Charles Henderson - Terminal Impact

“You can’t say that about Rowdy Yates,” Jack reminded his sniping partner. “In a few hours, when the sun comes up at Camp Lejeune, Elmore’s going to make the widow’s death notification with the chaplain and the Casualty Assistance Call Officer. We’re down a man, and he was a good one.”

“They’re all good ones,” Claybaugh said.

“Yeah,” Jack said, lifting the lid on his computer but then shutting it back down. Then he looked at Billy-C and put a smile on his face. “How’s your ass?”

Claybaugh grinned. “A horizontal smile to go with my vertical. But the sideways one hurts like a son of a bitch.”

“Let’s see,” Gunny Valentine said, motioning for the staff sergeant to stand up, turn around, drop trousers, and unveil his wound.

As Billy complied, britches at his ankles, bandage off, bent at the waist with his bare butt pointed at the gunny, Rasputin and the Mob Squad barreled through the main door.

“Whoa! Dude! Cover up! That’s one memory I don’t want,” Sergeant Romyantsev said, leading the four others and suddenly encountering Billy-C bent over bare-assed a foot from Gunny Valentine’s face.

Sergeant Carlo “The Iceman” Savoca and his top corporal, Sal “Pizza Man” Principato, swooped in close for a good look. Nick “the Nose” Falzone and Marcello “Momo” Costa stepped back with Rasputin. They had no desire to look at Billy Claybaugh’s naked bum or his wound.

“You need to get a tattoo with that scar, like eyes. You know, like on a smiley face?” Principato offered, and put his finger on the stitched wound.

“It does look like a smile across my cheek, don’t it,” Billy said, looking over his shoulder at the boys giving his butt close scrutiny.

“Like, have a nice day, asshole.” Iceman laughed. “You know, the smile face talking to your bung.”

“Shouldn’t you, then, have the whole cheek tattooed yellow?” Rasputin offered, now moving in close to see, too, interested by the smiley face comments.

“Yeah!” Billy said. “Like two big black eyes and a black outline around the smile, surrounded by a big yellow circle that takes up my whole ass cheek. And shaded like 3D. You know?”

They all laughed.

“You’ve got to do it, Billy,” Sergeant Savoca said. “Soon as we get back to Lejeune. We’ll all chip in.”

“Not to change the subject,” Jack Valentine said, “but to what do I owe the pleasure of not only having the entire Mob Squad grace my presence, but Rasputin the Devil emerge from his dungeon?”

“This operation with one-five out in the Anbar. Staff Sergeant D said we’re all going. Even him and me both. That true, Gunny?” Sergeant Romyantsev asked.

Jack Valentine looked at his Mob Squad, then Rasputin, and spread a big smile, cautious. “Would you like to go?”

“Gunny. That’s why we wear tree suits,” Sergeant Savoca said, wedging his two cents into the conversation. Then, looking at Romyantsev, added, “Rasputin will even put on clothes.”

Gunny Valentine looked at Romyantsev standing there with his arms folded, wearing a black Metallica: Some Kind of Monster tank top, neon-green P-T shorts, and flip-flops. “This operation. We’ll need the entire detachment. Except for Captain Burkehart, Smedley, and Billy-C. They’ll stay back and hold down the fort.”

“So, it’s not a handpicked team, like I heard at first?” Savoca said.

Jack shook his head no. “I changed my mind. After what happened yesterday, that silly horseshit stops. We’re going on mission to do what we came here to do. Kill Zarqawi.”

“Fuck yeah!” Pizza Man let go. “Balls out!”

“We’re assigning teams to each of one-five’s infantry companies, and a composite group to the battalion’s command element. We’ll brief everyone on the breakdown, overall objectives, and who goes where right after noon chow,” Jack went on.

“Mob Squad, heads up. You’re chopping out to Haditha Dam tonight. Link up with a hard-core Force Recon knife fighter, First Sergeant Alvin Barkley, top kick at Charlie Company. You’re first team out. I hope you’ve got your kits packed and ready.”

“They’ve been packed and ready,” Savoca said.

Jack gave Savoca a hard, cold look, then eyeballed each of his three Mob Squad cohorts. “Report to First Sergeant Barkley directly, Iceman. Got it? And none of your boys’ silly it’s-just-business shit. Barkley’s no-nonsense old Corps. Hard as woodpecker teeth. He’s even got muscles in his do-do. So don’t fuck around with this guy.”

“What do you mean hard-core knife fighter? You serious?” Momo Costa asked, now a little worried about dealing with a potential wild man.

“Fuck yeah. Serious as a heart attack,” Jack said. “Couple years back, over in Afghanistan, then — Gunny Barkley emptied his M9 pistol in one crazy Taliban hell-bent on killing him. Fifteen nine-millimeter rounds center mass in the dude, and he’s still coming.

“So Barkley takes out his trusty ivory-handled, sixteen-inch-long Dan Dennehy custom-made Bowie knife he always wears strapped on the side of his leg, and gutted the motherfucker, belly button to chin whiskers.

“When Billy and I were in Fallujah last pump, Barkley did a Haji there with his knife. Almost the same story. Man’s legendary.”

“Fuck, dude.” Momo laughed. “That’s cold.”

“Fuckin’ A, that’s cold. Cold as shit,” Jack said.

“Hey, you better have a big-ass pigsticker if you’re depending on a fucking M9. Total piece of shit that lightweight gun,” Pizza Man added. “My trusty .45 hardball 1911’s the only way to go to war.”

“The .45 compared to the 9. Like a truck over a Volkswagen,” Rasputin said. “That’s 230-grain hardball. It’s a hammer. Hard to beat in a gunfight.”

“Unless you’re shooting 230-grain .45 plus-performance jacketed hollow points. Puts your lame-ass Marine Corps hardball to shame,” a scraggly, scratchy voice chimed from the rear of the gathering.

Jack stood up and grinned. “Hacksaw Gillespie! You old horse thief.”

“Hammer, my boy, Hammer. The fabled Jack-Hammer of Justice!” Walter Gillespie beamed, showing a mouthful of gold grill, right at home with his Ray-Bans, a diamond stud planted in his ear, and black-silk do-rag tied on his shaved head.

While lines furrowed deep on his face, embracing a more salt than pepper heavy-duty Fu Manchu moustache wrapping around his mouth, the old Spartan’s trim body looked as young as ever. Hard muscles rippled tight beneath his black Under Armour high-tech fabric T-shirt, and even covered by the baggy 5.11 operator jeans, Hacksaw’s legs looked ample and strong below a narrow waist. He sported a well-defined six-pack under his shirt and not a hint of belly fat. This salty, well-seasoned guerilla fighter had few equals when it came to combat.

Behind Walter Gillespie, Kermit Alexander and Cory Webster stood equally fit, wearing similar hired-gun outfits, black-ops do-rags tied on their shaved heads, Ray-Bans, and full-blown Fu Manchus.

All three men sported rings of human skulls tattooed around their biceps, each head representing a kill. Hacksaw had three circles of thirteen per row on his right upper arm and two wraps of thirteen skulls on his left. Most of his sixty-five kills, cocaine cowboys in South America. Jack had splashed forty-nine down there, including Pablo Escobar.

“Elmore said you boys were in country, hired on as gunslingers for Malone-Leyva,” Jack said, greeting his old war-fighting compadres with bear hugs. “Where you been hiding?”

“Under your nose. Been by here four times to see ya,” Hacksaw said. “You’re always out babysitting diplomats or some such happy horseshit.”

“I see you got new teeth,” Jack said, eyeballing Walter’s glittering mouth. “Makes you look like hip-hop gone bad.”