Moon Dust | Generation Kill

Chapter 17: Danger-Close

Sitting on the back of one of the open-topped humvees, Katie let her legs hang over the edge as she began to swing them like a school girl out of boredom. "It's really kind of cool when you think about it." Katie looked down at Evan, his eyes glued to his notebook but his ears listening to every word she said. "You're just sort of let loose and everyone is given a few weeks to find a dog that they really connect with. If you don't connect with a dog, you're gone. It's really kind of nerve-wracking because after all of this hard work and studying to get where you are, the final test is sort of just left up to fate."

"I never knew it worked that way." Evan's hand moved so fast that Katie swore he had been sped-up somehow. "And how did it work for you and Whiskey? Was he the first dog you tried?"

Katie chuckled. "No, no. I tried two other dogs before I met Whiskey. The first dog was just a complete no-go, we did not work well together at all. The second dog and I lasted a little longer, her name was Rosie and she was super smart and willing to learn, but again, when it came down to it, she just wasn't the one. Then I worked with Whiskey and within the first ten minutes I knew we were going to make a great team."

"That's a cute story." Evan nodded slowly as he finished up his notes. "Sort of sounds like a romance movie."

"If only Whiskey was a human man and not a dog, right?" Katie mused.

A mischievous smirk spread across Evan's face, one that suggested he was about to dig even deeper for information. "So does that mean there's no one special waiting for you back home? I know a lot of these guys are married and have girlfriends. What about you?"

Normally, Katie would try to find a way around answering Evan's question, but she didn't really see any harm in answering this one. "No, no one but my family is waiting for me back home," she confessed. "... and even them I'm not always too sure about."

Before Evan could poke and prod some more at Katie's personal life, Poke strolled over, a can of dip in his outstretched hand. "Dip?"

"Yeah, thanks." Evan gratefully partook in the tobacco offering.

Katie just shook her head. "No, I'm good. Thanks though."

"Suit yourself." Poke shrugged before putting the lid back on the tin. "Dawg, we was like, thirteen or fourteen and we were pedaling around in this neighborhood I grew up in, just East of LA." He dove into a story from his childhood from out of nowhere. "We saw some cholos from another hood and we thought we was all hard gangbanger wannabes. So we started saying, 'Fuck off, yo!' 'Fuck off,' throwing and flashing signs to them and stuff. So they started throwing down on us, kicking our little asses. Then some of the older dawgs from our hood come out, grab those fools, took one behind the Tastee Freez ... they stabbed him up with a screwdriver. Killed that cholo. See, Generally white people, they don't drag a dude behind the Tastee Freez and stab him to death with a screwdriver. So after that day, I decided I'm gonna hang with white people."

Evan couldn't hide the amused smile on his face. "Well, here you are."

"Gotta love white people." Katie tutted her tongue against the roof of her mouth.  

Spotting Chaffin walking by, Evan excused himself to catch up with him, probably to try and track down the picture of his girlfriend he had lost. Somehow, that photograph had continued to make its way around the company without Evan ever knowing where it was. Like Brad had said, he should have never let the men see a photo of her in the first place.

"Poke!" Brad called and waved from where he, Nate, and a few others were gathered around a map on the hood of one of the humvees. "Katie, you too!"

Walking side by side, Poke and Katie joined the small gathering just as Nate began his little spiel for the day. "This town Ar Rifa runs right up on the MSR for two kliks." He placed his finger down on the mentioned town name on the map. "Must be seventy-five-thousand people in it. Our mission is to haul ass past it."