Baxter’s War

  Baxter’s War

  By

  A. L. Roberts

  Copyright © 2018, A. L. Roberts

  All rights reserved

  To Jai

  INFIL

  Moraine stroked the head of her tan and white cat named Skitters as an Afghan boy formed out of the haze and bright sunlight. A lanky child, with a blaze of amber hair, but with jade green eyes like hers. He slipped through the soldiers pulling security around dung colored buildings many centuries old.

  The children asked the strangers questions. Where in America did they hail from, their weapons, and attempted to sell mementoes or food to eat.

  For Master Sergeant Moraine Baxter they offered brothers, uncles, fathers, or themselves. Moraine accepted the moments of flattery as part of the job while keeping watch on the meandering villagers.

  A knot of kids appeared outside the compound she protected. They talked with excited voices as she studied their loose linen clothing for odd bulges and errant hanging cords. She learned through several hard experiences to maintain a professional awareness. Smile, nod, and don’t be gullible by the cute faces. An adult always hovered on the outskirts, studying the soldier’s responses to the children.

  Her colonel deemed her assignment extra critical. A general planned to visit the village to form a partnership with the local leaders and insure their safety until the Taliban lay defeated.

  She positioned herself close to the home being prepared for the gathering. Infantry surrounded the perimeter. Her and two Delta sergeants strolled inside the walls, waiting for the general’s arrival.

  The boy owning the blazing hair neared her. “You Special Forces?”

  “Maybe,” Moraine responded. “Who might you be?”

  “Alek.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Alek. You’re English is fantastic.”

  “Thank you, Baxter?” He pointed to her cat tucked in a tan pouch sewn to the side of her body armor. “What’s his name?”

  “He’s a she. Her name is Skitters. No school today?”

  “No, I’m a man. Do you want to be mine for the rest of your life?”

  Moraine grinned. “What age did you become a man, Alek?”

  “Eight.”

   Moraine spied children talking with a few soldiers who entertained them. She caught Alek peeking at what went on within the dwelling behind her. She turned, saw a woman sweeping the home's shaded interior, making things neat.

  “You know them?”

  Alek nodded. “They my neighbors. Friends of the family.”

  “Once the meeting starts, go play.”

  “I deliver tea today.”

  “Oh, you are?”

  “Yes,” Alek said. “See, my uncle.” He gave a frantic wave.

   “Alek.” The bearded elder came over. “Be on time, boy.”

   “Yes, Uncle,” he answered and walked off to join the other boys.

   “Happy boy.” The man gazed at Skitters and frowned before departing.

   Moraine sipped from her canteen as the duo mingled into the crowd. She re-wrapped her tan Hijab. Skitters meowed as engines roared in the distance. Heat waves shimmered the stifling air.

  Four armored Rhino trucks rolled into view and parked before the home. A security team jumped out, performed a perfunctory search, ensuring the village secure for the general to exit his vehicle.

   Moraine greeted the security leader with a quick handshake. “We’ve been here the entire morning. No rumblings so far.”

  “Sounds good, Baxter.”

  She watched him lower his chin and whisper into his radio handset. General Sanders emerged from the second truck wearing a clean and pressed uniform. He stopped to survey his surroundings with hands propped on slender hips.

  Moraine performed an inward eye roll. No one saluted the general out in public. An unspoken rule to keep the enemy from thinking a juicy target didn’t enter the neighborhood.

  She attached herself to the scene, noticing every movement or person drifting close to her zone. General Sanders and his entourage eased beyond the walls and a security team member shut the iron gate after the group. Her teammates resumed their stroll.

  The uncle from earlier arrived, glanced at Moraine and opened the gate. Alek showed up holding a silver platter loaded with teacups and a medium sized kettle of hot water. He stayed focused on his activity, passing Moraine as if she didn't exist. She followed the boy with her inquisitive gaze as he approached the open doorway.

  She trailed Alek, eager to witness a tea ceremony. Enough soldiers covered the front and her task allowed her room to move between the gates and house twenty yards from the main entrance.

  Moraine adjusted her Hijab again, covering everything beneath her sharp stare. She removed Skitters from her pouch. The cat scampered away to the compound’s entrance, sat in the shade and began cleaning herself.

  Alek vanished into the house cool innards. She halted near a window, watching Alek attend to a cluster of males sitting on rugs and decorated pillows. The boy placed the platter between the gathered men. General Sanders looked her way. Moraine noted his hazel eyes and a sense of hope spreading his face.

  Alek knelt to make tea when he exploded.

  A powerful hot fist struck her. A blank space saturated her mind with red light and pain. She found herself prone and blanketed with debris and blood. Acrid smoke assaulted her nostrils and her ears rang something awful.

  Alek’s uncle rounded a corner gripping a Kalashnikov forty-seven. The gun burped flames and chatted in a deep staccato. Delta Force operators Ricky Chance, and Lang Steward spun to the ground as rounds stitched their bodies.

  Alek’s uncle leaped over Moraine. He headed for the shattered building where the boy vaporized into a thick cloud of fire, dust, and over a thousand nails and glass marbles. He sprayed lead into the jumbled rubble, shouting incomprehensible words.

  Moraine pushed herself up, her head swooned and she retched her breakfast. Alek’s uncle consumed himself with killing off any infidels who survived the blast.

  She stared at her mangled right arm, a mess of singed material and bloodied flesh. Thin metal speckled her arm, akin to pins in a pincushion. The fingers on her hand twisted in awkward positions as if broken. Three round shiny objects sat embedded in her palm staring at her. She crossed reached for her pistol with her left hand.

  Moraine closed her mouth and fought through her blurred vision consuming her world with an ever tightening darkness. She stepped forward and brilliant sparklers of pain flashed up both legs. She screamed and vomited, tumbled over and Alek’s uncle pivoted.

  Moraine hit the dirt nose first. The man, lost in a blinding rage, continued squeezing the Kalashnikov trigger. Bullets snapped overhead, buzzing away into the unknown. She rocked onto her shoulder studded with searing nails, driving them deeper into her ruined flesh. She lifted her handgun while screaming and emptied her magazine into the attacker.

  Alek’s uncle paused, the rifle barrel aimed low. Arrogant awe widened his eyes and scrunched his lips as if death happened to other people and not him. Soldiers rushed through the gate, and finished off the terrorist with the elan of a firing squad.

  Moraine eyelids weighted down. Her thoughts fogged. Pain lingered in her body, dispersing with the seconds. Gloved hands tugged on her vest. She worried about Skitters as the clamor of war faded into the vast chasm of her unconsciousness.

  1

  Moraine surveyed the silent white hall. A bomb proof level X door loomed behind her. Her security clearance allowed for A1 access only. To her front footfalls echoed against the waxed linoleum flooring. From the T section, nine people and two dogs rounded the corner. She counted four scientists, three generals, and two interns leading a pair of Belgian collies on leashes. One
black and the other white.

  The nine reached her. She held out her left hand, and they produced their identification cards. A stoic silence ensued as the transaction took place. The four legged duo stared up at her, mouths closed, seeming to study her with an uncomfortable human interest. She ignored the canines and removed an ultra violet penlight from her pocket, sweeping the invisible light over the cards. The infinity markings appeared, a rank above top-secret.

  Moraine returned the cards and nodded, then stepped aside. One scientist approached a scan pad and pressed his thumb against the emerald surface. The door opened, sliding on hidden rails, and the gaggle eased through with a Benedictine monk hush.

  The door shut and locked the group inside. She placed her back against the door. Her thoughts refocused on family, her new job as a guard at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and her tour overseas as a Delta Force operator.

  The pleasant hum in the hallway from the air conditioner calmed her. Two hours remained on her shift, and its ending staggered towards her.

  The floor started on a sudden sway as if she tried to balance herself on a skateboard. Soon, the rocking turned into a shudder. The rising momentum resembled a locomotive plowing up from the earth. She looked at her watch, mouthing the time. If the trembler lasted over five seconds, performing an emergency override into laboratory X became her next step. Yet, her count proved unnecessary.

  An impressive roll swept underneath her, fighting its way up the walls. The bright lights above burst in a spray of glass and white powder. A jagged rent danced along the ceiling. The building rocked and rattled.

  Moraine struck a wall, slid to the floor where she landed on her butt. The secured door did something impossible. It bulged. A split ran horizontal from seam to seal. She thought the engineers built the door to withstand earthquakes and explosive devices.

  Moraine regained her footing while fighting against the swell and fall of the floor. She failed to notice the red knot on her forehead, or her cut fingers from the shattered fluorescent bulbs. Her brown eyes focused on the door until darkness swallowed everything.

  Alarms wailed within the Labs. Golden rays shot through the cracked titanium. The quake intensified until both wall and door crumpled in akin to aluminum foil.

  Moraine fell hard again and rushed from the destruction unfolding in her wake. More sunlight splashed the dusty debris ladened chaos. The terrible rumble settled to a gentle rock, reminding her of a baby in its father’s arms. Before her, mangled metal and exposed wiring sparked and jumped.

  Her stomach sank at the sight. The door she guarded no longer existed. The entire lab gone, ripped and thrown into the rugged claws of fate. A dirt wall rose ten yards across from her, exposing dark earth and underground power lines and pipes. Blue electricity and smoke drifted to her nostrils.

  Moraine struggled to her shaking legs and neared the earthen chasm. She forced her thighs not to spasm too much. A scientist lay twenty-feet below, unmoving, with a bloody gash decorating his sheared scalp.

  The two collies circled him, sniffing at his prone frame. Other scientists and generals, joined by the interns, lowered themselves to the ground on hands and knees. The black Belgian lifted a leg. Yellow urine streamed from the dog, splashing on the lead scientist’s head covered in black curly hair.

  The experiments gazed at the humbled scientist before bounding up a ramp formed from jumbled concrete slabs. Without pausing they scrambled beyond Moraine’s eyesight.

  Still kneeling, the scientist who the black dog peed on mouthed words she could not understand.

  “Are you okay,” she called to them. Her body trembled from the adrenalin dump and damage she witnessed.

  “Why didn’t you shoot them?”

  Moraine hunched her shoulders. “I'm not here to kill dogs.”

  “You screwed us,” the scientist shouted. “Leave, Moraine Baxter. You don't work here anymore.”

  2

  On her way home Moraine wondered why the dogs in the surrounding neighborhoods ceased howling. For the first hour after she left the Livermore Labs front door, a chorus of howls and yaps surged throughout the city. At the moment silence punctuated the air.

  The Labs let her off early after firing her and she hated losing her security guard job. As for the escaping dogs, a reasonable mistake. With the bleeding and injured below her, the mutts dropped to the bottom of her concerns. Besides, the scientists refused to inform the guards on the sensitivity of their projects. Thus, she concluded, her lack of action in killing two dogs.

  News of terrible road conditions forced Moraine to abandon her Toyota Celica at the Labs. She planned on returning for the car at night. Walking the four miles home with backpack and rifle bag strapped to her back, provided a chance to calm her jitters.

  On her journey she met refugees displaced by the earthquake. Thousands, both despondent and in shock choked the damaged roadways. Collapsed telephone poles and cell towers lay with exposed wires. Many with live cables dancing and sparking, resembling dangerous vipers.

  In other spots thick smoke plumed into the sky. Water gushed from burst pipes and rescue vehicles swarmed towns, trying to maneuver through the devastation.

  Two hours passed before Moraine saw her complex, relieved the building remained upright unlike so many others. On a normal day her travel time from work to home lasted fifteen-minutes. She climbed the stairs to her condo, body aching as she slid her key into the lock and entered.

  One Xanax, and eight beers on, she faced her living room window gazing out at the condominiums. Earlier they cleaned up, stacking the fallen pictures and sweeping broken glass and righting what needed righted.

  “Erik,” she said.

  Erik, her husband, emerged from a bedroom. “Can you get any louder? Casey is sleeping.”

  “The dogs stopped barking.”

  “Yea, since after the quake.”

  “What I meant, no random nothing. Yelps, snarls, yowling.”

  Erik saddled up to his wife of eight years and wrapped her waist with his lanky arms and rested his narrow chin on her shoulder. Together they beheld the late afternoon scenery brushed with umber. Neighbors assembled in tight knots, distraught, a few shouts sounded.

  “I’m going downstairs, Erik.” Moraine untangled herself from Erik's limbs and exited into the weak sunlight. She meandered for a babbling cluster of friends. “Mrs. Chase, hi.”

  An older woman, with liver-spotted hands pressed against her belly, smiled. “Oh, hi, Moraine. Did you see the dogs?”

  “No, I heard them earlier though.”

  “It was the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen.”

  “They howled at the same time after lunch,” Tom Flattery added.

  Moraine studied the parking lot. Cracks branched off at places. Support beams from carports snapped, metal carport covers leaned against parked cars. Blue glass shimmered in the dying light. Distant sirens wailed as firefighters and cops responded to emergencies elsewhere.

  She didn’t own a dog. In fact Moraine never cared for them, she considered herself a cat person. Their arrogance, and coolness, drew her in, and how they snubbed you until they demanded something. A shout reached her ears, and she shifted away from the condo.

  “The dogs are here.” A man shouted. “They’re in the old field.”

  Moraine frowned as Mr. Vu jogged into view, waving his wiry arms in frantic sweeps. Nervous citizens headed towards Mr. Vu. Their voices congealed in concern. Fright hung heavy in his stare as he waved.

  She spun, sighted Erik on their balcony. A gentle smirk played his lips. He winked at her. “What do you say, Erik?”

  “Go find out. Be a nosey neighbor for once.”

  “I'm gone.”

  She hunched her shoulders and walked the few yards skirting a shattered carport. She stepped over raised earth and hustled her way over a downed tree. Her heart beat in her chest as it did at the Livermore Labs. The fear she experienced when the impregnable titanium wall sheared off resonated with
in her, refusing to depart.

  Moraine trailed the upset gaggle to an undeveloped field carpeted with sun beaten grass. Once again large clusters of folks formed, the numbers rising. They soaked in the event. A short gasp escaped from her mouth.

  Canines in the hundreds, close to a thousand, stood on an easy slope. She couldn’t estimate the exact count. They yapped and barked, no growls. Different breeds jostled against each other. A few tails wagged, tongues lolled. Dogs rolled in the dry weeds. Yet, peace reigned.

  Pit bulls ran with Shih Tzu’s, German shepherds and French bulldogs tapped snouts with paws, Chihuahuas sniffed the butts of Huskies. More dogs poured in from various homes and streets.

  “My, this isn’t right is it, Moraine.” Mrs. Chase placed a wrinkled fist between her saggy breasts.

  Moraine scanned the high hillside and discovered two dogs dominating its peak. Familiar dogs and their presence sent an ache through her stomach. She slipped her hand into her pocket and pulled out her cellphone, hoping the service worked. She dialed the number to the Labs.

  After three rings someone answered. “Chuck, it’s Moraine.”

  “Hi, Moraine. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. Is Doc Carver available?”

  “Yea. He’s crying over his lost dogs. Hold on a second.”

  Moraine hummed a tune. Her mind tried to interpret the impossible circus act performed without human help. The two Belgian collies held the masses as if prepared to make a speech.

  “Doctor Carver. Who’s this?”

  “Hi, Doc. It’s Moraine Baxter. I see your two dogs.”

  “You what?”

  “The two collies. The black and white dogs you guys had. I see them. I think.”

  “What do you mean you think, Moraine? It is them or it’s not them.”

  Moraine shivered, her skin pimpled. More people arrived from the city, peddling in on bikes, or managing their cars over broken roads. Big and small followed their pets to the open land hazy with dust from feet and paws.