Reserve

Shawn McCaughey had this feeling that could equate to what a parent would experience, as the loaded their child onto a bus and to be taken off to some distant Summer Camp.

Although McCaughey couldn't agree with the decision from the upper brass at Black Company to declare older armored vehicles as surplus and place them into long term storage, he followed the orders nonetheless. He accompanied the Hercules fleet used to transport the decommissioned armor to strategic cache areas around the world. That expense alone was going to be written off as part of the year end accounting process, he was told.

His crews worked tirelessly to ensure a state of near readiness for each vehicle. By his estimates, a competent team could have any one of these forgotten treasures back into operational status with in a hour, two at the most. Ammunition is placed in safe, long term storage, fuel tanks were drained into containers and a stabilizer is added, software for critical systems was backed up and the onboard computers were wiped of sensitive and operational information, the list went on.

However, the moment that almost brought a tear to McCaughey's eye every time is when he personally put the external barrel cap on, to prevent moisture entering and rusting the bore. He felt like he just took the family dog outside and shot it.

Fortunately, this would be the last vehicle he would be performing that task on, a recently resurrected M60A3 Patton that had been dug out of Egyptian sands. This particular unit was one of those odd "labors of love", especially after he met the all female crew. McCaughey whipped his crew to make an extra effort to make sure this Patton would operate trouble free to the very best of their abilities, more so than the other vehicles they serviced.

Yeah, he would openly admit being smitten by the African-American woman who had commanded it. To him, her smile was the catalyst for that feeling of butterflies in his stomach and the quickening of the old heartbeat. It's just a crush, he kept telling himself, nothing more than a perk of the job.

Despite telling himself that, over and over, he always went an extra step to ensure her and the other two ladies more of a safe return. Since this particular unit was in former Egyptian hands, it missed out on upgrades put forward by the Service Life Extension Program engineered Raytheon of the early 2000's.

McCaughey scoured the world and called on many favors to get the Patton up to snuff with explosive reactive armor, electronic system upgrades, procured modern rangefinders and even installed air conditioning, all to make the crew more comfortable and combat effective. At least, that is what he told others was the reasons.

In reality, it was the smile of Sabrina Washington and the strongest desire to bring her home from every fight she and her crew went into.

The loud screeching sound of closing rusty metal doors rolling on equally rusty metal tracks snapped him out of his daydream. The Patton was to be sealed away from sight and the elements in some old, leased hangar. The huge doors fought this process, mirroring McCaughey's arguements with the powers-that-be at Black Company, about the logical and economic costs of keeping these vehicles in the fight.

The doors boomed closed and McCaughey stood, wondering what was going to happen next.