January Dawn (19 page)

“He is right,” he said, before going low to grapple my legs. I attempted to counter his move by wrapping my arms around his waist, but we both ended up on the ground in a tussle. I struggled to get the upper hand. I was too busy laughing.

“Stand at attention!” Someone barked.

With the order, Second Squad snapped to attention with arms flat to our sides.
What was this
? We hadn’t exactly followed proper military etiquette very much those past few weeks. Such things seemed so trivial in a combat zone.

“Don’t you know you’re supposed to salute a superior officer?” Teague asked.
What was he doing here? He’s supposed to be in Montgomery
.

He stood with his helmet underneath his arm, a shiny Lieutenants bar glistening on his lapel. Oddly, his uniform was not the traditional gray of a combat soldier. He wore a blue digital camo with coal black boots and vest. One thing was still the same; however, he still had his trademark arrogant smirk.

“Sir, we don’t salute in the field. Enemy snipers are everywhere,” I said.

He approached me and said, “We have the whole damn Ninth Infantry rolling down this road and you think a sniper is going to risk his life to plug one officer. When a superior officer is present, you salute him.”

I was reluctant at first, but I saluted. His narcissism was pungent.

“It appears to me that this unit is lacking in proper Army decorum,” he said, weaving through our ranks. “Improper usage of the combat uniform.” He was indicating Carrigan, who shed her shirt awhile back and settled for her tank top undershirt under her Kevlar vest.

He inspected Junior’s rifle. “You have an ungodly amount of rust and dirt in the barrel of your weapon, Private Gammon.” Teague was loving this.

“Instead of taking care of your equipment and keeping yourselves in top of the line order, I find you all lazing around reading love letters and playing a friendly game of grab ass,” he continued.

“Sir, the Captain gave us permission to rest,” Alex said.

“Is that so? Well, I’m giving you a new order Sergeant Redman. I want you to drop and give me fifty, all of you. Today’s the day we start molding you into professional soldiers and not a motley bunch of inbred state militiamen.”

Unbelievable
. I got into push up position and cranked out as many push-ups as I could muster in my exhausted state.

Not only was Teague an asshole, he was an officer. We could do nothing but obey his commands, or we could find ourselves facing a court martial for disobeying an order. I wouldn’t hold that past him either.

How did he get promoted so high in five weeks?

“What in tarnation is going on over here?” asked Captain Elroy.

“Captain, what kind of unit are you running here?” Teague asked.

“Watch your tongue, Lieutenant. Squad, on your feet.” We got up.

“Belay that order. Finish that fifty,” Teague ordered. We stayed standing.
What is going on?

“In what world do you think you’re living in, Lieutenant? This is my unit. You have no authority here,” Elroy said.

“We’ll see about that.”

“Excuse me?”

“Police up your unit,
Captain,
or else,” Teague said, shuffling away.

“Sir, what was that all about?” Alex asked once Teague was out of earshot.

How can Teague get away with talking back to the Captain like that?
Something wasn’t right.

“I don’t know Sergeant, but it’s nothing good.”

It had been drizzling all day. The swelling clouds rolled overhead and dusted us with a continuous mist.

Despite the unfortunate weather, we made it to our jump off point on time. Our reconnaissance teams went out early in the morning and came back to report positive findings. Positive findings of what, I don’t know, but we were about to find out. Something big was coming.

Captain Elroy summoned the entire company for a briefing. We huddled around him and made ourselves comfortable down on one knee.

“You all know me. I’m not one to dance around the truth, so I’m going to tell you everything straight up. Savannah has been surrounded. Our forces could not stop the southern invasion.” The company erupted in agitated murmuring. “The city has been officially declared under siege. That does not sit well with General Gammon, who has stayed behind in the city to organize its defense. As we speak, the last elements of the Sixteenth Armored and 102
nd
Infantry Division are pulling back across the river and joining in the defense of the city.

“Forward elements of the advancing Yankee Army have already been spotted on the northern banks of the Savannah River. To the east there is nothing but ocean and the Yankee Navy. To the south and to the west the Yankees have begun to dig in. They hope to contain the remaining remnants of our army within the city with as little of their forces as they can spare. They hope to bypass the city with the main bulk of their forces and move inland. That’s where we come in. The General wants us to break the siege. Lieutenant Teague will brief you on the details of our operation. Lieutenant.”

Elroy ceded the stage to Teague, who relished in his newfound power. After some investigating and a couple calls to his upper-echelon contacts, Elroy discovered that Teague was planted in our unit as an attaché from the Confederate Legion.

I remembered Alex’s father telling us about the Confederate Legion, the ambiguous sub branch of the Department of Defense. They had complete authority to carry out special missions within the country’s borders, whether they be legal, or clandestine. If the rumors were true, this elite unit only recruited the worst of the worst into its ranks, nitpicking the finest units of the army for the most ruthless, cutthroat, and die hard radicals they could find. Teague fit right in.

Apparently, these paramilitary nut jobs had been showing up in units across the nation. The government was stationing them in units deemed impaired with a deficiency of quality leadership or the lack of clear set effort and motivation.

Legionnaires were meant to bolster the fighting spirit of their men at arms. By increasing morale and stamping out defeatism in the ranks of its beleaguered armies, the government hoped to prolong the war. All they ended up accomplishing was exemplifying the President’s distrust in his own armed forces

Teague’s eyes scanned the crowd as he spoke. “The Ninth is the nearest available unit outside of the city capable of assisting our besieged comrades. Command has drawn up a two-pronged rescue plan called Operation Arrow Head. The goal of this operation is to open up a salient in the enemy’s lines and allow our encircled forces within the city an avenue of escape. If all goes according to plan, we can get our men out of the city and be able to regroup further inland, giving us the opportunity to launch a massive counterattack against the enemy.” Teague’s optimism was hardly infectious.

“Twenty miles separate us from our objective. It’s a long road and we have to cross a river to get there, but we can do it. Operation Arrow Head sets off tonight at 2300 hours. At precisely 2245, we will carry our rubberized inflatable boats to the riverbank. That gives us ample time to make sure everyone is in place before we launch.

“Under the cover of darkness, we will paddle across the river and take the opposite bank. We will have to attack in waves, because we only have enough boats to carry two companies across at a time. Our primary objective is to take the I95 bridge intact. Advanced reconnaissance has revealed only a token force of Yankees in the area, so this should be a cake walk. Once we push across here, the entire Ninth Infantry will push southeast and fight our way into the city as heroes.”

Echo Company did not take kindly to Teague since his arrival. Our distrust of him had turned into open resentment. His orders were often ignored and he himself was treated like he was invisible. Only when Captain Elroy would repeat the same order would the men spring into action. This only served to anger Teague even more and he’d always erupt in a fits of fury.

Teague did have the political authority as a Legionnaire to overthrow Elroy’s leadership, but the one thing he didn’t have was the trust of the men. Without it, he didn’t stand a chance of gaining control of the company. He tried nonetheless and was in a constant tug-a-war match with Elroy for Echo.

A hand rose from the ranks.

“Yes, Corporal Hutchens?” Teague asked.

“Define token force,” Danny Hutchens said. I couldn’t help but notice he did not say “sir.”

“No more than a company sized element. We should sweep them up with no issues. Our biggest problem is the worsening weather. There’s a storm approaching from the northwest that will hit us early this evening. The rain and the darkness will inevitably cause a few hang-ups, but we should achieve complete surprise. If everything goes smoothly, which there is no reason it shouldn’t, we could be well on our way to Savannah by early morning. Once we play our hand, we have to move with haste. The enemy will do everything in their power to stop us. Go in fast and go in hard. Lives depend on it.”

Lives depend on it? What a nut.

“Echo Company dismissed,” Teague said, straightening his back and snapping his heels.

Nobody moved. The expression of frustration on Teague’s face was priceless. Elroy stepped out from behind the pine tree he was leaning against.

“Alright boys,” he said simply.

Echo Company stood as one and faded away. We couldn’t stay huddled together for too long. Any longer and we would have been gambling with death. If the Yankees got wind of our meeting, a concentrated artillery strike could knock half the company out of commission.

“Can you believe that joker? Six weeks out of Basic he gets a Lieutenant’s bar pinned on his collar and he thinks he’s the next Stonewall Jackson,” Hayes said.

“Remember guys, it should be a cake walk,” Shannon mocked. “Can you believe he said that? What a slimeball. That man would call an alligator a lizard.”

“Did you hear Hutchens ask him to define token force? He didn’t even respect Teague’s rank. That took guts,” Carrigan said.

“You know, I’m always fumbling with my grenades. It’d be unfortunate if one should end up in Teague’s vicinity,” Junior said.

“It’ll be dark. Nobody’d know,” Beauregard said.

“Knock it off. Nobody’s fumbling with their grenades tonight. It is bad enough we have to fight the Yankees, but now we’re fighting amongst ourselves?” Alex said stiffly. “I don’t like him anymore than you do. You know that. I’m just not going to stoop to that level. Let fate run its course and maybe we’ll be rid of him sooner than you think. For right now, let’s worry about this operation.”

I agreed with Alex. Killing Teague wasn’t the answer. If we did that, our hearts would turn as black as his. Our best bet would be to pray for a well-placed enemy artillery shell or a burst of machine gun fire to free us of his parasitic existence.

At 2245 we were ready and waiting by our boats a few yards back from the riverbank. I patted the ammo pouches on my vest to make sure they were full, checked that I had my sidearm loaded and ready, fastened my boots tighter and secured my helmet firmly on my head. I had spent the past hour stripping my rifle and cleaning it. I did it twice. I don’t know why.

For the umpteenth time, I was scared to go into battle.
When will this all stop?
We’d been in plenty of engagements before, but something seemed off about this one. Like there was a missing piece somewhere.

I reached into my pocket for my flag and flattened it out on my knee. It was faded and smeared with dirt and torn in several places, but it was still my hope charm. A solemn reminder of how far I’d come.

You’ve gotten me through so much. Don’t let me down now,
I thought and kissed it before I stuffed it back into my pocket.

Alex jogged over and knelt beside me.

“You be careful and I’ll see you on the other side,” he said. We shook hands and he turned to leave.

Ever since the company meeting Alex was quieter than usual. I could tell that he took the news about Savannah pretty hard.

“Alex,” I said. He stopped.

“Yeah?”

“They’re going to be okay. Your family.”

A quick nod and he disappeared through the bushes to rejoin his assault boat.

I don’t know if I said that more for Alex’s sake, or my own. Maybe both. Did I really believe it? The Redman family was on my mind every day. I missed them all terribly and thinking about what could be happening to them right now, stuck in the Yankee encirclement, wrenched my insides into a ball. Mail wasn’t getting out anymore and the last letter Alex got was stamped two weeks ago.
I hope they’re alright.

Endless possibilities crossed my mind. War was all consuming. I’d seen countless families fleeing in terror in front of the advancing war. I’d seen enemy bombs level entire subdivisions full of people who thought cowering in the safety of their own homes was their best bet. I’d seen families running for the safety of our lines be gunned down by machine guns, Yankee and Confederate. I was sick of it all. The endless hate. So senseless.

The civilian population wasn’t targeted by either side, but war is cruel and unbiased and people die no matter what. Innocent people suffer in their own homes in their own country and when the war comes knocking on their door to claim their lives, they become another number in another statistic labeled under collateral damage. I wanted to believe that the Redmans weren’t a part of those statistics.

I lied awake so many sleepless nights on the cold earth wishing I could have had one more night wrapped in Tess’s arms.
I miss you Tess, so much
.

The inflatable boats only held six. One of those spots was reserved for the combat engineer, leaving only five. Carrigan and I drew the short straws and had to join a boat separate from the rest of Second Squad. I didn’t like it, but that was Army logistics for you.

I checked my watch. 2258.

The engineer for my boat bade us to pick up the boat. I grabbed ahold of the rubber handle at the bow, waded into the shallow water and gently let the boat settle on the surface.

We were on light and noise discipline. There was to be not a sound or a flare of a cigarette.

I climbed in at the front. Carrigan was behind me to my left. She gave me a thumbs up. I did it back. Good to go.

2300.

Like midnight serpents, dozens of black boats filled with gray clad soldiers slowly paddled their way across the languid river under a cloud of soft mist. Alex and the rest of Second Squad were a few boats down to the right. They were one of a dozen or so boats between me and our objective, the I95 bridge. To my left were even more boats.

A railroad bridge spanned the river about a hundred yards downstream from me. I couldn’t see them, but I knew Charlie Company would be crossing it at this moment, crawling on their bellies.

On the opposite bank, I could see nothing but a solid mass of trees. We paddled quietly onward.

A quarter of the way across the storm let loose. The top branches of the trees rocked back and forth violently with the strong wind. Heavy rain pounded down on us from an angle, making it harder to see. Only with the occasional flash of lightning could you see further than the boat next to you. The only blessing I could grasp from the thunderstorm was the steady slapping of the raindrops on the river’s surface that helped mask our crossing.

The steady sound of water hitting water was somewhat soothing, as was the clamor of bullfrogs grunting from unknown hiding spots along the river’s edge. We kept paddling.

I laid against the bow with my rifle pointing forward. I was one of the two front gunmen. The other four paddled. I ran my hand through the water. It was significantly warmer than the rainwater.

So far, so good.

Halfway across the river the frogs stopped croaking all together. The others must have noticed, because they stopped paddling.

“You hear that?” Someone asked.

Suddenly, I heard a low
thoomph
in the distance.
Mortars
. Wait for the explosion...nothing. It was a flare. A bright white ball of light burst in midair, illuminating everything on the river in a shimmering glare. They had us dead to rights.

A torrent of muzzle flashes erupted from the opposite bank. Bullets seared through the air around me, piercing the rain droplets as they fell.

I fired back. We were stuck in the open with no cover. Our only option was to paddle forward. There was no going back.

“Paddle! Go!” I yelled over the fury.

“Williams is hit!” Carrigan said.

I ducked back to reload and I saw Williams’ body sagging over the side dragging our boat like an anchor.