EDIT: I FORGOT TO PUT THIS IN THE TITLE, BUT THIS IS INDEED A REPOST! TREAT IT AS SUCH!

Author's Note: In this story, when I refer to the 'battalion' I'm talking about the Brigade Support Battalion. Basically the guys with all the shit that we needed but never got.... Well... Almost never....

In the spirit of the whole E4 Mafia theme that seems to have infected this sub, I'll drop my story. Enjoy.

At the time today's story took place I was either a brand new specialist or I was an E-3(P). Either way, I had been hanging out with the ground pounders for a good portion of my first deployment and I had been thoroughly corrupted.

A little history here for those who haven't read my previous stories.... I was a mechanic in the 82nd Airborne Division. I got to Ft Bragg right after my gaining unit deployed to Afghanistan. When I got there, I got heyyou-ed into an assignment as the Mechanical Support Team (of one) for an infantry company. I loved it.

Ok. Back to the story.

After I had been there awhile, we had kinda improved our situation. We had running water, showers, (see: Luck of the Polish) A/C (when I could make the units work) and the support battalion had just dropped off an MKT, a couple tricons, a reefer van (refrigerated container) and a cook.

That first week was glorious. Hot food for every meal! UGR-A's, but better by far than Mister E's.

BUT THEN!

We started to notice a very disconcerting pattern.

For one meal a day, we were eating sweet and sour chicken and rice. That's how it started out anyway. Then it was two meals a day. And then... It finally happened. He tried to serve it for breakfast.

It was at this point that we mutinied.

Well... Not really. He was just a Pv2, but we woulda mutinied if there had been someone that outranked us against whom to mutiny. We were out for blood and that blood had better not taste like sweet and sour sauce.

It turns out that the cook had accidentally had the wrong reefer van loaded and it had exactly two meals in it. The reason that he hadn't realized this initially was because somebody had run out of room in their reefer and stored a whole bunch of their own meals in this general supply reefer that was probably meant to supply the chow hall at the main FOB.

A request was sent to battalion to swap it out with the correct one, but for whatever reason, they didn't want to.

Long story short, we were stuck either eating MRE's or sweet and sour chicken. The options were limited and the situation was looking grim. The idea of eating the cook was bandied about, but rejected since he'd probably just taste like sweet and sour sauce. Something clearly had to be done about this.

~Now, before I go any further, I'm going to acknowledge the fact that I sound like a real REMF bitching about meal choices. It's true. But anyone who has spent any time with an infantry unit can testify to the fact that grousing about any slight inconvenience is their favorite pastime. In fact, they are never really happy unless they have something to gripe about. Moving on.~

We concocted a plan (by we, I mean the lower enlisted) and got the help of the cook and SFC Troy. No need to bother anyone else about it.

The Plan

Two platoons were scheduled to go back to the main FOB for refit (larger repairs on trucks, weapons etc. that we didn't have the capability and/or equipment to perform in the field.

We convinced SFC Troy to let us load half of the contents of our reefer van onto a 5 ton flatbed and deliver it back to the main FOB. He agreed and said that he knew nothing about it.

So, while we were waiting for our equipment to get taken care of, I grabbed a handful of grunts and the cook and off we went to the battalion's food storage area.

We found a van with plenty of space into which to offload the offensive food and one that was stocked to the brim with all sorts of goodies to include a wide variety of menus. We made what we felt was a fair exchange. Thirty something boxes of sweet and sour chicken for about 50 boxes of other stuff as well as 15 or 20 cases of Rip-its and at least as many cases of Gatorade.

Now comes the part where I cemented myself as a 'made man' within the E-4 Mafia.

While loading these boxes of UGR-A's, I noticed one menu included some sort of steak. So I started thinking to myself that we could really use a grill out at the COP. As fate would have it, on the way over to the food storage area we had passed the FOB Mayor's Cell, outside of which sat a beautiful homemade grill with an offset firebox decorated with all the battalion insignia. I thought it looked tacky just sitting in front of that nice wooden building and would look infinitely more at home were it to be relocated to just outside our chow tent. Plus, they didn't seem to be using it, so I figured they wouldn't mind if we borrowed it. I was so sure of this, that I didn't even bother to ask. Just went and procured a 10K forklift from their motorpool and loaded it up on the five ton right behind all that generously donated food. We strapped it down and tarped it and we were able to make a clean getaway with nobody the wiser.

I went through the three tricons that they had sent us initially and found a ton of seasonings, spices and canned goods. I started making chili every week until we left. Grilling steak on our new grill and cooking the beans on the firebox. I made the cook do the dishes, though.

One thing to add: Nobody ever asked where we got all the stuff. And I heard that the FOB Mayor had a shit-fit about his grill. Can't imagine why.