Walton could feel the rush of adrenaline shoot through his body.
That’s what happened when you were in the middle of an attack. At any moment, a bullet could end your life or a fellow soldier. You had to think clearly and straight because every decision involved life and death.
Just before the firefight, he had received a detailed situation report, and it seemed that everything was going as planned.
“Blocking positions set, moving into the assault.”
Walton knew that Sanders and Walding were almost to the village. They had one more terrace to go. He was about halfway up with Behr, CK, Carter, and Rhymer. Bringing up the rear, Ford’s element hadn’t even started climbing yet.
An F-15 flew low over the mountain, its engines sending a roar that echoed through the valley. Walton was getting a little concerned that the team was getting too spread out, but they hadn’t made contact with the enemy. Everything was going smoothly. Maybe they could get up to the village before Ghafour and his fighters could react.
Then a high volume of fire exploded around him. They were in an open area. As bullets hit inches from his boots, Walton and CK bounded toward a small nook in the mountain. The crevice was the size of two TuffBoxes, too small to offer much cover. The rounds were coming straight in, and one ripped into CK’s skull. Walton watched as the Afghan collapsed.
The captain felt like someone had punched him in the gut. CK was an important member of the unit. He liked CK, his upbeat personality. But he had to brush aside any personal feelings. Not when rounds continued to snap overhead and smash into the rock wall.
Walton and his men were stuck in a kill zone, and he had to find protection. Scanning the ledge, he noticed an overhang about fifty feet away. It wasn’t much, but it looked like it could provide a little cover. But as he retreated to the area, a round hit Behr. As Carter and Morales moved Behr’s body, Walton reached to get the radio from Behr’s back so that he could call for help.
Walton was wearing dual communication Peltor headphones, which allowed him to hear transmissions from the team’s net and from the satellite net. From the messages going back and forth between the different elements, he knew everybody was taking heavy, accurate fire.
“Assault 2, move up. We have one casualty. We need Ron up here,” Walton said.
Walton wanted to keep Shurer out of the fight. He was their only medic and he didn’t want him to get hurt. But he had no choice. Behr was seriously hurt and needed medical attention. And Carter and Morales didn’t know enough to save him.
Plus, he needed as many guns in the fight as he could muster. Walton quickly got on the air to the commanders back in Jalalabad and Bagram.
“Monster 33. Gremlin 36. Troops in contact.”
That meant that Walton and his team were in combat and would need more help.
“We’re taking effective machine-gun fire,” Walton continued.
“How effective is the fire?” asked the battle captain from Bagram.
“Pretty fucking effective.”
Everybody in Afghanistan heard it, and they would continue to tune in and monitor the firefight for the next several hours as Walton and his team fought for their lives.