The Saddle Arabia Diaries

Entry 2: Meals on Wheels

James “Big” Macintosh

Private First Class, 141st Infantry Brigade

1326 hours, January 16 2013

Kanterhar Province, South Saddle Arabia

"It ain’t me, it ain’t me, I ain’t no Wonderboooooolt. It ain’t me, it ain’t me, I ain’t no fortunate cooooolt.”

Private Carney had an annoying habit of singing along with whatever we played on the radio. I remember he wouldn’t shut up no matter what we threw at him. No matter how many times Gunner, Ox, and Caballine told him to be quiet, he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. It didn’t mind me so much, but it pissed the hell out of Ox, our fireteam leader. He actually volunteered to relieve Gunner of the machine gun nest on top of the Humvee we rode in. Eventually we shut the radio off and just rode in silence.

I couldn’t blame the kid. Carney was brand new and he’d already been deployed to Kanterhar, where fighting was fiercest. He was just trying to blow off steam. I found that I blew off steam best shooting bad ponies with my gun, which I named AJ. She was loyal, hard-working, and had a hell of a temper when it came to a fight. Just like a certain pony I knew.

Carney was brand new. You could call him a little overconfident. Ox made it clear a while back that he didn’t want to foalsit the new guy. He’d already gone through it once.

Well, in Ox’s eyes, I was still a B.N.P. [Bucking New Pony.] I’d seen enough combat to earn a promotion to PFC, but I still wasn’t used to this.

I don’t think I’ll ever really get used to it. I used to be a farm boy in Ponyville, and now I’m fighting a war. What for, you ask?

In truth, I really don’t know. I’m not really one to express my opinions. I just notice things, is all. Some might call me shy, but I don’t have any problem with putting a bullet in the head of a pony that’s trying to kill me.

Caballine liked me, and so did Gunner. Ox respected what I did and appreciated my efforts in Fire Team Four. As for Carney, things weren’t getting off to a good start. Especially when he kept singing without any music.

“Some colts are born, made t’ raise the sun, ooooh, and bring the moon down, too!”

“Oh for buck’s sake! Shut the buck up, Carmey, or I’ll throw you out!”

Finally, the kid stopped. “It’s Carney, sir.”

“What?”

“It’s Carney. C-A-R…”

“I can spell, Private!” Ox turned around to look at us, keeping his eyes on the new kid.

“Carney, huh? You get a lot of jokes about that?”

“What? Like I work for a carnival?”

“No, like your face is so bucking ugly that you belong in a freak show.”

Caballine stifled a laugh as she kept her eyes on the road, which was practically invisible due to the flying dust. I had to lean over and pretend to cough so that I wouldn’t double over. That was a pretty good insult, and I felt bad for the kid, don’t get me wrong, but I could only barely keep it contained.

“Well, I suppose that does make you an employee of the carnival, so you’re right, grunt!”

Carney didn’t speak for the rest of the trip.

We were on our way to a settlement called Bagriza. We’d been assigned a town sweep because Predators spotted terrorist activity, but as usual Command didn’t want civilian casualties. So they sent in the foot ponies.

It was something I had gotten used to. In truth, the army life is kind of dull. There’s a lot to do, but most of it is menial labor. You have to scrub the floors, clean your gun, accompany patrols, guard checkpoints, and other stuff like that. I got to see action, though, about two weeks ago in Guldeesh, just south of Nagram AFB, where I was stationed. That’s where I became Private First Class Big Macintosh (I don’t use my first name, not if I can help it.)

I’d done my share of town sweeps. Most of the time we came up with nothing, and ended up driving dozens of miles back to Nagram with nothing to show for it. Occasionally we’d find a gun or somepony left behind, but the RSA almost always managed to abandon the town before we got there.

But ARSA [Army of the Republic of Saddle Arabia] was the least of our problems. Now we had the Arabian Brotherhoof, a guerilla group that wanted both the RSA and the Equestrians out. We found more of them than we did government troops on our searches, and they tended to be more violent, more unpredictable. But worst of all was, you couldn’t tell them apart from the regular civvies, and we ended up arresting and searching nearly every damn pony we came across. You couldn’t trust anypony.

So I didn’t. Especially not after that day.

“Why so quiet, Mac?”

Caballine nudged me. I broke away from my thoughts and looked at her fiery eyes. She was a pretty mare, with her crimson mane cut short and her straw-colored coat peeking out from underneath her ACU. She could also find a needle in a haystack in under a minute, and use that same needle to disarm a bomb. She was a hardy little thing.

I just shrugged, and she smiled and playfully punched my arm. “C’mon, big guy. Bit for your thoughts?”

“I dunno,” I said. “Kinda hard t’think with all the bouncin’ and dust flyin’ up everywhere.”

“Damn right,” Ox replied. “I can barely see anything.” He brought his walkie-talkie up to his mouth. “Roller One, this is Roller Four, do you have visual on anything that ain’t sand, over?”

A few moments later: “Negative, Roller Three. We’re still ten miles out from objective. Sit tight. Over.”

“Copy, One. Out.”

“Ten miles?” Carney piped up. “That doesn’t seem too far.”

“It ain’t,” I said, looking out the window and seeing only clouds of sand. “I jogged ten miles every day back home.”

“Didn’t you live on a farm?”

“Eyup. Where’d you live, Carney?”

The new guy looked at me like I was about to insult him. “Manehattan. Bucklyn, specifically.”

We argued good-naturedly about the pros and cons of big city life.  Carney thought I was a dumb hick, and I threatened to teach him a thing or two.  Luckily, we didn’t have to endure much more bickering.  The Humvees could make good time even on the terrible roads.  It was a damned shame that we hadn’t yet received up-armor kits for extra protection, but at least the lower weight made the Humvees faster.

The town of Bagriza looked like many of the settlements in Saddle Arabia; sand-colored and primitive. Carney looked at me.  “Remind you of home, Mac?”

I didn’t reply, my eyes scanning the buildings around us.  I hoped Carney would shut his stupid mouth and do the same.  The convoy was most vulnerable in the tight confines of a town.

Moving as fast as we were, IEDs [Improvised Explosive Devices] would probably not be an issue.  The Arabian Brotherhoof were slippery bastards, but they couldn’t plant bombs if they didn’t know we were coming.  That made it important for us to get in, do the job, and get out ASAP.

Speaking of IEDs, that’s what we were here for. Intel suggested there was a sort of factory were the Brotherhoof was building them. I didn’t really know who or what “intel” was, but sometimes they were right and sometimes not.  We-or at least the more experienced of us-knew to take anything intel said with a grain of salt.

“Eyes on target,” called Ox from the turret. “See that three story building up there?”

I glanced forward, noting the structure he had pointed out before going back to scanning my area of responsibility. Everything about military order was divided into sections. Each member of the fireteam in the Humvee had an assigned task. Our Humvee was one of six in the convoy, which formed a small platoon of troops. Had it been necessary, we could have brought along more Humvees to bolster our ranks to a company or two. As it was, intel said resistance would be light and so only thirty of us went on the raid. This time, intel was wrong.

The radio squawked. “Roller convoy, approach target area and proceed as directed.”

Ox started giving orders. As fireteam leader, it was his job, but the rest of us knew them just in case. The plan called for the six Humvees to surround the target building before we went inside to take down the factory. To make that happen, we had to know the route to get there.

Caballine steered us in the right direction while consulting a map.  Gunner helpfully held it beside her with magic. It was really more of a rough sketch made from overhead imagery, but good enough. The problem was not our route, but who we encountered on it.

A civilian ran out into the street ahead of our Humvee. The narrow corridor between buildings didn’t leave much room to maneuver, and Caballine jammed on the brakes to avoid running the pony over.  From the turret, Ox shouted and waved a hoof, trying to direct him to get out of the way.  None of us in Roller Four spoke the local language.  The stallion was clearly trying to tell us something, but his point wasn’t coming across.

The hair on the back of my neck went up.  Something wasn’t right here.  The noncombatant locals might not hate us, but they didn’t go out of their way to warn us of danger.  Whoever this pony was, we wouldn’t gain anything by trying to communicate with him.  In fact, it would only delay us from the mission.  Or...

“Armed stallion on the roof, two o’clock!” shouted Ox, swinging his turret. He didn’t have to tell Caballine to get moving. The pony in the street jumped out of the way as the Humvee shot forward. I gritted my teeth and pulled my rifle closer.

“What-” Carney started to say, but his voice was drowned by the sudden burst of M249 machine gun fire from the turret. Ox was taking no chances.

The Humvee swung around the next corner as Ox briefly stopped firing to radio the situation. By now, Carney was fully aware what was happening and he wasn’t pleased. “That raghead set us up!  He pretended to be all innocent and then-”

This time it was me who cut him off. “Shut up! We all know what happened, an’ you talkin’ is not gonna help! Keep your mouth closed and your ears open.”

Ox didn’t say anything, but I thought he would be pleased that I took care of Carney. The radio began calling in more status reports. There was significant resistance at the target area.  They might not have been waiting for us, but there sure were a lot of Brotherhood in the area looking for a fight and we were delivering it to them as fast as our wheels could go.

“Technical!” called Caballine, spotting a pickup truck with a machine gun in the bed. I heard Ox light it up, spotting tracers from the M249 riddling the truck with holes. We swept past the wreck, noting a couple of dead ponies. Carney stared wide-eyed at the blood.

We slid to a stop near the target building. “Macintosh, Gunner, Carney, cover the rear.  Caballine, get us up the street to the command position.”

At Ox’s order, I opened the door and bailed out simultaneously with Gunner.  Carney did the same, but a little more slowly. I took half a second to get my M16 shouldered, scanning the buildings around us. The rifle’s sling was wrapped over my back to hold the weapon secure and my right hoof rested on the trigger guard. As a unicorn, Gunner didn’t have that problem.

The Humvee proceeded up the street with Ox covering the front quadrant from the turret.  The rest of us brought up the rear. Moving at the alert position with only three legs left for walking is not exactly easy on the muscles, but comfort comes second when your life is on the line. Despite his magic, Gunner was feeling something of the same thing. Unicorns can’t carry the load of armor and ammo on their body as well as an earth pony, which is why that race was less common in the army. Pegasi even less so.

We joined up with the rest of the convoy. There was a pony in every Humvee turret, and occasionally one of them would shoot at a bad guy. A group of dismounted soldiers covered behind the vehicles. The Lieutenant in charge of the convoy was there, coordinating with the fire team leaders before assaulting the building. “Team Four, you’re taking the south staircase.”

“Yes sir!”  Ox turned to the rest of us and we headed off. Caballine had replaced him in the turret and would not be coming with. The military likes to pretend to be integrated and equal, but we’re actually sexist as hell. All of us would gladly go into combat on behalf of a mare.

Ox looked too preoccupied with commanding the rest of us to worry about a little thing like getting shot as we assaulted the stairs, and that was good.  I don’t like my leaders looking more scared than I am. Gunner’s face looked grim but determined. Carney was a mess, but I was glad to see that he still gripped his rifle tightly.

The first floor had already been cleared, swept by M249 fire and grenades.  A piece of pony lay next to the stairs and I ignored it.

We leapfrogged up the staircase, covering each other in turn just like we had been trained. That was the great thing about training. It was long, grueling, and unpleasant, but it taught you how to do things instinctively, without having to think about it. Pausing at the landing, Gunner yanked a flashbang grenade off his load-carrying harness and tossed it through the door. “Flash out!”

I closed my eyes and braced against the wall. The ear-shattering blast was over in an instant and we went through the doorway, spreading out to keep any burst of fire from hitting more than one of us.

Two ponies were down, looking dazed and stunned. “Carney, cover them!” ordered Ox.  Gunner and I followed Ox through to the next room, meeting up with another fireteam. After declaring the floor secure, it was time to mount the stairs again. The two prisoners we’d taken were left with a support pony while Carney rejoined us.

“Flashes again,” ordered Ox. Gunner nodded and tossed two of the grenades out on the third floor. The two of them went left after the blast while Carney and I swept right. I saw one Brotherhoof member down and holding his ears. Further back, another stallion rolled out from behind cover, raising an AK-47.

I pulled the trigger three times, ensuring the pony would go down and stay there. His blood decorated the wall behind him. Still moving, I swept the muzzle of my rifle around the room, checking behind cover and pieces of equipment that took up the floor.

The next target to pop up was on Carney’s side of the room. It wasn’t my responsibility to cover that area, but I swung my rifle because I didn’t trust Carney. I was right not to. He hesitated, fumbling in surprise. I was an instant late in firing, and the raghead got off one shot before my bullets cut him down.

“Carney!  Are you all right?”

I kept my eyes on the room, rifle still ready.  I heard hard breathing and some pained moans.  Seconds passed, and I tried my hardest not to abandon my vigil.  Then Carney spoke.

“I’m okay.  The-ouch-my armor stopped the bullet, but it hurts like hell.”

I let out a breath I’d been holding. The shock plates and kevlar might have been heavy, but it was worth its weight in gold. “Are you good?”

“Yeah.” I heard him get up, and he trotted over to me. “Sorry.”

I bet you are, I thought. “Come on.”

I had taken half a step forward when an armed stallion came through the next door. Carney was still slower than I, but at least this time he got a shot off. Good; he was learning. We advanced, stepping over the fallen body.

We reached the end of the building and declared it clear. Coming back, Carney and I met up with Ox and Gunner. They both saw the marred surface of his armor, but didn’t comment.  It would have to be declared to the quartermaster who issued the gear, but not until we got back to base.

Back down at street level, we put up a perimeter to protect the rest of our guys as the demolitions ponies went in to organize the destruction of the factory. This was no time to relax, even though a shot hadn’t been fired in our direction for several minutes. I took a moment to glance at Carney’s face. There was a shallow cut on the side of his face from a fragment of bullet that had glanced off his armor, but more importantly I saw how his eyes had changed. He was serious.  He now knew what it took to fight and stay alive. Even a lowly PFC like me could see it.

With the explosive charges placed, we got back in the Humvees and pulled back to watch the fireworks. Really, it wasn’t that impressive, just a little puff of smoke from the third floor. We couldn’t just take down the building, as the civilians might not like that too much.

Mission accomplished, we rolled out of town. Carney was still on edge. He didn’t even sing along when the radio played that old Hay Stevens song about Arabians. Something very important had happened to Carney’s attitude. If we were going to survive, if our convoy was going to fight like it should and repel any attackers who thought we were easy pickings, we needed ponies like him-the new him.

I thought a little about going back to base for some nice food and giving AJ a good cleaning. She deserved a little TLC after the day we’d had. I made a mental note to help Carney with his rifle. He’d earned it.