Black Market (12 page)

Arnason held the handset to his PRC-77 radio up to his ear and yelled into the black transmitter. “Rabid Dog … Rabid Dog …
this is Bad News Six … over.”

He was answered instantly. “This is Rabid Dog Six … over.”

“We’re surrounded by a large NVA unit. I don’t know my grid but we’re at an old company-size lager site. From the looks of
it, they had stayed here a couple of weeks.”

The Special Forces captain knew exactly where the team was. He had seen the column of smoke and had already plotted the location.
Arnason’s description had to be the old Cav site. “I have you located and artillery fire is available … Also, I’ve fast movers
two minutes out that are carrying napalm …advise!”

Arnason pressed his switch. “Fire the final protective fires for this location if you have them!”

“Roger!” The captain was again one step ahead of Arnason and had the artillery battery that supported his camp pull all of
the prefired artillery DEFCONs—defensive concentrations—that were used to support units patrolling the highway. The old final
defensive fires for the company position were still in the artillery unit’s FDC and computed.

Artillery rounds began landing within a minute after Arnason had called. The first F-4 jet fighter’s low-level pass caught
the recon team off guard and scared them as much as it did the NVA, except the NVA received the presents the aircraft was
carrying for them. The Special Forces captain had taken the liberty of directing the fighters from his command bunker. He
had been at Arnason’s present position a number of times on patrol and knew it well. The captain had saved the team by reacting
so fast. The NVA assault platoon hiding in the jungle had been turned into a bunch of crispy critters by the napalm.

The recon team was still in trouble. A group of twenty NVA had reached the edge of the team’s defensive perimeter and were
too close in for the jets to take them out with their 20mm guns without risking American casualties.

Youngbloode saw the threat and the NVA flanking movement on the small team and opened fire. He emptied a magazine and reached
for another when the first NVA reached his position. He dodged the bayonet thrust and jabbed the barrel of his M-16 into the
crotch of the charging soldier. The man’s eyes widened and he gasped, lowering his AK-47. Kirkpatrick used his bayonet on
the enemy’s chest.

Warner dropped down to one knee in his foxhole and tried removing a grenade from his web gear. A fire team of NVA were maneuvering
against his foxhole. The NVA sergeant saw Warner duck down and signaled for his team to assault. Koski saw the maneuver and
the threat to Warner. He jumped up from his prone position and screamed at the top of his lungs. The sound came out as a bull
bellow. He dove at the lead NVA soldier and grabbed the man’s rifle by the front grip, forcing the soldier to hold onto it
tighter, and then he reached for the man’s leather belt and swung him up over Warner’s foxhole and into the jungle a good
twenty feet away. The momentum of the soldier’s charge and Koski’s enormous strength added to the distance the NVA sailed
through the air above his comrades.

Warner had removed the hand grenade and had pulled the pin but there wasn’t a target for him to throw it at. He watched Koski
standing in front of his foxhole waiting for a charging NVA to reach him with the bayonet on his AK-47 fixed and gleaming
in the soft sunlight. Koski sidestepped the thrust. The NVA had made the mistake of thinking the American had been paralyzed
with fear and wanted the pleasure of running his steel bayonet through his body. He should have shot him. Koski’s hands moved
like cobra strikes and yanked the weapon out of the NVA’s hands. The soldier’s eyes opened in terror with the loss of his
weapon. Koski used the side of his boot to kick in his face.

Warner looked over at the rest of his team. They were all engaged in hand-to-hand fighting. He looked back over at die edge
of the clearing and saw three NVA kneeling down watching the fight. The one in the center held a pistol in his right hand.
Warner had found a target for his grenade. The explosion was lost in the roar of artillery shells exploding all around the
team’s location.

The fighting stopped.

Kirkpatrick was out in front of his foxhole on all fours. He was panting and sweating profusely over the open-mouthed body
of a dead NVA. “I don’t need this shit! I really don’t need it!” No one heard him. The artillery rounds were still exploding
in the jungle a hundred meters away. Occasionally a hunk of shrapnel whistled over their heads. A single wild shell exploded
in the clearing that sent the team scurrying back into their foxholes.

Koski landed on top of Warner. “Sorry!”

Warner sighed. “That’s all right, believe me! I LIKE YOUR COMPANY!”

Captain Youngbloode sensed that the NVA force had been broken and that they wouldn’t be coming back again. The firefight was
over. He laid his neck against the edge of the foxhole and looked out at ant level over the battlefield. The jungle was burning
across the front of his position. He could see a half dozen burnt and twisted bodies. A small secondary explosion went off
in the flames from some NVA soldier’s ammo. Youngbloode didn’t duck. He just watched the results of what he had been trained
for.

A large king cobra slipped out of the jungle at the edge of the flames and moved swiftly out into the clearing. Youngbloode
watched the creature raise its head four feet off the ground and sense the air. The snake crawled over a dead NVA soldier
and jerked its head back when it touched the still hot barrel of the man’s AK-47. The cobra changed direction and started
crawling into a collapsed fighting bunker. Youngbloode smiled; today the snake would live. There had been enough killing.

Captain Youngbloode sat behind his desk and flipped the fifty-caliber shell he used as a paperweight from end to end, as he
thought. Sergeant Arnason had just left his office after briefing him on what he knew about the black-market operation that
Shaw was running out of the company supply room. Woods’s remarks about the death of Masters had shaken him the most. Even
though it was only circumstantial evidence that linked Shaw to Masters’s death, it was very strong circumstantial evidence.

He reached up and tilted the pieces of cardboard that Arnason had cut off the boxes before Koski blew up the NVA truck. There
was no mistaking that the medical supplies had been destined for his company, but that didn’t make any sense. Just one company
could never consume that amount of drugs and bandages.

A knock on the frame of his door brought Youngbloode out of his trance. “Come in!”

Captain Gouch pushed the door open and stepped into the sunlit office. “How are you doing, Yakub?”

“Good, I feel real good now that I’ve had a full night’s sleep.”

“I like that sign your troops nailed over your door.” Gouch pointed back over his shoulder using his thumb. He was referring
to a hand-painted sign above Youngbloode’s private entrance that read
THE BLACK TIGER
.

“I don’t know who put that up there, but it adds a little to my command mystique.” Youngbloode tried making light of the sign,
but he had really been impressed the first time he had seen it, and he knew exactly who had nailed it above his door and who
had picked it up from the Vietnamese sign painter.

“Did you want to see me about something? I’ve got to get back to my office.” Gouch kept glancing around the room.

“Yes I do.” Youngbloode leaned back in his chair and looked out of the window and then over at the junior captain. “What do
you know about a massive shipment of medical supplies to my company?”

Gouch twisted his mouth up and shrugged. “Nothing … why?”

“Well then, someone is forging your signature on documents. The requisitions have all been signed off by you.” Youngbloode
looked hard at the young captain.

“Uh … could be.”

“I’ll have the intelligence people check that out.”

“… but then again, I
might
have signed those documents without really checking the quantities. There’s a lot of paperwork that goes across my desk …
you know.” Gouch couldn’t look directly at the recon commander.

“Yeah, I understand that! I had a staff job that generated my weight in paper every day!” Youngbloode smiled. “I hear you
got your ass kicked in a poker game a couple of weeks ago? You’ve got to watch those NCOs, Larry. They are sneaky!” Youngbloode
stood and walked around his desk. ‘Thanks for stopping by … You’ve answered a lot of questions for me.”

Gouch sprang to his feet and left the room without saying good-bye. He was near panicking and almost went straight over to
Sergeant Shaw’s supply tent before he caught himself. He turned, looked back toward Youngbloode’s office, and saw the tall
captain’s silhouette standing in the screened three-foot-high window that went all the way around the hooch.

Sweat sprang out all over Gouch’s forehead. He was terrified. Youngbloode knew! He was sure that the man knew what had happened.
He had even mentioned the poker game! Gouch mumbled under his breath as he hurried toward his office. “He knows! Oh damn—he
knows!”

Sergeant Arnason left the shadow of the building he was standing next to and went back over to Captain Youngbloode’s office.
He entered the room without knocking and smiled at the captain. “He’s shook, sir. There’s no doubt about it; he’s in on it
somehow.”

“I figured that … Go on back to your team. Thanks, Sergeant.” Youngbloode rubbed his lips softly with the knuckle on his right
index finger as he plotted his next move. “Have the first sergeant come in here, would you please?” He glanced up at Arnason
and added, “And don’t forget what I told you about those unauthorized ‘Bad News’ caps. Your team can only wear them on patrol
or when they’re in or on their bunker. You wear your helmets like everyone else when we have senior visitors in the area.”

“They’ve been told sir, and thanks for letting them—”

Youngbloode cut Arnason off before he could finish his sentence. “They
earned
that privilege. Don’t forget to send in the first sergeant.”

Arnason nodded and left the office. The first sergeant appeared at the door seconds later. “Yes sir?”

“First Sergeant, I’d like to see
all
of the money order letters of authorization the Company has issued for the past two years, especially Sergeant Shaw’s.”

“Yes sir, but I don’t think they’ve kept them on file that far back.”

“
Try
, First Sergeant.”

“Yes sir.”

The company first sergeant left the commander’s office and went over to his desk. He laid his hand on the company land-line
telephone and looked back at the captain’s closed door. He owed Shaw over six hundred dollars in markers. The old sergeant
smiled to himself. Maybe he could work something out where those markers would be torn up. A favor should be worth a measly
six hundred dollars, especially if it was worth much more.

Youngbloode watched his first sergeant through a narrow crack where the door and the frame didn’t join together completely.
He shook his head and pressed his lips together. He had hoped the senior NCO was clean, but it was obvious that greed was
a powerful master.

Koski sat on the edge of the bunker and rubbed his thumbs over the silver-and-blue medal he held in his powerful hands. He
ran one thumb slowly over the silver rifle and then over the wreath that surrounded it. A Combat Infantryman’s Badge didn’t
mean that much to a lot of people in the Vietnam War, but to Koski it was higher than the Medal of Honor. The badge
proved
that he was a warrior who had fought an enemy. He had joined a long line of his ancestors.

“You sure like that thing, Otto … You’re going to wear the finish off and then you’ll have to polish it.” Warner leaned back
against the roof wall of sandbags that had been stacked three high. He fixed his muscles in the warm sun.

“It is important to me.” Koski smiled.

Sanchez tilted his head back and finished the can of cherry soda. “I hear the captain has put the whole team in for Bronze
Stars with ‘V’ devices.”

“One of the clerks told me that he typed up the orders, and he also told me that Captain Youngbloode was recommended for the
DSC by the battalion commander and he turned it down!” Warner leaned forward and wrapped his arms around his knees.

“Why?” Koski frowned. It didn’t make sense to turn down a high valor award.

“The rumor is that he feels he doesn’t deserve a DSC when”—Warner looked over at Koski out of the corner of his eye—“you’re
only getting a Bronze Star. He doesn’t buy all that officer crap.”

Koski tilted his head to one side and made a so what? expression. “He
is
an officer.”

Warner’s face turned a bright red. “I know I haven’t said thanks yet, Otto … but thanks for what you did for me out on patrol.”

Koski stood and stretched. The muscles covering his shoulders rippled and fluttered. “It was nothing. It’s not your fault
that you’re so fucking skinny.”