The Prodigy paradox

CHAPTER 7

Before David had reached five the grenade had detonated, but he had enough time to return his hands to his M4 and shoulder it, prepared to fire. Taking two steps out, he swept left to right, identifying the bodies of two PSD laying at the edge of the boulder. These were the ones they had shot previously. Further down the trail about fifty feet he could see two more PSD crouched down from the grenade's detonation. They had apparently decided to make a run for it. David aimed center mass on the first target and fired twice rapidly, double-tapping his corrupt betraying ass in the chest. Before his second round had left his rifle's muzzle, Epps had opened up with the Mk 48, sending a burst of 7.62mm 'freedom' into both opportunistic jihadists.

David began visually scanning the back trail for the captain and his two adjutant soldiers. "There sir," David called out, pointing at a bend further down the trail. "About three hundred meters out and running fast down the trail."

Hollywood moved to the nearest appropriately sized rock, and popped out the front bipod legs on the LMG, resting them on his new shooting platform. Tucking in behind the Mk 48's 4x magnification scope, the captain steadied his breathing and prepared to engage a moving target at what was now over four hundred meters with something that was less than a precision sniping weapon. Breathing in and out, he questioned the morality of shooting a fleeing enemy in the back. Then he thought about Bragg's wife and two children back at Campbell, and how she was going to have to explain to them their daddy was never coming home from this trip.

Bang.

The Mk 48 bucked in Epps hands, and David watched as Captain Massood, the architect of this attack, fell down face first mid run.

"Check the bodies for any pocket litter that seems important Kenny, then get your ass back to us pronto. We need to get Pappy stabilized, on a stretcher, and lifted the fuck out of here ASAP, "said Epps with a tight voice. "Where is your radio, I need to call this in?"

"It's on my ruck, I dumped it to move up and support Doc and Mother."

"Alright, hop to it. We're burning daylight here," Hollywood responded, walking back along the trail.

Looking back toward where Massood's body lay, David couldn't see where the Afghan captain's two adjutant soldiers had gone. He wondered why Epps didn't bother engaging them as well, and then wondered if they even knew anything about what was going to happen today. Sighing, David stopped caring. If he saw them again they were dead men, but they weren't worth the effort right now. Moving to each of the slain PSD, he checked their pockets, vests, and packs for their cell phones and any paperwork that looked important. He found a bunch of useless trinkets and other crap, but only a few papers on one of them. Not surprising really, most Afghans can't read. Finishing up he walked back along the trail to where Mother had moved up to cover him.

"I grabbed everything that might be important, but the papers are probably just Afghan erotic literature. And you know they only use the cell phones to d******d p**n," David griped to Lieutenant Hilliard as he walked past him.

"Naturally. Now get your rucksack on and get ready to move out. Captain Epps can't reach anyone on the radio and we can't get line of sight communications to lower Jubai or Able-Main from here. We need to move back along the trail until we can get someone on comms and figure out what the hell is going on," Mother passed along the situation report and his marching orders.

"What do you mean he can't reach anyone? We heard Gator 27 right before this whole shit show kicked off," David asked him, puzzled.

"No clue dude. But nobody's talking right now, and Pappy needs more help than Doc can give him. Standing here ain't getting it done."

"Roger that. Then let's get this done," David said. Pissing on about the unreliability of Army communications wasn't getting Pappy to the field hospital any faster, and that was the only thing that mattered now. He moved to his rucksack, and wrangled it back onto his shoulders. He had a passing thought about tossing any non-essential crap out of it to lighten the load, but he would have to dig through it to get to the MRE's and water he had packed in the middle, and there was not enough time for that. Turning to see if Doc needed help, he heard the zip of the first of many rounds pass by his left ear a millisecond before a powerful tug on his rucksack caused him to overbalance and fall backwards. Barely a second later he heard the cracka-cracka-cracka of an AK-47 firing a burst at his position. Turning his head toward the gunfire, he saw three insurgents taking up position on the high ground next to the trail leading toward the upper OP, where the mission was originally headed.

As David struggled to free himself from his rucksack so he could return fire, he watched two of the insurgents spray Doc with bursts of AK fire. David screamed in rage and denial as he was forced to watch while Doc was hit multiple times as he crouched over Pappy, trying to protect him. Epps shouldered the Mk 48 and unloaded a full ten second burst of 7.62mm hatred, screaming in anger at the enemy insurgents who had just stolen two more of his men from him. David could hear Mother returning fire from behind him on the trail. Finally freeing himself from his rucksack, he rolled over and crouched to run for the nearest cover. He wanted in this fight. He wanted payback for Doc, for Pappy, for Tongue-Punch, for every other soldier that these zealots had stolen from their families for no good damn reason.

Just as David spotted the cover he was looking for, he felt a sharp pain in his head and his body was thrown forward to the ground. But he never felt himself impact.