13th Valley (55 page)

Minh remained silent through El Paso's remarks. Cherry acknowledged it with a quiet, “I see.” Doc wearily asked, “What all that got ta do with anythin?” They were all very tired. The droning of the mity-mite did not allow them for even one moment to believe their position was uncompromised. The excitement of discovering and speculating on the tunnel had dissipated and apprehension filled the void.

Moonlight seeped into the black above as the moon began its late ascent. Thin clouds were forming at a very high altitude and the moonlight reflected off their earth facing surfaces.

“Hey,” Brooks said, “it's getting late. Get some sleep. We'll have other times to discuss these things.”

Cherry lay on his back in the dirt, his face flushed, feverish. The night had become cold and damp. Doc and Minh lay next to each other to Cherry's left. Egan was shoulder to shoulder with him on the right. At his feet El Paso and the L-T and Brown snuggled into the crotch of a stubby tree. All shivered with cold and their compromised position. Beneath a thin poncho liner Cahalan monitored the radios, checking 1st Plt squads, the other platoon CPs and reporting to the battalion forward TOC on Firebase Barnett.

Cherry shivered severely. “Oh God. No,” his whisper demanded. “Go Away!” The soldier had returned. Cherry's thoughts sped. He was completely exhausted. His arms and legs ached. The burns and scratches were not healing, but festering, inflamed and slowly oozing sticky thick liquid. Cherry shut his eyes. The NVA soldier moved quickly in Cherry's imagination. He moved quickly, determined to get his face into the sight of Cherry's M-16, determined to look straight up the barrel, through the sights, into Cherry's eyes. The enemy's head enlarged, his eyes, set deep in hollow haunted sockets, gleamed. A smirk rolled across the man's mouth. The mouth opened large, larger than the entire growing head, all teeth and tongue flashing. Cherry tensed about the trigger, began squeezing, squeezing with both hands, ten fingers, the headmouth became larger, the tongue whipping madly, saliva splashing Cherry squeezing the rifle exploding, flashing …

Oh fuck. I gotta get that man outa my head. Please Dear Lord, please … Cherry had sat up without being aware of having moved. The jungle rule—Always Be Quiet—had seeped into his subconscious. He had not even awakened Egan.

Cherry tightened the poncho liner about his neck and shoulders. His face remained hot. God. God? What god? He forced himself to think of something other than the dead NVA. Use your brain, he told himself. It can get you through. He searched his mind. He thought of Linda but the thought would not stick. He thought about school. Images dashed through his mind, a classroom, a lecture hall. Cherry forced the thought on. He wanted to sleep. So badly he wished for peaceful, unthinking sleep.

He recalled a picture his eyes had recorded several years before he had arrived in Nam. It was autumn in Vermont, the peak of the foliageseeker season. The sun had set and the sky was very dark and clear. Vic was driving the pickup truck with their moto-cross motorcycles in the back. Jim, Cherry paused, Jim he thought, that was me: I rode shotgun. They had been returning from a backhills course, coming down a twisting side road. From the crest of a mountain peak they looked down for several miles to Interstate 91. The roadway and numerous adjacent capillaries were jammed with automobiles. The reds of taillights and the beams from headlights illuminated arteries and veins on the blackness. Cherry could see the image clearly in his mind, could see all the tiny cells traveling through the organism, giving the body life.

The organism is a parasite, Cherry thought, forced the thought to expand. The earth is a parasite sucking life from a far more complex animal which in its turn lives in a small cage in a small shed on a small plot of the surface of a very immense planet, a planet which is tiny and insignificant in its own universe. God, Cherry smiled to himself, to have a thought to play with without that fucken gook stickin his head into it. Cherry pursued the idea. Someone on that immense insignificant planet has captured the animal in which the earth is a parasite. It is a doctor or scientist. Cherry could see the scientist working in his white lab coat. He could see it all now. It opened like
The Book of Revelations
before him. The scientist was operating on the animal to find the cause of its sickness. To the scientist the earth is the size of a molecule. To the earth the pathologist shall be forever unknown. After all, Cherry smiled, we have not yet explored even neighboring molecules much less the organ within which the earth feeds. The perspective from earth to intestinal wall is unimaginably vast. If there is a wall at the outer boundary of the universe, what lies beyond the wall? Stomach? Rectum? Skin? Air? A surgeon? Cherry laughed to himself. If I can imagine all this, he asked himself, is not my imagination larger than all of it?

Cherry was sitting upright, still shivering. The moon crested the mountain ridges and flooded the upper canopy. It was full. Flat colorless light fell into the valley and diffused in ground mist. The jungle floor on the side of Hill 636 remained black. Cherry looked around. The sound of the mity-mite throbbed in his ears. A guard on the perimeter coughed.

Gotta stop thinkin. I gotta sleep. I oughta jerk off. I wish I was with Linda. Oh please stop. World stand still. That's a fuckin order. Oh God, I wish I could plug my brain into a tape recorder and look at the results after I DEROS. Maybe it would make sense then.

As the moon rose a thin shaft of light penetrated the canopy. A glint triggered Egan's nightmare. A sapper was by his side. The silver machete was in his hand. Moon beams sparkled upon the blade as the dark foe raised the huge knife higher, aiming, cocking, striking down toward his eyes …

Egan snapped up, spun and landed on his fingertips and toes, like a cat, ready to leap. Adrenaline fired him awake alert paranoid. He smelled the night, listened to the night, swept a paw into the night. To let the machete fall would be to accept his own death.

*  *  *

“Somebody said if you ate it, you'd either get high as a kite or sick as a dog. So I ate it.”

“Just blow the fucken claymore. You got movement out there? Blow the fucken claymore.”

“I can't. There aint no C-4 in it.”

“Numbnuts, where the motherfuck is the C-4?” Steve Hoover quietly removed another grenade from his gear. He couldn't believe what he was hearing and he was pissed.

“I ate it. I ate it. I figured I'd get high. After today's hump, Man, I had ta do somethin. Maybe I'd get sick see? Then Doc'd have ta medevac me. I'd get medevacked see? That's good. Or I'd get high. That's good. Either way it had to come out good.”

“Fuck you. Just fuck you. Go out there and blow yerself. When did you eat the fuckin C-4?”

“This afternoon.”

“Did you get high?”

“No.”

“Are you sick?”

“No.”

“Fuck you. You whore sonavabitch,” Hoover whispered seething, staring into the jungle.

“Well at least I put out my claymore. Where the hell's yours?” Numbnuts whined.

“I'm goina stick mine up your ass. You hear anything more?”

“No.”

“Go over an tell the L-T we got movement and that our claymores are fucked up and won't blow.”

“Maybe it was just the wind.”

“Fuck you.”

“Fuck you too. Of all the guys in this fuckin platoon, I gotta get stuck with some dude who's got a three word vocabulary.”

“‘Fuck you' is two words bat shit. Now go over and check out the L-T and see if Jax heard anything and don't make any noise.”

“Where's the CP?”

“Wait here. I'll go.” Hoover began crawling away from Numbnuts.

“Hey, a …”

“What?”

“I aint really sure I heard anything. Maybe we should just wait.”

“Listen mothafucker, you either heard somethin or you didn't.”

“I don't know.”

“What time is it?”

“Three-thirty.”

“You fucken bat shit.” Hoover shook his head and crawled back to his position. He lay alert and strained his ears trying to differentiate the night sounds. The mity-mite and artillery rumbling came from behind them. A slight breeze rustled the vegetation all around. “Okay, mothafucker,” he snarled after eight or ten minutes. “You listen close. I'm sackin. You don't fuck with me unless you hear somethin. You hear somethin or even think you hear somethin, get me up. Get a fix on the direction. Keep your fuckin eyes pinned open and if I get killed cause a you, so help me I'll come back an haunt you till the day I die. How much C-4 did you eat?”

“Just a little. Tee-tee. I didn't want to get too high or too sick. I got the rest in my ruck.”

“How long you been in the Nam, Man?”

“Four … over four months. I got held up at Cam Ranh for a while cause they didn't have a unit for me.”

“Four months in Nam and yer already eatin your claymores. Man, that stuff aint good for you. An Jack, you don't go gettin high up here. You aint in Saigon, bat shit, you up the Sông Bo. There's dinks out there. You so fuckin dumb, I can't … What was that?”

“I didn't hear nuthin.”

“Shut up. Somethin's out there.”

“You see …”

“Shut up.” Hoover keyed his radio handset breaking squelch on all the radios. He did not speak. He rolled slowly to his left. In his right hand he grasped a frag. Very slowly he worked the pin out. Very gradually he slid from his position and moved to alert Silvers and Jax.

Numbnuts was petrified. He cocked his M-79. He squeezed the claquer firing device on his defunct claymore. Even the blasting cap did not explode. Sweat ran down his face. He shook nervously. Hoover did not return. Numbnuts fired his thumper. Whooaaccck, the round blew from the barrel. Then KaBuaccck, the small grenade exploded. Numbnuts was sure he could hear the enemy scatter. The mechanical ambush up the trail triggered and exploded, a violent thunderclap. To his right and left boonierats tossed frags. Claymore mines exploded before half-a-dozen positions. Boonierats could hear NVA dragging bodies through the heavy growth. They fired at the noises. Brown at the CP called the firebase and within minutes pre-arranged DTs were flattening and burning the vegetation in a wide circumference about 1st Plt. The fusillade gradually died, exhausted, numbed by a lack of return fire.

SIGNIFICANT ACTIVITIES

THE FOLLOWING RESULTS FOR OPERATIONS IN THE O'REILLY/ BARNETT/JEROME AREA WERE REPORTED FOR THE 24-HOUR PERIOD ENDING 2359 15 AUGUST 70:

IN A NIGHT-LONG BATTLE CO B, 7/402 ENGAGED AN ESTIMATED COMPANY-SIZED NVA FORCE IN THE VICINITY OF YD 173329,

THREE KILOMETERS WSW OF FIREBASE BARNETT. A FIRST LIGHT SEARCH REVEALED 34 ENEMY KILLED AND NUMEROUS BLOOD TRAILS. CO B CAPTURED 16 INDIVIDUAL WEAPONS AND SIGNIFICANT AMOUNTS OF OTHER ENEMY EQUIPMENT. US CASUALTIES WERE ONE KIA AND 11 WIA.

AT 0340 HOURS FIREBASE BARNETT WAS MORTARED. NO DAMAGE OR CASUALTIES WERE REPORTED.

AT 0715 HOURS, A SQUAD FROM CO B, 7/402 WHILE FOLLOWING A BLOOD TRAIL, ENGAGED A REINFORCED SQUAD OF NVA KILLING EIGHT.

THE RECON PLT OF CO E, 7/402 WAS AMBUSHED ON HILL 848 BY AN UNKNOWN SIZE ENEMY FORCE. THE UNIT RETURNED ORGANIC WEAPONS FIRE AND THE NVA BROKE CONTACT. CASUALTIES WERE ONE KCS WIA. AT 1100 HOURS, ONE PLATOON OF CO C, 7/402 WAS EXTRACTED FROM THE MOUNTAIN RIDGE SOUTH OF THE KHE TA LAOU AND WAS REINSERTED ON THE VALLEY FLOOR VICINITY YD 130317. THE LANDING ZONE RECEIVED FIRE FROM THE NORTH AND EAST RESULTING IN TWO US WIA. NVA CASUALTIES WERE ONE KIA AND ONE POW CAPTURED.

AT 1145 HOURS ONE KILOMETER SOUTH OF FIREBASE O'REILLY THE 1ST REGT (ARVN) RECEIVED 82MM MORTAR, RPG AND SMALL ARMS FIRE FROM A COMPANY-SIZE ENEMY FORCE. THE ELEMENT RETURNED ORGANIC WEAPONS FIRE AND WAS SUPPORTED BY AIRCRAFT FROM THE 2/17 CAV (US) AND 4/77 ARA (US). A SEARCH OF THE CONTACT AREA REVEALED 15 NVA KIA AND THREE CREW-SERVED WEAPONS CAPTURED.

A GROUND BDA BY ELEMENTS OF THE 2/17 CAV AND THE HAC BAO COMPANY FOUR KILOMETERS NORTHEAST OF FIREBASE RANGER RESULTED IN THE DISCOVERY OF 12 BUNKERS, EIGHT HUTS, 60 NVA UNIFORMS, 14 MEDICAL KITS, 2640 POUNDS OF RICE, 100 122MM ROCKETS AND MISC DOCUMENTS. ADDITIONAL ELEMENTS OF THE 1ST INF DIV (ARVN) KILLED 27 ENEMY IN THE VICINITY OF FIREBASE O'REILLY.

AT 1330 HOURS CO B, 7/402 WAS ENGAGED BY AN NVA SQUAD USING A .51 CALIBER MACHINE GUN. CO B CALLED IN ARA AND THE MACHINE GUN EMPLACEMENT WAS DESTROYED. AT 1430 HOURS, B/7/402 WAS AGAIN MORTARED AS THEY DISCOVERED THE ENTRANCE TO AN NVA FIELD HOSPITAL BUNKER COMPLEX. A FULL REPORT ON THIS ACTION IS CONSOLIDATED UNDER SIGNIFICANT ACTIVITIES 16 AUGUST 70.

1ST PLT OF CO A, 7/402 DISCOVERED A TUNNEL AIR SHAFT FOUR KILOMETERS SW OF FIREBASE BARNETT AT 1520 HOURS. THE UNIT PROBED THE SHAFT THROUGHOUT THE AFTERNOON AND EVENING WITH NO RESULTS.

AT 1855 HOURS FIREBASE BARNETT CAME UNDER ATTACK. THE ATTACK WAS REPULSED USING ORGANIC WEAPONS FIRE. ONE HUEY UH-1D HELICOPTER WAS DAMAGED.

AT SUNSET, VICINITY YD 160295, AN ELEMENT OF CO A, 7/402 WAS ENGAGED BY AN UNKNOWN SIZE ENEMY FORCE RESULTING IN THE DEATH OF ONE SCOUT DOG.