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“Halt! HALT! Cease fire! Cease fire!” Gradually, over the pounding rhythm of the automatic guns, two of the teams hear you and obey. One of the guns is still going. “I said cease fire, damn it!” You have to grab the assistant machine gunner and shout near directly in his ear before it too is silenced.
Covered by a dull ringing in your ears, the town seems totally mute – a quiet scene in which all eyes in the platoon are focused on you. You are focused on Rashidov, filled with a penetrating sense of disappointment that all of the barracks jokes and gossip about the Internal Ministry seems to be coming true. He looks as confused as the rest of them, tinged with some other emotion, fear perhaps, or irritation. At any rate, you cannot parlay with Lieutenant Rashidov now, not with the eyes of the whole platoon on you. Unless you are willing to find a replacement and deal with the resultant fallout, Rashidov is the V Platoon commander and you need his troops to follow his authority. Your mind races for a way to redirect the attention and move on: “Prepare for an assault, we’re storming the building!” Some of the men look at Rashidov, some start to move but then see their immobile comrades and stop again. You too look at Rashidov. He meets your gaze and his eyes widen; he joins in: “You heard the Lieutenant Colonel, move! Don’t stand there, move!” He walks along the line of men, now hustling to-and-fro in some planned formation, pushing on their backs to move them along faster.
As Lieutenant Rashidov reaches your side of the formation, you walk up and pull him brusquely aside: “That barrage could have damaged the radio equipment,” you snarl in a tight-lipped whisper, “Starting now, I’m taking over the rest of the operation.” The flesh is taught over his angular and chiseled features when he looks at you again, he gives a curt nod and a quiet “yes, sir.”
Your first thought is you shouldn’t have trusted him, but your second is that it is better you did; now that you have seen him in the field, you know not to trust him in the field. The ringing in your ears has lessened gradually, you can now make out the sound of a child crying somewhere north of your position, frightened by the gunfire.