“They didn’t want footprints, did they?” At this point, this deep into the dissection, there is no way I am leaving without making sure we have everything we need. If Fulton says the SSE guys back at base might want toe jam, I am fully prepared to put on my Rex Ryan face and get all up in those feet.
“I don’t think so,” Fulton says.
“Okay. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
With the head and arm now inside the trash bag, I sling it over my shoulder like I’m Johnny Appleseed and we head back. Our platoon stares at us as we walk around the side of the truck with the half-filled trash bag. I smile and wave to them.
“We got everything we need. Everyone get ready for exfil.”
“How’d it go with that guy?” one of the privates asks.
“As far as Al-Qaeda go? He was head and shoulders above the rest.” I fist-bump him for good measure. He’s still a cherry and not a total fucking nutbag, so he just nods back the way you do when you don’t want the other person to know that you have no idea what they are talking about.
I look over at Fulton and shake my head. Kids these days. A couple of privates are kneeling next to us. I reach over to one of the more timid ones and slap him on the knee, before placing the bag in his lap.
“Hey, could you hold this for the ride back?”
“Roger, Sergeant,” he says, completely unaware of the fact—to this day, actually—that he rode home with a severed head and arm in a garbage bag. Instead, he gets to read about it here in great detail, along with the rest of the world. You’re welcome, Sparkle Tits!
* * *
—
When we finally get back to base, it’s nearing 7:30 A.M., which is really late for us. Fulton and I go down to drop off our haul at the SSE room where the privates have already begun to lay out on a table everything they retrieved from the target buildings during the raids we completed earlier in the night. Since it’s so late, no one officially assigned to SSE is there to intake and catalog the stuff. Usually no one sweats it if you leave the more basic shit unattended until someone arrives to go through it, since you lock up the room once the last person leaves. But a garbage bag with a head and an arm in it is anything but basic. I hesitate to just drop it off.
“We can’t just leave it here, right?” I say, looking over to Fulton for clarification, hoping that the one guy I know who gives fewer fucks than me will give me the thumbs-up.
“I don’t know, man. I’m fucking tired and nobody is here.”
“So is that a soft yes?”
“It’s a ‘Let’s try and find someone, then say fuck it.’ ”
For the next ten minutes, we walk around the base trying to find someone to give it to. Anyone gullible enough to take a lumpy, unmarked garbage bag off our hands without asking too many questions. We do a full circuit, but no one is up yet, so we head back to the SSE room. It’s still just us, approximately one-eighth of an enemy combatant, and an empty command center.
“Soooooo…” I begin, like I’m dropping off a first date and hoping she asks me inside.
“I’m not taking that fucking bag back to my room,” Fulton says.
“Me neither. Merry fucking Christmas.” I drop the garbage bag on the table and we walk out. Fulton gives me a nod goodbye as I shut the door behind us. Walking down the hallway, he turns and heads toward his bunk, and I continue on to the gym.
Who the fuck knocks out a quick gym sesh after a night like we just had? That’s a good question. Although back then I probably would have said that’s a stupid question because only a pussy skips a workout—especially bi and tri work—and this was just like any other day, NBD. The reality is that you’ve got to put your emotions somewhere when you have an experience like this. The thrill of war turns to the terror of war, if you don’t get them out of you. I was lucky that I had music and working out, even if I didn’t fully realize it at the time.
I don’t give any of it another thought until I am awoken