The Last of the Dogteam

by William W. Johnstone

  Then, in a small bar, a hippie made a comment about the Vietnam war and the American assholes in the military—career types—fighting it. Uniform lovers. The hippie had several male buddies with him: with , beads and beards and pony-tails. They made a few remarks about the oppression of youth and the draft and how great LSD was, man.

  Terry rose to leave. The hippie grabbed his arm. "Hey, man, don't you like the conversation?"

  "Take your hand off my arm."

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  "Don't get bossy, man."

  "Remove it, or lose it," Terry warned him, cold menace in his voice.

  The hippie's eyes took in Terry's close-cropped hair. "I bet you're military, man. Hey, guys: dig the white-wall haircut."

  And they all laughed.

  All except Terry.

  Terry tried to pull away from the hippie's grasp, but the young man refused to let go. Terry broke the hippie's arm. His friends jumped into the fray. One would never walk again, and the other would be paralyzed from the neck down. Terry slipped out the back door as the bartender was calling the police. The entire fight had taken less than a minute.

  Two hours later, Terry was back in the hospital. "Are you going to call the police?" he asked the Colonel.

  "Certainly not! You know that in cases such as these—if we can possibly do it— the military cares for its own. But you see now, Terry, you're over-trained."

  "If you say so, sir. When do you want to start on me?"

  "In the morning," he smiled. "We held your room for you, Terry. I knew you'd be back. Get something to- eat and then get a good night's sleep."

  "We may have helped him some," Captain Moore said. "I think we did in certain areas.

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  He's not nearly as hostile as before, but he's still one of the most dangerous men I've ever dealt with. I ... I have a guilty conscience about this, Colonel. We—the military— trained him to be what he is. Oh, the potential was there, but we took it and shaped it, molded it, gave it finesse. Obviously, Kovak served his country well. He's a hero, or rather, perhaps, an anti-hero; that term always confuses me. But now, what do we do?"

  "We take a deep breath and release him into the bosom of society," the colonel smiled. A tight smile, without humor. "Into the arms of those civilians who look down their sanctimonious noses at men who serve their coun-try."

  "Begging the Colonel's pardon, but that isn't very professional. And it doesn't help Terry Kovak. Not at all."

  "What do you suggest, Captain?"

  Moore rubbed his hands, pinched at his nose, then frowned. He looked at his chief, grimaced, and said, "Surgery."

  "What land of surgery, Captain?"

  "You . . . know the type I'm suggesting, sir."

  "You would have a frontal lobotomy performed on a man who has given more than ten years of his life for his country? Who has worked in some of the most difficult areas of shadow warfare, risking his life dozens of times."

  Moore rose to his feet. "Kovak is dangerous,

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  sirl He's been over-trained. Good Lord, sir, just a few weeks ago Kovak crippled three young men in a bar . . ."

  "No," the Colonel cut him short. "No surgery on Kovak."

  "Then what do we do?"

  "Turn him loose. I've signed the papers, he's being processed now."

  "Sir, Kovak can be turned into a useful, productive citizen—it isn't too late."

  The Colonel sighed. "I have this fading dream of someday meeting a young psychiatrist who isn't an idealist. Kovak has killed many times for his country, Captain. And if he kills out there," he jerked his thumb to the outside, "I'll bet a year's pay he won't get caught. He's a professional."

  "// he kills out there?"

  "You don't believe some people need killing, Captain?" the Colonel smiled.

  "God, nol"

  "Dismissed, Captain."

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  SIXTEEN

  "Relax, Mr. Kovak," the VA psychiatrist said, trying to put Terry at ease. "Talk to me."

  "Screw you."

  "Why are you so hostile today? I thought you were happy with your new job?"

  "They guy I work for is a prick. A jerk. An idiot. A pompous strutting ass!"

  "I gather you don't care for your new employer."

  Terry glared at him.

  "Why don't you seek other employment if you feel you can't adjust to your present job?"

  "Yeah, I'm gonna do that. Just as soon as I punch this dude out."

  "Don't do that, Terry. You've got to learn to control your hostility. You're a civilian now."

  "Yeah. Sure. Tell me about it, will you?"

  "Mr. Kovak," the job counselor said, "I'm 284

  sorry, but I just don't have anything for you. I ... we can't help you. You're just not qualified for any opening we have. Look, the VA will train you; go back to school."

  "I tried that. It didn't work." Anybody want to hire a used assassin? Comes highly recommended.

  "I'm sorry, Mr. Kovak."

  "It's okay," Terry said, getting used to being turned down for jobs. "It's not your fault."

  But whose fault was it?

  Standing outside the employment office, Terry lit a cigarette and wondered what to do next. He was almost out of money.

  "Kovak?" a voice behind him, a somehow familiar voice from his past.

  Terry turned. "Yeah?"

  Master Sergeant Tate, in civilian clothes. He was grayer, and a bit heavier, but still looked in good shape. Terry grinned, holding out his hand. "Hey, Tatel Damn, it's good to see you."

  The two men shook hands. "I've been trying to track you down for two months, Terry. Finally a guy in the Agency said you were spotted down in New Orleans." He grinned. "You gave the Agency people the slip—really pissed certain people off."

  "Yeah, that dude wasn't very good at his job. I got word I was going to be followed from time to time." He shrugged. "I guess certain folks in High Places want to see I stay out of trouble."

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  "Certain folks in High Places want to see we all stay out of trouble, Terry. I think those certain people wish we'd all fall down dead."

  "Colonel Ferret?"

  Tate shook his head. "He's in rough shape. When he was forced into retirement he lost his guts—or so it seems. Drinks a lot, now. Thinks he might write a book about Dog Teams. Word is he's gonna get zapped if he isn't careful."

  "Let's get a drink and talk about this. I don't believe you tracked me down for old time's sake."

  Tate grinned. "Now you're talking."

  "So they. forced you out, too," Terry swallowed the last of his beer and waved for another round. "What's going on in today's Army, Tate?"

  "Politics, buddy—it's the new Army. Oh, there's still some rough units around, but guys like us—no."

  "What's on your mind?"

  "You're not working?"

  "That's right."

  "What have you been doing to stay alive?"

  "Odd jobs, scut work."

  "Can you make it on your disability?"

  "If I live in an alley in a cardboard box."

  "Any job prospects in sight?"

  "Not a one. You?"

  "No," Tate sighed. "Hell, what are we

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  qualified to do?"

  "I guess we could join the Mafia," Terry smiled.

  Tate returned the smile. "Where do we ap-ply?'

  The two men sat in silence for a moment as the waitress placed fresh bottles of beer in front of them. "So," Terry said, "what do you have on your mind?"

  "Let's go to North Carolina and look up Per-ret. Let's see if the three of us can't get back into soldiering."

  "Hell, man, where?"

  Tate swallowed a mouthful of beer and very' carefully placed the bottle on the table. "Africa."

  "As advisors?"

  "As mercenaries, Terry. Do we have any other options?"

  Terry drained his beer. He thought briefly of Bishop, Georgia and his parents. Jill entered his
mind and the bitterness swept over him. Paula pushed Jill out of the way and finally Sally stood before his eyes. He sighed. "Let's

  go-"

  Colonel William Perret (Ret.) looked at his uninvited guests through eyes that were red-rimmed from too much drinking and not enough sleep or food. "You fuckin' guys are nutsl Africa?" He held out his hands. "Look at me. I got the shakes from too much booze and

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  you guys want me to go back into combat? Get out of here, you yoyos!"

  "Where's your wife, Colonel?" Terry asked.

  "None of your damned business. Gone shopping."

  She was gone, but not shopping. The house was a mess, dirty clothes tossed about the room. "She left you, didn't she?" Terry asked, memories of Jill in his mind.

  Ferret put his face in his hands and openly wept. Tate and Terry went outside to let the Colonel get it out of his system. The two men sat in the back yard of the secluded country home for more than an hour, talking of old times and wars fought, of friends long dead, dying in a dirty and nasty corner of the world: for their country and its citizens, who, for the most part, did not appreciate their sacrifice. Then Ferret appeared in the yard, dressed in old, faded field clothes.

  "All right, Sergeants, put me back in shape. Then we'll talk of the Dark Continent."

  "We'll get something to eat," Tate said. "Then we've all got to get back in shape;"

  April, 1965, when the three men landed at Orly Airport in Paris. Following instructions, they made contact with the Merc recruiter in a quiet bar on a side street, and received their orders and travel money.

  "It's a real pot-boiler over there," the man known only as Cricket said. Put your finger on

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  any spot of the map, and there's fighting. Coup after coup. General Happy Jack DeLury said he'd be glad to have you men. I assume you'd like to work together?"

  "If at all possible," Ferret said.

  "It's all been arranged," Cricket said. "You will be met in Durban." He shook their hands. "Good luck."

  The men were of many nationalities: French, Belgian, British, South African, American, Portuguese, and others. They were all combat vets of many, many wars, and it would be unfair to call them mercenaries in the literal sense of the word. Soldiers of Fortune; Professional Adventurers. Perhaps they were men who had served their country, got out of the military for whatever reason, and could not find work. Or, simply would not take a lot of guff from a loud-mouthed boss, whose nearest experience to combat was when his wife hit him with a frying pan.

  Perhaps the men enjoy the gut-wrenching impact of combat; for man hunting man is the most challenging hunt of all: the Ultimate High. Mercenaries are not savages—not all of them, perhaps not even most of them. There are much less honorable ways of earning a living: a brow-beating boss; a shifty used-car salesman; a politician who votes against a bill he knows would be good for the whole country, but votes against it because it came from

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  the opposition; or a sue-happy lawyer ... to name a few less honorable occupations.

  The men are Ranger and Special Forces trained; Marine and Marine Force Recon; Commandoes; Paratroopers; Special Air Service; French Foreign Legionaires; Pathfinders; SEALs; Grunts. Many have had no military experience at all: sometimes those make the best mercenaries.

  The men were reared in half million dollar mansions and in the slums around the world. They are married, single, divorced. There is no such thing as the stereotyped Mercenary. Some are just literate, others have Ph.D's. Some speak one language, others speak half a dozen. They are de-frocked priests and homicidal maniacs. But they share one common thought: they know how to fight, and they like it. For the most part, Mercs will stand shoulder to shoulder and not bacic down. After the fight is over . . . well, that's something else.

  Most Mercs will fight against Communism, but some will fight for whatever side picks up the tab. Friend will meet friend in open combat; friend will kill friend in open combat. It doesn't happen often, but it happens.

  Mercs are usually left where they fall. Burial is a waste of time. In the bush, wild dogs or hyenas will almost always dig up the corpse and eat it. Sometimes insurance is provided for the Merc—sometimes not.

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  After a year in Africa, Ferret was the first of the three to go. His scout car hit a land mine and blew the Colonel and his driver to blood and shattered bone. Colonel William Ferret drifted quietly into Valhalla, to join the centuries of other warriors, and to meet his friends and await the others surely to follow.

  It was not a long wait.

  Tate took a bullet above the left eyebrow and died without making a sound, going the way warriors and true heroes wish to go, fighting all the way into the foggy unknown.

  For nine years, off and on, Terry fought all over Africa: from small teams of Recon, to the famed, or infamous Five and Six Commandoes. Terry moved around, working in Ethiopia, finally drifting to Southern Africa. He no longer possessed any dreams of ever being anymore than what he now was: a mercenary. Although only in his mid-thirties, Terry was graying, his face lined. It seemed to him he had been a soldier for a thousand years.

  Slowly they had been beaten back, fighting Impossible odds, taking heavy casualties as they retreated. The Mercs, led by Happy Jack DeLury, had stuck their contracted noses into another civil war and were getting the crap kicked out of them—Terry right in the middle of it. . There had been three teams of Mercs, and

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  Terry was Team Leader of his men. The other teams had split off, heading across country to the airstrip some sixty miles away. But the Rebels controlled the countryside, and Terry had asked the other teams not to split up; they didn't stand a chance out there. They had gone ahead, heading across the plains.

  None of the forty men would ever be seen again.

  Terry's team was resting on the side of the road, waiting for Terry's order to head them out to the airstrip where, hopefully, transport of some kind would be waiting to fly them out. Hopefully.

  "Team Leader Kovakl" the voice was full of surprise, horror, and a little fright. "Sarge! Come on, hurry!"

  Terry pulled himself wearily to his feet and walked to the young mere standing by the side of the road, pointing in the ditch at an object wrapped in a dirty blanket. "Look, Sarge—what the hell is it?"

  Terry looked, blinked, looked again. He could not believe his eyes. The blanket-wrapped object let out a thin, mewing cry, a tiny hand protruding from under the dirty blanket.

  "Goddamn!" Terry whispered. "It's a baby!"

  He handed his AK47 to the young mere and gently eased into the ditch, being careful where he placed his boots. It could be a trap; the ditch filled with mines.

  tfa-J.

  Nothing happened; the ditch was clean. The little baby was real—Terry could smell the stench of him, or her—where it had fouled itself. He picked the little thing up in his arms and pushed back the blanket from its face. A white baby, about a year old, Terry guessed. Filthy and hungry, almost too weak to cry. Terry stepped back on the road.

  "Get the men together and see if we can't come up with a clean T-shirt to wrap this kid in. Somebody find something to eat; mash up some rations and heat it. Somebody heat some water. She . . . him . . . whatever it is, it's got to have a bath."

  A huge German mere with a scarred face stepped forward. "Is it really a little baby?" he asked.

  "Yeah, Fettermann, it's a little kid."

  "I've never held a little baby before," the German said, slinging his weapon. "May I?" he held out his hands.

  "Hey, Kraut!" a mere called. "You're too damn ugly to fool with a kid. What are you tryin' to do, give the kid nightmares?"

  "Shut up, Lenny," Terry ordered, handing the baby to the huge mere.

  "I have a clean undershirt," Fettermann said, smiling at the baby, oblivious to the odors of the child. "I would be honored to let the infant wear it."

  "Fine, but first let's bathe it."

  Fettermann
looked pained. "But what if it's a ... female?"

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  "So what? Male or female, it's got to have a bath, doesn't it?"

  "I don't think that would be decent if it is a girl."

  "Well, helll" Terry said, a little disgusted. "I'm not going to assault the kid, Fettermann."

  Terry took the baby from the German and unwrapped the blanket. Its diapers were filthy and Terry tossed them in the ditch, then wrapped the child in a slightly-dirty field shirt.

  "It's a girl," Terry said. "Let me think. I seem to remember something about being careful when bathing a little baby girl."

  "Why?" a mere asked.

  "Well . . , you know . . . it's just different, that's all. I guess that's it."

  "I think that is disgusting!" Fettermann said. "Men shouldn't be allowed to view a young female. Terry Kovak, when you bathe the child, we will form a circle, with our backs to you and the girl, and no one will look!" His voice rang with finality.

  Terry shook his head and joined the others in laughter. "Whatever you say, Fettermann."

  The bathing of the child was quite an event; it was a spit bath at best, using water from the men's canteens. There is something about a small child that calms men—even tough, profane, ornery mercenaries. It was a sight to see. Heavily armed men, with knives, bandoleers of ammo, pistols and grenades hanging from

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  their web belts, all standing in a circle with their backs to Terry and the kid, Fettermann stating every few seconds, "Don't peek! Don't peek!"

  After the bath, which took longer than it should, because one of the men looked around at the baby and the German boxed him on the side of the head with a huge hand. The blow knocked the mere flat on his back in the middle of the dusty plain.

  "Jesus, Fettermann! I was just lookin' at the lad, that's all."

  "Animal!" the German growled.

  One of the men fixed a bowl of dehydrated field rations and another came up with a can of condensed milk from his pack.

  "I like cream with my coffee," he confessed, holding out the can.

  "You asshole!" a mere snarled at him.

  "That's enough of that!" Fettermann warned. "There will be no profanity around the child."