"Engage the Target!"
The Captain shouts at me,
Static in my ear piece
It is 0840.
We have come to a stop.
The lead vehicle providing security for a fuel convoy
Hot, bright sun
Hot body armor
Sweat-drenched Kevlar
Hot, deisel-fume filled atmosphere

"Engage the Target!"
And I see them up ahead,
Behind a pile of tires and dunnage.
70..80 meters maybe
Would be an easy kill.
Quick scan as I arm my .50;
I see an arm. a back, part of a leg, white, a flash of blue

"Engage the Target!"
The target is hiding like a covey of hunted quail.
They heard us coming...or do they expect us?

It's not the killing, no
It's not that.
On Sunday I ripped three of them apart after the lead hummer got hit by a roadside bomb.
We get hit...and you're around...you get killed-
That's just the way it is.
But this morning, behind those tires; they are hiding...unless
Unless they are waiting to attack us.
are they taking as long as I am to...
"Engage the Target"?

"Goddammit, S'gt, Engage the Fucking Target!!"
Yes,
this is what God would want.
Maybe we should tear off the stars and bars from our velco equipped uniforms
And sew crosses onto our shoulders
Maybe the kind that form right angles at the ends.
God can't damn me.
I've done that to myself.
Whether or not I
Engage the Target.

The deisel fumes are cleared and cordite takes their place
As I engage.
A three second burst from the fifty
Shredding the rubber, steel, and wood
I stop.
I scan the sector.
No movement.
NO, wait...There!!
Movement!!
Long, once-white shirt, beard-
He's got a bag in his hand
From behind me my ringing ears make out an American voice
"IED, IED!!!"
I point and re-engage,
Three more four second bursts..
my target's clear..
"My Target is Clear, Sir!"
Then..
Two more bursts into the bodies and debris
There's no such thing as over-kill.
Not here.
There's fuel to deliver to someone, somewhere.
We are over here to help these people, after all.

"Let's roll," the Captian orders once again.
Deisel.
Heat.
Slowly, a breeze under my helmet turns morning sweat
Into 100 degree ice on my scalp.

We creep past the contact site.
There are two bodies in the flotsam there.
A smaller one beneath..14 years old..I hope.
I can't see the face of the the target on top of it;
The head was covered in blue fabric from the back.
The white-shirted, bearded one...
The one with the IED, the one I watch smoke rising from-
His bag is spilled where I fell him.
There is a loaf of bread, some cheese
And a shredded box of multi-colored childrens cereal.
Fruit Loops floating in thickening blood.

Two Blackhawks rumble overhead on their way to the airfield.
And we roll on.
My focus is on the road ahead.

"Good Job," the Captain says, and I can barely hear him.
He pats me on the leg from inside the Hummer.
"Good Job."