and he says that we all know about the kurds and how they are up in the hills starving and freezing and how the us is dropping supplies to them and then how the marg has given orders to bring its marines to northern turkey and then having them go down into iraq and set up a safe zone for the kurds so they can go back to their villages and get on with their lives and how we are right now expediting backloading the marines and all their gear and how tomorrow we would weigh anchor and get underway for iskenderun turkey where we would offload the marines in four days and how this would be a tough mission , that nothing like this has ever been tried before , and how we all need to work hard to make sure that all combat and damage control systems are in order and working right and when he says that last part everyone looks at everyone else and one guy says oh shit so before you hit the rack , you go back up to the deck office and then grab the pms sheets off their hook and go out into the passageway and start going over all the hose reels and valves and obas and afff cans , and you are running your finger over a valve flange and the bright brass cuts into your forefinger and you hold it up and watch the blood run down the finger into the palm of your hand and then clench your hand to hold the blood there , then you go into the office and run over all the cables and check the welds on the angle iron holding the desks in place , and look over the pipes in the overhead and then trace them all back to their cutoff valves with the blood in your hand , and then you look up and its 0214 and the bosun comes in and tells you to hit the rack and on your way below you can see guys in every passageway going over the cables and the hose reels and the valves and the dogs on the watertight doors , each tracing them with their fingers and looking at them with thoughtful looks because it is real this time and the next day everyone is running all over the boat getting the marines back on board and you walk through the mess decks past a table of fcs and theyre talking about the bpdms , a piece of shit missile system , and you can hear them say that the raytheon guy said to just punch the fire button and hold it down until all the missiles are gone , and then you slip on a big chunk of italian mud on the deck and almost go down but catch yourself on a table , and you pull yourself back up and keep on walking one two three four and up and duck and one two three four and up and duck all the way to the supply office .