Roger Ellis - AK-239

Everything on the phone seems fine but:

No Service.

I now find myself angrily shaking my cell phone trying to deny physics and common sense.

I place my parka under Jennifer’s head and again shake her.

Nothing.

I check for a pulse on her neck and, getting nothing, I put my ear over her mouth.

Once again, nothing!

So, I begin chest compressions.

Nothing.

Now I remember, I am supposed to clear the mouth. I pull out a piece of green slimy something from her mouth, hopefully that’s from the water.

I extend her neck and elevate her chin and start mouth to mouth. I can’t believe it: I think I’ve remembered most of my medical training!

After several attempts, Jennifer half opens her eyes and mumbles something I can’t quite make out. I put my ear to her mouth to hear what she’s trying to say:

“If this is your idea of a first date, it may be your last.”

She speaks!

I see her trying to reach for her gun. I knew then and there,

This was my kind of girl!

Suddenly we hear voices and we both freeze.

I cover her mouth.

I’m afraid she’s in so much pain that she might scream.

I now see it’s two operators walking the beach nearby.

As soon as they walk away I take my hand off her mouth.

She lays lifeless again in my hands.

My first thought is,

Oh my God, I’ve killed her!

Again!

My heart races back to Mt. Hood, Oregon just days ago when I was holding the life of Trevor in his hands.

My mind then went flashing to Trevor’s girlfriend as I began to wonder if:

I’m cursed!

Then I remember the EMTs and the Portland Rescue Unit that rescued us on Hood said,

By the time we found you in that blizzard, if you hadn’t built those snow caves you would have frozen to death.

I then wondered how Trevor’s girlfriend was doing.

Last I saw her they upgraded her condition to stable.

The City of Portland wanted to thank me at a press conference.

I told myself: I don’t need no stinkin’ press conference.

And that’s when I left town.

Now I’m thinking,

What the hell? I should’ve been doing compressions.

I snap back to reality as Jennifer’s eyes struggle to open and she tries to speak.

“Don’t try to talk.”

Jennifer stubbornly shoves my hand aside saying,

“Russian! I know why they’re here.”

Jennifer pulls out a phone from her jacket and looks at it,

“Damn! They’re jamming the sat signal.”

“You have a satellite phone?” I grab it trying to see if it’ll work.

Jennifer struggles but gets out the following,

“We’ve gotta find their jamming device.

I joke,

“We?”

This is maybe the first time I’ve seen her smile.

I ask coyly, “So your Ex-Navy too?”

“Ya. Lieutenant Commander, USS Alaska .”

At this point she’s probably going to die, so I might as well compliment her.

“Weren’t you the first woman to command a submarine?”

“Thanks for bringing up such a painful subject.”

“You don’t want to discuss it?”

“Uh, no.”

“Okay. John Denning, SEAL Team Six. Nice to meet you.”

“So you guys killed Bin Laden?” asks Jennifer.

“My guys, ya.”

Where were you?

“Fishing in Alaska.”

“I don’t understand…”

“Ya, now that’s something I don’t want to talk about.”

“Fair enough.”

With that, Jennifer winces in pain and lays back.

“Easy.” I grab her head and adjust my jacket under her.

“Keep going it takes my mind off the pain,” says Jennifer.

I have never revealed these facts to anyone. I think,

How did she get me to say that?

I stare off into the woods, suddenly a million miles from Alaska.

Jennifer, told me later, she’d seen that thousand-yard stare before and wisely says nothing.

All she did was:

Sit up and grab my hand.

After an eternity and a deep sigh, I began,

“Our orders were to breach a compound in Kandahar province, five clicks from the Pakistan border.”

She later told me,

I thought you couldn’t look any paler but this did it.

I looked like a dead body, she said.

This is more painful than the swim. I said, “By the time we got there he was shot and on the ground. He was tryin’ ta say something. I brought my ear to his lips but I couldn’t hear him. I said, Buddy, I can’t hear you. He kept tryin’ ta speak as our medic worked on him. I just kept tryin’ to hear what he wanted to say.”

“He died in my arms. Bravest man I ever knew.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” says Jennifer from the other side of the planet.

I lose it yelling,

“It was my fault. Bull was on point. I made him announce to the terrorists that we were there and I killed him.”

“Why did you announce you were there?”

“The ROEs.”

“Rules of engagement!

“I hate ‘em.”

“I hate all of ‘em!”

Jennifer is clearly taking about the brass and not the ROEs.

“Make the fucking armchair generals in Washington come over here and follow their own fucked up orders!”

That snapped me back to reality. Other than my team, I’d never heard anyone talk about Navy command like this.

Jennifer is probably seconds from death and yet she seems like she could care less about her life.

I’ve met some brave people in my time but she just might be the bravest!

She’s listening, so I go on.

“My other buddy, Big John, was on the raid and we were both really close with Bull. When a review board command blamed us, Big John committed suicide. I resigned from the SEALs the same day. Brought up too many unresolved issues I had with suicide. I blamed myself.”

I feel like I’d just as soon die right here and now.

“I foolishly followed stupid orders and got two of my men killed.”

Jennifer slowly puts her weak hand over my shaking mouth. She sits up and hugs me as I my mind was a million miles away.

When I pull away from her, I realize that she has passed out. I shake her saying,

“Jennifer!”

As she comes to, her first words are:

“They probably heard you, Mr. PTSD. Have you ever talked to someone about all this?”

“Ya, you.”

I look around, “We gotta move.”

Jennifer tries to sit up but almost passes out again.

“You’ve lost too much blood. I gotta get you help.”

Jennifer looks over to the boats saying, “Are they off the boats?”

I peer through a large gaping hole on the side of the hollowed out log.

“Looks like it. All right I’ll swim back to the boat and try to use the radio.”

Jennifer says, “Too bad we don’t have on our blueberries.”

She’s referring to the most hated uniforms in the U.S. military. Fortunately, I heard they’re permanently retiring those dogs.

“We could a used those uniforms. They’d have been the perfect camouflage when we fell overboard.”

No sooner had I said that then both boats explode. Demolitions placed on both hulls sink them right where they sit.

I say sarcastically, “Well there goes Captain Jack and The Black Pearl !

Jennifer wasn’t laughing so I continue,

“I got texts coming into the bay. If I could swim there, I could text help.”

Jennifer: “How far out were you when you had service?”

“About two miles.”

And how far did you swim with me?”

I then had to stupidly act macho, “Hey, we had to do five and a half miles in SEAL training.”

“Coronado?” she sarcastically asks.

“Ya!” I confidently answer.

“Ya, that water was probably thirty degrees warmer!” she points out.

I grind my teeth and force out, “I’m sure it was.”