From ten thousand feet in the sky I peered down upon...insurgents in the heart of Baghdad. Using an infrared sensor to register heat signatures...I picked out machine-gun and rocket-propelled-grenade fire...that pinned down a squad of U.S. Army mechanized infantry on the wrong side of the Euphrates River...[M]y task was not to engage the enemy directly. Instead, I was to coordinate with and mark targets for an AC-130U "Spooky."...As soon as the gunship reported on-site in the night below me, my sensor operator and I began to "sparkle" targets with our infrared marking laser, lighting them up for IR sensors to detect. The Spooky opened fire with the sound of skies ripping apart on doomsday.... Hostile incoming suppressed, the army ground commander came on the radio and thanked me and the AC-130 crew profusely.... I stood up to stretch and regain my bearings in the "cockpit" of my aircraft.... Then I remembered that Trish had asked me to pick up a gallon of milk on the way home. You see, I wasn't in Iraq. Not yet. I was at Nellis Air Force Base, in Nevada, 7,500 miles from Baghdad.

Part I. Nellis air force base, Nevada. Part II. Ali air base, Iraq. Part III. Balad air base, Iraq. Part IV. Nellis air force base, Nevada.