Undisclosed location, US Navy Special Warfare
December 25, 2014/0408 Zulu
I’ve seen some strange shit in my
day, but this one tops the list. Two
days before Christmas we were getting ready to stand down and have a nice
couple of days off. Christmas was
falling on Thursday this year, and the skipper decided to give most of the
group liberty the day after. The nice
long weekend would be a welcomed break after all the traveling I’d been doing
and give me a chance to catch up with my family.
The command staff had planned a big
outing today, and our mission would be one that didn’t have us armed with
weapons; we would be carrying presents to a few places in town where the kids
were having a rough Christmas. Our group
would divvy up the work with a Marine Recon group who had recently stood up at
a nearby base. My dive buddy and I were
in the break room wrapping presents right before the shit hit the fan.
“So
what’s the plan for Christmas Day?” Shaq
asked.
“Give me
a few with the family in the morning, we’ll get Christmas between us out of the
way then come on over around noon,” I said.
“Are you
finally getting an Xbox One?”
“I don’t
have to, you’ve got one. I’ll use yours.”
“Man,
you suck. You’re so behind the times. By the time you get one, something else
will be coming out.”
“When in
hell are you getting a PlayStation 4?
Every time you come over that’s all you want to do.”
“Because
that’s the only decent gaming system you’ve got.”
“If you
lame dicks go any slower, we’ll be delivering these next fucking
Christmas! Move it!”
Shaq and
I looked toward the door. Master Chief
stood there looking like a Christmas nightmare.
Since he already had the white hair thing down, the captain decided he
could be Santa. There he stood, full
white beard in a Santa suit. He wasn’t
thick like Santa but the rest came pretty close. The crazy thing about this
whole get up was he loved being
Santa. I make that sound nice; he begged to be Santa.
“Nice
suit, Master Chief,” Shaq said.
I
started praying that my dive buddy didn’t get me into some serious shit. I didn’t like the tone he’d used, and any
second now his mouth would get us into trouble.
Master Chief’s eyes narrowed.
Nothing slipped past him, and he’d caught it, too. I looked at Shaq and shook my head and gave
him a don’t fucking do it look.
“You
think so?” Master Chief asked as he
walked toward us.
Correction, stalked toward us. I felt
like a rabbit about to be pounced on by one mean hungry wolf, and there’d be
nothing left of me when he was done.
“Would you like to be one of
Santa’s elves, JG?”
FUCK
NO! I’ve been one of his elves before, and I still have nightmares
about it.
“Aren’t we? We’ve been wrapping presents for two days straight,”
Shaq said.
Master looked the mountain of
presents up and down.
“You call that wrapping? I’ve seen better wrapping by blind two year
olds. I should tear that shit up and
make you two rejects start all over again,” he said reaching for one of the
presents.
“OW! Son-of-a-bitch!”
As hard
as I could, I came down on Shaq’s boot with my heel. I’d managed to get Master Chief’s
attention. My dive glared at me, but I’d
done it to keep Master Chief from carrying out his plan of making us rewrap
over three hundred gifts.
“What
the fuck’s wrong with you now?” Master
Chief growled.
“Hey! You three in the briefing room, now!” The captain said from the door.
Thank God!
The captain disappeared from the doorway and left us staring at each
other. I dropped what I had in my hands
and reported as ordered. When we got to
the briefing room, several of us had already arrived. In all there were about thirty people, and
while Shaq and I sat waiting, I overheard the captain tell the XO that the
Recon Marines were on their way.
A sinking feeling came over me as I waited to
find out what the captain wanted. I just
knew my Christmas would be spent away from my family, again. Last year, I’d been in Afghanistan and had
missed so much. I scanned the room and
met a beautiful set of brown eyes across the room. She sat next to Badass and they were huddled
talking with their little group. My
heart sank because I didn’t want her to miss Christmas at home, too. Over the years, we’d missed too many Christmases
together, and this would be a first and very special one. The Force Recon Marines arrived, and the XO
went to the front of the room.
“We’ve
been tapped to support a mission. I will
be your mission commander. Our liaison will
arrive shortly and brief you on what needs to be done,” Commander Corbin said.
“What
the hell’s going on? Do you know?” Doc asked.
“No
clue, captain showed up at the break room and told us to report here,” I
said.
“Man,
this is not the way I wanted to spend Christmas,” Shaq complained.
“Then
get another job, JG. You signed up for
this,” Master Chief said.
The XO
glanced behind us and waived the person in the back forward. I didn’t turn around but there was something
familiar about the footsteps. I
shivered and Doc’s jaw dropped, when our liaison passed by.
“Good
morning ladies and gentleman.”
Bella? What the…
Could I
be seeing this right? I had to be. The tension in the room amped several notches
as we waited for the rest. If this was
someone’s idea of a joke, I can tell you the humor was lost on the group
gathered in the room. The room got
unnaturally quiet and no-one moved.
“Holy crap on a cracker …” Master
Chief whispered.
“What
the hell is she doing here?” Doc said.
“Thank
you for volunteering for this mission,” she said.
And was Bella Juarez really standing here
without the whole room erupting in a riot?
Wait a minute… Volunteer? Mission? I hadn’t
volunteered for shit! I especially hadn’t volunteered for anything having to do
with HER! What the fuck was she doing here, and what
the fuck was happening to my world?
“Wake me
up, mama. This is a bad dream,” Shaq
said in disbelief.
“Shut up
dumbass!” Master Chief said.
“Yesterday,
at 1652 Zulu, the NSA intercepted a distress signal coming from 89.97 degrees
north and 0.0 degrees west. Contact was
made with the station and the threat assessed.
Information was passed on to the JCS who recommended that the President sign
an executive order to take action in the region. The President signed an
executive order authorizing action code name Operation WHITE OUT. Our Canadian allies have agreed to assist by
allowing us to utilize RCAF Station Gimli …”
Shaq and
I exchanged glances because those coordinates were a long friggin’ way from
where we sat. In fact, those coordinates
were at the top of the world, the North Pole.
What the hell kind of distress signal could be coming from there?
“A
terrorist group calling themselves the GAC has taken hostages and your mission
will be two-fold: free the hostages
while securing their compound, and isolate the enemy. Our goal is to attempt to capture as many of
the GAC as possible for interrogation.
Senior Chief Walsh, your team will be needed for interviewing all
captured enemy. Lieutenant Colonel
Thompson, your Marines serve as the hostage rescue team. Master Chief Jones, your SEAL teams will
responsible for securing the compound and rounding up as many hostiles as
possible.”
“Did you
say GAC?” Badass asked.
“Yes, I
did …”
W-T-F
I couldn’t believe it. Badass and Bella Juarez were having a civil
conversation. Captain O’Malley sat as if
this were a normal everyday occurrence, and who the hell was the GAC?
I felt a little out of the loop here.
Had I been dropped into the Twilight Zone? Bella is an NSA liaison? Really?
Oh yeah, I’d landed deep in the Zone.
Our briefing ended, and we went
gathered with our respective teams to do some mission planning and determine
how to take this enemy down. After
several hours I found myself along with my team on a C-130 with Recon Marines
heading for one of the coldest places on the planet. The weather forecast for Gimli was twenty-four
degrees with snow and for 89.9 degrees north and 0 degrees west, it was
negative two with definite snow. We’d be
fighting in the dark, and I still wasn’t clear about the enemy they called the
GAC, no-one seemed to be talking about that.
Our intel had been limited, making our planning broad and our time
tables loose. That was the worst kind of
mission planning. The intel on the
compound and hostages seemed solid, but fighting in the dark against an unknown
enemy wasn’t my idea of fun.
Before I knew it, we were fast
roping in front of the Recon Marines into a snow covered compound at the top of
the world. The icy wind that hit me as I
shimmied down the rope and made me quit breathing for a second because it was
so cold. When we hit the ground we went
around sweeping what seemed like an empty compound. We reached the first building and waited a
beat before going inside.
When we poured inside after kicking
open, the door the sight in front of us made the six of us responsible for securing
that area pause. The long building had
three long wide tables with stations that lined the tables on both sides. There were bins behind each one of the
stations filled with toys. Several rolls
of Christmas wrapping paper, ribbons, and bows were on rolls at each station.
“What …” Friday said behind me.
Passing
me, he walked to one of the stations and pulled out wrapping paper that had the
old time Transformers images on it. He
stared at it for a while. I walked up
next to him and asked,
“What is
it, man?”
“This
paper…”
“What
about it?”
“It was
the wrapping on all of my Christmas gifts until I was ten. No matter what home I went to, it was always
the same paper,” he said staring at the wrapping.
Friday
had it rough growing up in foster care.
He’d never known his mom or dad and had been bounced from home to home
until he’d joined the Navy when he turned eighteen.
“LT!”
Before I could look up, all hell
broke loose. Something came pouring out from the walls and under the tables but
before we could figure out what the hell we were dealing with they’d attached
themselves to our legs.
“What the fuck!” Friday said shaking his leg to try and get
them off.
“Do we shoot? What the hell do we
do?” Shaq yelled from behind me.
When I looked down to figure out
what had attached itself to me, I blinked and shook my head. It looked like something out of Lord of the
Rings or Gremlins; something out of a fantasy movie. When they opened their mouth to scream, they
had pointy teeth. They were greenish
gray with very little hair.
“OW! Fuck!” Friday screamed.
I watched him use the butt of his
weapon and bop one of the creatures on the head. The thing released him and ran away. Suddenly I saw stars and felt blinding pain
to my shin. Son-of-a-bitch had bitten
me! So taking a cue from Friday, I did
the same thing rifle butted the little bastard on the top of the head. I couldn’t shoot myself, and our orders were
to take as many of them alive as we could.
“The bait!”
Throwing the bait we’d been given
to the center of the table seemed to get them focused somewhere else. The shiny silver and gold balls bounce around
as the creatures tried to catch them.
We’d been given nets to throw over them and to catch them but there were
too many. I had to think this thing
through and stop reacting. Then I remembered during our briefing we’d
been told our enemy didn’t like bright lights.
I dug out a flare from my vest and threw it at the door so those little
fuckers couldn’t get out. It worked,
they huddled together shying away from the light.
“Use the flares to get them bunched
together,” I called out to my group.
After we’d figured out how to
capture them and rounded them up, we met at our designated landing zone or
LZ. It was the biggest building at the
compound. We walked inside and met
Master Chief who was talking to guy in a camo Santa suit. Now that I had time to think about the
mission we’d just completed, I realized how surreal this whole thing had
been. I went to one of the crates where
these little things were being kept to see if this was real. The first word that came to my head to
describe them was … goblin.
The Recon Team leader came in with
a creature who was human sized but looked just like the little ones we’d
captured. I joined Master Chief near a
big table in the hall where we gathered.
“Kris, this is our SEAL team leader–“
“Ah yes, red autobot transformer
fire truck with a changeable spare tire, 1987.
Daniel you’ve grown into a fine man,” he said holding out his hand.
I blinked. The man had just described my favorite
Christmas present, ever. I remembered
asking for that autobot when I was six years old. My mom had set me up for disappointment
because when they went back to get it, the store had sold out. That had been the only Christmas I’d written
a letter to Santa Claus begging for that truck.
I promised that I would donate all my other toys to kids who wouldn’t
get any that Christmas if I go that Transformer. Christmas Eve I had my mom take me to the
police station where I gave away all of my toys to Blue Santa. I remembered my mom and dad trying to talk me
out of it because they’d told me I wouldn’t have anything to open but I’d seen
it through. Christmas morning, my
autobot was there and so were all of my other presents.
“Sir,” I said taking his hand.
“Thank you for saving Christmas.”
“I wouldn’t go that far, sir. Christmas was coming no matter what.”
“Not for everyone, Daniel. It nice to see the goodness in some people
never changes, you still put others before yourself. You’ll never know how much you impact the
world every time you put on your uniform and leave your family. Thank you.”
A lump formed in my throat at the
thought of my family at home without me.
There was nothing for me to say so I nodded and moved away.
God, how I wanted to be home...
“LT, we need to decide what to do
with this one, he’s the leader of the GAC,” the Recon Team leader said.
“Gabriel, why?” Kris asked.
“Why? Why indeed! “
“I don’t understand…”
Kris looked confused and hurt. Gabriel shook with rage, and I prepared to
get in the middle. I just knew the green
monster would go for Kris’ throat.
“Mother favored you, always giving
you all the glory while she banished me to a life in the shadows!”
“It doesn’t have to be this way,”
Kris turned to us and asked, “Gentlemen, may I have a private moment with my
brother?”
Brother? Holy shit!
Something got into that DNA woodpile and went south. We shrugged and gave them some space. We watched as they had a heated discussion
then the green guy’s shoulders slumped and he put his face in his hands. Kris put his hand on the guy’s shoulder and
Gabriel nodded.
“Master Chief, what’s going
on?”
“Family feud. Gabriel is the Goblin king and the leader of
the GAC. We still need to take him in
and have Badass talk to him to find out if he’s still a threat.”
“Okay, what the hell is the
GAC?”
“Goblins against Christmas, a
terrorist organization we’ve been tracking since ’89. We’ve been able to contain the other
threats. The GAC was the only unknown
until now.”
By now I had accepted the fact that
I was either dreaming or completely delusional. I knew my Navy career would be coming to an
end and I’d be locked in a room with lots of comfy pillows around me. But I figured if I was going totally crazy, I
needed to at least have a complete story.
“Other threats? What other threats?”
“Boy, have you been living under a
rock?” Master Chief growled.
I knew he was already certifiable
so this conversation seemed perfectly natural now. Master Chief sighed and
shook his head.
“In 1955, we had a first confirmed
sighting of Kris Kringle. NORAD verified
that he was a friendly and an ally. We set up a listening post here in
1960. In ‘69, the compound was attacked
by the Abominable Snowman, then six years later, by Jack Frost. We’ve been able to neutralize all threats
except this one,” he said pointing to Gabriel.
“You mean to tell me Santa Claus,
the Abominable Snowman, and Jack Frost are real?”
“What the hell do you want me to
do? Throw you in the Ivan’s cave? After he bites you in the ass, maybe you’ll
be convinced. And Santa Claus is standing right fucking there!” Master Chief said pointing at Kris.
“Master Chief, I’m losing my
fucking mind right now so you’ll excuse me if I want to hang on to what little
sanity I have left!”
“I know, I felt the same way the
first time I had to deal with this. But
believe me, this is real and you’re not crazy.
Ask yourself something, who else knew about your bebot?”
“My what?”
“You know that truck bebot thing
Kris told you about.”
“You mean autobot? That’s Optimus Prime! He’s not a bebot–“
“Whatever, the point is how many
people know the details of that story?”
No one knew, not even my wife knew
and I’d known her since the second grade.
By the time I’d come into the SEALs, I’d forgotten all about it until
now. I had to admit, he had a point.
This was also Master Chief, and he had a way of finding things out. In a
very uncharacteristic move, Master Chief put his hand on my shoulder and said,
“Before we leave here, you’ll know
it’s real and so is Santa Claus.”
Before I could say anything, Kris
interrupted us.
“Jimmy, we’ve worked everything
out. Gabriel will be staying here. He
and his goblins will run the night crew.
Let Gavin know as soon as the rush is over, Gabriel has agreed to meet
with him and debrief. But right now, I
can’t do without him. Tell Charlie, he has my word that the GAC has officially
been changed to the GFC,” Kris said taking out his watch and shook his head, “I’m
so far behind schedule. He’ll be making
the deliveries to the north and I’ll go south.
Line up the men who’ve come so that I can thank each one privately
before I leave.”
“Yes, sir, I’ll get right on it,”
Master Chief said.
I grabbed Master Chief’s arm before
he could move, “Wait a minute, we’re leaving our tango and those … things here? What happened to our orders?”
Master Chief frowned and took out
his satellite phone.
“Dixie? Kris says ‘hey’ and he also wants me to tell
you that he and his brother have worked things out. Gabriel has agreed to talk to Badass right
after Kris gets all of his presents delivered.
He’s behind scheduled and needs some help.” He listened for a minute and
said, “All right, I’ll tell Kris, Badass will be here on Tuesday. Merry Christmas, admiral,” he said as he
ended the call. “Are you okay with that, Lieutenant?”
“Yeah,” I said shaking my head,
“Whatever the admiral wants.”
“Come on, boys. Line up, we’re burning daylight!” Master Chief shouted as he gathered the teams
up and led us to the back part of the building.
I felt like a kid again standing in
line at the mall. Only this time there
was no way in hell I would consent to sitting on Santa’s lap. I turned around and looked at my dive buddy
behind me. He was surveying the
building. By trade he was a structural
engineer and whenever we went somewhere he always studied the buildings around
us.
“This place is old. Look at the timbers, they’re almost petrified. Early Norse engineering, like the great
halls, it’s built to withstand the weather and keep the heat in,” he said.
“Shaq, are we dreaming, or have we
gone nuts?” I asked.
Frowning, he asked, “What do you
mean? Don’t you believe in Santa Claus?”
“When I was a kid but seriously do
you?”
“I never stopped believing. Well I guess I did for a while, and those
Christmas’ were the worst ones of my life.
They were empty.”
“What do you mean? Like no presents?”
“No, I always get presents, but
sometimes they don’t mean anything, its stuff. Real presents come from the heart. The best present I ever got was the scarf the
little kids from that tribe of nomads we rescued made. I’ve never gotten anything so valuable in all
my life. They didn’t celebrate Christmas,
but they understood the meaning. They
loved the idea of Santa Claus and unconditional love.”
My dive buddy had a point. I still had that autobot at my sister’s
house. Of all the presents I’d ever
received, it was one of the few things I’d kept from my childhood. When had I stopped believing in Santa? I was
a little ashamed of myself because it had to be about the time I started taking
things for granted. Somewhere along the
way I’d grown up and had stopped counting the blessings in my life. Before I knew it, I got ushered into a room
where Kris sat in a chair that looked right out of the Middle Ages.
“Come here Daniel,” Kris said.
“Sorry Santa, I’m not sitting on
your lap.”
Kris burst out laughing, “You
haven’t lost your sense of humor. Give
me your hands. I want you to think about
what you really want for Christmas.”
Reluctantly I put my hands in his.
I swallowed hard because all I could think about was being home with my family. That was all I wanted at the moment. He bowed his head and closed his eyes then he
suddenly raised his head. Letting my hands go, he reached into a bag beside
him.
“Still thinking of others,” he said
handing me something small.
I know my jaw dropped when I looked
at what I’d been given. It was the
diamond bracelet I wanted to give my wife for Christmas.
“She’ll love it, not because of the price tag
but because of the sacrifice behind it.”
At just past two am, I walked
through the front door of my house. Before
doing anything else I went to the room down the hall from mine and knelt next
to my son’s bed. I watched him sleep for
a little while before I kissed the top of his head. This was why I wanted to be home. This Christmas was the first one he’d understand. I couldn’t believe how incredibly blessed my
life had turned out. I was proud that I
had career that allowed me to protect the future of my family. I curled up next to the love of my life and
wrapped my arms around her. Cuddling
next to her warm body after being so cold was heaven. I realized that since she’d come back into my
life, I had everything I’ve wanted every day.
“Danny?”
I must’ve woke her with all my
moving around.
“Go back to sleep, babe.”
“I’m so glad you made it home in
time.”
“Me too,” I said kissing her
shoulder.
As much as I wanted to enjoy being
close to her, I passed out before taking another breath. When I woke up the next morning, my bed was
warm and so was my soul mate lying next to me.
Her eyes opened and when she smiled at me I leaned forward and kissed
her good morning. Before I could even
think of getting the Christmas present I really wanted, I heard little
footsteps running down the hall. Then …
“Daddy! Daddy!
Daddy!” My son screamed as he
jumped in the middle our bed.
Before he could really do some
damage with all of his jumping, I lifted him so he could go into his Superman
pose.
“Take me to my presents,” he said
squirming.
“Is today Christmas?” I asked him.
“Yes!”
“No! Not yet. I think its tomorrow.”
That statement made him go still
and disappointment crossed his face. He
looked to his mom for reassurance.
“Momma?”
“Danny! Stop it.
Come on mijo, let’s go open
your presents,” his mom said getting out of bed.
I remembered that feeling. I’d be up before anyone and itching to open
all my presents. No-one had to tell me
it was Christmas; I knew. While I
followed my wife and son down the hall, I wondered when I’d lost that
excitement. This last mission had
changed the way I see Christmas and why it was so important. The gifts didn't matter but the thought and
love behind them did. This needed to be
a time when everyone took a time out and just enjoyed being close to the people
who mattered in their lives. Mostly I
learned it was about reconciliation and starting a clean slate for someone who
is lost. While I watched my son drink in
the magic of Christmas I knew I had a new mission, and it would be to make sure
that he always believed and never lost his way like I had. After he’d opened all of his presents, I dug
into my ready bag that I’d left by the breakfast bar and took out the present
from Kris.
“This one’s for you, babe.”
“Wow! Did you wrap this?”
I laughed and said, “Na, I had some
help.”
Kris had his crew wrapped it so
beautifully that the box could’ve been used for a decoration. When she opened it, her eyes widened and her
jaw dropped. She’d told me not to get
that bracelet because it had been a little beyond our budget.
“Why?” She whispered.
“Because you deserve it.”
“We have to pay for school –“
I leaned over and kissed her before
she could finish.
“Don’t worry, it’s paid for.”
My wife quickly wiped away a couple
of tears. That was something to see
because my lady is strong. When I saw
the gift had touched her that much, I knew Kris had been right and it really was
special to her.
“Daddy, yours,” My son said pushing
a box toward me.
My wife giggled when I picked up
the heavy box.
“What’s this?” I asked before opening it.
“It’s something Mikey and I picked
out for you and the real reason I didn’t want you to get me the bracelet. I’d already bought this.”
When I opened the box, I swear my
heart must’ve stopped for a minute. It
was something I’d wanted so bad when it had come out a couple of months
back. During my single days, I wouldn’t
have thought twice about going out and getting it. Now with a mortgage, a kid, and paying for
her to finish college the almost seven hundred dollar Xbox One collector’s
bundle had been out of the question. When
my heart started again, I said,
“Jeez, babe, this is a seven
hundred dollar gaming bundle. We
couldn’t afford it when it came out, remember?
What about paying for school?”
“I found one in the original
wrapping at a Game Stop, the person who ordered it never came for it so the
store called me. The gift cards I got
from my family covered some of it and I’d put aside the money for the rest–“
What had she just said? I remembered what Kris said about
sacrifice. And yes this gaming system no
matter how old and outdated it got would stay with me. Running my hands over the box, I realized
she’d spent the most of we’d set aside for our presents and used her gifts from
her family on me. To say I was overwhelmed would be an understatement.
I couldn’t do that to her… she
deserved a nice present and I was so glad he’d given me that bracelet. Now I understood why it had touched her so
much. She’d given up a lot to give me
something I’d wanted but had put aside.
“Babe–“
Putting her finger to my lips she
said, “You deserve it.”
What did I tell you at the
beginning? Think I’m making this
up? Nope, not one word. I don’t think even Bella could make
this one up… and she has one hell of an imagination…
It really
happened that way – Lieutenant's honor – it really happened that way.
Gotta go!
Merry
Christmas!
