Hyena Road Page #2

66, roger, out.

We're on our own.

- They can't get anything to us?

- Not for a while. Okay, guys, let's arm up.

What the f***?

Grenade.

We need a grenade.

I got one. Here.

What do you think

they're doing?

Same as us, getting ready.

You see anything?

They got an 82 recoilless!

Oh, great.

- Everybody okay?

- Good!

- I'm good.

- You?

- What's he doing?

- I don't know.

They killed him!

- Gents, it's been a privilege.

- Likewise.

Kill every f***er

that comes through those doors!

Roger that.

Hold your fire!

Taliban?

No Taliban.

We're safe?

You trust him?

Let's gear up!

Let's go!

Thank you.

- Clear!

- Clear!

Clear!

Clear!

Where the hell'd they go?

Three Niner Alpha, 66,

we're clear in the village.

Moving to rendezvous point

at grid 4012-8883.

Three Niner Alpha,

acknowledged.

RV Quebec Quebec 4012-8883.

Over.

Zero, this is Three Niner Alpha.

66 coming home. Over.

Zero, acknowledged.

F***!

KAF.

You might as well be

on Mars as in Afghanistan.

We're out in the middle

of the desert,

surrounded by a force

of razor wire.

It's a coalition force

from over 45 different nations.

Two thirds of the soldiers

deployed here

never even see the country.

They just see blast walls,

DFACs, Tim Hortons.

Nobody even knows how many

people are on this base.

35, 45, 60,000?

It's here, inside the wire,

that we organize everything

that goes on outside the wire.

Half the time, we got it wrong,

but that means half the time,

we got it right.

It's a vast organism

that consumes

14 metric tons of food a day

and shits into a lake

that fills the air

with 30% fecal matter.

In KAF,

you breathe your own sh*t.

I'm building a road,

gentlemen.

I'm building a big f***ing road

and it's going like a dagger

into the heart of the enemy

and it is f***ing him up.

Every morning he wakes up,

I'm standing there

and I'm punching him

in his f***ing face.

Now, we've never been this deep

into the Horn of Panjwai,

but Hyena Road is in there

and she's in there to stay.

And they don't like it,

'cause we're f***ing

with their freedom of movement.

So they're going after

our dump trucks and our

gravel trucks and our workers.

What are you saying?

I'm saying I've lost 36

civilians in the last 4 months

and this bullshit

has got to stop.

And I'm gonna need

a little help from you.

- General, I am just one man.

- You're Bashir Daoud Khan, BDK.

You're one man with a militia.

And I am your partner

in peace.

So I need your eyes and ears

and I need you and your son

to be at our little

dedication ceremony,

how many clicks, there, Shorty?

- 15, sir.

- 15 clicks of hardtop

into the Horn.

Your presence there

would be... very meaningful.

Hyena Road is a gift

to all Afghans.

It would be an honour

for my father and I

to attend your ceremony.

Out-f***ing-standing.

- Thank you, general.

- Thank you, sir.

Look at the little prick.

He's like Caligula.

It'd be a f*** of a lot easier

to get Hyena built

if that prick

would stop breathing.

Right there, you're right.

I'm gonna hop a flight.

I wanna get to Sper,

run down a lead on an elder.

Tell Armstrong I'll call in

from the FOB.

You don't want

to hang out with me?

Oh, you know there is nothing

I'd rather do

but the future

of Western civilization

depends on my ass

getting out to Sper.

Alexander the Great

marched into this graveyard

about 2,500 years ago.

asy to march in,

hard to march out. His words.

He and his mother wrote

to each other all the time.

One day, he got a letter from

her saying,

"What the hell? You conquered most

of the known world in a day and a half,

what are you doing

bogged down in Afghanistan?"

He grabbed a bag

and shoveled it full of dirt

and had it sent back to Greece

with a message to his mother,

"Take this dirt and

dump it around the palace,

see what happens."

6-1, taking fire,

left, 10 o'clock.

300 metres, breaking right.

Clear to engage.

Target is neutralized.

Roger.

So Alexander's mother

spread the dirt

all around the palace.

Later that night, a couple

of attendants showed up

to make sure she was alright.

One says, "Go ahead, after you."

And the other says,

"No, after you."

And the first one says,

"No, I insist."

And the second one says,

"Don't you tell me what to do."

They pull their swords

and go at it

till they kill each other.

Alexander's mother

watched all this

and wrote a note to him saying,

"Okay, okay, now I get it."

And he wrote back saying,

"Even the dirt is hostile."

In Afghanistan, dogs fight dogs,

birds fight birds, men kill men.

Fire!

Oh, man, come on,

show me their picture.

- Mind if I join you?

- Not at all, Warrant. Please.

Hey, I got an update

from the engineer

on that stretch of Hyena

from yesterday.

They cleared 8 IEDs in all.

Something went wrong

with the last one.

The guy lost his leg above the knee.

They airlifted him to Landstuhl.

I think we need to talk.

Hey, uh...

Hi, Jen.

Sorry to interrupt here.

Ryan, I'm Pete Mitchell,

one of the effects guys

with Brigade.

I don't mean to wreck

your meal, but you mind

if I have a word with you?

Sure.

Catch up to you later.

I was in the TOC

where you guys

had that engagement

in Haji Baba.

You were f***ing lucky.

You come all the way

out here to tell me that?

Nope.

No, I came out here because -

and I could be

way out of line here but... -

you know, manifestly,

you and Jen got

a little something going.

On behalf

of the entire battle group,

I'd just like to express

our collective f***ing jealousy!

You got a girl?

Yeah. Woman of my dreams,

back home.

- Does she know what you do?

- My wife? No.

She thinks I work

inside the wire

and I'm gonna leave it that way.

Let her sleep easy at night.

Tell me something.

How much you do you know

about Pashtunwali?

Whatever's in the handbook,

you know.

It's a tribal code. It's old.

Oh yeah.

It's so old they look upon Islam

as a kind of recent add-on.

- What are those?

- They're dates.

They're local.

They help you sh*t.

The code has got

a bunch of, uh...

Well, they call them pillars.

And one of them is Panah,

which means... protection,

more or less. So when that elder

invited you into his home,

he gave you Panah:

no harm could come to you.

Uh... so I owe him, you mean?

Well, he did it for Allah,

didn't do it for you.

But you're still breathing,

so that'd be your call.

This elder...

He speak any English?

No. Just a couple words.

Any marks about him,

any scars?

- No, but he had weird eyes.

- Weird how?

His left eye was brown

and his right eye was deep blue.

Hmm.

So who is this guy?

Why do you...

Why did he give me this Panah?

That's what I wanna know.

I got a patrol going back

into the village in the morning.

I'd really like if you'd come

along with me,

help me ID the guy.

- Yeah, sure, I'll be there.

- 0900.

- Alright.

- Alright.

- I'll see you in the morning.

- Yeah.

- What are you thinking?

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