I look over to his right, and Armstrong is lying on his belly, desperately fighting to fix a jam on his rifle. A jam means no bullets. No bullets mean death.
I've got to do something! I run to Cooper, throwing him to the side and kick the grenade like it's the soccer ball we saw the boys playing with earlier. As the edge of my boot catches the casing, I can feel it fly away. Then a blast of hot air surrounds my leg as the grenade explodes. I'm lifted through the air like a pillow being tossed around at a teen girl's slumber party before my back thuds into the dirt and I roll another ten feet. My ears squeal the horrific siren song of war; my eardrums must be fucked.
I manage to push myself up onto my elbows and look at the scene unfolding in front of me like some kind of Scorsese wet dream. Blood and fragments of skin and bone are painting the beige ground a deep maroon as my men continue to fight off the ambush. My leg feels like someone is pouring hot water down it, when I look down my eyes confirm what my mind and body already knew: it's gone.
There's no time for that right now! Another explosion sends dirt flying everywhere and I flip over onto my stomach and use my good leg and my elbows to drag me back over to Cooper. He hasn't moved from where I threw him, I'm not sure if he's dead, but I know he's unarmed. The sand grates against my exposed skin and the feeling of hot water running over my leg continues. Somehow, I crawl to Cooper. He's not dead. Maybe injured. Definitely in shock. But not dead.
"Fuck! What the hell is happening!" he screams. I guess I can hear after all; the blast must've just phased me. I lay over him like a sandbag and raise my rifle. Pop! Pop! Pop! I squeeze the trigger, aiming for the center of mass, or the heart as civilians say. Another man from the village drops to the dirt.
I can hear the whirling rotor blades of a Blackhawk overhead. Thank you, Jesus. Keeping Cooper still beneath me, I raise my rifle, scanning for another fighter to come into view. However, I don't see any through the heavy fog of sand.
"Captain! Captain! We've got to take you out!" I twist my head over my shoulder to see 3 medics with a stretcher running up behind me.
"I'm not going anywhere without my men!"
"Captain, you're bleeding out. If we don't get you out of here you're gonna die," the young medic yells in my ear as he pulls my shoulders. I feel several hands on me as I'm lifted from Cooper. Lifted from the ground and put on the stretcher.
"How many did we lose? Did we get them all?" I yell.
"Don't worry about that right now, you'll be debriefed later. Right now we need to get you back to the base."
I wince as they strap me to the board. Looking down over my body, I see my skin hanging from just below my knee in long flaps. Blood spreads over the stretcher in the place where my limb should be. My leg is gone. It's gone. For the first time, my mind has a chance to process the thought.
I'm carried to the Blackhawk and maneuvered inside. I close my eyes as one of the medics begins tying off a tourniquet to slow the bleeding.
Gone.
I don't know how many of my men are dead, but I know I've lost some. My men are gone. My friends. My brothers. Dead.
As the wraps are tied down tight around my leg, I can feel us lifting up in the Helo. I used to love helicopter rides. The thrill of soaring through the air, usually to be dropped somewhere exciting and new. I close my eyes and try to slow my breathing. I need to calm down.
I need to ….
Lauren!
Her soft brown eyes and glowing almond skin race through my mind. I can smell fresh lilacs, her perfume. I can taste her gloss on my lips. I swear, I can feel her holding my hand as I’m lifted to the medical center.
I need her.
7
Mack
2014
“So where did you disappear to, Captain America?” Corporal Lopez twists around in his passenger seat to shoot a knowing smile my way. “Can you believe this guy?” He jerks his thumb at me in the backseat as his attention falls on our driver, Specialist Parsons. “He’s got a whole pussy parade after him all night, rubbing up on him like cats in heat, and then he just plucks the two prettiest ones from the bunch and takes off.”
In the rear view mirror I can see Parsons lift his eyebrows skyward. His moustache raises up higher when he does it, giving his face the appearance of a human arrow.
“Oh yeah? Two of ‘em, huh?”
I don’t respond, but the night before flashes in my mind. I can see their crimson lips brushing against each other as they slid their tongues from the base of my cock all the way up to the tip at the same time. My dick twitches up against my zipper, as if it’s reminding me that he had a great time when both the blonde and brunette from the night before slid their tongues up and around me like strippers on a pole.