I will personally see you grounded.” Colonel Loughrey would, but not out of vindictiveness. Out of concern that incompetence would kill someone. He printed the name of every soldier they hadn’t saved on an index card he carried inside his helmet. Last week she’d seen him write the first name on the back. He was a good man, and a good leader, but he was wrong to blame the flight medic. Something bigger was going on, something that seemed to have happened before, although she didn’t know what. The name Wardsen was her first clue.
As silently as combat boots allowed, she retreated. She’d meet with the big guy when she had more answers. This afternoon she had only questions.
Chapter Two
Theresa hated treadmills, gym rats and clanging weights. She hated to stretch in front of half the American soldiers in Paktia Province, their eyes all over her, but this was Tuesday, when she didn’t have the luxury of a solitary four miles at dawn around the airfield’s dirt track. On Tuesdays, she warmed the doctor seat at the 0600 briefing before her clinic shift. If she ran outside now, the eighty-plus-degree May afternoon would drop her like an aneurysm. At her normal duty station in Fort Hood, she could endure the Texas swelter, but Camp Cadwalader’s elevation seemed to add an insurmountable layer to the heat. Preferring to survive the second half of her deployment, on Tuesdays she thumped the treadmill in the air-conditioned gym.
“Hey.” Her roommate stepped on the next machine. “Finally finished the M and M.” Responsibility for the weekly morbidity and mortality report rotated among the four captains in the medical unit.
Theresa punched the button to decrease her speed enough to talk. Since the acoustics sucked in the converted Soviet warehouse, she also raised her voice. “Tough?”
“More missing paperwork.”
“The same?” After eavesdropping on Colonel Loughrey’s blowup last week, she’d told Jennifer about the pattern with Staff Sergeant Wardsen. Only four hundred twenty permanent parties crammed into this camp, but neither of them could find Wardsen.
“Yeah.” The second treadmill reached speed and they matched strides. “Inbound medevac call. Projectile penetration, a by-the-book gunshot wound, but nobody showed. Nada.”
“Think he exists?” Maybe Wardsen was a fictitious name Special Ops used for cover-ups or to treat anonymous CIA spooks. No one could have wounds like medevac had reported for Sergeant Wardsen and keep walking away.
“Uh-huh.” Jennifer entered a faster workout phase. “I think...SF guys...take paperwork...away.” She panted up the incline. “Secrecy...freaks.”
In her cooldown, Theresa could breathe and talk easier than her roommate could. “They’re not allowed to do that.” Her duties included coordinating patient care for soldiers moving between camps or leaving theater. If people removed their paperwork, follow-up care would disintegrate, an outcome she wouldn’t accept.
“ You tell them...what they can...can’t do.”
“If I can find them.” Theresa stepped off her machine, plucked her towel from the safety rail and wiped her face to unstick strands of hair from her forehead and neck. Turning, she froze halfway through retrieving her water bottle from the floor.
Isn’t that ironic. She and Jennifer had been griping about how hard it was to find men who were right behind them. Across the gym Captain Chris Deavers, commander of Special Forces Operational Detachment Alpha-5131, crunched out sit-ups on an inclined bench.
Jennifer punched a button to override the hill function and twisted to look. “Hellooo girlfriend, now what are you cooking up?”
“I’m going to ask Chris about his sergeant.” Straightening out this mess would take three or four simple questions. She aligned the corners of her towel.
“Chris?” Her friend’s eyebrows arched.
“We’re both captains. It’s perfectly acceptable to use his name.” She folded the towel
As silently as combat boots allowed, she retreated. She’d meet with the big guy when she had more answers. This afternoon she had only questions.
Chapter Two
Theresa hated treadmills, gym rats and clanging weights. She hated to stretch in front of half the American soldiers in Paktia Province, their eyes all over her, but this was Tuesday, when she didn’t have the luxury of a solitary four miles at dawn around the airfield’s dirt track. On Tuesdays, she warmed the doctor seat at the 0600 briefing before her clinic shift. If she ran outside now, the eighty-plus-degree May afternoon would drop her like an aneurysm. At her normal duty station in Fort Hood, she could endure the Texas swelter, but Camp Cadwalader’s elevation seemed to add an insurmountable layer to the heat. Preferring to survive the second half of her deployment, on Tuesdays she thumped the treadmill in the air-conditioned gym.
“Hey.” Her roommate stepped on the next machine. “Finally finished the M and M.” Responsibility for the weekly morbidity and mortality report rotated among the four captains in the medical unit.
Theresa punched the button to decrease her speed enough to talk. Since the acoustics sucked in the converted Soviet warehouse, she also raised her voice. “Tough?”
“More missing paperwork.”
“The same?” After eavesdropping on Colonel Loughrey’s blowup last week, she’d told Jennifer about the pattern with Staff Sergeant Wardsen. Only four hundred twenty permanent parties crammed into this camp, but neither of them could find Wardsen.
“Yeah.” The second treadmill reached speed and they matched strides. “Inbound medevac call. Projectile penetration, a by-the-book gunshot wound, but nobody showed. Nada.”
“Think he exists?” Maybe Wardsen was a fictitious name Special Ops used for cover-ups or to treat anonymous CIA spooks. No one could have wounds like medevac had reported for Sergeant Wardsen and keep walking away.
“Uh-huh.” Jennifer entered a faster workout phase. “I think...SF guys...take paperwork...away.” She panted up the incline. “Secrecy...freaks.”
In her cooldown, Theresa could breathe and talk easier than her roommate could. “They’re not allowed to do that.” Her duties included coordinating patient care for soldiers moving between camps or leaving theater. If people removed their paperwork, follow-up care would disintegrate, an outcome she wouldn’t accept.
“ You tell them...what they can...can’t do.”
“If I can find them.” Theresa stepped off her machine, plucked her towel from the safety rail and wiped her face to unstick strands of hair from her forehead and neck. Turning, she froze halfway through retrieving her water bottle from the floor.
Isn’t that ironic. She and Jennifer had been griping about how hard it was to find men who were right behind them. Across the gym Captain Chris Deavers, commander of Special Forces Operational Detachment Alpha-5131, crunched out sit-ups on an inclined bench.
Jennifer punched a button to override the hill function and twisted to look. “Hellooo girlfriend, now what are you cooking up?”
“I’m going to ask Chris about his sergeant.” Straightening out this mess would take three or four simple questions. She aligned the corners of her towel.
“Chris?” Her friend’s eyebrows arched.
“We’re both captains. It’s perfectly acceptable to use his name.” She folded the towel
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