No Greater Duty, page 6
Stunned and raising himself up on his forearms, the twenty-year-old squad leader looked around in a daze. He couldn’t make out where his Marines were through the dust and debris. His head hurt and his ears rang. The blast’s wind had sent his sunglasses and helmet flying off his face and head.
Feeling a sudden warm and burning sensation on the right side of his neck, he ran his fingers across the area to see them smeared with blood. A piece of shrapnel had torn a gash across that area of his neck. A bloody trail ran down the skin behind his ear, soaking the top of his flak jacket and turning the collar of the Marine Corps issued green short-sleeved T-shirt he wore underneath a dark crimson.
Enemy fire kept coming at them, either from the backs of the vacant warehouses or the grassy area behind them. He couldn’t confirm if it was coming from one or both areas. RUF rebels weren’t showing themselves or their weapons.
“Whittington, Crowell, Camacho!” Alex shouted. He heard moans but didn’t recognize the voice that called out.
RUF rebel gunfire continued in short bursts. His head throbbing like a jackhammer, Alex put on his helmet and crawled forward to find his men in the settling dust. He didn’t have to go far. Two were wounded, lying close to each other on the ground of dried red clay.
Alex reached Billy first. The Marine lay motionless except for his head slowly rolling back and forth. “Whittington, can you hear me?”
The gravely injured lance corporal groaned some inaudible words.
Alex’s hands and eyes quickly surveyed Billy’s body. His head, face, and neck showed no visible injuries. But his lower left arm was grotesquely bent from multiple compound fractures. Part of one finger on his left hand was gone.
Alex kept triaging Billy’s condition when a wave of nausea swept over him as his eyes traveled further down the wounded Marine’s torso. The upper left leg was badly mangled. Alex shuddered to see deep, widespread tissue wounds and an exposed bone-shattered femur. Blood flowed everywhere. His thigh had absorbed the brunt of the blast, but his lower leg hardly fared any better. Almost a third of the young Marine’s upper leg was partly severed and hung loosely, almost lifeless.
Alex ducked when more AK-47 rounds flew by inches from his head and tore into the rusted metal siding of the warehouse several feet to his right. He had to treat Billy fast, get him back inside the compound and then out to the USS Wasp’s hospital or the Marine would bleed out. “Hold on. I’m getting you the hell out of here.”
Next, Alex crab-walked over to check on Ethan lying nearby, unmoving, his helmet laying ten feet away from him on the ground.
“Crowell, it’s Kramer, where are you hit? Where’s it hurt?” he asked.
From the wounded Marine came an unsettling silence. Then Ethan’s mouth opened slightly, and one hand waved the air in front of his face. “I can’t see,” he said, his voice feeble.
Crowell had partly been shielded from the worst of the blast by standing behind Whittington . Blood wasn’t visible anywhere on his combat gear or exposed skin. But the lance corporal definitely sustained serious wounds. Alex’s guessed concussion, maybe traumatic brain injury. Rebel gunfire continued whizzing around them.
“I’m okay, brother,” Anthony called out.
“Hold your position, Camacho. And keep your ass down.”
Alex felt something moist on his upper lip. His fingers touched his nostrils. They were wet with blood running out of his nose. He could have been concussed from the IED blast. But he didn’t have time for that now. Billy and Ethan had to be moved out of the field of fire ASAP.
“I’m taking you and Whittington to a safer place,” Alex told Ethan. “Stay here, I’m coming back for you.”
On his knees between the two wounded Marines, Alex lifted his head and looked around. In front of him was a door leading into the nearest warehouse. He had to get Billy and Ethan inside that building and triage them until it was safe to carry both wounded Marines back inside the compound for medical evacuation. Billy had to be MEDEVAC’d first.
Alex’s 2nd and 3rd fire teams were already committed, flanking both left and right of the new enemy fire location. They couldn’t help move Ethan and Billy. That left him and Anthony Camacho.
The tap on his arm made Alex spin around and aim the muzzle from his M4 toward what was his platoon commander’s face.
“Shit, sir, I almost shot you.”
“Report your casualties.”
“Sir, Whittington’s thigh is one-third blown open and one arm’s busted up bad. Crowell’s concussed from the blast.” He pointed his chin toward the nearest empty one-story warehouse. “Sir, we need to get them inside until we can put down enemy fire. Then get Whittington out to the Wasp to save his leg—hell, save him—or else he’ll die here. Get Crowell out, too.”
“Copy that.” Lieutenant Fontana pointed at Alex’s face. “You’re bleeding from your nose.”
“I’m okay, sir.”
Except he wasn’t okay. But they were in a firefight for their lives and he wasn’t letting up. Not with two members from his fire teams down and badly wounded.
“I’ll kick in the door, you back me up, then we’ll carry Whittington and Crowell inside,” Lieutenant Fontana told him.
“Roger that, sir.”
At that moment, the enemy’s fire went silent again. The platoon commander and his squad leader knew it would be short-lived and that the RUF rebels would attack again.
With Alex kneeling and his M4 aimed at the warehouse door, Lieutenant Fontana raised his boot and struck the door handle with force. The instant his kick tore away the metal frame door from its jamb, he pivoted his body away from the open doorway and a possible second IED exploding. No second trip wire or blast followed.
His own M4 raised and aimed, the platoon commander stood ready at the doorway. Alex fell in behind him, the number two man of a short-handed fire team. They had to clear the building quickly, then get Billy inside and triage him as best they could.
Outside and watching over Billy and Ethan, Anthony Camacho stayed low to the ground. “Hurry up, guys.”
Standing inside the doorway and looking past his platoon commander, Alex surveyed the scene in front of them. Two doorways on their right, and the rest of the narrow one-story building was all open space to their left. Just a few metal folding chairs and several empty white Styrofoam food cartons scattered on the concrete floor.
“Clear right, hold left,” Alex called out to his lieutenant. He lifted his knee and lightly bumped Lieutenant Fontana on the back of the officer’s thigh. The platoon commander responded instantly to the signal and turned to his right. He stepped into a small room with his arms and M4 raised and swept the area. “Clear,” reported Fontana.
Now back in the hallway, the lieutenant took his place directly behind Alex. He bumped Alex to move ahead and clear the second and final room. They finished clearing the building in twenty-five seconds.
Things were still quiet outside. Too quiet. Alex hated the silence. He noticed the strip of single-panel window panes running the entire length of the left side of the warehouse. The windows faced the high grassy area to the northwest. RUF rebels could make out their images through the glass. The Marines were dangerously exposed.
With the warehouse cleared, Alex and Lieutenant Fontana rushed back outside. Alex grabbed a barely conscious Billy Whittington under both shoulders and carried him inside to temporary cover. Fontana lifted and held the critically wounded Marine’s nearly severed leg. Together they quickly moved the rifleman through the doorway and inside, where they carefully laid him down on the concrete floor.
“I’m going for Crowell,” Lieutenant Fontana called out.
“Copy that, sir.”
Anthony was still outside, guarding Ethan.
Alex kneeled over Billy. It looked bad. The Marine’s breathing was shallow and irregular. His eyes kept rolling back in his head. Blood still streamed from his deep, open thigh wound. Only the top section of Billy’s camo trousers offered any temporary protection to exposed tissue, bone, and nerves open at the middle section of his upper left leg.
Alex went to work straightway in treating Billy. He opened the badly wounded Marine’s first-aid kit and withdrew the Combat Applied Tourniquet (CAT). His fingers skillfully secured the tourniquet between the partially severed limb section and where Billy’s leg attached to the pelvis, with three inches of still-intact leg above and below.
Alex withdrew the package of combat gauze from Billy’s first-aid kit. With little wasted motion, he placed his index finger into two folds of the gauze, then pressed the hemostatic fabric down into the thigh’s very large, open soft tissue wound. He continued packing the sections of treated fabric into the area until it reached the end of the bandage.
Next with the roll of Emergency Trauma Dressing, he wrapped the ETD around the wound site, tightly compressing the combat gauze. The following three to five minutes were critical if there was any chance of saving the wounded lance corporal’s leg, let alone survive the IED blast.
“Stay with me, Whittington,” muttered Alex, his face, neck, and arms covered with sweat-coated dust and dirt. Seconds counted now.
Thinking fast about what else he could do to help Billy, Alex removed his flak jacket, folded it like a thick pillow, and placed it under the Marine’s severely injured leg. Any method to further reduce blood flowing out of the limb and body was worth trying.
Alex returned his attention to his sector’s field of battle. He ordered second and third fire teams to clear the remaining two abandoned buildings, then report back.
“Whittington, open your eyes,” Alex told the gravely wounded Marine while waiting to receive reports from second and third fire teams. “Look at me—”
Loud automatic gunfire suddenly exploded from the tall grass area beyond the three warehouses. Alex dropped to the concrete floor, carefully laying his body over Billy to protect him. Bullets whizzed across the row of glass windows above him. Rounds tore into the cinder walls inside, sending pieces of concrete and glass flying everywhere like tiny missiles. A glass shard ripped across the thin layer of skin above Alex’s wrist. Crimson liquid dripped out of the laceration and flowed down his forearm.
Alex heard a stream of four-letter words shouted from outside the building, and recognized Lieutenant Fontana’s voice.
“I’ll be back,” Alex said to Billy, ignoring his new wound and picking up his M4. Without his flak jacket, he was totally unprotected—against incoming AK-47 rifle fire, a Russian RPK machine gun, a Rocket Propelled Grenade—against anything.
Alex crawled on all fours toward the doorway, keeping his head below the windows. Once outside, he spotted his platoon commander lying on the ground some two meters away, writhing in pain. An arc of blood spewed from his right thigh like an outdoor fountain spewing red water.
A bullet had ripped into part of Lieutenant Fontana’s femoral artery. Alex calculated the wounded officer’s odds. His platoon commander’s life expectancy could be as short as Billy’s. Fontana could bleed to death if they didn’t transport him back to the Wasp soon. He crawled as fast as he could to reach his wounded officer.
Lieutenant Fontana’s hands attempted to open his first-aid kit and find the CAT. But lightheadedness from increased blood loss was setting in. The officer’s fingers fumbled trying to open the kit.
Alex reached his lieutenant. The glassy-eyed stare showing in Lieutenant Fontana’s eyes told him the platoon commander wasn’t in any condition to administer self-aid. His wound appeared to be life-threatening. But Alex considered Fontana lucky. He saw three inches of undamaged limb between the tourniquet and the bullet’s entry wound, and four inches above it to the lieutenant’s hip. Enough space to stem bleeding as much and as quickly as possible until Navy surgeons could treat him.
Alex reacted instantly again, now treating the lieutenant’s leg wound exactly as he cared for Billy minutes earlier. He swiftly applied and secured the CAT two inches above the gunshot exit wound on the front side of the platoon commander’s thigh. Next, Alex pressed layers of treated combat gauze fabric from the lieutenant’s first-aid kit, using all of it to pack the bandage deeply into the open bullet hole. Finally, he wrapped ETD around the wound site to compress and hold the hemostatic gauze in place.
With dressings pressed against the entry and exit wound points, the next several minutes were critical to stem further femoral artery bleeding and prevent Lieutenant Fontana from bleeding out.
“Camacho, get Crowell inside,” Alex called out. “I’ll take L–T–.” “Copy that,” answered Anthony, carrying Ethan in his arms and laying him down on the floor next to Billy.
Second and third fire teams reported in: the other two buildings were cleared. No enemy personnel.
Alex looked down into his officer’s face. “Hold on, sir.”
Fontana tapped Alex’s shoulder. He understood.
Exposing both of them but forced to act fast, Alex lifted Lieutenant Fontana onto his shoulders in a fireman’s carry. Moving quickly in a stooped position, he carried his wounded platoon commander into the warehouse when an AK-47 rifle shot grazed his upper left arm at the midpoint, ripping into the soft tissue.
“Dammit!” he screamed out, suddenly losing the grip on his left hand that held on to Fontana’s arm. The six-foot distance to the doorway looked more like sixty yards.
CHAPTER 7
USS John Warner, Control Room
South Atlantic Ocean
April 23, 2019 at 1404
Lieutenant Tara Marcellus marveled how Virginia class submarines were designed with more space for crew members grouped together under the watchful eyes of the Officer of the Deck; the OOD. The Sonar and Fire Control divisions were part of the same space, not separate. Seated at a console, a lieutenant junior grade operated a joystick to control the sub’s photonics masts. No periscopes penetrated the hull anymore.
On the port side of the dimly-lit, futuristic Control Room filled with multicolored PC consoles, Tara stood watch as Contact Manager. In front of her, Chief Petty Officer and Sonar Supervisor Greg Drysdale, the third generation from a family of Navy chiefs all in the silent service, stood watch over four sonar techs: two Broadband Operators and two Towed-Array Operators. Their eyes and ears monitored PC displays and headsets for all contacts signaling either deep-sea life forms or submerged vessels of unknown origin. The four sonar techs were not much older than high-school-aged boys. But they were all well-trained sailors, and committed to their jobs.
“Thanks for stepping in for Andrew.”
Tara turned and saw LTJG Warren Mumma, the Assistant Weapons Officer standing next to her. Warren and Tara joined the crew at the same time as new DIVOs.
“How’s he doing?” Tara inquired about the Tactical Systems Officer who’d been taken ill.
“Doc said he’s stable,” said Warren, “If his appendix bursts, there’s medical services aboard the USS Wasp in our escort group.” The crew had been informed the Wasp had two emergency operating rooms and could handle up to six hundred service members at a time requiring medical attention.
“XO and I will be in conference in the wardroom for fifteen minutes,” Commander Whikehart announced in Control and turned to Lieutenant Donald Schrager. “It’s your show, NAV.”
“Aye, sir,” replied Lieutenant Schrager, the Navigation Officer also serving as OOD and standing by the Ship Control Panel. He stood at an average height with coal black hair, fleshy cheeks, a slight paunch above his uniform belt, and was Naval Academy Class of ‘10. Tara and Schrager had made small talk on a few occasions since she joined the crew. Nothing serious. Their conversations leaned toward their recollections of being at Annapolis and nothing else.
Tara was still figuring Schrager out. Too often his expressions were fixed in a condescending smirk. Some officers called him arrogant behind his back. The man could be sloppy with his words and opinions, which didn’t go unnoticed by officers and sailors. He was ambitious too, which drew occasional scorn from other officers. Schrager boasted openly of wearing an O-6’s shoulder boards one day, the military services pay grade of a Navy captain and one step below a one-star rear admiral. Tara didn’t object to any officer wanting to advance. She didn’t have much patience with vain opportunists.
“NAV, make preparations to proceed to periscope depth at the top of the hour,” Commander Whikehart ordered Lieutenant Schrager on his way out of Control with XO in tow. “I want to clear the broadcast a little early.”
“Make preparation to proceed to periscope depth at the top of the hour. Aye, sir.”
Tara watched Schrager on the other side of Control, talking with COMMO, the Communications Officer, and jabbing a finger toward him. What’s that all about? she wondered of Schrager’s intimidating hand gesture.
She heard Petty Officer Third Class Ruiz, one of the sonar techs, call out, “Contact Manager, gained new possible submerged towed array contact bearing one-five-zero or two-one-zero, designate Sierra 14.” Ruiz and the other sonar techs promptly dissected through slices of high and low frequency signals to classify the Sierra contact.
Chief Drysdale stood behind Ruiz, focused on his sailors. The thirty-six-year-old salty sailor leaned over Ruiz’s shoulder and stared with a second set of submarine-experienced eyes.
The atmosphere in Control was calm. But the crew inside was alert to the towed array narrow-band detection. Officers remembered the captain’s mission brief: be alert to unidentified submerged contacts. Meanwhile, John Warner maintained its present course.
Ninety more seconds passed in the quiet room until the Sonar Supervisor announced updated data. “Contact Manager, Sierra 14 has been classified as a Russian Yasen-class attack submarine, bearing ambiguity resolved by correlation to hull-mounted sensor to the port side, bearing one-five-five,” said Chief Drysdale.
“Attention team, redesignate Sierra 14 and Sierra 15,” Tara called out in Control, “We have a contact of interest.”
Chief Drysdale swiveled his head in the TSO’s direction. “Ma’am, we have identified a Russian Yasen-class submarine. I believe it bears one-five-five, but I recommend we maneuver to verify. We also need to verify his range.”
