Carlos woke up to his wrist vibrating and beeping. With a grunt he pulled his wrist up to his face, and cracked open one of his eyes. The clock face read 0400 – it was time to roll out of his comfortable bed and get shaved. Well, it was a comfortable bed for him – it had finally conformed to his body after a couple of months of sleeping on it. It also helped that his body no longer remember what sleeping in an actual bed felt like after so many nights sleeping on the ground or on top of the tank or the Army issued mattress.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, he slipped on his shower shoe sandals and grabbed the shave kit and hand towel he kept on a small table next to his bed. Standing with a stretch he made his way to the latrine and did his morning business. Feeling a little more awake, he shuffled back to his bunk and pulled on his combat uniform. By this time, the rest of the platoon was also starting to stir and get dressed. Now he needed that ultimate necessity of American soldiers – coffee.
There is a theory that American soldiers are powered by at least one of three things: caffeine, nicotine and/or sunflower seeds. In his six years serving in the Army, Carlos had never met a soldier that didn’t partake in at least of those vices everyday. His fuel of choice was caffeine. Preferably coffee in the morning and Mountain Dew after lunch. He never smoked or chewed tobacco – he despised the stuff. However, when they started training for deployment months ago, he had picked up the sunflower seed habit from one of the other NCO’s in the unit. He now never went anywhere without a bag in his hip pocket. Today’s flavor was going to be Ranch.
The chow hall that morning was nearly empty. Second and Third platoon had spent the night at the gunnery range. First Platoon had done the same thing the night before. Which left First Platoon and the Scouts, plus a couple of mechanics and the Troop administrative staff this morning. Carlos grabbed a cup of coffee, a banana and some oatmeal and sat at a table across from First Lieutenant Richard Woods – he was the Scout platoon leader and a friend of Rayth’s.
Rayth and Woods had served together as enlisted soldiers in the same unit before heading off to college together and going through the Reserved Officer Training Corps, or ROTC, program together. They started their careers as tank crewmen in the 1st Heavy Armor Battalion, but had transferred to the 94th Armored Cavalry Squadron when they had earned their officers commissions.
“What’s happening Woods?” asked Carlos as he sat down. The smell of the coffee was starting to hit Carlos nose, and his body began to perk up. Almost like it was anticipating the soon to come caffeine intake. Woods ran a hand through his short red hair and looked up from his smartphone with a puzzled, and somewhat annoyed, look on his face.
“I honestly do not know. I have zero cell reception today. Like none. Not a mobile connection, a data connection and the barracks WiFi seems to be down too.” He stated as he placed the phone back into his chest pocket. “No news, no contact with the outside world. It’s like living in the Middle Ages. Bah!” Rayth smiled to himself. Woods was a stock market and news junkie. Few things agitated Woods like not knowing what was going on in the world at large. Out of curiosity, Rayth pulled his own phone out of his pocket to check the connection indicators. Oddly, they were all also blank. He had no connection at all. That explained why he saw no notifications on his phone that morning. It was odd, but it wasn’t alarming to him. They were after all in the middle of the Minnesota plains and with the nearest city of any size over an hour away, service on the base was spotty at best.
“Strange. My phone has the same issue. There must be a tower out or something. But then again, we do have to do without these when we get to Europe.” Rayth stated as he took his first sip of delicious coffee with French Vanilla cream. Another luxury he’d have to learn to do without soon.
“I know. There will be slightly more pressing matters to deal with over there other than a bad signal.” Woods took a bite of his eggs and asked. “I’m guessing your platoon did well at gunnery yesterday?”
“We did. The Table Eight went well and we all qualified. I hear your scouts did well too? I mean they are scouts so its surprising they didn’t just hide on the range.” Rayth replied with a smirk. There was a long standing, good natured rivalry between the heavy armor tank units and their lighter armed cousins. A rivalry that both Woods and Rayth were happy to continue, even though as part of their training as Armor officers they had trained on both tanks and as scouts.
“Ha! Yes we did well and all our crews qualified. Good job with all of your crews getting qualified. But, isn’t it really easy to hit a target when your bullet is half the size of the target?”
The conversation continued for several minutes before both the officers got up to check on their platoons to ensure everyone had eaten and was ready to head out for the day. Rayth walked into his platoon’s bay and was content to see that the room was nearly empty. A couple of stragglers were picking up and stuffing items into their day packs before heading out the back door of the bay. Glancing at his watch, he saw it was now 0430 – forty-five minutes before they needed to be on the road in their High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles, better known in the regular world as a Humvee. But no one in the Army ever called it a Humvee – it was simply known simply as a truck to soldiers across the United States Army.
Walking across the road to the Troop motor pool, he saw soldiers from both platoons doing their Preventive Maintenance Checks and Services, or PMCS before heading to the range. For the trucks, the PMCS process was pretty simple – it generally involved checking the oil, fuel, tires and giving the vehicle a general quick once over. Soldiers that weren’t performing the checks were busy loading gear into the backs of the vehicles – rucksacks, food, water and all the necessities of an Army unit spending the day on the range. Rayth saw Hunts barking orders at a couple of Privates that happened to get a little distracted from their duties and made his way over to Hunts.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
“Good morning Sergeant. How are we doing today?” Rayth asked as he stepped beside his platoon sergeant.
“Ah, good morning Sir. We are doing just fine, a little SLOW THIS MORNING,” Hunts said that last part purposefully loud enough for the rest of the soldiers to hear, “but we will be ready to move at 0515.”
“Bit of a struggle this morning?”
“Yes, a bit. Just a little complacency after completing gunnery yesterday. With our portion of training now complete, the sense of urgency has lessened. But we will get that straightened out real quick.”
“Of that I have no doubt. Any concerns for today?”
“No Sir. This isn’t anything we haven’t already done several times by now. But I will say, this has turned into a very solid group of soldiers. We’ve trained them well, and I do think they are ready for the war.”
“At least as ready as we can be for those of us who haven’t been in one already right?”
Hunts hesitated slightly before answering and gave his Lieutenant a side ways glance. “I didn’t mean it like that Sir, but yes. Training can only prepare you so much for the real thing.”
“I know – there’s no offence taken. I know I haven’t seen action yet, and neither have most of the platoon. But that is why I’m glad I have you around.”
“Well, someone has to keep you from doing something stupid. Sir.” Hunts looked at him with a smirk on his face. Rayth looked back at him and grinned.
“Now, Sergeant, I do believe that is my God-given right as a Lieutenant to do something stupid.”
“Bah. You used to be a Specialist back in the day Sir. You already used your stupid freebie.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about Sergeant. I am innocent.”
“At least you remembered how to be part of the E-4 Mafia.” Hunts said with a roll of the eye. Hunts had a deep-rooted annoyance with what is lovingly referred to in the Army as the E-4 Mafia. E-4’s, or Specialists, were the last rank before becoming a Non-Commissioned Officer in the Army. These ranks were usually made up of men and women who had been in the Army for at least a couple of years and knew their way around, and were masters at shirking responsibilities. They were able to do so because they had just enough rank to tell lower enlisted soldiers what to do, but not enough rank to have any actual responsibilities. The unofficial motto of the Mafia is “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”.
“That’s a skill I’ll never forget! Anyways, its 0510, let’s get these vehicles staged to move?”
“Agreed Sir. I’ll get the men together for the safety brief.” After confirming that the trucks were loaded and ready to go, he collected the remaining twelve soldiers to the lead truck so that Rayth could give the traditional Army safety brief and make sure that everyone knew the route being taken and where they were going. When Rayth was satisfied that everyone knew what was going on, he dismissed them to their vehicles and he went to his own truck.
Throwing his rucksack into the back of the truck, he went and took his seat in the front passenger seat, which was where the vehicle commander sat. His tank crew also sat in their respective seats. Rayth picked up the telephone shaped microphone for the radio, and after confirming the frequency was correct, pushed the transmit button to call the range.
“Range Tower, this is Saber One-Six, over.” Releasing the button, Rayth stared at the radio as he waited for a reply, but heard nothing but static. Radio operator must still be asleep, he thought as he pushed the transmit button a second time.
“Range Tower, this is Saber One-Six, over.” After nearly a minute of waiting and hearing nothing but static, he set the microphone back on top of the radio, Agitated, he picked his phone out of pocket to try and call Captain Johnson. Rayth only grew more frustrated when he saw that he still didn’t have a signal of any kind.
“O’Hare, can we get anyone on the radio?” Rayth asked his driver.
“Negative Sir. We can’t even hear the other trucks in the platoon. And we can’t have anyone look at them here – our radio guy is at the range.”
“Of course he is. No point in stressing it now – we know where we are going. O’Hare, go ahead and pull onto the road. Once everyone is on the road behind us, bring us to the range.”
“Wilco.” Came the single word reply as O’Hare put the truck into gear and pulled out of the motor pool with the other three trucks of First Platoon following suit. Turning the corner of the motor pool entry road to the main road, Rayth looked back and saw the Scout Platoon trucks also moving out of the motor pool. Making a note in his notebook to talk to the Supply Sergeant when they got to the range about the busted radios, Rayth settled into his seat and watched the hills of Camp Ripley roll by as they drove to the gunnery range.
After nearly thirty minutes of driving, the small convoy of vehicles pulled off the main road and in to the vehicle staging area of the gunnery range. The platoons parked their trucks in a neat row not far from the tower. Leaving the other NCO’s to organize their soldiers, Rayth and Hunts, followed by Woods and his Platoon Sergeant, Sergeant First Class Raymond Kennedy, walked up to the tower to link up with Sergeant Alm and see where he needed bodies. When they entered the range control tower building, they walked into something that they never expected.
The room was in a state of chaos. Soldiers were in a corner frantically working radios, trying to raise someone on a frequency, and then quickly changing to another frequency. Others were dialing numbers on their smartphones and Rayth saw one throw his phone across the room in frustration. There was a TV in the corner that was only showing static. And there was a lot of yelling in the room as soldiers were walking back and forth, going from one station to another. Taken aback by the chaos in what should have been a calm setting, it took Rayth a moment to notice Captain Johnson in the corner of the room, deep in conversation with the other Platoon Leaders, the XO and the First Sergeant. Motioning to his companions to follow him, Rayth led the way over to where the Troop Commander was holding court.
The Captain noticed them join the group, and in a reassuringly calm voice asked “Good, you men are alright. We’ve been trying to reach you for the last half an hour and I was about to send a truck to you. Almost none of our comms are working. No radios, no cell phones. The only thing working is an old landline phone.”
“We noticed Sir. None of our radios or phones are working either.” Woods stated. Johnson nodded in acknowledgement. Rayth cocked his head to the side in puzzlement. No working comms was a problem, but it wasn’t nearly enough of a problem to cause this kind of chaos and concern that he was witnessing, and he brough that point up to the group. Johnson paused for a moment and chewed his lip, as though he was having trouble forming the words.
“We don’t know much. We received word about thirty minutes ago over the landline from the Squadron S2 that there has been some kind of incident in Washington, New York City and Los Angeles. Details at this time are unknown.”