“Funeral music again?” Doc asked quietly.
“Yes,” Minh whispered.
They sat quietly for several minutes. Suddenly they could hear helicopters again, many helicopters sounding as if they were diving directly for Alpha. All of Alpha looked up. A Huey was diving off the south ridge down toward the valley floor. Behind it to its left and right were Cobras. Behind them two more Cobras chased. From the Huey a spray of leaflets gushed, thousands of leaflets falling, being caught in the rotor wash of the helicopters and splaying then fluttering, falling gently with the rain. “Them crazy fuckas,” Doc whispered. “Trying ta draw fire so the snakes can shoot em up. Crazy, Man. Crazy.” The birds pulled out of their dive, gained altitude and the Huey began a new broadcast. The loudspeakers crackled. The tape recorded message in Vietnamese blared.
“Dear Comrades of the 812th Regiment, can you identify me?” Minh translated sentence by sentence for Doc. “I am Lieutenant Le Xuan Que, Political Commissar from the 812th. I have rallied to the Free World Forces.”
“That the POW?” Doc whispered quickly between sentences.
“Yes,” Minh said concentrating on the broadcast.
“Po fucka,” Doc said.
Minh continued translating. “For years I was with Battalion K-34. I served with KI/6 Company on 652 Mountain. Then I served with the K-19 Sapper Battalion. Three days ago I was captured. Now I am a free man with the People of the Republic of Vietnam. I appeal to all my friends to rally before you are killed by Free World Forces. Do you remember Battalion Commander, Duong, and Political Commissar, Co Rang Vau, told us many times about plans to encircle the enemy? After many days of fighting what have you accomplished? Do you see our comrades who fought with us? What has happened? I hope survivors of 652 Mountain and of Khe Ta Laou become clearheaded enough to understand the hollow promises of our cadre. I advise you to allow yourselves the opportunity to rally to the Government of Vietnam. Be like me. Or go back home. Leave the battlefield. Do you know that no one buried Phi, Link, Chieu or Song of the K-19 who died during our assault against the Americans? In the past week companies of Americans and South Vietnamese have killed hundreds of our comrades. Already this morning twenty of your friends have been killed. Much of your ammunition has been discovered and destroyed. The Americans have terrifying helicopters. They are coming to get you. You have a choice. Pick up the leaflets we are dropping. Hold them up to the Allies as they come for you. Do not hold your weapons. You will not be shot. Comrades, the Allies have treated me well and they have taken care of my health. Soldiers of the 7th Front, You Do Not Have To Die!”
The helicopter repeated the message down the valley, the message no longer intelligible to Minh at Alpha. Listening, squatting beside Minh, were Brooks, El Paso and Egan. Minh looked at them. Then he said, imitating Jax, “Shee-it. Aint no fucken way we aint gowin shoot em.” They all laughed.
At 1600 hours Alpha was ambushed again. They had moved back down toward the river, this time with two recon squads eighty meters forward of the main column. 2d Plt had led off with Baiez’ and Mohnsen’s squads reconning and Catt’s squad at column point. Behind Catt’s came the Co CP then 1st Plt and 3d at drag. The exhilaration of the earlier firefight had waned. The boonierats were again tired. They did not wish to descend again into the valley. Yet into the valley they went. Brooks had directed the unit in a spiral off the earthen swell, uphill, then east, then north and finally west again. The vegetation was patchy and discontinuous, elephant grass then secondary scrub brush, then bamboo. Five hundred meters from where they started hell broke loose slowly.
It began with Mohnsen’s squad. Smith was at point, Garbageman at slack, then Mohnsen, Jones (RTO), Greer, Roberts and Sklar. A single AK round broke the air. Sniper? Trail watcher? It seemed like a warning shot fired high. They stopped. Squatted. Jones radioed El Paso. There was movement in the brush twenty meters ahead. Mohnsen moved up to Smith, kept him from firing. The squad leader motioned Smith and Garbageman right. The squad moved forward. Roberts and Sklar to the left. Mohnsen, Jones and Greer straight in. Jones radioed their position and situation to the other recon squad. They moved out. Another sniper round cracked, slashed through the high vegetation. They all wanted to open up but the sound was somehow muffled, its location blurred. They pursued quietly, hearts pumping faster, adrenaline flowing. Three AKs opened up at them. Mohnsen’s squad exploded in a charging fusillade. They attacked the noise, firing, meeting the challenge of an unseen enemy, breaking an unknown ambush, attempting to gain fire superiority. Again the NVA fired, lower now, more continuous yet still retreating. Garbageman saw one. He unloaded half a magazine at the fleeing soldier. The rounds slammed into the NVA’s legs, ass, lower back and the body collapsed running forward—Mothafuckers, Garbageman screaming—Mohnsen, Jones charging—got em runnin, kick ass, take no names. Then from three sides the entire jungle explodes, rocking—grenades, RPGs, RPDs and AKs. The ground shakes and thunders deafening all of Mohnsen’s people. Quickly, quickly, everything happening instantaneously, a long instantaneousness, last forever in a flash. Then slowly, the reality congealing and time again pacing—Got to get out, Mohnsen. Got to get my people out. Jones screaming, crying. He is down yet still he returns fire. Armageddon Two, he screams into the radio, the noise about him too loud for him to hear any response—a series of rounds catches Greer’s right thigh ripping the flesh and shattering bone, the leg disintegrates, he falls contorted, the leg twitching violently. Rockets whiz over Mohnsen, explode. Tracers zinging, then fireballs and thunder and smoke, powder, odor, pinned down, fear. The earth about them erupts, the air above becomes a fire tempest. Four boonierats are hit. All seven lay flat trying to creep into the earth, burying themselves in the rotting vegetation hugging the swamp floor muck. Smith bellows loud from pain, hit in the neck and shoulder and arm—Save us, God, save us—Mohnsen crawling to Jones grabbing blood-sticky radio. No American fire now, the NVA settling back to a controlled second-by-second torturous rifle fire methodically pecking at every square inch of their ambush kill zone, life seeping out of Greer, out of Smith. NVA gloating but not closing overrunning the site. Boonierats sad remorseful run to death from stupidity of falling into a trap at least two thousand years old. NVA in a U-shaped ambush clockwork pelting the killzone unseen.
From fifty meters away Baiez maneuvers his squad to behind the NVA position. The enemy have trenched-in beneath thick bamboo, their firing heard but not seen. Within two minutes the left flank recon squad is atop the NVA rear firing at noise, not seeing, just firing trying to break the NVA hold over Mohnsen. Another minute later the main column flanking right and coming frontally—the NVA opening up again with all their force, now inward, now outward. Brooks screaming into the radio, screaming at boonierats, “Keep your fire low. Keep it low.”
“Come on, Man,” Mohnsen whispers to Jones. “Come on. Hang on to me.” Mohnsen works Jones’ body on top of his own then begins crawling, retreating. Roberts pushes his bloody stumped torso after Mohnsen. Garbageman pulls Greer, wraps his arm over Greer’s chest like a lifeguard pulling a drowning victim. Sklar helps Smith. Crawling, all crawling, retreating, faces in the mud, slime oozing into their eyes and mouths, blood, fluids oozing out.
“Get em back,” Brooks calls, “Get em back.”
FO calling in artillery behind the NVA position. Cahalan calling for a medevac. El Paso monitoring each squad’s position, directing, passing the L-T’s orders. Withdrawing, withdrawing. Disengaged.
“Mark it,” Brooks directs. At Alpha’s flanks and from center three red smoke-grenades are detonated. They billow thick plumes. From high above the valley the GreenMan directs attack. Two Cobras swoop down firing rockets toward the concealed enemy fighting position.
“Where’s Greer? Where’s Garbageman?” Mohnsen asked.
“Hit.” Jones gurgles sputum blood.
“Where?”
Jones pointing toward the inferno.
“Stop the birds. Stop the birds. Stop the fire.”
<
br /> The helicopter barrage ceases, the birds circle. A rear element administers to the wounded. There are no cries of pain. Medics and soldiers helping. Cherry watching disattached as if not comprehending yet completely comprehending. “Medevac,” Cahalan screams into the handset. “M-E-D-E-V-A-C. You dumb mother. Got that.” Fear and bile surge to his throat, into his mouth, burning. The odor of explosions, gunsmoke, cordite and burned flesh is incredible and disgusting. He vomits. He does not care. “Get me a Dust-Off, here. Now … Fuck you, don’t tell me not to cuss on your freq … you crazy … crazy son of a bitch. Get off this freq … get me Mercy Eagle. Fuck the colonel. Get me Dust-Off or this company’s comin back in an looking you up. Over.” Cahalan shaking uncontrollably, crying. Doc Johnson working on Roberts. Both of his arms are torn apart at the shoulders. Fragments of bone and bamboo stick to the raw tissue, Doc Johnson works over the body like a highly trained mechanic. He works quickly, systematically, having Minh and Brown assist. Doc removes Roberts’ left boot and begins an IV of plasmatine in the foot. He shoots Roberts with a syringe of morphine, then returns to the mangled stumps retying them off, quickly cleaning and wrapping the meaty shreds.
Simultaneously Brooks maneuvers 1st Plt and the remains of 2d back to the ambush site while 3d Plt retreats to an open space 250 meters east to establish a perimeter and an evacuation LZ. Egan directs the frontal assault. “Jax, take your squad around right,” he speaks with complete confidence and authority. “Cherry, Bill, we’ll go left. Take it easy. 3d Sqd out farther right. Monk, you bring 2d straight in easy. Don’t know one push it too hard. We all cover each other.”
Cherry looks at Lt. Thomaston. It is obvious Thomaston will follow Egan, will let Egan direct everything. All 1st Plt knows who commands 1st Plt. Thomaston had long ago put his rank and authority behind Egan and followed.
“Right on,” Jax says leading his squad right.
The flank elements waddle forward. 2d Sqd eases up the center. The Cobra rockets had blown chunks out of the jungle exposing two NVA bunkers and a vacated lateral fighting position. 1st Plt moves in, then stops. The bodies of Greer and Garbageman, a mangled mix of blood, mush and jungle, are splattered and nearly unrecognizable as human.
“Cover me,” Egan whispers to Cherry. He crosses to the fighting position, slides in, freezes, waits, then inches forward. His 16 is in his left hand, a grenade in his right. Jax tightens 1st Sqd on the right. Whiteboy closes the far right. To the far left Baiez’ squad pinches in. Egan slithers from the foxhole toward the bunker, rolls, lays up next to the opening, rolls tosses in the grenade and rolls back. The concussion seems tame compared to the earlier hell. Cherry slithers to the fighting position and sets up cover for Egan. Brooks appears next to him from nowhere. Egan crawls to the second bunker and blows it. Then he dives in. Brooks jumps up and dives into the first. A second later they each reappear. Brooks has a shattered AK-47 rifle. Egan a sachel of grenades and two cans of AK ammunition. There are no NVA bodies. Alpha sweeps through the miniature bunker complex and fifty meters beyond. There are signs of enemy activity everywhere but no NVA and no blood trails.
Twenty minutes after blowing the bunkers Alpha retreated to where 3d Plt had cleared the evac LZ. The bunkers had exuded ghosts upon Alpha. They were not on a trail. The recon squad was in the middle of thick brush away from all trails. The ghosts followed the boonierats, infectiously passed from one to the next until a plague of skittish panic seized all but the doped wounded and dead.
The Dust-Off bird arrived and circled high above waiting for Alpha to bring its casualties to the LZ. Then the helicopter descended, set down. Medics helped the wounded, boonierats loaded the dead, the bird rose, sped off. It was late afternoon. Mist fumed from the sodden thickets building to fog. The jungle closed, pressed in. Alpha had to escape.
Egan did not stop to analyze any of the numerous trails he crossed. He did not study the tracks in the mud. It was clear, too clear. They had crossed into the midst of the long established enemy area. That madman Brooks, Egan thought. Mad. Flee behind their perimeter. It’s beautiful. Sweat poured from Egan’s armpits. Beads formed on his forehead, broke and streamed down his face. The salt burned in jungle sores on his face. He paid it no attention. He walked carefully, quietly, looking left right up down. He sniffed the air with each step. He saw no movement. Only fetid valley odor registered in his brain.
The column followed Egan, each man taking mental notes. Pop Randalph at column drag couldn’t believe his eyes. In his three Vietnam tours he had never seen such an elaborate and extensive enemy area. Fishing grounds, game snares, cultivated fields, roads, bunkers connected by trenches and commo-wire, tunnels, most everything dug in and underground. “This aint no place fer yall ta be,” he repeated again and again.
Cherry had fallen in behind Egan and now walked slack. His vision tunnelled, he lost all peripheral perception, he focused on Egan. I thought we weren’t goina march in and knock on Charlie’s back door, his mind chattered. That’s what the L-T said.
Hide, Brooks thought. Hide where they won’t look. Hide between them, amongst them. Use their bunkers. They build them everywhere to use in emergencies but they don’t occupy even a fraction of them. Hide. If they can’t see you, they can’t hit you.
At point Egan came upon a road as wide as the road beneath the north ridge. Across the road was a bamboo thicket looking like an impenetrable wall. Egan looked up and down the road. No movement. He sniffed. No smell. He listened. No sound. The road showed fresh tracks. Egan motioned for Cherry to cover him and to sit. He shed his ruck, crossed the road to the thicket, crawled into a hole in the wall and disappeared. A minute later he reappeared and came back to Cherry. He radioed Brooks. Alpha rose and followed.
The vegetation was very thick and it was difficult to see. Egan was at point, on hands and knees, crawling inward, penetrating the thicket. Cherry crawled behind Egan. One by one the boonierats scampered from the brush on one side of the road to the hole in the bamboo wall on the other. They crawled after the point. They cussed and bitched silently, afraid to make a sound. Dumb! Fucken Dumb! L-T’s gone mad. Green-Man’s behind this. No boonierat’d ever choose this way. They cussed themselves for snapping bamboo stalks and making noise. The bamboo made a tunnel about them. There was no place to look, no cautious observation, just follow the tunnel and the heels of the boonierat in front. At point Egan found the brush to be thickening. He crawled, then rested, looking, listening, then crawled again. The vegetation caught on his ruck and he had to strain to break through. The entire company crawled behind him. At drag Pop and Doc Hayes attempted to obliterate the signs of seventy-six pairs of GI jungle boots crossing the road. Then they attempted to seal the bamboo tunnel.
After 200 meters the thicket gave way to brush and elephant grass. Alpha crawled to the edge, circled to form a perimeter and stopped. Everyone was exhausted, filthy, yet purged of the ghosts from the bunkers.
At what time he had fallen into lonely sleepless dreaming Brooks did not know. He was not sure when the valley had socked in beneath the fogmist and darkness, nor when the dreaming stopped and his consciousness controlled his thoughts. He was only aware of a sickening taste in his mouth and the cold drizzle.
For two days he and Lila acted the parts of a soldier and his lover. They did the tourist things, they ate at another luau, they drank heavily, they pawed each other. Yet they spoke little. Nam was constantly on his mind yet he had agreed not to talk about the war. The hardships the war had caused her were on Lila’s mind but she dared not talk of that. She never told anyone she was married to a soldier. How could she tell him that? In her stateside life she denied him in a hundred silent ways. It almost seemed the patriotic thing to do. How was she to now be the army wife? They had toured Oahu in the morning then gone sail-surfing then returned to the hotel. Just how or why it had happened he did not know. It confused him and it tormented him to this night. The image of him and Lila washed over him like a cold wave.
“I’m not going t
o end up like her,” Lila said defensively while removing her bathing suit. He watched longingly and she pretended she didn’t see him watching. “I’m not going to let you do that to me.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Rufus said turning his back to her.
“My mother was a smart woman,” Lila said. “She had it all together.” Rufus turned back and looked at her. He was confused and did not know what to do. This is something she’s been thinking about for a long time, he told himself. Lila was slightly drunk and she slurred her words, but as Rufus suspected, the thoughts were not new thoughts. “After she do all the stuff, washing, cooking, like that, for the family, she don’t have no time for her own thing. The old man come home criticizing, tearing her down. Little things.”
“Are you telling me I do that to you?”
“Old man say he don’t like the way she dressed, or the food aint right, aint done enough. Like that. Always tearing her down.”
There was an aggression and hate in Lila’s manner Rufus had not seen since their first fights. Rufus tried to soothe and pass over the rough edge. “Hey, come here, now,” he said pulling her to him, toward the bed. They were both now naked.
“That’s not happening to me,” Lila said allowing herself to be wrapped in his arms. “You all the time expecting me to be just what you expect me to be. No way.”
“Lila, come on,” he said sitting, rubbing his, hands on her body, pulling her down to the bed. Her body relaxed but her head raced on. “Sweet, sweet Lila,” he said nuzzling her in a practiced way.
“Another thing,” Lila said. “Your old man. I can’t believe him. He living back in the ’20s or someplace.” Rufus removed his hands from Lila. He was excited yet anxious. “You know what he said to me before I left?” Rufus bent back and hugged Lila. He flicked his tongue across her nipples, alternating from breast to breast. His hand slipped between her thighs and she squirmed. “He said, ‘We are not Blacks. We are not Negroes.’ He said, ‘We are of color.’ He’s crazy. What the hell are you doing?” Lila pushed him away and sat up. She rose from the bed, turned on the radio, took her time finding a station and returned to the bed. During the physical break, perhaps because of a flash radio news item as Lila turned-the dial, Rufus’ concentration leaped back to Nam. He saw a scene of six dead enemy soldiers and one wounded American. Firing smashed into the trees. Someone screamed. Rufus wilted, lowered his body gently to the bed as if hiding from possible enemies in the walls.
13th Valley Page 56
