Walking Wounded td-74

by Warren Murphy

  "Our patrol boats report sonar soundings in the bay. Very large sonar soundings."

  General Trang's face grew grim. "A submarine?"

  "I have ordered depth charges dropped on it," said the defense minister, climbing atop a tank for a better view of the harbor.

  "Dare we risk it?"

  The defense minister looked down at him coldly. "We have won the military war with the Americans," he said. "But we have lost the economic war. Our industrial base is a shambles. Our money is worthless. We have no potable water anymore. We have enemies on all borders and our supposed friends the Russians, who are like the Americans except they have no money to spend, are leeching us dry. One day soon, we may have to fight them too."

  "None of what you say is new to me, comrade."

  "But obviously you have not applied your brain to the political situation. Let me do that for you. Our only hope lies with our former enemies, the Americans. Only their friendship and economic assistance can save Vietnam. We must have their goodwill, even if we have to achieve it by force."

  "I understand. We can never get it if the American prisoners escape on their own."

  "It is too late even to return them under a pretext," the defense minister said. "Thanks to that bungler Captain Dai. The Americans must all perish. Here, on this beach. By sundown."

  The defense minister abruptly stopped speaking. Rumbling detonations came from out in the bay.

  "But the American submarine, which has violated our territorial waters, may be the card that achieves our objective," he said. More detonations followed. Then, like a whale coming up for air, the submarine surfaced. Its conning tower broke the surface of the bay, throwing up spray. It settled.

  "We have them!" General Trang said excitedly when the American-flag emblem on the conning tower became visible.

  "And we will offer them back to America-in return for certain voluntary economic concessions," said the defense minister. "Once the POW problem is totally resolved. "

  "I can send my tanks forward, crushing everything in their path," General Trang suggested eagerly.

  "No," said the defense minister, dropping to the sand. "Let the tank come. When they see we have their submarine, they will know they have no hope of escaping our shores. We will offer surrender terms. They will accept. And we will eliminate them."

  "Stop here," ordered the Master of Sinanju.

  Remo braked the tank. "Everyone sit tight," he called out. "I'm going to see what we're up against."

  Remo shimied up a banana tree. From his perch he saw it all, the tanks, the grounded gunships waiting to lift off, and out in the blue waters of the Gulf of Thailand, a U.S. submarine-dead in the water and surrounded by the red-flagged patrol boats.

  When his feet touched the ground, Remo's face was ashen. Everybody saw it.

  "They've captured the sub," Remo said simply.

  The prisoners groaned in a single voice. Some wept. A few threw down their weapons in frustration. Youngblood stamped his feet like an overgrown child. "Damn!" he said bitterly.

  "You no longer have an objective, never mind a plan," Chiun told Remo coolly. "What will you do now, soldier boy?"

  "Win," said Remo.

  "How?" asked Youngblood. The others echoed him. Remo turned to Chiun. "I'll bet you can handle those patrol boats."

  The Master of Sinanju looked at Remo pointedly. "And what makes you think a frail old man such as myself could manage that daunting task?"

  "I've seen you in action before. Can you?" Chiun bowed.

  "Of course-for a modest price." Remo's face clouded.

  "What?" he said tightly.

  "It is no great thing. I only wish your help in transporting my elephant to America."

  Relief washed over Remo's face. "You got it," he said.

  Remo faced the others. "While he's doing that, we have to get past the beach. They have tanks and helicopters, but we've beaten them before. Are you with me?"

  "Hell, yes!" they shouted.

  "Then let's do it!" Remo said. "Anytime you're ready, Chiun."

  But Chiun was already gone.

  The Master of Sinanju took the direct approach. With scores of tank cannon and rifle muzzles converging at the end of the road, he did the unexpected. He simply walked out of the jungle.

  The Vietnamese were expecting Americans. They expected a powerless tank. They did not expect a venerable Asian man in a ridiculous kimono striding calmly toward their lines. His hands were empty, so they did not fire.

  The defense minister stepped up to the old Asian. Insultingly, the old Asian walked right past him. At the defense minister's order, soldiers reached out to arrest him. They fell on their faces, their hands clutching beach sand.

  The old Asian walked past the tanks and into the surf. He continued walking until his head disappeared under the waves.

  While all eyes watched the venerable old man vanish so mysteriously, gunfire erupted from inland.

  The defense minister dived for cover. He ordered the general to return fire. The general ordered return fire from behind a tank.

  The smooth-bore cannon started shelling. The noise was deafening. Trees crashed. Dust geysered upward. The defense minister shouted for the gunships to take off, but he couldn't be heard. The gunships began collecting bullet holes from the sporadic fire of the unseen Americans.

  Finally one did lift off of its own accord, the pilot frightened into action. The helicopter started to swarm away from the beach and out to sea, but it never reached the water. A storm of rounds stitched its cockpit and riddled the weapons pod. An antitank rocket ignited. The helicopter turned into a shower of flame and hot, slicing metal.

  Several tanks directly beneath the plummeting gunship were smothered in flaming fuel. Soldiers fled the tanks. The burning fuel raced along the sand. Desperately the other tanks surged ahead, trying to get clear. They smashed into one another, treads gnashing treads. One tank, running blind, actually climbed the superstructure of another and tipped over like an upended turtle. It fell on the screaming body of General Trang.

  It was out of control. And all because of that old man who had seemingly committed suicide. The defense minister hunkered down behind the tank line, trying to figure out a way to make his men cease fire. Burning smoke seared his lungs. His eyes smarted. He plunged into the surf for relief, thinking that it was like Dien Bien Phu all over again. But in reverse.

  Remo gave the cease-fire order.

  "Tell them to conserve ammo," he told Youngblood. The word was passed down the line.

  "Casualties our side?" Remo whispered.

  The word came back through Youngblood. "None."

  "Casualties their side?"

  "Heavy," Youngblood told him amiably. "And gettin' heavier. Sounds like they're doing each other."

  "Okay," Remo said. "I'm going to see how Chiun is doing. "

  Remo went up a tree. The top had been sheared off by a shellburst. Most of the shells had landed further inland, where the T-54 had been left. The Vietnamese had set their range on it, as Remo had assumed. Miraculously, it had survived. He'd brought his men up close to the tree line much closer than the Vietnamese would have expected. It had worked. They avoided the cannon shells, their biggest worry.

  Out in the gulf, Remo saw three patrol boats circling the wallowing submarine. He grinned tightly. Before, there had been four boats. As he watched, one slipped under the water, stern-first. It went down as if pulled by unseen fingers. Remo spied the colorful figure of Chiun swimming from the vortex of the sinking boat to the next-nearest craft.

  As Remo watched, the Master of Sinanju pressed up against the stern of that boat. He could be seen jabbing his fingers into the hull below the waterline. Remo could almost imagine the punch-press sound of his fingers piercing the hull.

  The third patrol boat disappeared with all hands. Remo dropped to the ground.

  "Okay, the sub will be in the clear by the time we hit the beach."

  "How are we gonna do that?" an Ameri
can demanded. "We're still outnumbered."

  "The same way Chiun did. March right down to the water and swim for it."

  "But they'll zap us for sure."

  "Our tank made it. I'll use it to create a diversion. They'll open up on me. While I keep them busy, everyone slips into the water at the far end. They're so confused down there, it should be a piece of cake."

  "Good plan," Youngblood said. "Except for one thing." Remo looked at him.

  "I'm drivin' the tank."

  "Nothing doing," Remo said. "It's too dangerous."

  "I sure ain't walkin' down. I'm too old. Can't outrun the bullets like I usta."

  "I'm with the sarge," Boyette piped up. "After all he's done for us, he deserves a free ride."

  "Shit, I ain't lookin' for no free ride," Youngblood protested. "I just know I'm the man for the job, is all." He looked at Remo intently. "Unless someone thinks he knows a better man than me."

  "Not me," said Remo, shaking his head.

  "They're gonna need you to save their raggedy butts," Youngblood whispered to Remo. "I carried 'em this far. I'm countin' on you gettin' them home."

  "We're all goin' home," Remo shot back.

  "I hear you," said Youngblood. And without another word he charged back to the tank. Its rumbling engine started up immediately.

  The old T-54 rolled past them and Dick Youngblood shot them a lazy wave of the hand before he buttoned up the driver's hatch and sent the grinding machine sliding down to the beach.

  "There goes a man," a voice said. "Amen. "

  "Save the prayers for church," Remo barked, his eyes anxious. "Dick won't be able to buy us much time. We go in twos. Starting-"

  The gunfire started up again. The sounds of bullets ricocheting wildly off plate metal came to their ears. "Now!" Remo said, pushing the first two off.

  He watched as they worked down the tree line; running parallel with the T-54. They reached the water unseen and unhurt.

  "Next!" Remo yelled.

  And so it went. The first three teams got to the water while the Vietnamese peppered the T-54 with machinegun fire. By then Youngblood's tank was cannon-to-cannon with a heavier T-72.

  "What does he do?" someone asked. Remo noticed it was one of the Amerasians, Nguyen.

  It became immediately apparent what Youngblood was up to. When the T-54 cannon barrel rammed the heavier smoothbore, the dummy bore began to splinter. The tanks kept lurching at each other.

  But out of the driver's hatch, Dick Youngblood arose like a genie from a lamp. He leapt to the other tank and popped its turret hatch, raking the interior with his AK-47.

  Then he disappeared inside.

  "That hulking sonovabitch," Boyette said in awe. Youngblood, obviously in command of the T-72, sent the cannon swiveling toward the remaining line of tanks. He began firing. Shells coughed out explosively. The concussions hurt their ears.

  "Now!" Remo yelled, jumping to his feet. "Everybody!" They raced for the beach. There was so much noise and smoke and confusion that even if they were seen, they were a minor factor compared with the rampaging T-72. Remo made sure everyone got into the water before he turned to see about Youngblood.

  Youngblood's tank was indistinguishable from the others. It was like bumper cars played with military equipment. Tanks rammed one another blindly. Men ran in all directions. The Vietnamese military had reverted to its fundamental mind-set: every man for himself.

  Remo was about to plunge in when one of the American POW's began calling for help. Remo turned. It was Colletta. Too weak to swim, he was going under.

  Remo hesitated momentarily, but in the end he had no choice. He plunged in after Colletta.

  Gripping the man's chin in the accepted rescue headlock, Remo swam for the sub. All around him, the others were paddling for their lives, their weapons left behind.

  Chiun's head bobbed up to one side.

  "Take this guy, will you?" Remo asked him. Seawater squirted from Chiun's mouth.

  "Why?"

  "I've got to go back. Youngblood's still on the beach." Chiun looked to shore. Each time a shell or tank exploded, a ball of fire climbed heavenward like a raging fist and a wave of heat struck their faces.

  "If your friend is there, he is lost."

  "Take him!" Remo spat.

  Reluctantly the Master of Sinanju took charge of the semiconscious Colletta. Remo struck back for shore. By the time he stepped onto the open sand, the conflict had settled down. Broken, flaming tanks lay strewn everywhere. The one surviving gunship sat like a broken dragonfly, abandoned and shot to pieces. It had never gotten off the ground.

  Remo ran from tank to tank, avoiding gasoline fires, and kicked hatches open in a vain effort to find his friend.

  "Dick!" he called. "Dick! Damn!"

  Remo found Dick Youngblood half in and half out of the driver's hatch of one T-72, his face pressed to the deck.

  Remo turned him over. His face was gray and bloodless, his eyes open as if seeing everything and nothing at the same time.

  Frantically Remo pulled Youngblood onto the deck. He slammed his doubled fists over the man's heart. "Come on, come on," he said, applying mouth-to-mouth. Dick's breath smelled like a pulled tooth.

  Youngblood suddenly coughed. His eyes fluttered. His lips moved weakly.

  "Give it up, man," he whispered. "I'm gone."

  "No!" Remo shouted. "I came all this way for you. Breathe!"

  "Hey, give it a rest." Youngblood's voice was gentle.

  "Phong died for you, dammit," Remo said, shaking him. "Don't you understand? I left you behind the first time. I won't do it again. This can't all have been for nothing."

  "It ain't, man. It ain't, 'cause I'm dying free." Then the breath went out of Youngblood's body in a slow, deflating rush.

  "Dick . . ." Remo said, hugging the man tightly. "You waited so long. So damn long. Why did it have to be you? Why couldn't it have been one of the others?"

  When the tears stopped, Remo pulled the body of his friend free. Dick Youngblood's massive body, for all its bulk, felt strangely light in his arms-as if the best part of him had deserted the physical shell.

  With unseeing eyes, Remo walked toward the surf. He. was oblivious of the sight of his fellow Americans climbing into the submarine's deck hatches. He didn't notice the man with the iron-gray hair and military bearing crawl out from under a disabled tank, pick up a fallen Kalashnikov rifle from the sand, and point it at his back.

  "You!" the man called in heavily accented English.

  "Go away," Remo said dully. "It's over."

  "I order you to surrender."

  "Who are you to order me to do anything?" Remo asked stonily.

  "I am the defense minister of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam."

  Remo stopped suddenly. An odd light leapt into his eyes.

  "That means you're in charge of the Vietnamese military, doesn't it?"

  "Yes. Now, drop that man. Quickly!"

  Remo did as he was told. He placed Dick Youngblood's body on the sand with infinite care. He turned to face the man with the iron-gray hair.

  "You speak English?" Remo asked.

  "I participated in the Paris peace talks."

  "Then you're just the man I want to talk to," Remo said, advancing grimly.

  "I cannot allow you to live," cried the defense minister. And he opened up. Remo veered to one side, evading the bullet stream. The second burst was corrected for his new position, but he wasn't there either. The Kalashnikov ejected its last smoking cartridge. Remo let the fact that the weapon was empty sink into the man's astonished mind.

  Then Remo took the rifle and reduced it to splinters and metal grit.

  Remo jammed the defense minister of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam up against a decapitated tank. He rifled his pockets, finding a wallet. The wallet contained several folded sheets of paper.

  "These will do," Remo said.

  "What do you mean?" the defense minister sputtered.

  "Can you write
English as well as you speak it?"

  "Perhaps. "

  Remo scrounged through the man's pockets until he found a pen. He turned the man around and slapped the paper and pen onto the tank's flat superstructure. "Write," Remo ordered.

  "What shall I write?"

  "A surrender treaty. Unconditional surrender."

  "I do not understand."

  "You were part of the Paris talks. You signed a treaty there. This treaty will replace that one. The terms are simple. Unconditional surrender to the American forces. Me."

  "Such a coerced document can mean nothing."

  "Humor me," Remo said, forcing his finger into the small of the man's back, where it caused the lower vertebrae to grind together painfully. The defense minister gasped for breath. He began writing.

  When he was done, he handed the scraps of paper to Remo with shaky hands. His eyes were stricken.

  "It means nothing," he repeated.

  "Wrong," Remo told him. "The first treaty meant nothing, because your people never intended to live up to it. But this one is different. It means my friend lying over there died for something. I don't call that nothing."

  "Am I your prisoner?"

  "I don't take prisoners," Remo told him. Then he released the man's vertebrae. The defense minister fell to the sand with his lungs expelling a final gusty breath.

  Remo walked away from the body without a second glance and stood over the mortal remains of Dick Youngblood.

  He looked at the papers in his hands and realized that he would have to make a choice. Dick's body or the papers. He couldn't swim with Dick's body in tow and still hold the treaty papers above the ruinous salt water.

  Remo was about to drop the papers when the Master of Sinanju called out to him. Remo looked.

  Chiun was returning to shore on the back of the elephant he called Rambo.

  "The submarine is leaving now," Chiun told him emotionlessly. "Do you wish to come along?"

  "Is there room for Dick on that thing's back?"

  "He is dead."

  "So?"

  "So I do not understand. We can do nothing more for him. Why bring his remains back?"

  "You'll never understand," Remo said levelly, hoisting Youngblood's body onto the elephant's back. "I'm a Marine, and we don't leave our dead behind."