Princes of War by Claude Schmid

now. I know he says he’s got a biiiggg love for her.”
    “OK,” Wynn continued. “Let’s keep our eyes on Kale.”
    “I’m definitely watching him. I watch them all. We got help too, Sir. Moose been watching him. Thinks he’s the sensitive type but says he’s doing OK. And the Chaplain. I know Kale’s been to the Chaplain several times. Just to talk. A lot of them need it, Sir. Need to know they’re being listened to. It ain’t no good keeping it bottled up inside. Gotta let them talk.”
    Wynn was pleased with that answer. Handling a man walking the edge wasn’t easy. Too much care could backfire, strip a man’s self-confidence. But withholding care when needed was like withholding a rope from a drowning man.
     

DAY TWO
    6
     
    Kale stirred violently, still asleep. Pale people with dark eyes surrounded him, and bright orange light enveloped the horizon. Something unbearably heavy restrained him. He breathed deeply, desperately. He could move nothing but his eyes, which darted, searching, burning with indistinct images. He felt as if he was tied tightly down on a ledge, his physical life stolen. Why? Was he being punished? The pale people pointed at him accusingly, hostile; shouting with so much anger, all shouting the same thing, with an edge of sadness and pain. He strained to listen but could not understand their words. Everything was in slow motion. He watched their mouths annunciate in unison, the pronunciation of words grotesquely magnified. He again struggled to understand, lost and confused and guilty. Yes—their fierce eyes proclaimed him guilty. Guilty of what? Was he in hell, and they the custodians?
    He struggled to focus his eyes on the moving mouth of one of the pale people. Follow the mouth. Listen! Kale now felt his own mouth start moving. He tried to say what they were screaming. Was he becoming one of them so he could understand?
    Three words. Was that all? Only three words.
    Then he recognized the words, and understood. He repeated them. Kale was crying now.
    “Ramirez”
    “Is”
    “Dead!”
    Then again:
    “Ramirez”
    “Is”
    “Dead!”
    Why tell him this? Why shout at him?
    Suddenly one of them leaned forward and touched Kale’s forehead with a long gnarled finger of death. Kale’s dream turned into memory, vivid and immediate, rushing back, taking him to where the past eats the present, where he had first seen violent death. His body was now free, soaring back to the surface. His memory came alive.
    They had been on a humanitarian mission, less than two months after the Wolfhounds’ arrival in country. The platoon was led to a family home so they could pay damages to a family for their shop that Americans had destroyed. The shop, destroyed when EOD initiated a controlled detonation of an adjacent vehicle laden with bombs, had been nothing more than a roadside stand selling pirated DVDs and CDs. Financial compensation for damages such as this was available to Iraqis thanks to the American taxpayer. It had taken about three weeks to get the money, $1,000 in this case. The Wolfhounds, assigned to provide security for the Army Civil Affairs team, accompanied them to dispense the money. Headquarters had gotten word to the Iraqi family by phone that the next day the Americans would come to make payment. T hat call had been a bad mistake.
    The family lived in the W13 sector, near an inoperable water fountain. The plan was simple. A family guide would meet the platoon at the fountain at 1400 and guide them to the residence. As the Wolfhounds waited at the fountain, a man drove up on a scooter promptly at 1400, and identified himself as a member of the family. After the link-up, the convoy drove maybe 300 meters, through a couple of intersections, and stopped near the home. Once the house was identified, Wynn deployed the platoon’s vehicles tactically, and established security at both ends of the street. The plan called for the Wolfhounds to provide two extra shooters for the