Irregulaire

Casualties

The next day. I was walking around the compound with my M16 when another explosion went off near the fence, followed by a bunch of gunfire. It was a little past 3AM. A little more probing, I think. Lucky, I had that gun locked and loaded. Let’s just hope they don’t come as far inside the perimeter now. But he did have his pistol ready. Red and I jumped out and stormed towards my position. We both noticed that the right flank machine gun was not firing.

“GET THAT DAMN MACHINE GUN FIRING, MICKEY!” she commanded. 

I rushed towards the machine gun, then fired away almost immediately. You know, when you fire that thing, you’ll feel an overwhelming force pulling you into shape, protecting you. A steady stream of thumps hurt you a little at first, but it made you feel stronger over time. And with a cartridge that powerful, the weight seemed not to be a problem for a while. 

I kept pulling the trigger until I ran dry. That gun fires rather slowly, but 200 rounds don’t seem to be that much. I wondered why. Red was still behind me, covering me while I reloaded. “Dammit, where are the ammo cans?!” I was sure I put it where I knelt. Not taking too long, I discarded the machine gun and went back to my M16. It felt like a feather after firing that behemoth. But of course, I was losing firepower. 

The wave was not as sporadic as last time. It was still manageable. Had I fired more controllably, I might’ve stopped that wave single-handedly with that machine gun. Little did I know, that smaller group dealt more damage than it seemed. 

In less than 5 minutes, the wave stopped. I just remembered I had loaded a used ammo belt, only 100-ish rounds instead of the standard 200 and I discarded the rest somewhere God knows. And in that confusion, it turned out I knocked over the ammo cans over the sandbags. The ammo cans were in front of our cover, only hidden behind a bush. As I turned around to check on Red, she was breathing rather heavily. 

“Are you okay?” I was worried. 

“I think so, yeah,” she knelt. 

“Where the hell is Karl?”

I then saw Karl run off towards us, leaving some people behind him. Those people seemed to be rushing to help someone. I stood up, asking him what had happened. 

“Harry got hit. Bad,” he said after abruptly stopping before us. We looked at each other, then stormed off towards his position. 

“How the fuck did he get hit?!” Red shouted, with such pressure that even I was afraid. 

“I… I… don’t know, he was running back and forth to cover more areas and stuff,” 

I immediately knelt down, joining Mark and Ryan who were trying to stop the bleeding. Harry trembled as sharp, agonizing pain traveled through his chest. A few of the Marines called out to their medics, who then rushed towards us after finishing up with their comrades. The medic then took over from us, but I saw a moment later that it was too late. They discovered that the round went through just under his left armpit. That, my friend, is a clear path towards the heart. 

A few long minutes later, Harry stopped breathing. A pool of blood formed around him. I just stood there, unable to swallow what I had witnessed. As bad as Red might feel right then, I felt even worse. I tilted my head back and jerked it forward, trying to contain the anger and disappointment I had for myself. 

We knelt beside Harry for a while, paying respect to what he had done with us here. He had been following Red by heart—they were best friends during freshman years. Red turned towards me and laid her head on my shoulder, sobbing. Her hand was clutching on my rolled sleeve. I then gently rubbed that hand, trying to calm her down. I leaned my head towards hers, feeling what she felt. 

“He was a good man. Poor Harry,” she said. 

I couldn’t say anything. Red was hit hard by the fact that she lost one of her best friends. I was thinking she regretted not hanging out with him as often as we got here. She was too busy organizing the rest of us. Come to think of it, she was his best friend. And she never thought she’d lose any of us. 

The rest of the squad gathered near Harry as they began to move him. Ryan felt guilty the most and turned quiet. He was trying to hold back tears as much as he could. But we need to keep our heads up. Everyone else seemed to be unable to hold their emotions. But being guys, they tried not to cry, at least out loud. That is, until we heard about Frank. 

“Staff Sergeant,” said Ian towards Red, “I am so sorry,” 

“What?” she said, unsuspectingly. 

“Your friend, he… he was hit when he tried to get up to help you guys. Last thing he said was—" he didn’t have the heart to continue. “We rushed him back in first thing, but… there was nothing we could have done,” 

We all froze. Our eyes widened, mouths agape, heads turned in disbelief. In one day, we lost not one, but two friends. That’s a lot, considering there were only eleven of us. We needed to try even harder to save ourselves, now. There’s no other way out of this. How the heck are we going to explain to their families about what happened here? Red then fell on her knees. The rest of the guys rushed in to calm her down. 

After regaining composure, she stood up. She was then determined to keep us safe, even more so than doing our objective. From then on, she really took care of us. She started checking on us, making sure the rest of the squad is okay. No one else was wounded besides me and Buck, or hopefully so. 

I needed some time alone and decided that I’d check out Grace. I thought I’d vent it all out to her. There she was, with her parents inside her room. Well, I then kept my intention to myself. I felt a tap on my shoulder then, and it was Soko. 

“Hey, Mick… I uh, I’m sorry about your friends,” 

“Soko,” I greeted, “Thank you,” I let out a heavy sigh. “How do you feel?” 

“Not so good, man. I’ve been leading for only less than what, 16 hours? And I already lost so many of us. That includes your friends,” 

“Dude, it was me who brought them here,” I tried to calm him down, “It wasn’t your fault, they died. It’s the enemy’s,” 

“Nice save, Mick,” he chuckled, “Thank you. You be careful, okay?” he tapped my arm twice, and walked off. Checking out on the guys, I presume. 

The Major then went out of the room, trying to look for the Sergeant Major. The old man was nowhere to be found. Not even in the command center. The Major then proceeded and let me into Grace’s room. Ian, her caretaker at this point, then went out too, letting me have a few words with her. I feel different now, though. I don’t… I don’t know. The feeling was still there, it was just fading away a little—probably because of the combat. 

“How do you do?” I asked her. 

“A little better, I think,” she replied, “How are you?” 

“Not good. Got two dead friends outside,” I answered. “I dragged them here, and they got killed,” 

“Oh…” she sat up, “I’m sorry,” 

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, getting a bit closer. I could see her sympathizing, worrying about me, “It’s not your concern,” 

“Of course, it is. My dad issued an order to tell you to come here, right?” 

“He did,” I confirmed, “However, I should’ve looked after them better,” 

“There’s nothing you can do about it now, Mike,” she said, “Just stay alive,” 

“Hmm,” I had nothing else to say. 

I then stood up and walked outside. It was dark, a little past sun-down and the lights were mostly off. There, I saw Red all alone. She needed some time alone, too, I figured. I proceeded to walk towards her, wanting to calm her down. All of a sudden, she turned towards me. We sort of looked at each other, before I finally took a seat next to her. She leaned towards me again, staring blankly into the ground.

“It’s okay,” I gently spoke, “You did your best, Red,” 

“I know, I’m just… everything happened so quickly,” she said, sighing and wiping her tears off. “Harry, Frank, they didn’t deserve it,” 

“We’ll make them pay, Red, you and I,” 

“We sure will,” she said, sitting upright again. Wiping her face, she then turned to me and said, “I wanted you to lug the machine gun because I trust you with it. But since it’s not your job, then—” 

“Hey,” I interrupted. “I’ll do what I can. And Red?” 

“Yes, Mickey?” 

“Stay alive, would you please. And drink some water,” 

“You, too,” she smiled while nodding softly. I checked on my watch, and it was about half to eighteen hundred hours. Suddenly, a bright yellow flash appeared from beyond the wall. A hiss and a splat later, Red fell on her back. 

“RED!!” I shouted as I ran towards her aid. As I crouched down to pick her up, bullets flew towards us, hitting the walls and the floor of the house. Gunfire started to fill the air again. 

“I’m okay! Get killing!” she said, after I got her behind cover. I started firing my weapon towards the direction of incoming fire. This time, the wave got bigger. I got into thinking I should take the machine gun. But not now. It seemed to me now that the enemy knows a high value target is inside this house. Ah, fuck it. 

“I’m getting the machine gun! You stay here!” I finally told Red. I stormed off before she got into saying anything. I heard a faint NO! Shit! though. I somehow managed to dodge all those bullets and rockets that were flying all over the place. I was thrown by an RPG explosion as it hit the walls of the house, but it was nothing. I managed to get back up and running again. 

I got to the M60, finding Karl trying to clear a jam. The bolt got stuck. I told him to scoot over and let me clear the jam. I cleared it in no time after opening the feed tray, then I let it rip. I fired more carefully this time, though, finding targets first rather than just sweeping the barrel left and right. 

I saw some RPGs being aimed at me. I managed to take down one of them, but there were two more. As I took out the second, I flinched, hoping that they didn’t get me. But just as I flinched, I heard some automatic fire from behind me—and an explosion on their part. Red, Kris, and Karl came towards my position, supporting me. Karl used that grenade launcher on his rifle. 

“Kris! You cover him while he reloads!” Red commanded. 

“Karl! Get over here and feed me!” That M60 was really smooth once you get it working. The first few rounds would always  overwhelm me at first, but then I got used to it. 

This time, they brought like, I don’t know, 2, maybe 3 platoons worth of foot soldiers. No technical, though, so it’s sort of easier to take them out. Sort of. I had a bad feeling about this one, though. It looked like there were too many of them for us to overcome. But seeing they had very little support, that thought got brushed off. 

While I was reloading, I saw Soko running back and forth organizing the rest of the Marines. He was coordinating with a sergeant from the 1st Squad when the sergeant took a hit and dropped dead in front of him. He then returned fire with his rifle. He himself then got hit, but seemed to be saved by the vest. I was amazed by how he managed to get back up again that quickly. For a moment, I lost focus. 

“Mick! Mick! Snap out of it!” Karl said, shaking me around to get me back on track. He finished reloading our gun, but then I heard a hiss and a splat. 

“KARL!!” I screamed as he tumbled towards the ground. 

I froze right there, confused for a little while. Should I take care of Karl or continue firing? I decided that Kris would cover me and Red while I take care of Karl, and I told him so. 

“Roger!” 

There Karl was, with a bleeding hole gaping through his neck. He was gagging as we tried to put pressure on the wound. I got blood all over my hands as I had to plug his wound with my hands while Red was frantically trying to open the bandage kit. That is, until we realized it was too late. He laid there, pale-faced, eyes wide open. His mouth was still moving a little, trying to hold on to his last breath.