Command Decision

by alienissimus

On a strange mission for a general he doesn't trust, Beach Head must solve a twenty year old mystery. But the jungle, his rogue teammates and Cobra Commander stand in his way.

Disclaimer: This is a piece of fan fiction using characters from the G.I. Joe universe which is owned by the Hasbro company. It is intended for entertainment outside the official canon and I, in no way, expect to profit financially from the characters or images associated with this story. I am a fan of GI Joe and I'm grateful for opportunity to express my ultimate devotion in the form of this series of stories.

Command Decision

August 9th, 1990. Highland jungles, Vietnam.

Two days earlier Wayne Sneeden commanded a unit of Army Rangers tracking narco-fascists along the Colombian, Ecuadorian boarder. After an expedited transfer to the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, he'd been assigned laborer duties on a strange mission with disconnected teammates he wasn't sure he could trust. In a remote plot of jungle, birds sang, lizards skittered and thirty armed Vietnamese guards surrounded Wayne and his team.

All of the guards were young men, too young to have fought in the War, though glory and hate mixed in their cold sneers. Wayne wanted to go home to his old unit.

At the center of the circle the field surgeon, Doc, and his medical assistant brushed leaves and dirt away from a slight mound on the jungle floor. Human bones, dark as the soil, emerged. A hand, and then an arm of an American soldier lost during combat in 1972.

Wayne lowered his head, whispered a word of gratitude for the fallen soldier that walked the path before him.

"Watch it."

Wayne glanced to the team leader, General Clayton Abernathy. The General scowled behind a veil of cigarette smoke.

Someone has to say something.

Abernathy had said that nobody was to acknowledge their mission and that nobody was to mention the military, or rank, or the War. And nobody was to speak either native languages to the other side. Only French and only by appointed translators. Those were the terms Abernathy had agreed to for the chance to reclaim the remains of a soldier missing for eighteen years.

He could've negotiated for dignity.

A Rottweiler sat beside Wayne, its hackles bristled, fangs bared, but its handler kept it quiet. The dog had scented rust deposits from the soldier's gear out of the hundred square meters of jungle the Vietnamese government had permitted Abernathy to search.

Doc and his assistant brushed away more dirt.

The fallen soldier's upper torso emerged, still dressed in 1970s olive drab combat fatigues. Wayne clenched his jaw. No honor guard, no chaplain, no dignity for the soldier's sacrifice. None of this mission makes sense.

"We have a mike-one-six," Doc said.

Abernathy blew smoke, asked the translator, "Do we have permission to move the rifle?"

The translator repeated the question in French to the Vietnamese guard commander. He answered and the translator said, "His guards will take it."

One of the Vietnamese guards ran into the circle, grabbed the M-16 rifle out of the dirt. Finger bones fell and scattered over the leaf litter.

Wayne's shoulders tensed. He deserves better.

Doc and his assistant returned to their excavation.

Wayne's partner for the mission, Flint, paced around the circle, smoking continuously, muttering to Doc to hurry.

Doc traced the angle of the fallen soldier's arms and said to Abernathy, "The position relative to the rest of the body suggests he was dead by the time he hit the ground."

Wayne had seen men fall the same way, knew this soldier had friends, family, a mother that missed him.

Screw the rules. Wayne stood at attention and saluted his fallen comrade.

Abernathy glared, shook his head no.

The Vietnamese guards raised their Kalashnikov rifles.

"Put your arm down," the translator yelled.

Wayne finished his moment of respect and lowered his salute.

Abernathy stormed toward Wayne, cigarette smoke trailing behind like the sooty belch of a steam engine. "I told you don't salute. Don't acknowledge the military, or our country in any form. Just do what you're told."

Flint chuckled. "Good job, Shit Head."

Abernathy put an arm around Wayne and angled him toward the guard commander. "We're here as a guest of the kind and benevolent country of Vietnam."

The translator repeated the compliments.

Wayne's breath shortened, his teeth ground together.

Abernathy patted Wayne on the chest. "He's new. A little stupid to your generous customs."

Flint laughed hard, blew smoke with each convulsive hack. "Now you're stupid, Shit Head."

Abernathy's forced smile showed his cigarette-stained teeth. "Please forgive him. He won't do anything like that again."

Wayne shrugged off Abernathy's hand and tightened his fists. Palm-strike, elbow, knee to face, pound Abernathy into the ground. See how he likes being abandoned. Wayne straightened his white button-up shirt and stood tall despite Abernathy's insults.

Abernathy approached the guard commander, offered him a cigarette. The commander accepted and the General followed with a lighter. Two puffs and the guard commander waved off his men.

Doc's assistant, a man too old, with an air too battle-hardened to be a medical assistant, held up the soldier's aluminum canteen. He shook it. Water splashed inside. Water last sipped by the soldier eighteen years earlier.

Wayne sighed.

Doc had shown the most sociability of anyone on the team, though he had a far away stare, like he saw through pretense and into people's souls. After their initial introduction he remained as disconnected as the rest of the team.

"Shit Head," Flint said.

Wayne shuddered. When Abernathy introduced Wayne to the team by his new code name, Beach Head, Flint laughed and designated him Shit Head, instead.

"Get the crate off the truck."

Wayne pulled a meter and a half long pine crate out of the back of a beat-up work truck. He dropped it in front of Flint, nearly on his toes. Flint's smirk turned to a scowl. Wayne stood face to face and smiled. "Your crate."

Doc's assistant tapped the soldier's boot with a stick. A centipede, twice as long as Wayne's hand, skittered out and hid beneath a small mound of leaves.

A shiver ran over Wayne's flesh as though the centipede had crawled up his spine. The mandated beige slacks and flat shoes everybody wore left too much room for insects and rats to climb inside.

In a calm tone, Doc said, "Grenades." He and his assistant stood and stepped away.

Abernathy jutted his chin to the explosives disposal specialist. The young man stepped into a protective suit, hefted an armored canister and waddled to the soldier's remains.

Everyone stood within the effective blast radius, but nobody moved. Flint lit another cigarette.

The specialist placed the first grenade in the canister.

The guard commander barked orders in French to Abernathy. The translator replied in soft, reassuring tones. The Rottweiler growled. Guards fidgeted with their rifles.

The second grenade went into the canister.

One loud shout and all the guards aimed their rifles. The dog barked and snapped. The translator's hands went up as he said to the explosives specialist, "Get out of your suit."

Abernathy raised his hands. "We surrender. We surrender."

The other's followed.

"You too, Shit Head," Flint said, a cigarette dangling from his lip.

Wayne raised his hands, stared at the soldier's bones. He'd always battled back and found ways to win tough fights. Wayne promised himself he'd die on his feet before surrendering. But that sentiment didn't run through Abernathy.

I'm transferring out of here.

The explosives specialist stepped out of his suit, raised his hands and backed away. A pair of guards grabbed the canister and ran back to their truck.

Two rusty grenades rattle together. The specialist winced.

The translator spoke to the guard commander, said to Abernathy, "They want us to get out now."

"But I haven't completed my survey," Doc said.

Abernathy nodded to Flint, lowered his hands and drew out another cigarette.

Flint kicked the pine crate. "That's you, Shit Head."

"What are you talking about?"

"The crate. It's for him." Flint pointed to the fallen soldier with a cigarette between his fingers.

"This is too small. Where's the coffin?"

"Ask Hawk."

Wayne peered back. General Abernathy glanced between the crate and his own feet. "Do your job."

"This soldier gave his life for our country. He deserves more dignity than this," Wayne said.

The guard commander shouted at Wayne. The dog growled again, its handler cooed to it for silence.

"Hurry up," the translator said. "And watch your language. He knows the banned English words."

"God damn it," Flint said. "Who gives a shit. I've got better things to do." He lifted the crate and dropped it beside the soldier's remains.

Doc and his assistant gently rolled the skeleton to its back. Scores of insects and worms scattered from the light. The head separated from the body. His rusty helmet rolled away. They lifted most of the remains by the loose fatigues and placed them in the crate. Then set the skull gently on top and folded the legs back to fit.

The assistant rubbed dirt off the dog-tags with his thumb, said, "Ramon Escobedo." He placed them square on the soldier's skeletal chest and closed the lid.

Wayne lowered his head.

Abernathy cleared his throat, stared at Wayne as though reminding a child of manners.

This is humiliating.

Flint grabbed one end of the crate, nodded to Wayne to get the other, but Wayne hesitated. The armed guards, the General's capitulation, Flint's disregard—in that moment, everything felt wrong. Wayne froze, refused to lift a finger if it made anyone else in the jungle happy.

"What are you waiting for?" Flint said.

Wayne blinked out of his dismay. Nothing remained. No chance to honor a comrade.

The guard commander shouted again.

"If you don't hurry, they'll kick us out without our cargo," the translator said.

A fellow soldier, reduced to cargo. He lifted the back end and followed Flint toward the truck.

Guards formed an aisle. As they passed Flint blew smoke into one of the guard's faces and in that one breath, Wayne saw Flint defy the powers at hand and return a thread of dignity to the fallen soldier. Thank you. But you're still an asshole.

Flint set his side of the crate on the edge of the truck bed and climbed inside. Wayne shoved it the rest of the way. He paused, stared at another person wearing the same civilian clothes all ready aboard. Small in stature, though a pointed straw hat hid facial features. The rest of the team stepped around Wayne and piled on as though this person had always been with the team. Abernathy waved Wayne in. Wayne hopped up and took a seat as near the back as possible.

The guards mounted a second truck and both vehicles started up together. Diesel fumes clouded the canvas covered truck bed as they trundled through the jungle.

From the side, Wayne caught the faintest curve of a breast beneath the stranger's sweaty white button-up shirt. He stared out the back at the truck full of guards. How did they pick up another living person deep in the jungle? Why didn't anyone else seem to notice, or care?

Wayne spun back to the woman. "Who are you?"

The lady raised her hat and smiled. Flint grabbed her around the waist and pulled her onto his lap. They fell into heavy kissing.

"Enough," Abernathy said. Neither of them stopped. Flint ran his hand between the woman's thighs. He rubbed the outside of her pants and she let out a moan between their kiss.

"Enough," Abernathy repeated. "They can see you."

Flint and the lady parted, though their hands still ran over each other's bodies.

What the hell is going on?

They kissed among the remains of a fallen soldier and still nobody said a word.

Wayne's breath shortened, fists clinched. "Stop that now."

The lady shot him a devious grin.

"Don't be jealous," Flint said and kissed the lady's neck.

She locked eyes with Wayne, smiled and blew him a kiss.

This is insane.

*2*

August 10th, 1990. Subic Bay, Philippines.

Wayne marched across the United States Naval base for General Clayton Abernathy's office. The previous day's mission in Vietnam had bothered him all night. Every word, every interaction, countered the reverence he had for the dead and values he carried from the Army.

A breeze blew over the sea, cooled Wayne's sweaty neck and brow. His Army fatigues returned a familiar comfort, one lost to him in the clingy button-up shirt and slacks.

A cargo plane roared on take-off. He and Flint loaded the soldier's remains on a similar plane headed for Hawaii without ceremony the day before. Wayne shook his head. He didn't even get a flag for his crate.

Wayne added that to the list of complaints he prepared to dump on the General before demanding a transfer back to his old unit.

He entered the Naval administration building. A mechanically chilled breeze blew under his collar. Secretaries shuffled papers. Janitors mopped the speckled linoleum. Wayne followed a peg-letter sign directing him along the hall to the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command's Philippines Liaison Office.

Nobody paid attention, no questions, no sideways glances, not even a sign-in sheet protected the office personnel.

The dog-handler and his Rottweiler stepped out of an office at the far end of the hall.

A corporal stopped and talked to him, then squatted and scratched the dog's chest. The dog wagged its bobbed tail and licked his face. The corporal was the only other soldier, beside himself, Wayne had seen in a proper uniform. At least someone follows the dress code.

Wayne ignored them and knocked on the General's door.

At a muffled response he entered. Golden razors of sunlight sliced through horizontal blinds and solidified in a thick smoky haze. Abernathy sat behind a beige sheet-metal desk, a left-over from the 1950s. Stacks of filing cabinets lined one wall. The others, bare tan, no photos, no awards, or flags. In front of the desk, seated at an angle to meet company, the woman from the truck in Vietnam.

Why is she here?

Wayne saluted Abernathy.

The General waved a hand without standing and motioned to an empty chair. "Sergeant Sneeden, meet my secretary, Lady Jaye."

Wayne glanced at her as he sat. Lady Jaye stared into his eyes with the same grin she wore the day before. Her scene with Flint repulsed him, yet her attention, her smile, called to him.

"I have another mission for you," Abernathy said.

Wayne refocused on the General. "Sir, before you begin, I'm here to formally request an expedited transfer back to my old unit."

"I'm sorry to hear that. I really want you on the team. Fill out the paperwork and I'll fax it to Washington. You should have an answer in a few weeks. Until then, I have another mission for you."

"No, I want out now. Nobody here takes anything seriously."

Abernathy's expression drew cross. "I can call the MPs and have you arrested for dereliction. Is that serious enough for you?"

"You're threatening me?"

"I said I want you on the team. The choice is yours."

Any disciplinary measure would delay the transfer process. Jail would get him out of Abernathy's mission, but he'd lose trust and never lead a unit again. Wayne hung his head and said, "You've found the remains of another American soldier, sir?"

Abernathy handed Wayne a file folder entitled, Snake Eyes. Wayne opened the cover, scanned the first page and a photo of a handsome officer paper clipped to the side. The dossier outlined the career of a fierce and idealistic captain named Calvin Copar. He had volunteered for five tours of duty during the Vietnam War and served with distinction. During the siege of Firebase Yankee, Copar defied an order from then Major Clayton Abernathy to stand his ground and instead led a ten man unit against a flanking maneuver. Thereafter, Major Clayton Abernathy accused Copar of dereliction, but Copar went missing and was presumed dead.

"Copar said the NVA's 66th Battalion was coming from the west," Abernathy said. "My intelligence claimed the 66th was coming from the north and when the lieutenant in command radioed that mortars were crossing the line, I believed it. Instead the 66th pushed in from Cambodia, while only a diversionary force attacked from the north. The Firebase was eventually overrun. I never heard from him again."

The General opened a drawer, pulled out a cigarette. Lady Jaye leaned over the desk and flicked a lighter all ready at hand. "Thank you, Alison."

She lit her own cigarette, blew a slow, lazy breath toward Wayne. "Care for a smoke?" Her words sounded husky, yet feminine.

"No, thank you."

Lady Jaye stared at Wayne, sucked a long drag on her cigarette. Her lips puckered, almost as if to kiss.

Back to the dossier. Wayne flipped through, but didn't read much detail. Lady Jaye's signals played in his mind. I must be reading her wrong.

The office air-conditioner chilled the cigarette smoke as it glowed in the sunlight. "Never heard from him again," the General repeated.

Wayne thumbed through a few more pages.

Another volley of smoke drifted from Lady Jaye.

General Abernathy's eyebrows sank into a scowl. "I got a call from Copar asking me to come get him. That wasn't uncommon, just propaganda, but Saigon was falling. The whole damn country was bugging' out. I evacuated with everyone else. After that I got into the DOD trying to get our POWs back." Smoke seeped out his mouth as he spoke. "The NVA had camps hidden all over the country. I finally found a place where Copar might've been held. A remote corner around the Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos boarders. I called over the radio and a strange voice answered, real high with a sibilant hiss. Whoever claimed to be Copar refused to leave the country."

Lady Jaye brushed her foot against Wayne's boot. He glanced at her. She blew more smoke with a touch of a smile.

Thin lines creased around her mouth, pulled a small dimple in her right cheek. Wayne blinked away. "More propaganda?"

"I hope so. The area is now controlled by the Cobra Cult. Very little is known about them, or their commander, though they seem to have earned some autonomy. About ten years ago an assassin, code named Storm Shadow, eliminated several strategic government officials. Since then, nobody has bothered them."

Lady Jaye stubbed out her cigarette, crossed her legs and drew the toe of her shoe up Wayne's calf. The contact was intentional, no way to misread the signal. Wayne shifted in his chair. The contact, her stair, her pouty thin lips, drew desire. She was with Flint, but he wanted her.

"Your mission is to locate the POW camp. Find out what's going on, or what happened. And if Calvin Copar is still alive."

Wayne looked over the dossier. The intelligence didn't make sense. Every document on the Cobra Cult was reported by Snake Eyes. No corroborating sources, no substantiating evidence. Just Snake Eyes and Cobra Cult.

Misinformation. Abernathy intends to clear his conscience. Maybe jail isn't a bad idea.

Lady Jaye touched the inside of his calf with a bare toe. Not unattractive, but plain, small nose, dark wide-set eyes, short brown hair. Her olive drab jacket fit tight, revealing the contour of her petite breasts.

"Lady Jaye will lead the insertion phase. She'll get you into Vietnam and through Hanoi. Once in the jungle you and the team will be on your own."

Wayne moved his leg closer. He liked her touch, yet stared at Abernathy incredulously. "American troops in Vietnam? Has Congress approved this act of war?"

Abernathy's eyebrows knitted together, his jaw clinched. "It was those dithering assholes that lost us the war in the first place." He paused, fumbled for another cigarette. Lady Jaye leaned over his desk and lit it for him. Her green pants pulled tight over her butt. She glanced back, caught Wayne looking and winked.

"No… neither Congress, nor the President, need to know about this." The cigarette glowed bright as he inhaled. "You and the team will enter the country by night."

"I'll insert you… at night," Lady Jaye said.

Wayne gazed into her eyes a moment too long. She slid her toes up his leg to his knee.

"Our translator, Duke, will be in charge," Abernathy said. "The medical assistant, Stalker, and Flint are the rest of the team. You'll ship at 0400 local time tomorrow. Any questions?"

With a cigarette between two fingers, Lady Jaye ran her pinky along the seam of her jacket, pulled back the lapel. Wayne followed the smooth line of her cleavage. She chewed the corner of her bottom lip, raised an eyebrow.

Wayne shook his head no to Abernathy.

Abernathy passed across another folder. "Complete dossiers on the others. Get some food, get some rest and get to know your teammates. You'll supply on the way. Good luck Sergeant Sneeden—Beach Head." Abernathy saluted.

Wayne stood, angled away to hide the tightness in his pants. He saluted and walked out of the office, folders in hand. Lady Jaye scared him. He followed her seduction and would've followed her further with or without the General watching.

Alison. That's a pretty name. He looked over his shoulder with a tacit hope, but Lady Jaye didn't follow.

The corporal, the one who let the dog lick his face, saluted Wayne and fell in stride. "Beach Head, right?"

Wayne cast a sideways glare, his mind still on the meeting, on Lady Jaye.

"My name's Grunt. That's not my real name, but Beach Head's not your real name either. That was a short meeting with the General. You've only been here three days and you've received your second mission? That's pretty good. He must like you. I'm still waiting for one. Where's he sending you this time? Back to Vietnam? I'm glad I missed that war, but a mission in country would be cool."

The corporal seemed too eager for someone three years into his first hitch. Most soldiers straightened out, saluted and held as still as possible until the higher rank left, but this man grinned with a little hop in his step.

"Grunt?" Wayne asked, then said before the corporal could answer, "Don't you have work to do?"

"Yes, sir. Of course, sir. It's just that we're all on the same team. A lot gets shared around here, sir."

Wayne stopped, eyed Grunt. "Classified material stays classified." Though he wasn't sure Grunt wasn't talking about Lady Jaye.

A corporal openly asking for treasonous information, the General and his mission of conscience, Lady Jaye's attention. Nothing fit. He walked in wanting a transfer and walked out with a mission. A chill shook him. The cool office air felt compromised, tainted, like the longer he stayed, the further infected he'd become. He turned for the nearest exit and stepped into the tropic sun. Heat drenched his skin, soaked the conditioned air out of his fatigues. Wayne knew how to handle hot, humid sunshine. It was dangerous, but pure.

*3*

August 11, 1990. Subic Bay, Philippines. 0310 local time.

Slender waves sloshed at sand. The cool morning air felt genuine, trustworthy. Wayne was twelve kilometers into his fifteen kilometer run. Departure in fifty minutes for Abernathy's act of war. Last chance for an honest workout.

A figure, black against the base's sodium yellow lamps, crept beneath the fence. Motion sensors, trip wires and guard dogs should've been alerted, but Wayne only heard waves. He jogged ahead as if he didn't see anyone. Only a full fifteen kilometers would make him feel complete and the rest of the day proper and if Abernathy didn't care what Flint and Lady Jaye did, then why should he bother himself with an intruder?

But the day he enlisted in the Army he had sworn to bear true faith and allegiance. I have a duty to uphold.

Around the corner of the office complex, Wayne spun and watched the intruder sneak along the perimeter fence headed for the barracks. Wayne crept forward, stalked over gravel and trimmed weeds, each foot-fall padded, every rock tamped into place as his weight shifted.

The intruder wore Army fatigues. Wayne tiptoed closer, moved faster when the surface turned to asphalt.

Twenty meters.

Wayne bolted after the intruder. Arms length away, a glint caught his eye. Wayne ducked a backhand knife strike, tackled the intruder at the waist. Both fell. Wayne rolled through. He bounced to his feet and recognized Grunt. He fired one, two, three punches. Grunt blocked, dodged, thrust his knife. Wayne leaned away, took a punch to the jaw, a kick to the ribs. He blocked a stab, parried another punch and drove his elbow against Grunt's head. Grunt stumbled. Wayne followed, kicked and buckled his knee. Grunt went down, rolled to his back, jabbed with the knife. Wayne hesitated, snapped a kick at the knife hand and dropped his knee into Grunt's chest. A cough exploded. Grunt stabbed again, but Wayne caught the wrist, trapped the elbow and wrenched back. Grunt cried out, released the knife as his elbow broke backward. Wayne let up, twisted Grunt's wrist until he rolled to his stomach.

"Who are you?" Wayne yelled. "Who do you work for?"

Grunt cringed. "I'm corporal Robert Graves, serial number RA 52779623. I work for General Clayton Abernathy in the JPAC department, Philippines Liaison."

"What were you doing outside the wire?"

"I was… I was banging a hooker."

Wayne picked up the knife. A double edged dagger with a hilt molded in the shape of twin serpents.

He lifted Grunt to his feet, shoved him limping to the Military Police station. The MPs locked him down. Wayne gave his report on the fight, turned in the knife and showed the MPs where Grunt had penetrated the perimeter fence.

Four and a half minutes left. Wayne sprinted from the MP station, jumped shrubs and dashed through cordoned areas. As he skirted an office building corner, something nagged. Grunt fought to kill. His skill surpassed basic hand-to-hand combat training and his reaction didn't fit someone facing a slap on the wrist. Wayne put it out of mind. He entered his visitors barracks, snatched his combat boots and knife and hustled out.

A U.S. frigate sat moored to the dock. Battleship gray, anti-aircraft missiles, anti-submarine defenses. That'll get us close. Plus good food, showers and a bunk.

"Beach Head," Wayne heard from farther down the dock. General Abernathy waved him over. Wayne glanced at the rusty fishing trawler the General stood beside, then back to the frigate with a long sigh.

"You've had a busy morning all ready," Abernathy said. "Good catch with that corporal."

"Yes, sir."

"Where's your side arm?"

"I don't have one, sir. I was told I'd be supplied en route."

"This is close enough. Have mine." Abernathy unhooked his belt, slipped the blackened leather holster off and handed it to Wayne. "Take care of it. I've had the damn thing since 'Nam."

"Thank you, sir. And about my transfer?"

"Faxed it this morning. Good luck, Sergeant."

Wayne saluted and walked the wooden gangplank.

Lady Jaye met him on deck dressed in loose cotton pants and shirt with a pointed straw hat. She spoke in Vietnamese. Two deckhands nodded, drew the gangplank aboard and untied the boat.

"This way," she said to Wayne.

Wayne headed below deck. A foul stink of rancid fish, rotten vegetables and diesel fumes billowed in the dank hold. A single exposed light bulb dangled from a cord and cast shifting shadows as the boat bobbed. Flint, Duke and Stalker eyed Wayne. All were dressed in light cotton clothes, pointed straw hats and combat boots. And each man held a grim aura.

"About time, Shit Head," Flint said.

Engines revved up. Motion, slow and steady, rocked Wayne on his heals. He dropped onto a bench seat beside Duke. The hold, about two and a half meters wide and five long, was filled with sacks of rice, crates of vegetables and wicker baskets of fish.

Lady Jaye handed Wayne a bundle of clothes. "Put these on." She sat on a burlap sack to Flint's left. No kissy-face this time.

Stalker passed around cigarettes.

Wayne turned away, peeled off his sweat pants and shirt, bared his back and legs, taught and glistening after the fight. She's watching. I can feel her eyes. He donned a cream colored coolie outfit, sat on the bench and glanced at Lady Jaye. She made no eye contact, no flirty smirk, none of the attention Wayne anticipated.

He stared at the door. She's modest in front of Flint?

Stalker's dossier said he had graduated Ranger School at the top of his class. Then he went on to study field medicine. He had come from the old doctrine of military diplomacy, where a day spent in a stone-age village administering antibiotics to children was supposed to earn a lifetime's loyalty from parents who couldn't read, let alone believed in microscopic organisms.

Duke pulled a lighter from his breast pocket, handed it around. Everyone, but Wayne, blew smoke into the cramped hold.

Grenada was Stalker's first mission. He went in with the 75th Rangers on a low altitude airborne assault, engaged in heavy fighting, was credited with two kills, treated and evacuated wounded, took shrapnel from a mortar to the leg, shoulder and neck and stood out during the capture of Point Salinas Airport. He was accepted into Officer Candidate School where he performed adequately. Stalker was being groomed to lead the United States Army past the Vietnam era depression. And then he was transferred to Abernathy. No disciplinary actions, no marks on his service record, no reason for the transfer.

Flint kept Duke's lighter. Wayne sensed a frosty relationship between Flint and Duke. They talked, but didn't chat. Avoided eye contact unless necessary. Flint was petulant while Duke showed patience. They seemed like two sides of the same coin, equal in value, yet opposite in a wager.

"Give my lighter back."

Flint scoffed, threw it at Duke.

Duke, the champion of Abernathy's quest, had turned down a commissioned officers post twice. He instructed at four different special forces schools including Ranger School where he had trained Stalker. Fluent in seven languages, among them Vietnamese, Hmong, Mandarin and Canton Chinese. Large portions of his file were redacted for all but the most senior officers to speculate about. The list of languages, the advanced training, Wayne suspected he'd been recruited for spy work, but something in the redacted black ended his career and he wound up chasing Abernathy's ghosts.

Lady Jaye stared at Wayne. A smoky cloud seeped between her lips, softened her sharp angles by the incandescent light. "Guess who has Clay's forty-five?" she asked everyone, though never broke eye contact with Wayne.

"So Shit Head's got the General's gun."

Wayne nodded, held up the leather holster with U.S. branded on the flap. He pulled out a heavily worn Colt M-1911 A1 service automatic with a snake's head etched into the slide. A hint of fresh gun oil brought memories of training camps and important missions.

Lady Jaye, covert operations, counter intelligence, polyglot, drama major at Bryn Mawr, Airborne and Ranger qualified and Abernathy's personal secretary. Not the résumé Wayne expected from his first two encounters. Tough, smart and manipulative. She'd gathered intelligence across Europe and brought a half dozen KGB defectors to western agencies. Wayne held her stare. She, like Duke and Stalker, could've gone anywhere and done anything, yet she followed Abernathy.

"You know about that gun, right?" Stalker asked as he dropped the cigarette butt on the deck, crushing it beneath his boot.

"Forty-five caliber, seven round mag. This serial number puts its manufacture somewhere in the early '70s," Wayne said. "No, I don't know anything about it."

Duke scoffed.

"It's killed six people since Abernathy found it. All of them U.S. soldiers. Five by apparent suicide."

Wayne closed the holster, set it at his side.

"He probably hopes you'll kill Flint with it," Duke said. Stalker and Lady Jaye both chuckled.

"Give me the gun," Flint said, "so I can put Duke's suicide on it, too."

The warrant officer. Flint had served three years in Vietnam flying Hueys in and out of the bush. He'd been shot down four times, taken prisoner twice and escaped. He found Firebase Yankee and flew cover fire during the siege. After his chopper was grounded by flack, he picked up a dead man's rifle and fought with the infantry until they were overrun. His record differed from the others. While their careers had been derailed by General Abernathy, Flint had no place else to go. Multiple disciplinary issues, alcohol, drug use, philandering with locals. One prostitute was found dead after he'd visited. He'd been acquitted on a friendly fire investigation, though with prejudice. After the war he showed an increasingly disrespectful attitude toward senior officers who hadn't fought. And when junior personnel moved passed him in rank, he became aggressively outspoken. Abernathy advocated for Flint at a courts martial hearing for illegally discharging a firearm outside an Army base in Okinawa. Abernathy he'd struck a deal with the Judge Advocate General and kept Flint out of the detention barracks at Fort Leavenworth.

That's why Abernathy puts up with Flint. He feels guilty about Firebase Yankee.

"You got first watch," Duke said to Stalker. He stubbed out his cigarette, tipped his straw hat forward and tried to sleep whether he needed it or not.

Flint followed suit.

Nothing in any of their backgrounds qualified them to investigate missing persons. But then, nothing of Wayne's background qualified him either. He'd spent two years advising indigenous forces in South America, he'd fought alongside guerrilla elements where his efforts and training paid off. His missions in South America met or surpassed expectations. Basic training, Ranger training, nothing he could recall required this punishment. And then he realized. Abernathy's building a private army.

*4*

Wayne unbuttoned his shirt, but couldn't cool down. He'd been trapped sixteen hours in a cargo hold with five warm bodies, burning cigarettes and droning diesel engines. Vegetables melted into runny brown puddles, blood and bile leaked from fish baskets. He glanced at the door as though it might open any second.

Another cloud of smoke. Lady Jaye's coy smile returned as Flint drifted to sleep.

I've got to get out of here. Wayne jumped to the door and twisted the handle.

"Wait," Lady Jaye said. "We're in contested waters."

Wayne held still.

"There're Chinese and Vietnamese navies hunting for contraband to blame on each other."

Her expression remained serious. Cool fresh air would flood in with a single push of the door, but Wayne studied her. What does she have to gain by staying down here? Hot, putrid, uncomfortable. Whatever she feared outside was worse than the conditions inside.

Wayne turned the handle back and took his seat.

Stalker and Duke curled up on their benches, their eyes closed, though only half asleep.

Lady Jaye stared at Wayne, fussed with Flint's shirt pockets, lit cigarettes, then stub them out only to light them again.

Wayne's glare shifted between her and the door. Lady Jaye's eye contact and grin, the way she tilted her head and the way she drew on her cigarettes rekindled his attraction. But he needed fresh air.

"So you wanted to be Night Ranger, huh?" Lady Jaye asked. "Sounds like a super hero name. Is that how you see yourself?"

She opened two more shirt buttons, exposed the middle of her sweaty chest.

"You and Abernathy discuss more than missions?"

She waved her hand dismissively. "Hawk and I talk about everything."

"Nobody's told me anything about you."

Duke hacked a sardonic laugh. "All you need to know is double up the rubbers."

A scowl flashed, then Lady Jaye's well trained smile returned. "He catches a disease, then blames every woman in the world."

"Seriously. Lady Jane Fonda, here, has banged every NVA regular up and down the Mekong."

Flint flew off the rice sacks, threw a left hook and cracked Duke across the jaw. Duke put up his guard, drew in his feet and kicked out, missed. Flint hammered his cheek. Duke's hands stayed up, but wobbled.

Wayne pushed Flint. Stalker pushed him back. Flint punched at Wayne. Wayne parried, fired a straight right fist to Flint's mouth. Flint lunged again. Wayne side-stepped, slipped his arm around Flint's neck and cinched a head-lock.

Flint gasped, struggled to get his feet beneath him, but Wayne held him off the deck by his throat.

"You take a run at me like that again and I'll drop you. Now go sit on your rice." Wayne stood Flint up, released his choke.

Flint breathed, massaged his neck. His red face lightened as blood flowed. He sneered at Wayne, but took his seat as ordered.

"And you," Wayne said to Duke. "Never talk about a woman like that again."

"I'm in charge," Duke said, his face puffy, blood leaking from his nose. "I give the—"

"One more word about Lady Jaye and I'll finish what Flint started." Wayne turned to Stalker. "What the hell? You're second in command and you just let them fight?"

"They fight all the time," Stalker said. "It's a good show."

"I don't know why I was transferred to you losers, but I won't sit by and take orders from anyone if you're going to fight between yourselves."

Wayne slumped onto the bench, snarling at everyone. Lady Jaye donned the cryptic grin. Her fingers slid along the unbuttoned seam of her shirt. Wayne kept his eyes on her face and shook his head no. Lady Jaye slowly pulled her shirt closed.

*5*

Damn, I don't want this thing. Wayne touched the Colt M-1911 A1 tucked in his waistband. He never believed in luck when he could train harder and never believed guns killed people, but this gun was dangerous. There was history on it, bad history. Suicides and fratricides.

Old soldiers, like Abernathy, hung onto their service pistols as proof that they'd been there, that they'd survived bitter hell. So why'd he give it to me?

The engines wound down and reversed. The boat rolled forward, overtaken by its own wake. A knock at the port side. Then another.

"Get your gear," Lady Jaye said. She licked her fingers, reached and twisted the bulb until the light went out.

The engines shut off. Wayne heard footsteps scurry over wooden planking. A few commands and replies sounded outside, but no one opened the hold.

The rancid fish turned Wayne's stomach, sweat broke across his face and neck. He mopped his forehead, angled his mouth and nose searching for a pocket of air, but only breathed fish and vegetable stench.

Stalker asked in a whisper, "When are they going to let us out?"

"When it's clear," Lady Jaye said.

Wayne's heart pounded. He opened the rest of his shirt buttons. The heat pressed against him, constricted his chest. He turned right, left, searching for a ray of light, but all he saw was black. Blackness closing in, suffocating him in poison and heat.

The boat tipped up, sank into a trough. Wayne vomited. Thick splatters sounded in the dark. A bad odor rose over the rancid fish.

Everyone groaned.

Another small wave slapped the gunwale and another heave purged. He leaned against the wall, hung his head and gasped.

Wayne had been seasick once on a whale watching trip in the seventh grade. His mother patted his back and told him everything was okay. But stuck in the hold with no escape, no air and no one to pat his back, his thoughts turned to the gun.

To curing the seasickness, the uncertainty.

That's crazy. Wayne stood straight, legs rolling with the boat. Injuries, illnesses, years spent away from his family and he'd never once considered suicide. He was tougher than that, always prided himself on his ability to endure. When the narcos brought heavy machine guns, Wayne charged. When his enemies sent assassins, he fought back. And when he faced a child with a bomb, he ripped the guts out of the bomb.

I've never given up on anything. But the rumors crept into his mind, gave him an easy way out that plenty of people had taken before. Wayne bit his lip, shook his head in the dark. This gun's reputation won't infect me.

A deckhand opened the door.

Fresh air slid into the hold. Wayne breathed deep. He marched up the companionway and onto the main deck. Still humid, still warm for nighttime, but cool against his skin. Stars twinkled overhead. A handful of lanterns and a few electric lights shimmered on the harbor.

Lady Jaye led the way. Twenty meters along the quay to the beach. Waves slurped and spewed over sand. Ten meters from shore. The gentle sound invited Wayne. He squatted, gripped the edge of the quay and lowered himself silently into the ocean. Cool water soaked through his clothes, poured into his boots. He let go, sank a half meter below the surface, felt the stale air and toxic atmosphere wash away.

Wayne kicked through the water. He blew bubbles, paddled a few strokes, listened to the sea. He sank to the bottom, walked the rest of the way through the surf and up the beach.

"What the hell are you splashing in the water for?" Flint said. "This is serious. We've got a job to do."

"You all stink like rotten fish. Everyone in this country will smell you a kilometer away. Go take a bath before we move out."

Duke and Stalker looked at Lady Jaye. Flint stared at Wayne.

"He's right," Lady Jaye said.

"I don't want to start a mission wet and sandy," Stalker said as he and Duke made for the sea. Lady Jaye followed.

Wayne met Flint's cold stare. "You up for round two all ready?"

Flint remained silent.

"Get in the water."

*6*

The black-blue sky softened with the rising sun. Wayne, Lady Jaye, Flint, Stalker and Duke sat on a wooden truck bed surrounded by baskets of vegetables. Small motorcycles buzzed, loud voices shouted, scents of grilling meats drifted and Wayne's mouth watered.

"When do we get rifles?" Flint asked.

"No rifles," Lady Jaye said. "We're here to investigate, not start another war."

"You've got your mission and I've got mine," Flint said.

Wayne tipped the straw hat down. He heard in Flint's voice true pleasure at the thought of war in Vietnam. His dossier made sense. Flint loved the war. He loved the stakes. He wanted to kill until he died, but the post-war years denied him the chance.

Flint stabbed a vegetable basket and pulled out a hand full of bok choy. "I don't know how these people live on this shit." He bit a mouthful of green leaves, tossed the white bulbs aside and pulled another handful. He had no regard for anyone else. Flint needed direction. Without it he drifted, acted on impulse, drowned in his own guilt and depression. Abernathy gave him that direction.

Abernathy should've given Flint the gun.

Humidity increased and the air sweated. Palm trees mixed with cement high-rise apartment blocks until the jungle canopy closed in. We're through Hanoi.

Five hours crouched behind baskets while white bok choy bulbs rolled around, Flint's expression drew angry. So did Duke's and Stalker's. Maybe they understood the dangerous part of the mission approached. Maybe they got tired of sitting on bok choy bulbs. Then Wayne caught Duke flicking his fingers. They only wanted cigarettes.

Three more hours of potholes passed before their truck stopped. Duke, Stalker and Flint hopped out beneath a stand of trees with strangler figs hanging from the branches.

"It's your stop, too," Lady Jaye said to Wayne.

"What about you?"

"Mine is down the road." She blew Wayne another kiss as he jumped off.

Goodbye Alison.

Wayne joined the others. The truck drove away, its roar lost to the foliage. The silence, the stillness, his senses settled into a moment of calm. Muted footsteps, distant cicada chirps, the beat of his own heart.

Stalker took point. He marched through the jungle, eyes trained to the farthest distances.

Duke kept to his compass, knew roughly which direction to head. Wayne spotted subtle glances and quick nods between Duke and Stalker. Duke had some experience in South Asian jungles, Stalker, South American, but they came together and used what they knew to handle the mission.

Flint wore a grin beneath his graying stubble. The jungle was his home. The place he'd grown up, the place he'd learned to survive. While Stalker led them through the jungle, Flint lived in it. He took his own path, slid between banana leaves and wove through fig vines. Wayne watched this man with an utter disregard for humans gently pluck a ripe a mango and carry it within the folds of his shirt.

The musty air, the familiar heat, marching with other soldiers—Wayne had all the pieces of a real mission, but nothing fit. The entire plan revolved around Abernathy's mistake some twenty years earlier. No clear objective, no significant weapons. As soon as my transfer comes through, I'm on the first plane out.

Stalker stopped in a small clearing on a hilltop. "We'll camp here for the night."

He gave Duke a cigarette. Duke supplied the light. Dry, blue smoke rose into the canopy. Hints of smiles returned with one breath.

Flint disappeared into the bush.

"Why don't you get a fire going," Duke said to Wayne as he and Stalker leaned against a tree.

"Because someone could notice," Wayne said.

"We're not in Colombia," Stalker said.

How is Vietnam is a better place for American soldiers?

Hardly a stick in the jungle took a flame, but Wynne got a small camp fire lit between knee high roots of a sixty meter parashorea tree.

"Flint's gonna be pissed," Duke said.

"What the hell is wrong now?" Wayne said. Duke and Stalker wore sardonic smiles.

"Why'd you build it beside the tree?" Stalker asked.

"To diffuse the smoke and hide our location."

Stalker and Duke shook their heads and returned to their conversation, but kept their talk low until they had something to laugh about. Then their voices boomed.

Both men were brilliant, highly skilled, highly motivated, yet behaved like children. Wayne recalled their files, searched for a common thread, something to explain how they ended up with Abernathy. Unless they had character flaws, something that excluded them from the general services. That would explain the closed conversations, but that didn't hold up against the rest of their backgrounds. Both lived for army life. So did Flint and Lady Jaye.

Flint rounded the tree. "What the hell did you build your fire there for? You didn't leave me any room to cook." He flung a dead monkey at Wayne and dropped a big bunch of bananas at Duke and Stalker's feet.

Duke peeled a banana. "He built it there to hide from the narcos."

Flint scowled at Wayne. "This isn't South America. We're not at war here. Nobody gives a shit about a camp fire in the jungle anymore."

Not at war. The words were true, though they made no sense. The clandestine boat ride, hiding on the truck, creeping though the jungle. It all pointed to war, but Flint was right. The Vietnam War had ended. All the troops had come out of the jungles and settled into policing the state. Alone in the bush, Wayne was hidden by peace. No scouts on the prowl, no narcos moving cocaine. Just jungle.

"Get to cooking, monkey," Flint said and sliced a wedge from his mango.

*7*

August 14th, 1990. Vietnam.

Waist high in jungle growth, a branch whipped back and slapped Wayne across his face.

Flint chuckled. "Hey, Shit Head, watch out for swinging branches."

Wayne gripped the forty-five…. No.

He broke off a tree branch as wide as his thumb and shaved off the smaller twigs and leaves. Two meters long, stiff, yet flexible, Wayne made a nimble walking stick.

Duke chatted with Stalker, but it was the same conversation. Stalker considered some Ranger School wash-out a waste of biological material because he retired and returned to his family instead of slogging through another course. Then a pattern formed. Wayne recalled the conversations he'd overheard. None of them included non-military personnel. No family, no relationships, no civilians of any kind. They'd all served for years, decades even, without applying for rest and relaxation. They'd lost contact with the outside world. They made themselves expendable.

Wayne hadn't spoken to his mother in five years, hadn't written to her in four and hadn't thought of her for two years until he wished for her soothing hand while sea sick.

That's what Abernathy wants. Soldiers that won't be missed. That's why I'm here.

Another tree branch slapped Wayne across the face. His head swirled, sound faded.

"Watch out for branches," Flint said.

Wayne shook his head and rubbed his cheek. Enough. He raised his walking stick and clubbed Flint on the shoulder. Flint cried out, went down to a knee. Wayne swung his stick around Flint's throat and pulled.

Flint's face turned red, spit ran down his chin.

Wayne growled into his ear, "Why aren't you laughing? This is funny to me, so laugh." He felt Flint's throat grind against the stick as he gulped for breath.

Duke stood frozen, eyes wide.

"Test me again and you'll die." Wayne released the stick, kicked Flint in the back. He stepped in front of Duke. "You're supposed to be in charge. Keep your troops in line."

Wayne heard scuffling and rasped threats, but Flint didn't retaliate. Now he knows there's consequences.

Nobody spoke until Stalker found another clearing for the night. Even then, familiar routine stifled any small need to speak. Wayne built a fire while Duke and Stalker smoked. Flint came back with a few mangos and flung a small cobra at Wayne.

Wayne jumped away. The snake twisted at his feet, dead, though with a nervous coil. "Cut the head off next time."

"I was hoping it would give you a little kiss." Flint bit his mango.

He needs another beating. But a feeling deep inside doubted more pain or violence could change Flint. He'll take every beating and still be the same asshole.

Wayne gutted and skinned the serpent, wrapped it around his walking stick and held it over the fire.

Quiet chewing, firewood crackling, occasional scrapes from a lighter followed by tormented exhales. Wayne stirred the fire, covered the coals with dirt. In the dark among cobras, tigers and elephants, only Flint drew a shade of fear.

Wayne had the first watch, then Stalker, then Duke and finally Flint. He pulled his gun as the others settled in.

Orange spatters glowed beneath dirt, drew Wayne's attention into the slowly cooling coals. All the years cultivating his career had set him up for a dead-end assignment in a dead-end unit with dead-end losers.

And Abernathy—building a private army from active duty servicemen, sending people to hostile countries to gather rumors. This was a mission for the CIA, but no government agency would follow a washed-up general's personal quest. Abernathy took a post with no oversight then dragged me along.

Wayne stared into the wall of flat black jungle. A cleft in the canopy opened to a faint blue and violet swath spangled in stars. The Milky Way brought a gloss to the surrounding flat. A shooting star streaked the sky.

Lady Jaye—the acting star. Her liberal arts background didn't correspond with her military career. There was something more, something hidden in her behavior. She wasn't a classic beauty, she could easily pass for male, but her forthrightness provoked strong emotions. Duke held a low opinion of her. But why? The scene in the truck infuriated Wayne, but Duke's contempt seemed deeper. Was he attracted to her? Was he jealous of Flint? Wayne stared at the Milky Way. I'm jealous, too.

The pieces came together.

Lady Jaye owned Duke's emotions. She had planted the triggers to his lust and disgust years earlier. She could manipulate him by either means and he didn't have a clue. The dead comrade, the hostile soldiers, the overt display. Her scene with Flint in the truck was designed. Lady Jaye used a stressful situation to reinforce control over Duke, over everyone. Everybody was uncomfortable, yet somehow wanting.

But her scene was meant for me.

Wayne had intended to complain, to refuse the mission and transfer back to his old unit, but Lady Jaye's sultry stare, slight grin, her toes touching his leg, distracted him and he wound up in Vietnam instead. "Fuck," Wayne said under his breath to the stars. "She's good."

*8*

"Rise and shine, Shit Head."

Wayne snapped awake. He tensed for another fight, but Flint had his hands raised above his head. Duke and Stalker did, too.

Men with Kalashnikov rifles surrounded Wayne and his team. Each dressed in combat fatigues with a snake's head symbol on their chests and black masks covering their faces.

The Cobra Cult? How did they find us?

"Stay calm," Duke said.

Wayne had listened all night for Flint's attack and still didn't hear anyone sneak into their camp.

One of the Cobra men spoke. Duke translated, "Everyone stand. No sudden movements."

Wayne, Stalker, Flint and Duke formed a single file. Another Cobra man frisked them, took their rucksacks, their knives, Wayne's stick and pistol. He commanded and Duke said, "Follow me. Stay in line."

Wayne stole quick glances at the dozen masked Cobra men. Their hair was short, not bald, but clean. No gray either. None of them were over thirty. They were babies during the war. Raised on tragedy and propaganda. They'll be eager to shoot.

But they offered water.

Flint offered them cigarettes. Several accepted, raised the masks to their noses as they smoked. Duke and Stalker lit up.

They hiked all day in near silence. Duke spoke once in a while to the captors, but didn't translate.

One of countless hills flattened and a clearing opened at the top. Wayne stretched his view over the unbroken jungle, a sea of trees rolling across the horizon. He hadn't seen farther than ten meters for the last week. The world had closed in on him, first in the boat, then the truck, then the jungle. He'd focused on himself, how he'd fit within the unit and when he'd transfer out, but the view freed his mind. This was never a mission to find the POW camp.

English words sounded.

Watch out for what? A branch snapped back and slapped his face.

Flint and a few of the Cobra men laughed.

Wayne's shoulders braced. A plan formed. Elbow to the face. Grab the nearest Kalashnikov. Mow everyone down.

It wouldn't happen.

Wayne massaged the sting. If I had my stick, Flint wouldn't be laughing. But then, Flint knew Wayne couldn't react. Flint used the Cobra men to check his anger. He manipulated their captivity to his advantage the way Lady Jaye manipulated lust and disgust to hers. But she has a purpose. He's just bored.

They marched into the night. No rest, no fires, just a ball of sticky rice and a sip of water every few hours.

Clouds flattened the glossy sky. Thunder rumbled in the distance. Closer than the horizon, but still far away. Rain poured, drowned the thunder's roar. The crunch and crackle of twigs and leaves became the slop and suction of mud. Wayne's shirt and loose pants clung to his skin.

Bright flash. Instant thunder. The rain stopped.

The mud didn't.

Hour over hour they hiked. Clouds obscured the starry sky, the jungle absorbed motion. Wayne lost track of time. Mud noises, struggles to move, the occasional shove from behind, those became moments to measure the night.

Daylight broke and they marched. Sunlight diffused in the morning mist to a golden glow. Water droplets, dangling on leaf tips and spider webs, gathered light into glimmering points that coruscated throughout the bright fog.

Wayne breathed the golden air, felt the beauty of a single place in time. Then a rifle buttstock shoved him forward.

By mid-day the golden fog had turned to steam. Mud caked Wayne's pants. Sweat streamed over his face, stung his eyes.

They marched toward a brook full of bacteria and leaches, though its shallows invited Wayne to rinse the mud and sweat and start fresh.

"Ask these guys if we can jump in the water real fast," Wayne said. One of the Cobra men jabbed him with a rifle. Duke didn't ask and the kilometers continued along the brook's bank.

Duke offered no leadership, Flint ran out of distractions and Stalker marched as though he still held the point position.

Abernathy was a Major during the Vietnam War. He commanded thousands of soldiers, lost a lot of men, but not too many to bar promotion. The captain, Calvin Copar, meant something to Abernathy. Something he was willing to lose more soldiers to discover. But what?

Copar's last known position had been investigated. Remains had been found and returned, though not all of the soldiers lost that day had been accounted for. Calvin Copar was declared killed in action, but no conclusive evidence had been recovered. His name never appeared on the Memorial Wall, or official lists of Prisoners of War.

Abernathy said Copar was right about the attack on Firebase Yankee. Then how was he promoted to general? Sounds faded, his teammates, the Cobra men, even the jungle vanished as he thought, Copar knows the truth. That's why Abernathy wants to know if he's still alive. Because Calvin Copar can ruin Clayton Abernathy.

Wayne stepped on a crumpled cigarette package. Flint had given his last cigarette to a Cobra man.

The Cobra Cult's Commander sounded like every jungle warlord Wayne had ever met. Learn the local animal-ancestor beliefs, reenact a primitive legend and soon villagers offer their children to a pedophile for the grace of a god. Give a dozen teenage boys some old, rusty guns, let them fuck with impunity and the pedophile creates an army of god to protect himself. Wayne loved to see, hear, smell a warlord's fear when he and his Rangers would enter a village, exposed the charlatan and let disillusioned villagers mete justice.

Wayne shoved to the left. A Cobra man blocked his path, pointed to the others. The column had turned. They crossed the brook on a bamboo bridge. Wayne sighed.

The crunch and pad and slop of footsteps changed. People shouted commands. Wayne pushed through a thicket, stepped onto a dirt road. The Cobra men stood in front of an old work truck.

His voice hoarse, Duke said, "Here's our ride."

The English words comforted Wayne, though they came from a person at the brink of death.

Cobra men circled them, guns pointed. One demanded Wayne's wrists, tied them together and moved to Flint, Duke and Stalker.

Wayne stepped onto the truck and leaned against the sidewall. His shoulders slumped, head tilted back.

The truck lurched, backfired, then drove away.

Humiliation, torture and death waited at the end of the road, but some rest, the engine roar, the gently rocking truck bed—Wayne closed his eyes.

A nap.

Five minutes, no more.

Damn. Wayne woke to the same teammates, the same truck, the same guns pointed at him. He glanced around. The long march had worn down his captors, too. He saw an opportunity. Snatch a Kalashnikov, take out two to the left. Blast the man in the far corner. But the men in the rear corner will get me.

He needed Stalker to distract the men in the corner. Wayne tapped his foot against the floorboard, signaled attack in Morse code, but nobody replied. His teammates had been trained to escape and evade, yet they sat, barely bound, hardly outnumbered, ignoring their chance.

"Come on," Wayne said.

Duke shook his head, no.

Wayne wasn't getting out.

Getting out. He thought of his mother. She didn't want him to join the army, she said a stable job as a machinist suited him better. She'd cringe at promotions and always asked when he expected to get out. Wayne didn't want to worry her. He'd lie about reenlistments, or deployments, about the dangers he'd faced and the horrors he'd seen. How he dealt with people who hated the world, people who did anything to anyone for greed, or entertainment—people without morals or consciences. He'd lie about meeting these people face to face, at their levels, and killing them.

But he also watched CIA comrades arm resistance forces whose moral compasses suddenly pointed south the moment they opened crates of weapons. Supposed allies pillaging villages, raping and murdering to teach lessons. The CIA claimed victory with territory gains, but Wayne saw brutalized people being tortured for their helplessness by both sides.

How could he tell his mother about that? Wayne left his last twelve letters from home unopened on a night stand in Colombia. Her worried words grated his sense of duty. Once he'd let her go, his choices became easier. Wayne loved his mother, but she weakened him, made him feel fallible, guilty… human.

Some little part, one that had always been there, yet hidden, revealed itself. After the worry he caused his mother he hoped to end his captivity lost in the jungle with an exit wound for a face.

The jungle faded from flat black to crisp blue-gray in the morning light. Chatter rose, masked expressions turned grimmer. They drove past a bamboo guard house. The Cobra Cult's reeducation camp. And somebody's boss is watching.

More engine noises echoed from distant sources. Huts and machine guns and soldiers drew into view. A strange vehicle, like a tank, rolled by, but Wayne had never seen the design. An elongated drivers section that overhung steeply angled tracks, a pair of medium sized cannons on top and a bright red blaze of a cobra's head stenciled on the side. Rear doors opened and more troops jumped out.

The truck stopped. The Cobra men grabbed Wayne, slung him out of the truck. He landed in red clay mud. Duke, Flint and Stalker were pulled out, too. Other soldiers shoved him along with their gun barrels.

At the center of the camp a five-tiered step pyramid, built of reinforced concrete, rose from the clay. Trees grew on lower levels with anti-aircraft guns posted at the corners. That's the Cobra Cult's temple?

The entire camp was far more organized than Wayne had ever seen, even better than the most powerful Colombian drug lords. Tanks crept in and out of the jungle, divisions of troops drilled, small helicopters and scores of strange fixed wing aircraft, resembling American A-10 Thunderbolts, sat on an improvised runway.

Wayne stumbled into a tiger cage prison complex. He heard a person hum as he and the others passed an isolated cell with a plate-steel door. A human stink reached Wayne and he understood no bullet would be coming for him soon. Cobra men shoved Wayne, Duke, Stalker and Flint into a communal pen, locked their hands and ankles in manacles and chained them to cleats on the sticky floor.

Whip-slap.

A masked guard, big and muscular, his shirtless chest the tone of a sun-baked Caucasian, stood over Wayne slapping the side of his leg with a bamboo cane. Wayne gazed up, met dark, smiling eyes. He saw no compassion, no apologies, just joy in authority.

Whip-slap. The guard struck Wayne across his back with the cane.

Wayne bit his lip to suppress the cry.

Whip-slap.

Another stifled scream. Wayne exhaled, inhaled and tensed his body.

Whip-slap.

A low growl escaped. He closed his eyes, inhaled.

Whip-slap.

Wayne coughed, gasped for air.

Whip-slap.

Wayne collapsed. The agony, too much to bear. Before he could catch a breath—

Whip-slap.

He screamed, glanced to his compatriots. Stalker stared at the floor. Duke held eye contact. Flint sat hunched over grinning at Wayne.

Whip-slap.

*9*

Blood and urine scents mixed in the cool morning air. A delicate blue light floated into the silent tiger cages. Wayne raised his head. Pain flamed over his back. Meaty flaps opened and closed as he breathed. His coolie shirt hung in tatters.

Flint got his. So did Duke and Stalker. Their screams still echoed in Wayne's head. They'd all been broken, though the masked guard never asked questions.

Keys jingled. A lock clicked. Wayne put his head down. The door opened with a metallic squeal. Wayne's lip trembled as stiff boots paced closer with a hard tap-tap in each heal and toe strike.

Please don't come to me first. Wayne had never shirked a duty, he'd never let another soldier take his punishment, but split open and exhausted, the primitive plea slipped.

The boots stopped in front of Wayne, black patent leather, spit shined, knee high.

Please, not me. Wayne looked up. A tall man stood in a clean dark blue uniform with glittering brass buttons. He wore a blue hood over his head and face with cut-out holes for him to see through. And on his chest the same red cobra blaze.

"Are you the… the Cobra Cult's commander?" Wayne asked.

The hooded man drew a gun. Wayne glimpsed the snake's head etching on the side. I'll be the seventh soldier it kills.

"I am Cobra Commander."

Wayne heard a mid-western American accent in a high, raspy tone. This time, though, the English words terrified instead of comforted. A countryman, someone Wayne had joined the army to defend, had become the charlatan god with heavy weapons.

Cobra Commander turned the gun over, touched the etching as though he recognized the design.

"A gift… from me to you," Wayne said.

Cobra Commander glared at Wayne, threw the pistol down centimeters from his hands.

Wayne eyed the weapon. I can grab it. But he wants me to so that he can kill me.

Cobra Commander reached over his shoulder. A snap and pop sounded. He stooped to Wayne's level, held out a cylindrical object, about thirty centimeters in length. A typical pistol grip and trigger, though with coiled wires and circuitry around middle and horizontal slats across the front. A ray gun?

He stood, aimed and pulled the trigger.

Pain erupted across Wayne's back as if all his flesh had suddenly ignited. Flame beneath skin. Flame from bone. He let out a hideous screech. And then it stopped.

Wayne panted for air, stunned. He stared at the pistol. Another blast of pain seared.

Then the pain lost intensity, subsided to a shell of heat across his back. Wayne collapsed flat and whimpered.

The hooded Cobra Commander stood still.

Wayne glanced at the pistol. It's so close. It's my only chance. He squirmed, wriggled his shoulders and wedged his arm as far into the manacle as possible. Grab the gun, take the pain, shoot Cobra Commander dead.

Wayne lunged, gripped the handle. His forearm exploded. Meat and blood splattered, bones cracked. He screamed, squeezed his arm near the elbow with his left hand.

Cobra Commander shoved the gun a few centimeters out of reach with his toe.

"Abernathy should've left it in the jungle." He paced away, heels and toes clicking.

Wayne clenched his teeth and squeezed, though arterial blood still seeped.

"Tear a strip off your shirt for a tourniquet," Stalker said.

I can't let go. I'll bleed to death. Shivers ran through Wayne's body. The tiger cages seemed to close in around him as his teammates receded into distant memories.

Wayne closed his eyes. I have to do this. He shrugged, bit at his shoulder, pulled his tattered shirt sideways. He bit again and again, gathered slack until part of his shirt bunched around his left arm. He leaned on his elbow, stretched his shoulders. Material tore along a seam. He held the rags in place with a knee and sat up. A large slip ripped away.

Wayne took a shaky breath. He let go. Arterial blood spurted. He grabbed one end of the rag, put it in his mouth. He reached over his bad arm and wrapped the rag around his bicep. Over and around and with each pass he pulled tighter until the spurts slowed to a dribble.

The tiger cage's lock clicked. Wayne's heart pounded. They'll kill me this time. The forty-five, just beyond reach. Heavy footsteps approached.

Whip-slap.

The bamboo cane. The big guard came back. Wayne stretched. Manacle steel dug into his left arm, but he couldn't reach the pistol.

Whip-slap.

The sound, the pain, the screams.

Wayne's breath seized. He glanced toward the door, at the gun. Panic, desperation, pain. His one salvation lay so close. He stretched once more. I need it.

Wayne pushed his right hand toward the gun. The manacle slipped over the bones, but his wrist flopped backward. He jerked sideways. His hand slumped onto the gun barrel, yet lay motionless. Grab it, damn it. Work.

Whip-slap.

He pulled back. The manacle caught on his dead hand. No escape. Unless…

Wayne rested his elbow on his knee, let the dead hand lay on the floor. He raised his left, swung down and smashed his bones. A woody crack, white hot pain. He cried a long, sustained scream. He bashed again. The bones broke in half. Wayne pulled his right hand away from his elbow, strands of flesh and marrow tore apart. The manacle slipped off.

Whip-slap.

Wayne extended his broken-off bones for the gun. He nudged the weapon closer, the splintered ends scraping cement. The gun turned sideways. He stretched again, drew it a couple centimeters. One more frantic pull. The gun moved, his fingers touched the barrel, walked the handle close.

Whip-slap.

Hammer cocked, safety off, Wayne aimed high. The big guard stepped into view. He saw the gun, the cane hung limp at his side. Wayne pulled the trigger.

Click.

Empty chamber.

The big guard relaxed. His vicious eyes smiled as he drew his cane high over head.

Wayne wailed. All his hopes, all the pain and suffering, the torture and desperation collapsed on an empty chamber.

His mother's red, teary face returned. How she cried the day he shipped out. How he cried now. His sorrow matched hers. Not for the loss of his life, but the loss of life with his mother. And in that moment, as the cane whipped through air, Wayne understood his mother's sense of loss. How many hugs had he missed? How many holidays? How many tears?

A light tap on his back and a meaty clump hit the floor. Wayne opened his eyes. The big guard lay dead, a half dozen holes in his chest.

Muted footsteps from behind. Keys jingled. Another person, dressed in all black, unlocked Flint, Duke and Stalker. Wayne peered up. The person, a man with a mask and a silenced Uzi sub-machine gun slung over his shoulder, unlocked Wayne last. "Try to relax," he said. "You're going into shock."

The manacles fell off. Wayne sat up, cradled his wounded arm to his chest.

"Stalker, take care of Beach Head. Flint, secure the far entrance," Duke said.

Flint took the bamboo cane and disappeared deeper into the tiger cage. Stalker pulled off his shirt and tore it into long even strips.

"How do we get out of here?" Duke asked.

"Your only chance is out the back."

Stalker rolled a bundle of cloth, pressed it hard against Wayne's inner arm and wrapped the tourniquet tight. He covered the raw flesh and bones, then tied Wayne's arm to his torso.

"This is going to get infected," Stalker said.

"Just stay with him," Duke said.

Wayne grabbed the forty-five as Stalker lifted him to his feet.

"That way." The man in black pointed to the far end of the tiger cage while he locked the front door.

Wayne shambled along, head hung, exhausted, but he clung to the gun. The object of protection, of hope, of betrayal.

Another person hummed out loud from an isolated cell.

"What about him?" Wayne asked.

Duke shot a quick glance at the cell, then down the hall. "We can't. We won't get another chance."

"But he's tortured."

Stalker pulled Wayne along. "It's a command decision. Let it go."

"Over here," the man in black said and waved them to a side exit.

"Who the fuck are you?" Flint asked.

"Snake Eyes." He said to Duke, "See that truck?"

"Yeah."

Snake Eyes, the name from the file. Wayne spotted the work truck parked a hundred meters out. Cobra soldiers mingled nearby, Kalashnikovs hung loose at their sides.

"Wait here until you get my signal." Snake Eyes handed Duke his Uzi and snuck out of the tiger cages. He turned the corner and walked out of view.

"What are we doing, Duke?" Flint asked.

Wayne shuddered, his legs gave out. Stalker held him up, said, "Come on buddy. We're almost out."

Frantic hums and rattling manacle chains sounded from the isolated cell. Duke glanced at the plate-steel door, then at the truck. "We'll wait for Snake Eyes."

"I don't trust this guy," Flint said.

"What other choice do you have?" Stalker asked.

"Give me the Uzi and follow me into the jungle."

The jungle. Flint's home.

"There's too many guards," Duke said. "They'll kill us long before we hit the wire."

The hums and rattles continued.

"Duke's right," Stalker said.

"Who cares? They're just going to kill us anyhow. Why deal with the torture?"

They didn't even feel the ray gun.

"I'm going out there."

"No. Stay put," Duke said.

"What are you going to do, shoot me?"

"If your insubordination threatens our lives, I won't hesitate." Duke held Flint in an icy stare, his finger on the trigger.

As though the words crawled out of his mouth, Flint replied, "Yes, sir."

An explosion rocked the base. Machine guns fired. People shouted and rushed to the fight. More explosions. Tanks rumbled, blasted their main guns while helicopters chopped into the air.

The hums inside the cell became muffled cries.

"We've got to help him," Wayne said.

A truck backed to the tiger cage's exit.

"That's the signal," Stalker said.

"But we've got to free him."

Duke stepped out of the tiger cage to the truck bed. He whipped open the canvas flap. A dozen Cobra soldiers looked back. Duke sprayed them with the silenced Uzi. He leapt inside, stole a knife and stabbed dead anyone still twitching.

Stalker pushed Wayne against the edge of the truck. Duke pulled him inside. Flint hopped in last and closed the flap.

"The other person," Wayne said.

"He's not our problem," Stalker said.

"Hold fire. Hold fire." Snake Eyes poked his head inside, looked over the dead soldiers.

"Next time find something empty," Duke said.

Snake Eyes snickered, said, "Surprise. Okay, when I knock on the cab, take out the truck behind us. On the second knock prepare to run."

Duke nodded. Snake Eyes disappeared. The truck pulled away.

Wayne slumped into the corner. We abandoned him.

He watched in a slow motion haze as the others commandeered Kalashnikovs, collected magazines and grenades, laced up boots and donned rucksacks to hold all the gear.

Stalker emptied a couple med kits at Wayne's feet. "This is going to hurt." He poked Wayne in the shoulder with a syringe. "Antibiotics and pain reliever." He cut away the old dressings until jagged bones and shredded meat hung exposed.

Wayne ground his teeth, growled against the pain.

Stalker slathered ointment over the wounds and across the bones. New bandages held everything together. He retied Wayne's arm to his torso and gave him another injection of morphine.

Who was that other person? Wayne wondered as the pain dulled.

Limp bodies jostled and swayed to the truck's rocking. A simple envy invited Wayne to lay down and no longer care, no longer suffer. But sleep was death. He fought the urge.

Flint found a pack of cigarettes. Stalker checked Wayne's pulse. Duke peeked out the back.

Cigarette smoke filled the covered truck bed.

Wayne held his pistol. Cobra Commander had said Abernathy should've left it in the jungle, but how did he know where it came from? Wayne turned the pistol sideways. The snake's head etched on the slide was an identifier, but Cobra Commander would've had to have known it's owner.

Wayne pointed the gun to his face, stared down the barrel, followed the rifling around. And then, as if a bullet shot him through the brain, it hit him. Calvin Copar is Cobra Commander!

Abernathy used the gun to identify Cobra Commander, to see if the person he'd abandon twenty years earlier had become a cult leader. But he wasn't a self-anointed vassal of a snake god with a few rusty rifles, Copar was a skilled warrior who'd raised an independent, technologically advanced army. An American who lived up to a native religion, then transformed his followers into an unpredictable regional power that neither the Cambodia nor Vietnamese armies wished to confront.

He glared at his bandaged arm, back to the gun. Abernathy set me up.

A knock sounded from the cab.

Duke held up two fingers. Flint nodded, stubbed out his cigarette on a dead soldier's chest. Wayne watched through a drug-laden veil both men take up their rifles, open the canvas flaps, aim and fire one shot simultaneously. They knew what to do and what to expect from each other without words, a fluid unit that only came from years fighting together. An undercurrent of contempt defined their personal lives, but from the single shot, Wayne saw two people paired in spirit by violence.

The column of trucks behind them stopped. Their truck rounded a bend, drove into a jungle thicket.

Another knock from the cab.

"This is our stop, boys," Duke said. Flint hopped out. Wayne rocked to his feet and slid the forty-five into his waistband. Stalker walked him over the bodies. Duke helped him off the truck.

"Faster," Flint said, peering down the sights of his Kalashnikov.

Stalker dragged Wayne into the thicket, Duke and Flint closed in behind.

"South," Flint said and took the lead. "Always south."

He's found his direction.

Stalker aided Wayne through the jungle. Duke stayed near, scanned behind for hidden threats. Flint seemed to grow in stature.

They moved fast, guided by a survivor who'd come to love the jungle through identical circumstances.

Faint explosions, distant cries. "What was that?" Stalker asked.

"Doesn't matter, just keep going," Duke said.

Gunfire. A stray bullet zipped through the leaves beside Wayne.

The morphine wore off. Pain radiated up his arm and across his chest. It tightened around his lungs, forced choppy breaths. Wayne pushed through, found his step and hiked on his own.

The jungle crept into night. Flint passed something to Duke, something to Stalker and handed Wayne a small piece of white cane.

"Eat it," Flint said. "Palm heart. You need the starch." He bit into a mango and resumed his place at the head of the line.

Flint collected food as he cut the path south and fed his guests while they visited his home. Wayne took a bite. Crisp with a nutty flavor. He's still an asshole.

The hike settled into familiar routines, but they weren't alone. Eerie explosions echoed every few hours.

Wayne shivered. Sweat drenched his face, his skin burned.

Stalker put a hand on Wayne's forehead. "Beach Head needs water, now."

"I'll find some, just keep him moving," Duke said.

"I won't stop," Wayne said. I'll never stop.

Dawn's early rays tinted the thin mist golden. Flint held up a fist, ducked below a bush. He whispered, "Village."

The four huddled together. Duke said, "Go around west. I'll meet them and try to get supplies."

"We don't have time for detours," Flint said. "We walk in, take what we want and continue south."

"I'm with Flint on this one. Beach Head's not going to make it much longer," Stalker said. "We can go in with force and get out fast."

"Do what I fucking say. This isn't a committee," Duke said. "We go in hostile and what do you think will happen when whoever is chasing us comes through here? The more enemies we make, the faster we'll get shot. Now head around this village to the west. Don't make contact with anyone. No farmers, no peasant girls, Flint. Just move."

Duke stripped off his gear, handed his Kalashnikov to Flint and entered the village.

Flint raised the rifle, aimed at Duke's back.

"Stop fucking around," Wayne said.

Flint huffed, slung the rifle over his shoulder, grabbed Duke's gear and hiked west.

Stalker pulled Wayne.

Midday, the jungle sweltered. Wayne's flesh felt clammy and cold. Shock, dehydration and exhaustion conspired with the hard march to kill him. He recalled the American soldier's skeleton, lost for eighteen years, consumed by the jungle. He walked through strangler fig vines, their tangling grasps try to pull him under and feast on his flesh until nothing more than cloth and bone remained.

"You're headed the wrong way." The words sounded harsh against the jungle silence. Stalker spun, but nobody stood where the voice came from. "Duke has a small car waiting on a road two kilometers east."

Again, nobody to account for the voice.

"Show yourself," Flint said. "Hands up and we won't shoot."

"You're all ready in my sights."

Wayne shook. All the time he'd thought they were escaping, a hunter had them where he wanted.

"Now go. Two kilometers east. Duke is waiting beneath a stand of trees."

"Sounds like a trap. Why should we trust you?" Flint said, still scanning the dark places beneath the bushes.

"Because, I'm all you've got."

Flint and Stalker spun back. Snake Eyes knocked aside Flint's Kalashnikov, held an Uzi to his throat.

Stalker took aim.

"He's on our side," Wayne said.

"Then why did he pull a gun on us?"

"Only on Flint. Flint's an asshole."

Flint shouted, "Shoot this fucker."

"He broke us out and covered our escape," Wayne said. "That proves he's on our side."

Stalker hesitated a moment, then slung his rifle over his shoulder. He propped up Wayne and said, "Flint, let's go. Two kilometers east."

"You bastards."

Red clay showed through green leaves as they approached the dirt road. Stalker stopped behind a bush near the edge, scanned both ways for traps. He flashed hand signals to Flint. Flint nodded, broke away from Snake Eyes and disappeared.

"You're overreacting," Snake Eyes said.

"We've all seen this ambush before," Stalker replied.

"Trust, but verify. Go ahead then. Get to your business, but it's still a waste of time." Snake Eyes walked through the brush and onto the road.

His voice muffled by the foliage, Duke called out, "Did you find them?"

"Yeah, they're scared."

Wayne said weakly to Stalker, "Trust him."

"Peace of mind." Stalker surveyed the jungle.

I trust him. Wayne stood, stepped forward.

"Get back."

Wayne shrugged and staggered onto the dirt road.

"Over here," Duke said.

Wayne spotted the car, saw Duke standing beside the driver's seat, Snake Eyes leaning casually against the passenger's side. Outside rifle range, out of the jungle and on a firm structure of civilization, both men relaxed.

Distant explosions rumbled.

Snake Eyes called to Stalker and Flint, "That was my last booby trap. They're getting closer."

Duke jogged to Wayne's side, took him by the good arm and walked him to the faded yellow coup. Snake Eyes opened the rear door. Wayne slid in.

Duke shouted, "Come on, all ready."

The springy seat absorbed Wayne's weight, yet laced ripping pain across his flayed back. Wayne leaned forward and the pain faded. His eyes closed.

Two, maybe a dozen slaps across his face.

"Stay with me, buddy," Stalker said. "No sleeping on the job."

Wayne raised his head, glanced at Stalker beside him, though the image was flat and hazy.

Stalker put a hand on Wayne's forehead and held a canteen to his mouth. "Gangrene's setting in."

A heavy body bounced on the seat to Wayne's left. Flint laid his Kalashnikov across Wayne's lap, pulled a pistol and jammed it against Snake Eyes's head. "Drive Duke," he said, then to Snake Eyes, "One sign of an ambush and you'll be the first to go."

The yellow coup sped forward, pressed Wayne against the seat. A fresh bolt of pain woke him up as the bright green foliage turned into an emerald blur.

*10*

"Don't fall asleep."

A sudden sting woke Wayne. His head lolled around. Squalid villages and rice paddies passed outside the car windows. He caught a faint scent of rot. Wayne closed his eyes again.

The air had cooled, humidity thinned. They drove into a crowded city. Wayne heard car horns, smelled grilling meat, saw men drinking beer, girls on scooters, mothers toting children. Home.

"You see that?" Snake Eyes said.

"Yeah," Duke said.

Wayne peered ahead. Two white cars with red and blue lights stopped in the intersection.

"Turn right. Try to get to the city outskirts and as close to the ocean as possible."

Flint aimed his pistol for Snake Eyes's head. "He told someone we're coming."

"Put… it away," Wayne said. "He's in this with us."

Duke made a hard right turn, raced past hoards of bicycles, wove between scooters and around chicken laden trucks.

"You're right," Snake Eyes said. "I told someone and now there's an evac team sitting off the coast. I've got the authentication codes memorized so take your shot."

"Our enemies are outside, Flint," Stalker said.

Enemies. We weren't at war when we started.

Duke swerved around a street vendor, tapped the brake and dove into a left turn.

Another police car stopped. The officer drew his gun.

Flint took aim, fired first. Glass shattered and the officer fell as Duke drove by.

"God damn it," Snake Eyes shouted. "I could've gotten us out of that."

Duke sped up, banked harder around corners and people.

"That's the second time. They're all ready onto us," Flint said. "We've got to get back to the jungle."

Flint wants to go home. I should go home, too.

"We've got to get to the coast. Evac is waiting for my call."

"Duke, get to the jungle. We can find cover and make a stand."

"We can't last in the jungle," Stalker said. "We don't have enough ammo."

"Follow me and we'll make it. Now turn around."

Duke drove onto a two lane highway south. The city receded to thatched huts, then farmland.

"Duke, I said get to the jungle. It's our only hope."

A deep thump pulsed from behind the coup. "Chopper on our six," Stalker said.

"Duke. We need cover."

Two army trucks blocked the highway ahead. Scores of soldiers poured out and opened fire.

"Duke!"

Duke banked left, bounded through an open field toward the faint blue horizon. Dirt flew off the tires, the coup lurched over rocks and ditches. Snake Eye shouted the authentication code into a transponder. Flint cussed. Stalker mumbled prayers.

The coup ground to a stop. Wayne lunged forward, smashed his wounded arm against the seat back. He screamed, though his agony was drowned by everyone's panic.

Flint and Stalker jumped out, shooting toward the soldiers. Duke staggered away, blood pouring from his mouth, his front teeth lost to the steering wheel. Snake Eyes stood beside Stalker. Wayne crawled out behind him.

The helicopter swooped around. A door gunner strafed the coup. Glass shattered, the radiator blew steam. Flint and Stalker aimed high and shot back.

"We've got to get to that ridge," Snake Eyes said over the gunfire.

Wayne rolled to his knees. The ridge line was six hundred meters away. I can't make it.

"Stalker, Snake Eyes," Duke yelled. "Take Beach Head a hundred meters back, post up and cover us. Flint, stay on the chopper." He fired long shots at the advancing soldiers.

"Should've headed for the jungle," Flint said. White smoke puffed from the helicopter's tail. It drifted off, but didn't leave.

Stalker grabbed Wayne by the left wrist, hefted him over his shoulder and ran.

Pain spiked with every step.

The helicopter circled around, sprayed the car. Duke skirted the coup, Flint dove aside as bullets sparked through sheet metal. Both shot back.

Stalker tossed Wayne off and fired at the helicopter. Snake Eyes shot into the trailing soldiers.

The helicopter pulled up and out of range. Duke and Flint sprinted back.

An explosion blew Wayne down.

"RPG," Duke yelled.

Wayne climbed to his knees. Snake Eyes rolled over beside him, clutching his throat, gurgling.

The helicopter swooped around for another strafing run.

Bright flash, deafening concussion. Duke shrieked. Flint went down. Stalker shot at the helicopter.

A scratchy buzz, washed out beneath the helicopter's beating rotors, sounded from the dirt. Wayne listened, heard English words. He touched a small plastic box. More words, a message repeated. Snake Eyes's transponder.

"… location. Please transmit. Evac needs a…"

Wayne pushed the button. "Five man team. Five hundred meters—"

Another burst. Shrapnel raked Wayne's flank. The transponder flew out of his hands.

He felt through the dirt, but the transponder was gone. They won't know where to find us.

Snakes Eyes writhed, choking on wet breaths. Stalker lay flat, begging for ammunition. Duke shrieked while Flint shot the sky as though to murder God. Wayne picked up a Kalashnikov, stood and faced his enemy, the enemy that wasn't an enemy a few days prior. He pinched the stalk beneath his left armpit and fired until his weapon emptied.

The helicopter door gunner opened fire. Zips and puffs and screams and a roaring hum muted to background noise. The final assault. The end of their last stand. Wayne breathed deep. He stepped forward. I'll die on my feet.

An explosion overhead. The helicopter spun out of control, crashed fifty meters away and erupted into a fireball. Wayne flinched, but didn't fall. More explosions in the distance. Artillery pounded the approaching soldiers.

The roaring hum became a hurricane. Dirt and debris blasted Wayne. Heavy machine guns ripped from behind. He peered back. What's that? What now?

A massive shadow, twice the size of any tank, floated over the ground and glided between Wayne and the soldiers. The front end opened. People ran out. Some faced the enemy, some met Wayne and his team.

By the flickering glow from the burning helicopter, Wayne recognized the first face to approach—Doc.

The evac team. Wayne pointed to Snake Eyes. "He's with us."

Doc gestured and people scooped up Snake Eyes. Others helped Flint and Duke. Stalker ran inside. Then Doc walked Wayne up the ramp and into the belly of the windy shadow.

The evac team piled in behind. Lady Jaye tromped inside last, smoke wisping from her M-4. She spoke into an intercom. "LZ's clear. Hovercraft's loaded." The front of the vehicle closed.

Lights inside flicked on. The vehicle rumbled, lifted up and floated in two directions at once.

"Intubate him," Doc said to another medic. The young woman jammed a tube into Snake Eyes's torn throat. Muscles twitched, ragged flesh flapped, blood spurted in a fine, pulsing mist.

The evac team sat silently at the forward end, their weapons turned down, fear and reverence spelled across their faces.

Blood poured down Duke's back. Scores of shrapnel holes punctured his skin.

Half of Flint's scalp had been blasted off. Shrapnel wounds ran up and down his side, too, but his exposed skull drew the medics' attention.

Stalker sat beside Wayne, his head in his hands.

The young medic squatted in front of Wayne and gave him a shot in the infected shoulder. "You're going to be okay, sir." The medic was too young to lie convincingly. She pulled out another syringe. "Morphine."

"No more pain killers," Wayne said. "This is all mine."

*11*

August 23, 1990. United States Naval Frigate.

Wayne half slept, face down on a rubber coated mattress. The frigate's roll with the sea tugged at the plastic iv tube stuck in his left arm. Four days since he'd evacuated Vietnam and not one night of rest. Emergency surgery amputated his elbow, brutal cleansings scraped out cooked and rotting meat from his back, and the dreams… windy shadows, fireballs in the sky, his arm exploding. Over and over.

Doc had told Wayne that he'd saved everyone, that they triangulated a location from his brief transmission. Maybe, but that information didn't ease his pain, or calm his dreams.

Voices spoke outside his head. Medical staff talking about their patients. Wayne slid toward awake, listened as they gossiped that one patient would never speak again and questioned his quality of life. Red mists and tendons and tubes. Snake Eyes. He's the one that saved us.

"Prepare the others for transport," Doc said to his staff.

Wayne woke fully, yet didn't move.

"Time to go, Beach Head."

Wayne rolled over. Doc stood beside him with a professional smile.

"Where are we?" Wayne asked.

"Subic Bay."

Wayne sat up, untangled his arm from the iv tube. "Where are my things?"

"Don't worry. We'll take care of everything."

"No. I've got something for Abernathy."

"He can wait."

"I can't."

Doc stared a moment as though he saw into Wayne's soul. With a simple nod Doc opened a small bin with Wayne's belongings.

The tattered clothes stayed, but Wayne took the Colt M-1911 A1 pistol with a snake's head etched into the slide and tucked it into the waistband of his new sweat pants.

"This way." Doc waved his hand toward a wheelchair.

Wayne stood, wobbled, steadied himself on the iv stand. Doc nudged him toward the wheelchair. Wayne pulled away. "I'm going out on my feet."

He hobbled through the narrow corridors pushing his stand along. Doc stayed close behind.

They emerged onto the main deck. Seagulls squawked along the quay, a gentle off-shore breeze cooled Wayne's skin as he squinted against the sunshine. Stalker pushed Duke in a wheel chair. Lady Jaye pushed Flint. Flint's head and face were fully bandaged. A cigarette dangled though the gauze. The young medic from the evac team pushed Snake Eyes. He was sedated, strapped to the gurney for transport to a better facility. A dozen people, the same people who'd evacuated him from Vietnam, stood shoulder to shoulder in two columns at the bottom of the gangplank. General Abernathy stood alone at the end.

Everyone saluted as Stalker and Duke passed between. The General shook both their hands.

Abernathy really thinks this shitty honor guard will make everything better? Wayne's stump throbbed pain.

Lady Jaye and Flint earned salutes and handshakes.

Snake Eyes was saluted and moved through without a word of thanks.

Wayne held his chin low as he lumbered down the gangplank and through the columns.

General Abernathy approached, right hand held out to shake. "Glad you made it home, Sergeant."

Wayne's gaze narrowed onto Abernathy alone. The fake smile, the false mission, the pain. Wayne drew the forty-five, aimed it between Abernathy's eyes and pulled the trigger.

Click.

Empty chamber.

Abernathy dropped to the ground covering his head.

Everyone gasped. Flint let out a raspy chuckle, smoke billowing from the wraps. Then he fell into a coughing fit.

Wayne threw the gun down in front of General Abernathy, took his iv stand and walked away.

*12*

September 28, 1990. Vietnam.

Wayne Sneeden's white button up shirt clung to his chest and arm. He pinned the right sleeve back at the shoulder. He stared hard at Hawk, General Abernathy, seated across from him in the back of a work truck. Abernathy focused on his own feet. Doc, a Marine appointed as translator, the explosives disposal specialist and the dog-handler accompanied them.

The Vietnamese government had informed the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command's Philippines Liaison Office of more American remains and invited officials to reclaim the fallen soldier. In their request they asked for Wayne by his proper name.

With his transfer orders in hand, Wayne told Abernathy to fuck off and told Lady Jaye that they could never be more than friends as she ran her fingertips up the back of his arm. But the thought of a fellow American soldier alone in the jungle, humiliated by the victors, brought him reporting for duty.

The truck stopped. One at a time they got out. Vietnamese guards with Kalashnikovs held across their chests escorted Wayne's group to a clearing in the jungle. Ropes outlined the designated area. A pine crate sat in the center. A phalanx of masked Cobra men stood at one side of the clearing, staring silently. Among them, a full head taller than the rest, Cobra Commander.

The Vietnamese guard commander spoke in French. The Marine translated, "They want us to look inside the crate."

Doc and the explosives specialist lift the lid. Stuffed into the disgracefully small crate, a human body. Caucasian male dressed in an up-to-date Army uniform. Soft tissue still fresh. This wasn't a soldier lost to the Vietnam War. He was killed by a knife across his throat and Wayne recognized him. Grunt—the corporal he'd caught sneaking onto the base. But how could he get to Vietnam?

Splayed across the deceased soldier's chest rested a third hand.

Why—

Then Wayne's skin chilled, stomach churned. That's… that's mine.

Muscles pulled in his shoulder and he felt his hand move, yet it sat motionless inside the crate.

"Close him up. Let's get out of here," Abernathy said. Doc and the specialist hoisted the pine crate onto the truck.

Wayne glanced at the hooded figure. Cobra Commander nodded slowly.

They know me.

"You next," the Marine said and threw Wayne onto the truck.

The truck trundled forward. Abernathy lit a cigarette, handed another to a new person in the back. Lady Jaye.

"We've got a problem," Abernathy said to her. "Looks like our ghost has been haunting us awhile."

Lady Jaye inhaled. "I know. I heard about the two dead MPs. He must've kidnapped Grunt and brought him here a few months ago."

That's how they found us in the jungle. They knew we'd be there.

Abernathy looked at Wayne, said, "You should feel proud. You're the only person to lay a hand on the spy we know as Zartan and survive."

Wayne leaned his head back. He heard the desperate hums in the tiger cage again. That was Grunt, a teammate, a fellow American. We could've helped. We could've saved him.

Tears welled up, spilled down his face. He didn't feel proud. He felt ashamed and tired and used. And for the first time, Wayne wanted to go home.

Thank you for reading Command Decision. Watch for the next segment of the series entitled, The Viper's Tale. Enjoy and tell a friend.