[The Reaper]

I arrived at my next objective somewhere in the afternoon. The last stretch to the objective was about a kilometer and a half, most of which was up hill on an improved road well exposed to the hot afternoon sun. I had lost more fluids and electrolytes than I had anticipated on this leg of the course. I was running out of all water and desperately needed to put some fuel into my system. I arrived unceremoniously upon the point sitter who gave me my next coordinates and told me to make sure I topped-off on water before I left. I did as he said, but not before eating another MRE and using the facilities that nature provided. That was one of the only times that the E-tool was useful. I sat with my back to my rucksack and tried to rotate the muscles of my right shoulder only to find that to be a very painful exercise. Blood soaked the side of my BDU pants and I opted to not even look at the wound. The trek was taking a toll on my body and it was beginning to dawn on me that the next movement was going to be longer than the last one. I plotted the next set of coordinates to find that my next objective was even further away than any of the previous ones. The discovery did not alarm me. I was too tired to be alarmed. As I sat there, the gusty wind sent a chill through my body. I didn’t believe that it was really that cold, but perhaps the exhausted state I was in magnified the conditions around me.

I was well on my way to my next objective and realized that this would be my last objective before going back home to Camp Mackall. Once I arrived to the last objective, I would be merely informed that I was to find my way back to Mackall. If I wanted, the point sitter would give me those coordinates. But, I was well aware of the location on my map, so this would not pose a problem. My rests became much more frequent and much longer. By now, I was carrying most of the weight of the rucksack on my left shoulder in order to give respite to the right. This was causing another set of problems as it was forcing undue stress on parts of my left shoulder and lower back that I was sure would haunt me later on in what was left of the course. Midway to my objective, the darkness of the approaching evening began to blanket the sky. I began to see an exodus of candidates already headed back towards Mackall, or so it seemed. Some traveled in groups or in pairs. By now, it seemed that the threat of roving instructors had done little to dissuade this practice. Besides, I had not seen an instructor in the last day. My take was that regardless of whether one walked accompanied, or not, there was no way of getting around carrying the heavy rucksack all the way back to the finish line. No one else was going to carry it for us. Also, there were far less instructors working at SFAS this time around than there were last year due to the War on Terrorism.

About four kilometers from my objective I stopped and panted for air. I was becoming a total mess and had to reorganize myself before my morale hit bottom. I released my rucksack from my shoulder and let it fall back to the sand with a loud thud. Earlier, the rucksack’s external frame had broken and the PRC-119 radio had begun to dig into my back during movement. I opened up the rucksack and tried to redistribute the weight, but the broken frame did not help matters any. The radio problem would just have to be another bit of discomfort I had to accept. By God’s mercy, it had not rained on us. Cloud cover, however, had eliminated illumination. The BDUs I wore were soaked in sweat and I decided to change my top to a dry one, and changed my socks. I tore open another MRE and ate the items that I knew contained the most carbohydrates. I gulped down some more ORS water and covered my head with the poncho liner as I re-checked my current progress on the map. There was no real need to cover my red lens flashlight from view; it was just the force of habit. This activity was just something to get my mind of the various pains I felt. I had to reassess my situation here. I was not going as fast as I should. My left shoulder was now deteriorating as well from carrying the entire rucksack’s weight on its own. The wound to my waist kept seeping blood onto my BDU pants, as it never had a chance to heal with the waist strap grinding its way along. I was in a bad state. The one good thing going was that my feet were in good shape. I felt one blister on my left foot and it felt like a little one. It wasn’t on the bottom either. It felt as it was on the side, near the top of the foot. The warmth of my breath under poncho liner felt good as it poured warm air into my BDU top. It was a great idea to change tops also; this made me feel much better. It didn’t help my other problems but it just made me happy to be dry. It is one of the most positive things a soldier could hope for. After about a half hour at rest, I picked myself up and began to trek towards my objective.

Everything was pitched dark by now. About the only visible thing was the white sand of the road I was on. The lack of outside stimuli stated to nag at me again. I began to play mind games with myself again, as well as stopping to make frequent map checks, although I didn’t really need them. I reached my last checkpoint before I was to turn, nearly ninety degrees, towards my objective. I had about eleven hundred meters to go through a sparsely wooded area with way too much deadfall on the ground. Worse than the deadfall were the numerous burn holes. Burn holes occur when a pine tree burns all the way down to its root. This leaves behind a hole big enough to accommodate a boot and deep enough to reach the knee. The danger of falling into one of these and snapping one’s knee, as the body and rucksack weight continued forward, was very real. This, coupled with the deadfall strewn all around this little illuminated area, made for an interesting last leg towards my objective. I fell over numerous times and was hit on the face by way too many dried and thin branches. The falls didn’t hurt much. The worst part of it all was getting up with the rucksack on over and over again. I finally found my objective, which would be my fifth point on the exercise, and walked up to the point sitter, who was inside his Coleman tent. He heard my approach through the rustling of the leaves and his pale white hand was already visible as I approached. I pulled out my scorecard and handed it to him. He called in my roster number with the Tactical Operations Center (TOC) and handed back my card. The next objective would be my last. “You know were you are going now, right?” he asked. “Yes, sir.” I replied. He gave me the usual monotone verbal guidance about topping-off on water and maintaining myself two hundred meters from his position should I want to conduct personal hygiene before I left. I was mostly deaf to his words by now. I had heard them a previous four times and was well aware of these instructions. My confidence was waning at this point. I was not sure if my shoulders, left or right, would be able to take much more of this. My side was a huge raw nerve that I couldn’t even stand to look at, much less touch. I walked about fifty meters from the point sitter - I didn’t care to walk any further away - and released my rucksack to the ground. I sat there dumbfounded at the difficulty that this last movement posed. It was finally the end of the exercise; that was the good thing. But, my last objective was even further away than any of the others. It was close to midnight at this point and I didn’t have much else left in me. This, I knew, would be the defining moment. I had to dig deep inside myself and continue on to complete the mission. That was ultimately the most important thing. I rested my head against the top of my rucksack as I looked up at the obscure, un-illuminated sky. I dreaded the thought of traversing back through the deadfall and burn holes to the improved road that brought me here. However, I didn’t want to plan another route in my current state. It would be very possible to get back another way, but, the dead fall on the original route would only last for about a kilometer and the alternative was prone to miscalculations due to the poor visibility. I decided to rest for half hour.

(TBC)