The helicopter suddenly stopped, its main rotor banged into a tangle of metal. The gunship hung in a net of foliage several feet off the ground. Men started jumping out of the open doors.
Remo saw that they carried rifles. He ran toward them. Unless he hit them first, while they were shaken up, the advantage would be theirs.
Dashing across the road, he plunged into the bush. He moved in a low crouch, the AK-47 feeling strange in his hands. He was used to an M-16. The helicopter hung like an enormous rotting fruit among tangled trees. A Vietnamese soldier was clambering out of the gun door, his rifle slung over his shoulder. Remo lifted his own assault rifle and squeezed off a single shot.
The gun clicked. He tried again. Nothing. Remo dropped into the grass and pulled the clip. Empty. The Vietnamese soldier was hanging by both hands from the chopper skid. He dangled momentarily, then dropped to the ground.
Remo dropped his useless weapon and eased forward. The Vietnamese was standing with his back toward him, unlimbering his rifle from his shoulder. Remo made a fist and came up like a ghost rising from a grave. The Vietnamese picked that moment to turn around. He saw Remo's fist and screeched in fright.
It was too late for Remo to pull his punch. It flew past the soldier's shoulder. Remo felt his legs being kicked out from under him. The two men landed in a tangle, Remo on the bottom.
Furiously Remo tried to fend off the soldier's flailing blows, but his hands wouldn't do what he willed them to. Every time he made a fist, it felt wrong. He found himself warding off the blows with quick, openhanded thrusts. What the hell was happening to him?
Remo grabbed the man's wrists. The two of them struggled. Then the soldier collapsed on top of Remo. Remo shoved him off and found Lan standing beside him, the soldier's AK-47 in her hands. It was pointing at him. This is it, he thought. I'm dead. But, wild-eyed, Lan tossed the weapon to him.
Remo caught it and spun on the sounds of approaching soldiers. There were two of them. They yelled like Indians as they charged through the grass. Remo set the fire selector to automatic and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. "Damn!" he said.
"What wrong? Why you not shoot?"
Remo looked at the breech. It was fouled with mud. "Damn!" he said again. He threw the rifle away. "Run, Lan!"
"No!"
He gave her a cruel shove. "Di-di mau!"
Lan stumbled away. Remo cut off in a different direction. The soldiers would be after him first. He got behind a thick-boled tree. He forced his right hand into a fist and listened for the clump of boots.
He saw the sweeping muzzle of a rifle before he saw the soldier himself Remo waited tensely. One step, then two. When the man's flat-nosed profile came in sight, only inches away from Remo's face, he uncorked a roundhouse swing.
Remo never felt his fist connect. Suddenly his face was wet with blood and bits of matter and he stumbled back, wondering if he had been shot or had stepped on a mine.
He wiped his face desperately. His hands were covered with blood. His first thought was: Oh, God, I'm wounded. Then he noticed the soldier.
He was lying on his back, his head turned completely around so that the back of his head was where his face should have been. His fingers and feet twitched in the nerve spasms of near-death.
Remo knelt down and pushed the man off his rifle. He checked the breech. It seemed unobstructed. Then Remo saw the man's face and backed away in horror.
The man's jaw was shoved up under his right ear. The jaw was shapeless, as if the bone had been pulverized. His neck was obviously broken too.
Remo checked himself for similar damage, but other than the blood on his fist and face, he was uninjured. Then he noticed a patch of human skin clinging to one knuckle and wondered how he had skinned his knuckles if he hadn't connected. He peeled off the patch and saw the skin underneath was undamaged. In spite of the danger all around him, he blurted out in English, "Did I do that?" He looked at his fist stupidly and wiped the blood off on his pants.
Crunching sounds told him the other Vietnamese was getting close. Remo ducked behind the tree.
"Let's see if this works a second time," he said under his breath. He made a fist. It felt strange to make a fist. As a kid growing up in Newark, making a fist was second nature. Not now. Weird.
This time Remo didn't wait for the soldier to come into view. He sensed when he was close and jumped into his face. Remo's punch connected before the other man could snap off a shot.
The impact sounded like a beanbag under a sledgehammer blow. Remo felt hard bone turn to grit under his knuckles. The soldier's arms flailed like he was trying to balance atop a high wire. When he went down, he lay still. His face was a smear of red, and Remo, who had seen terrible things in Vietnam, turned away, heaving.
He found Lan crouching by the roadside. "You okay?" he asked.
"Lan okay. And you?"
"I'm not sure," he admitted, breathing hard.
"Soldiers dead?"
"They won't be bothering us," Remo told her. He plucked thick rubber-tree leaves off with his hands. They were still wet from the night rain, and with several of them he got most of the blood off his hands.
When he was done, he turned to Lan. "Thanks," he said.
"For what?"
"For helping."
"You helped me before."
"I don't remember that. I told you."
Lan's eyebrows drew together quizzically. "What do you remember?"
Remo sat down with his back to the alligator-hide bark of a rubber tree and looked up into the too-bright morning sky.
"Vietnam," he said distantly. "I remember Vietnam."
Chapter 14
The Hind gunship deposited Captain Dai Chim Sao at a staging area twelve miles inside the Cambodian border. Dai stepped off the skid before it fully settled on the ground. The rotors kicked up the reddish-brown dust of the dry season. He pinched his eyes shut to keep out the grit.
A short, buck-toothed officer hurried up to greet him.
"Captain Dai?" he asked.
"Who else would I be? What can you tell me about the American?"
"We know he is in this sector," said the officer, leading Dai to a string of waiting T-72 tanks. "One of our patrol helicopters radioed that it had found him. Then all communication ceased. We think the helicopter has been lost."
"How far?"
"Ten kilometers south. Not more than fifteen. Do you wish to lead the convoy?"
"That is my duty," said Captain Dai, climbing into the passenger seat of a Land Rover. He struck the driver on the shoulder as a sign to proceed. "I will not shirk it."
The officer jumped into the back as the Land Rover turned smartly and took the south road.
"You do not waste time," said the officer, waving for the tanks to fall in line behind them.
"I have no time to waste," Captain Dai said grimly. He unholstered a nine-millimeter Sig Sauer pistol and made a show of checking the action.
This is a man trying to prove himself, the officer thought. It would not be a good assignment, even though the American was alone.
The sun wallowed high in the shimmering sky. But even at midday, there was no traffic on the road. Occasionally they came to a crater where a mine had gone off, and around the crater the shattered remains of a truck. One mangled door bore the flag decal of Vietnam.
"Khmer Rouge," Lan explained. "They fight the Vietnamese same way the VC used to fight Americans."
"Turned the tables, huh?" Remo mused. He was still trying to fit the pieces together. There was no question that things had changed. He trusted Lan now, even if he couldn't believe her story. Not entirely. Not yet.
"You say the war is over," Remo said. They stuck to the side of the road, just in case they had to melt into the tree line. Remo had stripped one Vietnamese of his uniform and boots, donning them only after he removed all insignias. It made him feel like a soldier again, even though everything was two sizes too small.
"Yes. War over long time. For America.
Not for Vietnam. Always new war for Vietnam. Vietnam fight China after Americans go. Now fight Kampucheans. Tomorrow, who know?"
"How long has it been over?" Remo asked. He searched his mind for a familiar memory. Yesterday was a blank. He could not even remember last month. His memory was clearer the further back he searched it, but recent events were vague. It was like looking down a tunnel. The walls were dark. But there was daylight at the end. What was it they used to say about the light at the end of the tunnel?
"War over ten-fifteen years now. Longtime."
Remo whirled. "Fifteen years!"
Lan stopped dead in her tracks. Remo snapped his rifle up defensively.
"I tell truth. Americans go in 1973. Saigon fall 1975."
"Crap!"
"Not crap. True. Lan tell truth!"
"And I suppose I've been asleep in a rice paddy all that time." Remo sneered. "Like freaking Rip Van Winkle."
"Not understand."
"The last thing I can remember is fighting in Vietnam. In 1968. What have I been doing for twenty years?"
Lan shrugged. "How Lan know? It your life."
Remo looked at her without speaking. Her face was troubled and confused. He wanted to believe that she was his friend-he desperately needed one but her story was ridiculous. It was impossible.
"I don't know what I'm going to do with you," he said slowly.
"Do nothing, then. I go." And Lan turned on her heel and walked in the opposite direction. Remo watched her go, half-wistful, and half-afraid that if he turned his back she would back-shoot him. Maybe she was VC after all. Maybe he was being set up for some elaborate brainwashing trick. He wondered if he'd been drugged. He still felt light-headed.
Lan's hair switched like an angry pony's tail as she walked off. She did not look back. Not even as she disappeared around a bend in the road.
Remo stood in the middle of the road, feeling foolish. "Aw, hell," he said, and started after her. He walked at first, then started running. His feet felt like lead in the canvas Vietnamese boots. Funny they would feel like that. American boots were heavier. Canvas boots shouldn't feel like lead weights on his feet. He was a marine. Yet he felt like his whole body was screwed up.
Maybe he had been asleep for years. What else would explain it all?
Automatic-weapons fire chattered not far off. Remo dashed into the bush.
"Dung lai! Dung lai!" a man's voice cracked. He was calling for someone to halt.
"Khoung! Remo!" It was Lan's voice. And then an AK-47 opened up.
Remo hurtled down the road like a linebacker. He plunged into the trees when he got to the bend and came out beside a low-slung tank. A Vietnamese soldier up in the turret hatch was sweeping the road with a pedestal-mounted .50-caliber gun.
Remo picked him off with one shot.
There was another tank behind the first, and a third idling at the rear. A Land Rover sat on a flat tire in the mud. Three soldiers crouched behind it, working their weapons.
Remo saw Lan dart between two trees. The crouching soldiers opened up on her with small arms.
"Hey!" Remo yelled, trying to think of the worst curse in the Vietnamese tongue. "Do may! Do may!" The soldiers turned at the sound of his voice. Remo waved at them, then vaulted onto the first tank and disappeared into the open turret hatch.
Captain Dai Chim Sao heard the American voice accuse him of sleeping with his mother, and a chill swept through him. He spun on his heels, still crouching. "There!" he pointed. "The American."
But before they could open up, he disappeared into the lead tank, past a dead machine-gunner. Muffled shots came from the tank's interior. Then there was silence.
"You and you," Dai said. "Lay down covering fire on that girl. I will get the American's body."
"How do you know he is dead?" the officer asked.
"Because there are three brave Vietnamese soldiers in that tank. They have shot him. Do as I say."
The officer shrugged and started firing at the trees. Captain Dai ran for the shelter of the far tank's tread, worked his way back, and climbed onto the rear deck. Just as quickly, he jumped back onto the road.
The tapered turret was swinging around, its .125-millimeter smoothbore cannon nearly knocking him in the head. What was happening?
When the turret was pointing back at the other tanks, the cannon fired. Once, twice. Captain Dai screamed as the successive concussions pounded his eardrums. He hugged the ground. Shrapnel flew. A steel wheel wobbled past his head and clattered to the ground like a manhole cover.
Captain Dai looked up. The second tank was in ruins. Then he got a blast of exhaust as the tank containing the American started up. Dai scrambled out of the way of a rolling tread as the tank jockeyed around the destroyed machine and bore down on the third T-72.
The hatches on the third tank popped and the crew came out like ants from an anthole. They poured off the tank's plate sides just in time. Captain Dai was certain his painful scream was louder than the cannon roar. The third tank took a direct hit. It was enveloped in flames.
Then the first tank rolled across the flattened front end of the damaged tank and worked back toward the Land Rover. The driver and the officer showed stern stuff. They bounced bullets off the tank before they split in opposite directions. The tank climbed across the Land Rover, mashing it flat. A tire burst under the pressure of those remorseless treads.
The tank kept going. And out of the open driver's hatch, an American voice boomed.
"Lan! Hop aboard. I'm not sure I can stop this thing." Even though Captain Dai knew that the Amerasian girl was about to jump out of the bush, he made no attempt to stop her when she did. He stood there, his pistol hanging loose and impotent at his side, as the girl disappeared into the open turret hatch and clanged it shut.
The T-72 continued on. There was nothing Captain Dai could do but inhale its foul exhaust and fight back the racking sobs of failure.
"See if there's any food in here," Remo said, straining in the driver's bucket to see through the periscope. The seat was mounted low to accommodate someone of Asian stature. Remo felt cramped in the tiny cockpit, which was set in the tank body just in front on the turret.
Lan stuck her head forward. "You believe Lan now?"
"I'm reserving judgment," Remo told her.
Lan shrugged. "Whatever that mean. I will look for food." She stepped around the bodies of the tank crew and opened steel ammunition boxes. They contained ammo clips. There was a crate tucked under a shelf. She lifted the lid.
"No food. But look."
Remo twisted around in his seat. He saw the gleaming stocks of new Kalashnikov assault rifles packed in Cosmoline.
"Food would be better," he grunted. Lan frowned.
Remo turned back to the periscope. Just in time. He had steered the tank toward some trees. He corrected the tank, his feet searching for the brake. He found it, and the tank rumbled to a halt.
"I'd better get rid of these bodies," Remo said. "In this heat they're going to stink. "
"I help."
"You sit." Remo climbed back to the turret and hoisted the bodies out the top hatch. He kicked them off the back of the tank and climbed back in. He left the hatch open to ventilate the tank.
As he got the tank moving again, Remo motioned for Lan to sit behind him. She did so without speaking. "You were pretty brave back there," he told her.
"Not brave. Scared."
"Same difference," Remo said, shooting her a smile. Lan bowed her head, but finally the smile was returned. "We friends?"
"Yes," Lan said. "Friends." She shook his hand and Remo laughed at the gesture, although it touched him.
"A while back you said something about my American friends. What was that about?"
"You say you come to Vietnam to help other Americans. POW's."
"Prisoners? Of the Vietnamese?"
"Yes. "
"Did I say where they were?"
"No. I think you not know."
"Great. I don't kno
w where I am, where I've been, or where I should be going."
"Not my fault."
"I know. I wish my head would clear. I feel like I've got all the answers swimming around in my head, but the thoughts won't stop long enough for me to get a clear look at them."
"I know one thing."
"What's that?"
"We need food."
"Yeah, maybe we can find a friendly village."
"Not here. Not anywhere."
"We'll come up with something," Remo said. But he had no idea what.
They hadn't driven much further when the sunlight streaming through the open hatch was suddenly blocked. Remo looked up first. Then Lan screamed. Remo braked and wriggled back into the tank's main body.
A face was looking down at them. A thin face pocked like a golf course, with thin, cruel black eyes. There was something vaguely familiar about that face, Remo thought, but his eyes were focused on the pointing barrel of the pistol that was aimed at his face.
"Dung lai!" the Vietnamese screamed.
"Sure thing, buddy," Remo said, putting his hands up. "Just don't get excited." To Lan he whispered, "Stay calm. I can handle this jerk."
The Vietnamese screamed at them. "What's he saying?" Remo asked Lan.
"He say get out of tank. Now."
"I'll go first," Remo said. He grabbed a pipelike handhold and climbed up. The Vietnamese-he was a captain, Remo realized-stepped back from the turret, and when Remo lifted his head out into the air, he suddenly felt his stomach go cold.
"No," he croaked. "Not you."
The Vietnamese screamed at him again.
"Yeah, sure, I'm coming," Remo said thickly as he got out of the tank. His legs felt rubbery. He held his hands at shoulder height, but they trembled.
"Captain Spook," Remo said dully. His eyes were sick.
Lan came out next.
The captain motioned for them to step to the rear of the tank.
"Lai dai! Lai dai, maulen!" he screamed. His face was a mask of pocked fury.
"Cai gi?" Remo asked. And received a slap in the face for his question. He had no idea what the man was screaming.
"He wants us to walk to back," Lan told him. "I think he plan kill us."
"Why not?" asked Remo, stepping toward the back. "He's dead. Why shouldn't we be too?"
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