Men in Green Faces (13 page)

“Yeah.” One good thing about the Teams, Gene thought, was that they took care of their own. Even a Freddy Fanther. Anybody who tried to take a SEAL out, or hit one, had to take them all on. In spite of their personal differences, they were a close family, one of the reasons for the reputation they’d earned. People just didn’t fuck with them. Didn’t dare. Doc appreciated what the monitored radio meant.

Gene briefed him on the call signs and extraction. “We’re not to make contact,” he finished.

“Right!” Doc replied. The word dripped sarcasm.

In green face and full combat gear, they walked to the boat at 1300 hours. A lieutenant dressed in new clothes, whom neither had seen before, took Gene aside and immediately began telling him what he wanted done.

Gene, pre-op tension already building, was in no mood to hear from an amateur. Especially riverboat personnel.

“You’re in charge of the PBRs,” he snapped, “but I’m in charge of the patrol. I know the mission objective. You don’t.”

The lieutenant looked him up and down, obviously searching for signs of rank or rate.

Gene took a step toward him. “I’ll follow your orders on the boat, but when we insert, I run the op. If you don’t like it, you insert.” Damned piss-ant, he thought.

“That’s
sir!
” the lieutenant barked, face reddening.

That’s shit, Gene thought, starting to walk away toward Doc.

“Get your ass back here,” the lieutenant ordered, “I’m not finished.”

Gene whirled, went nose-to-nose with him. “You’re right,” he said softly. “You call
me
‘sir,’ lieutenant, or I’ll take those lieutenant bars and shove them so far up your ass you’ll need a medevac. Now, you leave and get this fucking boat moving before I make you lieutenant junior grade.”

There was a short silence, during which the look in Gene’s eyes convinced the officer. He turned and started giving his men orders to head out.

Gene motioned to Doc, who’d kept his distance.

“What was that all about?” Doc asked.

He was too angry to talk about it. “Don’t worry. I took care of it.”

“Seems so,” Doc said.

As the boat pulled away from Seafloat, Gene walked to the bow. Had to get his mind back on the op and off that piss-ant lieutenant. No way would he call the boats in, if and when a sighting was made. He and Doc could take them out. They had the firepower with the 60, M-16, XM-203, LAAWS, frags, and SEALs back at base if they needed them. They’d open up, take out the target, and only then call the boats in. All he’d need to say was that the enemy saw them. The lieutenant would really be pissed off.

Hot breeze in his face, he stood, examining the tree lines and river. It occurred to him that there’d been no sign of Willie before they left. Odd. Where the hell was he?

Shortly the two PBRs pulled into the bank on the north side of the Son Ku Lon. They’d reached the insertion point.

Together, he and an unhappy Doc slipped off the side, into the water between the boats, to cover their insertion. If any enemy watched, they’d see only the two boats banked onshore, and not them.

They moved immediately into the bush and trees and disappeared into the dense greenery. Behind them, the boats would wait about ten minutes, then cruise back down the river. Normal routine for PBRs. Familiar to the enemy.

About a hundred meters into the jungle, Gene motioned Doc to stop. Back-to-back, about five feet apart, they waited and listened. Nothing.

Doc snapped his fingers. Gene motioned him over.

“Why,” he whispered, before Gene could speak, “don’t we just stay here, wait out the time, and then call for extraction? No one will ever know.”

In the wet, green heat, the incessant hum of insects and bird cries came clear and distinct. Sweat ran down his sides under the ammo belts and shone on his painted arms.

He looked down at Doc. “Nice try.”

Almost inaudibly came Doc’s under-the-breath comment, “…sonofabitchin’ SEAL really is crazy,” and Gene couldn’t help but grin.

Patrolling was comparatively easy, so, with Doc behind him, he moved west, parallel to the Son Ku Lon, another fifty meters. Watery mud went from ankle-deep in one area almost to their chests in others, but it wasn’t too bad. They’d both been through a lot worse, he thought, stopping to look and listen every 100 to 150 meters.

He’d been counting their distance since insertion. They were getting close. The danger level increased. They’d have to be careful the last 200 to 300 meters. If the enemy waited ahead, he’d abort the mission or have Doc call in for an air strike.

Doc, he suddenly realized, was falling behind. He’d have to slow his pace. Turning, he placed his finger over his mouth to let Doc know they needed absolute silence from now on. There was no way to know what would be up there.

Expressionless, Doc nodded.

Through the trees then, Gene caught sight of the river they’d sat ambush on the previous night. Stopped, he waited, ever so carefully scanning their surroundings. Nothing unnatural moved. No sound of metal, no sound of voices. Only normal jungle sounds around them.

They moved up, pulling each foot loose from the sucking mud as silently as possible. Finally they were at the previous night’s interdiction site.

The area was clear. Crouching next to a tree trunk behind a curtain of vines, he blinked sweat from his eyes. Sometime between then and now, the enemy had removed their dead and saved any supplies left after the devastation of the SEALs’ interdiction. Fragments of the sampans lay washed up on the bank and scattered in the underbrush.

They turned south to set up their observation post on the northwest corner where the small river met the Son Ku Lon. There they settled into position, each quietly clearing a small, individual area in the bush. They’d be there for a while. Gene had hooked four hundred rounds into one long belt of ammo for the 60.

He hadn’t told Doc his plans for taking the enemy under fire. Doc, sitting within arm’s reach, would be there when and if the shit hit the fan, whether he was told or not.

Silently they waited. It was 1445 hours. Then 1545…1600…1630.

He reached out, touched Doc’s shoulder. When Doc looked, he pointed to his eyes, then across the small river, and held up two fingers. On their right as they faced the Son Ku Lon, two VC were about thirty feet away, on the far bank of the small river.

Doc made a forward motion with his weapon, silently asking if they were going to take them out.

Doc wanted to make a hit, get out, and go home. Gene shook his head no and put up a fist: Hold.

The two VC moved up to the small river’s mouth. They stopped, looking out over the Son Ku Lon. For ten minutes they watched and waited before turning to head north, back up the same river they’d tried to come down the night before.

Watching, Gene thought about how strange it was that both he and Doc and the enemy had all returned to the same area. When the VC were out of sight and hearing distance, he whispered, “That’s a point element. They might be going to attempt a day crossing. They badly need food and supplies down Twin Rivers.”

Doc nodded.

The point elements weren’t gone for long.

Gene breathed so softly, he couldn’t hear himself, watching the two VC return to the place they’d just left. Directly across the Son Ku Lon from Twin Rivers, the men looked up and down the small river branch, waiting.

At 1800 hours, he picked up the sound of paddles entering water. Slowly he turned his head to observe two small sampans approaching the mouth of the small river.

Doc was ready. He motioned slightly with the radio. Should he call in the boats?

Gene shook his head. No.

“Oh, shit.”

Gene barely heard Doc’s whisper, but hearing it, he knew Doc understood, only too well, what he had in mind.

There were six VC. Two in each of the two sampans, and the point elements on the far riverbank. He waited until the sampans, only six or seven feet away, were even with his right side. That put them between his and Doc’s positions and the two VC on the opposite bank. By allowing the sampans to come even with them, the two VC onshore would have to fire into the sampans to hit Doc and himself.

With the four-hundred-round belt for his 60, he’d have plenty of rounds before having to reload. He spun right and squeezed the trigger. Doc pivoted at the same time to come on line with him and bear down on the kill zone with his M-16. Never letting up on the triggers, they raked the two small sampans. Rounds that didn’t hit them went into the far bank.

From the time of the first burst from his 60, about thirty seconds had passed, with no return fire.

“Cease fire!” he yelled to Doc. In the silence, he whispered, “Call in the boats.”

They had four KIA in the sampans and one KIA on the far bank. He couldn’t see the second VC, didn’t know whether they’d got both point elements or just the one, but he wasn’t about to cross the small river and track the missing one down. They’d stopped the attempted crossing and more than completed their mission objective.

Waiting for the PBRs, they watched the two sampans drift out into the Son Ku Lon. Shortly four PBRs came in. Two picked up supplies from the sampans, while two banked to take him and Doc aboard.

The boat they boarded was not the one they’d inserted from. He wouldn’t have to say anything to the slipknot lieutenant. Not yet anyway.

When they docked at Seafloat, he and Doc jumped off. Not more than a minute later, the lieutenant came up behind him.

“What the fuck did you think you were doing? You were to call us in to make the kill.”

Ignoring him, Gene kept walking toward Jim, who was approaching. Brian and Cruz were right behind him.

“Everything okay?” Jim asked.

Gene pointed behind him. The PBR officer screamed on.

Jim stopped the lieutenant short. “What the hell is going on?”

The raving officer shoved Jim aside in his determination to catch up to Gene, who’d come to a halt. The shove was a mistake.

Jim flipped the lieutenant to the deck. Before he could shut his mouth, Brian and Cruz had the barrels of their weapons in it.

“Don’t fuck with my men,” Jim said. “You have a problem, you see me, and I’ll take care of it. But don’t fuck with my men. Especially him.”

He nodded to Brian and Cruz. They removed their weapons and helped the lieutenant to his feet.

“Your man,” he told Jim, “made the kills. We were supposed to do it.”

A disgusted expression crossed Jim’s boyish face. “Was the sampan crossing stopped?”

“Affirmative.”

“Then the op was successfully completed. Drop it. You’re lucky,” Jim added, “that he didn’t kill you.”

“I’m filing charges,” the lieutenant snapped, and stormed off.

Satisfied that the loudmouthed officer had received what he’d been asking for from the start, Gene followed Doc toward the cleaning table at the hootch. “Hey, Doc!”

“What?”

Gene rested a hand on his shoulder. “Good job.”

Mud-covered and stinking, Doc glared at him. “You’re not a damned bit welcome.”

He’d have to do something, thank Doc in some special way to make up for forcing him to go and to ease his own conscience for not even looking for a different corpsman. But what? He thought a moment, then headed out to get a Whaler and motor over to Solid Anchor where the Seabees were working. Behind Solid Anchor about two hundred Montagnards were camped.

One of the Seabees, recently arrived from the States, located an interpreter, a Kit Carson Scout, unaware of the bad blood between the KCSs and the Montagnards. The three started crossing the narrow area between Solid Anchor and the Montagnard camp. One of the Montagnards yelled and the KCS yelled back. Within seconds Gene, the Seabee, and the KCS faced armed and angry Montagnards.

“Oh, shit,” Gene said, and aimed the 60, knowing the odds were really bad now. Suddenly he heard the sound of many running feet, barked commands, behind him. He turned to see a mass of heavily armed Seabees coming in behind the three of them. For some long, tense moments they were in the middle of a deadly silent stand off. Finally the Montagnards lowered their weapons, but they didn’t move until the KCS was sent away.

It took a few minutes more to find a new interpreter, and a bit more time before Gene handed money to a narrow-eyed but now smiling Montagnard who pushed forward the gap-toothed whore waiting behind him.

Less than ten minutes later, after having fended off her advances twice, Gene walked her into the hootch and up behind Doc. He tapped him on the shoulder, and Doc wheeled around.

“Here’s your reward, Doc. She’s all yours. Bought and paid for.”

Doc’s mouth dropped open and his eyes went wide before his yell split the air. “Hoo-Ya!”

“Hoo-Ya!” the surrounding SEALs yelled back.

Chaos reigned for a bit until Roland yelled that since Jim wasn’t around, Doc could go behind the plywood partition and use Jim’s bunk for the privacy he was demanding.

Gene laughed, watching Doc drag the woman away from the deals she was already making with the others.

Behind the plywood partition they went. A line formed next to its doorway amid much arguing over who would be next.

“For a guy who has such a damned fit over falling in a shit ditch, he sure doesn’t care much who he fucks.”

Gene looked around into the Eagle’s startling blue eyes. “He’s a desperate man. Been a long time.” He laughed.

G
ENE WAS SQUATTING IN
the shade behind the hootch, smoking, sipping a PBR and staring off down the river, when Willie silently settled down next to him.

Gene knew it was Willie without looking. His presence felt different than anyone else’s. “Where the hell have you been?”

“On patrol with Sean and some of the KCSs.” He lifted both hands and ran fingers through his red hair. “I fear I’m the bearer of bad news.”

Gene drew long and hard on his cigarette. “What happened?”

“We made contact with some NVA. Colonel Nguyen’s people. A small force, thank God. A few VC with them.”

Gene’s stomach muscles tightened at the mention of the colonel, the instant remembrance of the desecrated bodies of Tong’s little girls. He looked at Willie, blocking their small, pitiful faces out of his mind. Looked him over good. His forearm was bandaged. “What’s that?”