Lieutenant Ron Bradley strode from the forward cabin, bellowing to be heard above the roar of the plane’s four powerful engines. “Okay, ladies! The pilot has informed me we are at cruising altitude, so feel free to remove your restraints. We’ve got another couple hours before we reach the drop zone in Tikrit, so make sure your tactical gear and chutes are ready and then feel free to natter on about the latest dress your favorite celebrity is wearing, or hold a knitting circle, or whatever it is you ladies do best during your down time!”
A chorus of “Hoo-ah!” filled the cabin and the lieutenant — the LT — showed them his back before returning to the forward cabin.
Neidermeyer unlatched his safety straps, reached for his M16, and performed a quick check of the weapon then the rest of his gear. When he had made sure that all was in working order and in its place, Neidermeyer looked across to where Jack Howling Wolf sat opposite him. The big Indian held a combat knife in one hand, his eyes fixed on its silvery blade.
Neidermeyer leaned to his right and elbowed Joe Leeds. “Hey, what’s Tonto’s deal?” he whispered, tilting his head toward Wolf.
“Don’t let him hear you call him that, man,” whispered Leeds. “Wolfman’s full-blooded Navajo and he don’t take any shit about it. Watch what you say, or he’ll kick your ass, newbie or not.”
“I didn’t know.” Neidermeyer held up a pair of placating hands, leaning close to Leeds. “But what’s the deal with him and the knife? It’s giving me the willies.”
Leeds grinned, his pearly whites a stark contrast to his ebony skin. “You’re new, so you haven’t heard the story yet.” He turned toward Jack. “Hey, Wolfman! Newbiemeyer wants to hear the story about your blade. What do you say?”
Wolf raised his gaze from the keen edge of the silver blade to look first at Leeds then to Neidermeyer. With his eyes never leaving the new soldier’s face, Wolf flipped the knife into the air where it spun end-over-end until it fell prey to gravity and continued its descent, the flat of the blade slapping into Wolf’s outstretched palm. “Cuts Like a Knife. 1983. Bryan Adams. The album was released to great commercial success and few singles of the day sold nearly as well as the title track, particularly from Canadian artists such as Adams, who was made popular by love songs.”
“Wolfman Jack, baby!” Leeds thrust a forefinger through the air. “Dropping musical knowledge left and right.”
Wolf balanced the knife by the tip on the pad of one outstretched finger. “This knife saved my life in Mosul. I keep it with me for luck. And protection.” A slight movement of the finger caused the knife to topple to one side, where Wolf caught the hilt in his other hand. “Before I transferred to this unit, I was part of an eight-man squad tasked with what was supposed to be a simple rescue mission.”
“They never are,” Leeds interjected.
Neidermeyer looked to the man and saw that others in the unit were crowding close to hear the story.
Wolf looked at the lean, dark-skinned soldier. “Who’s telling this story, Leeds?”
Leeds bowed his head and his voice dropped an octave. “You are. Sorry.”
Wolf nodded. Whether in forgiveness or agreement, only he knew. “We’d just been dropped into the shit. It was 0200 hours when we hit the ground. We figured we’d catch the enemy napping, hustle our guys, a pilot and a journalist out of there and be done with it. Little did we know the shitstorm we were walking into. It was a complete eleven up, three down, eight up situation.”
Jack Howling Wolf and Lieutenant Rudy ‘Hawk’ Hawkins hustled to the next available cover, keeping their weapons trained on a fixed point ahead, ready to fire if the enemy should present themselves before the unit could reach their destination. The next fire team, comprising Jester, Hulk, and the only female soldier, ‘Swerve’ Raiborne, moved past Wolf and Hawk to the next vantage point, where they covered and waited for the third and final team — Slim, Doc, and Preacher, who moved forward to the next point.
Wolf and the LT advanced once more, but when they reached the first fire team, Hawk signaled for a squad-column movement. The fire team followed behind Wolf and the LT, who repeated the hand signal when they reached the second fire team. Moving ahead in this manner, they eventually came to a halt a few hundred meters from the camp.
Hawk turned to the rest of the unit and signaled no gunfire until absolutely necessary, or until fired upon. He was met with grim nods as several of the unit withdrew knives, their blades dulled with camo so the weapons didn’t shine in the moonlight.
Hawk switched off his night-vision goggles and slipped them up to his forehead. The others in the unit followed his example to avoid being blinded by the fire that burned in the center of the camp. The LT waited thirty seconds for their eyes to adjust to the darkness then signaled for one fire team to head east around the perimeter of the camp, and another to the west. Wolf and the LT would take the more direct route.
As the two soldiers crept closer to the encampment, Wolf spotted a lone enemy moving along the far perimeter of the camp. Two more soldiers stood sentry outside what Wolf guessed to be a command tent. While Wolf looked on, Swerve emerged from the shadows across the camp, snaked one hand around the perimeter guard’s mouth, and drove the blade of her Ka-bar into one of the man’s lungs, stealing his ability to scream an alarm. Swerve dragged the twitching body into the darkness and Wolf lost sight of them both.
Wolf and the LT stayed out of the line-of-sight of the command-tent sentries and crept into the nearest tent, where four of the enemy slept, unaware. They went to work with their knives, moving from one sleeping enemy to the next. When they had done, the desert sand drank the blood the marines had spilled.
As they exited the tent, Wolf noticed the command-tent sentries were no longer at their posts. Swerve stood outside the tent nearest and when she saw Wolf and the LT, pointed at the command tent, raised two fingers and then drew another across her neck. Jester and Hulk emerged from the tent at which Swerve stood lookout, and read her hand signals. They looked to the LT who motioned for them to clear the perimeter then converge on the command tent.
Wolf and the LT made another bloody visit to the next tent as the other fire teams finished up the rest. Once this was done, the three teams converged on the command tent. Still no prisoners, which Wolf knew meant one of two things: they were either inside the command tent, or they were already dead and disposed of. The LT signaled breach orders then Hawk unclipped a flashbang, pulled the pin and lobbed the grenade inside.
The flashbang did its work. Screams of alarm followed the explosive light and sound. The LT and Wolf rushed inside, moving around the edge to the tent’s rear. The other fire teams followed, one moving left and the other taking up a position near the entry point. At the back of the tent, two bound and hooded figures knelt on the sand, one with his wrists in gleaming shackles. The restraints lacked the dull, weathered hue of iron, or the gunmetal grey of solid steel. They could only be made of silver. There was no time to ponder this oddity. Standing behind the hostages, reeling from the effects of the flashbang, stood two enemy soldiers. One held an AK47, the other a knife. Wolf took aim at the latter and squeezed the trigger of his M16, placing three rounds in his center mass. The enemy dropped his weapon and toppled to the ground next to his ally, whom Hawk had already dispatched with his own three-round burst. Ordered chaos erupted as gunfire took out the remaining targets. One of the two prisoners found his feet and rushed toward the tent flap.
“Watch your fire,” Hawk yelled.