very quick update with any FRAGO³s...