Mob Mentality
By: AliasCWN
The Allied base was crowded with soldiers as the build-up for the new spring offensive stalled. Over the course of the last two weeks more than a dozen soldiers had been found knifed to death in alleys around the base. There were no witnesses, and so far, no suspects. Fear and anger ran rampant among the troops, leaving everyone on edge. Men traveled in groups whenever they walked around the base.
The Rat Patrol entered the base just after dark, returning from a three day patrol that had left them dusty and tired. Now, back at the base, they were looking forward to some hot food, a warm shower, and a comfortable bed.
"Troy!" Jack Moffitt called his attention to a large crowd gathered in a street several hundred feet away.
Both jeeps stopped as the sergeants studied the group. Shouts and jeers surrounded a smaller clump of men near the mouth of one of the alleys. Troy and Moffitt exchanged looks and Troy indicated that Moffitt should stay put. Silently, trying not to draw attention to himself, Troy approached the clustered men to try to discover what was happening. As he drew closer he could hear the men at the rear muttering among themselves; the louder voices were all concentrated toward the front. Listening to the comments, Troy quickly retreated to the jeeps.
Moffitt watched Troy approach the crowd with a sense of unease. There was a tension in air along with a sense of anticipation. The other sergeant's hasty retreat only bolstered his sense of foreboding. Moving around the jeep, the British sergeant jumped into the back of his jeep with one lithe move, reaching for the 50 caliber machine gun to balance himself among the gear still stored there. The grim look on Troy's' face had him gripping the 50 tighter.
"What's up Serge?" His driver asked with concern.
Troy hurried to his driver's side and gave him his instructions. The blond nodded and started the jeep, pulling out slowly so he wouldn't attract attention, he drove away.
"Moffitt, I may need you and Tully to help me here." The sergeant eyed his men uneasily. "It looks like they caught someone standing over another body. Things could get pretty ugly real fast."
Moffitt nodded his understanding while Tully chewed on his matchstick and waited.
"I'm going to try to talk to them; maybe I can get them to listen."
"You know Troy; mobs don't always do the most logical things." The Brit warned, his eyes dark with concern.
"I know," Troy responded, grim faced, "but I can't sit back and watch them kill that guy without doing something."
"Perhaps he is the killer."
Troy stared at Moffitt in disbelief. "So you think I should just forget it and let it go?"
"Not at all Troy. I am just trying to put it in perspective. How far are you willing to go to protect a man who may be a cold-blooded murderer, or perhaps even a German operative?" The Brit watched Troy carefully, judging his reaction.
"There is such a thing as a fair trial!" Troy's eyes flared with anger, he glared at his friend.
"True." Moffitt admitted with a slight smile. "But this mob doesn't seem to be concerned with that right now. They could turn on you too if you try to interfere. Are you willing to face that possibility?"
"Moffitt's right Serge. Once they get something in their heads it can be hard to change their minds. They might just decide to take you down along with that other fella." Tully's quiet voice carried despite the yelling of the mob getting louder.
Troy sighed as he looked toward the ever growing crowd.
"I guess I'll just have to take that chance." He glanced back at the other two. "I'll have the advantage of having you two at my back." His grin looked confident despite the situation.
"That you do Sam." Moffitt admitted without even glancing toward Tully. "So what do you have in mind?"
Reaching for one of the machine guns in the holster on the fender, he quickly outlined his plan. Moffitt quietly cleared the 50 while Tully pulled the second machine gun from its holster and placed it on the seat next to him within easy reach.
Loud shouts and some pushing and shoving from the front of the crowd urged Troy to move faster. The crowd was getting more unruly by the minute, their anger fueled by each other. Troy climbed a set of stairs that led to the roof of the building on the corner of the alley. Moving cautiously, he peered over the edge, looking down at the mass of milling men.
"I say we kill him, right here, right now!" A tall soldier struggled to hold a smaller, lighter soldier who fought against his grip.
The smaller soldier looked out over the crowd with fear written all over his face. The angry men looking back at him were whipping themselves into a frenzy.
"I didn't kill him! I told you, he was dead when I found him!" The prisoner tried again to pull free, realizing that no one was listening to him.
"Hold it!" The loud shout from seemingly out of nowhere reached the crowd. They looked around, swiveling their heads to try to locate the speaker. Sam Troy stepped closer to the edge and showed himself, his machine gun held loosely in his hands.
"What do you want?" A voice called from the crowd.
"Let him go!" Troy demanded.
"He's a murderer!" Another voice shouted angrily. "We caught him red-handed holding the knife he used to kill the guy!"
"I told you," the prisoner cried desperately, " I pulled the knife out of his body after I found him. He was already dead!"
"Liar! Murderer!" The shouts rose and were picked up by more voices as the crowd joined in the hysteria.
"Did anyone see him commit the murder?" Troy's voice carried over the shouting.
"He had the knife!" Another anonymous voice called from the mob of humanity.
"He could be telling the truth." Troy argued. "If no one saw him actually commit the murder, he could be innocent."
"No!" The voices blended together, the ones doing the shouting lost among the nameless others milling about.
"He is entitled to a fair trial." The sergeant shouted, realizing that he was losing the argument.
Cries of protest and calls to execute the 'murderer' rang out, echoing through the streets. The crowd surged forward toward the prisoner and the men holding him.
Unable to get their attention by shouting, Troy fired a short burst from his weapon into the air. The forward momentum stopped, frozen by the furious figure pointing his weapon at them.
"What are you going to do Sergeant," a voice drifted eerily up to him, "shoot us all?"
"Don't test me." Troy called down to them. "Let the law handle this. If you do this, you'll all be murderers." Troy could see some of the men on the fringes of the crowd shift uneasily at his words. "If he's guilty, the law will deal with him. Turn him over to the MPs."
"And if he wiggles out of it?" Someone called. "You said it yourself Sergeant, no one saw him commit the murder."
Troy tried to locate the speaker, to identify him among the crowd; once his face was separated from the crowd he might lose some of this bravado.
"Let the MPs figure it out." Troy repeated.
"And how many more men will he kill?"
This time the speaker was separated enough from the rest of the group that Troy was able to pick him out.
"What if he's innocent? What if you kill him and the murders don't stop? How do you deal with the guilt of having murdered an innocent man?" Troy looked directly at the speaker, forcing him to acknowledge the question.
"He can't get us all." Another voice called angrily from the safety of the mob.
"Maybe not," Troy agreed, realizing that this was the 'now or never' moment that he had been expecting, "but that 50 behind you will be a big help."
A hush fell over the crowd as everyone turned to look behind them.
Moffitt cleared the 50 for show and waited, the big gun pointed just over the heads of the crowd.
Tully calmly reached over and picked up the machine gun from the seat next to him. He held it casually but the threat was clear.
"They wouldn't shoot at their own guys." Someone in the crowd called hesitantly. Murmurs started to spread among the tightly packed mob.
"You're ready to kill one of ours." Troy pointed out loudly to his audience, still holding the machine gun loosely. "What's the difference?"
The murmurs grew louder, spreading like a wildfire through the mob.
"Let him go." Troy repeated, watching the men holding the frightened soldier.
Reluctantly, knowing that they were losing the support of the mob, the men holding the suspected murderer released him.
"Make a path." Troy commanded. He looked directly at the prisoner and made eye contact. "Head for the jeep, nowhere else." He warned.
The man nodded and gingerly made his way along the path that had opened between him and the vehicle.
Tully watched him approach, glancing past him every few seconds to try to read the mood of the crowd. The mob had lost its steam and cooler heads were now starting to prevail. As the prisoner reached the jeep, Tully pulled a short piece of rope out from under the seat and bound his hands. He was reaching for his arm to help him into the jeep when he heard the other jeep returning.
Hitch pulled to a stop next to Tully and quickly reached for a machine gun to help. Captain Boggs climbed out of the passenger seat and eyed the crowd. A truck pulled up and stopped behind the two jeeps with a screech of brakes. MPs began to pour out of the back dressed in riot gear. They immediately took the prisoner into custody and began to urge the crowd to break up. Now that they had lost their momentum, the men began to break up into small groups and wander off to their own business. The MPs were quick to hurry along any group that tried to linger.
Captain Boggs was standing next to Moffitt when Troy descended from the roof. The sergeant approached cautiously, holding his weapon pointed at the ground so the MPs wouldn't mistake him for a threat. Once at the jeep he replaced the gun in its holder with a deep sigh.
"Tricky huh?" Captain Boggs reviewed the scene before him giving Troy time to let the relief flow over him.
"Mob mentality." Troy shuttered. "Once it gets started, it can turn deadly."
The Captain nodded, looking at the men standing by the jeeps. "You handled it just right. Sending Hitchcock for me and the MPs was a smart move." He eyed Moffitt for a moment. "Tell me Sergeant, would you have used that 50?"
Moffitt's usual amused smile was absent as he met the officers questioning look. He scrunched his face in indecision. "I guess we'll never know Captain. I would like to think that whatever I would have chosen to do would have been the right thing. I just can't answer that question with any degree of certainty."
The Captain nodded his understanding while eyeing Pettigrew. He didn't ask him if he would have fired; his loyalty to his sergeants was well known, although where he aimed would have been questionable. The Captain hoped that he would have aimed to scare or wound, not kill. Still, he didn't ask, because it turned out that it didn't matter.
"Do you think he's the one killing all our soldiers?" The Captain asked Troy, returning to the matter at hand.
"I don't know Captain. He was caught holding the knife but no one saw him use it. Like I told the crowd, that's a matter for the MPs to sort out."
"But you still risk your life and the lives of your men to save him." The Captain pointed out.
Troy shrugged. "He has the right to a fair trial. If I had let them kill him, that would have made me, and them, no better than murderers. Once they got away from the crowd, a lot of those guys would have regretted it for the rest of their lives."
"True Sergeant, true." Some of the MPs gathered around the murder victim who had been the unintentional catalyst for the mob. As they began their investigation, the other MPs loaded the prisoner into the truck and drove away. "Well Sergeant, the MPs will get to the bottom of this. If you could give me a ride back to my office, you can make your report. I suspect that you and your men are more than ready for a little rest after all this excitement." The Captain crawled into Hitchcock's jeep and waited for the others to join him.