Fields of Fire Read online

  But first there was Vietnam.

  * From the song “Until It's Time For You to Go,” by Buffy Sainte-Marie, ©Copyright 1965, 1973 by Gypsy Boy Music, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

  3

  Hodges began processing in Da Nang. At Division headquarters, he and several other new Lieutenants were granted a quick audience with the Assistant Division Commander, then briefed by a string of Colonels regarding the Division's area of operations. One of the Colonels produced a detailed map, on which he had carefully placed a mass of dots, one for each enemy contact in a certain place. The map was loaded with dots. In some places they were speckles, like polka dots, and in others they gathered to make large red smears.

  The red dots reminded Hodges of blood, and their collective presence was like a slap that awakened him to the reality of the bush. They were only dots, but each one, according to the Colonel, represented someone killed or wounded. The Twenty-Fifth Marines area of operations, where Hodges was headed, was a large red smear.

  The first night he lay on a mildewed cot inside a tent at the Motor Transport battalion's compound, which housed Division transients. On a far ridge, all night long, a .50-caliber machine gun expended ammunition in deep burps. Shadows from distant flares lit one side of the wall, on and off, and Hodges felt vulnerable, naked in his ignorance. He didn't have the slightest idea why the .50-cal kept firing while the compound where he slept was not even on alert. It irritated him. He was finally in Vietnam, but he wasn't a part of it.

  The following morning he and two others took a convoy from Da Nang to the combat base at An Hoa. It was a journey into darkness and primitivity, as little by little the comparatively lush surroundings of Da Nang fell by the wayside. Strings of American bases and well-kept villages gave way to wide, ruptured fields, saturated with little ponds, permanent bomb craters from the years of war. The multitude of gravestones and pagodas beginning just outside Da Nang bore chips and divots from a hundred thousand bullets. Hodges could make out old fighting holes along many of the ridges, where units had dug into their night perimeters months and years before. He felt young, even more naive, a stranger to an ongoing game that did not demand or even need his presence.

  At Liberty Bridge, the Vu Gia and Thu Bon rivers joined, isolating the An Hoa Basin from the rest of civilized Vietnam. The convoy crossed the river on a pull barge, one truck at a time. There was no bridge at Liberty Bridge. The old bridge had been blown by the VC years before, and the new bridge was not yet completed. On the far side of the rivers, after they passed a combat base that sat on a large J-shaped hill, was land as chewed and devastated as the pictures Hodges had seen of Verdun. Whole treelines were torn out by bombs. All along the road were tatters of villages that had been ripped apart by the years of fighting. Fields were porous with bomb and mortar craters. The scattered hootches that served as homes for the villagers were no more than straw thatch, often patched with C-ration cardboard, appended to large earthen mounds where the families that remained hid from the battles.

  The convoy road ended at An Hoa. There was nothing beyond the combat base but the mountains, across the river, which stretched all the way to Laos. The enemy owned the mountains. Hodges quickly comprehended the isolation, studying the wasted terrain on all sides of the narrow convoy road. It was as if the convoy had passed through a distance-warp when it barged across the river, and had ended up a million miles from Da Nang.

  An Hoa, for all its red dust and oven heat, seemed an oasis. He watched the base as the convoy approached, attempting to distinguish its structure. None was apparent. An outpost appeared, surrounded by reams of concertina and barbed wire, then another. The tents of the larger base were packed onto one red hill, then fell into a draw and continued on another bald ridge. Hodges remembered that it was a futile effort to attempt to find order, that An Hoa was merely another legacy passed on from French times, turned into an American base because there had already been an airstrip capable of use.

  There's barbed wire, he finally decided, surveying a wounded countryside swollen with anger. That'll do for starters.

  MORE processing in An Hoa. Regiment to battalion to company. He dragged his Valpac from place to place, receiving instructions about how to be a Good Lieutenant. His stateside utilities became completely soaked from his sweat. Finally the company supply clerk brought him to the supply tent, where he stored his Valpac and was issued jungle utilities and boots, a flak jacket, a helmet, and the full ration of combat gear. His new boots were embarrassingly unscuffed. His flak jacket was too bright a shade of green, undulled by the dust of the Basin, which penetrated every type of weave known to man. But, finally, he could begin to blend in.

  That night the base was mortared and he shared a small bunker with four other men and a few fleeting rats. He heard the mortars fall in random bursts across the base and could not fight back a feeling about how neat it was. By God, he pondered, leaning like an unconcerned old-timer against the bunker wall, it's finally happening to me.

  The next day, as he was walking to an indoctrination class with another new Lieutenant, the base was rocketed. He sprinted to a dry ditch and dove in, feeling like a true combat veteran. One rocket landed perhaps fifty meters away, directly on top of a tent, and he began composing in his own mind how he would put that into a letter to someone. But then he climbed out of the ditch and almost stepped on the severed hand of a man who had been inside the tent. It lay on the road, in perfect condition, having been blown more than a hundred feet by the rocket's explosion. The man's wedding ring was in perfect place. Someone from near the tent shouted that the First Sergeant was dead.

  And it wasn't fun anymore.

  On his second night in An Hoa he was awakened by a company clerk who told him that the company was in contact, and asked him if he wanted to watch. It was past midnight. He couldn't quite understand the man's meaning. Do I want to watch, he pondered over and over, gathering his flak jacket and helmet and weapon. Do I want to watch. Why? Is it on TV?

  But he dutifully followed the man and joined several clerks from the company office on top of a large sandbag bunker. They pointed north, across the river, and he followed their fingers as his eyes searched into the hell that was known as the Arizona Valley.

  And he sat, feeling slightly obscene, as if he were a peeping tom to someone's private doings, and watched his company dying across the river. Red and green tracers interlaced and careened into the black night air. Mortars and B-40 rocket-propelled grenades flashed and impacted, spewing dirt with whumps that he could hear from the three-mile distance he was watching. Illumination flares dangled like tiny streetlights in the distance.

  He was washed with a mix of helplessness and fear that overrode any emotion he had ever experienced, and continued to stare, an armchair spectator to the sport of dying. And tomorrow, he said over and over as he watched, tomorrow that will be my very own Vietnam.

  4

  Ogre was bleeding right outside the hole. Lying there, inching through the dust, grinning for a fat man's ass.

  Not supposed to be grinning.

  I'll bet that mother's stoned again, fretted Snake. Then he doubted himself. Been out on the listening post for five hours, now. Wouldn't smoke on no LP. Not out here. Not even Ogre. Then he double-doubted himself. Maybe Ogre would. Crazy fucker. He peered across an eternity of dust that began abruptly at the edge of his fighting hole. Ogre was fifteen feet away. Ogre peered back, the ugly square face grinning, yes grinning, behind the droopy moustache.

  “Hey-y-y-y, Snake. You seen Baby Cakes?”

  Came from the bomb crater. That's close, mused Snake. But they won't get any closer. Too late for them. We got 'em stopped.

  An illumination flare popped in front of him and floated down on its parachute, brightening the distant treeline. It swung lazily, a phosphorescent pendulum. Snake peeped the crater in the flare's dim light. Fifty feet away, maybe. The flare flickered once, twice, and was out. Another grenade exploded in front of the hole.
Ogre screamed again. He was maybe two feet closer.

  “Snake. Heyyyy, man. Where's Baby Cakes?”

  Machine gun from the treeline again. The rounds ripped through the perimeter like a daisy chain of cherry bombs. Got to find Phony. Snake bolted to the next hole, a quick crabwalk.

  “Phony!”

  Phony grinned earnestly, chewing C-rat gum, as if he were expecting some insane or at least irresponsible request from Snake, and grooving on it. “What's Ogre doing, man?”

  Snake shrugged impatiently, his eyes on the crater. “Looking for Baby Cakes. Listen. See that crater?” Phony nodded. “There's four, maybe five gooks in it. We been keeping 'em down but we can't put any rounds out now. Might hit the LP Christ knows where they are, with Ogre back here. Chuck a couple in the crater. OK?” Phony nodded again, still grinning, but concentratedly now. “And don't throw too hard. LP's somewhere on the other side. Hear?” Phony nodded yet again, apparently unconcerned. He was the only member of the squad with the accuracy to pull it off.

  Another illumination round popped behind the tree-line and Phony raised his head six inches out of his hole and peeped the crater. He gestured to Snake, popping his gum crazily. No sweat. He prepared two grenades. Snake crawled quickly back to his own hole. AK-47 bullets followed him. They raised dust near Ogre, too. But they were fired from the treeline, two hundred yards away, and most of them went high, into the center of the perimeter. Ogre screamed again. He was another foot closer.

  “Where's Baby Cakes?”

  Phony arched a grenade expertly, like a free throw. Boom. It was harvest time, the ground was brick hard, and shrapnel saturated the crater. There was a frantic, sibilant chattering inside it. Boom. The second grenade impacted, and the crater was suddenly silent. Snake smiled grimly. What the hell did they expect, snooping up so close? They're in the hurt locker now.

  “Hey-y-y-y, Snake!”

  Ogre. The flare went out and it was dark again, not even a moon. That's why we're in trouble, Snake remembered. Beware the no-moon night. He paused for a moment and then jumped out of his hole and stood nakedly in the black, pulling Ogre by the arms. Ogre screamed. It hurt.

  “Shut up.”

  Another group of enemy opened up from just across a narrow, scraggly field, behind a paddy dike. The sound of bullets was terrifying but the rounds went high again. Snake pulled hard. In the next hole Cannonball fired his grenade launcher steadily, a smooth rhythm of blooper balls exploding near the dike. On the other side, Cat Man's team laid down a steady base of small arms fire. No sweat. Snake jumped back into his fighting hole and rolled Ogre over the top of him.

  “Where you hit?”

  Ogre grinned confidingly. “I'm O.K., man. Yeah.” He looked around, the ugly face relaxed. “Now. Where's Baby Cakes?”

  Ogre's trouser legs were soaked. Snake ripped one of them apart. Long gashes, deep, pulsing holes covered Ogre's thighs. Snake screamed up the hill, toward the command post. “Corpsman up!”

  Doc Rabbit was already in Cat Man's hole. He crawled heavily to Snake. Pop. Another illum flare burst. Doc climbed into the hole with Snake and started to dress Ogre's legs. Ogre continued the amused, chiding grin. “Hey-y-y-y, Doc. I'm O.K. Go take care of Vitelli, man. He is all fucked up.”

  Baby Cakes sprinted the fifteen meters from Cat Man's hole, holding his helmet on his head with one hand, staying very low. He was a thick-necked, powerful shadow that belly-slid up to Ogre when more rounds went off. He drawled out abruptly: “What you want, Ogre?”

  Ogre warmed to Baby Cakes. He seemed to be enjoying the mystery he had provoked. “Baby Cakes. There you are, man! Vitelli wants you, man. He just keeps saying, ‘Go get Baby Cakes,’ you know every five seconds. ‘Go get Baby Cakes, go get Baby Cakes.’ So finally I said, ‘All right, motherfucker, I'll go get Baby Cakes.’ Hey. Vitelli is all fucked up, man. So is Homicide. Hey, Doc. I'm O.K. You go help Vitelli and Homicide, man. They are all fucked up.”

  Artillery on the treeline. Crrrunch. Crrrunch. Round after round. A battery, six cannons, unloading on the tree-line, from distant places like An Hoa and the Bridge and Hill 65. They all crouched, watching tautly, silently. Get some, artillery.

  The low drone of a propeller-driven airplane emanated from the direction of Da Nang, so far west and north that it was from another world. Snake listened carefully. Will it be Spooky or Basketball? He hoped it would be Spooky. We need the gatling guns, he decided again. Don't need no Basketball flares.

  Baby Cakes stared out into the dark at where the LP was. Snake scrutinized him. Don't do nothing stupid, Baby Cakes. Friends are friends, but… Baby Cakes took off at a dead run, out into the black. The near paddy dike erupted with AK-47s again. Baby Cakes hit the dirt. One hole down, Cat Man's team poured a steady stream of red into the dike. Further away, second platoon's lines were firing, too.

  Ogre put his head up lazily when he heard the rounds go off. He had a shot of morphine in him now. “Where's Baby Cakes?”

  Snake pushed his head back to the dirt and held it. “Shut up.”

  In the treeline there was a steady thunk of mortars igniting inside their tubes. Snake got tight inside his hole. Where's Baby Cakes? Near paddy dike opened up again. Must be ten gooks firing now, he decided. Cannonball retaliated with the grenade launcher. ThunkBoom. ThunkBoom. The blooper balls exploded flatly and the firing grew less intense.

  The mortars that began in the treeline landed, walking their way quickly through the middle of the perimeter. Someone at the command post just up the hill from Snake screamed. Two people. Maybe more. When the mortars stopped Cat Man's people put more rounds on the paddy dike.

  The plane arrived. It was a Basketball. Figures, thought Snake ironically. Just what we need with Baby Cakes out there. The droning monster dropped out huge flares that lit the perimeter like a stadium. Then Basketball shifted its orbit and a flight of Phantom jets streaked into the far treeline, dropping bombs and napalm.

  The big machine gun in the treeline turned onto the Phantom. Huge balls of tracers reached toward the jets as they approached the treeline. Snake laughed to himself, almost enjoying the thought of a “wing-wipe” being shot at. Shoot at them awhile, you gook bastards. And I hope you run outa ammo.

  More screams from the command post. Maybe three. Snake saw him move then, a hesitation in a fighting hole who thought once, twice, about it, then bolted across the scarred hill in a half-lope toward the command post. A torrent of tracers flew from the dike and they nailed him in the middle of a stride. He fell forward, landing on the back of his head and one shoulder, crumpling like a dropped deer. Snake shook his head knowledgeably. Who'd you think you were, Superman?

  It's Marston, Snake noted. Only a new dude would do that. Not even here long enough to be named yet. Marston rolled once in the deadly bright of Basketball and looked bleakly to Snake, imploring him. Finally he grunted painfully.

  “Snake. Snake.”

  Snake peered at Marston, sizing up his wound. Marston was just up the hill from him, twenty feet away. “Where you hit, Marston?”

  Marston held the middle of his flak jacket. “In here. Ohhh shit it hurts.”

  Snake looked for Doc. Doc was gone, over with Pierson's squad. He crawled out of his hole then, and scooted up to Marston. Powder of the hill poured through his fingers as he pushed it. More rounds now, all around them: they were lighted targets. B-40 rocket boomed. Another.

  “Marston, you're an ass.”

  “CP's all fucked up, man. Can't you hear 'em?”

  “Fat lot of help you are. Now you're gonna get my ass blown away.”

  Marston was hit in the lung. He gurgled. “I'm sorry, Snake.”

  Snake was still five feet away. He stopped crawling and listened expertly to Marston's gurgles. “Roll onto the side that hurts.”

  Marston tried, and screamed. “Ohhhh! Jesus ChristMy God!”

  Snake crawled back toward his hole. In the far tree-line a new series of artillery rounds succeeded the departed Phantom jet
s. Marston called to him as he moved down the hill. “Don't leave me up here, Snake!” Marston tried to crawl and screamed again. Snake reached his fighting hole, grabbed a poncho, and crawled back to Marston. Marston was whimpering.

  “Marston, you're a goddamned girl. Shut up. You did this to yourself.” Snake laid the poncho out beside Marston, then grabbed his legs and flipped him lifeguard-style onto the poncho. Marston screamed. More AK bullets sprayed the hill.

  “Shut up or I'll leave you here.”

  “It hurts.”

  “It's s'posed to hurt.”

  Snake dragged Marston down the hill. Marston screamed each time Snake jerked the poncho. Snake reached his hole again and called for Doc. No Doc. He screamed again. Still no Doc. He despaired of Doc and pulled the lone battle dressing off his own helmet, hating Marston for leaving his up the hill. He reached in and felt the hole. Marston screamed as if in torture when Snake's fingers slid along the slick wet inside of it.

  The hole gurgled like a stopped-up drain. Snake put the inside of the plastic battle-dressing cover over the hole, and pulled the dressing supertight over that. Marston had given over to weak groans, too exhausted to scream any longer.

  “Now. Lay on it till Doc gets here.”

  “Ohhh. It hurts too much.”

  “Don't give me any of your shit, Marston. You wanna die? Lay on it.” He looked spitefully at Marston, then grinned encouragingly. “You tough, Marston? Hold on to it, then. You gonna be O.K.”

  The Basketball flares twinkled and died, one by one, like huge candles spending their wicks. It became quiet but for sniper rounds. In the far distance, maybe a mile away, a speaker droned. Some gook promising Australia vacations to anyone who surrendered. Something like that. No one listened. The company's 60-millimeter mortar section fired a perfunctory mission in the speaker's direction, nine or ten casually aimed rounds, as if to acknowledge its absurdity. No effect. Speaker continued. Sounds funny, thought Snake. Stupid gooks.