Deadly Charisma (Part 3)

Like I said, I knew I was fucked. There was no way I was going to survive a one year tour of this place if I had to work for some gung-ho “Hooah!” spouting jackasito! Understand that I had run afoul of “his kind” before and it there had been some rather bloody and under-handed battles fought for ascendancy. The difference was that in this unit here at Ft. Hood I would not have my usual advantage : The Mission.

You see in all my previous assignments I had been involved in active intelligence collection Missions. Real world Missions roll over other military considerations like a Mack truck. To achieve any goal, all you have to do is relate it to the Mission in some manner. If you manage to do this convincingly you win. Every time. Additionally in the past my cause was helped considerably by the fact that I was *always* among the very best at what I do if not *the* best in the unit. This combination made me very hard to trump in most situations and I had learned to use it like Mike Tyson uses his bull rush. Confront me and you would be painted as a detriment to the mission and as an incompetent by comparison. Many former foes had fallen to me in this manner before but I knew it would not be an option here.

Ft. Hood in the year 2000 had not received a Mission since Gulf War I. The unit had degenerated into a “garrison only” unit. The soldiers had no function in life intel-wise and the unit had no tactical combat use. They had not been to the field in years, had not rotated through NTC (National Training Center) for around 3 years, and had not persecuted a live mission with the equipment upgrades they had received recently at anytime whatsoever. Add to the situation the fact that I was a Korean linguist in a unit full of Arabic operators in a unit whose area of responsibility was the Middle East and not Asia. My professional skills were not worth a plugged nickel.

I laid low and figured that I would simply have to be a faceless joe at this unit until my time for rotation back to Korea came up in another 12 months or so (more on how wrong I was about the time I would spend in the left armpit of Texas in later posts). Mainly I just hugn about saying little and listening as much as possible, looking for some niche I could make my own. Suddenly out of the blue came Jackpot! SSG C was ranting about how he only had one driver for the M915 in the entire company. (For those who don’t know or don’t care to look it up an M915 is the military version of a line haul semi-tractor/trailer). His only driver was a average sized guy with a mustache that would have been totally in character for a Swedish Porn Star. This effect was heightened by his continuous “come hither” look. In short he was a refugee from a bad 70’s hippie skin-flick and his name was SGT Bindme.

Seizing this straw of hope from amongst the maelstrom of mediocrity I was mired in I promptly informed SSG C that I could drive a 915 as well. From that moment on it was as though I had flipped a light switch. That single marketable skill landed me in SSG C good graces without another word.

I was further helped in this by an unwitting ally, SSG Thatguy. You see, SSG Thatguy had also seen fit to frost the tips of his dark brown hair blonde while he was on leave over Exodus in the same fashion as SPC Raver. The fact that this particular SSG had never been anywhere but the unit here at Ft. Hood and had still managed to rise to equal SSG C’s rank served to further enrage the already volatile Calangelo. With SPC Raver and SSG Thatguy as shining examples of everything he hated in the Army SSG C welcomed me into his inner circle with open arms. We were not friends or anything mind you, but I had elevated my worth in his eye a thousandfold.

At this point I must admit I started to feel like I was going to be just fine here at Ft. Hood. Little did I know how far I had yet to fall.

Next…The Fall