Proof of Life/Homefront
Disclaimer – Same as before.
Eternity – Thanks for reviewing.
~ ~ ~ ~
Forward Operating Base
Here we check zeroed the Wiraways and 206s. Weapons are just a tool, as long as they go bang when you squeeze the trigger and hit what you're aiming at, that'll do.
Over the dune I could see Link, Stoney, Dave and Shorty firing their Wiraway squad automatic weapons in short burst of four or five rounds to make sure the sights were aligned properly. They were shooting at four Figure 11 targets, essentially a big picture of a charging man, and blasting holes through them in the indicated 'kill' areas within three or four rounds.
I watch Arnot fire a 206 grenade at several empty shipping crates we set up as targets. When he misses he calmly adjusts the 206's azimuth sights for the range he's at. I fire a couple 10mm rounds at another Figure 11 from the assault rifle component of my 206, which is above the grenade launcher part.
I'm carrying 590 rounds of 10mm ammunition in ten magazines when we go over into the Sinai as well as a dozen 206 bombs. Why only fifty-nine rounds per magazine? Easy most weapons stoppages are due just as much to bad magazines as they are to bad weapons. Technically speaking sixty rounds is a lot of weight for the spring to bear, at maximum capacity. I'd much rather the spring have just that little more extra push being one round light as opposed to being at full capacity and having a stoppage from a bad magazine. I can change magazines pretty quickly, and I've even got a couple rigged magazines that are taped end over end so all I have to do is flick my wrist and I've got another fifty-nine rounds ready to be loaded. I also have four grenades, two L4 fragmentation and two white phosphorous grenades as well as my Fairborn-Sykes commando knife, a favorite of British commando units during World War II.
A major sore point with the unit is pistols. The twenty pistols we'd packed away as useful backup weapons simply disappeared into the hands of A and D Squadrons. Our mates are just as afflicted with shiny kit syndrome as we are, but the big difference is they'll be going in by vehicle, we'll be going in on foot after the Skimmer dropped us off.
~ ~ ~ ~
Kate got into the rental car beside Scott as they drove down to Orlando to visit Scott's aunt and his older sister. As she did, she couldn't help but worry. It was that same kind of sixth sense she'd gotten when Hiram was in South America. It was as if she could tell he was about to get into a major drama. It turned out she was right during those days, whenever she'd had those feelings she would write them down and date them. Hiram's letters from around the date of those feelings always talked about patrols where major contacts were discovered.
An example was one day at the clinic, back in 2143; she had that weird feeling again. And not more than ten days later a letter from Hiram arrived speaking about a jungle patrol where his four man patrol ran afoul of a two hundred and fifty man enemy base camp. Luckily the skimmer extracted them without a hitch, but as they returned to base the skimmer was found to have exactly two hundred and seventy eight large and small holes in its airframe.
Scott was busily talking on his cell phone, something about a major client, Cogsworth, wanting to advertise some new drug that it had made. Kate rolled her eyes and sighed, Scott had yet another business meeting. It wasn't as if she didn't know what the various drug conglomerates spoke of, she was a veterinarian after all, but she wondered just when she and Scott would have some time just being a couple.
~ ~ ~ ~
Forward Operating Base
The kit we always divide equally amongst us, so if anything goes wrong, any two of us could pull the mission of with some success.
"Nice to have known you wankers." One of the guys, Rolly Thiemann, a half Swiss-half Brit from A Squadron shouts over at us.
"And you dickheads." I shout back, as I put my belt kit together. Belt kits are the padded belt and suspender set you see soldiers wearing that contains the essentials, water, ammunition, and maybe a ration pack or two. During jungle warfare school we were taught that your belt kit, golock (machete), and weapon had better not be more than an arm's length away. Whenever we were out of our A-frames (our pole beds built in the jungle), weapons and belt kit were always worn.
We only take the essentials but even that adds up to around 210 pounds sometimes. In our case it did. Jack's adjusting the straps on Stoney's field pack and he pats him on the back when he's done.
"How far do we gotta tab with this lot on?" Stoney asks.
Cyril walks among us with plastic garbage bags, "Right gents, sort your kit and bag it up. Squadron in one bag, next of kin in the other. Remember to label which is which. Don't want the missus finding out about that blow up love doll you take on deployment, do you."
"Why don't we stuff all this in the garbage bags and take them with us?" Stoney asks.
"We're not a bunch of New Age travelers." Arnot replies.
"It's always a question of style with you Arnot, isn't it?" Stoney replies.
"You are what you wear." Arnot points out.
"And what you carry." Budnick adds.
"Hey Budnick, if you die can I have your guitar?" Donkeylips shouts from the group adjacent to us.
"Sure, but don't try wearing my clothes. They won't fit your cavernous ass at all." Budnick retorts.
"Ha ha ha." Donkeylips replies.
"Everything goes in the packs." I reply, "Except for the NBC (Nuclear, Biological, Chemical suits), which in deference to Arnot we will carry in these designer sand bags. Right, anything we've forgotten?"
"Oui, cover story." Arnot states, "There's a high probability of capture on this one."
"Well the obvious one's pilot rescue. We're a search team looking for downed pilots and our own skimmer gets shot down whilst searching for them." Jack replies.
"Sounds good." I reply.
"Want a picture?" Sponge Harris, a grad school bound kid who joined us in 2144, asks.
"Sure, why not?" Budnick replies.
With our belt kits and weapons on we pose on a Land Rover. Sponge takes two copies, one for the Interest Room back at Ft. Bragg and the other to be signed by the lot of us on return. A night insertion is what I asked for and we're getting one tonight by the US Army Air Corps.
Photo ops, I've had a few of them before missions back in South Am and on the Counterterrorist Team when it was B Squadron's rotation. There's a picture from the old days of South Am, back in 2141, of four guys from A Squadron. Only one signature adorns it, and that signifies that the other three boys in the picture were killed in action. It's another old tradition we have in the Special Forces, we take pictures of departing teams and when the team comes back the survivors autograph the picture. In our Squadron Interest Room there's one signed by the current top dog of the Special Forces, Lieutenant General Diennes, a three star who had served a long and distinguished career, including one in the 21st Territorial Special Forces.
There's no other crew other than these seven guys under me that I'd rather go into hostile territory with. Every single one of them I've spent at least one tour in South Am with. Even our 'newbies' like Budnick, the third ex-paratrooper in our group, from the 82nd Airborne Division, have experience in the field. I know I can count on them in firefights, because I've been through at least one with each of them under me.
Budnick's carrying the signal kit for the mission, Arnot's got the primary medical kit, and I've got the backup set. Since I'm team leader, patrol medic's no longer my primary responsibility, but, nonetheless I've still better keep that skill intact. The primary demolitionists are Link and Jack.
As we ride in the Land Rovers towards the area where the skimmers are parked a procession of guys from D Squadron are marching up and down humming a funeral dirge.
"Dum dum dum da dum dum da dum da dum da dum..." the chorus sounds.
"Tossers." Fallstaff shouts.
I hand Mike a trio of letters, to be delivered if I should fall in battle, "For Uncle Shaggy and the others, for Kate, and this third one's for you."
"What's the one for me say?" Mike says, smoothing his gray hair.
"Easy, cock this up and I'll come back and haunt you." I reply.
"Seriously Hiram, does the one for Kate..." Mike says.
I nod soberly, "It does."
"Name and proof of life statements, gentlemen, we need to know you're alive in case we need to give a ransom away." Major Gates says as he and Cyril walk up to us with a video camera.
"Hiram Becker, 29, if I win I'd like to travel and work with children." I say with a grin.
"Linkovich Chumovsky, ex-para, chain smoker." Link says, puffing on one of his cigarettes, "Statement, My God, My country and my Harley Davidson, not necessarily in that order."
"Bobby Budnick, ex-para like Link only better looking." Budnick says.
"Bullshit." Link replies.
"Statement, I will quit smoking this year, or next year. Ah hell." Budnick replies.
"Alan Felders, Filipino-Australian, US Marine." Shorty says
"Ogles tall women." Stoney remarks.
"David Morgan, Encino, California. Statement, Hiram, if you die I'm taking those new boots of yours."
"Stoney Brown, also from Encino. Statement, Disco will never die dude."
"Ah shut up Stoney." Shorty remarks.
"Arnot." Arnot replies, "Les Anciens (ex-legionnaire). Statement, Je ne regrette rien. I regret nothing."
"Hey, you forgot about Falstaff." Budnick interjects.
The camera pans to Falstaff and he says, "Jack Falstaff, from the Reader's Digest, 'Congratulations, you've just been selected out of people in your area to receive a prize in a literary competition.' That's shit that is."
As we board the skimmer with our gear and it takes off I see a contingent from A and D Squadrons mooning us. Bastards, I grin, this was an old tradition from South America as well.
I go forward to talk to the pilot, "What's our contingency plan."
"Contact on landing, get back aboard and we'll reinsert you elsewhere. Contact after landing, call me on the TACBE and I'll recover you." The pilot says, "And I want plenty of covering fire."
"Shouldn't be a problem." I reply.
"If we get shot down whichever way you go, we'll go the other." The pilot replies, "Nothing personal it's just that to enemy forces we're simply aircrew, where you guys are Friday the 13th."
It's really nothing personal. Special Forces guys don't exactly receive the best treatment if we fall into enemy hands. But that's a big if for us. We either fight to the end, or we escape and evade across hostile terrain. Throughout the history of Special Forces there have been tales of incredible escapes including one man during World War II, Jack Stillito, who walked across over a hundred miles of North African desert behind German lines to return to his own unit, the British SAS which we are partially descended from.
The flight goes without a hitch and as we disembark we muster in a circle with our weapons aimed outward in case of a contact. When we see nothing I have Arnot as the lead scout, he's always been good at that particular duty when we were in South America. Jack and Dave are behind him with me behind Dave with Link, Budnick, Shorty, and Stoney behind me. Even in the dark I know what each of my team mates look like by their manner of walking, by particular pieces of headgear some of them wear (like Arnot with his peaked field cap with the Gerbigsjager (mountain warfare) device on the front), or by the weapons they carry.
The big problem with finding a lay up point (LUP) in the dark is that what might seem like an uninhabited gully could easily be the foundations of a construction site on the outskirts of residential area. So we'd have to search carefully and not leave any sign that enemy trackers could follow.
Presently Arnot finds us a wadi to hide in and the eight of us hole up. Six of us go to sleep with two of us on watch at any given time. Taking first stag (watch) are myself and Stoney.
~ ~ ~ ~
Kate and Scott were sitting in the waiting area at a Caribbean themed eatery on International Drive called Bahama Breeze. Cogsworth wanted to know if they had time for a quick business lunch. Scott said definitely he had time for it, much to Kate's chagrin.
'Katherine and Scott, the ideal couple.' Kate thought.
An older, bearded fellow wearing slacks, an Oxford button down shirt with the top button unbuttoned and a dark blue blazer came in and said, "Scott Peterson?"
"Yes sir, that's me." Scott said. Dressed in a similar fashion as Cogsworth despite the fact that it was over ninety degrees outside, Scott began talking animatedly about Cogsworth's latest pharmaceutical innovation.
"Ah, and this must be the future Mrs. Peterson." Cogsworth began. He noticed the small silver ornamental edelweiss worn around Kate's neck.
"You were in the veterinary unit for one of the mountain infantry divisions?" Cogsworth asked.
"No, a good friend of mine went through the Gerbigsjager course in the Swiss Alps." Kate replied, "Back in 2138."
"What unit was he with?" Cogsworth asked.
"B Squadron, Mountain Troop, 21st Special Forces." Kate replied.
"Ah, a Territorial Army soldier." Cogsworth said, "You know what men who attend the Gerbigsjager course must do to rate the edelweiss insignia worn on the front of their caps, right?"
"To really be considered worthy of the right to wear the badge they climb the steepest slopes in the Alps and pick one from the peak." Kate replied.
"Men have sometimes died trying to do so." Cogsworth replied, "When I was on vacation in Switzerland several years ago I heard about two soldiers from the 117th German Mountain Division falling to their deaths from a steep slope."
As the waitress led them to their table, Kate took her seat beside Scott and the pair sat across from Cogsworth. She had a funny feeling that Cogsworth was up to no good, how she knew it she couldn't say exactly but the man seemed about as trustworthy as a snake oil salesman at a county fair. She knew she had some investigating to do. As soon as she got some free time she was going to research everything that could be found on one Osborn Cogsworth.
~ ~ ~ ~
TBC
Disclaimer – Same as before.
Eternity – Thanks for reviewing.
~ ~ ~ ~
Forward Operating Base
Here we check zeroed the Wiraways and 206s. Weapons are just a tool, as long as they go bang when you squeeze the trigger and hit what you're aiming at, that'll do.
Over the dune I could see Link, Stoney, Dave and Shorty firing their Wiraway squad automatic weapons in short burst of four or five rounds to make sure the sights were aligned properly. They were shooting at four Figure 11 targets, essentially a big picture of a charging man, and blasting holes through them in the indicated 'kill' areas within three or four rounds.
I watch Arnot fire a 206 grenade at several empty shipping crates we set up as targets. When he misses he calmly adjusts the 206's azimuth sights for the range he's at. I fire a couple 10mm rounds at another Figure 11 from the assault rifle component of my 206, which is above the grenade launcher part.
I'm carrying 590 rounds of 10mm ammunition in ten magazines when we go over into the Sinai as well as a dozen 206 bombs. Why only fifty-nine rounds per magazine? Easy most weapons stoppages are due just as much to bad magazines as they are to bad weapons. Technically speaking sixty rounds is a lot of weight for the spring to bear, at maximum capacity. I'd much rather the spring have just that little more extra push being one round light as opposed to being at full capacity and having a stoppage from a bad magazine. I can change magazines pretty quickly, and I've even got a couple rigged magazines that are taped end over end so all I have to do is flick my wrist and I've got another fifty-nine rounds ready to be loaded. I also have four grenades, two L4 fragmentation and two white phosphorous grenades as well as my Fairborn-Sykes commando knife, a favorite of British commando units during World War II.
A major sore point with the unit is pistols. The twenty pistols we'd packed away as useful backup weapons simply disappeared into the hands of A and D Squadrons. Our mates are just as afflicted with shiny kit syndrome as we are, but the big difference is they'll be going in by vehicle, we'll be going in on foot after the Skimmer dropped us off.
~ ~ ~ ~
Kate got into the rental car beside Scott as they drove down to Orlando to visit Scott's aunt and his older sister. As she did, she couldn't help but worry. It was that same kind of sixth sense she'd gotten when Hiram was in South America. It was as if she could tell he was about to get into a major drama. It turned out she was right during those days, whenever she'd had those feelings she would write them down and date them. Hiram's letters from around the date of those feelings always talked about patrols where major contacts were discovered.
An example was one day at the clinic, back in 2143; she had that weird feeling again. And not more than ten days later a letter from Hiram arrived speaking about a jungle patrol where his four man patrol ran afoul of a two hundred and fifty man enemy base camp. Luckily the skimmer extracted them without a hitch, but as they returned to base the skimmer was found to have exactly two hundred and seventy eight large and small holes in its airframe.
Scott was busily talking on his cell phone, something about a major client, Cogsworth, wanting to advertise some new drug that it had made. Kate rolled her eyes and sighed, Scott had yet another business meeting. It wasn't as if she didn't know what the various drug conglomerates spoke of, she was a veterinarian after all, but she wondered just when she and Scott would have some time just being a couple.
~ ~ ~ ~
Forward Operating Base
The kit we always divide equally amongst us, so if anything goes wrong, any two of us could pull the mission of with some success.
"Nice to have known you wankers." One of the guys, Rolly Thiemann, a half Swiss-half Brit from A Squadron shouts over at us.
"And you dickheads." I shout back, as I put my belt kit together. Belt kits are the padded belt and suspender set you see soldiers wearing that contains the essentials, water, ammunition, and maybe a ration pack or two. During jungle warfare school we were taught that your belt kit, golock (machete), and weapon had better not be more than an arm's length away. Whenever we were out of our A-frames (our pole beds built in the jungle), weapons and belt kit were always worn.
We only take the essentials but even that adds up to around 210 pounds sometimes. In our case it did. Jack's adjusting the straps on Stoney's field pack and he pats him on the back when he's done.
"How far do we gotta tab with this lot on?" Stoney asks.
Cyril walks among us with plastic garbage bags, "Right gents, sort your kit and bag it up. Squadron in one bag, next of kin in the other. Remember to label which is which. Don't want the missus finding out about that blow up love doll you take on deployment, do you."
"Why don't we stuff all this in the garbage bags and take them with us?" Stoney asks.
"We're not a bunch of New Age travelers." Arnot replies.
"It's always a question of style with you Arnot, isn't it?" Stoney replies.
"You are what you wear." Arnot points out.
"And what you carry." Budnick adds.
"Hey Budnick, if you die can I have your guitar?" Donkeylips shouts from the group adjacent to us.
"Sure, but don't try wearing my clothes. They won't fit your cavernous ass at all." Budnick retorts.
"Ha ha ha." Donkeylips replies.
"Everything goes in the packs." I reply, "Except for the NBC (Nuclear, Biological, Chemical suits), which in deference to Arnot we will carry in these designer sand bags. Right, anything we've forgotten?"
"Oui, cover story." Arnot states, "There's a high probability of capture on this one."
"Well the obvious one's pilot rescue. We're a search team looking for downed pilots and our own skimmer gets shot down whilst searching for them." Jack replies.
"Sounds good." I reply.
"Want a picture?" Sponge Harris, a grad school bound kid who joined us in 2144, asks.
"Sure, why not?" Budnick replies.
With our belt kits and weapons on we pose on a Land Rover. Sponge takes two copies, one for the Interest Room back at Ft. Bragg and the other to be signed by the lot of us on return. A night insertion is what I asked for and we're getting one tonight by the US Army Air Corps.
Photo ops, I've had a few of them before missions back in South Am and on the Counterterrorist Team when it was B Squadron's rotation. There's a picture from the old days of South Am, back in 2141, of four guys from A Squadron. Only one signature adorns it, and that signifies that the other three boys in the picture were killed in action. It's another old tradition we have in the Special Forces, we take pictures of departing teams and when the team comes back the survivors autograph the picture. In our Squadron Interest Room there's one signed by the current top dog of the Special Forces, Lieutenant General Diennes, a three star who had served a long and distinguished career, including one in the 21st Territorial Special Forces.
There's no other crew other than these seven guys under me that I'd rather go into hostile territory with. Every single one of them I've spent at least one tour in South Am with. Even our 'newbies' like Budnick, the third ex-paratrooper in our group, from the 82nd Airborne Division, have experience in the field. I know I can count on them in firefights, because I've been through at least one with each of them under me.
Budnick's carrying the signal kit for the mission, Arnot's got the primary medical kit, and I've got the backup set. Since I'm team leader, patrol medic's no longer my primary responsibility, but, nonetheless I've still better keep that skill intact. The primary demolitionists are Link and Jack.
As we ride in the Land Rovers towards the area where the skimmers are parked a procession of guys from D Squadron are marching up and down humming a funeral dirge.
"Dum dum dum da dum dum da dum da dum da dum..." the chorus sounds.
"Tossers." Fallstaff shouts.
I hand Mike a trio of letters, to be delivered if I should fall in battle, "For Uncle Shaggy and the others, for Kate, and this third one's for you."
"What's the one for me say?" Mike says, smoothing his gray hair.
"Easy, cock this up and I'll come back and haunt you." I reply.
"Seriously Hiram, does the one for Kate..." Mike says.
I nod soberly, "It does."
"Name and proof of life statements, gentlemen, we need to know you're alive in case we need to give a ransom away." Major Gates says as he and Cyril walk up to us with a video camera.
"Hiram Becker, 29, if I win I'd like to travel and work with children." I say with a grin.
"Linkovich Chumovsky, ex-para, chain smoker." Link says, puffing on one of his cigarettes, "Statement, My God, My country and my Harley Davidson, not necessarily in that order."
"Bobby Budnick, ex-para like Link only better looking." Budnick says.
"Bullshit." Link replies.
"Statement, I will quit smoking this year, or next year. Ah hell." Budnick replies.
"Alan Felders, Filipino-Australian, US Marine." Shorty says
"Ogles tall women." Stoney remarks.
"David Morgan, Encino, California. Statement, Hiram, if you die I'm taking those new boots of yours."
"Stoney Brown, also from Encino. Statement, Disco will never die dude."
"Ah shut up Stoney." Shorty remarks.
"Arnot." Arnot replies, "Les Anciens (ex-legionnaire). Statement, Je ne regrette rien. I regret nothing."
"Hey, you forgot about Falstaff." Budnick interjects.
The camera pans to Falstaff and he says, "Jack Falstaff, from the Reader's Digest, 'Congratulations, you've just been selected out of people in your area to receive a prize in a literary competition.' That's shit that is."
As we board the skimmer with our gear and it takes off I see a contingent from A and D Squadrons mooning us. Bastards, I grin, this was an old tradition from South America as well.
I go forward to talk to the pilot, "What's our contingency plan."
"Contact on landing, get back aboard and we'll reinsert you elsewhere. Contact after landing, call me on the TACBE and I'll recover you." The pilot says, "And I want plenty of covering fire."
"Shouldn't be a problem." I reply.
"If we get shot down whichever way you go, we'll go the other." The pilot replies, "Nothing personal it's just that to enemy forces we're simply aircrew, where you guys are Friday the 13th."
It's really nothing personal. Special Forces guys don't exactly receive the best treatment if we fall into enemy hands. But that's a big if for us. We either fight to the end, or we escape and evade across hostile terrain. Throughout the history of Special Forces there have been tales of incredible escapes including one man during World War II, Jack Stillito, who walked across over a hundred miles of North African desert behind German lines to return to his own unit, the British SAS which we are partially descended from.
The flight goes without a hitch and as we disembark we muster in a circle with our weapons aimed outward in case of a contact. When we see nothing I have Arnot as the lead scout, he's always been good at that particular duty when we were in South America. Jack and Dave are behind him with me behind Dave with Link, Budnick, Shorty, and Stoney behind me. Even in the dark I know what each of my team mates look like by their manner of walking, by particular pieces of headgear some of them wear (like Arnot with his peaked field cap with the Gerbigsjager (mountain warfare) device on the front), or by the weapons they carry.
The big problem with finding a lay up point (LUP) in the dark is that what might seem like an uninhabited gully could easily be the foundations of a construction site on the outskirts of residential area. So we'd have to search carefully and not leave any sign that enemy trackers could follow.
Presently Arnot finds us a wadi to hide in and the eight of us hole up. Six of us go to sleep with two of us on watch at any given time. Taking first stag (watch) are myself and Stoney.
~ ~ ~ ~
Kate and Scott were sitting in the waiting area at a Caribbean themed eatery on International Drive called Bahama Breeze. Cogsworth wanted to know if they had time for a quick business lunch. Scott said definitely he had time for it, much to Kate's chagrin.
'Katherine and Scott, the ideal couple.' Kate thought.
An older, bearded fellow wearing slacks, an Oxford button down shirt with the top button unbuttoned and a dark blue blazer came in and said, "Scott Peterson?"
"Yes sir, that's me." Scott said. Dressed in a similar fashion as Cogsworth despite the fact that it was over ninety degrees outside, Scott began talking animatedly about Cogsworth's latest pharmaceutical innovation.
"Ah, and this must be the future Mrs. Peterson." Cogsworth began. He noticed the small silver ornamental edelweiss worn around Kate's neck.
"You were in the veterinary unit for one of the mountain infantry divisions?" Cogsworth asked.
"No, a good friend of mine went through the Gerbigsjager course in the Swiss Alps." Kate replied, "Back in 2138."
"What unit was he with?" Cogsworth asked.
"B Squadron, Mountain Troop, 21st Special Forces." Kate replied.
"Ah, a Territorial Army soldier." Cogsworth said, "You know what men who attend the Gerbigsjager course must do to rate the edelweiss insignia worn on the front of their caps, right?"
"To really be considered worthy of the right to wear the badge they climb the steepest slopes in the Alps and pick one from the peak." Kate replied.
"Men have sometimes died trying to do so." Cogsworth replied, "When I was on vacation in Switzerland several years ago I heard about two soldiers from the 117th German Mountain Division falling to their deaths from a steep slope."
As the waitress led them to their table, Kate took her seat beside Scott and the pair sat across from Cogsworth. She had a funny feeling that Cogsworth was up to no good, how she knew it she couldn't say exactly but the man seemed about as trustworthy as a snake oil salesman at a county fair. She knew she had some investigating to do. As soon as she got some free time she was going to research everything that could be found on one Osborn Cogsworth.
~ ~ ~ ~
TBC
