the Hill (1995)

by Scott, Leonard B

  The sweat-soaked company commander tried to talk on the radio and inform the colonel that his company had secured the hilltop, but he couldn’t get through. Alpha and Delta companies had walked into a nest of entrenched NVA and were in a firefight only two klicks down the ridge to the north. They were on the same frequency trying to get more artillery support and medevacs. They already had one killed and seven wounded and were fighting for their lives.

  He gave up and looked at Ty. “What is it you were trying to tell me, Cat?”

  Ty pointed to the right side of the perimeter and had to half-yell to be heard over the landing helicopters, which were bringing in the rest of the company. “Sir, the dinks were here just before we came in and had a defensive position in the trees! Saber picked up their scent, and he’s going crazy! They’re not far away!”

  The captain stood and yelled to his platoon leaders, “Get outposts out and tighten the perimeter!” He glanced at Ty as he picked up the radio handset again. “Get over to where the dog picked up the scent and keep me posted.”

  Ty jogged to the Third Platoon sector and knelt down by the platoon sergeant. “Where’s your L-tee?”

  The sergeant pointed down the hill toward a small trail. “He’s coming. He just put out the outpost.”

  The lieutenant strode up the trail and was about to speak when AK-47 fire erupted from where he had just put his two-man listening post.

  “OH NO!” he blurted and spun around. Without hesitating, he began running back down the trail and yelled at three men lying beside the trail to follow him.

  Ty stood up to follow when, to his horror, the lieutenant and two of the troopers who had gotten up were cut down by a burst of machine-gun fire. A split second later, from out of the trees only twenty meters down the hill, a squad of NVA burst out of the woodline shooting and screaming. Bullets popped by Ty’s ears and filled the air like mad hornets. He fell to the ground and pulled Saber behind a fallen tree as the camouflaged NVA pressed their surprise attack.

  An M-60 gunner lying in the crater began firing, catching the charging soldiers in the open. The red tracers were only visible for a millisecond before disappearing into bodies and bamboo.

  Ty and the platoon sergeant began shooting along with the rest of the platoon. The charging enemy were riddled, but not before the last man had almost reached the crest. The only survivor of the three men who had gone with the lieutenant raised to his knees and called out for help. A PFC on the perimeter jumped up to make a dash for him, but an NVA stepped from behind a tree and shot the wounded paratrooper in the back. The PFC screamed in rage and ran down the hill, shooting from the hip. The NVA soldier was flung backward by a ricocheting bullet that struck his weapon, then his chin. The charging PFC jammed the rifle barrel into the NVA’s face and pulled the trigger.

  Shaking horribly, Ty lowered his rifle. The earsplitting noise, the smell of gunpowder, and the sight of charging men were terrifying. Tossing off his rucksack, he quickly took out his entrenching tool and began digging behind the fallen tree. He had to get Saber into a hole. Shrapnel or a bullet was twice as devastating to an animal.

  The platoon sergeant was stunned by the death of five of his men and his platoon leader. He mumbled as he stared at his rifle, trying to figure out how to change magazines. His mind was blank. Ty stopped digging and took the weapon from him. He quickly inserted the new magazine and tossed the rifle back.

  The sergeant’s blank gaze evaporated and he stood up yelling, “Tighten up, Third Platoon, and fill the gaps! Buddy up and dig in! Jones, you and Kalanoski dig in by the trail! Baker, get that sixty dug in and break out the spare barrel! Everybody break out your extra sixty ammo!”

  The company commander and first sergeant ran around the perimeter, checking positions and yelling out to the leaders. “Stay in your platoon sectors and be prepared to help another platoon! Get your grenades out and bring your mortar rounds to the crater, one man at a time!”

  Ty dug frantically, feeling helpless. This was a different war. His skills as a tracker were useless. There were no tracks, signs, or smells to warn him of the enemy. This war was unfair. Skill meant nothing. This was nothing but raw force—gun against gun—and pure luck. These five dead men could not have done a thing to keep from being wasted. Their only mistake was being on Hill 823 in Bravo Company on the sixth of November 1967.

  Ty’s hands wouldn’t stop shaking. He was thirsty, tired, and scared. His only consolation was that the dirt was soft and the hole was quickly becoming deeper. He didn’t want to stop digging. The deeper he got, the farther away from the madness he got.

  Suddenly, the air was filled with hornets again, and the log in front of him groaned with the impact of bullets. Two platoons of NVA broke from the trees and charged the perimeter as machine guns raked the hastily dug American positions.

  The M-60 gunner couldn’t raise up behind his gun without exposing himself, so he lay back in his shallow hole and waited for the first wave to appear. The captain screamed for the second and first platoons, who weren’t receiving fire on their side of the perimeter, to turn around and shoot across their pinned-down buddies.

  Ty lay on top of Saber, cringing. Bullets were crisscrossing only a foot over his head. He could hear the screams of the NVA as well as his own men. The sounds weren’t human. A grenade went off only a few feet in front of the log and threw up a cloud of dust. He raised up only enough to ready his submachine gun when a North Vietnamese soldier jumped the log and ran past him. Another appeared and began to leap the obstacle. Ty shot him in the chest in midstride, knocking him backwards. He raised his head again and could see NVA running in all directions. Red and green tracers were whizzing past in a stream, and grenade explosions were shaking the ground like small earthquakes. Two NVA ran shoulder to shoulder, shooting and screaming in front of him. He fired a burst and hit one, but the other kept running. The soldier he had shot suddenly got up and ran straight toward him without his rifle. Ty fired again, hitting the wounded man in the chest, but his momentum carried him over the log. Ty deflected the falling body with his rifle barrel just as three more NVA broke out of the smoke only fifteen yards away. He swung his CAR-15 back and fired. The weapon recoiled twice, then nothing. He kept his finger on the trigger but realized the magazine was empty. The NVAs’ fatigues looked brand new. They weren’t wearing camouflage like the others, and they carried a fall combat load of equipment. Their brown eyes were wide and fear-filled as they ran toward him, shooting wildly. Ty saw every detail as if they were stepping in slow motion. One jerked sideways, shot in the shoulder by a machine gun, and another abruptly fell face first, hit in the legs. The last one kept coming, his face contorted and screaming. Ty lifted his pistol. He didn’t remember taking it from the holster or pushing off the safety. It was just there. He didn’t aim or blink as he rose up and fired at point-blank range. The NVA’s head snapped back and his legs buckled. He hit the ground and fell backwards.

  Sergeant Hammonds crawled behind a fallen tree and stopped to catch his breath. He had been sent by the platoon sergeant to find the company commander and learn what the platoon was supposed to do. The first platoon was on the eastern side of the company perimeter and had not been attacked. When the NVA overran the third platoon’s western sector, the first platoon had turned around and shot down those who tried to continue the attack through the perimeter. There had been a twenty-minute lull after the assault, and the first platoon had lost radio contact with the captain. The NVA had pulled back but their mortars had continued to pound the perimeter, making it impossible to move about without crawling.

  He heard radio static ahead and resumed crawling. Near a large stump he saw the captain lying on his stomach with his fatigue pants pulled down to his knees. The RTO was placing a bandage on the bleeding right cheek of the officer’s buttocks. Hammonds felt better on seeing Cat beside the wounded first sergeant, holding a canteen up for him to drink.

  The captain turned his head toward Hammonds and spoke with s
urprising calm. “What’s your platoon’s status?”

  Hammonds hugged the ground as a bullet cracked overhead. “Sir, we don’t have anybody hit, but we’re running low on ammo and grenades. The platoon sergeant sent me to find out what your orders are for him.”

  “Where … where the hell is Lieutenant Salias?”

  “I haven’t seen him since the first shots were fired,” Hammonds said and frowned. “Sergeant Ramaldo has taken over. He wants to know what we should do. ”

  The captain dug his hands into the dirt to fight back the pain. “Tell … tell him to tighten the perimeter and tie in with the platoons to his right and left. Dig in deep. We got hit by a mortar round that got six of us. We got through to battalion and they’re sending out medevacs and a resupply of ammo once we get this damn perimeter secured.”

  A mortar round hit twenty yards away, shaking the ground and sending up a dust cloud. Hammonds raised his head, nodding at the captain, then looked at Ty. “See ya later.”

  Ty raised his right thumb. “See ya. ”

  The darkness was gone for an instant when another mortar round exploded in an earsplitting, blinding flash. Ty held Saber down as dirt and debris showered them. He shook off the dirt and looked into the blackness, straining to see if anyone was hurt. He couldn’t see anything but purple spots from the previous flash of light. A grenade exploded across the perimeter, but he didn’t flinch. He was too tired to cringe anymore. The 81-millimeter mortars thunked out two rounds from the crater in a defiant response to the enemy mortar. Then a low drone passed overhead, and suddenly the sky was set ablaze with floating lights. The parachute flares dropped by Spooky immediately brought a tinge of hope. Ty raised up, checking the trees to his front, then knelt back down beside Saber. The flares cast an eerie glow over the crater, the fallen, twisted trees, and the stiff, grotesque bodies. Cordite from the firing mortars floated in a low-hanging cloud and mixed with the odor of blood and freshly plowed earth. The golden glow of the flares deepened then slowly faded into blackness. The shadows danced and swayed tricking the eyes and nerves into believing another attack was coming. Men threw grenades at noises, shadows, and ghosts in the darkness.

  Hammonds tapped Ty’s shoulder. “You okay, Cat?”

  Ty welcomed the nudge. He was glad to be reminded that another living human was beside him. “Yeah, how ’bout you?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine … naw, I’m spooked half out of my mind but sure glad you decided to join us.”

  Another series of flares popped overhead, and one of the mortarmen dropped a round in the tube.

  Ty leaned back against Hammonds’s shoulder. “I gotta tell ya the truth. I was told to join you guys. Otherwise I’d still be in my deep, deep hole thinking about you all.”

  Hammonds smiled in the golden light. “You’re better off with us anyway. We’re lucky. Did all the wounded get out?”

  “Yeah, the pilots really deserve a big kiss for that one. They were taking fire all the way in. We got all the wounded out, plus we got a resupply of ammo and grenades. I wish they woulda brought in water. Saber has just about had it.” Hammonds lowered his head. “We all have.” Ty looked at his watch; it was almost midnight. The NVA had attacked twice with grenades and rockets, but they had been repulsed each time. If the resupply chopper hadn’t come, the enemy would have taken the perimeter. One man, a pilot he didn’t know, had saved the company of desperate men with a resupply of ammunition and much needed grenades.

  A flash of white-orange light went off down the hill and was followed by a whooshing noise. Ty and Hammonds ducked as the rocket screamed overhead and exploded behind them. Hammonds raised up, throwing a grenade at the spot where the NVA soldier had fired the launcher and flattened himself. The crack and echoing boom were hardly noticeable among the other grenade explosions going on around them.

  “AHHHHHH NOOOOOOO!” Surf screamed and rose up from his foxhole, shooting his M-16 blindly at the shadows. Hammonds yelled as he balled up, knowing what was going to happen, “STOP SHOOTING! STOP SHOOTING!”

  Within five seconds chicom rifle grenades hit the ground all around them. The explosions ripped through the night air, covering the men in dirt, dust, and splintered wood. Next came the mortar rounds. In the distance was the metallic thunk pop, and then came the wait. In twenty seconds they would know if they were going to live. The rounds impacted first twenty, then thirty feet to their right, just outside the perimeter.

  Hammonds spat out dirt and whispered loudly, “Goddamn it! Nobody fire your rifle! The muzzle flash lets ’em know where we are! Book Man, take care of Surf and get him calmed down!”

  Ty hugged Saber. Living was now a matter of luck. There was no protection from the mortar rounds and no protection from men who made mistakes. Surf had reached the breaking point, where living or dying didn’t make any difference. Sitting in a hole all night waiting to die had gotten to him. It was the worst nightmare come true. Like a frightened child who knows a monster is waiting in the darkness under the bed, each man in Bravo Company waited and cringed in his foxhole. Only there was no mother close by to scream out to or to crawl in bed with. There were no hugs or gentle words of reassurance. There was no light to turn on to feel safe. The men of Bravo Company were living in a nightmare where the monsters were real.

  Ty watched the darkness slip away, praying it would hurry its retreat, though as things became more visible, they became more depressing. The night had hidden the awful truth of death. The smell grew worse in the rising, smoky mist. Gunfire cut through the silence, causing Ty to jump, and he accidentally hit Saber with his raised weapon. The southern part of the perimeter seemed to explode and then rattle with M-16 fire. Someone yelled, “Medic!” and another yelled, “Incoming!”

  Ty flattened himself and threw his arms around Saber. The incoming mortar rounds landed forty feet away, and someone screamed.

  Hammonds yelled for his squad to sound off. Silk and Bugs both hollered from their holes, “Yo!” Book Man barked out a “Here!” and Cowboy and Surf answered up with “Okay.”

  Hammonds exchanged a relieved look with Ty and raised his head to spot the lieutenant, who was yelling for him. A bullet cracked by his ear, missing him by only an inch. “Shit! Goddamn sonofabitchin’ motherfuckers! Shit yeah, shoot at me, you bastards! You couldn’t do me last night!”

  Ty reached out and put his hand on the seething man’s shoulder. “Save it, Sarge. We ain’t outta this yet.”

  Hammonds lowered his chin into the dirt. “I hate this shit, Cat. I hate this fucking hill, this fucking country, and this fucking war. We’ve been here half a day and all night, and now the lieutenant decides to lead the platoon again. I’ll bet the sonofabitch has been lying in a foxhole the whole time shitting his pants. Fuck him!”

  The sound of approaching helicopters brought all the men’s eyes up. The sight of the gunships was like a shot of hope.

  “GIT SOME!” yelled Silk.

  Ty hugged Saber to him as the lead gunship lowered its nose and streaked in for a rocket run. Minutes later he raised up. Someone was yelling for him. A captain he didn’t recognize made his way over the felled trees. “Nance, I’m the new commander. We’re going to begin searching outside the perimeter. You and your dog are going to lead us.”

  Ty stood in the center of the perimeter with his old squad. Stacked beside him were twenty-two AK-47 rifles, one RPD machine gun, a pile of rocket launchers, and hundreds of chicom grenades. The company had completed the search around the perimeter and down the ridges and had found eighty-one dead NVA and one wounded prisoner.

  Hammonds used his foot to turn over the body of an NVA soldier. “These guys are well fed, and they’re wearing new uniforms. They have new AKs, and they’re carrying the same basic shit we carry. The press ought to see this and quit saying we’re fighting farmers. This guy is a hardcore infantryman just as good as we are and just as well equipped.”

  Ty took the canteen from the dead man’s equipment and poured water into his hand fo
r Saber. “Those platforms we found in the trees are something we haven’t seen before. If we ever get into anything like this again we better hose all the trees down for snipers.”

  Silk sat down and took off his helmet. “Again? Man, I seen enough; I’m ready for da fuckin’ house. Dis shit is gettin’ real fuckin’ old, man.”

  Bugs collapsed to his knees and looked up at Hammonds. “How many we lose?”

  Hammonds took out his canteen and drank before answering. “Eight killed and fourteen wounded yesterday, and Platoon Sergeant Cabrera got it this morning. There’s a few more wounded that will be medevaced in a little while. ”

  Book Man sat back on his rucksack and shut his eyes. “We started with 102 men … that leaves us 79 in the company.”

  Cowboy looked around him at his friends. “Yeah, but we all made it. That’s what counts. ”

  “Fuckin’ A!” Silk said, holding out his hand for Bugs to slap.

  Ty remembered the plan the captain had revealed the day before and closed his eyes. Taking Hill 823 was just the first of many. Alpha and Delta companies had reported two men killed and twenty wounded. The fourth battalion had lost the equivalent of two platoons—half a company in a day and a half of fighting. He wondered how many steps the battalion could afford to make.

  * * *

  Colonel Thong drummed his fingers on the table as he listened to the report from his operations officer. The Third Battalion was finished. Only one company showed more than fifty percent strength. The Americans’ fire support had decimated the ranks. He stopped drumming and stood up. “Have the remaining men form into a reinforced company and report to the Sixth Battalion. The Yankees are building a firebase on 823 and will be searching the entire area.”