Disclaimer: all characters belong to Stephen J Cannell and Universal Studios.
You see more colors from the air than you do on the ground, Face thinks. More patterns. Gold-brown calico of wheat fields and ranchland. In 'Nam, it had been rice paddies, cratered by artillery shells, with a few scattered hooches at the corner-points, and bamboo thickets yellowish green. Green and white elephant grass. Jungle deep greens, or black where it had taken a napalm hit. Everything kind of opens up and maps out, like how Murdock explains it, and you can see your way out of the maze.
Up here, Face feels like he can walk a little way into Murdock's head, for a while.
Cruising a thousand feet above east Nebraska in a scammed chopper. Hannibal and BA following in the van, somewhere below. Radio contact. Murdock hums a few bars of Sinatra, then croons in reply to himself. Nothin' but blue skies do I see - Face picks up the harmony, and Murdock glances to his left and flicks the intercom switch.
"You broadcasting on my frequency today, Faceman?"
"Nobody's on your frequency, buddy, but it's a pretty good one to tune into sometimes. How long before we cross over into Sumner County?"
"Four minutes. Give or take some. Doors open and everything hanging in the breeze, back on the Hueys... eighty knots, maybe, on a real good day. Flying civilian's like floating like a butterfly!"
"Guess I'm wetting my feet as your peter pilot today," Face comments.
"Absolutely. Co-pilots get killed more often than pilots, by the way, 'cause the pilot always swings his bird away from ground fire."
Face rolls his eyes. "Thanks a whole lot."
"You're welcome." Murdock flashes him a grin. He checks the radio, then his voice drops chirpily in again over Face's headset. "Hey, you know who come to see me last week?"
"Who?"
"Ol' Mac McWilliams! Used to bunk with me and Cash and Fellini down at Marble Mountain? Cussed finer'n any other flyboy on the airwaves?"
Face laughs, in recognition. "If we heard singing over the radio, it was you, and if we heard cussing, it was Mac."
"'Member how he used to yell at Charlie and tell 'em how they couldn't shoot at a guy wearing glasses?"
"Yeah, Murdock, I remember."
Murdock dips the chopper's nose, sending it smoothly into a right bank. A less seasoned observer than Face would have been blown away at how easy he makes it look: pulling here, pushing there; collective, cyclic, pedals, sending out instinctive, perfectly coordinated messages to the aircraft at the other end. "Anyways, fifteen minutes before supper, they tell me I got a visitor, and I'm thinking who and how 'cause I know you're out of town, and then I hear a guy outside my room holler, Holy shit, Howlin' Mad, you're a goddamned sight for sore eyes!"
"And the nurses were okay with that?"
"Well, ol' Mac always did know how to get the ladies wet, so he starts telling them all the stories he can think of from when we were the two biggest hotshots in country, and pretty soon Jackie's sat right smack dab on his lap and Cory's sat on mine, and both those little gals were eating out of his hand."
Face's smile is soft, and a little sad, as he looks out of the window to where the chopper eats up the distance over the fields. It's another story, he thinks, like Pathfinder, or the hole in the floor in Murdock's room that leads to an alternate dimension. One of the stories that Murdock half-believes himself sometimes, because he wants it to be true, and the more people he tells it to, the more he can believe it. Because if everyone knows something happened, or didn't happen - well, it has to be true, doesn't it?
After a while, he asks, "Did Mac really come and see you and cuss in the VA?"
Murdock sniffs, and, turning, Face sees him grin a bit. "Nope. Did get a letter from him, though. Plenty of cussing in that."
Face nods. Not minding. "Would you have liked to see him?" he says.
"I dunno. I would, and then I know I'd feel bad 'cause there'd be stuff I couldn't tell him if he asked me." There's a pause over Face's headset, as if Murdock sighs. "Just get lonely sometimes."
"I try not to leave it too long, Murdock. I really do."
"I know. Ain't your fault. Things happen. You got business to take care of. Guess I liked thinking about how it might have gone if Mac had come and visited. Two of us had a real party up there, in my head."
"Can I read the letter sometime?"
"Sure."
Face stares back out through the bubble of the windshield. Always so very little, between Murdock and the ground, if he hit. So fragile. Sometimes it reminds him of his own fragility.
"Murdock, would you do me a favor?"
"Yeah?"
"Don't go telling BA that story."
"Not 'cause his problem's with Mac, right? 'Cause his problem's with me?"
"You make BA think too much. As long as you're there - as long as you're -"
"Nuts," offers Murdock.
"You're his little bit of 'Nam. You're what stops him turning it into a memory and makes it keep on happening, right there in front of him. That's the reason he gets so mad. It's not you. It's -" Face stops, tries again. "You know what it is."
"I know," Murdock says, simply.
Hannibal's voice breaks through over the radio, disturbing what's come to pass, weirdly, for silence. Murdock thumbs his push-to-talk button. "One minute ETA, Colonel. We see the ranch on up ahead."
"Nice going, fellas. We're coming in right behind you. I don't know if Cal Pridham's ever been in a range war before, but I know he's never been in one with us. Everything okay up there?"
"What you and that crazy fool been jibber-jabbering about, Face? Yo' radio's been off." The channel manages to render BA growly and crackly at the same time. "Reason he talks to you, is 'cause you the only one crazy enough to listen."
Face reaches up, and presses his own PTT. "Just been killing time, BA," he answers. "Just killing time."