Tales of the Wheeler Family

by the Mandalorian terminator

Happily married Mike and El Wheeler are invited to attend a school reunion back in Hawkins with the rest of the Party. While in Hawkins they each must confront their past as they seek to unravel a web of plots and plans - some old, some new - that seek to destroy not just Hawkins but the world itself. Set in 2005

17. Chapter 17

Chapter 16: The spider and the Fly

Author Notes:

Hi, everyone it is the Mandalorian terminator back with a new chapter of my story Tales of The Wheeler Family. This chapter will very much be a breather compared to the darker previous one. Well mostly…

How about Season 4 of Stranger Things? My god that ending! Season 4 is easily my second favourite season after Season 3. And aside from a minor change (looking at you Ten and having to wait to see what happens regarding Max's coma and eyesight in Season 5) the story told in Season 4 more or less lines up with my own plans going forward with this crossover.

As always, thank you very much for reading and please, please review!

Your reviews give me life! They give inspiration! And they make me want to keep writing for more than just myself! Thank you for your continued support and please enjoy!

---

"The most shocking thing about war is that its victims and its instruments are individual human beings, and that these individual beings are condemned by the monsterous conventions of politics to murder or be murdered in quarrels not their own"

-Aldous Huxley

---

Then

Vietnam, October 5 1968

"So tell me, Jim. What do you see?"

Jim Hopper was sitting in a leather chair in a plain, whitewashed room at the back of Bearcat Base Camp. He was on one side of a desk, facing the smiling Dr Sulu. He was dressed not in a white coat but jeans and a brightly coloured open-necked shirt with the sleeves rolled up.

Dr Sulu was holding a white card with a black shape on it. The shape looked like nothing at all; it was just a series of blobs. But Jim was meant to be able to interpret it.

He thought for a moment. He knew that this was called a Rorschach test; he had seen it once in a film.

He supposed it must be important. But he wasn't sure that he saw anything in particular on the card.

Eventually he spoke.

"I suppose it's a man flying through the sky," he suggested. "He's wearing a backpack."

"That's excellent. Very good!" Dr Sulu put the card down and picked up another. "How about this one?"

The second shape was easier. "It's a football being pumped up," Jim said.

"Good, thank you."

Dr Sulu laid the second card down and there was a brief silence in the office. Outside, Jim could hear gunfire. General Wilson as a way for soldiers to kill time in-between patrols and to hone their shooting skills had set up a shooting range. But there was no view of the range out of the window. Perhaps the doctor had chosen this room for that reason.

"So how are you settling in?" Dr Sulu asked.

Jim shrugged. "OK."

"You have no anxieties? Nothing you wish to discuss?"

"No. I'm fine, thank you, Dr Sulu."

"Good. That's good. I apologize it has taken so long for me to see you," Dr Sulu explained in a huff. "Things have been pretty hectic around here."

The doctor sounded annoyed. "Too many patients for you to handle, Doctor?" Jim asked half-jokingly.

"No, Jim, I'm talking about the recent shakeup. With the previous commander of the 9th Infantry Division and the older former members vacating to other divisions, this camp's transition period is rougher than I thought it'd be."

"Oh."

Taking the moment as a chance to vent, Dr Sulu added, "Yes, it's made it almost impossible for me to properly settle in and speak to the soldiers' one on one, see how they're adjusting to Vietnam, that sort of thing." He calmed down. "But now, after also a year and a half, Commander Mary is now in complete control of Base Camp Bearcat." It sounded almost like he was boasting as he said this.

Jim wondered if he should say something about this but decided to stay silent.

The silence was broken when Dr Sulu opened a drawer on his desk and rummaged in it. He took out something that looked like a small soldering gun.

Jim eyed it wearily. "What are you going to do with that? Tattoo me?" He thought of Jews getting numbers tattooed on their arms when they entered the camps at Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. That should have been a totally ridiculous idea, but…

Dr Sulu looked surprised, then laughed. "No. I'm just going to chip your earlobe. It's like getting pierced for an earring. No big deal, all the soldiers here get one."

Jim backed away in his seat. "I don't care. You're not putting anything in my ear."

"I am, though," Dr Sulu said, grinning. He looked like the guy who would help little kids on the bunny slopes before trying to kill James Bond with a poison dart. "Look, it's no more than a pinch. So make it easy on both of us. Tilt your ear towards me, and it'll be over in seven seconds. I'll even give you a free beer before you leave. Make it hard and you will still get the chip, but no beer. What do you say?"

Jim glared at the gun in the doctor's hand and shook his head. "I'm not letting you put anything in my ear," he repeated, adding more emphasis this time.

Dr Sulu sighed. He set the chip insertion gadget carefully on his desk, rose to his feet and stood over Jim. He looked solemn, almost sorrowful. "Are you sure?"

"Yes."

His ears were ringing from the open-handed slap almost before he was aware Dr Sulu's right hand had even hit him. Jim staggered out of his seat and stared at the doctor with wide, stunned eyes. His cheek was burning, and he still could not believe it had happened.

"That hurt a lot more than an earlobe pinch," Dr Sulu said. The grin was gone. "Want another? Happy to oblige. You boys all come here thinking you're tough. Man oh man."

Jim knew, with a sense of revulsion, that he'd had this conversation many times before. Jim wasn't the first solider who refused to get his earlobe chipped for whatever reason. Others had sat right where he was sitting now. Had Dr Sulu struck them too when they had refused? Or had he been more physical with them?

"You ready to get your earlobe pinched?"

Jim sat back in his seat and tilted his ear up. Dr Sulu was right. The earlobe pinch wasn't as bad as the slap, possibly because he was ready for it, possibly because it felt like a medical procedure rather than an assault. When it was done, Dr Sulu went to a sterilizer and produced a hypodermic needle. "Roll up your sleeve."

"What's in that?" Jim asked.

"None of your concern."

"If it's going in me, it is my concern."

Dr Sulu sighed. "Do I need to hit you again? Your choice."

Pick your battles, Jim thought. He rolled up his sleeve.

"Good. Just a little sting and done."

It was more than a little sting. Not agony, but a pretty big sting, just the same. Jim's arm went hot all the way down to his wrist, as if he had a fever in that one part of him, then it felt normal again.

"Let me give you some advice," Dr Sulu said. "You need to realise that you are here to serve. That means being realistic. Things will happen to you here. Some of them will not be so nice. You can be a good sport about them and do as you are told or you can be a bad sport and get hurt. Those things will happen either way, so which should you choose. It shouldn't be hard to figure out."

Jim made no reply. The doctor's smile came back as he showed him out of his office.

He had been missing gun practice because of his medical appointment and he joined the other soldiers on the firing range. The first thing Jim Hopper had learned early on was that there was no privacy at Bearcat. Even the bathrooms had no locks. And Hopper had not been able to shake off the feeling that everything he did, even everything he though, was somehow being monitored, noted down. He was like a goldfish in a bowl.

After the initial shock of the sights and smells of the South Vietnam finally wore off, most of the soldiers in Jim's company began to enjoy the camp's leisure spots. Beer was cheap and plentiful. It was also Jim's first exposure to the beautiful Vietnamese woman and their slinky aio di dresses. They walked around the base camp exuding sexuality. Most of the Vietnamese women worked on building and rebuilding the defences of the base camp, and they were much less sexy.

General Percy Wilson was waiting for him. He had built a cut-out town, with offices and shops that were nothing more than fronts, like a film set. Jim had already been through it twice, using a handgun to shoot at paper targets—black rings with a red bull's-eye—that popped up in the windows and doors.

He nodded as Jim approached.

"Good afternoon, Private Hopper. How was your visit to the shrink? Did he tell you you're mad? If not, I wonder what the hell you're doing here!"

A number of other soldiers stood around him, unloading and adjusting their weapons. Jim knew all of them by now.

"You're just in time to show us what you can do before lunch," General Wilson announced. His southern accent made almost everything sound like a challenge. "You got a high score the day before yesterday. In fact, you were second in the class with Frank here still on top and Butcher in third place."

The solider-Butcher-made a disparaging noise as he glared across at Jim.

"Let's see if you can do even better today. But this time I may have built in a little surprise!"

He handed Jim a gun, a Tokarev TT-33 semiautomatic pistol. Jim weighed it in his hand, trying to find the balance between himself and his weapon. Wilson had explained that this was essential to the technique he called instinctive firing.

"Remember—you have to shoot instantly. You can't stop to take aim. If you do, you're dead. In a real combat situation you don't have time to mess around. You and the gun are one. And if you believe that you can hit the target, you will hit the target. That's what instinctive firing is all about."

Now Jim stepped forward, the gun at his side, watching the mocked-up doors and windows in front of him. He knew there would be no warning. At any time, a target could appear. He would be expected to turn and fire. He waited. He was aware of the other students watching him. Out of the corner of his eye he could just make out the shape of General Wilson. Was he smiling?

A sudden movement.

A target had appeared in an upper window and immediately Jim saw that the bull's-eye targets with their impersonal rings had been replaced. A photograph had appeared instead. It was a life-sized colour picture of a young man. Jim didn't know who he was—but that didn't matter. He was a target.

There was no time to hesitate.

Jim raised the gun and fired.

---

Later that day, Mary sat in her command centre, Dr Sulu and General Wilson seated opposite her. Outside, the sun had begun to set. The floor was close-fitted with a colourful Caucasian carpet of the finest quality. Across the far left-hand corner of the room stood a massive oak desk. On the walls were four large pictures in gold frames. One of American President Lyndon B. Johnson, the second of American Vice President Hubert Humphrey, and, facing each other on the other two walls, portraits of Defense Secretary Clark Clifford and Director of the CIA Richard Helms.

General Wilson was currently speaking. "Today Private Hopper returned to the shooting range. We've been putting him through a course of instinctive firing. It's something he's never done before and, I have to say, it takes many of our soldiers several weeks to master the art. After just a few hours on the range, Hopper was already achieving impressive results. At the end of his second day he scored seventy-two per cent."

"I don't see anything wrong with that."

General Wilson shifted in his seat. "Well, today we switched the targets," he explained. "Instead of black and red rings, Hopper was asked to fire at photographs of men and women. He was supposed to aim at the vital areas: the heart … between the eyes."

"How did he do?"

"That's the point. His score dropped to forty-six per cent. He missed several targets altogether."

Dr Sulu leaned forward now. "I also have the results of his Rorschach psychological test," he explained. "He was asked to identify certain shapes—"

"I do know what a Rorschach test is, Doctor Sulu."

"Of course. Forgive me. Well, there was one shape that every soldier who has ever come here has identified as a man lying in a pool of blood. But not Jim. He said he thought it was a man flying through the air with a backpack. Another shape, which is invariably seen as a gun pointing at someone's head, he believed to be someone pumping up a football. I have to say that, psychologically speaking, he seems to lack what might be called the killer instinct."

Sulu was not interested in human beings—not even in his own family. Nor did the categories of 'good' and 'bad' have a place in his vocabulary. To him all people were chess pieces. He was only interested in their reactions to the movements of other pieces. To foretell their reactions, which was the greater part of his job, one had to understand their individual characteristics. Their basic instincts were immutable. Self-preservation, sex and the instinct of the herd—in that order. Their temperaments could be sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric or melancholic. The temperament of an individual would largely decide the comparative strength of his emotions and his sentiments. Character would greatly depend on upbringing and to a certain extent on the character of the parents. And, of course, people's lives and behaviour would be partly conditioned by physical strengths and weaknesses.

It was with these basic classifications at the back of his mind that Sulu's cold brain considered the woman across the table. It was the hundredth time he had summed her up, but Sulu always liked to refresh the memory.

It was said that during torture sessions of captured Viet-Cong prisoners, Mary would draw herself up close below the face of the man or woman that hung down over the edge of the interrogation table. She would watch the eyes in the face a few inches away from hers and as the courage and resistance seeped out of the eyes, and they began to weaken and beseech, she would start cooing softly. "There, there. Talk to me and it will stop. It hurts. Ah yes, I know it hurts. And one is so tired of the pain. One would like it to stop, and to be able to lie down in peace, and for it never to begin again. Your mother is here beside you, only waiting to stop the pain. She has a nice soft cosy bed all ready for you to sleep on and forget, forget, forget. Speak," she would whisper lovingly. "You have only to speak and you will have peace and no more pain." If the eyes still resisted, then the cooing would cease, the torture would resume and Mary would squat there and watch the life slowly ebbing from the eyes until she had to speak loudly into the ear of the person or the words would not reach the brain.

But it was seldom, so they said, that the person had the will to travel far along Mary's road of pain, let alone to the end, and, when the soft voice promised peace, it nearly always won, for somehow Mary knew from the eyes the moment when the adult had been broken down into a child crying for its mother. And she provided the image of the mother and melted the spirit where the harsh words of a man would have toughened it.

Chet Sulu had worked very hard not to be an American citizen. His was the fourth generation of his family in the U.S.-the first of his ancestors had arrived right after the turn of the century and before the "Gentlemen's Agreement" between Japan and America restricting further immigration. It would have insulted him had he thought about it more. Of greater insult was what had happened to his grandparents and great-grandparents despite full U.S. citizenship. His grandfather had leaped at the chance to prove his loyalty to his country, and served in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, returning home with two Purple Hearts and master-sergeant stripes only to find that the family business-office supplies-had been sold off for a song and his family sent to an intern camp. With stoic patience, he had started over, built it up with a new and unequivocal name, Veteran's Office Furniture, and made enough money to send his three sons through college and beyond.

Done it pretty well, too, Sulu thought. He'd overcome his accent problems in a matter of weeks and had learned from his surgeon father to fix his eyes forward to the things he could do, not back at things he couldn't change. He had enrolled in medical school in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He studied science, engineering and computers there and met and quickly became friends with fellow student Julius No (1). After finishing his studies Sulu followed No to the island Crab Key off the coast of Jamaica. Being adept at engineering Sulu was part in charge of the construction of the facility from which Dr. No would sabotage American missile tests at nearby Cape Canaveral. The facility and No himself would both be destroyed by the British secret agent 007. Sulu had only barely managed to escape the complex and had fled to Florida in hiding.

After spending the rest of the 1950s and early 60s keeping his head down, Sulu got a job as an analyst working for the RAND Corporation in 1964. In late 1966 Sulu was assigned to Vietnam to gather on the ground data for the corporation. While there he saw firsthand the results of the CIA'S Phoenix Program (2) even taking part in the organising of the larger, country-wide action elements of the Phoenix program–the Provincial Reconnaissance Units (PRUs). By 1967, Sulu was part of the Intelligence Coordination and Exploitation Program (ICEX), centred on gathering information on the Viet Cong.

It was here he would first meet Mary and quickly became a close confident of hers. Following the Tet Offensive Sulu would be reassigned from ICEX to be the physician of the Bearcat Base Camp at Mary's behest and, alongside General Wilson, would act as her trusted advisor and aide.

There was a long pause after this. Both General Wilson and Dr Sulu exchanged a worried look with each other. "I see," Mary said finally. "How are his interactions with the rest of the unit?"

"He has bonded with several of them quite quickly, especially with Private Kelley," Dr Sulu noted.

"Unnaturally fast if you ask me," Wilson remarked, his lip curling in disgust. "Homosexuals for sure in my opinion."

"Thank you for your input, General," Mary said quietly. She rose from her chair and walked over to the large map of North and South Vietnam that covered the wall behind her desk. She silently began tracing her fingers delicately over the map deep in thought. General Wilson and Dr Sulu watched and waited for her to respond.

Percy Wilson was good at waiting. He learned to be patient in prison while the rest of America waged senseless war against the one nation that should have been its ally. He had been reviled by the very people he'd been fighting to save.

They had called him a traitor.

Men that had stood shoulder to shoulder with him in the 1930s – good men who had marched down the streets of Phoenix, proud to be American, proud to fight against the Jews and the Bolsheviks, proud to stand up for their race – even they had rejected him, blinded by the Zionist propaganda.

Wilson found himself alone, a single voice against the madness.

He had been born in Albuquerque, New Mexico in 1921. Growing up in a mobile home; his father was a failed businessman who ended up shooting himself in the head when the young Percy was just eleven. His mother, a southern woman, was a drunk, favouring Vodka – specifically Screwdrivers and Bloody Mary's – and whiskey.

Determined to make a better life for himself, Percy accepted a full-ride scholarship to Arizona State University where he went on to be a three time all-Pac 10 pitcher for the Sun Devils. His dreams of pitching professionally were ruined when he was in a car accident his senior year. Unwilling to give up his dreams of a better life, Percy took a job at a resort in Scottsdale, Arizona, where he began networking with influential people in the real estate business.

All that would change however with the arrival of World War 2.

And so he had gone to prison under the Alien and Sedition Act of 1798 and learned patience; he had been rewarded. When in 1950 war broke out in the Korean Peninsula, Wilson had enlisted immediately and, much to his surprise and joy, served under the command of Douglas MacArthur. He quickly grew to idolize MacArthur's leadership and had been dismayed by President Truman's firing of him. As far as Wilson was concerned the United States should have used nuclear weapons to end the Korean War. After all, it had been the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki that had ended the Second World War. Why wasn't it used to end this war? Because Harry Truman was scared of the Soviet Union using their own new atomic bombs on the United States? The fool should have hit them and Red China there and then! Instead the war had ended in a pathetic stalemate.

Wilson had returned back home, bitter over the firing of MacArthur and angry at the weakness he believed the United States had shown. At first he had hoped that MacArthur would run for President in 1952. With a true leader in the White House the Soviets and Red China would be put in their place. Wilson had even joined a "Draft MacArthur" group and campaigned hard for him in states like New Hampshire and Idaho.

Unfortunately Eisenhower wound be winning the Republican nomination and that year's election. While he admired Eisenhower for the landings of D-Day and respected him as a military man, Wilson did not believe Ike had the right advisors in his cabinet. While he supported Eisenhower's "New Look" defense policy, Wilson was once again dismayed by the fallout of the Hungarian Revolution and Suez Crisis and, in his opinion, the failing of the image of US strength in the face of an increasingly bombastic Nikita Khrushchev flexing the military muscle of the Red Army.

Rebuilding his old contacts proved harder. The influx of new immigrants helped. They were easy targets, more obvious than the Jews, more different. Yet it was not like the 1940s – there was affluence now. People didn't need scapegoats like they used to. Wilson knew in his heart that he and his friends would never amount to more than a rabble driven by hatred.

When the Cuban Missile Crisis began playing out, Wilson believed the United States had been given a second chance to destroy the Red Army and their new Cuban ally. He strongly agreed with General Curtis LeMay's suggestion to hit the Soviet Union and Cube with a first strike. And once again, he would be disappointed by what he viewed as President Kennedy's "weakness" in not launching a nuclear attack on either Cuba or the Soviet Union.

Mary hardly seemed to even breathe before finally turning her back on the map to face the two men. "I assume you've been told by MACV about our Chennault problem?" She asked suddenly. (3)

Wilson nodded but Sulu looked confused at the name.

Mary came to a decision. "I believe we can solve our Chennault problem and this issue of Private Hopper killing in one go," She said.

"You want to send him on an assignment?" Dr Sulu asked.

"Not just him, the entire team as well. See just how strong their bond of friendship will be when it's tested in the field. If Jim Hopper does succeed, well we could all be going home very soon."

General Wilson scoffed. "I wouldn't get my hopes up," he muttered.

"We shall see," Mary said quietly more to herself than the two men as she turned back to the map. "We shall see."

---

The moment Jim Hopper had arrived in Vietnam, he had felt the weight of his decision. A door was closing. He had picked one path over another and this was undoubtedly the one less travelled. It was overgrown and more treacherous than his imagination could do justice to, but then again his youthful self felt invincible and was filled with schemes to cheat death. He would undoubtedly be pushed to quit, but he was confident that would not happen. He'd never quit anything in his life, and he'd never wanted anything near as bad as he wanted this. Hopper knew the score. He knew how his chain would be yanked and jerked every which way and he would be forced to endure all of it.

The other members of the unit were in their early twenties and equally fit. Most seemed to be easy-going and eager to introduce themselves.

There was Tommy Moon, a small, tough American-Korean who loved to argue and play cards and had the largest vocabulary of swear words that Jim had ever heard. Tommy's father had been a soldier in the Korean War and in the war's aftermath immigrated to the United States. Despite facing racism, he managed to marry and settled down in the Chinatown area of San Francisco. His mother and father owned a prosperous corner shop, selling food and fancy goods. They opened from eight in the morning until nine at night, seven days a week, in an effort to keep them, Tommy and his brother Chul fed and clothed.

Then the Tong had moved into their neighbourhood, bringing with them protection rackets and drug deals. Chul Moon, two years older than Tommy, had somehow got caught up in it all and before long was trying to persuade their father to sell marijuana under the counter at the shop, laundering money and generally acting as a front for them.

Tommy's father had naturally refused, appalled by his son's behaviour. He would yell and shout that he had not devoted his entire life to the good of the community just to enable his son to become a petty criminal and ruin the family name. Chul had replied that if his father failed to do what the triads wanted, well, Chul was not responsible for what could follow.

Unperturbed by what he considered adolescent prattling, Tommy's father continued to run his shop the way he saw fit.

Until one day, on a warm April afternoon in 1966, when three members of a gang from the other side of Chinatown entered the store and demanded drugs. When Tommy's parents announced they did not deal, they were both shot dead. It was later claimed that this was a warning to everyone else in the area that the gangs and the Tong's ruled Chinatown now.

By default, Tommy became part of the gang Chul ran with. The gang's aims were to make life as miserable for the locals as possible.

However, nothing lasted forever, and before long inter-gangland warfare broke out. Not just a few bar-room scuffles but major league stuff. One day Tommy was pick-pocketing tourists and such like, the next he was armed with a pistol, taking pot-shots at opposing gang members.

Chul had died three years back. A knife had slit his throat during some late-night break-in to a warehouse. Someone in their gang had set them up and the enemy gang was lying in wait. Alone now, Tommy decided to get out. But moving to another state wouldn't be enough.

Tommy, having grown up hearing stories of his father's war stories, decided to sign up for the Vietnam War.

There was Dave Moss, something of a legend in Bearcat. He'd been on several different tours of Vietnam since the Gulf of Tonkin incident. LBJ himself had awarded Dave a Purple Star medal for his valor in combat. He was tall and muscular: handsome in a grungy sort of way, with bright green eyes and long blonde hair. He liked to brag about having several different girlfriends all waiting for him back in the States and there was even a rumor he'd gotten one of the nurse's at Bearcat pregnant.

Jim had especially gotten along well with Frank Kelley.

Solid and fit, Frank had a boxer's face—a flat nose that had been broken too many times, sunken eyes and thick black eyebrows. He was popular in the company—serious when he had to be, but relaxed and funny when the pressure was off. He had been born in 1950 in a roach-infested Newark slum. His father was a construction worker fully employed through World War Two and Korea creating thousands of new factories, jackyards and government offices along the Jersey shore.

But with the ending of the Korean War, work had dried up. Frank was five when his mother walked out of the loveless union and left the boy to be raised by his father. The latter was a hard man, quick with his fists, the only law on many blue-collar jobs. But he was not a bad one, trying to live by the straight and narrow and to raise his toddler son to love Old Glory, the Constitution and Joe DiMaggio.

Within two years, Kelley Senior had acquired a trailer home so that he could move where the work was available. And that was how the boy was raised, moving from construction site to site, attending whichever school would take him and then moving on. It was the age of Elvis Presley, Del Shannon, Roy Orbison and the Beatles, over from a country Frank had never heard of. It was also the age of Kennedy, the Cold War and Vietnam.

His formal education was fractured to the point of non-existence, but he became wise in other ways: streetwise, fight wise. Like his departed mother, he did not grow tall, topping over at five feet eight inches. Nor was he heavy and muscular like his father, but his lean frame packed fearsome stamina and his fists a killer punch.

By seventeen, it looked as if his life would follow that of his father, shovelling dirt or driving a dumpster on building sites. Unless…

In January 1968, he turned eighteen and the Vietcong launched the Tet Offensive. He was watching TV in a bar in Camden. There was a documentary telling him about recruitment. It mentioned that if you shape up, the army would give you an education. The next day he walked into the US Army office in Camden and signed on.

The master sergeant was bored. He spent his life listening to youths doing everything in their power to get out of going to Vietnam.

"I want to volunteer," said the youth in front of him.

The master sergeant drew a form towards him, keeping eye contact like a ferret who does not want the rabbit to get away. Trying to be kindly, he suggested the boy sign for three years as opposed to two.

"Good chance of better postings," he said. "Better career choices. With three years you could even avoid going to Vietnam."

"But I want to go to Vietnam," said the kid in the soiled denims.

He got his wish. After boot camp and his noted skill driving earth-moving equipment, he was sent to the engineer battalion of the Big Red One, the First Infantry Division, based right up in the Iron Triangle. That was where he volunteered to become a Tunnel Rat and enter the fearsome network of scary, black and often lethal tunnels dug by the Vietcong under Cu-Chi.

After two tours of nearly suicidal missions in those hellholes he would be transferred to Bearcat Base Camp where he and Jim Hopper quickly developed a liking to one another. Almost everything in Bearcat liked Frank….with the exception of one person.

Sam Butcher. (4)

Unlike the rest of the unit, Butcher had plenty of scathing remark towards Jim. He did everything he could to taunt or humiliate him. It was as if Jim had somehow insulted him by being placed with him.

A group of soldiers shouted as they counted away the seconds in which Billy was performing a keg-stand.

"…thirty-eight, thirty-nine, forty, forty-one, forty-two!"

Lowering himself back on his feet, Sam stood straight and spat beer out of his month into the air and everyone cheered. Butcher was six foot five with massive pectoral muscles inside a sweat-stained military vest. His face was handsome in a butcher's boyish way, with its full pink cheeks, upturned nose and rounded chin. But there was something cruel about the thin-lipped rather pursed mouth. His bare chest was shinning with a sheen of beer and sweat.

"Yeah!" he hollered, his thick British accent instantly distinctive amongst the soldiers.

From beside him, Michael Ehrmantraut shouted, "Forty-two! We got ourselves a new Keg King!" He had green eyes, light freckles on his face and short-cropped dark blonde hair. (5)

Michael handed Sam a lit cigarette as the crowd began chanting his name. Sam took a deep drag then through a haze of smoke he shouted boastfully, "That's how you do it, you Yanks! That's how you do it!"

Sam Butcher was born on May 28th, 1939 to a British aristocratic family. Rich, snobbish and fervent supporters of the British Empire, his parents would instil in their son a love for everything British. After matriculating in economics and political history at Oxford University he obtained a desk job at GCHQ , the British government's signals intelligence centre. Dismayed with the path his country was going down (the partition of India, the independence of Burma and Ceylon, and the dissolution of the British mandates of Palestine and Transjordan); Sam would decide to get even with the politicians who were destroying the once great British Empire before his very eyes. He liked all he heard about the Russians, their brutality, their carelessness of human life, and their guile, and he decided to go over to them. But how? What could he bring them as a gift? What did they want?

He took a gamble and would soon pass along a stockpile of top-secret documents, reduced to microfilm, concealed in the sleeve buttons of his expensive suit to the Soviet Union. The Russians paid him handsomely for them and soon he would begin to run information-gathering operations relating to SMERSH (6), the Soviet organ of vengeance, using the top secret documents he had access to at GCHQ.

SMERSH would continue to pay him well for the information he supplied and at their insistence would use a small place called St. Petersburg near Tampa, the West Coast of Florida as the meeting place to trade the information. By 1951 Sam Butcher had joined the likes of Le Chiffre (7), Mr. Big (8) and Auric Goldfinger (9) as SMERSH's most prolific non-Russian operative.

1956 would be the year of global revolt and herald a change for Sam. First the Suez Crisis ended in an embarrassing back down by the British and consolidated United States leadership of Western interests in the Middle East, especially its patronage of Israel. The demand for civil rights for African Americans provoked conflict, rioting and lynching; there was the bus boycott associated with Rosa Parks in Montgomery, Alabama, while proposals for the end of segregation in schools revived the dispute between the respective rights of States and the Federal Government. In South Africa the apartheid government arrested more than 50 opposition leaders, among them Nelson Mandela, and charged them with treason. France was engaged in what became the most vicious of wars in Algeria, and then came anti-Soviet uprisings in Poland and Hungary. Nasser's triumph inspired the spread of Arab nationalism across North Africa and the Middle East, while continental Europe, encouraged by West Germany's Chancellor Adenauer, quickened the pace of European unification with establishment of the European Economic Community in 1957.

Sam Butcher, meanwhile, would be reassigned from GCHQ to Military Intelligence after the Suez Crisis, where he would excel as an infiltrator and covert assassin: extremely well trained in hand-to-hand fighting, small arms and demolitions and completely ruthless. SMERSH didn't seem to care about the change and now were able to use him in the role of dual-agent.

A great deal of killing has to be done in the USSR, not because the average Russian is a cruel man, although some of their countrymen are among the cruellest peoples in the world, but as an instrument of policy. People who act against the State are enemies of the State, and the State has no room for enemies. There is too much to do for precious time to be allotted to them, and, if they are a persistent nuisance, they get killed. In a country with a population of 200,000,000, you can kill many thousands a year without missing them. If, as happened in the two biggest purges, a million people have to be killed in one year, that is also not a grave loss. The serious problem is the shortage of executioners. Executioners have a short 'life'. They get tired of the work. The soul sickens of it. After ten, twenty, a hundred death-rattles, the human being, however sub-human he may be, acquires, perhaps by a process of osmosis with death itself, a germ of death which enters his body and eats into him like a cancer. Melancholy and drink take him, and a deep lassitude which brings a glaze to the eyes and slows up the movements and destroys accuracy. When the employer sees these signs he has no alternative but to execute the executioner and find another one.

Sam Butcher became that new executioner. He took part in several operations in Northern Ireland throughout the 1960s and would serve in the Malayan Emergency where he finally deserted the British and commanded a unit of Special Forces involved in acts of political assassination and sabotage for the Malayan Communists on behalf of SMERSH.

Sam and Michael made their way through the court yard into the barracks followed by the chanting of Sam's name. All but one.

The only woman in Bearcat was unimpressed with the display. Why did men always feel the need to have to show off? She lounged on a small white fold-up chair near the entrance to the barracks. She had just finished painting the nails on her left hand. Now she stretched the hand out in front of her to examine the effect. She brought the hand back to her lips and blew on the nails. Her right hand reached sideways and put the brush back in the Revlon bottle on the ground next to her chair.

She wore no rings and no jewellery except for a rather masculine square gold wrist-watch with a black face. Her eyes were soft charcoal slits such as you see on some birds and her mouth was bold and generous and would have a lovely smile. The profile, the straight, small uptilted nose, the determined set of the chin, and the clean-cut sweep of the jaw line were as decisive as a royal command, and the way the head was set on the neck had the same authority—the poise one associates with imaginary princesses. Two features modified the clean-cut purity of line—a soft, muddled Brigitte Bardot haircut that was in endearing disarray, and two deeply cut but soft dimples which could only have been etched by a sweet if rather ironic smile that Sam had not yet seen. The sunburn was not overdone and her skin had none of that dried, exhausted sheen that can turn the texture of even the youngest skin into something more like parchment. Beneath the gold, there was an earthy warmth in the cheeks that suggested a good healthy peasant strain from the Italian Alps. She wore green military fatigue. The general impression, all the members of Bearcat agreed, was of a wilful, high-tempered, sensual woman.

Her name was Dominetta "Domino" Vitali (10). She had been born in Bolzano in the Italian Tyrol and had been send by her parents to school in England at Cheltenham Ladies' College and then studied acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art until being forced to return to Italy after her parents' tragic death in a train accident where she became an actress and used the stage name Vitali. While in Italy she became the mistress of Emilio Largo, Number 2 of the infamous organization called SPECTRE (the Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion).Being his mistress made her feel trapped like a bird in a gilded cage.

SPECTRE had at the time hijacked a new military aircraft, the Villiers Vindicator, by bribing the NATO observer on board, Giuseppe Petacchi (Domino's brother), to kill the crew with poisonous gas and redirect the plane. SPECTRE had threatened to destroy a major city in the United States or United Kingdom, unless a ransom of £100,000,000 is paid.

Domino had met British Secret agent James Bond while staying on Largo's yacht, the Disco Volante in Nassau in 1959. From that first encounter, she would discover from Bond that Largo had Petacchi killed after Petacchi had hijacked the bomber on SPECTRE's behalf. She then allied with Bond as an ally to spy on Largo. Domino had returned to Largo's yacht, the Disco Volante, with a Geiger counter to verify the ship as the location of the two stolen nuclear bombs, however, she had been uncovered and taken prisoner. She still to this day remembered Largo burning her with a cigar for heat and then using ice cubes for cold. During a battle with Bond, while Largo was focused on 007, she had appeared behind him and shot him in the neck with a harpoon from a spear gun, avenging her brother and for what he had previously done to her. Domino smiled at the memory. It was true what they said after all, revenge was sweet.

After that she had returned to Italy and pursued her dream to be an actress, starring in several Italian-made films from 1960 to November 1961 until after watching the Berlin Crisis of 1961 had woken her from the apathy Italy and indeed much of Europe showed towards the Cold War. Patriotic fever had gripped her and Domino had left behind her acting career and subsequently joined the Italian Secret Service. During her training she discovered, much to her delight, she was a crack shot with a sniper. This skill alone would greatly help her in the many missions she participated in. 1964 and the Gulf of Tonkin incident inspired her to go to Vietnam herself and help the South Vietnamese people fighting against the Communist North Vietnam. Italy, like most of Europe, had refused to get involved in the war. Apathy, that was Europe's problem, Domino thought. Tired from the dark days of the World War Two, Europe had practically withdrawn from any new wars that had erupted.

Arriving in Vietnam she had gone straight to MACV and requested participation in the war. After some hesitation she was allowed in. From 1965 to the middle of 1967 Domino was shunted from one military unit to another until finally she would be placed at Bearcat Base Camp.

Sam walked up to Domino, still basking in his triumph, blowing smoke from his cigarette. "What do you think, Domino?" He leered towards her. "Fancy giving the new Keg King a kiss for breaking the Keg record?"

Domino sucked her teeth sharply with the incisiveness of a parrot spitting. She said, "Go buy yourself some better smokes, Butcher. That thing smells like burning wrestlers' trunks."

"Shove it, Domino," said Sam inelegantly.

Domino was determined to have the last word. She said sweetly, "Know what, Butcher? I could go for a he-man like you. Matter of fact I wrote a song about you the other day. Care to hear its title? It's called "If I had to do it all over again, I'd do it all over you".

A bray of laughter came from some of the soldiers near Domino, even a small giggle from Michael. Sam glared at her as he continued his way into the barracks.

Many of the other soldiers they passed were either smoking cigarettes themselves, playing cards or huddled together in small groups chatting to themselves.

Sam approached one such group playing cards, a menacing expression across his face.

"We got ourselves a new Keg King, Hopper," Michael announced as he pulled up besides Sam.

"Yeah that's right!" yelled another soldier.

"Yeah. Eat it, Hopper," said another.

Jim, Tommy and Dave Moss peered back at their comrades in annoyance and Jim glared back at Sam. "Is that supposed to impress me?" Jim asked.

"Yeah, so why don't you piss off?" Tommy piped up, pointing his finger at Sam.

Sam took another drag of his cigarette and leaned in close to Jim. "If your pet monkey points at me again, I'm gonna break his fucking hand," he warned.

"What did you call me?" Tommy yelled. He was always quick to temper and preferred to settle arguments by fighting.

"Must be a little hard of hearing, are you?" Sam sneered.

Before Tommy could so much as raise his fist, Jim had already stepped in-between Tommy and Sam. "Leave it," he warned Tommy.

"But-" protested Tommy.

"I said leave it," repeated Jim calmly.

Tommy, knowing Jim's tone was absolute and he would have no chance of convincing his friend otherwise, nodded, moved away from Jim and took his seat back down on the floor with his cards rested beside him.

"Now back off," Jim said, turning back to face Sam who took another drag of his cigarette with amusement. The two men were so close to each other Jim could even see the cigarette packet sticking out of Sam's pocket. It's logo was of a green worm with a handsome anthropomorphic male face crawling out of a wholesome-looking red apple. Jim recognised the brand immediately. Red Apple Cigarettes (11). He had seen advertisements of the brand heavily in places like New York and Los Angeles.

"You actually smoke that shit?" He asked in disbelief. Last time he had tried a Red Apple cigarette it had been the worst cigarette he had ever tasted.

Sam's eyes flickered down to the packet and gave a little smile. "Better drag, more flavor, less throat burn," he said as he took another deep drag. (12) "You going to let your pet monkey fight your battles for you, Hopper?"

He gestured to the mat in the middle of their barracks where soldiers would spar with one another during their downtime. "A little pussy like you wouldn't last five seconds against me."

Jim stayed calm, but there was something unmistakably ominous just beneath the surface. "Let's find out," he said evenly.

"Suicide," Sam retorted.

"I think you're afraid."

Jim silently moved to the centre of the mat, wary that Sam would do whatever it took to win. A strategy was already forming in his head. Sam had shown that he was a fairly one-dimensional fighter. Against the uninitiated he could probably hold his own on the mat, but boxing was his preference. That was plain enough to see.

Sam was all smiles as he slapped one fist into the fleshy palm of the other. "I'm going to kick your ass, you little puke."

Jim brought his fists up close to his face like a boxer, elbows in tight. "And if you can't, Sam?"

"Oh! …there's no doubt. You're going down."

Jim drew him in. He feigned that he was out of position and allowed Sam to initiate the first salvo. Two slow left jabs were launched straight for Jim's face. Jim blocked them with his right hand and then ducked under a big hook that would have knocked him off his feet if it had connected. Jim changed directions and bobbed back to the left as Sam threw two hard jabs. The first one Jim dodged and the second one hit him in the hard shoulder. The blow was solid, but Jim played it up, intentionally stumbling to his right as if he were in trouble. Sam took the bait and charged in, his left hand trying to push Jim's hands out of the way so he could deliver a knockout blow with his right.

As Sam brought his fist up by his right ear, Jim sprang forward with such quickness that he caught Sam completely off guard. He grabbed the bigger man's left wrist with his right hand and threw up his left arm to block the coming punch. Jim launched himself at Sam, his head arching back and then whipping forward. His hard forehead slammed into the soft cartilage of Sam's nose, making a sickening crushing sound. Before Sam could counter, Jim wrapped his hands around the back of the big man's neck, pulling him down and in. Jim delivered two harsh knee strikes to the big man's sternum before releasing him. Sam staggered back, blood pouring from his nose, gasping for air.

"Sorry about that, Sam," Jim said, egging him on. "I didn't mean to break your nose."

"I'm going to fucking kill you," Sam screamed.

Jim simply motioned for Sam to bring it on.

The big man charged. Jim expected the bull rush. He feinted to his right and then back to his left, and as Sam lumbered by he hit him with a punch to the kidney which stood him up. Sam pivoted to meet the next blow, and rather than gain distance, Jim engaged, moving in and wrapping his left hand around the back of Sam's neck and his right hand around Sam's biceps. Sam reared his head back and was prepared to deliver a head butt of his own, but before he could strike, Jim did something that none of them expected. He jumped up in the air, swung his left leg under Sam's right armpit and then his right leg around Sam's neck as he allowed himself to fall to the mat. Jim was now upside down hanging on to Sam's left arm and pulling him down on top of him. Jim raised his hips, and the pressure toppled Sam to the mat.

Jim grabbed Sam's wrist with both hands. He twisted and pulled the arm until the elbow socket was on top of his right hip bone, and then he raised his hips while pulling down as hard as he could with his hands. Jim did not stop, even when Sam started to scream. The entire thing took under just two seconds. There was a loud pop, and then Jim released the arm, which was now bent at a very unnatural angle.

Jim got to his feet and looked down at Sam. The man was moaning, his entire body rigid with pain. Jim didn't smile or gloat. There was a touch of guilt over what he'd just done, but Sam was a bully and a jerk. Tommy nodded to Jim and flashed him the thumbs-up. Dave and Frank wandered over, each man quietly congratulating him for solving their problem. Michael Ehrmantraut was too busy attending to Sam, who was flopping around writhing in pain. Jim looked up and saw that General Wilson was standing near the doorway of their barracks. He had seen everything. Immediately, Jim, Tommy, Dave and Frank along with the rest of the soldiers all snapped to attention. The general's lips were pursed in thought as if he appeared to have drawn some conclusion about Jim. The only problem was, Jim couldn't tell if it was admiration or disappointment.

"Sir-" Frank, ever the responsible one, started to say but General Wilson held out his hand for silence.

Like Mary, Wilson had the gift of keeping the soldiers silent without effort. "Get dressed and make your way to the command centre immediately," he ordered. Wilson cast one final glance at both Jim and Sam before strolling out of the barracks leaving everyone in silence and wondering why all of a sudden the Commander wanted to see them.

---

20 minutes later, the group (excluding Sam) stood anxiously in front of Mary's oak desk as she gazed intently at each of them, studying their faces as if trying to know what they were thinking. Finally after a few minutes of this, Mary's eyes flickered away from them and she opened a brown folder bearing the Top Secret red star and selected a single sheet of paper. "This group," she began, "has been selected to participate in an important operation which, if successful, will bring the War in Vietnam to an end."

Though the group was silent, their brains were whirling into overdrive as they tried to process this news. They all know peace negotiation were underway right now in Paris and that there had been speculation of the United States putting a halt to the bombing taking place under Operation Rolling Thunder in hopes of encouraging to but an actual end to the entire war? Such a possibility felt fanciful, even impossible given how long America had already been fighting in the war.

"What I am about to share with you," Mary continued in a sterner tone of voice, "is, if it were known to the American public at large, very damaging to the reputation of several important political figures and therefore is considered very sensitive information. If any of you are caught or found to be sharing this information in letters to your loved ones back home or to anyone else in this camp regardless of the reason, you will be court-martialled and sent to prison for a very long time. Is that understood?"

A chorus of "yes ma'am" was her answer. Satisfied, Mary read from the sheet of paper:

"First, do any of you know of a woman named Anna Chennault?" When no one responded Mary continued, "She is the Chinese-born widow of wealthy businessman Claire Chennault. Born Chen Xiangmei in 1923 to a prosperous clan in Beijing, she and her family faced terrors and starvation during World War II, as they fled the Japanese invaders. Toward the end of the conflict, as a plucky, petite young war correspondent, she secured an interview with Claire Chennault, a leader of a renowned squadron of American aviators, the Flying Tigers. The general was three decades older than Chennault, but he left his wife and married the twenty-something journalist in 1947.

"The combat had ended in most of the world, but for China the victory over Japan was a prelude to civil war. Claire and Anna Chennault sided with the nationalist Chinese; Claire's post-war passenger and cargo airline (taken over, in due course, and named Air America by the CIA) ran missions for the anti-communist cause throughout Asia. But the nationalist forces could not contain their communist foes and were compelled to retreat to the island of Taiwan.

"After her husband's death in 1958, she retained control of his aviation company, which has substantial contracts to haul cargo from America to South Vietnam. She also," Mary paused as if trying to phrase the right words, "appears to have been enlisted by the current Republican presidential candidate Richard Nixon to open a direct channel of communication with the South Vietnamese president, Nguyen Van Thieu, in 1967."

Mary paused again to let her words sink in to the group in front of her. "The reason I am telling you all this is because Anna Chennault has passed word to South Vietnam President Thieu that if he boycotted planned peace talks in Paris, he could count on the support of a President Nixon."(13)

"But ma'am," a stunned Frank said whose jaw had dropped upon hearing the revelation, "that's a violation of the Logan Act."(14)

"It is indeed," Mary replied. "It appears that Nixon is trying to prevent a last-minute political bombshell by Johnson – the cessation of bombing North Vietnam – that would swing the election to Democratic Party candidate Hubert Humphrey. As president, Nixon would then, presumably, support Thieu's peace demands."

"If this is supposed to be so secret how do you know about it then?" Dave Moss asked.

"I know because MACV told me and MACV know because President Johnson knows. President Johnson knows about this because the FBI recorded a call from Chennault to the South Vietnamese ambassador to the United States Bui Diem. She "advised him that her boss…wanted her to give personally to the ambassador" a message to "hold on, we are gonna win." Vice President Humphrey also knows about this because LBJ shared it with him."

"So is Humphrey going to tell the American people about what Nixon is doing?" Jim asked.

For an instant Mary's multicoloured eyes stared hard at Jim. They stared right through his face to the back of his skull. Then the lids drooped, her X-ray ceased and Mary shook her head. "From what MACV have told me the Vice President has declined to make the information public, knowing it was classified, and he — incredibly — seems to doubt Nixon would be capable of engaging in such a nefarious undertaking."

"What bullshit!" shouted Tommy boisterously. "Nixon is playing with our lives here! Everyday this war goes on is a day one of us could get killed. If Johnson and Humphrey know about Nixon trying to sabotage these peace talks then they should call it out instead of keeping it secret!"

There were nods of agreements from many of the group but Mary quickly silenced them all with a stare. "What happens during the election is not our concern," she told them, "This is."

Mary reached into the brown folder and took out another single sheet of paper and a black and white photograph. It was of small, thin South Vietnamese man with glasses and short jet-black hair. The photograph appeared to have been taken from a distance as it showed him standing near the side watching President Thieu at a press conference.

She handed the picture to Frank who glanced at it then passed it along to the other soldiers next to him to look at.

"This is Giang Dai Duong, the chief of staff to President Thieu. He has been the one Bui Diem has been passing Anna Chennault's advice about boycotting the Paris peace talks who in turn passes it along to President Thieu. He frequents a club in Saigon. The details are here," Mary held up the second sheet of paper, "You will extract Mr. Duong from this club tonight and bring him to Bearcat alive so that I may persuade him to convince President Thieu to take part in the peace talks and finally end this war once and for all."

"Uh ma'am," Frank asked, "to kidnap the chief of staff to the President of a country we are allied with in the middle of a war? Isn't that going a bit….far? What if the South Vietnamese government find out?"

Now Mary's eyes bored into Frank and then drooped. "Should you be successful they won't find out at all." Mary got up from her chair. She placed both hands on her desk and leant forward. "I'll leave you to work out amongst yourselves your plan to extract Mr. Duong. Just make sure you do it quickly, quietly and effectively."

"In other words don't fuck it up," Frank retorted handing the photograph back to Mary.

"Precisely. Dismissed," Mary said as one by one the soldiers filed out of her room to plan ahead for the mission that lay ahead.

---

Chairs were lined up along the wall of the barracks. A bucket filled with beer and ice sat in front of the soldiers. Frank dimmed the lights and used a remote to turn to the projector's first image, a building surrounded by expensive cars. "This is Terry's– a very exclusive club in Saigon. Giang Dai Duong is a member and it's normally where he spends his evening. There are a few armed bouncers out front, but their role is more to keep out undesirables than to handle anything serious. Cameras inside. No other security that we're aware of."

"Can we get inside?" Jim asked.

"Not without being a member or being accompanied by a member."

"Then let's get a membership."

"Impossible," Frank said. "There's a waiting list a hundred people long and most of them have more money than Duong did."

"If you're so sure he's going there, why not snatch him off the road?" Tommy said.

"I know how you men like to break things," Domino interjected. "But let's not make this any harder than it is. Unless this is very different from the clubs I've been to, beautiful women don't need a membership. I'll go in, strike up a conversation with the chief of staff, and he'll invite me to a hotel. Then it's just a matter of a quick jab with a needle."

"I don't think that's going to work," Frank said.

"Why not?"

"Because while you're right about beautiful women getting around the membership rules, those women tend to be half your age."

Dave tensed, but said nothing. The two had developed a close brother-sister like relationship during Domino's time at Bearcat. Sure, Dave flirted with Domino but that was all it ever was, harmless flirting.

"There isn't a guy in there that wouldn't cut his left nut off to get Domino in bed. This is a no-brainer," Dave said.

"And if you're wrong?" Frank asked.

"Then we'll move on to plan B," Jim said. "But I don't see any drawbacks here."

"I believe Domino's plan to be a reasonable one," Frank said after careful consideration. "But just in case anything goes wrong we'll need a man inside the club as a backup."

"I'll do it," said the gruff voice of Michael Ehrmantraut as he went for a beer from the bucket.

"Good. I'll act as mission controller for the extraction from here. Jim, you'll be coordinating everything for me outside Terry's. Dave, you're our sniper in case things go wrong. Tommy, you'll be the getaway driver. As soon as we get Duong in the car, you drive like you've get the devil on your tail. Understood?"

Tommy nodded. "Sure. Trust me I got a lot of practice driving out of bad places fast," he said with a grin.

"If things go bad and we get separated for any reason, we all meet back here. Clear?"

Everyone nodded.

Frank turned back to look at the projector's image of Duong and said with grim determination, "Let's get this bastard."

---

"I am Giang Dai Duong."

Both Domino and Michael had microphones on them that fed through the BMW's sound system. Jim glanced at his watch when he heard Duong introduce himself to Domino. Eight minutes forty-two seconds since he'd walked into the club. She hadn't lost her touch.

He half listened to Domino's coy banter. There was no reason to worry or second-guess. She'd play with him for a while, get him worked up, and then inside of forty-five minutes they'd be on their way to her hotel suite.

Jim watched the flow of traffic, in and out, memorizing the positions of drivers waiting for their clients. It was impossible to tell how many were armed and how many just handled the wheel, but it paid to learn as much as possible about the operating environment.

The conversation droning from the speakers was the most interesting thing on the menu until two black sedans cruised up to the entrance. The light from the building passed through them, illuminating an interior that caught Jim's attention. Each contained two men in front and three wedged into the back. All were Vietnamese and appeared to be between twenty-five and forty. An advance security team for some heavy hitter? Jim glanced back, hoping to see a limo hanging back. Nothing.

"Dave. Are you seeing those two sedans?" he said.

"Yeah, I got them. What's up?"

"Probably nothing. But stay sharp."

The valets opened the doors and the men began stepping out, taking pains to stay facing the car. What were they hiding?

"Finger on the trigger, Dave."

"Who are these assholes?"

Jim opened his car door a couple inches. Finally one of the men was forced to move away from the vehicle in order to let the next one out. When he did, he opened his coat and swung an assault rifle into firing position.

"Take them!" Jim shouted, throwing the door fully open and leaping out.

The bouncers went down with the first bursts of automatic fire, followed quickly by three men and a young woman congregated at the entrance. The shooter who had pulled his gun first was slammed against the vehicle by what seemed to be an invisible force but it was in fact a round from Dave's fifty-calibre sniper rifle. Another was spun around when Jim hit him in the right shoulder blade, spraying rounds across the parking lot before dropping behind the lead sedan. Dave took out another across just as a group of drivers Jim had identified earlier–including the ones who had arrived with Duong–started running towards the building with guns drawn.

"Too soon," Jim said under his breath.

Six of the surviving shooters were going for the door, leaving one behind the vehicles in anticipation of the bodyguards coming up behind them. He fired on full automatic, mowing down all of them before they could get within fifteen yards. One of the drivers had hung back and was shooting over the hood of his car, but fear was getting the better of him. He ducked down to reload as Jim took careful aim at the man firing around one of the sedan's rear bumpers, but was forced to drive back into the car as three of the men about to enter the building concentrated fire on his position.

"Domino, Michael! You've got six men coming in on you." Jim said into his radio. "All armed with assault rifles."

He slid back out of the car and aimed between the window and the pillar at the lead sedan. The driver east of him had reloaded and was shooting again, but still not managing to hit anything. On the bright side, he was giving the shooters remaining outside something to shoot at.

Finally, the attacker went for better position and was forced to break cover for a moment. Jim's round hit him in the face while Dave's impacted his torso, dropping him on top of a dead parking attendant.

"Dave," Jim said. "See that bodyguard shooting from the cars east of our position? Pin him down. I don't want him coming up behind me."

By way of answer, Dave rammed a fifty-calibre round into the edge of the door the man was hiding behind. A good third of it was ripped off, and shrapnel sprayed across the asphalt. Apparently that was enough. He ran for the trees at the edge of the lot while Jim sprinted towards the building.

He kicked one of the doors and looked inside. Two bodies lay on the floor in the opulent entryway but it was otherwise empty. Gunfire echoed from deeper inside, with enough rounds expended to create a gunpowder haze in the air. He leapt over the bodies and passed two more corpses before coming out into the main bar area. Most people were on the ground or seeking cover behind overturned furniture. The scene seemed to slow as Jim swept his Tokarev from right to left. One shooter was down, likely the work of either Michael or Domino, but he could spot neither of them.

A man appeared from around the corner and began sprinting across the room. His extraordinary speed made him easy to identify.

Jim fired at Michael, missing his ear by only inches. His teammate didn't flinch or bother to look behind him to see if Jim had hit the Viet Cong who had been coming up from behind him. Instead, he swung his gun awkwardly towards a man shooting at a group of young people huddled in a corner booth. The seemingly desperate shot fired from beneath his arm hit the man in the neck, spraying blood across a massive mirror and crumpling him.

There were only three shooters left, and they seemed to recognize that the momentum of the battle had reversed. Instead of continuing to fire at every viable target, they were shouting at each other to spread out. This wasn't a random attack. They were looking for someone.

Jim ran towards the bar, grabbing an injured girl as he passed and shoving her beneath a table. He finally spotted Domino and Duong in the southeast corner of the building. She was screaming her head off while the chief of staff cowered behind. Her right hand was in her purse, undoubtedly wrapped around the Beretta 70 inside, but for the being she seemed content to play the damsel in distress.

A barrage of automatic fire began pounding the polished wood trim near her and Jim dove to the floor as she fired, hitting the attacker in the leg. Jim didn't bother to check his momentum, instead sliding towards the Viet Cong, zeroing in on Duong, who was so focused on his target that he didn't even notice Jim coming to a stop only inches away. Hopper was actually able to press the barrel of his weapon against the back of the attacker's head before pulling the trigger.

In his peripheral vision, Jim saw another Viet Cong using a young man as a human shield while he tried to get a bead on a fast-moving Michael Ehrmantraut. His teammate had a clear head shot but didn't take it; instead firing through the hostage's stomach and into the shooter's left him. Jim hit the shooter in the back of the head as he was falling away from his hostage.

That left one alive by his count. He was out of view, though, so that meant he was Michael's problem.

Jim sprinted to where Duong was now trying to wrestle the gun from Domino's hand. He grabbed the politician by his silk collar and shouted at him in Vietnamese. "Forget the whore, Mr. Duong. We have to get you out of here!"

"Who…who are you?"

"The President charged me with your safety, sir. Now get up. We have to go!"

Jim pulled the man to his feet and they started running toward the front door. Duong was terrified and unaccustomed to moving fast, causing him to stumble with nearly early other step. They were only a few feet from escaping when a shot sounded–not the undisciplined automatic fire that had been echoing off the walls since he'd entered, but a single, carefully aimed round. Duong's feet went out from under him, and Jim was forced to drag the man across the polished floor.

He was still conscious, but the wound in his lower back was bad enough that he wasn't going to be able to continue under his own power. Jim lifted him into a fireman's carry and head for the door, talking into the microphone hidden in his shirt cuff.

"Dave, I'm coming out carrying Duong."

"Roger that. You're clear to the car. Tell Tommy don't try to get out of the parking lot the way you came in, though. It's a complete clusterfuck. Tell him to back straight up and go through the bushes. If he doesn't hit any trees, it's about twenty yards to the road."

"Copy."

Very few people had managed to escape the building, but most of the ones who had were forgoing their vehicles and running for the edges of the property. That left Jim a clear path to Tommy's car and a welcome amount of privacy as he shoved the wounded politician through the side car door. A few moments later Jim was already in the passenger seat as Tommy had the engine started and was reversing through Terry's expensive landscaping. When the BMW finally jumped the curb into the street, Tommy drifted it 180 degrees and slammed it in Drive.

"Tommy, you've got a vehicle coming hard at you from the southwest corner of the lot. Might just be someone looking to tag along on your escape route, but I wouldn't beat on–"

Dave's voice was drowned out by the sound of automatic fire and the ring of impacts against the BMW's rear end.

"Can you do anything about them?" Jim asked.

"No angle. You're on your own, man."

Tommy pressed his foot to the floor and he and Jim were shoved back in their seats as the vehicle accelerated down a sweeping hill.

The stench in the car suggested that one of Duong's intestines had been punctured, and Jim glanced over at him. The pallor was obvious even in the dim glow of the instrument lights, as was the amount of blood that was soaking into the upholstery. More concerning, though, was the sedan in the rearview mirror. There was a man standing up through the sunroof, and Jim could see the gleam of his weapon. So far they were out of range, but the driver was talking insane chances, nearly rolling over the steep embankment to the right every time he cornered.

"Did you hear those men speak, sir?" Jim said. "My guess is they're Viet Cong. And there's no question that they are after you personally."

"Hospital," he responded weakly. "Hospital…"

Jim had seen enough people in similar shape to know that he wasn't going to make it. This would be a short interrogation and he needed the man to focus. To that end, he nodded to Tommy, who eased up on the accelerator and the let the sedan get close enough for the shooter to shatter their rear window.

Duong's feeble scream mixed with the roar of the BMW's engine as Tommy accelerated again.

"Your wound doesn't look serious," Jim lied. "And I think we can lose the men chasing us, but it'll be hard to hide you from them–they know that we will have to take you to a hospital. Why are they after you? Do you know anything we can use? The President has made it clear that you're to be kept safe at all costs."

Duong started to cry. "I…I betrayed them."

"Who? Who did you betray?"

"I gave money to the Viet Cong. I supported their efforts…" His voice faded. For a moment Jim thought he was dead, but a volley from behind jerked him back to consciousness.

"Lieu Khac Viet! It has to be."

"The Deputy Treasurer of South Vietnam?"

Duong nodded and then coughed violently, spraying the back of the front seat with blood. "He and I have been draining treasury money to supply to the Viet Cong for months in secret. But then when I was told by Bui Diem from the Chennault women that Nixon would be much harsher on the communists if he won in the US I was worried I would be found out. So I told Viet I was out. He…he must have told the Viet Cong and they decided to come after me," he responded, weakening quickly.

"What about President Thieu? Did you tell him not to attend the peace talks?"

Duong didn't respond.

"Answer me!" Jim shouted. "Did you pass on from Bui Diem and Mrs. Chennault to Thieu not to go to these peace talks?"

"The hospital," Duong said in a voice that was barely audible. "You have to get me to the hospital."

He didn't have much more time. Tommy tightened his hands on the wheel and focused on putting a little distance between them and the chasing vehicle. He wasn't going to be able them completely, though. The sedan was a surprisingly capable car, and the man behind the wheel was either going to stay on their tail or die trying.

Jim seemed to realize that too as he suddenly ordered, "Stop the car."

"Are you crazy? These bastards are right on us," Tommy replied.

"Just do it."

"Your funeral." Tommy hammered his foot onto the brake pedal, slamming Duong against the passenger seat. Tommy kept his eyes on the headlights growing in his rearview mirror as Jim stepped out of the car.

"What are you doing?" Duong managed to say before Jim threw open the side car door and shoved him out.

"Stop! What–"

Jim climbed back into the car and instructed Tommy to drive on.

"We were given very clear orders to bring Duong back to base. We can't leave him there!" Tommy argued.

"He's close to death anyway. These guys are going to follow us until they get their hands on him. You want to lead them back to Bearcat be my guest," Jim retorted. "Now drive!"

"Fine. But it's your ass on the line not mine," Tommy reminded him as he accelerated away, turning on the stereo and leaving Duong lying in the road. In their rear-view mirror, Jim saw the sedan come to a stop in front of the chief of staff, illuminating him in its headlights as the man in the sunroof emptied a full clip into him. After that, they hooked a U and disappeared back up the road.

With their immediate problem solved, Jim spoke to Frank over the radio.

"Jim! What the hell happened? Are you alright?"

"Tommy and I are both fine. We were attacked. They were after Duong."

"Shit. Where are you?"

"About seven miles south of Terry's, getting ready to head back," Tommy added.

"No, don't. All the shooters are down and Domino and Michael are out."

"Do they need a pickup?"

"They'll be fine on foot."

"What about Dave?"

"He's already on his way back. Did you get Duong?"

"I lost him."

"What do you mean, "lost him"? He's not a set of keys! How could you have lost him?"

Jim turned to look at Tommy who glared back at him. "Long story."

---

Frank was waiting out the front of the barracks as the BMW drove up to him. Tommy turned off the ignition and he and Jim climbed out of the vehicle and approached Frank, who stared back at them intently.

"What the hell happened there? Where is Duong? And don't give me that crap that you "lost him" alright? Because I know that's a bullshit excuse," Frank demanded.

"He got shot during the escape."

"Well did you get him to a hospital?"

"It was too late. He had already lost a lot of blood," Jim reported solemnly.

"Well then where's his body? Is it in the BMW?" Frank asked.

"Nope. Jim left him behind on the middle of the road for the Viet Cong to shoot him," Tommy answered before Jim could.

"Are you fucking kidding me?!" Frank said in disbelief, his face turning a bright red of anger.

So much for loyalty, Jim thought shooting a quick glare Tommy's way. "The Viet Cong weren't going to stop until they either caught us or killed Duong. I had to make a decision and I did," he replied.

"Our orders were to bring him back alive," Frank retorted through gritted teeth.

"Kind of hard when he was bleeding out in front of me," Jim muttered.

A second BMW rolled up to the barracks. Domino stepped out. "Hey there boys," she said with a wave. Aside from her slightly dishevelled hair, it was impossible to tell she'd just been in the middle of a firefight. Domino looked around expectedly. "Where is Duong?"

"Dead. Jim here let the Viet Cong finish him off," Frank told her, still glaring at Jim.

Domino swore softly in Italian. "So all of that was for nothing?" she asked.

"No," a defiant Jim protested. "Before I gave him to the Viet Cong he told me he had been working with the Deputy Treasurer Lieu Khac Viet to supply Treasury money to the Viet Cong."

Frank's face now switched from rage to mild curiosity. "The Deputy Treasurer you say?"

Jim nodded. "That's right. He said they had been doing it for months. But it was only after being told by Bui Diem from Chennault that Nixon would be much harsher on the communists if he won the election that he told Viet he was out. The Viet Cong must have found out and decided to come after him," he explained.

"That's nothing we couldn't have learnt if he were alive," Tommy remarked.

Dave arrived next and like everyone else was not happy to learn Jim had left Duong on the road to die. Ironically Dave turned out to be the most aggressive of the group shouting several obscenities at Jim. Clearly Tommy's use of colourful language has rubbed off on him, Jim thought.

"What the fuck were you thinking? We practically risked our lives to grab Duong and you just fucking left him there for the commies to finish off!" Dave shouted.

"He was already dying! There was nothing I could do," Jim retorted, his voice rising now in anger. "If we took him to a hospital they would have followed us there and attacked the hospital. Is that what you would have wanted? More dead?"

"Michael isn't back yet," injected Domino loudly to get everyone's attention as she looked around the courtyard. She wasn't right; Michael hadn't arrived back at Bearcat.

"I thought he was with you?" Dave asked Domino, his voice returning to its normal tone as he realised the absence of one of their teammates.

Domino shook her head. "No I thought he was with you," she replied.

"Great. Now I have a member of this group missing. Just what we need," Frank complained loudly.

No sooner had the words come out of Frank's mouth then the third BMW appeared in the distance of the camp, its headlights illuminating everything in the vehicle's path. The group watched as the vehicle sped towards them, finally stopping inches from where they all stood. The driver's door swung open and Michael stepped out, his shirt covered in dried blood. He said nothing to anyone as he walked over to the passenger side door, opened it and pulled out a bound and gagged Viet Cong man. He had clearly got the worst of the fight.

Michael dragged the prisoner out of the side door and shoved him hard on the ground in front of everyone. "Bastard put up a hell of a fight. Luckily I'm better," he said it not as a boast but as a fact. "Now we can interrogate him and find out why they were after the chief of staff." His eyes swept around the courtyard. "Where is he?"

"Dead," Jim answered automatically before anyone else could.

Michael swore violently. "So much for getting him back here," he said sardonically.

"You can thank Jim for that," Dave revealed pointing his finger at Jim. "Son of a bitch all but handed him to the Viet Cong to kill!"

Michael's eyes flashed over to Jim enraged. "You did what?" The words were barely out of his mouth before his fist came out of nowhere and collided with Jim's face. Jim staggered but didn't go down. Instead he ducked the next punch that came his way and sent a big hook that knocked Michael off his feet as soon as it connected.

"You fucking bastard!" Michael shouted as he got to his feet and raised his fists up close to his face like a boxer. But before he could swing another punch at Jim, Frank had stepped in-between the two man.

"Enough!" He commanded. "We have to fight the enemy not each other."

Michael lowered his fists and glared pointedly at Jim. "Doesn't matter. I'm not the one who's going to have to tell the Commander about this clusterfuck," he reminded Jim.

---

A few minutes later the group once again stood before Mary in her command centre. This time Mary's business-like tone was replaced with a fury almost unmatched by anything Tommy, Dave or even Michael could have unleashed on Jim.

"What were the words I used to describe how I wanted this extraction to go?" She asked to no one in particularly as she paced back and forth in front of them. Not waiting for an answer she responded, "Quickly, quietly and effectively. But did you do that? No! Instead this fuck-up is being talked about on pretty much every television channel in the world. Everyone knows about it. MACV knows, hell LBJ probably knows about it!"

"Sixteen dead," she continued. "More than that wounded. The authorities are holding back the names, but an unofficial list is starting to circulate. There are some very wealthy and powerful men on there. Hence the attention."

"Ma'am those shooters were specifically after Duong. Most likely Viet Cong," Frank said stiffly. "They took us by surprise."

Mary let out a bitter laugh. "Jesus Christ!" She yelled as she slammed her fist down on her desk. "Do I need to fucking hold your hand? Did it not occur to any of you that the Viet Cong would be after him?" She took a deep breath and in a calmer voice added, "The only silver lining in this debacle is the shooter Mr. Ehrmantraut brought to us for interrogation."

Michael nodded at the mention of his accomplishment.

Not to be outdone Jim retorted, "What about the information I got out of Duong that he and the South Vietnamese Deputy Treasurer Lieu Khac Viet were stealing government money to give to the Viet Cong? That must count for something! Have the authorities arrested Viet?"

Once again Mary's eyes stared right through Jim's face to the back of his skull. "The Deputy Treasurer has left the country," she explained.

"What?" Jim exclaimed.

"This house was emptied by the time authorities arrived. Everything gone, no trace left of the man. President Thieu has already announced there will be a internal government investigation as to why and how both the chief of staff to the President and the Deputy Treasurer were able to get away with stealing government money and giving it to the Viet Cong without anyone noticing for several months," Mary continued.

"Of course," she added. "Such an investigation would be more helpful if Duong was alive." She continued to glare pointedly at Jim.

"It was my decision alone, ma'am. No one else's. If you're going to punish anyone it should be me. Not them," Jim said defiantly.

Mary's eyes never left Jim's face. "Everyone but Mr Hopper is dismissed," she said softly.

Tommy, Dave, Michael, Frank and Domino nodded and one by one left the room, Michael giving Jim a death stare as he passed him.

Mary sat down in her chair and motioned for Jim to sit as well. Her previous hard look was gone. Now she seemed…tired, almost exhausted. "What would you like to drink?"

"What?" said Jim, quite sure he had misheard her.

"To drink, Mr Hopper," she said, in a bored, flat voice. "Tea? Coffee?"

"Beer, thanks," said Jim, shrugging.

Mary got up from her chair and walked over to a small mini-fridge near the side of the room. She opened it, took out a single beer and handed it to Jim.

"I don't myself drink or smoke, Mr Hopper. Smoking I find the most ridiculous of all varieties of human behaviour and practically the only one that is entirely against nature. Can you imagine a cow or any animal taking a mouthful of smouldering straw then breathing in the smoke and blowing it through its nostrils? Pah!" Mary showed a rare trace of emotion. "It is a vile practice. As for drinking, I am something of a chemist and have yet to find a liquor that is free from traces of a number of poisons, some of them deadly, such as fusel oil, acetic acid, ethylacetate, acetaldehyde and furfurol. A quantity of some of these poisons taken neat would kill you. In the small amounts you find in a bottle of liquor they produce various ill effects most of which are lightly written off as "a hangover"." Mary paused as she drank a glass of water.

"I'll try to remember that," Jim replied.

Mary glanced at him sharply. "So Jim," she said in a formal tone that immediately put Jim on edge. "What should I do about your disobedience? As you yourself said you took it upon yourself to make the decision to leave Mr Duong on the middle of the road to die at the hands of the Viet Cong chasing after you."

"And as I said before the man had already been shot! He was dying!" Jim was beginning to get frustrated having to repeat this now for a third time.

Mary seemed to be enjoying his rising frustration as if she were a vampire feeding off blood. "It didn't occur to you to take Mr Duong to a hospital?" she asked matter-of-fact.

"He had lost too much blood. There was no point! If I had actually gone to a hospital the Viet Cong would have followed us there and killed even more people," Jim said through gritted teeth.

Mary sighed and took another drink of water. "I believe you," she admitted. "Tell me do you have any family back home waiting for you?"

Jim paused. Why would she want to know that? "My fiancé. She's pregnant. We're very excited," he said, carefully not to give her too much information.

"Boy or girl?"

"Boy," Jim said.

Mary's entire demeanour had changed. She no longer had the air of a strict principal about to punish a rule breaking student. Now she was relaxed, happy…almost jovial. But Jim wasn't letting his guard down.

"How about you?" he asked cautiously. "Do you have family waiting for you back stateside?"

Mary's demeanour changed yet again. Now she appeared slightly wistfully and regretful. Her eyes seemed to stare off into the distance as if remembering something or someone. "I guess you could say that. I have quite a number of brothers and sisters," she said, her eyes still fixed in the distance.

"Must be a big family," Jim noted.

Mary shrugged absentmindedly. "I suppose so. I-I have a brother. His name is Henry. Everyone else is scared of him. Except me," she said, letting out another bitter laugh. "I suppose that's why he doesn't like me much. He knows I'm not easy to control or hurt as the others are. Just as I was about to board the helicopter to take me to Andrews Air Force Base Henry came up to me and whispered in my ear that I better end up dying in Vietnam otherwise when I returned to the United States he would kill me." Her eyes seemed to widen in fear as she recalled the memory before finally settling to face Jim.

"I think that was the first time I was afraid of him. He must have got a kick out of that."

Mary seemed to compose herself and stood up from her desk. She turned and walked over to the large map of Vietnam that occupied the wall space behind her desk. Mary stared at it intently for a few minutes before noticing that Jim was still in the room. "You know, I really hoped with these peace talks happening over in Paris we might have a breakthrough. That we might finally be able to go home." She sighed longingly.

"A war is fought, land is gained and land is lost. A war ends. The media caravan moves on to somewhere else. But as for the person that's lost a son or a daughter in that war forever more — they're going to be thinking on their birthdays what they could have done, what they would have achieved, where they would have been, what they'd be doing now. The hurt goes on and on through their lives.

"Nobody actually ever wins a war. Even having a war is a defeat for all of us. And so the question is how to halt the wars as quickly as possible and move on to a process of peace, understanding, and recognition," Mary said with an eloquence in her voice befitting Abraham Lincoln or Franklin Roosevelt.

"I've been fighting this war too long Jim," she continued. "But, ultimately, it's all I have. You're dismissed now. Don't worry about being court-martialled. I'll decide your punishment eventually." She left it hanging like a threat.

Jim nodded, got to his feet and turned to leave. Before he had reached the door Mary's voice called out. "Oh and the next time you feel like breaking Mr Butcher's arms during a fight, don't. I need all of my soldiers in one piece including him. Is that understood?"

Jim raised his head in understanding and quietly left the room.

---

Later that night, Mary walked into a circular building with a doomed roof and a tower. This had once been a chapel. Mary had found faded pictures of various saints on some of the walls and there had even been a stained-glass window.

The intro was brightly lit and kept at a pleasant temperature by several air conditioning systems. The walls were now all white and specially thick, to keep out the heat. There were machines everywhere: television monitors, different-sized boxes with dials and gauges. In the middle of all this, trapped in a pool of brilliant light, the shooter that Michael had brought back sat in a leather dentist's chair, tied to it by soft cords around his ankles and wrists. He was wearing only boxer shorts. Dozens of wires had been attached to him – to his head, his chest, his pulse, his abdomen– held in place by sticky tape. The prisoner was about thirty years old and he was trying not to look afraid. He was failing.

General Wilson and Dr Sulu both stood next to the prisoner, expectedly. Wilson's face was flushed with excitement while Dr Sulu kept his face impassive apart from a glint in his eyes. There was a trolley draped in a white cloth next to the dentist's chair. Mary nodded at Dr Sulu, who wheeled it round and uncovered it to reveal a series of knives lined up in a neat rows, each one a different shape and size, gleaming in the harsh light. There were other instruments too: swabs and silver bowls, hypodermic syringes, vials containing liquids that were colourless but somehow didn't look like water. The prisoner saw this. He tried not to see any emotion. But his naked skin crawled.

Mary pulled up three stools as she, Wilson and Sulu sat down.

The prisoner spoke something in Vietnamese. Mary shook her head. "No, no English," she said sounding like a disapproving parent.

"You…are the demon lady," the prisoner gasped.

Mary laughed. "Oh my god is that what they're calling me? I mean I'm honoured to have gotten such a nickname from the Viet Cong," she said. "It is always nice to be known. I suppose it's better to be feared then loved, right?"

Wilson and Sulu nodded.

"I know what you do to my countrymen," the prisoner spat. "Put demons in their heads."

"Close enough," Mary said. "Now since you seem to know about me I think it's only fair I get to know about you, don't you think?"

"I'm not going to tell you anything."

Mary shrugged. "We'll see. In any case, I'm sure you're wondering what on earth this contraption in front of me is. Well since I can never answer this question I'll let Dr Sulu here explain, since he invented it. Take it away doctor," she gestured to Sulu who nodded in appreciation.

"Thank you as always. It occurred to me some years ago that everything in this world is measured and that many of these measurements have been named after the great engineers. The most obvious example is the watt, which measures electricity, and which was named after James Watt, the inventor of the modern steam engine. Joule and Newton were both physicists and have been immortalized in the measurement of energy: joules and Newton's. Every day we measure the atmospheric heat in either Fahrenheit or Celsius. The first is named after a German physicist, the second a Swedish astronomer.

"We measure distance and height and speed and brightness. If you wish to buy from a shoe to a sheet of paper, you will ask for it by size. But here is the strange thing. There has never been a measurement for something we experience almost every day of our lives. There has never been a measurement for pain.

"Can you imagine how useful it would be if you went to the dentist and he was able to reassure you? "Don't worry, my dear fellow, this is only going to hurt two and a half units". Or if you went to the doctor with a damaged knee and were able to tell him that it hurt three units down here, but seven units up here, above the knee? Of course, it is very difficult to measure pain. It all depends on how our nerves react and what the stimulus is – knife, electricity, fire, acid – that has caused the pain. But I still believe it is possible to develop a universal scale. And you're going to help us figure that out."

"Dr Sulu is going to be attempting to measure how much pain you are able to handle. General Wilson is here to watch. You see he gets off on seeing people in pain. Oh he's not a sadist by any means if that's what you're thinking. No when I say "gets off" I mean stimulation sexually. Isn't that right, General?" Mary asked, her face turning to General Wilson.

The general nodded. "Everyone's got their vice," he said already gripping his genital area through his pants in anticipation.

"As for me I'm here to get you to talk. And," Mary paused and allowed a smile to cross her face, "to get to use my powers every once and a while. Because you're right; I do put demons in your countrymen's heads. Let me show you."

Mary held out her hand in concentration towards her prisoner as drops of blood slowly fell down from her nose.

Moments later the needles on the various monitors leapt forward as the first screams rang out into the night.

---

Well it is done! After two months chapter 16 is completed!

This chapter was very much inspired and influenced by the Tom Cruise Mission Impossible films and Quentin Tarantino's film Inglorious Bastards. I wanted to show what everyday life in Vietnam was like for Jim Hopper as well as introduce some of his teammates and explore who they each are, how each of them interacts with the other and the different ways they ended up serving in Vietnam. All but three are original characters of mine.

There was also a ton of James Bond references in this chapter. Been listening to several audio original Ian Fleming James Bond books during the writing of this chapter and decided to include nods to some of them. A reminder that those books and the events that happened are real and did happen in this crossover universe as are all of the characters.

I hope you enjoyed the action parts in this chapter. They took me a long time to write.

Oh and the Henry Mary is referring to in her conversation with Jim is of course Henry Creel/001 from Season 4 of Stranger Things.

Here are some end-notes that I must explain:

(1) Julius No is the titular villain in the Ian Fleming James Bond book "Dr No"

(2) The Phoenix Program was a brutal counterinsurgency program run by William Colby, later head of the C.I.A., aimed at weeding out Viet Cong and their sympathizers. According to some sources, more than 25,000 suspected Viet Cong were killed, many of them assassinated, as part of the operation. The program was in operation between 1965 and 1972, and similar efforts existed before and after that period.

(3) The U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam or MACV was the joint-service command of the United States Department of Defense. MACV was created on 8 February 1962,in response to the increase in United States military assistance to South Vietnam.

(4) Sam Butcher is the father of Billy Butcher from the Amazon streaming service show The Boys.

(5) Michael Ehrmantraut is a character from the shows Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. Both shows also take place in this crossover.

(6) SMERSH, a contraction of Smiert Spionam – Death to Spies– did exist in the Soviet Union. The organization features heavily in Ian Fleming's James Bond books.

(7) Le Chiffre is the main antagonist in Ian Fleming's first ever James Bond novel Casino Royale.

(8) Mr. Big is the main antagonist in Ian Fleming's second James Bond novel Live and Let Die. He is also an agent of SMERSH in the book.

(9) Auric Goldfinger is also the main antagonist in Ian Fleming's seventh James Bond novel Goldfinger. He is also, like Le Chiffre and Mr. Big, an agent of SMERSH in the book.

(10) Dominetta "Domino" Vitali is the main female character in Ian Fleming's James Bond book Thunderball. The subsequent information about her is taken from that novel.

(11) Red Apple Cigarettes are featured heavily in all of Quentin Tarantino's films. I'm also including those films as having really happened in this crossover.

(12) This line is said in the credits scene of the Tarantino film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood by Rick Dalton in a commercial for Red Apple Cigarettes.

(13) All of is true. Richard Nixon did use Anna Chennault to convince President Thieu of South Vietnam not to attend the Paris peace talks in 1968 so that he could win in the November Presidential election that year.

(14) The Logan Act is 1799 statute forbidding U.S. citizens from interfering with the diplomatic negotiations of the U.S. government.

Please don't forget to read and leave a review. Your reviews give me life! They give inspiration! And they make me want to keep writing for more than just myself! Thank you for your continued support and please enjoy!