Chapter 6: Twelve Names
Doyle's quarters were a single room with a made bed, a locker, and a framed photograph of a woman in a garden.
The MP posted outside had been called away for a "disturbance" at the motor pool.
Danny, it turned out, could be very loud when he wanted to.
Wes stood against the wall.
Ellie sat on the edge of Doyle's bed.
Doyle set a battered black recorder on the footlocker between them.
"I clipped this to my vest that day," he said.
"Habit.
The battery should've been long dead.
I found it in a duffel last winter, charged it, and listened to it for the first time in six years."
"Why did you wait?"
"Because I was afraid it would only be static, ma'am.
And then I'd have nothing." He pressed play.
Static crackled.
Then wind.
Then a woman's voice, calm and level, cutting through gunfire.
*"Twelve, this is Fury Ten.
Drainage ditch, two hundred meters east of you.
Go now.
Do not look back.
I have the line."*
A man's panicked answer.
*"Fury Ten, command says hold!"*
*"Command is wrong.
Go."*
Ellie's hand went to her mouth.
Another voice came through, older, clipped, unmistakable.
*"Fury Ten, you will keep that net clear and let those men hold.
That is a direct order."*
*"Sir, they'll be…"*
*"A direct order, Operator."*
*"No, sir."* Her own voice on the tape, shaking for the first time.
*"Go, Doyle.
Go.
I've got you."*
Doyle stopped the tape.
Nobody breathed.
"That's the Colonel," Wes whispered.
"That's him ordering the hold."
"That's him ordering twelve men to stay in a kill zone," Doyle said, "after he knew." His voice shook.
"I was nineteen, ma'am.
I had a kid brother and a girl I hadn't proposed to yet.
I ran down that ditch because a voice told me to."
Ellie was crying now, silently, tears running down her face.
"I never heard it again," she said.
"I stayed on the line four hours after you were safe.
They pulled me out and put me in a room, and I was told the mission had a hero, and it wasn't me.
Nobody said thank you.
Nobody said anything."
Doyle crossed the room and knelt in front of her.
This broad, gray, iron man lowered his head until it nearly touched her knees.
"Thank you," he said.
"For my wife.
For my daughter, who's sixteen.
For every birthday I've had since that day."
Ellie put her hand on his shoulder and sobbed, and he let her.
When she could speak, she wiped her face.
"Twelve of you."
"I've called all of them.
Every one." Doyle's eyes were red.
"Eleven are on their way.
The twelfth is overseas but says he'll join by video."
The door handle turned.
Colonel Hargrove stepped in with two MPs behind him and the photograph still in his hand.
May you like
"Gunnery Sergeant," he said softly.
"I believe you have something that belongs to me."
