Moon Dust | Generation Kill

Chapter 18: Tainted Love

With Whiskey between her legs, Katie rubbed soothing circles into his fur—the action calming her down more than it did Whiskey. In the aftermath of the danger-close close call and the recent news that Bravo Company would be strong-pointing the walled town with nothing but their humvees, Katie decided that she needed to take a few minutes to cool down. 

The day so far had tested Katie beyond her limits and it was only about mid-afternoon. 

"Corporal Shaw." Doc Bryan appeared at the open back window. "Lieutenant Fick needs you and your dog. We have surrendering Iraqis coming out of the town."

Closing her eyes and exhaling softly, Katie tightened her grip on Whiskey's leash. "Of course we do." She pushed open the door just as Bryan stepped out of the way. 

"You doing alright?" Bryan asked as he walked with Katie and Whiskey down to where Nate and the others were greeting the citizens.

"I could ask you the same thing." Katie snorted. "The way you snapped at Encino Man like that. Man, I wish I had the balls to do something like that."

Bryan shook his head. "No, you don't. It was stupid and I shouldn't have done it."

"Nevertheless, it was fun to watch." Katie was already beginning to feel a little better. "But, yes, I am alright. Thanks for asking."

Arriving to the meeting spot, Katie began to take Whiskey around the locals, directing him to sniff out each and every one of them to make sure they were clean. In the meantime, Nate was desperately trying to figure out what a man using horribly broken English was trying to say.  

"Meesh, seriously, what's this guy trying to tell me?" Nate finally gave up.

Meesh, who had somehow gotten his hands on a beer, took a sip of the drink. "They are glad to be liberated."

"Okay, I got that." Nate's face twisted with annoyance. "What's he trying to tell me right now?"

"They want to show us the locations of the Republican guard, Ba'ath party, and Fedayeen forces," Meesh translated. "Maybe some weapon caches, maybe even some chemical weapons."

Nate nodded, glad to have finally figured out what all the blabbering had been about. "Okay then, it looks like we got our work cut out for us. Tell this man he's going to come with us. Tell him I'm going to take him back-"

 "No, no. That's not how we're rolling, eh?" Meesh cut Nate off. "We are pulling out of here soon. But rest assured, Godfather has a legit plan to exploit the situation." He then pulled out a black case, handed it to one of the Iraqi men, and opened it. "We are going to give these righteous people IR chem-lights. They are going to set them up where the bad guys are, and mark them for the bombers who are going to bomb the shit out of whatever's marked. American Air Force ... the best in the world."

Nate looked from Meesh, to the chem-lights, to the Iraqi citizens. "How do we know this guy isn't just going to put these chem-lights on the homes of people he owes money to? How do we know for sure that he's even on our side, Meesh? How do we know anything unless we properly debrief these people and check their intel?"

Meesh, who clearly couldn't care less, offered his beer to Nate. "Here."

"No thanks, Meesh." Nate refused before walking away.

Looking down at the bottle in his hand, Meesh huffed. "Okay, it's not the good shit, but it's local brewed."

Heading back up to the base, Katie shared a look of disappointment with Nate, who was slowly reaching his tipping point as well. God, how Katie just wanted that day to be over with already; but of course, that couldn't happen until at least one more stupid thing happened.