Those experiences had gotten out the jitters and sharpened the team’s senses. By this third day, their movements reflected the precision of a fine point drill bit driving to its objective without obstruction. They were focused and all business. They entered rooms with a dominating presence, moving in smooth controlled pairs; never in a hurry and recharging ammunition every time they had a breather. The awareness Stephen was beginning to see in his men’s eyes gave him a shot of courage spiked with adrenaline.
Stephen observed the chain fence that ran alongside the buildings. Maps were close to useless as the fighting had left most landmarks unrecognizable and streets provided new access ways that didn’t even exist before mortar rounds, rocket-propelled grenades and tank divisions pounded them. On the other side of the fence was a train station which separated the city from miles of sandy nothingness. Aerial intelligence indicated insurgents had been using the train routes as cover to move supplies and reinforcements into the city. The fence separating the train tracks from the main city provided circumstantial evidence as it had several purposeful holes cut into it. The detail of what was done or how it occurred was beyond Stephen’s pay grade and not something important to him at the moment. His job was to lead his team and clear the three buildings directly perpendicular to the train station while other teams from his platoon, including the rest of his squad, concurrently worked through the buildings parallel to their position.
Stephen placed his hand on Rodriguez’s shoulder and firmly gripped a mix of uniform and dirt speckled neck. He pointed an extended hand towards a brick red building along the northern edge of the city and spoke with a distant stare. “That’s our next target.”
“Hooah.” Rodriguez responded confidently.
The men of Stephen’s “Alpha” fire team, representing about half of his total squad, entered the powerless building with their night vision goggles on and rifles traced to every corner. The team passed floor after floor without incident, cautiously peering out of upper floor windows to conduct a brief recon by scanning windows of the adjacent building. Convinced there were no signs of activity that could be seen from their elevated viewpoint, the team prepared to exit the opposite side of the building. Waters poked his head around the corner of a door adjacent to the exit door.
“I’ve got a weapon!” Waters’ voice was alarmed as he crouched down and raised his rifle behind the open doorway, peering through its scope. Tomlison slapped Waters’ shoulder and the rifle temporarily rose toward the ceiling for Tomlison and Stephen to pass into the room and take up their own firing positions in the same direction where Waters had aimed his weapon.
From the distance, Stephen could make out a rifle on the floor. It was partially covered by debris but under the rocks lay the unmistakable presence of a jacket extending to the rifle.
Tomlison’s deep but whispered voice rose over the stilled air, “I got eyes on the target. No visible movement.” He scanned the area around the body, training his rifle across any possibility of an unwanted surprise which might catch them off guard. Easing the rim of the rifle’s sight off his eye, Tomlison looked over his shoulder and called out, “No threats, Sarge. All clear.”
Stephen advanced past the body without concern and followed a disheveled trail of debris pattern leading to an enlarged opening. He could see from the hole that the rubble in the room had actually come from the entire north-facing wall being blown out. Soot covering the ground and surrounding walls suggesting that heavy firepower had blown through this area in recent days if not that very morning. Outside he saw a rough looking pack of dogs. Their hair was matted with what looked to be blood. Stephen’s squad had received word about the starving dogs in the city following the sounds of battle in the hopes of finding a carcass for dinner. The thought made him sick to his stomach so he turned away from the opening.
Tomlison, resting his chin on the cool steel of the rifle and still securing the area, called out to Stephen, “Whatcha got, boss?”
“Looks like someone made the mistake of popping off a few rounds at those Marines.”
Catching up to Stephen and surveying the damage in the adjacent room, Waters uttered, “Damn, they won’t be doing that again.”
Hooper arrived and began examining the destruction of the room with an investigator’s eye. “I’d say… looks like an AT4 hit this.”
“You sure? We using tank busters on buildings now?” asked Stephen.
“Pretty much.” Hooper responded. “Hey, somebody starts taking pop-shots at soldiers, I’d throw back whatever I had handy; the bigger the better.”
“Hooah!” chimed in Waters, “Blow their asses out of the sky.”
“Sends a nice little Hallmark message to his friends in the nearby windows too.” Hooper confirmed, pointing his finger sideways like a gun with a bobbing thrust and a brash expression as if he were in some rap video sending a pointed threat to some unseen adversary. “Tells ’em not to start something they can’t finish.”
The bravado was etching up a few notches when Tomlison called out to Stephen, “Yo Sarge! Might wanna take a look at this.”
Stephen walked over to where Tomlinson knelt near the body of the dead insurgent. His hand held up a large piece of debris, exposing the bloodied and battered face of the enemy and revealing it to be a boy who couldn’t have been more than 10 years old.
The air thickened in its place. It didn’t matter that a massive hole left the southernmost portion of the room completely exposed, not even the slightest breeze dared enter the room as the men hesitantly crowded around the boy’s lifeless body. Not a word was spoken by any of them but each gave attention to his own doubts. Stephen picked up on the shared realization that their enemy wasn’t always the evil, knife-wielding psychopathic jihadist they wanted him to be. But he couldn’t have his men’s alertness shrouded by doubt in their mission or grief over the enemy’s indiscriminate use of weapons; even if those weapons were kids whose lives were robbed from them the moment they were assigned a firearm.
“This wasn’t us and this isn’t why we’re here.” His voice lingered in the air. Air which had gone stale as it hovered above the image which would never depart their memories. “And more importantly, we did not put that gun in his hand.” Stephen’s voice was paired with hurt, disgust and a righteous indignation. “Let’s keep moving,” he ordered. The team left the room and exited the building in complete silence.
Their next target was directly in front of them as the buildings had been designed to parallel the road. The second building seemed to have taken more of the brunt from the Army’s gun bunnies in the artillery. There was also evidence of damage from aerial bombardments as the higher floors seemed to be far less stable. Stephen sent Hilton and Tomlison up a mostly intact staircase while Hooper quickly set up a firing position with the M249 squad automatic weapon, more commonly referred to as the SAW. He faced a collapsed wall on the second floor; the most obvious place for an ambush. With Hooper’s SAW well positioned and at the ready, Stephen felt confident that any attempted ambush on their squad would be brief and highly unsuccessful.