Field of Blackbirds - Clayton Jeppsen & Lindsey Jeppsen (me reader txt) 📗

air. It was German for; ‘Master cigar for the upper-class’. Otto was delighted to find an unscathed box of German made, ‘Geiger’ cigars, from Oberweier, taking refuge in a kitchen cabinet.
Angelo offered his cigar to Reed.
“Hang on to it Angelo, I’m appreciating the cloud already lurking around me.”
Angelo laughed, which turned into a horrible cough.
“Ah ha!” Otto grunted. “I knew Angelo wasn’t a true ring blower.”
Reed had to make some compromises for the morale of the team. He already denied, without question, Florentine’s request to try out a record player he’d revived under a fallen ceiling. It wasn’t an easy decision for Reed, considering Johnny Cash was one of the records Florentine tried to tempt him with. Reed would almost give anything to feel American again. ‘A Boy named Sue’ would do just that. For now, the team would have to settle for Reed’s graciousness in letting them smoke the cigars.
The team had been in Srebrenica for a day and a half. The home they found provided the most shelter out of a cluster of homes, recently destroyed. It was also the nearest to the camp. They were able to conceal the van under a broken down shed next to the house. Otto had rubbed ash on the van to simulate fire damage.
Most of the home had caught fire and the smell of burnt wood was almost too much. Some of the furniture away from the walls was still useable. A German made J. Becker piano with a broken leg rested against the dining room wall. Marcielli spent some time trying to tune it, but finally gave up. What made them all uneasy, were all the family portraits, either still on the wall or broken on the floor. It made them feel guilty, like violating someone’s privacy. But the truth was, privacy was the least of amenities, the least of basic rights robbed from those who lived there.
Reed stood and narrowed the gap in the curtains a little. He adjusted the wooden stool he’d been sitting on most of the day, watching. He held the Steiner night vision to his face and resumed watch over the, now speckled, blanket of flickering lights.

************

Nikola used his sleeve to soak up the alcohol that escaped the edge of his mouth. His forehead began to bead with sweat, as it always did when he drank too much. He stared at the last swig and finally tilted his head back and tipped the bottle; suspended it long enough to allow liberation of all contents. The bottle came down with a clad as the vodka burned its way through his body.
Nikola dimmed his lantern. Black, cold air crept in through the seams of the tent. Loneliness was his only audience. Self hatred was the manna on which he thrived. The more pain he could impose on others, the less alien he felt. Nikola staggered away from the table and slumped over his cot. He fought for a moment; tried to hang on to the last minutes of night before he slipped into a world where he had no power; a world where things were in order and humanely uncomplicated. Caustically, Nikola preferred the conscious nightmare. The living nightmare of those he terrorized, neatly stocked the shelves of his cold, damp cellar of power. The worst part was that he kept track. To battle his slumber, Nikola rolled the mental footage. He counted the villages, counted the bodies. He brought each face back to life and replayed their deaths over and over. The color red clouded his vision and then he fell asleep.

Nikola rose early the next morning. He emerged from his tent, cigarette already in mouth. He straightened his beret and began a quest to find the first morning pot of coffee. On the way back to his tent he motioned Goran Rugova, his most trusted henchman, to follow.
“Sit down, Goran. I’d offer you a drink, but I already drank it all.” Nikola chuckled for a moment forcing puffs of smoke into the air.
“I’ve been watching you, Goran. You’re ruthless and you should be ashamed. I’ve seen you kill people, an old woman even. And here you sit before me with a smile on your face. You’re going to burn in hell.” Nikola laughed again, “Right alongside me.”
Nikola paced around the tent. He removed his beret and rubbed his brow at the hairline. “But before we burn Goran, Greater Serbia pleads with us to do our jobs. And I have a job for you. It will test your abilities. But if you do well, I am looking for a Sergeant First Class that I can trust. What do you say?”
Goran was a well-built soldier, although biasly corpulent. He had bulging grey-green eyes, a blunt quarrelsome nose, pouting lips and a double chin. His hair was dark brown and completely in place. Goran looked at Nikola like a hungry dog waiting for a sausage to roll off the grill,
“You can trust me. I’m in.”
“Good,” replied Nikola. “Pick two men and go to Srebrenica. There is a refugee camp there. Just east of the camp, there are some burnt out homes. One of them hides a group of spies. I sent Corporal Katich and Private Gavrillo to capture them. I want you and your guys to kill them both and their detainees. I don’t trust either of them. Gavrillo betrayed General Pec and he knows too much for his own good. And Katich, he hasn’t been on board with us since he went nuts in Visegrad.”
Nikola tried to invoke a challenge. “The detainees should already be disarmed. It’s Katich and Gavrillo you need to worry about. They have both proven themselves combat worthy.”
Goran stood up, absent of fear. “Give me the Sergeant patches and I’ll have them sewn on when I return. But Lieutenant, there is one condition; I work alone.”
Nikola smiled. “You remind me so much of myself, it scares me. I’ll see you when you get back.”

************

Reed had taken hundreds of pictures of the camp earlier that day; the movements, the conditions, the mood and the people. Their faces, hope ridden and blank, their bodies, careworn and their pride, bedraggled. Reed found every frame captivating. Every frozen image bled a legacy of the human spirit, the need and will to survive and the private victories of those who were still standing. It all fascinated Reed; the soft, but mighty heartbeat of the refugee.
“What do you see, Reed?” Marcielli was seated next to the window. He had the operation orders spread out on the table and two army MRE wrappers on the floor by his feet.
Reed tried to fine tune one of the knobs on the night vision, not sure exactly how to use it. “There’s been a lot of movement out there over the last hour. It’s like they know a storm is coming. Some have gathered their things and started westward, toward Sarajevo maybe. They’re leaving in small groups.”
Marcielli thumbed through a few of the photos in the briefcase. He found the one of the little girl; the one Reed had seemed so mesmerized over. “Where do you think she’s from?” he asked.
“Kosovo,” Reed answered without disrupting his concentration.
“How can you tell?” Marcielli questioned.
“She’s Albanian. They have a certain look. And besides, I read the entire operation, twice. All of our Intel comes from the Kosovo area.” Reed lowered the night vision, seemingly frustrated with its performance.
“What do you think about going into the camp tomorrow? The refugees don’t seem too intimidating.”
Florentine joined Marcielli at the table after hearing Reed’s comment. “Mama Mia, Reed! Are you crazy?”
Marcielli shrugged his shoulders, “I think you’re right, Flo. He’s gone mad.”
Marcielli knew there was more at stake now that he was going to be a father. He was concerned about what they were really doing in Bosnia.
“Reed, if the Intel mostly comes from Kosovo, isn’t that where we should be digging? If there are graves out there we can find them without the Serbs on our backs.”
Angelo dashed out his cigar, making a burn mark on a perfectly good chair. He joined the others at the window.
“Marcielli has a point, Reed. Now that the Serbs have left Kosovo, we have all the time we need to poke around there. It could be too dangerous here.” Angelo picked up the night vision and looked at the camp. “The refugees know something. They’re leaving for a reason. We probably should too. You got some good pictures, Reed.”
Reed motioned Otto over.
“Don’t worry about me, Boss! I go where you go.” muttered Otto, who was nestled into a slanted sofa, shy of two legs. Nevertheless, he popped to his feet and rested the shotgun he was holding against the wall by the front door. Reed could feel the team was uneasy about being there. He wasn’t even sure himself why he wanted to be there. It was just a feeling he had. He was drawn to it. Was it perverse that he wanted to see the suffering up close? Or was it a need to protect those in imminent danger? It was foolish to think he could gallop in on a white horse. It was foolish to think he had the resources to make a difference. He did feel he should have made a better case for leaving Kosovo and going into Bosnia.
“You’re right, Marcielli. It would make for an easy investigation without the Serbs in Kosovo. You’re right too, Flo.” Reed admitted. “I might be a little crazy. It’s just that, I don’t know, Kosovo is quiet now; nothing is happening there. The dust clouds have settled there and now