Payback (9 page)

He knocked at a door that he figured was a bathroom. Getting no answer he opened it. The room was a bathroom all right. Mack was on the floor, the sash of his bathrobe tied around his arm and the needle going in.

Mack said easily, “You wanted to know.”

***

Time is absolutely NOT on my side:
graffiti on a urinal wall in Saigon.

Faith can't even move bowels:
Bien Hoa.

Things Happen:
slogan on the side of a helmet.

Catlin was keeping his eyes on the helmet. The face underneath it was a farm face: simple, acned and pale, getting paler when the chopper did a hundred-foot drop, and then greener on the bounce. They'd already been hit, shrapnel of plastic scattered on the floor, one guy dead and still strapped into morbid attention in his seat, the blood dripping out of him, not even gushing, just dripping, like a leaky faucet, on the floor. Catlin kept hearing it,
drip … plop
… though he couldn't hear anything but
bladadadadat
. The door gunners sending out a message from the doors, tail gunner stretched out flat on his stomach, the rotor blades keening and screaming in alarm. He reached for a cigarette, eyes on the helmet. There were forty of them, strapped into two facing rows; flak jackets zipped; helmets like lids screwed tightly onto jars. Like jars, Catlin thought, they were all made of glass; he could picture it clearly, the jackets sprung open, the collection of shards falling softly on the floor with a merry little tinkle.

Bladadadadat
. Something hit the chopper like a fist coming down and the thing was going crazy, going out of control, going down, and then hitting some invisible net, and then bouncing. A guy with
Avenger
on his helmet took it off and threw up. Catlin got the cigarette nearly to his mouth.

There were guys who muttered Jesus, and guys who clutched medals, and guys who got their mouths all jumbled in a grin about as cute as rigor mortis, and guys who just stared. Mack, sitting next to him, cooled out and easy, had his eyes half-closed again. Scarf bit a nail, went after it with achingly beautiful precision.

Bladadadadat
. The door gunners squatted over swiveling machine guns, shooting at the wind. The Chinook fell again, then braked again, bounced, the wind biting in through the open tail section, Catlin, in the tail section, keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the slogan with the ultimate truth:
Things Happen
. Oh yeah. Absolutely. Amen. You could make a religion out of that one, he thought. The question would be which of the forces to appease, the Things or the Happen. You could go either way. There were guys, Catlin knew, who made a thing about Things. There were Good Luck medals and Good Luck charms: photographs, bullets, shoelaces, rocks. One guy carried a lucky cigarette—small–“1” lucky—the one he didn't smoke on the plane coming over so that way he'd smoke it on the plane going home, and it made as much sense as either of the Testaments, old or new, the Koran, the Talmud or the Bhagavad Gita. Happen was a trickier and funkier religion, more truly Oriental; you looked for your talismans and charms in events. Missing a chopper that had crashed was a good one; moving to the right for no particular reason when the guy who moved left for no particular reason got insulted by a mine. On the other hand, Happen, he'd decided, was a bitch. Happen could be lucky or Happen could be saving you for Something Much Worse. The question was whether you believed in design or in the lack of design.

Catlin wasn't sure. The only thing he knew, he was going back to war, where Things and Happen were enthroned like a couple of malevolent kings.

The crew chief was up now, moving down the aisle, a big guy, a Georgian with a thick southern accent, who was now yelling, “Fav.” There were fav more minutes and then they'd hit ground. Catlin checked his watch.

Mack cleared his throat, stirred himself, yawned, said, “When're we gonna get there, when're we gonna get there.”

Catlin said, “What comes after fav would be fur.”

“And after fur would be thry.”

“Fur,” yelled the crew chief, standing at the hatch now and peering past the gunner. He lifted four fingers. Catlin looked at mud-brown swamp through the tail. Riceland, he thought. If the chopper went down, there'd be chicken-fried rice.

Mack loaded up now. Catlin pulled a clip, shoved it into his rifle and listened for the click. He heard it very clearly, the last thing he heard before the sky started shrieking, a different kind of sound, and then daylight was shooting through a long jagged cut as though a can were being opened, the contents being spilled, everybody suddenly slammed against the walls, and then the wind rushing over them, smoke rushing over them. Catlin ripped his belt off and stood for a moment half-marveling that death could be an iridescent glow, and then everything exploded.

8

He opened his eyes into pummeling rain. He was lying on a mudbank surrounded by five-foot elephant grass and for a time he just lay there, impractical, stoned, as entirely contented as an egg in a nest.

Except somebody'd scrambled him.

Somebody'd beat him into breakfast-time shit.

He was sore all over.

He came into focus with a bang of adrenaline that shot him to his ass. He sat there and listened, not breathing, his bare head angled to the rain, heard nothing but the rain—no shouts, no screams, no artillery fire, no footsteps approaching him softly in the grass. He looked at his watch. It had smashed; it had died at eleven after one, and it hit him with a dawning amazement that he hadn't.

He tried to think back. Chief hollered fur and then—what?—something hot and hypnotic in the air and then …

What?

I don't know.

What else don't you know?

Everything.

You think you want to try and find out?

No, but keep talking.

He tried to get up and was grounded by the pain that exploded in his ankle, bringing tears to his eyes. He lay there for a moment and struggled with his panic. A busted ankle was a death warrant here.

Take it easy. Are you listening? Take it very slow
.

He sucked in his breath and then, frowning concentration, he slowly, individually, wiggled all his toes. Okay, he could tell himself, ankle's not busted so you'll deal with it. Lacerated ligaments. Sprain. Kidstuff. He tightened the laces of his boot.

Now brace yourself. Mark
…
Ready
…
Set
.…

He struggled to his feet, standing mostly on the left one, and peered above the grass. He'd landed on a small dense island of the stuff—fronted by a jungle, surrounded by canals. Up ahead in the jungle, a sky-licking fire that would have to be the ship. He could guess at the distance, maybe six hundred, maybe up to eight hundred yards.

They'd been hit from the paddies.

They'd been heading to the north.

He looked at his island—a kilometer squared except shaped like a teardrop. Behind it, in what he imagined was the south, was the dull brown flatland he'd spotted from the tail.

They'd been coming from the south.

Are you ready, Dr. Watson?

Charlie's in the south.

And you think he's just sitting there?

No; coming here.

Catlin ducked down again, flat on his belly in the tangle of the grass, chin on his forearm, trying to peer into the gray mist ahead of him. It seemed to him he'd heard something moving in the water; voices, very soft, “
Con bao
…” and then the rest of it drowning in the rain. He waited, not breathing, listening, reaching for the butt of his pistol, the only thing he had; seven there for Charlie and the last for himself.

Sound of canoes. Grunts, a few whispers as they banked against the shore. They were thirty feet away from him, right across the stream. Then they were farther. Then they were gone. He waited for a decade, silent and aware. In his mind, he was a small kid hiding in the grass in back of Bloomstein's garage. Waiting for Kip to yell “ollie ollie oxen free free free.” He wanted to go home; have a couple of Mallomars, a large glass of milk.
This game really sucks
.

He rose from the weeds, keeping his head down, and peered across the stream. There were two long canoes—empty, unguarded. He figured they could hold about ten men apiece. A decisive patrol.

He started to crawl around the bottom of the grass now, looking for his rifle. He was sweating an ocean; he was raining inside his flak jacket, fucking little hotbox zippered to his chin.

He was afraid of making noise.

He was afraid of going too far away from his lookout.

He was afraid.

He lay flat, belly down in the rainstorm, and listened to the shots, the short hot volley of automatic fire that was coming from the jungle. Charlie was shooting into everything alive, into everything dead. Charlie made
sure
. Charlie went over to a guy with no stomach and shot him in the head. Or a guy with no head and shot him in the stomach.

Catlin lay sweating.

If I get out of here—

What?

I'll be kind to old ladies.

You think you'll get out of here?

Seriously?

Yeah
.

No.

Okay. Just testing your sanity
.

Pass?

Pass
.

He thought about Mack. If anyone could really make it out, it was Mack. And it made him feel better. Possibly Mack was even now in this grass. Crew chief, gunner, Catlin, Mack, Things Happen, Scarf—they were all of them more or less standing in the hatch. Mack was so stoned he could've floated, could've flown to Song Be by himself. Four minutes north. Four if by chopper and a week if by foot.

No—if by TWO feet. One busted ankle and it's—

Lacerated. Sprained.

Sorry, I forgot
.

The shooting was over. Catlin drank water from a plastic canteen and left it open to the rain.

Hey asshole! You think you'll live long enough to drink it?

Hey fucker? I got two words for you.

What?

Things Happen.

You think they're gonna happen anymore?

Catlin gave it thought. Whatever was happening had already happened. It had happened in threes. And whatever was up there, it wasn't gonna give him any fourth time at bat.

You want to hear the punchline?

No.

If you made it, if you no-shit made it, you know what'd happen? They'd send you back to war. Up another mountain. Down another path
.

Catlin closed his eyes. The inevitability hit him like a stone. There was no way out of here, no way back. The game was so crooked that to win was to lose. He thought about getting out his pistol right now, get it over with, just put a bullet in his brain. He thought, But that's something you can always do later, and the thought seemed to offer him a sliver of support. Candle in the dark; light in the tunnel. My rod is my staff.

He waited now, sweating and plotting in the grass. The rain seemed to slacken, then stopped. The mosquitos came roaring into life. Charlie moved over to his boats again. Heated discussions in the heat. Catlin could make out a couple of the words but not enough to make sense, though it sounded like a fight. On the other hand, everything sounded like a fight; the whole fucking language sounded choppy and vicious. “Have a nice day” was like “Take it up the ass.” So it might have been friendly:

“What do you feel like doing tonight, Marty? You want to go beat a few bushes for Catlin?”

“I don't know, Angie. What do you want to do?”

He was biting at his lip so hard it was bleeding.

Boat sounds again. Grunts. Oars. Conversation receding. Silence.

He waited, staring at the sky. It was leaden, it was totally socked in with gray. Already new thunderclouds threatened from the south.

Passengers waiting for the incoming flight are invited for cocktails in the Sky-Tripper Lounge
.

He would look for his rifle.

He would find his rifle and he'd head for the jungle.

Or stay in the grass.

Like a damn sitting duck?

Okay. You're right.

He headed through the grass again, carefully, slow, wary of the traps and explosive trip-wires he knew were all around him. His foot throbbed heavily, Krupa in his boot going
babadabadop
, the pain shooting up at him. Every time he landed, it felt like he was stepping onto seven-inch spikes. He kept on moving. He thought about The Doctor, who'd lost his intelligent imaginative head to the tripping of a wire. “No metaphors,” he'd said. “There are no metaphors in war. When you're feeling like your heart is on fire—it is.” And the seven-inch spikes were no metaphor either, they were hidden in the grass—short little seven-inch knife-sharp punjis, nasty little spears made of fire-hardened wood and then planted as one more contemptible surprise. And again he was alerted to the randomness of fate. If he'd landed on one of them—Jesus—could've gone through his stomach, through his heart.

Do you think God loves you?

Do you think there's a God?

Here? In this sinkhole?

So why did you ask?

I thought you'd start imagining He'd saved you or something
.

For what?

Exactly
.

For Something Much Worse?

It could be you've hit it on the button there, kiddo. Or otherwise
—

What?

You've uncovered the secret. You've eaten of the apple and uncovered the core, and the secret is
—
what?

That there is no secret.

Exactly. There's absolutely nothing going on. No pattern, no justice, no moral, no law. You're all on your own here, kiddo. It's you
.

And there wasn't any goddam rifle in the grass.

***

He turned, and there was. He actually smiled. The rifle was waiting there, black and shiny and buried in the grass. He moved to it, all things considered, pretty fast.