The Short Stories Of Mila Strictzer (7) "Tango four foxtrot, this is Romeo fife tree, over," John said in as professional, military sounding voice as he could muster. It was must have been convincing, because there was an almost immediate answer. "Go ahead, Romeo," came the reply. "Fuck! Its the Lt. Where’s Caesar? Probably fucking off too," John said and then continued, "Tango, my team will be conducting a route recon for a possible alternative route to the rear...break...we may arrive a little late tonight, over," John said. "Roger, Romeo, how long will this take, over?" "I am not anticipating on returning until tomorrow. I will contact you at that time, over," John answered. "Roger, Romeo. The war is over. Take it easy, over." "Roger, sir, out." "YOU DON’T OUT ME, SERGEANT, I OUT, OUT YOU!!!" Their Lieutenant screamed angrily back over the radio. "Jesus fucking Christ! What crawled up his ass and suddenly died?" John turned and asked his team and then keyed the mike again and answered, "Roger, sir, over!" "Roger...OUT!!!" "That fucker must be stressing bad. Fuck him, man. I guess we can’t fucking all be as fucking happy as pigs in shit," John said and put the mike down. Night was rolling in across the desert in its typical, awesome glory; slow and purposeful. Once they were moving down the main highway and John felt they were safely far enough away from the old man’s farm so that Joel would not turn around and go back and try to kill him, he unscrewed one of the bottles of whiskey. He took a big slug from the bottle and felt an intense burn in his throat. He put the bottle between his legs and wiped his mouth with his BDU jacket sleeve, feeling like the cowboys must have felt after drinking whiskey at the end of a long, dry, hot cattle run. "Goddamn, Sergeant, I hope you don’t fucking die from shock to you fucking system. Save some for the fish!" Rodriguez said as he watched John. "Ahhhhhhh...fuck an A! Fuck a B and a C and the fish too! That is fucking goddamned ecstasy; there can never be any doubt. Better than sex! Well, not quite, but damn close! Ha!" John answered on the trail of Rodriguez’s comment. "Want some?" "Damn straight. Hand me that fucking bottle over to me and consider it mine." John handed the bottle back to Rodriguez and then opened the second one. He took a smaller drink this time and handed the bottle back to Johnson, who took a swig and checked back a cough. After a moment, John felt a rush of alcohol slam into him like a giant tsunami wave hitting the shore. He leaned back into his seat and stared at the slowly darkening sky passing by overhead and felt the sensation of the warm Arabian air on his skin and blowing in his face. John quietly thanked God for letting him feel so good. "Look at the stars up in the sky. It’s not even dark yet. I wonder if it’s legal to have open containers in Iraq. Its still legal in Oklahoma, ya’ know? Joel, do you want some?" John asked his teammate. "No, Sergeant. You know I don’t drink." "Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that," John said mockingly and they all laughed, except Joel. They all knew Joel did not drink. He was the perfect designated driver for his team. "Okay, let’s talk about this problem you had with the old man. I know you’re pissed as fucking hell but I don’t know the fuck why. I understand you are a Jew, but who cares? I respect that, you know that, but I mean, goddamn, I don’t get bent out of shape when the British talk about taking over Northern Ireland. Well, maybe just a little bit. Rod doesn’t care about Puerto Rico, do you? I guess you do. We’re Americans, man. So what’s the fucking problem? Does Johnson care about Africans? Probably not. Now his bros back in Chi town, oh yea, you better believe he cares about them. I guess Johnson is the only real American among us, then. Fuck it, just drive then. I don’t have any answers. We don’t have to be back until tomorrow, we have the two five gallons on the back rack and two fifths in hand...hell, we could go all night, let’s just go on driving. Wanna go to Bhagdad?" John asked, half-joking, half serious, now feeling very buzzed from the alcohol. "Gimme one of those bottles. I just had a fucking idea. You know what everyone is doing with the Valium, right? What the Lt said not to do. Johnson, we all know what the fuck you did with yours," John said and grabbed a bottle from Johnson, behind him. He reached into the back of his protective mask and pulled out his five huge shots designed to retard the effects of chemical weapons. He carefully read the small writing on the sides of the thick shots, his vision a little blurry. "Atropine, atropine, some other shit I can’t pronounce, Valium and more Valium, ah ha!" John said as he examined the sides of the needle cases. He put both of the Valium shots in his left hand and threw the others out the window. Then, with the precision of a junky, he placed the edges of each Valium injector case up against the edge of the whiskey bottle and pushed slowly downward until he felt a sudden click. Two huge needles flew out of the end of the injectors and down into the bottle of whiskey, reaching nearly three inches in length. The needles quickly squirted their contents into the tan liquid and raised its volume by almost a third. "Whoa, now those some goddamn needles. Jesus, I hope this is safe," John said and then, "but then, I guess war is not so safe, either." John threw the spent ejectors out the window and swirled the bottle’s contents around and took another big drink. It tasted more mediciney then before. "Rodriguez, you going to drink that whole.... HOLY SHIT!!! Joel, let’s go over there!" John said and pointed at the oil well fires they were passing on the right. "Are you crazy, Sergeant? We can’t go over to the oil well fires." "Why not? I want to check it out." "Because we just can't! Sergeant, do you ever listen to anything anyone ever says?" "I listen. Generally. But, fuck; most people don't know what the fuck they’re talking about! Well, there are some people who do know what they’re talking about but they’re just being fucking pussies `cause they’re too afraid to take chances. Then, there are a very small percentage of people who I do listen to, yes, who know everything, like the Platoon Sergeant. Other then that, why listen to what anyone says?" "Sergeant Brown, I did not understand a word of what you just said," Joel replied. Rodriquez had been looking and listening to what John had said. "Just pull over when you get far enough into them and we’ll walk the rest of the way. You stay in the vehicle and come get us if we get into trouble," John said. Joel drove to the edge of the highway and then stopped next to one of the burning oil wells close to the highway. He left the vehicle running, opened the door and got out to put a five-gallon container of fuel into their hummer’s gas tank. John got out, carefully put the whisky bottle in his seat, and leaving his door open, walked a few steps into the desert and stood there, swaying back and forth a little as he stared at the close oil well fires blazing. He was in complete awe. He was also drunk. His head was swimming and he felt a strange relaxation engulf his body. He realized the Valium was taking effect. Then, he suddenly saw a wall of black smoke moving toward them at a very fast rate. "Gas! Gas! Gas! Get your gas masks on, the wind just fucking changed direction and the smoke is now coming straight for us, men! Holy shit!" John yelled as he fumbled for his protective gas mask, taking twice as long to get it on as when he was sober. The rest of his team did the same behind him. When he had his mask on, John stumbled back to the open door of the hummer and then turned around just in time to see everything turn black around him from a wall of black smoke that instantly covered over them. The winds that almost always blew east, prevailing easterlies, had decided to change direction on this day. John quickly turned back around to his open door and grabbed the bottle of whiskey on the seat and then felt a tap on his back. He turned back around after first carefully putting the open bottle under his BDU shirt to protect it from the smoke, and saw someone from his team in front of him with his gas mask on. He could not recognize who it was with certainty but guessed that it was probably Joel, given the man’s tall, light build. John reached out with his left hand, grabbed the soldier by the neck and pulled him forward, pressing the right side of his mask against Joel’s mask to be able to hear his words clearly from within his gas mask. "Sergeant Brown! We have to get the fuck out of here! Are you fucking crazy! We have to get the fuck out of here, man! Pull yourself together this time! Your drunk, high and being fucking stupid!" Joel screamed at John, from inside his protective mask. Black smoke was whirling past them as a very fast rate and visibility was only two or three feet, at best. After that, the thick, black smoke was impenetrable, like a solid wall. The smoke was blowing by so fast it sounded like a roaring wall of water and it was also hard to hear. The two soldiers looked at each other from a single eye as they spoke with their gas masks pressed together. John’s right eye was staring into Joel’s left eye, with both of their eyes covered by the thick, plastic lenses of their gas masks. Black smoke just kept rolling across their eyes. John saw that Joel’s eyeball was very red and bloodshot. He thought to himself that Joel must be under a lot stress. "No way, Joel! Not this time, Joel! No way! What have we been through the last few months?! FUCKING LIVING HELL!!! We are going to enjoy ourselves for once! Goddamnit! Fuck! This is a once in a lifetime chance, man! I feel it is my destiny to go see the fire of the burning well! Just like the fucking Burning Bush! Isn't the President named Bush? I think he is! He would want no less for us! He would want us to go see the Burning Bush, man, FUCK AN A!!! Rod and Johnson will follow me, I know! They will follow me to the end of the goddamned Earth! Stay here if you must, with the vehicle! Come get us after half an hour if we’re not back!" Joel yelled at Joel. "YOU INSANE FUCK!!! YOU...ARE...AN…INSANE...FUCK!!! YOU’RE FUCKING INSANE!!! GET A GRIP ON YOURSELF!!! GET A GRIP!!! DO YOU COMPREHEND ME, SERGEANT BROWN?!!!" "I know I am and you do too! I’ll see you later! I love you, Joel!" John said, released Joel’s neck, lifted his mask up just a little, put the whisky bottle quickly to his lips and took a deep draft, finishing nearly all of the rest of its contents. He handed the small amount of whiskey left in the bottle to Joel and walked forward into the moving wall of black darkness. He quickly stumbled into Rodriguez in the rapidly moving black smoke. John pressed his mask into Rodriquez’, looked into his eye and shouted, "Where’s Johnson?" "He’s right next to me, Sergeant, I’ve got a hold of him! Are we ready to move out, Sergeant?!" Rodriguez asked in a confident voice. He was almost as drunk as John was. "Fuck an A! That is what I want to hear from you! I like your attitude! You got that goddamned right, big fucking Rod! How you feeling?!" "I drank that whole bottle, man. The whole bottle! I am so drunk I can’t see straight!" "You are the Fucking Man! The Fucking Big Dog! El Hombre! Hold on to Johnson! He drank too and he’s real young! If I lost him, the Platoon Sergeant would kill me and then I would kill you! He would kill me! DON’T LET HIM GO!!!" "Okay! I got him!" The black smoke kept blowing past them. It would have easily suffocating them if they did not have their gas masks on. John started walking forward into the swirling darkness. Rodriguez was holding on to John’s web gear in front of him and holding onto Johnson behind him at the same time. John could hear a muffled sound in the darkness in front of him, almost like an endless stream of loud explosions, one after the other in rapid succession. He moved toward the powerful noises in the darkness. After walking for about ten minutes, the three soldiers holding on to each other began to see red and yellow flashes suddenly and violently cut through the thick, black smoke. The flashes looked like lightning bolts striking from out of nowhere and landing right next to them. Then, as if they had walked into the gates of very hell itself, the three soldiers saw the burning oil well fire in all its grandeur. It was as if the impenetrable black night had just opened up in an instant before them to reveal a huge secret, explaining the very meaning of the universe itself. The fire of the single oil well in front of them was as big as a mansion. John now saw what was causing the sound of the rapid explosions. The oil spurted out of some hole in the ground and then instantly caught fire and exploded in a violent combustion in the direction it had ejected. As each ejection of oil that spewed from the Earth caught fire, the whole, gigantic fire continuously exploded outwards in randomly differently directions, taking on the appearance of huge bubbles rolling over the sand, moving this way and that, at a very fast rate. John and the two other members of his team stood in true awe. They were in such awe that they could not move, even if they wanted to. The soldiers had about as much control over their bodies at the moment as a deer caught in headlights. The sight before them was more powerful and awesome then anything they had every seen in their lives. The fire seemed to be reaching for them, yearning to take them, yet stopping just short of where they stood. The soldiers stood mesmerized by the massive oil well fire. It must have been the same as the Burning Bush was for Moses, John thought. The fire spit and flurried outward in every direction, violently moving to and fro. The massive burning oil well fire had its own mind and its own will and John and his team were unfortunate enough to have stumbled onto this God, this divine being. Now, all that they could do was wait, as useless as chess pawns. John, Rodriguez and Johnson stood there for about fifteen minutes, watching the burning fire advance and retreat in different, random directions. They felt like the flame might move toward them and engulf them, but it never did. They had stopped just far enough away to be safe from the fire or the heat it generated. When the Burning Bush had finished with them, it would release them. For now, however, the flame was not about to release anything. John felt as if he were in hell as he watched the fire ebb and flow and the massive firebombs that looked like some kind of huge chemistry experiment gone way out of control. Then, John heard the voice of God talking to him. God was telling him that he was nothing before him, a mere speck of existence-a water molecule in the vast ocean of life that is the universe. John listened to God’s words with passion. "HEY BOY!!! LISTEN TO ME!!! I am god! You and your worthless problems are shit before me! I am the burning bush, man! You killed a man, right? Another soldier! And now you crave an answer! I feel for you, but guess the fuck what?! I don’t care about your worthless problems! You are shit before me! You are the oxygen molecule I engulf to spread my awesome fire forever outwards, man! Get a grip! GET A GRIP!!!" "GET A GRIP, SERGEANT!!! GET A GRIP!!! WE ARE LEAVING!!! WE ARE LEAVING, NOW!!!" John felt a tug on his web gear in the opposite direction of the burring oil well fire and he resisted the pull. God had been talking to him and he wanted to finish the conversation. God of the Burning Bush had been talking directly to him and he desperately wanted to finish communicating with God. "Stop! Stop! Leave me alone! I was talking to God! He was talking to me! I want to finish the conversation with God! He was helping me to understand my problems!" John fought hard but he was forced, nonetheless, in the opposite direction, where his team had come from, back into the darkness. John heard the smacking sound that his boots made as they walked through the oil that covered the sand, a couple of inches deep. John suddenly had a flash of reality. He realized that Joel was pulling him. His team was safe and alive, that was all that mattered. He loved his team and all he wanted was for them to be safe. He stopped resisting Joel pulling him forward, with Rodriquez holding on to him and pulling Johnson behind him. As a team, they moved together through the think wall of black darkness, holding on to each other. When they got back to the hummer, John was forced into his seat and he sat there, still desiring to talk to God-the Fire God. Moments later, the hummer pulled off into the wall of black smoke. John was feeling the effects of the Valium and the booze hard. His body was very relaxed and his thoughts were wondering. He wished that he were home and not here in this hell. The hummer plowed through the black smoke. John felt his thoughts slowly clear as the thick smoke whisked away past the windshield. He heard his own heavy breathing in his gas mask and tried to concentrate on the sound. When he saw the black smoke disappear completely, he pulled his mask off and looked over at Joel, who was watching the road. The rest of his team took their masks off, too. "Make sure that you look out for the Air Force craters, Joel. Are you listening to me? Watch out for the cluster bomb craters," John said to Joel, referring to the massive holes blasted into the highway by stray USAF cluster bomblets. "Sergeant, you are an insane fuck, you realize that don’t you? Do you realize that you are an insane fuck? Do you truly realize how insane a fuck you are?" "I know, Joel. And you are my fucking driver. But I was talking to God back there, do you know that?" "Go to sleep, Sergeant. I will see that we all make it back to our tent and out cots, okay? I will see to it that our weapons are secured. I will see that our team is squared away, alive, healthy and kept out of trouble tonight, okay? Just like you always do, somehow, but I SWEAR TO GOD that I don't know how you do it. So just go to sleep, man. Our team will be tucked away and happy tonight, Sergeant, just leave it to me." "Okay, Joel, I trust you. I trust you, Joel, you know I trust you. Thank God for you, Joel." "Good, then just go to sleep now." "I am going to sleep now, Joel." "Goodnight." "Goodnight, Joel, my friend and lover. Goodnight." John leaned down on a box of water bottles and quickly fell asleep. In the middle of the night, John forced himself out of his dreams. He got up, and stumbling, fell out of the entrance of the tent, knocking it down as he went. He made it a short distance and then urinated in the sand. When he finished, he turned and started back toward the tent but was stopped, cold in his tracks, from a deep growl in front of him, somewhere in the darkness. The hair on the back of his neck stood on its end. John quickly reached into his BDU cargo pocket for his .45 that he always kept there, loaded but not locked. His heart sank as he did not feel his weapon at his side and then John realized that Joel had done exactly what he said he was going to do, secure all of their weapons. Again, John heard a low snarl from what must have been a rabid dog, blocking the entrance to his tent. John had no choice but to run for it. So in a mad dash, he rushed forward into the darkness at where he guessed the entrance to his tent was. Just as he found the semi-collapsed entrance to the tent, he felt the dog hit his left leg. John jumped for the hole to the tent and hurriedly crawled inside. Behind him, he heard the dog scrambling at his heals. Inside, John tried to move in the darkness to the opposite side of the tent. He ran into someone’s cot and knocked it over. He heard a startled groan. "Wake up, everyone wake up! There’s a fucking mad fucking dog in the tent! Wake up!" John yelled to his team. He was still very drunk and the only thing that was keeping him on his feet was a sudden rush of adrenaline. Then, he heard the dog bark loudly in front of him somewhere in the darkness. The dog was just as scared as he was. "Joel! Joel! Where is my goddamned forty-five! I have to shoot this fucking mad dog!" "You can’t shoot in here, Sergeant, you will kill one of us! I am not giving you the .45! No way! We’ll have to stab it with our bayonets! They’re under my cot! Here! Here’s one, come over here!" The dog was still barking loudly and it seemed to be moving around as it barked. Luckily, John had run into Joel’s cot, knocking it over between them and the barking dog. John moved over to Joel’s voice and felt his arm and then reached down to his hand and quickly snatched the bayonet from his hand and pulled it out of its sheath. He threw the sheath across the tent and it hit the canvas and fell to the ground. Then Rodriquez suddenly started screaming in the darkness, "HOLY FUCK!!! HOLY FUCK!!! There is some fucking shit eating me! Holy fucking mother of fucking Christ, some fucking shit is eating me! GET IT OFF OF ME!!!" John moved cautiously over to him, stumbling a little, and grabbed his chest and tried to feel down to his leg. He heard the dog somewhere around Rodriguez’s ankle, probably chewing on his boots. John struck with his bayonet where he calculated the dog to be. He was careful to overcompensate his stab somewhat in order to avoid hitting Rodriguez’s leg. To his surprise, his bayonet hit soft flesh and the dog released its grip on Rodriquez and let out a yelp. John reacted quickly and jumped on the dog, putting his forearm over its head, forcing it into the ground and trying his best to hold it there. "I got it here, Joel! Get over here and help me kill this fucking dog! Get over here, Joel, and help me kill this fucking dog now!" John yelled, as he pressed down as hard as he could with his elbow on the animal’s neck to keep it immobile. He had to press down with all of his might as the dog squirmed underneath him. John felt Joel come up behind him and drive his bayonet into the dog’s midsection. The dog let out a pathetic gasp as it tried to suck air through its clogged throat. Joel stabbed with his bayonet again and again into the dog’s stomach until John felt it stop moving. "Its dead, Joel," John said and Joel stopped stabbing. "Help me take the carcass outside." Then the two soldiers carried the dead dog outside a long way from their tent and dumped it in the sand. They stood there for a moment, breathing heavily. "Maybe we should shoot it to make sure its dead," Joel said. "Go ahead," John answered and Joel took out his .45, locked and loaded it, and aimed his pistol at the dog’s head. The gun went off with a ‘pop’ in the desert night and the dog’s head jumped up a little and then fell back down on the sand. "He’s dead for sure now. Let’s go back to sleep," John said and they walked back to their tent and collapsed on their cots, covered in the dog’s blood. "Jesus fucking Christ," John said as he breathed a deep sigh of relief and then continued, "Jesus fucking Christ, this fucking war is turning into a real fucking mess. Where’s Johnson?" "He’s still asleep," Rodriguez answered calmly. His voice had a cold edge to it. "Thank God. The Platoon Sergeant would kill me if he got hurt. How's your leg, Rod?" John asked.
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Copyright © 2001 Mike Strozier |