Shot where the arm and the leg used to be
He was face down in the Iraq desert on a US military base with a big gulp of Iraqi desert sand in his mouth.
The mortars boomed, the earth trembled. Suddenly he was grabbed, dragged to a pile of sandbags and heaved behind. Explosions everywhere. Then just as he was about to breathe he was grabbed again and this time bent in half and half run half carried in the grip of strong arms to a reinforced building where he was rushed downstairs to an underground bunker. He never saw more than a few feet in front of his face in the swirling blackness outside, was never allowed to straighten up even once inside the building. He had taken some shrapnel in the back and couldn’t comfortably straighten up. Only saw boots. Wounded, bleeding, the President was shoved into a secure room where he passed out.
He was lucky to be alive.
He had no business being in Iraq in the first place, of course. The US military had no business being in Iraq in the first place. But there it was. There they all were. Any one of them would be lucky to get out alive. This time, even the Big Shots.
Right about now I can hear dominant media book and film critics blather about how boring and artless is partisan fiction. Poor hired hands – or is it hired guns? – they don’t even realize the pitiful the polemics they write, these establishment pros, tin of ear and gross as they mistake and mistype.
Almost everyone in the President’s entourage had been shot or killed by the initial blasts, as much of the base went up in flames. Five US Army helicopters piloted by Iraqi resistance forces had been able to land but failed to locate the President before he was secured. Several of the Iraqi-piloted helicopters did manage to take a few wounded members of the media and the President’s staff hostage, most of them unconscious or mortally wounded, left behind by their colleagues in the initial scramble.
Soldier Two was shot in both legs but superficially. His peg was splintered not shattered, and he was about the only one standing after the initial burst who could much help. He grabbed the President with one arm and Soldier One with the other – her peg had been blown off, and they threw themselves behind nearby sandbags. Smoke everywhere though Soldier Two could see the helicopters landing and not in any defensive formation. He guessed immediately what was happening. The helicopters lay down a covering fire. The three Americans were close enough to the main building and the smoke was heavy enough they could move to it unseen though they would have to move fast.
