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Conflict

16 March, 8:00am Boynton Beach, Florida

Former SEAT unit commander Leroy Hodds awoke with a start, forgetting where he was for the briefest of instants.  The smell hit him first:  There was a decomposing body only a few feet away lying on the floor.  This one, unlike most dead bodies these days, did not move.  Hodds, wide awake now, remembered where he was, sat up and pulled the jacket from his chest.  The name tag read LT.ANGELA RODRIGUEZ.  She was not in the room.  The sunlight was what had broken his sleep.  “Morning?”  His watch said 8:00am.  “I thought I told her only an hour.”  He got up, a little worried now.  Rodriguez’s weapons lay against the wall; the TV was silent; Emergency Broadcast instructions playing.  “Angela?” he called quietly.  No answer. 

Leroy Hodds had been a young man during the Vietnam War.  He had known then what it was like to be losing to an inferior foe.  The Vietcong had deviled his unit, killing nearly all of the friends he had made during his tour.  It was the year of the Tet Offensive.  His base overrun, Leroy Hodds had been forced to crawl thirty miles through swamp and shit to safety.  Up to now that three-day crawl had been the most terrifying experience of his life.  That survival was what had made him a candidate for SEAT (then called UNSN; United Nations Special Negotiators) and also what had won him his most prized award:  The Congressional Medal of Honor.  Thinking of that made him think of Gregory Porter. 

Gregory Porter had been with the team since its beginning.  Porter had won his Medal of Honor for his secret work with the CIA in Panama.  He had led the attack on a prison housing political US prisoners.  Even after being shot three times and losing three fingers of his left hand to a grenade Gregory Porter had used an AT-4 anti-tank rocket to demolish a wall and rescue the prisoners.  Complete the mission at any cost:  That was the SEAT creed. 

Rodriguez had survived and Porter had not.  Not that there was anything wrong with the young lady’s skill, she was just, well, Rodriguez:  Prone to emotionally fueled outbursts and fighting with any man that merely looked at her wrong.  Few were those in the unit who had not felt her wrath.

Or felt her compassion.  In the right mood Angela Rodriguez was one of the best people to have around.  Her mental stability was unquestionable, so thought Commander Hodds; her actions under pressure were admirable and commendable.  Her youth was one of the things that had always drawn Leroy away.  SEAT rosters were filled with new recruits.  Most would be out or dead in days, best not to become attached.  It was the ‘ancient’ ones such as Porter (over thirty missions) or Ioseph Illyushin (another dead SEAT comrade with twenty-some missions to his credit with SEAT and countless others for the KGB during the Soviet war in Afghanistan) who drew Hodds in.  And now they were dead and this girl with only a handful of missions was his only surviving SEAT compatriot.

Walking into the kitchen he, opened the refrigerator and popped the top of a Coke.  A noise came from the hallway leading to the master bedroom.  Drawing his pair of .45 autos Hodds crept in that direction. 

A shape was visible against the light coming from the east-facing bedroom.  The form was dragging something, grunting with effort.  Hodds cocked his weapons and the form turned, dropping to a crouch gun up also.  “Rodriguez?”

The form sighed and the gun went down, “Who the fuck do you think, sir?” the brash young soldier asked.  “You want to help me with this?”  She was dragging a body down the hall.

“What are you doing?”  Hodds grabbed the body’s legs and lifted.

“Taking them outside.  Makes the house feel safer.”  She wouldn’t meet Hodds’ gaze for a moment.  She looked exhausted, like she would collapse any moment.

The commander stopped and set the body down, looking at her.

“What are you doing?  Help me with her, man!”  Rodriguez turned away, dragging the body again.

“Angela, stop.  Listen to me for a minute, will you?”

She shook her head, “No, gotta get em outside.  The place won’t stink so much with them outside.”

Hodds grabbed her shoulder and tried to turn her.  At that, she spun quickly toward him, her hand striking at his face.  With little effort the older man blocked the woman’s strikes.  She cried out as she threw herself at him; no military training was this.  This was pure instinct.  The seasoned commander blocked her strikes and took her down.  Lying on the ground she breathed heavily for a moment before sitting up.  “Rodriguez, get yourself together, girl.  I need you now.”

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