Free Into Darkness by Richard Fox

spoke with Abdullah. Abdullah knew something as petty as jealousy should be beneath him. But jealousy burned in his heart as the tribe looked to Abu Ahmet for leadership on the battlefield and his father for leadership of the tribe. Abdullah had nothing to offer and nothing to lead, at least not yet.
     
     

Chapter 10
    A single padlock on a frayed and splintered door locked the squad bay door. Most of the smaller patrol bases didn’t bother locking the doors of the mass troop bays. Thievery was impractical, since the senior noncoms could turn the base inside out within hours to find any stolen items. A simple “Don’t Touch” attitude for the base’s sixty-three and dwindling Soldiers kept barracks thievery to a minimum.
    Sergeant First Class Young added the padlock to the squad bay door soon after the ambush once it was clear that none of the nine Soldiers who had lived in that room were coming back. With the sudden loss of so many, the lock kept the material reminder of the occupants hidden, as though a cheap lock could contain fresh ghosts. A comic drawing of a top-heavy bodybuilder over the words “Rock Squad” adorned the door. Captain Shelton peeled the picture from the door and held it for a moment. He rubbed the edge between his thumb and forefinger for a moment, a decision brewing behind his eyes.
    “Burn bag,” he said as he handed it to Kovalenko. The young lieutenant dutifully stuffed the paper into an empty black garbage bag. Collecting the personal effects of the dead was a duty for the chain of command. Rock Squad’s platoon leader, Lieutenant Oberth, had been dead for weeks. The platoon sergeant had died in the attack that emptied the bay.
    Shelton stepped aside as Young searched his key ring. The ring had dozens of keys, numbers, and letter combinations scrawled onto bits of packing tape adorned to each key. The men of Dragon Company joked that they’d starve and start throwing rocks at hajji if that key ring was ever lost. Common areas would always unlock, but anything on a hand receipt was locked at all times. That included the mess hall stores and ammo bunker.
    Young was an older Cajun man with a salt-and-pepper moustache that was far too large for army regulations. Shelton never chided his former platoon sergeant, and now acting first sergeant, for the moustache. The company ran so smoothly that Shelton spent his time fighting the enemy, not his company; he couldn’t ask for more.
    Young opened the padlock and pushed the door open.
    Shelton stepped in and turned on the lights; a single bank of fluorescent lights cracked and snapped on, which were inadequate for the room but better than nothing. The squad bay wasn’t too far removed from basic training. Dual rows of plywood bunks with thin foam mattresses lined each wall. A heap of duffel bags and standard-issue, large backpacks straddled the head of each bunk, bookended by a large, black plastic trunk. Shelton walked to the nearest bunk and opened the trunk.
    “OK, this is…PFC Fernandez.” Shelton pulled out a handful of magazines as Young filled in the property transfer form with Fernandez’s information. All his worldly goods would go back to the family, and a proper accounting was essential. Shelton flipped through the magazines: bikini magazines sold at the PX and a few racier magazines that were strictly forbidden in Iraq. Shelton tossed the magazines in the trash bag.
    He rifled through the box, handing magazines filled with bullets to Kovalenko; those stayed with the company. He tossed vacuum-sealed food packets from field rations into the garbage bag. Nothing perishable could go back to the States. Why Fernandez had a substantial stash of lemony poppy cakes would remain a mystery.
    Shelton glanced through a photo album—the young man with family at a summer barbecue, probably just before the deployment; Fernandez with a toddler perched on each knee; him with a young woman at a bar. Him hugging a different young woman, their