Chapter 16

[November 11th, 2021]

I feel the plane land on the paved runway in Texas, and then the call to get out. I stand up and get my place in line. It's very cramped, as you'd expect in a passenger airliner. My eyes are still tired from the nap I took on the flight over here. I accidentally bump into the person in front of me and they turn to me. His eyes widen for a moment before whispering something to the man in front of him. He steps to the side and speaks. "You go ahead, thank you for your service." I look at him dumbfounded. "A-are you sure?" "Of course you go ahead." I do as he requests, but then the next person steps to the side, this next man whispers something to the person beside him. He steps to the side, then he whispers to the next, and this continues. Each one of them, telling me to go ahead of them. A tear comes to my eye as I see happy smiles, as people thank me for my service, and as a small few old veterans salute as I walk by. One woman doesn't move. I didn't mind, but other people did. "Why aren't you moving to the side, he's a service member, it's a sign of respect." After the man questions her, she snaps back very quickly. "Why should I? The military is nothing but glorified murderers!" As soon as I hear this my smile disappears. "Ma'am, he has decided to risk his life so you can be free, and you want to call him a murderer?! Do you have any clue what the price of our freedom is?!" "Do you have any clue how many innocent Iraqis and afghans are killed every year by the US?!" I try to awkwardly move through to get away from the angered woman but I get pushed back. Another passenger catches me. "What do you think you're doing, are you trying to push past me?!" "N-no ma'am, I wasn't." I respond politely, but it doesn't seem to make her falter. "You totally where! All of you service members always think you're so privileged!" It was at this point that the first man bursts. "Do you understand the hell that men like him go through to make sure that people like you are safe, so you have the privilege to sleep in a comfortable bed and not a foxhole or a bodybag, so you can live in a house with AC and not some FOB in the middle of the fucking desert with the scorching sun, do you know how privileged you are to be able to see your family every day, to not have to worry about an IED on the side of the road or a sniper while you're going through a mountain pass?! No, you obviously don't! I spent 13 years of my life in the corps and lost 5 of my buddies to the 'innocent Iraqis' that you speak of! I don't want to hear shit from you, now step aside!" By the time he's done she's stepped to the side and he has tears in his eyes. I'm genuinely shocked. I don't know what to say. I don't know what to do except nod solemnly and go ahead. I exit the aircraft and enter the actual building. Inside the door is Brandon and Maple. They've been waiting for me. "Hey, Jackson!" I look up at the wildly energetic Maple waving at me. I approach them and Brandon speaks. "Enjoy the ride alone?" My mind flashes back to the woman. "Not particularly, no." Brandon gets confused for a moment and asks why. "Why not?" "Don't really want to talk about it, just an argument that happened." "Oh, I see." "Come on let's go inside!" Brandon speaks up again. "On our papers it says to report to Fort Hood and that we are going to be assigned to the 17th infantry." "Yep, so we better get our luggage." We all make our way into the building. As soon as we enter, we see the same hordes of people as in Greenville. I'm not quite sure why, but I was hoping, and expecting, it to be at least a little bit better here. We shuffle through the crowd, bumping into people along the way, to our luggage and pick out our camouflage packs. "Well that's that done, who wants to call an Uber?" Maple cheerfully perks up. "Oh! I can!" She fumbles around in her pockets before pulling out her phone and ordering the Uber. "Done!" "Perfect." Brandon chimes in. "Now we just get to the entrance and wait." We do exactly that. We wait around for about 15 minutes before we see the car pull up. We get in. "Where to?" "Fort Hood" The man takes a moment to respond. He looks to be in his late 40's. "Alright." We sit in the car for a good 5 minutes without talking until the driver speaks up. "So, y'all in the army?" "Yep." "What's your MOS?" "Just 3 11B, that's it." "Ah, my uncle was in the marine corps during the second world war. They stationed him at Pearl Harbour halfway through the war, my son went in during 2001, just after the twin towers fell." "Yeah?" "Yeah, why'd y'all enlist?" I chime in. "Tough situation." "I joined because he did." "I joined because of my father." "You three ain't much talkers are you?" I look up at him to respond. "We usually are, but it seems that all of the excitement has worn off." "Yeah, that's ok." "Thanks." We arrive outside of the base within and get out. Maple gets out but quickly panics. She stops the driver as soon as absolutely possible. "What about your payment?" "I'm fine, helping brave troops is good enough payment for me." With that, he leaves. We all gather around and talk. "So do you guys know how this works?" "Nope, not at all." "Do we just walk up there?" "I guess." So that's what we do. We walk up to the checkpoint and get stopped by the MPs. I see a man in combat gear walk up to us. "I need to see identification please." I whip out my card and hand it to him. He runs it through, I get searched, and that's about it. "He's good to go."