Eagles Cry Blood
Page 37
“What do you want with me?” Paul turned his face back to the sea and watched the breakers.
“You have a reputation for being a damn good recon man. In fact, they say you’re one of the best. I’d like to hear from you what it’s like being out on 255
Donald E. Zlotnik—Eagles Cry Blood
[ e - r e a d s ]
patrol behind enemy lines.” Michaels joined Paul, uninvited, and looked out to sea at the fury of the breakers when they hit the reef a hundred meters in front of them. The spray had the pair of them soaked within minutes.
“Recon is like working with the ocean: both the jungle and the ocean are neutral to everything,” Paul turned a little on the sand and faced the reporter,
“but if you can learn the ways of the jungle and don’t fight the currents, then you can make the animals, bamboo—everything there—work for you.”
Paul talked for hours in a soft voice that was repeatedly drowned out from the sounds of the waves. Michaels listened patiently, not daring to interrupt and change Paul’s chain of thought. Slowly, over the hours on the beach, a friendship developed between the soldier and the newsman.
Morning came early; it always did when your team was due for insertion.
Paul lingered under the shower head, enjoying the relaxing effect coming from the water jets. He would have at least five days ahead of him that would be spent sweating and caked with grime. Paul left the shower and leisurely dried off and dressed in his battle gear. He stood in front of the mirror and applied his camouflage grease paint with the care of a professional clown who was getting ready for the opening act of a circus—except that the clown was getting ready to entertain and the warrior was preparing for a possible encounter with death.
Paul stopped by Jay’s hooch on his way over to the isolation building, but found it empty. He found a piece of paper lying on a shelf in the hooch and wrote a note reminding Jay to pick up his mail and take care of his stuff while he was gone. Paul knew that he didn’t need to remind Jay, but the note served to let his friend know that he had stopped by before leaving on his mission.
The flight to the Marine base was as relaxing as a helicopter flight could be in war-torn Vietnam. The normal tension was not there that they would have had if they were going in for a helicopter insertion. Walking into his assigned area of operations appealed to Paul. It gave the team a much better chance of survival and the opportunity to surprise any enemy soldiers who might be operating in the area.
The Marine patrol that had been assigned to escort the recon team out to their break-away site was a group of young but rugged professionals. The patrol leader briefed Paul on the tactic they were going to use to cover for the team’s insertion and the route that they would be taking through the dense highland jungle. The platoon leader took his time to check each one of his men to ensure they carried the proper amount of ammunition and combat gear. Paul was impressed over the young lieutenant’s concern; most new officers had lost that leadership trait in the regular army, or had shucked that boring responsibility to their NCOs.
256
Donald E. Zlotnik—Eagles Cry Blood
[ e - r e a d s ]
The Marine patrol departed from the barbed-wire enclosure using extreme stealth the minute they merged into the jungle, ready to encounter the enemy with the first step they took outside the base camp. Paul’s team brought up the rear element of the small Marine platoon formation.
Darkness replaced the bright sunlight from the underside of the triple canopy jungle much earlier than it would have if they had been in open areas.
The young platoon leader signaled for a break and waited over to check out the piece of terrain he had selected for a night lager site. He waved for his sergeant and whispered that he wanted the army lieutenant to join him. The sergeant returned five minutes later and informed his lieutenant that the recon team wasn’t with the Marine column and that he couldn’t tell the lieutenant when they had dropped off .
Lieutenant Bourne moved through the thick jungle using every trick and bit of stealth he had learned in the years prior to his joining CCN. He was followed at intervals by his team mates who also blended in with the jungle.
It had been very important to break away from the Marine column without being detected by the Marine rear-guard element. The area of operation for the team was highly classified, and if the Marines knew what direction they were traveling in, it would have been very easy to tell where they were going.
Paul stopped his team for the night along the military crest of the hill that they were on. The recon team watched flickers of light coming from the Marine lager position from some of the guards sneaking cigarettes. The guards obviously didn’t know how far the light from the end of a cigarette carried in the jungle blackness.
The night passed slowly, with the early-morning light filtering almost without notice through the trees. In the jungle, light changes happened with a gradual ease that almost caught you off guard if you weren’t aware of it. Paul watched the vegetation turn from black to gray and then to a variety of green shades. He kept looking at the jungle and then began to identify individual objects with his eyes, allowing his ears to rest.
Bourne slid over to Coop’s position and alerted him that he was ready to move out. The old Montagnard took his turn as the pointman and led the team toward the river. Paul could smell the river before he broke through the jungle growth and saw the rocky banks and the water. The old Montagnard had already started downstream, looking for a fording site that they could use for a night crossing. Late afternoon found them at an excellent river crossing strewn with flat rocks the size of houses. Paul signaled for the team to take cover and wait for the sun to go down before crossing the open waterway, which was two hundred meters wide at the point Paul had chosen for the crossing. Cooper slid next to Paul and signaled for him to get some sleep before it got dark. Paul pulled the short brim down on his camouflaged hat and dozed.
257
Donald E. Zlotnik—Eagles Cry Blood
[ e - r e a d s ]
A light tap on his shoulder brought Paul instantly awake and alert.
Cooper was pointing at an object moving in the river. Paul rolled over on his stomach and touched shoulders with his team mate.
“What?” The word was an exhaled whisper.
“In the water,” Cooper said, his mouth up against Paul’s ear.
Paul focused his eyes on a large “V” mark that was moving swiftly down-river. The water following the mark seemed to be rolling, as if another water creature just below the surface as chasing the creature making the “V” mark.
The mark changed course slightly and headed directly toward Paul, and then abruptly turned and headed for one of the dry river rocks surrounded by running water. Paul frowned and tried to figure out what kind of creature was swimming on top of the water and what sort of fish was chasing it.
The “V” touched the rock and answered Paul’s question.
Cooper’s breath rushed into his lungs between clenched teeth. The smaller object, about the size of a standard football, touched the rock and climbed ashore followed by more and more of itself. Paul and Cooper watched in awe as one of the largest reticulated pythons they had ever seen, or, for that matter, had ever heard about, slid up on the house-sized rock.
Cooper released the trapped deoxygenated air from his lungs and quickly sucked new air back in. “Damn! It has to be damn near forty feet long.
“Shhhhhh . . .” Paul put his hand over Cooper’s open mouth.
The Montagnards shifted nervously in their hidden positions, sending rustling noises out over the water. Paul knew that if the water monster stayed on the sun-warmed rock when it got dark he could forget about crossing the river, and would lose another whole day waiting for it to get dark again. Paul slipped his rucksack off his back and pulled it around to his front so that he could see into the canvas side pockets. He removed his silenced .22-caliber pistol and checked the safety switch. The gun was loaded and ready for a
ction. The snake moved slowly on the warm rock less than twenty-five feet from the team’s concealed positions. A hard shot for a handgun between the constantly moving coils of the reptile at the only vulnerable spot: the head.
Paul took a half-hour crawling to the point on the riverbank nearest the reptile that offered a clear shot at the constantly moving coils. He took aim, using both hands to steady the long barrel of the weapon. Paul squinted to bring in the front sight on his weapon in the half-light of the late afternoon.
The python’s head emerged from the pile of tight coils and touched the water.
Paul paused and looked downstream in the direction the snake was headed. A wild pig was a third of the way across the river and was swimming at an angle toward the hunting snake. Paul returned his attention to the python and saw that half of the snake was already in the water and that the second half was rapidly following. The thing was huge. Paul waited and watched the jungle 258
Donald E. Zlotnik—Eagles Cry Blood
[ e - r e a d s ]
drama developing between the unsuspecting pig and the hunting snake. He had no doubt as to who the winner was going to be. An involuntary shudder traversed Paul’s spine when the snake reached the pig. The python first bit the pig and then threw its coils around the screaming animal. The whole event took less than five minutes. Darkness fell quickly and began hindering visibility. Paul signaled for his team to cross the river while the reptile was occupied downstream. He didn’t have to tell his men to hurry across the waist-deep obstacle. Paul figured that there wouldn’t be any more snakes in the area because of the size of the hunting python, but he hoped that the creature wasn’t married to a hungry wife.
The team had bunched up on the far side of the river, each man breathing hard from the rapid crossing.
“Christ, Lieutenant! Why did you decide to cross the river now! I damn near pissed my pants!” Cooper’s whisper was high and filled with fear.
“Would you rather have waited for the moon to come out and have that fucking beast ready for dessert?” Paul was angry at having his judgment questioned. “Now keep quiet!”
Cooper reflected for a second and winked at the lieutenant.
Lieutenant Bourne thought about the next day’s planned activity as he lay in the total darkness of the jungle. He felt the comfort of Cooper’s boot against his right foot and the old Montagnard’s against his left leg. The team settled down and waited for the night to pass.
First light brought a large flock of multicolored birds to the fruit trees surrounding the hidden recon team. The brightly colored parrots and songbirds began to feed on the abundant seeds and rotten fruit. Paul and his team remained hidden under the thick layers of bamboo leaves on the jungle floor; any movement would alarm the birds and advertise their position to anyone within miles around.
A loud squawk followed by the whirring sound coming from hundreds of wings beating the humid air preceded the sound of truck engines. Paul pressed his chest and right ear to the black soil and listened to the sound of vehicles approaching and then passing less than a hundred meters away. Paul counted the trucks as they passed, stopping to look up when the number reached fifty. The team waited for an hour after the last vehicle had roared by, and then cautiously crept forward from their hiding places.
Cooper stepped through the jungle growth that had been covered with a thick layer of dust from the passing trucks. A gravel, all-weather road stood under the thick canopy of the jungle. The road was no more than a path twenty feet wide by American standards, but in the jungle it was a main thoroughfare. Coop slipped back into the cover of the jungle and peered out. It was becoming very clear why the North Vietnamese didn’t want any attention 259
Donald E. Zlotnik—Eagles Cry Blood
[ e - r e a d s ]
brought to the area. They had built a main supply route south that supplied most of their army in the three southern corps areas.
Paul drew his team around him and removed his small map from its protective case. He showed each man the selected team-extraction site nearest them in case they made contact with the enemy and needed to get taken out in a hurry. Coop nodded in agreement with Paul’s choice and pointed to the road. Paul nodded and took the lead, pushing the jungle aside. He felt naked standing on the edge of the highway, but turned and slipped along the easy-walking roadside back toward the river.
A large troop-transport truck was pulling into the jungle just as another truck left the special camouflaged site. The NVA were hurrying to get their vehicles across the open waterway before any early-morning American spotter planes could locate them. Paul knew that the river fording site would not show up on any of the maps and was extremely important information to get back to the CCN intelligence people.
Paul waved his hand for Coop and his team to follow him and slipped back into the covering jungle. He stopped after a few meters and spoke in a soft whisper. “Head north.”
Cooper took the point and set a steady pace through the large, arm-thick bamboo. He found a low tunnel entrance at the edge of the stand, which allowed passage through finger-thick interlocking bamboo, that had been made by wild pigs. Cooper entered the tunnel crawling on his hands and knees. The team could have moved faster staying in the fairly open clearing, but the trail would offer more cover even at the risk of running into a boar, or, worse yet, a hunting tiger. Sergeant Cooper led the team for two hours of slow crawling and stopped only when he reached a fork when the trail turned sharply to the west. The cause of the trail to turn was a clear water stream. It was a stroke of good luck that allowed the team to rest and have a cool drink of much-needed water. They filled all of their canteens with fresh water and listened for any sign of approaching danger.
Paul tried orienting himself in the thick growth but had to settle for a compass direction. He guessed that they were still near the road, and noticed that one of the CCN area-studies officers had placed a symbol on his map that represented a landing-zone site nearby. Paul replaced his weatherproof map in his pocket and motioned for the team to move out. He took the point and followed the turning mountain stream until it intersected with the NVA road. The banks of the stream had been leveled so that trucks could ford the watercourse without any difficulty. A simple bamboo footbridge had been built for troops to cross the water about ten meters up from the truck crossing.
Paul took ten minutes to visually recon the crossing site. He noticed that the jungle growth had crept back to within ten feet of the footbridge, with a 260
Donald E. Zlotnik—Eagles Cry Blood
[ e - r e a d s ]
slightly enlarged area leveled flat by use, both up- and downstream from the bridge. It was a good place to set up an ambush. The truck crossing site was deserted and the water in the stream was crystal clear, a sign that the site had not been used since the first convoy that had passed Paul’s team in the morning. Paul assembled his team around him, touching heads with almost all of them, and briefed them on how he wanted the ambush set and conducted if an NVA force tried to cross the stream. The jungle to the north and south of the stream formed a shallow ravine as it dipped down to meet the water. Paul stationed two of his men on the south side of the stream after they had placed their claymore mines along the foot trail. He placed himself and the remaining team members on the north side behind their claymore mines. The ambush was set along the western side of the NVA road, which would allow for Paul to withdraw westward—in a direction the NVA would not expect from an American-led unit. Paul slipped around from position to position checking each of his men to ensure that they blended perfectly with the shadows and surrounding jungle. None of the men could be detected from as close as five feet away if they remained lying still. Paul returned to his selected ambush position and wiggled back into the underbrush near the road. He pulled the short elephant grass and vines together in front of his face and held the detonator to his claymore mine loosely in his right hand. He rearranged some of the loose vines so that he could command a view of the f
ootbridge and dropped his chin down against his left hand. Paul hoped for a squad-sized unit or, better yet, a lone NVA courier. A prisoner to take back to the CCN
camp would really make a success out of his assigned dead-end mission.
The team waited.
Sweat rolled off Paul’s forehead and dripped from his chin to the dry earth forming a small puddle. The afternoon slipped by. Hundreds of bugs crawled and slithered within inches of his face, ignoring the living flesh. Paul blinked the sweat out of his eyes and felt the slight burning sensation from the strong salt. The bugs crawling all around him and over the exposed parts of his body didn’t bother him, but certain hairy species of jungle spiders that grew large as a man’s open hand would force him to shiver even in the green-house heat. Paul felt the urge to urinate and slowly, without noise, rolled over on his side and unbuttoned his fatigues. He tried keeping the urine far enough away so that he wouldn’t have to roll back in it.
Laughter came from down the trail. Paul’s muscles tensed. The team waited. A group of thirty NVA soldiers appeared suddenly carrying their weapons flipped on their shoulders, holding onto them by the barrels. The enemy didn’t suspect anything in their own backyard. It was a common mistake that had been made during every war ever fought. Paul had just finished urinating and had rolled back over onto his stomach without taking the time 261
Donald E. Zlotnik—Eagles Cry Blood
[ e - r e a d s ]
to button up his pants. He felt the wetness seep through his clothes. He waited, knowing that his team would not open fire until he detonated his claymore mine. Paul counted the group and decided that there were too many of them to effectively kill. The NVA removed their round boy-scout-style canteens and began filling them from the clear stream. A shout brought those enemy closest to the stream back up on their feet. Another group of NVA appeared on the ridgeline led by an officer, who started yelling down to the unit filling up next to the stream. Paul rapidly assumed that the first element was the point platoon for a very large NVA troop movement, and he slid deeper into the underbrush, hoping that they would all pass by quickly. Paul’s thoughts slipped to where he had left his claymore mine. He hoped that it was camouflaged well enough to miss detection.