Profane Men (17 page)

“Protect yourself at all times.”

— tagline routinely used in covert-type classifieds

We are sweeping toward the far edge of a field bordered by thick hedgerows along the base of a hillside, moving toward the Z, in the deep, bad bush. This is the farthest north any of us have been.

The closest thing to home from here is Firebase King, which is our northernmost base camp this side of the Z. King is a typical hilltop-support firebase. After that, it's all injun country. We have taken the occasional sniper round this morning. A couple of AK-47s making their distinctive pops don't come too close, but Charlie knows we're here.

As we reach the hedgerow, we hear a noise. From the distance it sounds like a wounded animal, then a baby crying. Everybody's uptight at the sound.

“Wwaaaaaahhhh!” The screaming is much louder. Big Merlin plunges into the hedgerow. It is a little kid lying in there, crying up a storm.

“Hey! C'mere, there's a little boy in here!” Merle walks toward the Vietnamese, who can't be over eight or nine, on his back there in the hedgerow screaming and crying in pain, and just as he leans over to see what's wrong with the little boy, something happens nobody can believe. I see it on my eyeball's slo-mo instant replay again and again. This little tot pulls his hand out from under his leg and he has a fucking gun and pulls the trigger.

Again, it is something that you just stand and watch for a heartbeat because nothing has ever prepared you for it. A little baby with a gun is a contradiction your mind isn't going to deal with. Then one of us hollers as the gun goes off:

“Lookout!”

The gun is the loudest fucking .22 you've ever heard, and it jumps from his tiny hand as it fires. On reflex, Merlin blows the little boy away, just cuts the poor little bugger in two with a close burst, and then he drops his piece and he just stands there with the .22 in him. He's not believing it, either.

“Awww, hey, goddammit to hell! I'm
shot!
” he yells.

“Eighty-ninth Med, Toledo Blade Six, over!”

Cccrrrrrrrawwww.

Crack! Crakaka-
crack
! AK-47 opens up on us. Sniper.

“Wait one! Goddamit, gimme that fucker.”

“Hold that dressing there.”

“Eighty-ninth Medevac! Blade Six, do you read me over?”

Ccccrrr “—
vac, over.”

“Wait one, med. Can anybody see him . . .? Fall back about five.”

“See anybody?”

“I think it's more'n one.”

“Eighty-ninth Med — we — uh, this is Blade Six Actual, emergency, we need an emergency medevac at these grid coor — ”

“Hold it, wait one!”

“Copy that request. Blade Six, say grid coordinates, over.”

Finally El Tee gets him squared away.

“Echo Tango Alpha ten minutes over?”

“Rog that, thank you, eight-niner, Blade Six Actual out.”

“I still don't see 'em.”

“Anybody got 'em?”

“I got one made,” Shooter says. He has done about a pound of toot. He pops a pair of North Sonic Us into his ears and squints into his scope, laying the cross hairs on his target area.

“Somebody draw his fire and I'll pencil the fucker right now.”

“Whatdya have in mind, Shooter, ya want me to have Washington stand up?”

“Have yo' mama stand up, Chuck.”

“Stand on this.”
Ci-rrakkk.

We hear a long scream.

“Shit! All fuckin' right!”

“Get some!”

“Way to reach out and touch someone, my man!”

Sarge has got Big Merle resting, but he looks like he's going to go into shock any minute. He's probably about as ripped from wasting the kid as he is from the wound.

“Million-dollar wound, Big Merle.”

“Yeah,” he mutters, “fuck it.”

“There it is.”

Merle looks like he's about to go over the high side. He's just about to redline. Come on, dust-off!

We examine the gun. It is an American-made .22 derringer manufactured by the same folks who make the CIA silencer hit kits. Who the hell ever heard of anybody ever getting shot with a derringer? Wisdom: I'd rather be missed by a .44 Magnum than hit by a .22.

Another first. Man, when they start putting eight- and nine-year-old assassins in the game, you can fuckin' believe those dinks are out to eat your lunch. There is just no way Americans can grasp the concept of little kids sent out to war by their own families. It's just too Martian to handle. All of us know somebody who was taken off by a little flower girl with a chi corn, but seeing something like this is pretty staggering.

The other sniper, if there is one, has either booked or he's waiting to pot us when the dust-off chopper comes in. We leave Harold with his M-60 and make a perimeter for bird security, splitting into two-man teams. The field is about one hundred meters in back of us, and it's a natural LZ, as long as we don't have that other AK-47 on our case. We gotta get Big Merlin out.

We bring in the medevac bird OK, and Merlin is out in a shitstorm of flying rocks and crap, heading for a heart and an early DEROS. Lucky motha. You never can find a nine-year-old with a derringer when you need one.

We find Shooter's sniper. Local-forces type who looks like he might go all of sixty pounds soaking wet. Make that fifty-nine pounds, he's about a quart low on gray matter, which has oozed out of a big hole in the back of his head in a funky, leaking mess of brains, skull, and spongy stuff.

“Nailed him right between the horns there, Ace.”

“Way to get some!”

Hot as hell's nuts out here. Stifling, breezeless, suffocatingly close from the humidity, rotting vegetation, stinking slime, and the everpresent smell of danger and death. Moving. White Laidlaw at the point. Rodriguez behind him on the radio counting down like some zombie astronaut:

“Four . . . three . . . two . . . one . . . How do you read, over?”

“Forces Radio, with transmitters in — ” Slowly I turn.

South of the Z, heading through The Badlands toward Firebase King and the big green hurt locker out beyond. Waiting to drop into the quicklime and hunting KILL, which is shaping up to be a cesspool full of bad t-r-o-u-b-l-e.

Corns, our new FO if he lives long enough, plunges off a muddy strip of embankment as we cross a rice field, and is standing there in knee-deep slime and stinking paddy water, hollering:

“Ooooohhh. Goddamn, it hurts! Oooohhh, shit!”

“Atsa way to go there, Corns,” the Dutchman says. “Whatja do, break ya' ankle?”

“Shit! I'm hurt!” We stop. We assume he'd twisted an ankle or whatever.

“What'd you do — sprain your ankle?” asks El Tee.

“Uuuunnnnnnnnn, oh! Get it out! Back of my leg!”

Ewell checks him. There is a thin, needle-sharp piece of bamboo stuck through his left calf where he slid down off the paddy dike into the water and muck. Ewell and I get him out of the slime and he gets his pants off, slitting the one pantleg off with his blade. It isn't the usual punji stick; there are a row of little bamboo needles implanted in the side of the embankment. Paddy seems to be full of them. They are very small, but long enough to do the damage, and he has broken this one off in his leg.

“Watcha think, Roy?” Dutchman asks the El Tee.

“Well. Looks like we gotta cut her out.”

“There it is.”

“Well, girls, let's get it done.” We try to lift Corns as gently as possible and half carry him over to the tree line. It seems like it takes fucking forever.

“Lucky the dinks didn't use bigger bamboo on that fucker.”

“Lucky your grandma didn't have wheels, she'd been a trolley car.”

“Lucky your mama didn't have kids or they'd been pussies.”

“Fuck your mama, cuntlips.” This shit ain't getting nobody nowhere.

“Let's go — lift him there.”

“Nnnnnnmmm mmmmmm.”

“Here, get a hold like this here.”

“Ahhhhummmm.”

“Be careful there, goddammit!”

We get Corns under a tree and try to start a fire. Even though it is hot as a bitch, stuff is still too soggy, so we flame up some C-4 and El Tee and Sarge hold him while we gather around to watch the big operation.

“Anybody got a small pocketknife?” El Tee asks innocently, as a five-inch “007,” a Remington bullet, and a Super-auto “straight-ahead” all flick open in his face. Laughter.

“Very fuckin' funny. Ya mind gettin' that shit outta my face.”

We get Corns back to his feet and he tries to walk, but he is in lots of pain. El Tee tries to get another bird in to cut us a huss, but no way. No more dust-offs. We sit around sandbagging while El Tee screams at some other lifer, but he can't get it done this time. No birds available until tomorrow. No way we're staying out here tonight.

“Ed, you're going to have to walk on that leg.”

“I'll try.” We've hit him with some good dope.

We get him back to his feet again, and we take turns helping him as we drive on. We are carrying eight frags apiece, couple claymores each, a ton of ammo and water, the batteries, now we all got some of Corns's shit too. What a foot-dragging, bamboo ball-buster of a hump this is turning out to be.

“Goddammit, no-good rank ass cockshit fucked-up mothergrabbing remf pussydick faggot ballsucker-poguebait . . .” El Tee has gone a little nuts for a second and he just runs out of steam. Fucker hates it when he can't get a dust-off, or a ride or whatever.

“Gimme that goddamn sonofabitch again.”

“Blade Six Actual. King Six over?”

“Wait one.”

Sizzle.

“Yo. Six, King Six?”

“We're about a half a klick from Romeo Niner Sierra — ” and he gives grids of a main road that leads into King's AO. “If we'd deploy to that position, what would be the chances of getting a lift on any wheels moving inbound, over?”

Slim and none, I think and Slim left town.

Rrrzzzawwr —
“voy comin' in supposed to be late afternoon. You might be able to rendezvous with them at your coordinates, but there are no guarantees. We can contact them to watch for you, over?”

“Oh! Yes, sir, King Six, a definite rog on that. Thank you, sir! Out.”

Roger that shit for sure. Man, we are so fucking tired it is no joke. We struggle into our rucks. I'd dump this damn batten in a heartbeat if I could figure out how to do it. And some of this fucking ammo too while I'm at it.

“Saddle up, let's go!” Ewell bellows.

“Personal to Jim from Tony,” the radio crackles, “call me as soon as you get to Bangkok,” pleasant, cultured kill's anonymous voice advises.

“Call
me
Tony, I'll bang your cock.”

Sqwwwwaaaaaawwwwwuiwwwrrrrrri
Judas H. Priest. Damn near pissed my drawers if I'd been wearing any. Only static.

“ — wants to meet discreet clean couples or singles for some quote very hot and horny unquote sex. Not into drugs or pain. Call me at — ”

“Too bad, hah hah, Dutchman, no heavy drugs or pain, or you coulda caned the bitch.”

“Yeah, an' too bad she wanted hot sex or you coulda called, eh?”

“Call your mammy for that shit.”

“Gonna be calling graves registration, you little fingerfuck.”

“Hey, Dallas — ”

“Yo.”

“Hold up a minute. Hey, ya got any blow?”

“Does Ray Charles wear long-sleeve shirts?”

“Let's have a tootski.”

“Here, man, knock yourself right out.”

“Gracias, my amigo — ”

“Your grassy asshole, señor — ”

“Do one of these.”

The heat is intense and punishing. I wipe the sweat out of my eves to see what he's holding in his hand.

“Holy shit! Acid!” I laugh. “Are you fuckin' crazy?”

“Why the fuck not? This shit is a skate. Here, mano, pop one.”

“Damn,” I say, doing the tab, taking a taste of Kool-Aid, wondering if I still have some ludes. “I can't take you anywhere.”

“Ain't this a trip.”

“We'll see.” Gook sunshine.

I see myself clearly for a moment. If Oreo was indeed the Prince of Darkness, how then can I not be the Emperor of Speed?

“Code name Abracadabra — ”

“What a vision!” I say.

“There it is.”

“Damn.” I see the word as it is meant to be seen. So clear! It is two words, you see. ABRACAD and the ABRA is the beginning of the second word, which ABRACADABABRACADABRABRACADABRA into infinity. It is the perfect word! Damn! What symmetry. I see it pregnant with implications, the A and the B and the R the size of a small town in Montana, each strung out across the fields in towering stone monoliths. Gigantic alphabetics to live on after Vietnam is a memory, after World War Four when the asphalt ball is unlivable and nobody won, to still sit here in an enormous puzzle that straddles the 17th Parallel in legendary letters, mute testimony of a millennium-old struggle as an alien culture ponders their prehistoric significance. A message from the gods: ABRACADABRA.

“Say — ” I begin. Have you ever looked at the letter A before, I think. Consider the awesome perfection of its design. Finally it comes to me, for the first time I
get
the damn alphabet. But when I open my mouth to tell my friends, a red silken scarf flies out and ties itself into a lipstick kiss above my head. I hear them laugh with pleasure at the trick I've done, and their laughter sounds like fine crystal goblets breaking in a stone fireplace.

I walk by, watching myself pass, and as the landscape flashes I understand both the meaning of art and the meaning of life in one great, heady, bittersweet, poignant rush of insight and flood of genuine understanding, and it is all so fucking simple. So
that's
why every thing has shape and color! What a rush!