In a Washed Up Land
Alpha
Jonesey lead the four guys towards a helicopter with German Army markings parked at the edge of the field marked off by off limits signs next to a minefield on the outskirts of Camp Eggers. Loaded down with extra duffle bags and exceptionally large backpacks they still move briskly in the heat. Looking through the dropped tail ramp they see that there are at least two pallets of supplies strapped down, the four rearmost stretcher racks are dropped down with obviously sleeping crew flaked out in the early morning cool. A slender woman uses a large pushbroom to move the accumulated sand off the edge of the ramp.
The five men walk up the ramp, the third in line slaps the woman on the ass.
"Great, we get a stewardess to bring us cocktails and lu-" He is cut off from finishing by being knocked past the men already aboard by the vigorous slam of the pushbroom to his back. He is prevented from rising by the woman standing with one foot on his arm just under one shoulder and on the back of his neck.
"Jones, name of this" bouncing on him slightly, causing him to grunt in pain "rude asshole?"
"Santos" replied Ranger before the handler could answer.
She moved off of Santos, reached down and lifted him by the back of his collar and flipped him over.
"You touch me without my permission, you are disrespectful to me again you will discover the landing zone from one thousand meters. We do not carry spare parachutes. Understood?"
"Yes, Ma'am."
"Every woman is someone's mother, someone's sister, someone's daughter. We are not property."
"I am sorry for being an asshole. I won't do it again, I promise," Santos said.
Wrath reached a hand down to Santos to help him up. "Apology accepted. Welcome aboard the Wrath of God." She takes a clipboard and passes it over. "Confirm all your supplies are present. We step off in one hour when the morning wind has dropped."
Ranger and Jonesey watch Santos take the clipboard and walk around each pallet doublechecking each case. They will be training a small group that need weapons and education. Two of the four aircrew are woken up by the woman by name "Fog, Smoke. Time for the preflight check." The two men get up and grab clipboards and start their walk around. The blond climbs up the outside and starts checking the outside at the rotors and works his way back. The small darker man checks the interior of the helicopter, moving around the various obstacles. "Wasp and Bolt loaded the pallets and acquired two pallet jacks. We will need to return them when we return. Don't damage them."
Santos returned with the clipboard and stood next to Ranger.
"Everything is checked off. I did a random check on 5 crates on each pallet and the contents check out." He set the clipboard down on one of the vacated stretchers and turned to Wrath. "Where does our gear go?"
"Strap the gear into the stretchers, when we leave you will be sitting in one of the four empty seats between the pallets and our door guns." She slaps the bottom end of each occupied stretcher to wake up the occupants. With the check being finished, the two pilots return to the back.
Jonesey finally introduces the 5 crew to his team. "This is the Wrath of God. My best insertion team. Wrath and Wasp are the doorgunners, Smoke and Fog are the pilots, and Bolt is the loadmaster. Wrath is the boss. Until she lifts off after dropping you guys, she is in charge. Don't piss her off, it makes lots of paperwork explaining the bodies." Turning he indicates the four men "Ranger, in charge of this group. Tank, Santos who you met and Brown. This is their first mission with us, please be a little lenient with them Wrath."
The two groups all shake hands, and Jonesey heads down the ramp towards the small office building the ISAF was using as a tower.
Step off time here, they button up the tail ramp, slide open the sides and head off into the morning sun.
...and Omega
"Just once I would like to see sand that comes with a nice beach. And some other color than brown," Wrath commented to Ranger.
"I think the first thing I want to do is take Steph to Point Pleasant. I bought a house there before we left. She loves the beach."
"Tell you what, shoot me an email and let me know how things come out." Wrath passes over a small card with nothing on it except a Gmail account. "I am glad you guys made it."
"Thanks, I thought it was a good omen when I saw you were our team for this. First team we worked with, last team we worked with."
"Going soft, Bossman?" Tank laughed softly.
"Offload fast, we need to bail immediately. We have some issues with some damned fobbit and I don't want to get hung up in paperwork." Wrath commented.
Fuck, I think something crapped in my mouth. Hm, Sikorsky green. Rivets. Canvas.
"Bolt? Bobby?"
A hand moved into view with a bottle of water, outside beaded with water. Lester felt his head lifted so he could drink.
"We are five minutes out, everybody else is waking up now."
"I hope Fog and Smoke are awake" wisecracked Lester.
"Ha ha ha. Nobody likes a smartass." The loadmaster leaned over and looked towards the front of the helicopter. "You guys want your extra crap? Looks pretty whipped."
"Nope, we can tell them it was lost or destroyed." Ranger, Bobby and Tank slung their weapons on their backs, and braced for landing. As soon as they hit, Bolt dropped the ramp, and Ranger and Tank each grabbed an end of Lester's stretcher and trotted down the ramp. Bobby followed with a small rucksack loaded with the intelligence they had been sent to retrieve. As they met Jonesey they passed 8 military police headed towards the helicopter.
The sounds of the GE T64 turboprop engines winding up stopped the MPs in their tracks as the downdraft whipped the sand and dust around in a wild cyclone and the Wrath of God left.
"Where the fuck did they go?!" demanded Jonesey.
"Don't look at me, they are your guys, not mine." Ranger commented as the four men headed to the base infirmary to get cleared to leave for Washington with Jonsey.
Brand New Sun Lyrics - Jason Lytle
Here,
Grab a broken branch
With a sunburnt hand
In a washed up land
Soon,
We should rest a while
We're like a tired child
It's been a lot of miles.
I might fall down
And my back is bad
We might fall down
On a sleeping back.
So you should hold my hand
While everything blows away
And we'll run,
To a brand new sun.
We will run,
To a brand new sun.
Damn,
How did it get so bad?
With all the dreams we had
Now you seem so sad.
You should hold my hand
While everything blows away
And we'll run
To a brand new sun.
We will run
To a brand new sun
We will run
To a brand new sun.
www dot youtube dot com/watch?v=78pXxZdFxDc