Disclaimer: All characters belong to SJC and Universal Studios.
"VC got a hospital in there." Still holding the neck of the bottle of Jack Daniels, Murdock used the same hand to indicate the chain of red marble and limestone hills. With the light just about gone, you couldn't see the red, only five black mounds rising startlingly out of the pancake-flat stretch of landscape. "Inside Thuy Son. Down in those caves and catacombs, right there smack dab under our noses."
"That's a rumor," Face said. The hooch stilt at his back still held the heat, and the sand beneath him, but it was better this time of the evening. The wind coming in off of the ocean down here diluted the diesel fuel and the lingering hints of freshly-burnt shit. When Face had first landed in country, he'd thought that 'shit detail' at the firebases must just mean an assignment that really sucked, until they started hauling out the sawed-down oil drums from the outhouses. A couple Vietnamese were hired to do it at the base camps. There were actually people who made a living out of setting fire to shit. He leaned a little harder against the wood.
Murdock was shaking his head, slowly, no. He'd sounded like he was thinking more than he was talking tonight. "Tunnels go back miles. All twisty and turny. How d'you know what they're hiding?"
"Buddhist and Hindu shrines."
"Could be dragons."
"No dragons around here except Puff, Murdock. And Puff's on our side." Face reached over, uncurled Murdock's death-grip from the bottle, finger by finger, and swallowed another mouthful himself. The whisky burned, settling into his stomach, and that was good. He had his regular supply routes, his contacts. If you wanted it and could pay up front, or had something you could do for him, he could procure, scrounge or scam it. The only way to make it out here was to be fast on your feet and slick as a pickpocket, and Face was slicker than just about everyone. He'd been damned if they were going to drink Tiger Beer on Fourth of July.
And sitting all quiet behind the hooch that Murdock shared with three other Marble Mountain flyboys, with stone-ass drunk marines whooping it up around the facility, they'd managed to keep it to themselves so far.
"Way the legend has it, a dragon come out of the water on Non Nuoac Beach and laid an egg." Murdock's drawl was getting more pronounced, the way it always did when he was drunk, or tired. "One thousand days and one thousand nights went by, and then the egg hatched into a beautiful woman. And the five pieces of shell left over, they grew into the five mountains."
Face watched Murdock lift his hand again, make a couple of half-hearted attempts to count the hills, then give it up as a bad job. He wasn't drunk, himself; at least, he didn't feel it. Only a little spacey. When the screaming nightmare suddenly went away for a while, it felt like a void inside. Empty, the ground ripped away from beneath you. He liked listening to Murdock, who asked questions, but never really expected him to answer them properly, just to be there while he did. Murdock's head always seemed a lot like Thuy Son, to Face. He never knew exactly what was going on in there. He wanted to follow him in, but he couldn't. So he just waited for him to wander back out.
And that was okay, because he always did, sooner or later. It was just how he was. It didn't matter.
Some of the grunts who Murdock had flown said their chances of getting picked out of a hot LZ doubled if he was the one in the pilot's seat. Some of them swore about him and said that he was nuts, a real fruitcake; that there was something wrong with him; that he flew like he was crazy. Howled on takeoff. Imitated the AFVN announcers and did sports-style commentaries over the intercom while the slicks were dodging ground fire. Put choppers down in holes meant for McGuire rigs.
Hannibal liked Murdock because he liked crazy. He did crazy. The first time Murdock had flown them, Hannibal had watched him with that grin that said he wanted him on the team, and he was going to get him. Hannibal always got what he wanted, no matter what strings he had to pull or favors that he had to call in.
Face had his own reasons. Murdock was the one thing that was consistent. No matter what was going down, he always popped up with his own personal brand of loopy apparently intact and untouched. Only a couple of years older than Face, he could talk about ideas that sounded incredible but were frankly beyond him, and then the next day a story would come up the road about how Murdock had prepared one of the choppers for its pre-flight inspection by attaching adhesive labels to everything with arrows pointing to it and a description of what it was, what it did, or how it had happened.
The two of them always pulled back towards each other again, somehow, even when you pushed them apart for a while. When he wasn't with Special Forces, Murdock and his crew chief, the Canadian, Pete Olsen, could be anywhere in half of I Corps. The Two Eighty Second were workhorses. Sometimes Murdock talked about the missions he'd been flying, turning them into TV show narratives, and sometimes he didn't, and you knew those days had been rough ones.
Face took another shot of JD. "Well," he said, "I never thought about looking for girls in eggs, but you know me. I'll try anything once."
One corner of Murdock's mouth turned up in a light smirk. "That why you keep jumping rides out of Da Nang, Faceman? You gone through all the nurses already?"
"No, I just have to come down here to work on my tan. We don't all get to be beach bums like you." It was a long way off being one of Face's best lines, and he didn't bother trying to improve it. He could never con Murdock, in any sense of the word. Murdock always saw it for what it was, played up to it for a while, then called him out and laughed at it with him. He had a hundred faces stored up, ready for when he needed them. None of them were his, but Murdock was one of the few who could see the one that was. BA was another, but BA rarely said half of what he knew.
Face was slow to make friends. Slower to trust. He was good at what he did, whether it was conning, scamming or outright thieving, and there was nobody who didn't love a guy who they thought could give them what they wanted. He took what he wanted from them in return as fast as he could, before they disappeared again. He'd always thought that that was the way it went. Then Murdock had been around, with his stories, and his songs, and his huge, slightly off-kilter smile and he and Face were, somehow, friends. Murdock had heard all about him, and, surprisingly, still liked him.
He was certain in his uncertainty. Face had never had certain, not before he came to 'Nam or after. Hadn't known what it was. He was confused at first, then drawn to it, like a magnet.
Murdock, Howling Mad, was the most dependable thing he knew.
"Sand's hell on the rotors," Murdock said, randomly. He turned and groped for the bottle again, flailing arm bumping Face's chest. Face let him have it without a struggle. There was plenty more where that had come from.
"Spoken like an AC. You love that big ugly slick of yours way too much."
"Damn straight. How's my ugly bird look coming in to pull you Greenies out of a hot spot?"
Face smiled. "Most beautiful sight in all the world."
Murdock didn't say anything for a bit. Face was starting to drift when he heard him again. "Crashed a chopper on Monday."
Face glanced across, but the other man was staring out into the falling darkness. He found himself unsure for a moment whether Murdock had actually spoken, or whether he'd just imagined he had. "You crashed your chopper?" he asked, as an experiment.
"Nope. One of the Medevac choppers." Murdock's words were matter-of-fact, but there was something in his voice. Anyone who didn't bother to listen closely enough wouldn't have noticed. "Took some fire through the belly on a dustoff near Que Son. Musta hit the main fuel line, 'cause the engine died faster'n an ant under a magnifying glass. Had to autorotate through the trees."
"You got her down?"
"Busted up the blades and the mainframe. Made that baby cry something fierce. She held upright, though. We moved out to another LZ with the wounded and got picked up."
Face frowned a little. "You got shot down," he said. "You didn't crash." He'd have preferred to have known about it, regardless.
"Shoulda seen it coming. Had Charlie's position. Coulda swung her out of range."
"Could've. Should've. Would've. You got everyone out in one piece. You're the best damn pilot I've ever seen, or Hannibal's ever seen, but you aren't Superman. Though you probably like imagining you are."
For the first time, Murdock didn't pick up on the joke, let alone run with it. Up at the base, they'd bat it back and forth for a while, tones of voice increasingly serious as the conversation got more insane, until BA finally bellowed out something about knocking both of their heads together. "I didn't see it coming 'cause I wasn't there."
Face felt his brow crease harder as he suddenly realized that not only did he not understand what Murdock was saying, he actually hadn't from the start. "Weren't there? Where were you?"
"That's the thing. I don't know. Happens sometimes, lately. It's like I'm going through all the motions, but it ain't really me doing it anymore. And I know what to do, but I don't how I know, 'cause everything looks different. Kinda like I'm watching it through a TV screen. And then the world all comes back in a big rush and I know there's things I wouldn't've seen."
Murdock came out with crazy stuff all the time, Face thought. Tales from a big mixed-up hilarious world rolling out of his mouth at a hundred miles an hour, but it always sounded as if what he was saying made perfect sense to him, even if it didn't to anybody else. Usually Face was one of the people who didn't have a problem with that. There was a fundamental Murdock Logic to it that worked on some level and that he could probably have explained if you had a few spare days with nothing else to do. Now it sounded like something that he was having trouble explaining to himself. It didn't sound right.
"You think this is something you need to tell your CO about? Or Hannibal?"
"No." Murdock said. But his eyes slid from the horizon to Face's, and the question was in them: did Face think it was something that he needed to tell him?
It might be. Maybe he ought to drop it into the conversation sometime soon, that Murdock thought he'd gotten his bird downed because he zoned out, or whatever the hell it was that happened. He was Hannibal's XO, wasn't he? That meant it was his job to report it to Hannibal if they had a problem. If something, or someone, was getting to be a risk. They had to take too many risks already because they didn't have a choice. Nobody needed another one around. They needed guys they could count on, when trust affected every decision; when it came down to the wire. They were hard to find, and everyone knew it. Murdock couldn't be a risk, because the team couldn't afford to lose him.
Couldn't be a risk, because Face couldn't afford to.
"Look, this place screws with everyone's head. Nothing's like we thought it was going to be. Nobody thought they were ever going to have to do or see some of the shit we do. And anyone who says it's not going to mess them up, at least a little, they're either lying out of their ass or already too messed up to realize. You just got your own way of dealing with it."
"So you think I'm okay?"
Lying had always been what Face did best. "You're okay," he said.
"I remember things different now. Out here, I mean. All gets mixed up. I don't know when it happened, or where, or who it was splashed his guts over the back of my chopper today. I try and remember, and I can't get it to come straight in my head."
"That's the way to go nuts. Guaranteed."
"You remember 'em? Gooks you took out?" The other man was looking at him as if he really wanted to know the answer. Needed to know.
"Yeah. I remember them."
"Where'd you put 'em? What'd you do with 'em all?"
"You put them in a box. And you put it away, and you don't look at it again until you think you can. Until you're okay with it. Maybe you don't look at it ever again."
"That's just it, Face. No more room up in the ol' attic. No more boxes left. Already filled 'em all up. Gotta hang it on the walls now, where I can see it all the time."
From down on China Beach, on the other side of the barbed wire, came the crack and hiss of signal flares. They stood out against the twenty-four-hour backdrop of sound and color that was 'Nam: the sheet lightning flash of dozens of batteries over the horizon, the dull sound of illumination rounds leaving their tubes, the whine of the jets and wink of their wing lights, and the endless, distinctive wop, wop, wop of choppers. There were faint hoots and yells. The lights darted into the sky to hang there briefly and then slowly fall. Tiny pencil flares followed, tracing delicate arcs.
Fireworks tonight as well as booze. All the way from the ammo dump.
"Gonna be hell to pay for that one tomorrow," Murdock said, as if in answer. He lifted the bottle again. When it came down, he pressed it to his chest, like he didn't want to let it get too far away.
Appearances mattered, Face thought. You were supposed to pretend. Everyone did. You were supposed to pretend you didn't give a shit, about anyone or anything, right up to the day you couldn't do it anymore and blew sky high. The difference about Murdock had always been that he acted like he'd already done it. He acted like it was all out in the open and under control. If that was only the spillover and he still had enough to blow, dependable-crazy Murdock, he was going to cover the ceiling.
"You all right?" he asked.
Murdock laughed, a high, uncomfortable sound. "Fine as wine, Faceman. Fine as frog hair."
"Really?"
"You want me to be?"
"For Christ's sake, Murdock. What I want doesn't matter."
"You sure about that?" Murdock's eyes held his for a moment, then drifted back to the sky. They traced the path of one of the flares as it rose. "Pretty, ain't they?" he said.
Face tried to remember a time when he'd never seen anything exploding in the sky except real fireworks. "Yeah," he said, "I guess they are."
"Like lightning bugs. I used to sit out in the yard back home and play the radio to lightning bugs. They flash in time to the music."
"Murdock, they really don't."
"How d'you know, California boy? You need to come on down south and see for yourself. Better'n a disco."
"I just know. And they don't."
"If I wanna see it happen, it happens. Stuff's always been real, up top, if I wanted it to be. If I didn't want outside to be real, I stayed there where it wasn't."
"You don't get to pick and choose."
"Used to be able to."
"I used to be able to deal with a lot of the shit. Hannibal deals with it because he lives on his jazz. BA can deal until he has to watch other guys reacting to it. Ray's got a fuse shorter than the match that lit it because he can't deal, and the Montagnards only deal with a bunch of burnt-out Greenies because their country's been screwed up since most of them were born and they don't know anything else. I used to handle stuff I can't handle any more. Things are different now."
Murdock's eyes were hooded. "The nights different, too?" he said.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"When you're camped out in the jungle and Ray has to shove his fist in your mouth so Charlie doesn't hear you, 'cause you woke up gasping and screaming? That when you take the lids off of those boxes?"
More flares went up from the beach; one, two, then a barrage. Defiant. The marines cheered. Finally, Face said, "Ray told you that?"
"Yeah, Ray told me that. And you think he shouldn't've."
"It isn't any of Ray's business."
"Ain't any of mine, either, if you don't want it to be. But if that's why I got to be okay, Face, 'cause it's the only thing holding you together, then I don't think I can be. I can't be okay for you when I can't even be okay for me."
Face couldn't respond. Murdock straightened his bent knees, letting his long legs stretch out in front of him. "Can I ask you something?" he said, after a minute. "You like hanging out with crazy guys 'cause it makes you feel that bit more sane? I mean, guys who are, y'know, fun-crazy."
Face stared at him. "You've really been thinking that that's what this is about? You and me?"
"No. I'd know it if you were running a con on me. Watched you too many times."
"Then - what?"
Murdock looked sad, like he'd had to make the decision to put a dog to sleep. Sad, and drunk, and strange. "I wanna be your friend. I want it bad. But you're right, you know? I ain't Superman. I fly, but I don't come swooping in before you fall off of a building. It ain't good, the -" He reached up and tapped his own skull. "Some of it's just the way my head's always been, and some of it's what I got to do. To try and make it better."
"Would you believe me if I told you it does make it better? And that, scared as I get sometimes, there's nothing scares the hell out of me now like the idea of you leaving me alone as well?"
He felt surprised, when he'd said it. The world hadn't fallen off of its axis. The words had just come out, and they hadn't killed him after all. He'd felt all right, saying them. Safe. He didn't feel like he'd handed Murdock something gift-wrapped to use against him.
"If you yell out that you're falling, Face, I'll try my damnedest to catch you, but we're probably gonna fall together anyway and end up in a big pile of hurt and crazy on the sidewalk. If you figured you'd keep me around so's you wouldn't go to hell, you made a bad choice."
"Most of my life's been a bad choice, or somebody else's bad choice. What makes you think you could be any worse?"
"I'm your friend. I ain't your hero."
"I never asked you to be."
Murdock's shoulders rolled a little, less than a shrug. "Maybe it's just worked out that way. Funny, ain't it?"
Face took in a deep, long breath. "I want you to be okay," he said. "It doesn't make any difference if you're not."
"I keep seeing 'em, Face. Guys I dropped in the jungle and brought back in body bags. Guys burnt up in their choppers, like pork barbecue. They got a new home now. They live in my head. Just can't remember who any of 'em were any more."
Face had been with grunts before who'd had their bellies blown open by a landmine; watched them sitting there, holding their intestines in, while they waited for the medics. It was that kind of feeling; trying to stop it all coming out. Trying to stop yourself slowly and endlessly leaking away.
"Yeah, Murdock." he said. "I see them too."
Murdock took another slug of the whiskey, and blotted his mouth with the back of his hand. Shuffling closer to Face, inching his ass along the ground, he leaned in and kissed him. His mouth pressed against his temple and stayed for just a second, his breath stirring the fine hairs there, before withdrawing. It was so soft that Face almost flinched from the shock of it; from what seemed so out of place it was obscene. Gentle touches didn't exist here. Only hard ones; needy ones. He drew back a little, involuntarily, just from that.
"Don't worry about it, Face. You're drunk, and I'm crazy, and I promise we ain't gonna remember any of this in the morning."
There was silence for a minute. Then Face said, "How can you be sure I don't want to?"
"You don't. Believe it, muchacho."
"It's not your decision to make."
"Maybe. But I already did."
"Why?"
He thought he heard Murdock sigh. "'Cause it'd wind up turning into something so strong, and so good, that if I had to take it away you'd lose every itty bit of faith you ever let yourself have in anybody. And you already lost more than you ever should have. So I ain't gonna get all hung up on you, and I sure as hell ain't gonna let you get wrapped up in me. I like you too much for that."
"What if I said that if you wanted to verbally puke all those thoughts you get, I'd listen? That I'd be your hero as well?"
"No," Murdock said, ambiguously. "You already been that."
"I'm a dumb grunt, Murdock. Be generous to me."
Murdock gestured a little to the bright, flickering coronas of red and green in the sky. "Think of it as freedom. What los Americanos do best."
Face suddenly felt tired, like he was hunkering down to hump a dozen clicks. "Freedom," he repeated, heavily. "Freedom. Right."
He saw something resembling a twisted smile ghost across Murdock's face; a smile without humor in it. Carefully, the other man placed the bottle in his lap, and, picking up Face's right hand, folded it over the top.
"Happy Fourth of July, Faceman," he said. "Happy fucking Fourth of July."