At that moment the mad Legionnaire officer looked sharply into Hunter’s eyes. And then he chuckled. Suddenly the color returned to his face. His eyes took on a more rational look. His whole body seemed to relax.
“I’m really just a foolish old man,” he told Hunter with a grin. “I really should have retired years ago. These little episodes are simply cries for help. But I’m feeling much better now.”
The tension in the bunker eased with LaFeete’s sudden lucidity. Hunter let out a long breath in relief. LaFeete looked at him and somehow managed to combine a smile and a frown.
“Well, then, help me down from here,” he said. “We both have a lot of work to do.” He started to bend over to grab the back of the chair.
But then he suddenly lost his balance for real.
Hunter watched in horror as the chair accidently kicked out from underneath the Colonel. He dove towards the officer, but it was too late. LaFeete dropped the three feet to the floor and the noose cleanly snapped his neck. He was dead an instant later.
Midnight
The officers and men of the battered Legion outpost gathered together just three hours after Colonel LaFeete’s untimely death.
They had come to pay their respects to the man who had been their leader. And though emaciated and in tatters, they managed to present an image of proper military pomp.
Hunter, Frost and Geraci were in attendance as well—but more out of respect for all those Legionnaires and mercenaries who had died as well as a courtesy to those who were still alive.
Wrapped in a French flag—hastily sewn together from scraps of filthy red, blue, and white cloth—LaFeete’s body rested on top of a pile of shattered timbers soaked in oil and gasoline. It was a funeral pyre—the classic send-off for a warrior of greatness. But the method of LaFeete’s bodily departure from the world of the living had been chosen for less heroic reasons. Simply put, cremation was much more efficient than an interment into the ground at Khe Sanh these days.
Although an occasional sniper round forced the mourners to take cover several times, Captain Zouvette persevered in conducting the abbreviated service. A short prayer was recited in French. Zouvette then read a hastily composed eulogy. Appropriately, nothing was said about the Colonel’s recent failures as a commander. Only his victories were cited.
When Zouvette was done, a very scratchy rendition of the French national anthem played out from a hand-cranked Victrola. Those gathered stood at attention in silence, heads straight, salutes in place, despite the crump of mortar shells exploding in the distance. When the anthem was over, seven Legionnaires, lined up off to the side, fired their rifles three times into the air.
Then the pyre was lit.
With a roar, the pile of lumber burst into flame, lighting up the dark night. In an instant, enemy snipers and mortar crews in the hills took advantage of the glow of the fire and opened up. The mourners scattered, throwing themselves into whatever hole, ditch, or trench they could find.
For Hunter—taking cover in a shell hole filled with stagnant water—it was an appropriate ending to a service for a man he considered a sad but dangerous soul. For the scar-faced Captain Zouvette, who had taken shelter in the same hole, it was also a big relief.
“Well, we are finally rid of the magnificent madman,” he said, in between crashing of nearby explosions. “And now that he is dead, I can at last tell you something—something that fool had ordered us all to keep in secrecy.”
Hunter looked at Zouvette, waiting for him to continue.
“There is a place, a very secret place that LaFeete had forbid all of us to enter,” Zouvette cryptically told him.
“What place is that?” Hunter asked.
“A place you should know about—before we all die here,” Zouvette replied. “I will take you there—now.”
Chapter Nineteen
Two hours later
THERE ARE REALLY NO such things as illusions.
People see what they want to see—any misinterpretation is simply the result of lack of information. This proved, to Hunter’s way of thinking, that everyone, and everything, big and small, held at least one secret.
But still, Hunter had ever seen anything like this.
It was the small mountain located at the far end of the runway, about 150 yards from where Bozo had come to a muddy stop—the one which Hunter had slammed on the brakes to avoid smashing into during the breakneck crash landing.
On closer inspection, it did look odd. The side facing the base was unusually pristine when compared to the bomb-blasted, torn-up terrain all around it. It was covered with vines and shallow vegetation, all of it a slightly brighter emerald than the dull, dirty green everywhere else.
Also unusual was that while the Minx always launched their attacks from the same direction—out of the jungle to the north and west—they always avoided the small mountain, giving it a rather wide berth. And tactically, this was the incorrect thing to do. Had the Minx chose to take this high ground, they would have had an ideal location from which to launch their mortar attacks, one which would have increased their accuracy at least five-fold.
So it would come as no surprise to Hunter then when he learned later on that the small mountain was considered by the Minx to be haunted.
It was about 0400 when Hunter, Zouvette, Ben, and Geraci reached the foot of the mountain, which the Legionnaires had named “Magic.”
Close up, it was obvious why the vegetation on the mountain was of a different color: much of it was fake. Similar to the ersatz foliage used by the Asian Mercenary Cult to camouflage targets on the Japanese Home Islands, this stuff looked real, felt real, and even smelled real. But it was all very artificial—and its purpose was to hide something very important underneath.
Zouvette consulted a map which had been drawn up by the late Commander LaFeete himself. It took several minutes to hack through the plastic vegetation, but finally the Legionnaire found what he was looking for. It was a small fuse box, located next to a black electrical panel which held twelve On-Off switches.
Zouvette carefully brushed away several months of dirt, dust, and cobwebs from the fuse box, and then gingerly screwed in four 5-amp fuses into the four empty sockets.
“This equipment is originally French-made,” he whispered as he worked. “It’s been here for years. I hope it still works.”
Once the fuses were in place, Zouvette snapped all of On-Off switches to on. Within seconds, they heard a faint humming noise.
“I think it’s working,” the French officer whispered, the glee evident in his voice. “Definitely well-made equipment.”
Hunter and Geraci looked at each other and shrugged. They really had no idea what the hell was going on.
Zouvette consulted the map again, and then suggested they all step back a few paces. It turned out to be good advice. Suddenly the ground beneath them began to tremble; then the side of the mountain began to open up—literally.
Even Hunter was surprised—and more than a little impressed. Zouvette had activated a years-old hydraulic generator, which in turn locked into a mechanism which was now parting two huge heavy metal doors. It took them about ten seconds to creak open about halfway, but when they did, they revealed the secret of Magic Mountain: Buried deep inside was an artificial cave, at least the size of the biggest hangar at Edwards.
Geraci looked over at Hunter and shook his head.
“This is getting interesting,” he said dryly.
Hunter nodded. “To say the least.”
They quickly slipped inside the artificial chamber, and Zouvette, upon finding a similar electrical box on the inside, activated the doors to close again.
Again Geraci got Hunter’s attention. “I hope this great French machinery stays together long enough to open those doors again.”
Hunter could only nod in agreement. What was worse? Going down in a massive enemy attack, like Davy Crockett at the Alamo, or being buried alive?
The ever-industrious Zouvette next located ano
ther control box which held a light switch. He flipped it on triumphantly, only to hear at least a dozen light bulbs in outlets on the cave’s ceiling pop and die as their decades-old filaments burst with the sudden surge of electrical power.
But about a half-dozen bulbs stayed on—and they provided enough light to reveal what the cave contained.
At first look, it didn’t seem like much. There were several dozen fuel barrels, some empty, some slowly leaking. Against one wall there was a large tool cage containing instruments Hunter instantly recognized as those used by aircraft mechanics. Scattered about were pieces of sheet metal, copper tubing, and lengths of rubber hose. The floor was also littered with coffee cups, sandwich wrappers, and newspapers, some in English, others in Vietnamese, Chinese, and even Russian. Hunter picked one up. It was a copy of Stars & Stripes, the U.S. military’s old in-house newspaper. He read the date: “July 15, 1968.”
“They’ve got to get another paperboy,” he said, handing the paper to Geraci. “This one’s been here a while.”
It was becoming quite clear that the place was not only large enough to be an aircraft hangar, it was an aircraft hangar—or more accurately, an aircraft maintenance barn.
But who built it?
Zouvette didn’t know—no one in the Legion did. They found the man-made cave when they decided to defend Khe Sanh against the Minx. In some ways it appeared to have been built during American involvement in Vietnam; all of the tools were American-made and stamped with Marine ID numbers. But in other instances, especially the gears and works for the doors, there was obviously French influence, possibly dating back to the 1950s. Yet the Chinese and Russian newspapers pointed to activity after the U.S. pullout in 1975. But then again, it was obvious that the area’s current oppressors—the Minx themselves—didn’t know of the cave’s existence.
Hunter was sure they’d probably never figure out just who built the cave, or why.
But its existence did beg several other questions, one of which Geraci hit upon right away.
“I don’t get it,” he said as they wandered around the deep cavernous space. “Mr. Dien Bien Phu allows his men to get torn up out there, when they could have been all safe and cozy in here—at least for a while.”
“The commandant would never have allowed it,” Zouvette replied. “That’s why he kept this place secret from all but his officers. It may be hard for you to understand, but the commandant believed that to fight meant doing so on equal terms with the enemy. He would have considered using this place as a haven as simply running away, avoiding the fight. It was a matter of honor, for him and the Legion.”
Geraci almost burst out laughing at the man. “Sorry, compadre,” he said, “But that’s the lamest excuse I’ve ever heard.”
He turned to Hunter. “No wonder they’ve been getting their ass kicked.”
Hunter just shrugged. “LaFeete really went by his own book.”
Zouvette’s face sagged, but then his eyes lit up again.
“This is true,” he said. “But there is something in here that might surprise you even more about him.”
They walked into the darkest recesses of the cave, into an area that was lit by one very dim bulb. There they came upon a large object wrapped in an old oily tarp.
“Did you know the commandant was also a pilot?” Zouvette asked them.
Both Hunter and Geraci shook their heads no.
“Well, he was,” Zouvette continued. “And a great one. He could fly anything—even did some test piloting in his earlier days. And I have to believe because of this fact, he thought about this place, this thing here, every day.”
With dramatic fashion, Zouvette yanked the dirty tarp off to reveal a very old airplane.
“You see,” Zouvette said, pointing to the aircraft. “He could have left here any time he wanted.”
Hunter barely heard Zouvette; he was too busy staring at the old airplane.
“Goddamn,” he whispered. “Is that a Skyraider?”
It was a Skyraider—an AD-1J to be exact. And after his initial surprise died away, Hunter realized it wasn’t too out of the ordinary that this particular airplane was here.
The Skyraider was a flying warhorse. Designed at the end of World War II by the Navy as a torpedo-carrying dive bomber, the single-propeller airplane first saw action in Korea and then in Vietnam. Used as a bomber and ground support aircraft for the Air Force, Navy, and Marines, it was a huge aircraft for its day, famous for its thick, heavily armored design, built to withstand carrier takeoffs and landings.
It possessed a bulky 3050-horsepower engine, but its weight and lifting capacity saddled it with a top speed of only about 315 mph. But this was OK, as it meant the Sky raiders could lug around a lot of fuel and a lot of bombs, and stay in the air long after newer, higher-performance jet aircraft had to go home and gas up. No surprise it was a favorite among the ground troops during the Vietnam War.
This particular airplane was sporting U.S. Marine markings, but just how it got inside the cave was a mystery. It probably wasn’t any great leap to deduce that the Skyraider could have put down at Khe Sanh sometime during the famous siege and was unable to take off again. But did they build this huge cave around it? No way. Not with the depleted resources the Americans were forced to live with here. Besides, when the Marines finally abandoned the fire base, they were supposed to have destroyed everything they left behind. Whoever moved in after the fall of Saigon, and what they did here at Khe Sanh, was anybody’s guess.
The aircraft itself looked like it was in relatively good shape. Its fuselage was patched in several places, and its engine had long since leaked all its oil and hydraulics. But other than that, it appeared very flyable.
“Well, the commandant really knew how to keep a secret, didn’t he?” Geraci commented. “I don’t know whether this proves he was more nuts or less—I mean, this was his ticket to freedom right here.”
“Nuts or not, he would never leave his men behind,” Hunter replied, running his hand along the venerable fuselage. “Not his style.”
They walked back into the more lighted main area of the cave, where Geraci took a closer look at the tools on hand.
“This stuff is old, but it’s in working condition,” he said, studying an ancient hydraulic jacksaw covered with Marine serial numbers. “These bastards were getting rocketed and mortared every day, and they still kept their tools cleaned and oiled.”
“That’s the jarheads for you,” Hunter said.
He checked the time—it was almost 0500 hours. The sun would be coming up soon, and with it the waiting game for the next big Minx attack.
It was time to go.
Zouvette dutifully shut off the cave lights and they carefully exited the way they came in, taking pains not to create any disturbance that would attract the attention of the Minx gunners.
Then they set out over the battered torn-up ground again, past the dozens of rusting crashed airplanes, into the first line of muddy trenches and toward the relative safety of Bozo.
By the time they were halfway home, Hunter had already conjured up the beginnings of a bold plan to escape from the hell of Khe Sanh.
Chapter Twenty
THE NEXT DAY PASSED in almost surreal fashion.
The rest of the New Jersey 104th Engineers had repositioned to Bozo, where they would share in the common defense of the Americans’ untenable position. They’d wired their C-5 with dozens of makeshift booby traps, enough to discourage any Minx from snooping around the giant abandoned cargo plane.
More defensive positions had been established around Bozo; all day long everyone’s eyes were fixed on the sky overhead, looking for any sign of clouds gathering. The Legionnaires knew all too well that the Minx only attacked during the daily downpour, so even the slightest bit of wind was enough to send an alarm through the beleaguered camp.
But this day was different. This day, the rains did not come. The sky stayed clear; it was unbearably hot, unbearably humid. But it did not rai
n. And everyone in the base thanked the stars for giving them another day of life.
The officers aboard Bozo found different ways of busying themselves. Frost took a complete inventory of food and medical stocks from both C-5s; they had about a two-week supply, and then some left over to give to the beleaguered Legionnaires. Ben did the same for ammunition; based on one major attack per day, they had enough for about ten days, with some left over for Legion defenders. Geraci had his men surveying the most vulnerable spots on Bozo’s hull and covering them as best as they could.
Zouvette assigned a squad of his healthier troopers to fill sandbags for placement around the downed cargo jet. They stopped only at noon to pay a short, but emotional visit to the grave of their fallen commandant.
No one had seen Hunter for most of the day. He’d been up on the Bozo’s flight deck for hours, the specific reason being unknown to the others. But they all had a good idea. Many had been in tight fixes with The Wingman before—though not many tighter than this. It always fell to Hunter to come up with a plan, a strategy, a way to give them at least a fighting chance to escape their dire straits.
And they needed him to do so now more than ever.
As soon as dusk came, the Americans began to relax a little. The Minx never attacked after sundown—they were way too superstitious for night ops. The guard was doubled outside nevertheless, and a makeshift radio link established with the Legionnaires’ main bunker, 100 yards away. Then, those who could be spared settled down inside the hulk of the Bozo and either caught some sleep or dined on MREs.
Ben, Frost, and Geraci gathered near the battered nose of the huge plane and prepared a meal of MRE-style chicken à la king, applesauce pie, and coffee.
“How long has he been up there?” Geraci asked once the meal was ready.
Ben checked his watch. “Going on fourteen hours now.”
“No coffee? Nothing to eat?” the engineer asked.
Ben shook his head. “You know what happens when he gets in these modes,” he said. “I’ve seen him go for five days without a meal, a drink, or even a nap. It’s scary.”
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