Sleeping Next to the Burn Pit

Air was black. Not in a colloquial sense, though the sun had set hours ago, and the air was honey thick. It was a call put out over the radio, code for the hospitals were overflowing, and no emergency helicopters would respond to requests for help. A warning, not heeded by those in charge. We were going to be relieved soon by another unit of Marines, and they needed to be shown the area of operations.  It was my team’s turn to show them around; give them the layout of this patch of endless expanse of desecrated farmland we had called home for seven months. I was the point man, the lead of our patrol, the one who held the fated dice and gambled with lives each time I picked the route we moved along. But I was good at my job, a grandmaster chess player who moved my pieces like a blank puzzle and kept my opponent always guessing.  I followed some basic rules when we patrolled, like never take the same route twice and avoid the manmade bridge crossings that formed over the spiderweb of canals. Better to jump across and land face first in the mud than your last moment be the sinking of a pressure plate being stepped on.

Tonight, we were taking their senior leaders out, both officer and enlisted, as well as parts of the group that would directly replace mine. My team leader was out for the night, having rolled his ankle during the previous patrol. This meant the direction rested solely on me. I was the navigator; we all went where I went. As we prepared to leave the base, I checked my gear one last time. My body armor was Atlas’s stone, weighed down by ammo, medical equipment, the metal detector, and the creeping fear I had swirling inside me every day we got closer to leaving for good. Despite these feelings, I was a professional, bound by the boots I had walked thousands of miles in. Tonight was no different. I had a job to do, and like I said, I was good at it.  I switched on my night vision goggles and let the emerald light wash across my eyes. The wind was picking up a little, whispering bedtime stories to only me. I exited the door, and my muscle memory switched on. I could feel the tilled earth shift beneath me, and I suddenly felt like some nocturnal animal waking up for a hunt. I scanned the village around me like a hawk, soaring above the area I had mapped out in my mind so many times before. “Let’s move”, I heard the hushed radio squawk, and I started moving towards our first point of interest.