by Tim Lebbon
“Listen, Senator Willis. NASA is sending a Landsat mission to this island. They’re geo-marking the area for further imaging. We can piggyback on their mission, cutting the cost and sharing some of the burden. With your permission, of course.”
“And just what do you expect to find there?”
“Resources,” Brooks said. He caught Willis’s attention with that one, Randa thought. Every instinct told him to shut Brooks up and take over again, but he stopped himself. His young intern continued. “Who knows? Medicines, the cure for cancer, geological riches, possible alternate fuels, a new, strategically located outpost claimed by the USA…”
Willis was nodding slowly, and when Brooks trailed off he prompted him to continue.
“To be honest, Senator, we don’t know for sure what’s there. What we do know is the Russian NOVSAT is passing over this sector tomorrow night. In three days, they’ll have the same images we have.”
“And why haven’t these images been available to either country before now?”
“Storm front,” Brooks said. “The island’s surrounded and covered by an almost permanent storm system, and as far as we can make out this is the first time it’s cleared and broken. At least, first time since we’ve had satellites up there mapping the Earth’s surface.”
“So the Russians can see it too,” he mused, almost to himself.
“Whatever’s there, I’d prefer that we find it first,” Brooks said.
Willis glanced at his watch, rubbed his chin. He’s thinking about it, Randa thought, trying to withhold his excitement. He knew that once Willis started thinking about it, the cogs would begin turning and the idea would grow in his own mind. All he’d needed was one little nudge. Brooks had given it.
“I can’t believe I’m saying this,” the senator said, “but that almost makes sense.” He looked at Randa. “Next time don’t lead with the monsters, and let Yale here do the talking. I’ll get you the piggyback, but this is it, Randa. Last favour.”
Randa nodded. He was still nodding when the senator turned to leave.
“Oh, Senator, one more thing,” Randa said.
Exasperated, the senator stopped and turned. His face looked like thunder… but Randa knew they had him.
“What is it, Randa?”
“I’m going to need a military escort.”
“In case of monsters, right?” Willis asked, but neither man replied. He laughed. But Randa didn’t think it was quite as heartfelt, or as honest as before. “Yeah, okay,” Senator Willis said. “In case of monsters.”
TWO
Warrant Officer Glenn Mills thought that his buddies might just love him and want to have his children. It wasn’t that they hadn’t already had enough beer. It’s that they hadn’t yet had this beer. Brewed by one of the 3rd Assault Helicopter Company (Sky Devils)’s most talented ground crew, using the finest ingredients and a filtration system ripped from the guts of an old Huey, this stuff might well be used as a substitute for napalm. If the war was still on, that was.
But it wasn’t.
I’m going home! Mills thought again, the idea sitting uncomfortably in his own beer-addled brain. Home had been a calming concept for all three of his combat tours, but the longer he’d spent out here, the more alien a place home became. His last time back he’d spent pacing the neighbourhood and looking forward to his next tour. He knew that was twisted, and he’d never intended to become one of those guys, the sort who became entrenched in war and the camaraderie it entailed. He still didn’t think he was. I’m going home, he thought again, and this time he pictured the good things—his mother’s cooking; Jane Broderick’s soft lips; sunset on the hill above town, where as a teen he’d gone to make out. I’m going home, and I’ll make it home again.
He walked straight through the breaking yard. A dozen Hueys were parked here, most of them already in a state of being dismantled. Wrecking crews worked on the rest. Drills and saws buzzed, metal tore and screamed, and sometimes the sounds took Mills straight back into combat. He paused beside one aircraft and checked out the half-lion, half-eagle griffin that had become the Sky Devils’ mascot. Gotta cut that outta there. He’d thought that before. He wanted to take one of these griffins home, but maybe he’d never get around to it. Could be that the only souvenir of his time out here would be the memories, good and bad.
He carried the heavy barrel into the old operations centre and booted the door closed behind him.
They were still partying. The room was large and now almost empty, apart from the group of Sky Devils over in one corner. They danced, spilled beer, changed records on Slivko’s record player, and generally revelled in these new, post-war times. There was an air of hysteria about them that he’d never seen before. Usually the hysteria was because any one of them might be killed on their next mission. Now, it was because they were safe. Mills thought that fact might take a very long time to sink in.
He paused for a moment and glanced across at one long wall. It was still lined with photographs of friends they’d lost, along with their citations and medals ready to ship home to their families. Sometimes they were whole crews, pictures taken beside the aircraft that had gone down with them inside. Many of them were still missing, hidden out there in the jungle, rotting sculptures of metal and bone. Sometimes there was just one guy, unlucky enough to catch a bullet whilst airborne. Mills couldn’t recall how many times he’d helped clean bodies and blood from a Huey’s interior after an assault.
“Hey, Mills!” Specialist Joe Reles shouted. “You got your girl a present?”
“This is for you, numb-nut,” Mills said.
“Oh, that’s right. You think there’s no point taking a gift home for your sweetheart.” Reles helped him with the barrel and slapped him playfully around the shoulder. Other guys whooped and cheered as they popped the barrel and started filling their beer funnels. The brew even smelled toxic.
“All I’m saying is, we ain’t exactly been angels while we were over here,” Mills said. “So now that the war’s over, don’t go home expecting to find your women right where you left ’em.”
“I left mine in bed, worn out and aching for my loving touch.” Slivko laughed. He laughed at everything, though now Mills thought the young Detroit hipster’s laughter carried a tint of desperation. He was a good soldier, but he’d lost it a couple of times, partaking too frequently of the drugs so easily come by out here. Slivko had believed that they’d numb him to the pain, but he’d learnt the hard way that they only brought another form of hurt. He was okay now, though. Mills hoped he’d take that level-headedness back home with him.
Cole just stared through his aviator glasses. Cole stared a lot and spoke very little.
“All except Cole,” Mills said, staring back. “His woman’s right where he left her, in the crawlspace under his house.”
Cole didn’t even raise an eyebrow.
“Smile, brother,” Slivko said. “Pizza and hamburgers, man, and cold nights with warm girls.”
“At least curl your lip so we know you’re alive,” Mills said, moving closer to Cole. They’d been on countless missions together, and on one memorable mission they had both saved each other’s lives. You couldn’t put a price on that. Yet he still didn’t understand the guy. “You’ll end up being shipped back on the wrong plane, in one of those coffins with the flag over it.”
“Leave him alone,” Reles said. “He’s still in shock.”
“Still in shock from being born?” Mills asked. “I ain’t seen his expression change this whole war.”
The sounds of the Sky Devils’ aircraft being broken down for scrap increased as the hangar’s side door opened. Mills glanced around to see Major Chapman enter, and behind him came Lieutenant Colonel Packard. Mills sighed. Just when things were about to get messy, here came the old man to spoil things.
“Atten-shun!” Chapman ordered. “Look alive.”
Mills and the other guys stood and gathered to attention, swaying slightly in the heat. Mills’s sto
mach churned. Damn, well, maybe he’d had enough to drink already, anyway. None of them really needed this new barrel of badness.
“At ease, you assholes,” Packard said. “You look like idiots. This is a celebration!”
Chapman’s stern face broke into a grin as he produced a big bottle of champagne from behind his back and popped the cork. Mills and the guys cheered and whooped, and Chapman came forward with a roll of paper cups and started pouring. A major serving champagne to the grunts. Mills grinned, but still struggled not to salute when it was his turn.
“I just want to say one thing,” Packard said as the Sky Devils drank. “It has been an absolute honour to serve with you men. I know you’re all happy to go home, but you’ll realise in ten, twenty years… you’ll look back at this time and miss it. The family we became out here. We’re brothers. I know I’m gonna miss you. You all served in the most decorated chopper assault unit in air-cav history.” Packard looked directly at Mills, and the barrel of toxicity he’d brought in. “If that doesn’t rate tying one on, I don’t know what the hell does.”
Mills and the others cheered, even as Packard about-faced and walked towards the hangar’s far corner. As he entered the small office there, Mills saw the smile drop from the colonel’s face.
The sound of breaking aircraft increased again. Mills didn’t think he’d ever get used to that, and with every crack or impact he felt a little bit of himself being broken off. It was like they were chipping away at his history. Some things are best left behind, he kept telling himself, hoping that one day soon he’d believe it.
The side door opened, and a couple of guys from the demolition crew looked in, as if searching for something else to take apart.
“Hey, man,” Mills shouted, “can’t you see we’re in the middle of a meeting!”
The two breakdown crew retreated quickly and closed the door. Mills looked across at the small office, the door now closed. Then he turned back to his brothers and their party continued.
* * *
Packard leaned back and rested his feet on his desk. He stared. He wasn’t even sure what he was staring at. Previously there would have been maps on the walls around him, marked up with red and blue pins, tape, marker pens displaying LZs and enemy targets. He’d known those places, even though much of the time he’d never flown there himself. He’d pored over those maps with Chapman and some of his better pilots, getting to know the lie of the land before sending his Sky Devils into combat. He’d always found it important to know as much about the missions as he could before committing his men, and that was why he often went against tradition and flew an occasional mission himself. Some believed that being in command was about giving orders from a place of safety, but he would never send his men to do something he wouldn’t do himself. He knew that they appreciated that, but it was more about him than his men. It was because it made him feel strong.
Now there was only bare wood around him, snapped staples the only evidence of what had been there before. The office bore silent witness to the plans once made here, the deaths sanctioned. Buried in these wooden walls were echoes of conversations he might never have again. Most men would have been pleased.
Most men had more to go home to than they had out here.
The stripped-down office made him feel sad. If there were ghosts, they would surely inhabit somewhere like this. It was a place where violence, fear, and death were once planned, and now he could only sit and stare at an empty wall.
“Sir?”
The voice startled him, and Packard jumped. He didn’t like being surprised, but this was his fault, not Chapman’s. The major stood at the open door, one hand still on the handle.
“Chapman,” Packard said.
“You need anything, sir?”
“What are you gonna do, Chapman?”
Chapman frowned, looking confused. He entered and closed the door behind him, cutting off the sounds of celebrating, drunken men. Maybe he’d seen some weakness in his colonel’s face and didn’t want the men to see that.
“Sir?”
“When you get back. What are your plans?”
“I’m all set up at Eastern Airlines. Grace and Billy are already moved-in in Atlanta. Ready and waiting for me.” Chapman smiled, and it suited him. But Packard’s stern mood drained the major’s smile quickly.
“What about you, sir?”
“I don’t know,” Packard said, quieter than he’d intended.
“Home?” Chapman asked, moving from foot to foot. He seemed embarrassed and awkward, and Packard knew why. None of his men knew him. He was an enigma to them, and he liked it that way. They’d even been running a book on whether his wedding ring was real or not.
“Look at this place,” Packard said, ignoring the word and pointing at the walls. “When these walls were covered in maps I’d think of myself as some sort of king, lording over all the lands around me. I could reach out with one hand and then the other, and touch places a hundred miles apart. Then sometimes, on those bad days… you know the days I mean, when someone came home in a body bag, or didn’t come home at all… sometimes, I was a devil. So, home? I’m not sure where that is.”
Chapman said nothing.
“Hell, I’m sorry,” Packard said. “Get out there. Enjoy yourself.”
“You’re sure everything’s okay, sir?” Chapman asked, and this time it was a friend asking a friend.
“Go on.” Packard smiled and waved at the door, and Chapman turned and left. As he closed the door behind him, the smile fell from Packard’s face.
Okay? he thought, and he had to really think about that. He had no real answer. There was no one waiting for him back in the States. Soon, there would be no one relying on him here. Sure, maybe he’d end up with a desk job somewhere, if he wasn’t one of those destined to be thrown to the wolves for the way this war had played out. Heads were going to roll, he knew that for sure. He was old enough to remember the joy at soldiers’ homecoming from the Second World War, and wise enough to know there was going to be nothing like that for this one.
Maybe the lucky ones were going home in a box. Maybe the luckiest ones, or the wisest, would decide to not go home at all.
Packard closed his eyes and listened to his men outside. He liked his own company, but he’d never felt so alone.
It was best to just go, and figure out where he was going when he got there.
* * *
With his kit bag slung over his shoulder, Packard stalked through the darkness, making his way across the base and towards the gate. He had no idea what might lay beyond. That would trouble some people, but not him. All he knew was that he needed to find a purpose in life once more, and the one place without purpose was here. The sight of choppers being decommissioned and taken apart broke his heart.
A dozen trucks were parked behind the guard shack, all loaded up and ready to leave. More would arrive tomorrow, ready to take his troops to the bigger airport seventeen miles away, and from there back to the USA. They’d still be together then, joshing and joking about what they’d do as soon as they got home—a beer, a burger, a woman. They’d soon learn. The joking would end pretty soon when they found themselves alone, and the time would come when they’d yearn once more for rain, thunder and bullets.
Packard knew that feeling so well.
He paused by the trucks, sighed, shrugged the pack higher on his shoulder, and took one more step towards his future.
“Sir?”
Packard turned to see a guard jogging towards him. He sighed, relieved. He’d thought it might be one of the Sky Devils coming to ask why he was leaving without saying his goodbyes.
“Colonel, there’s a call for you.”
“Thank you, Private.” They swapped salutes, and as the guard left Packard stood wondering just who the hell might be calling at this time of night. The idea of ignoring the call and continuing on the beginning of this aimless journey crossed his mind, but he could not bring himself to do that. Duty called, and he was first and
foremost a soldier.
He went to the nearest camp phone, set on a pole with a simple metal cover protecting it from the worst of the weather.
“Packard,” he said into the receiver.
“Packard, it’s General Ward.”
“Sir,” Packard said. It was the last person he’d expected, but he always felt a buzz talking to the General. He was a true military man as well, married to the army, a lifer who had told Packard that he hoped to die on duty rather than retire and wither away in some residential home for forces personnel. A soldier too old or feeble to fight is no longer a soldier, he’d once said.
“Word has it you’re looking for a mission?” the General said. Packard froze with the phone pressed to his ear, staring out across the rain-dampened airfield towards the gate he had been readying to walk through. Perhaps the General had just offered a solution to passing through that gate.
“I wouldn’t be opposed to one, Sir,” he said.
“Why? Your orders to head home are already processed. I’m sure your men are anxious to get back to the real world.”
This is the real world, Packard thought, but he said, “They are, sir.”
“But you’re not?” He was testing, pushing, probing. He already knew the answer.
“You want me to lie to you, General?”
“You’re sure about this, Packard?” General Ward said quieter, as if afraid his voice might carry.
Packard looked towards the gate once more. He tried to put himself in his men’s place, walking away from camp with packs slung over their shoulders and diverse mementos of Vietnam tucked away in hidden places, ready to meet their worlds again—wives and girlfriends, families and jobs, friends and neighbourhoods where they’d grown up and to which they might now return, scarred and tired, to eventually wither and die.
“Yes, sir,” he said. “I’m sure.”
“Okay. Here it is. NASA has a gang of eggheads called Landsat. They need chopper transport to an island. Survey job. They need a half-dozen slicks plus pilots and support to get them in and out. A few days in paradise. I’ll send the details, but you’ll need to brief and prep your men immediately.”
