Title: In a Dead Man's Eyes
Author: Aiko Namika
Fandom: Gundam Wing
Pairings: None
Warnings: Blood, some gore, cursing
For merith's request for a Vietnam War fic. When I first saw that while reviewing past requests, I knew that I really wanted to do it – my personal near-obsession with historic military aircraft was one of the factors, along with the fact that I have just read The Things They Carried and If I Die in a Combat Zone by Tim O'Brien (both are about his experiences and stories in Vietnam). I hope you like this!
June fic #2
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Heero Yuy dropped to the ground once more as a stream of bullets tore through the air above him, cursing silently to himself. He was having a hell of a time staying out of sight of the VC, who had staked out the plane wreck in an attempt to either capture or kill one more American pilot. The frequency of the fire had been dying down lately, but he knew that was because they were trying to keep themselves hidden in an attempt to lure the coming rescue choppers into a false sense of security.
He glanced behind him toward where the still-smoking wreck of his F-4 Phantom was, though the thick forest concealed the actual sight from him. His co-pilot had gone down with the plane, killed by the burst of fire that had taken out the port engine. Fortunately Heero'd managed to eject, but now he was stuck on the ground, surrounded by the enemy, and he didn't know how to let any of the rescue choppers know where he was – he didn't dare risk a flare to alert them.
The shrapnel wound in his left arm was crudely bound by what bandages he could rescue from his med kit, but they were rapidly staining with blood. His main concern was to keep himself from bleeding all over and leaving a trail, but with the incapacitated arm, his mobility was fairly limited.
Suddenly the sound of salvation approached – the heavy thudding noises of chopper blades as they cut through the air, the roar of their turbines bringing them closer and closer to him. Heero narrowed his eyes slightly and gathered himself for a run to a nearby semi-clearing. There wasn't really any place that was perfectly clear, but if he could get somewhere that the pilot could see him easily, then he'd have a better chance of being rescued. But he had to be fast about it, because he didn't want to put any other US troopers in the line of fire – and he knew that the Jolly Green crews would keep coming back over and over until he'd been rescued or confirmed captured. Or dead, for that matter.
The deafening sound of roar of the Jolly meant that it was almost overhead. He ran for it, pushing himself up onto his feet with the help of his uninjured arm, tucking his left arm tightly against his chest. The sound of gunfire resumed, but he ignored it and just tried to get to the point he'd designated in his mind as his pick-up point. Nothing else mattered – he'd failed the mission that he'd started out on, been ambushed by a pair of MiGs, and been shot down. He'd lost his copilot, he didn't know what had happened to his wingmate, and his plane was currently a merrily burning wreck. Heero wouldn't accept failure in at least getting back to base to report.
Unfortunately, it looked like his run of bad luck wasn't over quite yet. He tripped, tumbling to the ground and landing on his bad arm with a cry of pain. Rolling over to get back to his feet, he froze as he was confronted with the sight of a Viet Cong soldier standing over him, rifle pointed directly at his heart. Some distant part of Heero examined the features of the other fighter, trying to see how they were supposed to be related – the Vietnamese had some sort of distant relationship to the Japanese, right? And Heero's grandmother had been Japanese. But as he stared upward and looked his death in the eye, he just couldn't see anything that linked them. Nothing except that fear in the back of the gaze, the look of a young man in a situation that he didn't really want to be in, fighting a war that he didn't really know about just because someone told him to.
Heero was expecting the sound of a shot, expecting to hear the end of his life overwhelming him. There was indeed a crack of gunfire, but to his surprise it wasn't that of a semi-automatic rifle, but instead something that would be expected of a hand gun. The head of the VC shattered, bits of his skull pattering down onto the forest floor as the dead body collapsed. Eyes wide, the pilot twisted around to see his savior – a uniformed American soldier, the red cross on a white patch marking him as part of the search-and-rescue team, a medic and soldier rolled into one.
"Hey soldier," the other man – no, as much a boy as he still was – said, hurrying over to him. "Are you mobile?" Even as he spoke he was leaning down over Heero, looking him over carefully and noting the now-ineffectual bandage on his arm. The fabric was now completely soaked with blood, and the throbbing pain was suddenly brought to his attention, wringing a hiss from him before he managed to stifle it.
"I'm clear," he grunted, hauling himself to his feet with the help of the other guy. "Just get me the fuck out of here." With a chuckle the medic got them moving rapidly toward where the violent movement of trees indicated the chopper's presence.
"Jolly Green 43, I've got one walking wounded on the way. No sign of the other pilot," he said into the radio in his hand, glancing at Heero at the mention of the other pilot. If there was any hope for the other man the Jolly Greens would go after him, the chopper that was currently playing high bird coming down for the attempt while the low bird took off for the base. Heero simply shook his head negatively – his copilot was dead. "Negative, negative, the other pilot is KIA," his rescuer stated.
The downwash of air hit him then, and he ducked his head against the force, though the other man didn't seem to notice it nearly as much. Then again, he was part of a chopper crew, and was thus used to working around the behemoths. A firm grip on his uninjured arm brought his gaze up to meet that of the other soldier's – odd, he thought for a moment, that shade of blue is really familiar – and then there was a harness being strapped around the both of them.
"Hang on tight; we're getting out of here!" Hang on he did, as Heero felt his feet leave the ground as the winch began to pull them up. He was oddly conscious of the sound of gunfire all around them, and some part of him hoped frantically that he wouldn't get hit by a stray bullet. They were in the upper parts of the trees when he his good shoulder was shaken slightly to get his attention.
"The pilot can't hold the hover any longer! He's taking us out now, and they'll try to get us up as soon as they can!" The words that were shouted in his ear did nothing to reassure him, but he simply shifted his grip slightly and nodded. There wasn't much else that he could do.
For the most part he never remembered much of being dragged through the treetops for several minutes before the Jolly started to ascend. There was just a moment of glancing down after a while and seeing the trees growing smaller beneath his boots as the two of them were once again lifted higher. He was used to seeing those trees from the safety of his cockpit, not from being suspended in open air, and he quickly redirected his gaze to the face of his rescuer. In the clearer light of the open, the reason for the vague familiarity of the guy's face became clear, and he started in shock.
"Duo!" His voice couldn't have been loud enough to be heard over the roar of the blades, but somehow his childhood friend registered his words and met his eyes, surprise etched on his face as well.
It was then that they were finally pulled into the belly of the chopper, pulled into safety, and detached from the harness with a brief apology from a soldier for their rather rough ride. As he was helped onto one of the stretchers, Heero could only stare at Duo in what was becoming a combination of shock, joyful surprise, and…a great deal of relief. Finally, here was someone he knew, someone he trusted in this whole insane war. And as Duo neatly re-bandaged his arm, he didn't really care about the strange coincidences that led them to meet under these horrific circumstances.
For now he had a bit of a refuge from the fear he'd seen in a dead man's eyes, a fear he knew was in his own as well.
-end-
- F-4 Phantom II's were the predominant fighters during the Vietnam War, and proved to be extremely useful once the military figured out the proper tactics to employ while using them.
- "Jolly Greens" are Sikorsky S-61 HH-3 Jolly Green Giant heavy lift helicopters, and were used (and are still used, I think) for search-and-rescue missions of downed airmen.
Comments and responses are always welcome!