The Red Line

“How’d I get here?” Jensen asked, trying to shake the faces.

“That’s also a long story. Let’s just say Steele saved your life. I guess I had something to do with it, too.”

Footsteps echoed through the open room of beds filled with the wounded. Jensen could hear the sounds of suffering all around. The smell of death was everywhere. It was an overpowering sensation he recognized all too well.

“Sergeant Jensen, I’m Dr. Wehner. How are you feeling?”

Jensen could smell the same oddly alluring combination of perfume and antiseptic. The sweet-sounding nurse had to be standing with the doctor.

“I’ve been better.”

“Well, you’re lucky to be alive. From what I’ve heard, if it weren’t for the actions of Private Ramirez, you wouldn’t be. As it was, when the medevac brought you in, we didn’t know if we were going to be able to save you. It was touch-and-go there for quite a while. You’re obviously a difficult man to kill, Sergeant.”

“I guess that’s true, sir.”

“Lieutenant Morse tells me you’re experiencing some discomfort.”

“Yes, sir. My leg’s hurting me a lot.”

“Well, after the trauma you’ve suffered, that’s quite understandable. I’ll prescribe some morphine for the next couple of days. After that, we should be able to switch you to a codeine painkiller. Lieutenant Morse will be back to administer it in a couple of minutes. I’ll have her set up a morphine drip after she gives you the shot so you can control the dosage yourself whenever you feel you need something for the pain. Until she gets back, you do the best you can to rest.”

“Yes, sir.”

The doctor turned to Ramirez. “How’s your shoulder? Those bandages too tight?”

“No, sir. I’m doing okay. Inside a warm building, getting three hot meals a day, and not having to make my own bed—what more can a guy ask?”

“Private Ramirez seems to be doing just fine, Doctor,” Lieutenant Morse said. “In fact, I sometimes think he might be doing just a little too fine if you know what I mean.”

Ramirez grinned in response to her comments.

Dr. Wehner looked at Jensen once again. “Sergeant, if you need anything, tell Lieutenant Morse or Private Ramirez,” he said. “He’s already pretty much taken over running this ward anyway. I’ll check in on you later if I get a chance.”

“Doctor, one more thing,” Jensen said.

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“When will these bandages come off so I can see again?”

“The bandages will come off in a few days.” The doctor hesitated. It was clear he was struggling to formulate the proper response. “Until then, we won’t know if you’ll ever see again. The shrapnel hit you just above the temple. The damage to that area of your head was quite extensive. Until the bandages are removed, we won’t be able to tell what long-term damage your eyes might have suffered. For now, you just try to rest.”

While his mind struggled to cope with what he’d been told, Jensen listened to the doctor’s footsteps disappearing down the hallway.

“I’ll be right back to give you the painkiller, Sergeant,” Morse said. “Just take it easy while I’m gone.”

A second set of footsteps disappeared down the hall. The enticing smell went with them.

“Hey, Sarge! You know what?”

“What’s that Ramirez?”

“I know you can’t see them, but there’s a purple heart and a silver star pinned to your pillow.”

“What?” He’d only half heard what Ramirez had said.

“Yeah! This three-star general was here yesterday afternoon. After I told him how you figured out how to wipe out all those Russian tanks and kept the platoon alive for as long as you did, he gave you a silver star right on the spot.”

“That’s great, Ramirez.” There wasn’t the slightest hint of enthusiasm in Jensen’s voice.

“You know what else that general told me?”

“No. What?”

“He said when all this is over and done with, they’re going to put you in for the Medal of Honor. He told me that normally the act of heroism has to be witnessed by two people, and they only had me. But in your case, my story matched with reports they’d received about what was happening up at the border. So he had this captain take my statement. The captain said he’s pretty sure you’re going to get it.”

“That’s nice, Ramirez.” But it didn’t really matter one way or another to the wounded platoon sergeant. At this moment, he would have eagerly traded all the medals in the world for any of the men of his platoon.

Accompanied by her footsteps, the sweet smell returned.

“Okay, Sergeant, I’m going to give you a shot of morphine. This is going to sting a little.”

He could feel her cold hands on his hip. A pinprick rushed to his brain. It was nothing more than a minor annoyance compared to the pain he was in.

“That should do it,” Morse said. “In a few minutes, the morphine will take hold. It’ll relieve your pain and put you back to sleep. I’ll be around in a while to set up your morphine drip and show you how to use it.”

The footsteps headed down the hallway once again.

When the footsteps were gone, Ramirez said, “Sarge, guess what.”

“What is it now, Ramirez?”

“I’m in love.”

“Again?”

“I mean it this time, Sarge.”

“A real looker, huh, Ramirez?”

“Face like an angel, Sarge. Face like an angel. Long dark hair and big brown eyes. And, Sarge, I don’t care how much she tries to hide it, there’s a body under that nurse’s uniform that just won’t quit.”

“Well, she sure smells nice. Maybe someday if I’m real lucky, I’ll get to see the face that matches the sweet smell. By the way, Ramirez, why the hell are you in here?”

“Well, Sarge, let’s just say I took a bullet for a friend and leave it at that for now.”

As he returned to the land where his pain was relegated to his dreams, Jensen wondered what Ramirez had meant by his odd response. It wasn’t long before the powerful drug took hold. Jensen drifted deep into the world within his mind. Once again, he was dancing with his beautiful bride. Her flowing dress swirled behind her. Linda’s captivating smile radiated throughout the corners of the glistening room.

This time, however, the faces of the people standing on the edges of the dance floor were no longer indistinguishable.

The faces of the onlookers were those of the dead soldiers of 2nd Platoon.

CHAPTER 43

January 30—10:13 a.m.

/> On the Eastern Fence

Ramstein Air Base

As darkness had fallen upon Ramstein on the previous evening, the immediate response to the dire threat created by the deadly parachutists was to hammer them with an immense strike by B-2 bombers or a relentless assault by napalm-loaded fighter aircraft. Either approach was one that would have destroyed the vast majority of the fanatical killers within the foreboding woods’ sheltering branches. Within minutes, however, it became clear that neither action was one the Americans would want to undertake.

The risk from both was far too great.

With the base’s fences so near the masking trees, even the slightest miscalculation by a single B-2 during the nighttime assault and rather than dropping its massive load of essence-devouring bombs on the Russians, it would strike Ramstein instead. Such an error was one with the potential to severely damage the critical runways. With the huge bomb craters the errant strike would create, it would take incalculable hours, possibly days, to repair the extensive damage. The B-2’s mistake would have accomplished the parachutists’ mission for them. Ramstein would be out of the war for an indefinite period by the Americans’ own hands.

Burning down every tree in the profuse forest with napalm strikes was certainly tempting. But creating a raging forest fire on the eastern and southern edges of the air base, especially with the prevailing winds, was a far greater peril than anyone wished to face. Watching the endlessly cascading embers sailing toward the base’s structures was something none of them wanted to see. And the horror of being unable to stop the torrent of falling flames tumbling into the base ammunition-storage dump was beyond reason. They needed to find another far-less-hazardous way.

This was an action requiring a surgeon’s scalpel, not a butcher’s cleaver. And there were numerous alternative methods available to the defenders to eliminate the perilous menace to the base’s continuing existence without accidentally destroying Ramstein in the process.

Precision, not brutality, was what was required.

The circumstances called for helicopters, drones, mortars, and Bradleys.