William Forstchen - The Final Day

His friend was wide-eyed and gasping. It looked as if his vest had taken a shot, and for a few seconds, John thought he had just been stunned by the blow, turning to Grace and shouting at her if she was wounded.

“I don’t think I’m hit!” she cried. He then looked back at Lee, who at that instant started to cough up blood.

The medic frantically tore the Kevlar jacket open, cursing. There was an entry wound that had punched through his jacket just above his heart. The medic rolled Lee up onto his side, slipped his hand down the back, and came up with a bloody hand.

“Damn it!” the medic cried, and he looked at Grace, who had been standing behind Lee in the helicopter, her face splattered with blood.

“You hit?”

“No, not sure… no.”

“Then put pressure on Lee’s wound!” the medic shouted, pushing down hard with his own hands first and then grabbing Grace’s hand and guiding her to take over. He looked back to the front of the chopper. The pilot was staggering out, arm drenched with blood, copilot running around the front of the Black Hawk to help him get clear. The medic returned his focus to Lee.

John knelt beside Lee, not sure what to do other than hold his old friend’s hand. The medic was cutting through Lee’s parka and shirt underneath, stabbing the exposed arm with a syrette of morphine, and seconds later the look of panic in Lee’s eyes cleared a bit while the medic worked frantically to set up a bag of plasma.

“What’s his name?” the medic cried, looking over at John.

“Lee Robinson.”

The medic leaned down close to Lee’s face. “Lee, you are going to make it, but you’ve got to stay with me. I’ve got to keep you breathing, I’m going to work a breathing and suction tube down you; don’t panic. You got that? Stay with me. I’m going to get you through this!”

Lee looked around wide-eyed, gaze resting on John. “Gettysburg. Good place to die, my friend.”

“You’re not dying, Lee!” John cried.

Lee coughed up more blood. “Thought we’d share being grandfathers together. Tell them I love them.”

He started to convulse. The medic gave up on the breathing tube for a moment, pulling Grace’s bloody hands aside and actually slipping a couple of fingers into the entry wound.

“Jesus God,” the medic whispered softly, and then he leaned back, reached into the tote bag dangling from his shoulder, pulled it open, and drew out an emergency surgical pack.

“I’ve got to try to go in,” the medic announced, “stop the bleeding there.”

He unrolled the pack beside Lee and then drew out another morphine syrette and stuck it into Lee’s arm.

John looked at him, questioning this decision.

“I’ve got to all but knock him out,” the medic snapped before John could even ask.

All this time, gunfire was snapping around them, several shots stitching up the snow within feet of where the medic was working. He looked back over his shoulder. “Damn you, you sons of bitches, can’t you see I’m a damn medic?” he cried.

Lee was still frothing up blood. His lungs were clogging with aspirated blood, the medic whispering for Grace to cover her friend’s eyes and keep reassuring him.

She began to sob as she leaned over him and started to whisper calming words that he would make it.

Another convulsion tore through Lee’s body, blood spraying up out of his mouth in a torrent, and then he just started to relax.

The medic leaned back and said nothing, lowering his head.

Lee looked up at John and actually appeared to smile. “Gettysburg. Bury me here, John.” And then he was gone.

John could only kneel beside his friend of so many years, holding his hand, finger resting on his pulse, feeling the last faint beat, and he was gone. All he could do was kneel over, embrace his friend… and cry.

“Matherson!”

He looked up. It was Sergeant Major Bentley gesturing for him to come forward.

John ignored him for the moment, looking back to the medic.

“It was .50 caliber most likely. Kevlar won’t stop that. Felt like his aorta was nicked, pulmonary arteries shot up as well.” He stared at Lee for a moment and then turned to look at the pilot, who was crouched down next to him, blood pouring down his arm.

“Let’s take care of that,” the medic said, and he turned away as if Lee had never existed.

“Damn it, Matherson, on me!” Again it was Bentley. John forced himself to stand up and then paused, leaned back over, and closed his friend’s eyes. Grace was kneeling by the body, crying.

“Grace, stay here with the medic. You can help him.”

“I’m going with you,” she snapped sharply.

“Damn it, I’m not losing you too, Grace. Now stay here with the medic. He needs you more than I do.”

“Stay here, Grace; I need you,” the medic ordered even as he tore away the sleeve of the wounded pilot to reveal arterial blood pulsing out.

“Matherson, damn it, the general wants you. Move it!”

John looked back to where Bentley was standing out in the open, arms on hips, as if oblivious to the firefight that was going on.

John spared one last glance for his fallen friend, stifled back his emotions, and crouching low started toward Bentley.

Maury, Forrest, and Malady, who had been deployed forward, got up to join him.

“Lee?” Maury asked.

“Gone,” was all he could choke out.

A loud tearing sound, almost like that of a bedsheet being ripped in half, echoed against the face of the ridge. One of the Apaches, angled down, was at a hover fifty feet up, pouring in a stream of 30mm shells across the face of the huge steel doors, then turning its fire into a bunker on one flank for several seconds, pivoting, delivering the same deadly blow to the second bunker on the other side of the door. Its tracer rounds made its efforts look like a garden hose of liquid fire pouring down from an angry heaven. A second Apache was swinging back and forth, sweeping the ground above the door with the same river of death. There was a secondary explosion from what must have been a concealed bunker positioned partway up the steep slope.

John came up to Bentley, who without comment turned, set off at a slow jog, and led them to where General Scales was down on one knee, snapping out commands into a handheld radio.

“That’s it, you’ve torn the shit out of them!” he cried. “We take one more shot. Don’t wait for me. Cut loose again!”

The two Apaches broke away from their attacks, turned, and with rotors thumping loudly pivoted and climbed up.

Bob stood, went over to a Black Hawk, and held up his hand, and the pilot offered him a microphone linked to a loudspeaker strapped to the helicopter.

“That’s it!” Bob shouted. “We didn’t want a fight. You opened fire first. You saw what you got. Lay down your arms, come out hands over your heads, and I promise safe surrender. You’ve got thirty seconds, or some Hellfires will come in next.”

The bunker to the left flank of the steel door let go with a secondary explosion, ammunition within lighting off like a long string of firecrackers, men around Bob ducking. He remained standing.

“Fifteen seconds or you’ll really get a taste of hell.”

Three men came staggering out of the second bunker, hands up, one of them obviously burned, smoke swirling up from his scorched uniform.

“Medic forward!” Bob shouted. “Surrender; we’ll take care of the wounded. This is General Bob Scales, Eastern Command. I am giving you a direct order that will save your lives. Now give it up.”

One of Bob’s medics raced forward and actually knocked the man in the smoldering uniform down, rolling him back and forth in the snow and shouting for one of the other surrendering men to help him. The sight of this finally broke the standoff at last.