by Scott Ely
He thought of Loretta, looked for her in the scope. The image faded and the electric smell in the air was replaced with the rotting leaf stink of Light.
Light said, “Nobody has to die.”
“You come up to Laos with me,” Light said.
“I want to go home,” Jackson said, thinking of Loretta, thinking of the hundred days he had left.
“Come with me.”
“No, goddammit, I’m going home.”
“You look again.”
The scope glowed, and Jackson saw mountains and a narrow valley covered with jungle. Then he realized it was Little Tit, Big Tit, and the Cunt. No sign of the fence, everything grown up. Not even a rusted steel post or a piece of wire showing.
“Before long there’s not gonna be a fence or firebases,” Light said. “You come with me.”
Jackson looked in the scope again, the jungle smooth and uniform. Only the chopped-off tops of the mountains indicated that firebases had once been there. He looked for himself in the scope, wished he could know.
“What’s going to happen to me? What if I stay?”
“If it’s not in the scope, I don’t know,” Light said.
Jackson thought of the R&R he had taken with Light to Vung Tau and returned to find Hale’s new RTO had been killed.
“No, I belong at the firebase,” Jackson said, getting the words out all right but gasping for breath after he said it.
Jackson caught his breath and continued, “Remember we have a deal. You keep me covered.”
Light said, “I ain’t forgot. But you saw what was in the scope. You know what’s gonna happen. Come up to Laos with me.”
“I’ll be all right. You keep me alive,” Jackson said.
“You get killed I’ll raise you.”
“Shut the fuck up about that. You keep the dinks from wasting me.”
“I won’t go back on my word.”
Then Jackson left Light at the hut and started back for the firebase. Light had promised, but could he trust a man who claimed he could raise the dead?
What did I see? Was it real? Jackson thought as he walked through the jungle. Alfred Ten-Deer had been real, no doubt about that. But that was not the same as raising the dead. By the time he reached the front gate, Jackson had begun to doubt again. No one had seen Pate die. Maybe he had survived the firefight. Pate’s squad had gone out on a night ambush and vanished. Maybe Tom Light had found Pate and asked him to stay out in the bush.
And Jackson thought about the jungle-covered mountains and valley he had seen in the starlight. Then he considered returning to Light. He paused a moment before he continued to walk toward the firebase through clouds and a steady rain.
CHAPTER
20
THE NVA HIT LITTLE Tit with a night rocket and sapper attack in the middle of a heavy rainstorm. They breached the wire and ran through the camp tossing satchel charges. The rain and cloud cover made it impossible to call in gunships or fighters. Desolation Row gave them fire support along with the big guns from Firebase Mary Lou, but by morning the sappers had been reinforced by at least a company of NVA. The enemy hit the hill with rockets and mortars and began to push the engineers off. No one could see the battle because the mountaintops were shrouded in clouds.
Finally the engineers abandoned the mountaintop and retreated to the fence. Hale called in an arclight on Little Tit. The next day the air force blasted Little Tit, killing any NVA left on the hill and destroying the firebase.
Major Hale pulled the troops off the fence and assembled the men at the firebase. A gentle rain was falling, and clouds filled the valleys, the firebase like an island in a gray sea.
“Men, we’re leaving this place,” Hale began.
Everyone cheered. Hale waited until they were quiet before he continued.
“The enemy’s been kicking our ass,” Hale said. “Fence is going nowhere. We’ve been using the wrong tactics, that’s all. General Morton has ordered us into Laos.”
“We’re ready, Major,” Raymond shouted. “We’ll waste the dinks.”
Reynolds played his M-16 with his teeth.
Jackson had been in the TOC when the call came through. Hale had protested that he was not ready, that he needed air support, but Morton had given him a direct order, leaving Hale no choice.
Hale took out a plastic-covered map and held it up for the men to see.
“I got air force pictures. If the dinks dig a goddamn new latrine at the Holiday Inn, I know. Dinks won’t be expecting us, sitting over there fat and happy. Intelligence says there’s about the same number of them as us. Thinks we might catch us a general if we’re lucky. Remember, we’ll have the element of surprise.”
“Don’t care how many of us die long as you make fucking colonel,” Leander said, his pith helmet pulled down low over his eyes.
“Leander, you can get yourself plenty of those helmets where we’re going,” Hale said. Then Hale hesitated before he continued, “I didn’t say it would be easy. Better than waiting for them to kill us here. Hiding underground like fucking rats.”
“Fucking crazy,” Leander shouted.
Hale ignored Leander and talked fast, “Men, we’re going out in the jungle and destroy the enemy. The NVA will learn not to fight this unit.”
Light probably gone off to Laos and now Hale deciding to get me killed, Jackson thought.
“We’ll all get fucking wasted,” a soldier shouted.
And another said, “I’m staying here.”
The officers and NCOs went into the ranks to quiet the men.
“You will all go. You engineers are infantry now,” Hale said, talking fast. “This firebase will cease to exist. We’re not leaving a single goddamn C-ration can for the enemy to use. This mountain-top will be evacuated and bombed.”
“I ain’t going,” someone yelled.
“Only way you men will get home is by way of the goddamn Holiday Inn,” Hale said. “Next man opens his fucking mouth gets a court martial. You hear me, Leander?”
“Kill him now!” Leander shouted. “Kill the motherfucker.”
Two members of the mortar squad wrestled Leander to the ground.
Hale continued, talking so fast now it was hard to understand him, “Tear down the bunkers. Fill ’em in. Rip up the wire. Pull down the tower. Leave nothing for the enemy.”
Hale glanced up and down the ranks to see if anyone was going to challenge him.
Leander struggled with the men who held him. One held a bush hat over Leander’s mouth. Jackson wished they would let Leander go so he could kill Hale, save them all.
“We’re walking to Laos,” Hale went on, calmer now but still talking fast. “No choppers to let the enemy know exactly where we are. Slip up on ’em. Won’t build bunkers. Won’t dig foxholes. No flak jackets or steel pots to slow us down. Leander’ll be right at home with his fucking dink helmet.” Leander tried to yell something but still had a mouthful of bush hat. Hale continued, “By the time we reach the Holiday Inn, you men will be jungle soldiers. Learn to live and fight like the enemy. Be better than the fucking dinks.”
Hale dismissed the battalion. Jackson found Labouf in the TOC sitting on his cot staring at the footlocker.
“What am I going to do with it?” Labouf asked, speaking in a whisper so the man at the big radio could not overhear.
“Send it to Saigon with one of the crew chiefs,” Jackson said.
“They can’t walk into the Bank of America with American dollars,” Labouf said. “I was planning on sending it home on a ship as hold baggage.”
They both stared at the locker.
“Maybe bury it,” Labouf continued. “But if we lose the war the North Vietnamese will never let me come back here. Arclight’ll blow it to pieces.”
“You have to take the chance.”
“Yeah, no way to hump this money. No room in my ruck.”
In the morning, the footlocker was gone. Jackson did not want to know where Labouf had buried it.
Th
ey tore down the bunkers, emptied the sandbags, and used the dirt to fill in the holes. Even the piss tubes were dug up. A sky crane appeared during a break in the weather and removed the tower and the wire. They poured diesel fuel on the wood and sandbag covers and burned them.
The morning they left, Hale wandered about the firebase pointing out things the men had missed, like an empty sandbag cover or a set of rusty hinges off a mortar shell box. By the time the job was completed and the battalion walked off the mountaintop, nothing was left of the firebase but a field of red clay gullied by the endless rain, the filled-in bunkers marked by pools of water.
Jackson and Labouf stood looking at the muddy pool where the ammo bunker had been.
“Swimming pools for the dinks,” Labouf said. “They’ll like it here.”
Leander walked up to them. Hale had busted him to private and put another man in his place.
“Labouf, folks’ll be wanting their money back,” Leander said. “Tom Light’s still sitting in his hut. Bet he ain’t going to Laos.”
“He’s going,” Jackson said.
Leander laughed. “Glad I won’t have to listen to no more crazy talk. Your man’s shit is weak.”
Leander walked off to help take down the mortars.
“Let me know how it feels humping tubes and baseplates over the mountains,” Labouf yelled. “Maybe some slope’ll put another hole in your fucking dink helmet.”
But Leander did not turn around.
“He’s out there,” Jackson said, wishing the tower was still there so he could climb it and try to see Light’s hut through the clouds and rain.
“Maybe,” Labouf said.
“Dinks still won’t give up their dead. They know he’s there.”
“Nobody’s getting their fucking money back.”
Tom Light, you better be out there, Jackson thought. Risked my ass to write your letters. Can’t run out on me now.
The battalion marched past the fence in the Cunt, walking across the scrub toward the trees. Clouds filled the narrow valley and heavy rain fell, the worst weather the monsoon had brought so far. Even in the open it was difficult for Jackson to see the man in front of him.
In his ruck Jackson carried the radio, six batteries, six canteens, M-16 magazines, flares, smoke grenades, and three days’ rations. He staggered under the load which felt like it weighed a hundred pounds, the straps cutting into his shoulders.
I had it made, Jackson thought. Light was my ticket home. Crazy goddamn bastard. Should’ve gone to the city with him.
He started to choke, his mouth wide open as he sucked in great gulps of air.
“Swallow a bug, Alabama?” a voice asked.
Jackson looked up and saw Labouf grinning at him. Labouf had been given the job of carrying an extra radio and spare batteries. His rucksack bulged with the load. He, like Jackson, was supposed to stick close to Hale.
Labouf continued, “We’re fucked for sure this time.”
Suddenly there was an explosion off to their right, followed by rifle fire and the chatter of a light machine gun, the fire close but the sound muffled by the rain. Jackson lay on the ground along with Labouf and Hale.
“Do something,” Hale screamed into the handset.
“They’re fucked,” a voice came back, the lieutenant in charge of Alpha Company.
“A whole fucking platoon?” Hale asked.
Then the mortars started falling.
“Run for the trees!” a lieutenant yelled. “Everybody move.”
They all ran, but Jackson knew the enemy was shooting blind. Only a lucky shot could get them. They entered the trees, the steady beat of the rain replaced by the irregular drip from the leaves.
Another machine gun opened up on them. Jackson lay with his nose pressed into the leaves. He turned his head and saw Labouf lying beside him.
“Fucking Hale didn’t have flank security out,” Labouf said. “We lost thirty or forty men because of him.”
Jackson subtracted that from the total. The addition of the engineers had given them almost five hundred men.
“Jackson, get me Charlie Company,” Hale said.
Jackson spoke into the handset, surprised words were coming out of his mouth. He handed the handset to Hale.
Someone came running through the trees. Jackson threw his rifle up.
“Hold your fire!” a voice yelled.
Reynolds & Raymond dropped down beside them. Short-timer, his painted bones still showing, rode on Raymond’s shoulder.
“We’ll get ’em for you, Major,” Raymond said.
Reynolds sat up to play his M-16. Raymond pulled him back down. Then Reynolds switched on a small battery-powered tape recorder.
“After the jacks are in their boxes/And the clowns have all gone to bed,” the voice of Jimi Hendrix sang.
“Cut that off, goddammit!” Hale shouted.
Raymond took the tape recorder away from him.
The machine gun was joined by another. Pieces of bark and bits of leaves dropped down on them as the gun traversed over their position. The battalion replied with grenade launchers.
“Short-timer’ll get ’em,” Raymond said.
Jackson noticed for the first time that Short-timer wore a cloth vest in which he carried two frags. The pins had been straightened. Raymond held Short-timer on the ground, and the monkey squealed and twitched every time the gun tracked over them.
Raymond released Short-timer who immediately climbed the nearest tree.
“Tell ’em to stop shooting. They get him all confused,” Raymond said.
Hale gave the order over the radio, and the firing stopped. Jackson waited, pressing his body closer and closer to the earth, imagining the NVA creeping through the jungle now since the fire from the battalion had stopped.
Whaaamoom!
One machine gun stopped.
A few minutes passed and then Whaaamoom! the sound again. The second gun was silent.
Hale gave the order to resume firing.
But the NVA broke off the contact. Labouf believed they were falling back until the battalion reached a place where the enemy could be certain they could kill them all. The battalion had lost fifty men, among them was Lieutenant Sims. Also Morrison was now dead for sure. Jackson hoped that Tom Light was following them, raising the fallen men. There were a few wounded, but they could all walk. Heavy rain continued, and thick clouds dropped down over the mountains, making noon in the jungle appear like twilight.
The point squad kept making contact with the enemy. After a few hours only the squad leader was left alive. Hale replaced them with a fresh squad.
Labouf said as they took a break, “Won’t be calling Phantoms or gunships in when we make contact. No medevacs. Nothing can fly in this shit. Don’t get wounded so bad you can’t walk. Gonna need more than a frag-throwing monkey.”
Hale left a group of wounded behind with a medic and a squad for security. They were to call in a medevac when the weather cleared.
Where the fuck was Light, Jackson thought.
“I don’t need air support,” Hale said at a meeting of his commanders, which Jackson and Labouf as battalion RTOs attended. “The dinks don’t have air support. We’ll beat them at their own fucking game. Tell the men that anyone who falls out will be left behind.”
“He didn’t talk about the wounded,” Labouf whispered to Jackson. “They’re going to be left behind to die.”
“Americans don’t leave their wounded,” Jackson said.
Labouf shook his head and said, “You wait. You’ll see.”
Please, don’t let me get wounded, Jackson thought. Where is Tom Light?
Hale had continued his briefing, “And keep their goddamn feet dry. I don’t want the whole battalion down with immersion foot.”
Jackson sloshed the water in his boots about with his toes and wondered how anyone was going to keep their feet dry.
“What about resupply?” a lieutenant asked.
“When we cross over into Laos,�
�� Hale said. “We’ll need rations before the attack. If the weather is too bad for choppers to fly, we’ll live off the land. There’s deer. Wild pigs. Peacocks.”
Off in the distance they heard a deep rumble.
“Arclight on Big Tit,” Labouf said. “Hope they caught some dinks in the open.”
If Labouf had buried his money on Big Tit, he did not seem to be concerned about it. Jackson imagined the bills floating through the air, blown out of their hiding place by the bombs.
Jackson kept expecting another ambush, but it never came. The rain continued. Although the big trees broke the direct force of the rain, there was the constant drip off the leaves. The men’s boots stripped away the leaf cover, creating a slippery red clay trail to climb. Jackson pulled himself up the side of the mountain on tree limbs and vines. His body ached from the climb.
At night on laager, Jackson could count on only four hours of sleep because of guard duty. But his ruck was growing lighter because of the rations he had eaten. Some of the men had eaten almost all of theirs. Labouf had. “The place for rations is here,” Labouf said, patting his stomach.
At noon of the third day Hale called a halt for a break and brought in his commanders for a conference. They huddled together under a bamboo lean-to covered with their ponchos. Labouf and Jackson sat in the rain with their backs to a huge tree, the vines wrapped around it larger than Jackson’s leg.
“Do you think we’re in Laos yet?” Jackson asked.
“Don’t know,” Labouf said. “I think dickhead Hale is lost. That’s what they’re doing now, trying to figure out where the hell we are.”
“Where’re the dinks?”
“Watching us. Waiting. Hit us when they’re ready.”
“Tom Light’ll keep me from getting blown away,” Jackson said.
Labouf laughed. “You said that fucker went crazy. How can you count on him?”
“The men keep sighting someone.”
“Have you seen him?”
“No.”
“It’s dink scouts they’ve been seeing or hearing. Jesus, how could you see anything in this goddamn mess.”
“Maybe Light’s out there?”
Labouf laughed and said, “That’s what I’ve been telling the guys who want their money back.”