Time/Date Error (Damned of the 2/19th-Book Six) - Done

Ya'll Fucked Up

Grafenwöhr
US Army Training Area
Training Site 22
2/19th Company Area
West Germany
29 October, 1987
2230 Hours

Specialist, no, Corporal Bomber stared at the map, shaking his head. He could see the same thing I could, that Stillwater was stuck in a bad position that was only going to get worse as the air got colder and colder through the night. Latest reports was the there was lightning in the clouds, and with the low pressure front the cloud tops, which currently were mirror smooth, would mushroom up and into the low pressure.

Which would expose Stillwater to ice crystals and the ion haze of the lightning bolt.

"Well, shit, Chief, if'n there a way to help Ant, I sure can't figure it out," Bomber said, staring at the map. "I mean, I might be able to lead a small team up the side of the mountain, maybe up AWOL Trail, but..." he let the sentence trail off.

"That's only an option if he fails," I told him. "What about Goat-Fuck Trail, could you use that to reach the lower egress point?"

He tapped the map and shook his head. "No, you have to move along a five foot wide path right here, and the wind sheers right across it," He looked at me, "At fifty miles an hour? It'll snatch someone clean off that ledge and throw them two thousand feet straight down."

I shook my head, "How the hell do you guys justify taking that trail drunk off your asses?"

He just shrugs. "It seems like a good idea at the time."

"Your mothers all obviously threw away the living children and kept the afterbirth and stupidity that thick is obviously genetic," I snapped. Bomber just shrugged, my insults just rolling off his thick hide. "Goddamn it, there has to be a way to give him some help." I rubbed my temples, trying to think of something.

Nothing.

Goddamn it, just when that retard was starting to show some potential beyond typical enlisted man stupidity and arrogance, and now he was going to get killed for no fucking reason beyond some asshole had been too lazy to his fucking job.

I lit a cigarette and slapped my Zippo down. When Bomber tapped the pack and looked at me questioningly I waved my hand, staring at the map. Holding the cigarette between my teeth I slowly walked around the table, looking at it from different angles, trying to figure out something to give him an edge.

"Fast movers," Bomber said suddenly.

"He doesn't need a goddamn napalm strike," I snarled.

Bomber grinned, "Why not?" He suggested. "There's sixty feet of goddamn snow up there. Hit the Group Area here, here and here, that'll cut everything off from one another, give him straight channels of fire."

When he swiped his finger down the main road, and then the road that led up to the motorpool, then between the chow hall and the Dispensary I just stared as he put forth what had to be the dumbest thing I had heard since Captain Quintin had ordered my platoon to take that goddamn hill back in '69. Yeah, it would melt the snow all right, but the steam would cover everything and God himself only knew what it would do to the storm clouds.

"Joking, joking, Chief," Bomber said, exhaling smoke with a grin.

I wanted to punch him in his smart mouth. I opened my mouth to tell him to outside and play in the goddamn snow, tell him to shove those fast movers right up his...

...wait...

...jets...

I picked up the Naval Weather Service paper, only a half hour old and stared at it. A C-130 wouldn't cut it since the barracks themselves were over the plane's maximum ceiling, you'd need jet thrust at that altitude, but a C-141 might do the trick.