Roger Ellis - AK-239

I notice the water is deeper at the back of the barge right up to the coastline.

A tiny cove is there.

I decide this is our only chance.

I give another breath to Jennifer before disappearing into the icy black waters under Jack’s boat.

The water temperature must be under forty degrees.

Hypothermia occurs when the human body cannot generate enough heat to compensate for the warmth it loses. You have maybe ten minutes, if you can breathe, before all the blood rushes to the core of your body as your extremities go numb. But I’m underwater pulling another body and every second feels like eternity.

I’m right back in SEAL training.

Miles and miles and miles of swimming.

Pain, pain and more pain.

I rolled out with a broken leg and then I couldn’t pass Phase II. I had to repeat Phase II with a completely new class.

Your underwater times are the slowest the Navy has ever seen, son! was all I could now hear. That instructor was the meanest, cruelest son of a b…

I stopped myself because I then remembered graduation day when that same instructor walked up to me and said, I’m proud of you, son. I have never, ever in twenty-five years, seen a more determined guy than you!

That helped.

That helped right now.

I could use one of those other SEALs arms and legs right about now. What I wouldn’t give for a breath of air. I can do it. Only a little further. It’s only fifty meters underwater! I had to do twice that for Hell week!

And thanks for bringing up that painful memory, JD.

When I retired from the Navy I swore I would never do anything ever again that involved cold and wet.

And now look at me!

In addition, looks like I’m up against a full blown team of operators. It was like another reoccurring bad dream I had in BUD/S training. I dreamt I was being drown by someone I couldn’t see. By someone I couldn’t reach. All I remember is that I’d wake up in a cold sweat trying to catch my breath.

These operators I could see: Big, mean and decked for warfare.

I’m outta here!

If they were Russian Special Forces I am in trouble as they train in just about every form of combat the same as SEALs: HALO, SCUBA, demolitions and all have specialized training.

There’s no way I can go on.

These guys are just going to track us down and shoot us where we wash up.

I pop Jennifer’s head out of the water first.

We’re about 100 feet away from Jack’s fishing boat.

It’s at least another 100 feet to land but I needed air.

The Russians are still on the dock, nearing the barge, and don’t notice us, yet.

Jennifer’s lips are blue and so, probably, are mine. I breathe another breath into her lifeless mouth while holding her nose. I continue my sidestrokes on my way into a tiny cove, somewhat hidden from the boats.

I’m thinking to myself I can’t quit; I’m so close to the beach. With every breath it seemed as if my heart was growing fainter and fainter. Again, I thought back to my Navy SEAL training.

One instructor said:

Mind over matter. If I don’t mind, nothing else matters!

Pain is just weakness leaving the body!

That was what another instructor yelled at me one day when I almost quit.

Everybody has something that makes them push way beyond where they thought they could go.

In SEAL training, you were taught: Never put your faith in a friend or the toughest guy in the group. If they quit, you’ll likely walk out right behind them.

The instructors taught you to put your faith in something deep inside you, preferably something eternal, bigger than you.

At Coronado, I’d look back to the 32nd Street Naval Base, see some ugly ship and say,

Hey, I’m in the sun! I sure don’t want to be stuck in the bowels of that ugly tug in some God-awful part of the world!

Some of the smallest guys in my SEAL class had the biggest hearts and the fight and strength of guys much, much, bigger. In the combat classes it was like watching a Chihuahua nipping at the heels of a pit bull. The Chihuahua is much faster and has the heart of a lion. And when the Lion soon tires the Chihuahua pounces.

Suddenly, the rain pours!

Thank God!

The rain will make it harder for them to see any trace of us.

I took another deep breath and continued to swim, if you can call it that.

It was a chore to push my legs at all. The strain of holding a hundred-pound woman’s head now above water would have been tough enough at these temperatures and with only one arm pushing through the water, it’s too much.

I’m standing still!

It was like the reoccurring dream I had as a child.

With a high fever, I was running down my grade school hall.

The harder and faster I ran, the further and further the door seemed to get.

The harder I paddled, the further away the beach seemed.

I’m giving up.

On the other hand, this is much easier than that five-and-a-half-mile ocean swim!

The cult I lived in with my mother banned all electronic devices but I found this old cassette tape recorder left at a rest stop picnic table on Interstate 5 and after asking everyone, no one seemed to own the it so I took it!

It had one cassette tape with one song:

When all else failed, that one song got me through Phase II underwater SEAL training.

I started singing what little I could remember:

Every man has a place

In his heart there’s a space

And the world can’t erase his fantasies

Take a ride in the sky

On our ship, fantasize

All your dreams will come true right away

And we will live together

Until the twelfth of never

Our voices will ring forever, as one…

Every thought is a dream

Rushing by in a stream

Bringing life to the kingdom of doing

Take a ride in the sky

On our ship, fantasize

All your dreams will come true miles away

Our voices will ring together

Until the twelfth of never

We all will live love forever, as one…[7]

I couldn’t remember any other verses so I just kept singing the ones I knew over and over and over.

Strange as it sounds:

It worked!

After what couldn’t have been more than ten minutes,

I touched land!

As I try to stand the sheer weight of my wet clothes and Jennifer drop me back into the water. I make one more lunge at the shoreline and fall into some shallow water like a ton of bricks.

Jennifer isn’t breathing. I pull her all the way out of the water to give her a few more breaths.

All SEALs were given basic medical lifesaving training but this situation was clearly beyond “basic.”

I notice the duct tape on her wound is peeling and starting to bleed. Jennifer is still unconscious and doesn’t look like she’ll make it.

I look around knowing we can’t stay here, exposed on the beach. If that is a Special Forces Platoon they will search this beach first.

I would.

So I pick her up and sling her over my back and head for some trees.

I find a sheltered area inside a huge dead tree. I am deep in a lush green forest. What am I thinking: Are you sightseeing? Or trying to stay alive?

Fortunately, this whole area doesn’t have much snow.

I knew from wilderness survival training this meant the area was warmer than the surrounding areas covered in fresh snow.

Also, it’s fortunate that this area has no snow.

Tracks in the snow would lead those operators right to us.

Again, the whole area is beautiful.

“Maybe you should take out your phone and get a picture,” I sarcastically thought to myself.

Idiot!

We’re gonna die here and I want a selfie!

I take off my waterlogged trusty, old, Richard Bass, black parka.

My cell phone falls out of a pocket and quickly check to see if there’s service.