Page 37 of Everything Changes

“Rogue Actual, Rogue Six. Affirmative, over.”

The SEALs in the last two vehicles would set out on foot to flank the enemy before they could move behind the convoy and box them in. One advantage they had was the enemy’s lack of cohesiveness and combat experience, something the allied forces were highly trained in and could take advantage of in minutes, giving them precious time.

A large outcropping of rocks appeared ahead, and Vince steered the vehicle behind them, yelling, “Bail, bail,” the minute they’d taken cover.

Jase was out the door in seconds, rolling, exposed for one brief moment. It was enough that he felt the slap of a ricocheting bullet off the side of his helmet; if it had been a direct hit, he would have been killed instantly. He lay gasping behind the rocks, feeling horribly exposed. The other vehicles followed suit, but the gunfire from the ridge was relentless and withering, and soon screams of pain were heard echoing through the wadi.

“Go, Doc,” Vince said tersely. He keyed his comm, “Rogue Four, this is Rogue Actual. Doc is on the move. Smoke grenades and cover fire… NOW! Over!” As soon as several smoke grenades deployed and the sharp crack of cover fire started, Jase started crawling as quickly as he could toward the other vehicles and the wounded.

Hunched behind the wide tires of the trucks or the inadequate cover of rocks, he worked feverishly, bandaging, staunching bleeding. Dimly he heard someone radioing for air support, and a hand suddenly gripped his shoulder. “Attack helicopters on site in one-five mikes.”

“Copy,” Jase gasped out. Fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes they probably didn’t have. A sense of calm took over, the fatalism that came with knowing you were going to die. His vision sharpened and his hands steadied as he worked, minute by minute passing.

Suddenly the beat of rotor blades sounded above the gunfire, and the words “Apache One, this is Rogue Actual. Cleared hot, over” came over the comm from Vince, authorizing the birds to fire.

“Rogue Actual, this is Apache One. Solid copy. Over” was the pilot’s reply, and HELLFIRE missiles screamed toward both sides of the ridge, annihilating everything in their paths.

“Apache One, Rogue Actual. Confirm target neutralized, over.” Jase heard Vince’s voice over the radio.

There were a few beats of silence before the gunship radioed back, “Rogue Actual, Apache One. Confirmed.”

The sudden silence and absence of gunfire was deafening, and slowly, cautiously, men emerged from the sheltering rocks, and the cleanup began. With more room and the safety to maneuver in, Jase was able to start IVs in order to push pain meds and fluids, and soon he had the wounded as comfortable as he could manage.

He was gratified to see Danny walking toward him, seemingly unharmed. He smiled his relief, and Danny grinned. “Got some today, huh, Doc?” Jase thought that he could happily go the rest of his life without “getting” any more combat. He flipped Danny off, and Danny moved away, his quiet laughter echoing back.

The final tally of dead was seven ANA, the entire occupancy of the first vehicle that had been blown to smithereens, and most of the second vehicle that had been cut down by the gunfire, leaving one survivor, a survivor who was so shell-shocked he was almost catatonic. Jase wrapped him in a blanket and had him lie on his back, his legs elevated to keep the blood flow toward his heart and brain. He would send him along with the more visibly wounded on the CASEVAC chopper that would be on site in ten minutes, according to Vince. Considering how thoroughly they’d been surrounded, how exposed they’d been, the casualty and wounded count was considered low. Tell that to the dead men, Jase thought.

He finally was able to sit in the shade of one of the vehicles and gulp a lukewarm canteen of water, delayed reaction setting in as the adrenaline leached away, leaving Jase weak and shaky himself. He forced himself to eat a few bites of a protein bar and sat briefly with his head between his knees, breathing deeply.

As he sat there, he heard Danny and Ali conferring, planning to hike up to the ridge and confirm the hostile dead, search them for intel, take a count. It was bound to be a highly unpleasant task, and Jase offered to spare him the job.

“Nah, man,” Danny drawled. “But you should come with in case there’s any survivors.” It was unlikely, but Jase nodded, grabbing his medical pack, the sense of purpose already steadying him as adrenaline surged again.

He and the other two men made their way slowly up the rough path of the rocky ridge, dodging debris. It was slow going. Ali had taken point, Danny second, and Jase bringing up the rear, all of their weapons at the ready. As they rounded a bend, they reached the first body, clearly the RPG operator, whose eyes stared sightlessly up at the sky, the lower half of his body missing. Jase flinched as he saw the weapon was primed and ready for launch, seconds away from annihilating the forces below if not for the timely arrival of the Apache birds.

Ali crouched and disarmed the weapon, setting it aside for retrieval. They made their way still farther into the depths of the ridge, Ali and Danny briefly out of view, and suddenly the crack of gunfire echoed up ahead. Jase gripped his weapon and cautiously moved forward, rounding the bend himself to see Ali on the ground and Danny nowhere in sight. He surprised a man who was coming from the opposite direction, and Jase fired his weapon. The man jerked and fell to the ground.

Not knowing how many hostiles were concealed, Jase crouched behind some rocks and watched, but no other men revealed themselves. He carefully looked around. Danny was sprawled on the hillside several feet below Jase’s position, the gunfire he’d taken having obviously blasted his body backward over the side of the cliff. He wasn’t moving. Jase turned his attention to Ali. He was pulling himself into a sitting position and wincing, blood spreading over his shoulder.

“Stay put, sir. Don’t aggravate your injury. I’ll be right there,” Jase hissed.

The ANA commander nodded, and Jase left him and carefully picked his way down the hillside toward Danny. He knew he was violating the first rule of frontline battlefield triage, which was to treat the less wounded and more easily accessible one first. But Danny was his friend, and memories of Carey welled up and overwhelmed his judgment. He wouldn’t have left Carey dying alone on a hillside….

Jase reached Danny’s position and ran his hands over the other man’s body, looking for wounds. He pulled the blood-soaked collar of his BDU blouse aside, and his stomach dropped to his toes. Danny’s body armor had stopped the bullet from entering his heart, but it hadn’t stopped it from nicking major blood vessels before entering Danny’s lungs. He was bleeding sluggishly from the wound, blood trickling from his mouth, so Jase knew his heart still beat. He pressed his fingers to the other man’s neck, feeling a weak and thready pulse, so weak it wasn’t enough to sustain oxygen flow to his brain. For all intents and purposes, he was dead, even if his body hadn’t fully caught on to that fact.

“Doc?” Ali called out from the path above, his accented voice strained with pain. “Bleeding is getting worse. Help me.” Just as the words left his mouth, Jase could see a small contingent of insurgents rushing toward Ali from where they’d been hidden in various cracks and crevices of the ridge.

“No!” Jase screamed, raising his weapon. The hostiles fired first, forcing Jase to take cover as best he could, flattening himself on the hillside. For some reason they weren’t intent on killing Jase; they were focused on dragging Ali away, and they did so, yanking him up from the ground and rushing him back the way they’d come. Jase rose and fired, but it was too late. As he knelt in helpless horror, blood-curdling screams came from somewhere off in the distance, interspersed with the sounds of Ali begging for his life. The screams were cut off by the most awful gurgling sound Jase had ever heard, and rage and horror swept through him as he realized he was listening to a man being beheaded.

Jase shut his eyes tightly, his mouth open in a silent scream of helpless anguish, tears running down his face as he listened to a brave, honorable man being butchered in one of the most awful ways Jase could think of, his head being sawed off by a machete. If only he’d gone to help him first as battlefield rules had dictated. He would have helped Ali to cover, would have been able to defend him with his weapon, would have called for backup from the team. Instead he’d thought with his heart, going first to help a friend who had been all but dead before his body had rolled to a stop.

The gurgles and screams ceased, and there was only an awful silence. Jase’s comm crackled to life.

“Medic One, Rogue Actual! Sit rep!” Vince demanded. “Doc, report status! Over!”

Jase’s voice didn’t even sound like his own as he said hoarsely, “Rogue Actual, this is Medic One. American KIA. ANA captured and executed. Over.”

Silence. “Medic One, come again? Over.”