Bones of the Lost(43)

Flight staging took place in another hangarlike affair with TVs airing yet more football.

Troops sat crammed onto benches, either on cell phones or other devices or with eyes closed or numbly resting on a game. Observing them, I wondered, Is sport the new opiate of the masses?

Others slumped on duffels or slept tucked to the walls. Male or female, all looked weary. And wary.

Mensforth led me to a side room in which shelving and bins overflowed with IBA.

Personal protective gear is designed to protect your person. Which does not mean it fits your person. Especially if your person is of the double-X gender.

Outer tactical vests come in four colors—woodland green camouflage, desert camouflage, universal camouflage, and coyote brown, the khaki of the Marine Corps. Mensforth handed me a universal, size small. I removed my outer jacket and slipped into the gray-green beauty. Not bad.

Then Mensforth added small-arms ballistic inserts to the front, back, and sides. And handed me a helmet. The combined weight came to somewhere north of forty pounds. I felt and looked like a Hesco unit with feet.

And then we waited.

I dozed on and off, mostly sat listlessly watching game after game.

Wisconsin lost by a field goal to Minnesota. Badgers and Gophers? Really?

Oklahoma hammered the TCU Horned Frogs.

Okay. Maybe small furry mammals didn’t make such bad totems.

The room grew thick with the smell of sweat, mildew, and dusty canvas. With the scent of exhaustion and fear.

At one point those around me began gathering their gear. Mensforth reappeared and told me to stay put. It wasn’t my flight. Mine was delayed.

Just past four, Mensforth finally led me onto a bus crammed with marines. Fifteen minutes later, we were standing on the tarmac outside a plane that looked as if it had been designed to transport shuttles for NASA.

“You’re going to be impressed.” The shriek of aircraft engines forced Mensforth to shout. “A C-130J can carry three vehicles, or close to a hundred troops.”

I eyed the plane’s interior, estimated the space was maybe forty by nine by ten.

Not exactly business class. I didn’t say it.

As I waited with what seemed like a thousand marines, crew off-loaded cargo onto palletized rollers, then flipped down flooring.

“Word to the wise,” Mensforth said. “The heads on these babies aren’t designed for our team.”

“What’s the flight time to Bagram?”

“Two, maybe three hours.”

“I’m good.” I planned to sleep.

At a signal from a camouflage-clad kid with a rag around his head, Mensforth plucked me from the line and led me onto the plane. The marines watched in hostile, exhausted, or good-natured silence.

Seating was on long benches arranged in facing pairs. Back support came in the form of red nylon latticework strapping.

Parachutes and other gear hung from the fuselage walls. Pipes, tubing, cables, and countless things I didn’t recognize snaked overhead.

“Ass to the wall, you freeze,” Mensforth said. “Ass to the center, you go numb.”

Numb sounded good.

“You can lose the body armor.”

Grateful to offload the extra poundage, I removed the hated jacket. Mensforth tossed it to the floor at the end of the bench, then showed me how to stow my helmet at my feet and my pack in my lap.

“Use ’em.” Offering a small packet containing two orange earplugs.

I nodded.

“You’ll be met at Bagram by a Captain Welsted.”

I thanked Mensforth, wondered briefly if she knew the purpose of my trip. Then she said an odd thing.

“Watch your back.”

“Got my trusty IBA.” Tapping my helmet.

“That’ll handle the bullets.” Glancing left then right, she leaned close. “Be careful.”

Before I could ask her meaning she said, “Have a good one.”

Then she was gone.

The plane filled fast. A marine the size of a linebacker took the “seat” to my left. A black kid with spectacularly white teeth dropped down on my right. Opposite, I drew a guy who had to be seven feet tall. My knees met his lower legs at about mid-tibia. Snugly.

After a final round of shouting, the crew shut the hatch. I glanced at my fellow passengers. Most were male and in their twenties.

I heard a lot of “fucking” this and “fucking” that. Bravado. We were going downrange. In Pete’s day the phrase had been “in country.” Same idea. Same apprehension. We were heading to war.

I noticed a man three over and opposite, watching me intently. Asian. Maybe eighteen.

I smiled. The man looked away.

The engines thundered to life. I inserted the earplugs.

The ungainly craft lumbered skyward. Finally leveled.

I lowered my lids. Tried to sleep.

We pitched and dipped, engines throbbing out a deafening roar. Icy air blew up my back. Though shoulder to shoulder, shin to shin with my seatmates, a penetrating cold invaded my bones. Before long I felt desperate to stretch, or at least reposition. Knew there wasn’t a chance.