Free Into Darkness by Richard Fox Page A

cheeks pressed together as they smiled for the camera. “Was Fernandez married? Engaged?” Shelton asked.
    “No, sir. Has his mother listed as next of kin,” Young said. His Cajun accent came out on his last word.
    Shelton thought for a moment, then tossed the photos of Fernandez with the women. Such photos could lead to painful questions for the family. Shelton went back to the trunk, calling out numbers and a description of everything Fernandez had brought to the war: socks, multiknife tools, gaudy paperbacks featuring space knights locked in mortal combat with muscle-bound and green-skinned barbaric foes.
    Shelton stopped when he felt something hard and round inside a sock. He teased a large coin from inside. The coin was larger than a half dollar and made of bronze; the raised seal of a dragon was on one side, the battalion crest on the other. It was a unit challenge coin. Shelton had had dozens made before he took command; he awarded them as an attaboy whenever one of his Soldiers accomplished something notable but not notable enough for a medal.
    “I gave this to him…It was bayonet day, right, Sergeant Young?”
    “Yes, sir. Fernandez was the company champion after the pit fight.” Young nodded slowly.
    Shelton remembered that a beat-up and exhausted Fernandez had ripped his football helmet off and spat out his mouth guard only to let loose a string of expletives after beating the piss out of the sergeant with a pugil stick in Green Platoon. Shelton had declared Fernandez the victor of the single-elimination tournament and slipped him the coin during a congratulatory handshake. Shelton remembered Fernandez’s pride beaming beneath a sheen of sweat and still clearing acne.
    Shelton returned the coin to the sock and returned them both to the footlocker. He reminded himself to include the story behind the coin when he wrote the condolence letter to Fernandez’s family.
    They continued cataloging Fernandez’s worldly goods, separating out anything that was Army’s property. Shelton and Kovalenko signed off on the inventory sheet, then taped Fernandez’s footlocker shut with thick silver tape. One down.
    Shelton looked down the aisle; six more bunks remained. Their still life of war interrupted, awaiting order and cataloging. He handed the clipboard with a blank form to Kovalenko.
    “Your turn,” Shelton said. He initially balked at Young’s suggestion that Kovalenko assist with this task. Kovalenko’s platoon was relatively unscathed; no one had been killed or even injured badly enough to warrant evacuation to the States. Young had argued that the young lieutenant might think he was invincible. Reminding Kovalenko of the consequences of his leadership might deflate a growing sense of cockiness.
    Kovalenko moved to the next bunk and opened the footlocker belonging to the late Private Jericho.
    It took an hour and a half to finish the inventory for the entire bay. Young had the personal effects tagged and sorted in the hallway outside the squad bay, ready for transport to mortuary affairs. He also had a sizable pile of contraband destined for the burn pit.
    Young looked back into the bay. All but two of the bunks were bare. All but two had been stripped of everything that made a few feet of plywood and a mattress a home away from home. Those two bunks waited for their owners, as if they would burst back in after their mission, sweating and swearing and bitching incessantly about the heat and the Iraqis. The two bunks remained untouched for Brown and O’Neal in case they returned.
    Young turned off the lights and locked the door.
     
    The compartmentalized housing unit (CHU) Ritter shared with Joe Mattingly was a luxury resort by the standards of any Soldier in Iraq. He had his own bed with a wall locker conveniently placed to block the view of his roommate as they slept. The CHU had its own power outlets and a blessedly frigid air conditioner. Most importantly, the two-man unit was a tiny bastion of privacy