CHAPTER FIVE – CLUNKGATE
Caladaan Military base was nestled in the cleft of two imposing mountains with its giant cement walls wedged in like a gilded monstrosity. Command had set up here deliberately, at God knows what expense. It was partly to do with the fact that air assaults had to penetrate several hundred feet of rock and cement before they could do any damage; and partly because the depth of the tunnels went who knows how far down in the earth. It wasn’t like you asked those kind of questions without someone from command grilling your ass over why you wanted to know. It paid to be an incurious bastard with a distinct lack of personality in the army. But Charlie had yet to master that skill. 1600 metres. That was how far the giant son of a bitch went down into the soil of this forsaken country.
After the torturous drive, the truck eventually rolled its way through the outer defensive perimeter consisting of barbed wire and cement barricades, Charlie was wondering at the health of his friend. It wasn’t that he was complaining, or doing anything to suggest he was actually hurt – he’d just stopped being an idiot. Likely that meant he was near death.
‘Hey Baz, how’re you feeling?’
‘Still got tingling in my balls.’
‘Well that’s always a good sign… let me know when you don’t and I’ll drive slower.’ Maybe he just never stopped being an idiot.
The barricades and wire eventually gave way to a bright yellow boomgate that dropped down to impede his path, forcing him to bring the truck to an abrupt halt that sent pain shooting through his arm. Bright yellow boomgate, it’d definitely look pretty all broken up as he ploughed through it with three injured men in a shredded truck. Lucky the gate was yellow, not red. Charlie resisted the temptation to impersonate a bull and casually rolled down the remaining two inches of the cut-through window despite the pain radiating across the entirety of his body.
‘What is your business?’ A guard with a shaved head, flashy sunglasses and sand brown fatigues asked, his gun ominously hanging forward and finger triggered.
Charlie sighed. ‘Well, you see, we’re a collective of terrorists who were driving along with an atomic bomb in the back of our truck and wondering where the best place to blow it up would be. You know, a bit of light explosion and we all roast marshmallows? There was that movie in the 90s with that famous actor, Schwarzenegger? And the nuclear bomb…This dour place looks like it could use a bit of warmth. Besides, I’ve heard that it is full of cocks… roaches. So I guess they’ll all survive the blast.’
The soldier glared at him, not amused. ‘Step out of the vehicle now, you jackass, before I put a few rounds into your body.’
‘That’s step out of your vehicle now, you jackass, Sir!’ Charlie replied, turning so that his rank was clearly visible. It wasn’t a great trick to pull when you’re a corporal, but heck, the soldier was a private so why not? ‘Now move that fucking gate before I do it for you.’ He pumped the accelerator and the truck lurched longingly.
The soldier – well kid, he had been reduced to a kid now – gave him a stare for half a second, before grabbing his radio and speaking into it briefly. Charlie added another thrust of accelerator just to cheer him up; he did look awfully displeased after all. Moments later, the radio crackled to life and whatever he heard on it, forced him to turn around and remove the glaring yellow obstruction from his path. It smoothly leapt upwards just as Charlie threw down another burst of acceleration.
‘Clunk.’ Not really a boom sound after all. Clunkgate did sound ridiculous though.
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Baz was laughing merrily, or wheeze laughing was likely more accurate. Cut from the same cloth they were, and it was going to get them drowned in trouble as a result. Still, Charlie thought, he’d been sent into hostile territory by people who obviously knew it was extremely dangerous, he’d been ass-raped by some unknown entity that cut through his windscreen with a little bit of metal, then held up at a gate by a fucking goose like it was all standard procedure. The only thing standard about any of this was that they were wounded and blood was leaking from them. That was natural. The rest bloody well wasn’t. The one small thing keeping Charlie’s mood in check was the fact that Simeon was still unconscious and hadn’t shown signs of coming back from that dark place.
Not bothering with anything fancy, Charlie drove the truck straight at the entrance to the base, saying a silent thank you as he saw medics making their way out towards them. Slamming the brakes on in front of a sliding, reinforced cement entrance, he again didn’t bother with an attempt to impress but opted to simply fall out of the truck. It did start out as a step until blood loss told his brain that his legs were not going to perform their required duties. As his face hit the ground, the realisation came to him that this must all be some grand ol’ dream. Yeah, a giant dream where seeing his fantasies of Simeon dying came true. Such a lovely dream it was too, until some prick medic decided to pull him up by his wounded shoulder.
‘You fucking bastard!’ He screamed into the man’s face as he was maneuvered upright.
‘Oh shut yer trap Corporal,’ a burly, bearded medic replied. ‘If you can still scream that loud, why are you falling on your face?’ That was a good question so Charlie shut his mouth.
The medic set to inspecting his wounds, pulling away cloth so that he could get a look at what he was working with. He reached into a sling kit across his waist and pulled out a decent sized needle. Charlie seriously hoped it was morphine. Enough to take the edge off everything and send him spiralling into a fabled seventies dream involving drugs and rock and roll. Not to mention the sex part too – his wife wouldn’t be able to hold a morphine-induced sex dream over his head when he was wounded in the line of duty – well not for very long anyway.
Disappointingly, he was still lucid as he was pulled to his feet and jacked up by the strong arms of the medic, Rjolder, who was sporting a dense Viking beard. As his eyes regained their focus he saw a General, no doubt the General Bell, walking towards him in a very deliberate way.
‘Is he going to be alright?’ Bell asked Rjolder in his deep, stereotyped voice. He was just like that character in a film. Stern face, squared off glasses that just accentuated a stubborn jawline and a hook beaked nose. Not to mention the thin lips that pressed together to almost disappear when creating that gravelly voice.
‘Should be, Sir. No arterial damage is evident in either wound. Not that we’d be seeing him here if there was.’ He pulled the sleeve left and right, getting a wince from Charlie despite the gentle medication kicking through his body. ‘No excessive blood loss, but there might be something buried in that hole in his arm, I’m ninety-nine percent sure of that. It’ll need to come out.’
‘Surgery?’
‘That’d be the easy way…’ He seemed to know what was coming.
‘I want him operational and…’ he looked at Charlie, ‘conversational. Now, Medic.’
‘A general then, but it’ll hurt like... ah, it will hurt a lot.’
‘Generals always do,’ Charlie interjected. He met the General’s eyes squarely.
The man just smiled. ‘Tell me when he is back up and lucid.’ He turned and walked to the medic attending Simeon.
‘You always like that?’ Rjolder asked, as he started him forward through the solid cement entrance of Caladaan base.
‘I’ve been with him too long.’ He nodded to Baz, who was, no doubt to his humiliation, being assisted into a wheelchair by a female medic and wheeled towards Charlie.
‘You ever done it in one of these?’ Baz asked drunkenly. Then again, perhaps he wasn’t humiliated.
‘Not so much morphine next time, Caern.’
‘He’s a big guy… I thought he could handle it,’ the female medic replied.
‘I can baby, I can.’ A deranged smile filled his face, leaving Charlie feeling envious. Why did Baz get the morphine induced sex dreams and not he?
‘He’s really a giant pussycat.’ Charlie filled the female medic in.
‘Tasmanian tiger,’ Baz replied merrily.
‘Did they go extinct a long time ago?’
‘Nah, they’re just shifty.’ His eyes were taking on a glassy appearance, so Charlie left him to it. He didn’t particularly want to feature in that dream after all.