A wooden framework surrounded an outlet from the cave and as we opened it we were treated to a great expanse of the Afghan mountain-scape, from a high vantage. The ten-or-so marines with which we were embedded, kept talking of a large movement of personnel that scouts and UAV's had observed and radio'ed into them. Our guide, a white haired, Indian looking and sounding wise-man sat quietly between their nervous ranks intermittently conversing with his assistant, our translator, as well as a plucky, bright-faced young television journalist. A rocky, natural out ridge served as the apparent path up to this wooden facade; a deck and several log beams and broken planks that nested between them, clods of rock and wild-flowers creeping up out of their gaps gave the location a decidedly ancient-Buddhist flavor; it evoked a time before Islam. Some of the soldiers perched from the edge of the deck began firing down into the valley at several clearly deleneated figures running back and fourth. I covered my mouth as the group voted to pursue these sporadic figures down below. It was decided that we would stay behind, the translator was given an M-16 and the journalist a handgun. As they snaked their way down the path we saw flashes of light from their guns like little lightning-bugs, and their poses and shadows were etched nightmarishly on the walls around them like huge caricatures of fright. Finally we glimpsed their small battle with a tribe of Taliban at the base of the mountain. Some had already fallen, and some were falling in the skirmish now. A cloud of dust soon enveloped their fast, bug-like movements and they had disappeared. The T.V. journalist was busy behind me, and as I looked back he was bare-chested, ripping the sleeve off his white undershirt and tying it to a long strip of a wooden plank which he had broken off. Our wise-man sherpa began adjusting the red-lit dials on a short wave radio, his hands slow and patient. Suddenly we heard cries of agony, a moment later arabic dancing music, and then silence again. His face was leather, frozen in a sort of amused countenance; he was not afraid of death. The dark haired, serious looking translator snatched up the machine gun as we heard the sound of falling rocks not too far down the trail.