Brown, Paper Box

“Smith! Get up here. You are going out on patrol today. Garland is out for the day. We need a gunner for B flight.”

“Yes sir. I will go back to the armory for the gun. What squad am I on?”

“You will be with Echo Squad. Fuentes is driver, Jacobs is navigator, and secondary gunner is Drake. Better get going. You head out in 10 minutes.”

As I ran from the flight tent to the armory all I could think of was how much I wanted to strangle Garland. What the heck could happen that you got out of your full shift? I yelled at him in my head I got over to the armory and got the 240.

“Hey Smith! What are you getting the 240 for today? I thought you were on the hospital gate?” Williams, the armorer asked me.

“Man! Stupid Garland isn’t taking his shift for Echo Squad. I have to go out for patrol as gunner. I was looking forward to being guard at the hospital. So much for an easy day.” I said and then looked at my watch. “I will catch you late Williams I need to go mount up. Have a good one.”

I picked up the gun and an extra can of ammo..I hoped it wouldn’t be that bad today. Every day over here was hot so that wasn’t anything new. I would sit up top as gunner. With full armor and a helmet on got so hot out in the sun like that. We were supposed to go out on patrol every 3rd day. At least that was 1 thing nice the military did. However, the MREs I knew I would be eating today were not a nice thing the military did.

I got up to the HMMVV; Fuentes, Jacobs, and Drake were already there. “What the hell Smith? Where is Garland? He’s our normally runs with us.” Said Fuentes the driver.

“I have no clue Sarge. I was told to grab the gun and get over here to head out,” I responded. “I definitely didn’t volunteer for this.” I said. “Dang! I hope he’s alright. It’s not easy to get out of this post! Believe me! I have tried!” Drake jumped in with a smile.

As I got the gun set up along with my gear I was thinking on how this wasn’t a bad team. It was normal for me to be the only female on a squad. There were originally 2 of us, females, who deployed with this team. But the other girl, Perez, tested positive for pregnancy 6 days before we got on the plane. I hated not having her here but I would never want her and her baby to deal with all this. It wasn’t too bad out here. It’s really hot though! Also the random mortar attacks can be a little stressful. With our job you just never know how physical the day could end up. I was brought out of my head to the sound of Sgt. Fuentes giving the mount up order. He was a good guy and good leader. He was one of those who worked for and earned his rank. Definitely a good leader.He was also very determined to get the job done and done right.

“Hey Sarge. Drake and I are set to go. Looks like Smith is too. We can roll out whenever you are set.” Jacobs yelled over the “truck.” I always called it a truck, while others called the armored HMMVVs cars, and others just said HMMVV. It didn’t really matter as long as you set your butt in the right seat.

Fuentes, yelled up to me, “Smith, are you all set? Did get the extra can of ammo?”

“Yes sir. The extra can is set up with Drake. The gun is set in and I am ready to roll. Let’s get the day finished.” I answered.

“Hey Drake, enjoy your comfy seat down there while you can. I might get too much of a tan up here and need a break!” I yelled laughingly down to him. “Smith, what do you mean? Your white skin can’t tan! Do not even think you will see anything similar to a tan unless it’s brown from the sand your gonna get in the face!” Drake joked back.

Today I sat up top of the “truck” with the gun. This job wasn’t really fun. I wore big goggles to keep the sand out as we drove around and a heavy duty neck gator to try to keep sand out of my mouth and clothes. I also had my combat helmet with a night vision clip on. The helmet is pretty heavy but not an item I would ever go without. The helmet could typically keep you alive from a bullet you would never expect. I hope I would never feel anything hit this helmet like that. However, the helmet is a great asset from bumping your head on a door frame or top of HMMVV. On most rides like today, it was my job to stay alert. I had a communication headset on to be able to talk smoothly with the guys inside. Along with the helmet and mic I was also issued a lovely matching vest. This isn’t a normal asset to an outfit vest by any means. It was my second form of protection from anything aiming for my upper body. This vest has two ceramic plates and the vest part has cargo type netting to hold essentials. I carried five double magazine pouches, flashlight, and numerous other things. The vest secured around my torso which made it seem that much hotter. Today’s job was just a hot situation.

The truck did have a windshield but with the armor on it the windshield didn’t give a wide view. Due to this, my job was to be a second pair of eyes. The teams objective was to go out on sand path that was supposedly a road. Each day we were assigned to random locations to clear the road. We needed to keep these different roads clear. No one ever wants to roll across a “package” unexpectedly. At least if we found it expectedly then we would have bomb squad come take care of it. We find and they destroy. Not a bad deal. I know I did not want to be the person walking up to one those or having to stay in the vicinity to send a robot. Not my thing.

It was a hot day. We rolled through the desert. Every once in awhile we would see a bush or a blowing piece of trash, other than that it just seemed never ending. We were all excited on first few days of training to find out we would be using mics while in the HMMVVs. We all love to pick on and joke around. It wasn’t exactly the most entertaining job.

We stopped around noon and ate pieces of our MREs. MREs could be really fun because everyone traded for different jellies or cheeses or even different main course packages. Each truck always had a few Rip-Its somewhere in it. These fun little cans of an energy drink were tasty. That was about the only other option than water, neither were ever cold. We also didn’t have much ice for drinking/eating available. Just one of the many things you don’t plan for when being deployed. There were a lot of things I missed. I missed flip flops, a private shower, a private toilet, and a private bed. I did feel like I was earning the right to a secluded, lazy day or two in my future.

We cruised a long. We were getting close to our turn around point when I thought I could see something dark not moving by the road. I tapped the top of the truck and spoke to the guys over the mic. Seeing trash wasn’t uncommon but it is always better to be cautious. We never knew when someone had a strong enough desire to blow us or a convoy sky high. Which made sense, we are here because we are at war. After tapping the top of the truck Sgt. Fuentes stopped it immediately. “Damnit Smith don’t tell me we have something now. I was about to head back.” Fuentes said to me. “I agree Sir but this looks interesting enough.” I replied.

I put the binoculars to my eyes. I didn’t always agree with the quality of items the military issued us but I will say these were excellent binoculars. As I look towards the item on the side of the road I saw a package, a brown box or package that looked for to have some sort of paper wrapping it but also flapping in the wind. Next thing I noticed was dirt. As sand sat in the hot sun it gained its own lightened color. The dirt around this brown paper package was darker compared to the sun baked sand around it. This was not what we wanted to see.

“Alright guys we need to call this one in. It looks too odd to make me feel good about going by it. We need to set up a perimeter and call this one in,” I said. I could definitely feel the frustration we all had. Even though this was our job and why were here, we all love to get back, sit in the shade of our tent, and not have sand giving you a microdermabrasion treatment all the time. Such is the life we have chosen. We called in to the bomb squad to head out this way. We knew it would be awhile until they showed up but that did not mean it was siesta time. We had to be highly alert. There were some people who set things like this up and then picked us off as we maintained a perimeter for bomb squad.

It took a couple hours for bomb squad to get out to us. It felt like days sitting in the sun waiting for them. They got there and I described what I saw with them. They got out there fancy robot and sent it to the brown box. As it got closer it’s camera showed more signs of an IED. There were a few wires running from under the box. Sgt. Powell, the robot controller, said to me, “Looks like you made a good call. We are going to clear this out.” He also gave Sgt. Fuentes instructions on a perimeter based on what he saw through the robot. EOD got set up. About an hour later they were set. They had IED taken care of pretty quickly. The sound of explosions like that always set me on edge. However, I knew I had helped to rid the world of 1 less explosive that could hurt someone. As we mounted up we were all pretty excited. We all wanted to finish our search along the road. However, we also knew it would be dark before we got back. We headed back for home, well, our temporary home.

We actually got back later than our technical shift end time. This was not uncommon. I turned my good ole, big gun in. I walked back to my tent. This was a good day. Not what I had expected. Finding that brown, paper package had really helped me remember why I had chosen this life.