Thunder cracked and pealed.
“Daddy, here I am in this graveyard, wet and without you or the Lord. I am miserable, and I know now that I am lost. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.” Delroy fought back the pain that threatened to choke him. “I know you believed I was saved, too, but I wasn’t. I know it has to be a terrible thing to see me here like this, to know that I doubted God so much that He left me behind. I’ve shamed you, and for that I hope you’ll forgive me.” He wiped the tears and the rain from his face with a big hand.
“I hope you’ll understand why I’ve got to do what I’m going to do.” Rain pelted Delroy, smashing hard against his face and getting into his eyes. “I hope that you’ll find it in your heart to forgive me.” Taking a fresh grip on the shovel, Delroy turned and walked to the grave two plots down. The one in between was reserved for his mother. Etta still lived in Marbury in a self-assisted home.
At the foot of the chosen grave, Delroy shone his flashlight over the headstone:
LANCE CORPORAL TERRENCE DAVID HARTE
SON, SOLDIER, HERO
BELOVED ALWAYS AND MISSED DEARLY
Delroy stood at the foot of his son’s grave for a moment. He heard the sound of the rain all around him. Tears coursed down his cheeks.
“God, forgive me,” he whispered. “I know what I’m about to do is an affront to You. I know I can’t ask Your blessing in this, but I do beg Your understanding.”
Firming up his resolve and his conviction, Delroy set the flashlight on the ground so the beam spread over the grave. He pulled on the gloves that George had lent him; then he took up the shovel. He placed the keen blade on the ground, then leaned on it and plunged it deep into the dark, wet earth.
9
United States 75th Army Rangers Temporary Post
Sanliurfa, Turkey
Local Time 0510 Hours
Goose swept his gaze around the makeshift operating theater set up inside the basement of one of the city’s more prestigious hotels. Beds filled every available space, but severely wounded and dead still lay in the floor in places. Cries of injured men and women filled the large room, while doctors and nurses shouted information to each other across patients. More litters arrived, transferred from the triage stations on the first-floor level.
The wounded weren’t just military; a few were citizens and tourists who hadn’t yet found a way or a time to depart. Some were journalists that Goose had seen working over the past two days. Recognizing them, Goose wondered what had happened to Danielle Vinchenzo. The young journalist tended to insert herself and her team into the thickest action. He had no doubt that reporting from the front lines where the Syrian tanks had crashed through was her idea. But he hadn’t seen the woman or her team since then.
While making the rounds, Goose also checked in with standing security teams, making certain they held the line. The combined military forces in the city had immediately elected to set up their own surgery areas instead of using the Turkish hospitals. Sanliurfa’s hospitals became targets for the Syrian air force the next night after their retreat and had taken major damage during each successive raid.
Triage teams manned the doorways into the building. Incoming wounded were marked before they came inside. Shorthand written across their foreheads with washable markers indicated to surgeons and nurses what had to be done, whether to attempt to save a life or administer painkillers till they passed. Life and death was reduced to a symbol or two. In the middle of bloody and pain-filled chaos, the surgical teams somehow managed to eke out a sense of professional care and compassion that amazed Goose even after his other battlefield experiences.
“Control,” a man called over the headset Goose wore, “I’m starting to see movement along the Syrian front line.”
“I do too,” Remington replied.
“They appear to be pulling back.”
“Affirmative, Tango Leader,” Remington replied. “Stay on them. I want laser-assisted targeting for the howitzers for as long as you can. We’ve earned their respect for the moment, but they’ll be back. We’re standing between the Syrian war machine and everything their generals need to control. I want to take down every unit of their armored cav that we can while we have the chance under the cover of darkness.” “Roger, Control. Tango Team will continue to flag ’em and tag ’em.”
Tango Team, Goose knew from the defense briefing Remington had put into effect nineteen hours ago when news of the Syrian armored advancement was received, was a scout team lead by Lieutenant Carlos Mendoza of the 75th. The team all rode Enduro motorcycles tricked out with infrared lights for night riding. They also carried Litton PAQ-10 Ground Laser Target Designators. The GLTDs used by Lieutenant Mendoza’s team marked targets and relayed coordinates to Captain Mkchian’s artillery teams, allowing them almost pinpoint accuracy. Judging from the communications traffic Goose had been privy to, Mendoza’s team was turning the Syrian armored cav into sitting ducks for the Turkish howitzers and mortars.
The constant thunder of the artillery cascaded over the city, echoing hollowly down in the basement.
Pain ratcheted through Goose’s knee as he walked, causing a slight limp. He tried to remain distant as he recognized the Rangers who were wounded or dead, but he had difficulty doing that. He knew most of them personally, from ops out in the field to basketball and volleyball games back at Fort Benning. So many of them were young men, and too many of those were dead and dying, or horribly wounded.
“Bleeder,” a surgeon called out as a line of blood shot up from a patient’s open chest cavity. He ignored the stream of blood splashing his chest and neck, reached into the man’s
