Cracker! (15 page)

Cracker went to lie in the doorway next to Rick. She loved the windy choppers. Wind was her favorite thing … but then so were wieners. She wished Rick had a wiener, but if he did, she would be able to smell it. She glanced at him, but he didn’t even glance back. He was frowning.

When the helicopter landed, Rick and Cracker hopped off. Bien Hoa was huge compared to his little camp. He saw another handler with a dog and called out, “Hey, I’m with the 67th IPSD. I’m supposed to go to Special Forces headquarters.”

The other guy said, “Hey, I hear you guys have some good dogs.” He pointed. “Special Forces is that way.”

“Thanks!” Rick said.

He was barely in the building before a man stopped him and said, “Rick Hanski?” Then before Rick could answer, the man said, “I’ll go get the Camel.” Rick wondered who or what “the Camel” was. He waited with Cracker. He was so nervous, he couldn’t tell if he really had to take a leak or if he only thought he had to take a leak. After about twenty minutes a man walked in and straight up to him, holding out his hand for a firm shake.

“I’m Camel. I’ll be leading our mission.” Camel was broad and didn’t look even slightly like a camel. Maybe he smoked them. Camel wore plain O.D. fatigues, no stripes, no dog tags, no distinguishing marks at all. Everything in the army was O.D.-olive drab. A scarf was tied around his neck, and his hands were heavily veined. He reminded Rick of a kid a few years older than him who’d lived on his block. The kid got in trouble a lot, especially at school, but then he’d gone on to become a cop. Rick remembered something his dad had told him once about being a cop: “It’s a thin line. It takes a bad boy to stop the bad boys. The best cops are bad guys who want to do good.” Dad the Philosopher. It was weird, though, that line—as thin as a hair, yet it still made all the difference in the world.

Cracker felt alert in all her muscles and her nose and ears and even all the hairs on her body. This man who shook Rick’s hand was strong, she could tell, though she figured she could take him if it came to that. She couldn’t tell from Rick’s response whether this man was Rick’s friend or enemy.

“This is Cracker?” the man said.

“Yes, sir.”

“Beautiful animal. May I pet her?”

“Of course, sir.”

“You don’t have to call me sir.” Camel softly petted Cracker’s head. “Magnificent.”

“Yes, sir. She sniffed out a sniper one day. Another day we saw a little action.”

“You can call me Camel. You know what I do?”

“Yes, sir, Camel, you’re Special Forces. You do … stuff we don’t know about.”

“That’s a good description of it.”

Rick had to ask. “So why me?”

“Your reputation. Your sergeant said you’re the best there is.”

“My sergeant?” U-Haul had recommended
him?
Rick felt a jolt of pleasure and shock at the same time. “Thank you, sir-I mean, Camel … sir!” Even Rick couldn’t help laughing at what an idiot he sounded like. Camel laughed as well.

Camel cocked his head toward the door, and Rick followed, thinking that there’d been a mistake. Could it really be U-Haul who had recommended him? Camel offered a cigarette as they walked outside.
Nice guy!
Rick reached for his lighter, but Camel had paused and was already holding out his. They walked quietly for a bit and then stood under the gray skies smoking. Rick felt like a new kid at school who’d just been befriended by the star of the football team. Camel squinted toward where the sun would be.

“We’re going to fly to Tay Ninh to practice for a special mission with your dog.”

“What’s the mission?” Rick asked. Rick waited.

A split second passed. You wouldn’t even have noticed under normal conditions. But Rick could tell Camel was formulating a response instead of speaking spontaneously. “We’re executing a rescue. I’m still finalizing the plan.”

“You get to make up the plan?”

“Oh, yes. In Special Forces you get the assignment, and then you have to put together a plan.”

Rick couldn’t help exclaiming, “Cool! We just follow orders.” He waited for more, but Camel didn’t say anything.

Two men were walking toward them. When the men arrived, one immediately put out his hand. “Vukovich,” he said. “You must be Rick and Cracker.” Like Camel, the two men wore nothing on their O.D. fatigues to indicate rank or affiliation.

The other man stuck out his hand. “You can call me Madman.” Madman spoke so softly, Rick needed to strain to hear him.
Madman?
Rick hesitated nearly imperceptibly before reaching out his hand and saying, “Nice to meet you, Madman.”

There was a silence, and Rick got the funny feeling the other three were evaluating him. He tried to stand taller, add an inch to his stature. Then Camel slapped his shoulder. “Let’s get going. We got a long day of practice today. We’re going to be rescuing some POWs. They’re okay, just a few bruises, a little malnutrition, but no broken bones. We’re lucky.” Rick felt his heart beat faster at the word “rescuing.” From where, he wondered.

They walked over to the helicopter pad. The chopper hadn’t arrived yet. Madman gently knelt down next to Cracker. Rick said, “Easy, girl,” but it wasn’t necessary.

Cracker immediately liked this man. He understood her, she could tell. He rubbed her ear.
Oooh, mmmm.
Maybe he could teach this new ear-rubbing method to Rick.
Mmmm.

Rick felt a stab of jealousy as Cracker seemed almost to be smiling.

Madman stood up. “Very nice dog.”

Camel said, “Madman talks to the animals, I kid you not. He’s got a master’s in psychology, and I swear, sometimes I think he understands every living thing.”

Madman actually blushed. Rick asked, “So you work with animals for Special Forces?”

“Nah,” said Madman. “I’m a demolitions expert.”

Camel laughed, slapped Madman hard on the back. “He blows things up, don’t you, Madman?”

Madman just smiled.

The chopper arrived, the noise preventing any further normal conversation.

They all climbed aboard. Camel sure was a nice guy. Rick had never thought much about Special Forces, but so far they weren’t what he expected. He’d assumed they’d act more superior, like they were better than you.

At Tay Ninh they got off and approached the Special Forces compound, a fenced area within the larger base. A sign said
CLASSIFIED AREA.
Rick hesitated before walking farther. “Camel?”

“Yup.”

“I’m just a grunt, man. I don’t have clearance.”

“We’ve taken care of all that.” Camel kept going, so Rick followed. It dawned on him that if they had clearance for him, they probably knew everything about him. They must have checked him out already, and he hadn’t even known it was being done.

Camel, Madman, and Vukovich stopped to talk to a couple of other guys. “Hey, how’d it go?” Camel asked one of them.

The man took on a peculiar expression. “Ah. We found him.”

Camel seemed to understand immediately. “I’m sorry,” he said, and then Rick got it: The man they were talking about had been found dead.

“Yeah,” said the other man.

“Did you talk to his parents?”

“Yeah, yeah.” The other man looked away. “Yeah,” he said again.

There was a long silence. Vukovich spoke first. “We’d better get started.”

The other men walked on.

Camel, Vukovich, and Madman all turned to Rick at the same time. The suddenness of their attention made Rick catch his breath. Then Camel smiled. “Let’s have ourselves a good time today. We’re going to practice weapons firing, demolition, helicopter insert of the team, movement on the ground, helicopter extraction with STABO rig—a lot of fun stuff. Special Forces uses the STABO for extractions. It’s a great harness—never let me down. Cracker’s going to love it!” Rick had one overwhelming feeling: He wanted to do good. No. No. He wanted to do great.

The other guys acted as if Rick were one of them. Two Montagnards also practiced with them. Montagnards were the indigenous people of Vietnam, like the American Indians, and they worked closely and loyally with the Special Forces. The “Yards,” as Camel affectionately called them, knew the terrain intimately.

So for the rest of the day the six of them fired CAR-15s—a shortened version of the M-16 Rick usually carried-and ran, crept, hid, and jumped. Cracker occasionally sniffed traps that had been set up to test her. Camel had her move faster than she was used to, but she still caught every trap. They also attached the special harnesses Camel had talked about-the STABOs-to themselves and Cracker, and then they were lifted off into the sky as they hung beneath the chopper. Camel had been right. It was just about the most fun day Rick had ever experienced.

As they worked, Rick thought he had never sweated so much in his life. Then, at the end of the day, the other three were suddenly slapping Rick on the back and saying, “Good job.” And they petted Cracker and said over and over, “Good dog!” They had a celebratory air about them, and that’s when Rick realized that he had
not
been one of them all day, but he was now.

They ate in the mess together that night, not talking about much except sports and dogs and their girls—everything except this damn war. At Camel’s insistence, Cracker lay in the mess hall next to them. With Camel doing most of the talking, Rick and the other guys ate the way the guys all ate, basically shoveling food into their mouths in a way Rick’s mother would call “bad manners.” Rick’s mind flitted briefly to home, then back again. “That’s the whole point,” Camel was saying to Rick. “Six men and a dog, but we’re like one creature.” But then all of a sudden Rick wanted to know something. “Say, Camel?”

“Yeah?”

“What’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen?”

Camel didn’t answer at first. He slowly finished chewing. He swallowed. Then he finally said, “You gotta move on from that kind of stuff. That’s the nature of the work, man. You move on from what haunts you. Otherwise, you become like Tommy.”

“Who’s Tommy?”

Camel paused again, then said, “Lost his nerve. Had to quit.” There was a silence while they ate. Then Camel said, almost gently, “Hey, I hear your sister went undergrad to MIT.”

Rick said, “Yeah, she’s a brain.” Then he thought about that. “What, you guys know everything about me?”

Camel smiled. “For some jobs I got higher clearance than the members of Congress. We gotta know who we’re dealing with.”

They ate quietly, and then the others looked quietly at Camel, as if waiting. Camel seemed kind of pleased, but also displeased. “We did good out there today. But we’re going to have to cut the practice short. One day instead of two. We got some new intel, so we don’t have time to waste. We got a safe house we’ll take you to in the morning.” He was talking to Rick.

“Safe house?”

“It’s just a house in a village, but it’s guarded. We’ll be fine.”

“So we’re starting tomorrow instead of the day after?”

“Yeah. So I want you and Cracker to get a good night’s rest.”

Rick’s heart sped up. A good night’s rest? When all this was going on? Later he lay on his cot, Cracker on top of his legs. “My knees, girl,” he said, but she didn’t budge. He didn’t try to push her off, let his mind wander instead. He hadn’t goofed here in Vietnam. But he hadn’t gone on a killer mission yet. And Cracker, she was the other factor.

He didn’t know, because he hadn’t asked it of her, whether she was a generalist or a specialist. She’d done everything he’d asked. But now they were stepping up in level. Why him? He could think of two reasons: Bruno had just returned from a kick-butt mission—two weeks in the field. Couldn’t overwork the dogs, or they weren’t as effective. And Tristie had gotten orders yesterday. So now here he was—the generalist asked to step up, to specialize. But, man, he didn’t know. He just didn’t know. Did he have the hunger for this kind of stuff? It wasn’t too late. He could go to Camel, tell him no. They’d find someone else, lose just a day. But who knows what could happen to those prisoners in a day? He became aware of one of his feet going to sleep and reached down to push Cracker away.

Sometimes Cracker liked to stay right where she was even if he didn’t want it. Now, when he reached down and tried to push her off, she stubbornly folded her paws around him. Maybe if he scolded her, she would move.

But Rick suddenly felt too tired even for that. He crashed in mid-thought and woke with his knees aching from Cracker’s weight.

After breakfast Camel said, “We’ll go in two separate jeeps so the locals don’t know what we’re up to. Cracker will ride with Madman.”

“She won’t ride with anyone but me,” Rick said confidently. Then he saw Cracker seem to smile as Madman petted her.

Cracker looked from Rick to Madman. She liked this Madman fellow, but Rick was her guy. She sat in front of Rick. Finally, he said, “Go with Madman, Cracker. He’s your friend.” Madman picked up her leash. Cracker looked up at Rick. “Good girl. Go with Madman.” He gave her the “stay” gesture and took a few steps away to stand next to Camel.

Madman said, “Come, Cracker!” She hesitated and looked again at Rick. He didn’t know what to do, so he turned his back. When he turned back around, he saw her jumping into the jeep with Madman, Vukovich, and one of the Montagnards. He watched as the jeep drove off, Cracker gazing at him anxiously.