Title: Don't Drink The Water, Chapter Twelve
Archive: Not without Permission of the Author
Disclaimer: "Over There" and all its characters belong to FX Networks and other entities that may have been involved with its production. No infringement of copyright is intended. This story was written for personal enjoyment and to share with other "Over There" fans.
Summary: Suspicions confirm that there's a traitor in their midst; Scream and His Squad fight to save a friends life.
Camp Freedom
Stockade
01630 Hours
"Group attention!" Silas shouted, as he approached the squad. The men quickly stood, when they saw Colonel Ryan one step behind him.
Ryan grinned. "Well, if it isn't my favorite squad! "He said with a grin. "At ease, men. Good to see you all in one piece, especially you, Private Dumphy!"
"Yes,sir, thank you sir."
He turned towards Del Rio and Mitchell. "And these must be the two soldiers who did such an outstanding job of capturing our delightful prisoner. Hell, ladies, I need to put you two in charge of the stockade! "
"Yes sir!" Mitchell responded emphatically.
Ryan laughed. "But then you wouldn't get to see so much of exotic Iraq, would you? Anyway, we haven't gotten anything out of this clown, so you guys are good to go. Sergeant you went over the particulars?"
"Exactly as you told me, sir."
"Good." Ryan said. He quickly turned and looked behind him to see several MPS scuffling with Sulayman, whose hands were in flex ties behind him then, attached to a set of manacles around his waist. He was trying to kick at the MPs. When that wasn't effective, he resorted to spitting.
"Nasty habit that man's got." Ryan commented.
"Smoke, Angel!" Silas shouted. "Cover him!"
Both men walked over and adjusted there weapons to cover the prisoner, who suddenly went limp; the MPs continued to drag his dead weight towards truck.
Silas turned at the sound of door slamming shut and looked up to see Captain Baron, approaching. "Why aren't his legs secured? Get his legs secured now!"
"They thought it would be easier to walk him out and get him manacled in the truck, sir."
The MPs dragging him allowed him to fall to the ground, while the third dropped down to his knees and unraveled the manacles. The other two MPs held him down onto the ground, but Sulayman continued to struggle. Tariq ran over and knelt beside him, pressing his knee into his back.
The third MP was still struggling with the manacles. "Damn!" he whispered. "The links all messed up."
"What the hell is going on? Get that man secured and into that truck!" Baron yelled.
The MP holding Sulaymans' right arm turned his body towards the less experienced MP. "They forgot to spray them. Here, give it to me. You come hold this guy's arm down." He shifted his body, and leaned forward to take the chains from the other man unknowingly shoving his lower leg against the prisoners face. A moment later he was screaming, as Sulayman opened his mouth wide and clamped his teeth down on the MP's calf, hard enough to bite thru his BDU pants. "Oh Christ, get him off me!" He shrieked.
The man who'd been kneeling on Sulayman's legs lost his concentration allowing the prisoner to turn slightly, his legs flailing. He kicked out with his left leg and struck the man in the face hard enough to break his nose and the man crumpled. Del Rio ran forward and grabbed the injured man, his blood spurting all over her. She dragged him out of the way, making room for Silas to join the fray.
Tariq was screaming at Sulayman. "IFTAH! OGIF ! " (Stop! Open up!") He suddenly reached over and grab Sulayman's nose, pinching it tightly, until the man could no longer breathe and had to open his mouth to take a breath. Tariq grabbed the MP under the arms and pulled him away.
Angel and Smoke were still covering the Iraqi who now lay on the ground sputtering and breathing heavily with Silas on his back. "Someone get that goddamned medic!" he screamed, just before he heard the report of a rifle and a bullet flew past his ear. He threw himself down on the ground beside Sulayman. ""Get down!"
Immediately the rest of the squad, Ryan and Baron threw themselves down on the ground. Baron, who was behind one of the Humvees with Ryan, grabbed his ICOM headset, and called for additional support.
Smoke had landed on the ground closest to Silas and the prisoner. He quickly moved on his forearms and knees staying as low as possible, and crawled over to them, but Silas saw him coming. "Smoke! Stay where you are."
"I'm almost there, Sergeant. I'll help you pull him behind cover!" he called back, still crawling along the ground.
"Where the hell is that fire coming from! Baron yelled. "Can anyone see anything?"
"Up by the fence line sir! Mitchell called out. There's three of them!"
"I see them from here," Del Rio confirmed. Three of them!" She was just left of Mitchell, shielded behind the large rear tire of the Humvey, the MP with the broken nose, lying dazed with his head in her lap as she pressed down as gently as she could with a clean rag to staunch the bleeding. "It's gonna be okay." She whispered to him. "Just hang in there. It's okay." God! She thought, this kids' more scared then I am!
"Smoke goddamn it, go back I said!" Silas shouted, as the other man kept coming, crawling closer and closer. "That's a goddamned order, Private!"
"Sergeant!" Smoke yelled as he watched Sulayman maneuver himself to his feet, and begin toward run toward the fence line. Suddenly the bullets were flying again.
"IFTAH! IFTAH! Tariq yelled.
"GODDAMN IT!" Silas screamed, he jumped up and grabbed at Sulayman, but just missed grabbing onto his clothing.
Smoke rose up onto his elbows and took aim, his sites on Sulayman. Immediately Angel and Dim followed suit and raised their weapons as well.
"No! Don't shoot him! We need him alive!" Ryan screamed at them.
"What the fuck?" Smoke said in a shocked voice. He watched as a bullet whizzed past Silas, causing the man to dodge and lose his footing, once, then a second time.
He jumped up, driving his body into Silas and knocking the man flat on the ground, and then dropped as well, but not before he took a bullet in his shoulder. He fell heavily to the ground.
The shooting stopped as quickly as it had begun, as Sulayman ran running toward the fence line, shouting "My brother, he said you would come! Praise Allah." Three other soldiers were hot on his tail.
Sulayman stopped in his tracks as a dark-hooded figure stood up and spoke to him. He took two steps backward then turned to run back towards the base, but it was too late. The figured raised his rifle and pulled the trigger.
Camp Freedom
Stockade
01730 Hours
Silas strode into medical unit, his clothing covered with dirt and he had an angry red scrape on his chin.
"Sergeant Silas. Long time no see," quipped Corporal Shaver, who was sitting on an unused gurney, a stack of clipboards on the bed beside him. There were large dark splotches of blood on his uniform pants and on the sleeve of his jacket. "How's the head?" he asked.
"Fine, Corporal." Silas retorted gruffly. Then relenting a bit under Shaver's close scrutiny, he said "I still have a headache. Hurts like a sonofabitch."
"Yeah. Dull headache, probably last a day or so. If it doesn't get better soon let me know. But right now I guess you're looking for the prisoner and Private Williams?"
"Yeah."
Shaver jerked his head to the left. "You're Private Williams is in there. He's okay. Lucky bastard, the bullet went right into his shoulder and sat on the other side. He's gonna be fine in a few days. Now you're prisoner?" Shaver continued jerking his head to the right, "He's not gonna be okay. He's dead."
"Shit."
"Yup. They're all there, Baron, Lapus, haven't seen your best buddy and mine…."
"Shut up, Corporal," Silas snapped as he walked towards the right.
"You got it. Be nice and I might even look at that boo-boo when you're thru."
Shaver joked.
Silas growled and walked away.
"Fuck you, Sergeant Neanderthal." Shaver muttered to himself.
Ryan, Baron, and Lapus were standing to the side of the gurney where Sulayman's body lay; he almost looked like he was sleeping, except for two very large holes in his chest.
"I don't know. I didn't see any other weapons but rifles; Del Rio, Mitchell and Dumphy said the same thing."
Silas walked over and peered past the medic. "That looks like it came from a NATO 7.62 x 51mm, most likely the West German version. Small entrance wound but huge exit wound," he commented. The all turned to face him.
"Say again, Sergeant?" Ryan asked.
"A .308 Winchester; It was used in service rifles and machine guns, like the M14 rifle and M60 machine gun late 1950s, pretty much a standard firearm cartridge among NATO countries. It also became popular among civilians."
They continued to stare at Silas.
"We were using a longer cartridge of the U.S. standard .30-06 which was difficult to use in semi and fully automatic weapons, whereas a shorter round would allow for higher rates of fire. They kept using the .30-06 after the Korean War and into the 1960s, up until Vietnam though, when we traded our M14's for AK-47's."
"Whoa." Lapus whisperd. "Mr. Wizard."
"Well that's very interesting, Sergeant." Ryan commented. " Just one question though."
"Sir?"
"How the hell did it get here!"
"This entire situation……" Baron began, then thought better of it. "Alright. Lets meet back at the command tent in," He looked at his watch, " one hour. We'll go over all the details for the offical report. Hunter can give us a security briefing as well."
"Yes,sir."
Baron and Ryan left the medical unit, Lapus following them out when he stopped and looked back at Silas.
"I'm gonna check on Smoke, I'll catch up with you."
"OK."
Camp Freedom
Lieutenant Hunters Tent
1730 Same Day
Lieutenant Hunter sat on his bunk; his legs stretched out in front of him, and folded blanket in his lap. On it, and beside him, were several items that had been in the large manila envelope which had been removed from Sulayman's person earlier on when he had been discovered hiding in the Motorpool. Hunter had managed to make copies of before handing everything over to Captain Baron.
Sulayman had managed to get access to a lot of official information; there were memo's that outlined several recent missions, including those official actions by military forces that meant to roust the growing number of insurgents from the neighboring villages and within Baqubah. There were also several documents that he recognized as classified information from Battalion. There were several copies of unrelated information as well; probably someone had grabbed what they could and ran.
There were maps, including a recent one of Camp Freedom, while another map clearly showed Camp Packhorse in detail. Information on one sheet listed the approximate number of soldiers, personnel, and workers.
Hunter reached over and grabbed several newspaper clippings from articles that had been written in Stars and Stripes, as well as several from Al-Jezerah about the recent bombings.
But what was most interesting, were the letters.
He consulted his watch and realized that Silas and his squad of miscreants would have just left for Abu Ghraib; it was the perfect time to speak to Captain Baron about what he'd found out. Hunter carefully grabbed the various items and slipped them into his own large manila folder.
"Lieutenant Hunter?"
"Yes, what is it?" he yelled, as corporal St Claire stepped into the tent.
"Sir, Captain Baron would like to see you right away regarding the security report."
When St. Claire didn't budge, Hunter snapped, "Well, you delivered your message, now get out!"
Only after the other man departed, he tossed the blanket aside and lift the large strategically placed, bag full of ice and carefully lifted his legs over the side of his bunk.
This time he had enough proof to prove his case.
Camp Freedom
Stockade
01745 hours
Smoke was lying on the gurney, naked from the waist up with a large bandage and rolled gauze covering his left shoulder, his eyes partially closed. He was still hooked up to several machines carefully monitering his blood pressure and heart; a pulse oximeter was clipped onto the index finger of his left hand; A clear tube ran from his right arm up to several bags on the IV pole, administering fluids and pain medication.
Beside the gurney a female medic was making some notes on a clipboard. When she finished writing she acknowledged Silas with a smile and walked over to him, speaking softly. "He's doing very well, no damage we can see. He'll be here a few days so we can moniter for infection, then he'll be confined to base for a few days after that."
"Is he awake enough to talk?" Silas asked.
"To talk? Yes. But not for too long, Sergeant. He needs his rest."
"Affirmative, Sergeant." He replied gruffly, trying to hide a slight smile. She was pretty cute.
She moved two beds down and began to evaluate her next patient, leaving Silas beside Smoke's bed.
"Smoke? You in there?"
Smoke's eyes opened a bit wider. "Hey Sarge." His voice was a bit rough from the anethesia.
"Feeling no pain?"
Smoke nodded. " It's not so bad. Everyone else okay?"
"Everyone else is fine. But that's cause they follow orders, not like some pigheaded privates I know-"
"AHEM" The female medic cleared her throat loudly and gave Silas a truly nasty look.
"I'm sorry 'bout that Sarge, but……I'm not sorry."
"Yeah. I know. Damned moron. Just get better."
Smoke nodded slightly. "Slee-py." His eyes closed.