Warzone: Nemesis: A Novel of Mars (23 page)

SEAWOLF HQ/BINH THUY

The SEALORD pilot awoke me when we arrived at Binh Thuy. I felt better but was still depressed. Every time I’d been here before to go back stateside, Binh Thuy was a welcome sight. The Seawolf HQ was every bit the same as when I was last here, but seeing it didn’t generate any excitement in me. It was funny; one letter changed the world for me. Binh Thuy hadn’t changed; I’d changed. Always before I had a plan, now I was just another soon-to-be ex-sailor with nowhere to go.

First stop, after grabbing my seabag, was to the o-club for a beer. Popping the top off of my beer, I slowly sipped it, contemplating the hand I’d been dealt. Yesterday I was a hero. Now I’m returning home to a place that didn’t appreciate heroes, after a civilian stole my girl. I suddenly realized I had no plans, no purpose. My parents died and left the farm to my brother, my girlfriend was gone, and the job offer seemed pointless.

I needed a clear head to think this through, and booze wasn’t helping. I needed to stop drinking. My old buddy “Mad Dog” wrote back that there was no respect or honor from the public for the returning vets. He hadn’t handled it well. The last I heard was that he crawled into a bottle and was trying to drink himself into a stupor. I didn’t want to share Mad Dog’s fate. I was at the crossroads of the rest of my life, and being a drunk didn’t seem to be the right path. Pushing the beer aside, I looked around. SEAL Team Two’s corpsman, Doc Steuben was in the bar.

“Hey Doc, can you do a Seawolf a favor.”

“You bet, name your poison.”

“Don’t need poison, just a bunk for a couple more hours sleep.”

“We have an extra bunk.” He set me up and I hit the rack for three more hours. I awoke feeling better physically, but depression was a predator, patiently stalking me and waiting for me to surrender to apathy so that it could devour me.

I thanked the corpsman and went to see the chaplain.

I hadn’t particularly been a religious man while serving here, but there was nowhere else to turn but booze or God. LT Caffrey was a Catholic priest. I was raised Baptist, but today was not the day for doctrinal prejudices. Clearing my throat, I knocked on his office door.

“Come in,” called the deep, bass voice from inside. I opened the door and beheld the man. At the sight of him, my jaw dropped, and my eyes grew as big as saucers. I had expected to see a scholarly type, soft from years of catechisms and prayers and hearing confessions. He looked to be about thirty years old, red-haired, and a towering giant built like a brick outhouse. I didn’t expect to see such a rugged-looking man in such a gentle profession. He sensed my surprise.

“I was taking a break from working on my sermon while I put on a new pot of coffee. Join me for a cup?”

“Yes, thank you, Padre.”

He poured us both a cup and motioned to the cream and sugar. I added cream to my coffee and sipped the hot liquid slowly. He noticed me eyeing him over.

“Is something wrong, Lieutenant?”

“Um, you’re kind of big for a priest.”

He chuckled softly. His eyes twinkled, recalling a time long ago before the war, when he was happy just being a college student. “I got a scholarship at Notre Dame to play football, but my real calling was the priesthood. I’m Father Michael Caffrey. How may I help you, Lieutenant Bordelon?”

“Gene will work. I’m nearly a civilian anyway.”

“Call me Michael. You didn’t call me father, since you’re not Catholic. Since you’re not here to confess anything, I suppose you have something to talk about.”

I thought it over a moment and decided that calling him Michael wouldn’t do. I was here to seek spiritual advice, Catholic or not. “Padre, I’m not Catholic, but I do have to speak with someone. I guess you’ve heard it before. I planned to marry my college sweetheart, but she sent me a Dear John letter just before I was to ship stateside. I feel lost, like a ship adrift. I’ve dreamed of going home to her. It was so real I could taste it. It was what kept me going in dangerous situations: bad weather, loneliness, and the feelings of hopelessness following the start of the United States withdrawal.

He lit his pipe and puffed it a bit and gave it some thought. “Do you recognize God as the creator of the world?”

“Yes.”

“Do you believe He has a purpose for the world he created?”

“Of course.”

“Do you know that God is interested in you personally?”

“I hadn’t thought about His caring much about the specific details of my life. But, ok… I might believe he cares what I do and where I go.”

“Have you considered that God could be closing one door and opening another one?”

“No, I hadn’t thought past my pain.”

“I want you to do this. Keep an open mind and forgive everyone involved. Keep your eyes prayerfully open and expectant of what God may do next. Faith is the key. When the door opens, you’ll know it.”

The words of the chaplain penetrated my heart as surely as a surgeon’s knife. He prayed with me, and we had a second cup of coffee. A load was lifted off my shoulders and I felt I could be free. With no plans, the possibilities were endless, not just purposeless. I had my lifeline, and I would take it. I visited with the chaplain, and he told me stories of his glory days at Notre Dame until it was time to go.

I took an uneventful flight to Saigon, and then hit the military transport to San Francisco. When we reached Travis AFB, I picked up my baggage and checked for a flight that would be going to England AFB. I was to report stateside to San Francisco to a MAJ Callahan for debriefing, which I thought was unusual because I was a naval officer, and major was not a naval rank.

GOING STATESIDE AND THE
OFFER

I assumed I was to be processed out. MAJ Callahan met me at the airport personally. As I looked at the other servicemen, I realized that no official military officers were greeting them, and I was curious. I followed the major out to his car and threw my seabag into his trunk. The major directed me to sit in the front passenger’s seat. As the car moved down the interstate, I drank in all of the sights and sounds of my country like a child discovering it for the first time.

MAJ Callahan saw me looking at the radio, which was turned off. Seeing my interest, he motioned an invitation for me to turn it on. I was all over it like a fat kid given a cake. In no time I had a rock-and-roll station tuned in and was listening to Simon and Garfunkel singing “Cecelia.” “Cecelia, you’re breaking my heart…”
That will not do
, I thought. I changed it to another station, and Santana was playing. “You’ve got to change your evil ways, baby.” I wasn’t in the mood for heartbreak or evil woman songs. I turned it off and looked out the window as the government sedan traveled down the interstate.

“Dear John letter, Lieutenant?”

“Sir, yes, sir.”

“Lieutenant, what are your plans?”

“Sir, I haven’t any, sir. My girlfriend dumped me, my parents are dead, and my little brother is running the family farm.” Vietnam’s future and my own uncertain future was a dark storm brewing over my mind.

“You’re a fine pilot. Ever consider continuing to serve?”

“The war is winding down for the US, and it looks as though all Charlie is waiting for is for us to leave.”

“What if I were to tell you that I can get you into a unit that takes fighting communists to the next front? There will be no cowardly politicians or antiwar protestors to worry about. And what’s more, you will make a difference. Be warned, there will be no glory for battles won, no public recognition.”

Suddenly I saw the open door that the padre told me about, and I wasn’t about to let it close. “I’m not in it for the glory; sign me up.”

As we pulled up to his office, I had a sense that the offer was genuine.

MAJ Callahan bade me to follow him to his office. “Lieutenant, have a seat.” He took a seat at his desk, and I sat down across from him. “Were you serious about starting a new chapter in your service to America?”

“Absolutely.”

“Do you have any business stateside?”

My parent’s farm was willed to my brother and the only property I had was a red convertible ‘65 Mustang on blocks back at the farm. My ex-fiancée married someone else while I was in ‘Nam. “I have no unfinished business.”

“Okay then. I want all of your property including clothes that have any military identification.” MAJ Callahan threw me some civilian clothes just my size. “Lieutenant, please change your clothes.”

I handed him my seabag with all of my personal effects in it, and quickly changed into the civilian clothes he gave me. He opened my seabag and revealed the walnut carrying case containing my two pearl-handled Colt forty-fives.

“Very nice. Do you have any shells with it?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll take the shells; the pistols you can keep.”

I surrendered three boxes of .45 shells. He checked the cylinders in my pistols to make sure they weren’t loaded and handed the box with my pistols back. After changing into the civilian clothes that he gave me, the major took all of my personal identification and the pictures of my grandparents and parents.

An uneasy feeling was settling upon me, replacing the sadness that was dominating my mind the previous minute. The major had seen that look before. “Relax, you’ll get these back when you arrive at your post.” The major was busy filling out paperwork, in a file that was marked LTJG Eugene J. Bordelon, Jr. After he finished writing, he pulled out an inkpad and stamp and firmly stamped it on one of the papers, pressing it evenly so the mark was clear. I caught a glimpse just in time to see the word “DECEASED” in red letters on the page. Instantly my mind thought of stories I’d heard of some kind of covert CIA ops where the agent is officially “dead.”
What was I getting into
? I thought. My internal klaxon inside was sounding off, as real as any all-stations alert, causing tight knots to form in my stomach.

He chuckled as if he was party to an inside joke. “Don’t worry. Where you’re going, son, there are no newspapers or protesters following you—just Soviets to fight.”

“I noticed you are a major and I am in the Navy. How did you get access to my discharge papers?”

“Someone very important decided to pull some strings to invite you to join an elite force.”

I was beginning to feel like Tom Sawyer at his own funeral. I pointed at the paperwork. “How did I die?”

“Officially, you were part of a helo crash from Bin Thuy to Saigon. Bodies burned beyond recognition, that sort of thing. All of the paperwork of your getting to Saigon and coming home will be shredded. Your family will be notified. I am sorry for the loss they will feel, but it can’t be helped. Your “body” will be flown back and buried with full military honors in a closed casket ceremony.”

“What if the offer doesn’t work out? I mean, if you find me unsuitable for the task?”

“Then we’ll discover that we were mistaken about your death, and apologize to your kin for upsetting them.”

I was given three days’ liberty in San Francisco, but I was ordered not to discuss any of this with anyone. For my liberty, I was given civilian ID, some money, a phone number and an address to report to at zero eight hundred on the third day. Spending the next three days seeing San Francisco, I tasted the food, went to Chinatown, rode the trolley cars, and talked confidently to women I’d never met before and hoped to make some memories. Soaking in a real bathtub every night for an hour was a luxury I had sorely missed. The three days were over way too soon. I sucked it up and reported to the address I was given.

I checked the address on the paper one more time and knocked on the door. 1LT Wilson gave me a new flight bag with what seemed to be all the gear and personal things needed. He motioned me to follow him. As we got close to the door, I noticed two other young men dressed just as I was, standing at the door. We all piled into his van and were driven toward New Mexico—into the desert. The fact that I was officially “dead” and being taken for a ride into the desert set off my internal claxon to the color of blood.

WELCOME TO HELL