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Blood Trail by Gary J. Cook
Publication date: March 21, 2006
Prologue
Laos, 1973
The mountain on the far side of
the valley stood dark
green and massive. Tendrils of mist clung to folds and finger ridges
and to the jungled tops of vertical limestone outcroppings. Once upon
a time, the small valley must have produced rice, but now the valley
floor—maybe a thousand meters long and not more than four hundred meters
wide—was a lake of waist high, yellow-green grass. Mist like slow smoke
drifted across the tall grass.
To his right, in the direction the Huey would come, the mountain descended
to a heavily forested saddle. Behind him rolling hills covered with
a patchwork of grass and dense brush and, here and there, remnants of
canopied forest, rose toward the distant, impossibly rugged ridges of
the Annam Cordillera.
It had taken him a day and a half, staying off ridges and trails, snaking
his way through forest and bamboo and elephant grass, to work his way
down out of the hills to the small mound at the edge of the valley.
High grass and the branches and leaves of an ancient tree growing in
the center of the mound allowed him to stand concealed beneath the tree.
Normally he would stay away from such an obvious spot, but because the
grass was so high he needed the little bit of elevation that the mound
offered to see across to the treeline on the other side. The slope of
the hill behind him was where he wanted to be, but the slope was too
open, the nearest stands of brush and bamboo too far from the valley
floor. He’d never make it to the helicopter if the meet went south.
There had been no need to insert him so far from the valley, except
that he’d wanted a day or two to get reacquainted with the bush. But
from the moment he’d jumped out of the helicopter, he’d felt at home.
The rich, pungent smells of growing, living things overlaid with the
stench of rot and decay. The sting and cut of elephant grass. All of
it had been as familiar as yesterday.
He’d quickly moved away from the insertion point, through thick bamboo
and grass taller than he was, into the forest. Dark, damp forest. Mold
and moss and spider webs. Sunshine flickering in the leaves and branches
high above, like the light from an old-time movie arcade.
In the morning, he’d waited for three deer, graceful and fragile and
twitchy all at the same time, to move on. That afternoon, he’d been
eyeball to eyeball with a green viper nearly invisible in the leaves.
Mr. Slide come home again.
A half klick or so from the mound, a cobra had appeared—the first King
Cobra he’d ever encountered in the bush. Seriously spooky that snake.
Pucker factor of at least twenty on a scale of ten.
He’d been sitting hidden inside a stand of thick bamboo on the other
side of a nearly dry streambed, waiting for the afternoon rain so he
could move down the open slope to the small mound with the big tree,
and the snake had emerged from the grass on the lip of the far embankment.
One second there’d been him and the mosquitoes and the ants and before
his brain could even process what he was seeing a huge cobra, black
at the head, flowed down the embankment to the streambed, gliding over
and around and between moss-covered rocks and debris. Nearly fifteen
feet of horror.
It had stopped and, for what seemed like a long time, lay motionless,
its olive body nearly invisible in the rocks and debris. Finally it
had raised its head slightly and flowed back up the embankment. At the
top, a third of it still exposed on the embankment, it had sensed or
smelled him and had risen, its small sleek head like a malignant periscope
above the grass, and rotated toward him, exposing an underside of gray-brown.
It searched forty-five degrees, back and forth, swaying from side to
side, locking on to where he sat hidden and not even blinking in the
thick, leafy bamboo. He could see white crossbars beneath an orange
and yellow and black throat.
No jungle animal or human would have known he was there. He knew that
from experience. But the cobra had known and had locked onto him, its
jet-black eyes glinting. He’d clearly heard it growl. No hiss or spit
or any of that. Growl. The most frightening sound he’d ever heard. He
thought for sure it was going to come for him. Huang had taught him
that King Cobras had no fear. They were known to attack any living creature
in their territory, elephants included. And for sure he was in its territory.
And not only was he in its territory but the terrain was too rough,
the grass and low bamboo too thick for him to outrun it.
He’d eased the selector switch to full auto and pushed the safety off,
and as he did the remainder of the cobra had retracted up the embankment,
the head elevating even higher, hood spread white on the inside. It
swayed from side to side, growling, its eyes pure black death. Angry
and no fucking doubt about it. He’d had the eerie feeling that it could
read his mind.
Sweat trickled down his back and along his rib cage, dripped from the
corner of his right eye. If it came, it would go to ground—out of the
grass and down the embankment and on him in seconds. He’d have to shoot
it, and then the whole world would know he was there.
Even now, just thinking about it, he could feel the hair stand up on
the back of his neck. Folklore said that King Cobras mated for life,
and sometimes hunted in pairs. Kill one, and the other would hunt you
as long at it had a trail to follow. Where had he heard that? Kipling,
maybe. The other one was in the bamboo with him; he’d suddenly been
sure of that. That was why the one he was watching hadn’t gone to ground:
it was waiting for its mate to sneak up on him.
He’d fought the nearly uncontrollable urge to see what was behind him.
Was it cobras or black mambas that mated for life? There had been cobras
in the Kipling stories his grandfather had read to him. The cobra could
smell his fear; he was sure that it could. And he tried to hunch his
back without moving, not taking his eyes off the snake swaying above
the grass, hoping that if there was one behind him, it would strike
his ruck and the radio inside.
The cobra rotated its head away from him, its hood no longer spread,
and moved farther into the grass, its head smoothly sinking out of sight.
He sat there for a long time, more than an hour, waiting for the afternoon
rains and the cobras to come. When the rain finally came, gray sheets
of it obscuring even the embankment on the other side of the stream,
he stood and forded the stream, and climbed the embankment and hurried
through the grass on the other side, down the long, mostly open slope
to the small mound.
He suspected that the cobras—he thought of it now in the plural—knew
the tree and the mound. They probably hunted here.
And all through the long, wet night, he’d hoped that was all they did
here—hoped that it was not also their home.
The rain had stopped before first light and he’d eaten some rice and
nuoc-mam, had a drink of water, stashed the poncho in his ruck, and
then, by touch, broke down the M-14, and with a silicon-impregnated
cloth wiped the parts. He reassembled the rifle—the same rifle he’d
used before; God alone knew how Peter had managed to hang on to it.
Ran a couple of patches down the bore. Unloaded the eight magazines,
seventeen rounds per twenty-round magazine. Wiped each round. Reloaded
the magazines. Seated a magazine in the rifle.
Quietly cycled the bolt. Made sure the safety was on. Put the other
magazines back in the ammo pouches on his web gear. Put the cleaning
gear back in the ruck. The usual drill.
It was like old times—except that he was light grenades and extra boxes
of ammunition. And instead of the bulky 7X50 binoculars, he was making
do with much smaller, plastic, nine-power Nikons.
He poured a spoonful of black, sandbag ash into his hand from the old,
yellow plastic tobacco pouch that had been his grandfather’s, added
water, and mixed it into a thick paste. Dabbed and smeared the paste
onto his face and neck and hands. In his opinion—an opinion not shared
by Peter—sandbag ash beat the hell out of grease sticks. He wedged the
tobacco pouch into one of the ammo pouches. If things got hinky, he’d
leave the ruck and the radio, take only the rifle and web gear.
Finding a good hide had been impossible given the parameters of the
mission. The grass was too high for him to lie prone, or even to sit,
and he’d settled for standing in the bend of a branch that was at least
a foot in diameter, solid as a fence rail. In the night, he’d cut branches
and leaves so that he’d have a field of fire that included most of the
other side of the tiny valley. By widening his stance and crouching
slightly, he was able to wedge the branch between the back of his left
arm and side. He’d adjusted the sling so that when he put the rifle
stock into his shoulder, his left elbow was pulled solid and tight under
the magazine and receiver. The sling plus the branch gave him a position
as solid as resting the rifle on a sandbag. The flash suppressor was
well back inside the hole he’d made in the outer branches and leaves.
Being on the only elevated spot on the entire valley floor was not where
he wanted to be, but at least the muzzle flash would be hard to spot.
Holding the rifle with his left hand, arm and hand wrapped in the sling,
he lifted the Nikons and scanned the other side of the valley. Nothing
moved. Only the slow creep of mist across grass. The forested mountainside
had taken on definition, and the mist escaping from the forest made
it look as if there was a ground fire.
According to Huang, there would be only three or four Chinese advisors.
But there had to be a big unit nearby or the Chinese wouldn’t be here
at all. If there were more than five, the helicopter would not land
and he’d have to hike back out.
Damn. He hadn’t thought about that, hiking back out. AKs and RPGs and
mortars were one thing, King cobras another. No way he wanted to walk
back out through country inhabited by two snakes that size, with that
kind of attitude.
He heard a rustle off to his left and saw grass ripple away from the
base of the mound. He glanced slowly around. Nothing moved. No cobra
periscoped above the grass. Something was watching him; he could feel
it. He looked up into the branches. Nothing there, either. That’s all
he’d need, a giant cobra to fall out of the tree on him. This was getting
weird. Serious weird. He’d spent beaucoup time in the bush and nothing
like this had ever happened before. The actors in this little play hadn’t
even appeared and already he was as twitchy as the deer he’d seen.
There was movement across the valley and putting the Nikons to his eyes
he saw four Asians in camouflage fatigues come out of the mist. Tall.
Too big for Vietnamese. Some kind of Tiger-stripe camouflage. Floppy
bush hats. Three with AKs slung barrel up. One—the one closest to him—with
an AK slung so that it rested at his hip, barrel pointed forward. Extra
magazine pouches were worn at the chest on the first three; a pistol
was strapped to the waist of the one with the AK at his hip.
The guy with the pistol and one other were carrying what looked like
half a body bag. The bag was square and from the way they were carrying
it not heavy. The other two were carrying a full body bag, one at the
head, one at the foot, the bag sagging into the grass between them.
The front guy on the big bag had his hands behind his back holding onto
a strap; the man at the rear was holding another strap with both hands
in front of him. The large bag probably contained the heroin. The square
bag the remains of a U.S. Special Forces Lieutenant.
He was there to help recover the remains. Peter had brokered the deal
with the family. The heroin was part of the deal for use of the helicopter
and pilots. Nothing was ever clean when spooks were involved—and the
spooks were always involved. For some reason that he could not fathom,
the heroin was worth more than money to the spooks.
The four men walked a hundred meters out into the grass, and dropped
the bags. Maybe Huang and Peter were worried about nothing. Maybe for
once this was going to go off without gunfire.
He dialed the scope for 250 meters. No windage. The helicopter would
be putting out a lot of rotor wash, but at that distance it wouldn’t
make much difference.
From the direction of the saddle, the unmistakable thump of a Huey inbound
reverberated across the valley. And a white Huey, blue at the tail and
along the top of the fuselage and engine hump, thudded over the saddle,
skimming the trees as it flew nap of the earth down into the tiny valley,
the white fuselage stark against the rich greens of the saddle.
A white, Air America Huey. Fuck Oh Dear. How could you miss a white
helicopter? Peter was thumbing his nose at the Chinese again. Damn.
What an asshole he could be.
The Huey leveled out thirty feet above the grass on the other side of
the tiny valley, rotor wash pushing grass and mist down and to the side
behind it, like the wake from an airboat, rotor disc flashing against
dark forest. It powered past the four Chinese, down to the far end of
the valley, and banked into a sharp turn, the edge of the rotor disc
only a few feet above the grass, the top of the helicopter visible beneath
the disc.
He reached down to the ruck at his feet and keyed the radio twice, letting
them know he was there. The Huey completed the turn and came straight
for him down his side of the valley, the dark Plexiglas windows and
the jungle behind it making it look like some gigantic prehistoric bug.
As it flashed past, rotor wash buffeting leaves and branches, he again
keyed the radio twice, marking his position so that the pilot would
not put down between him and the four Chinese.
The helicopter continued to the base of the saddle and again banked
into a sharp turn, tracing its way around the valley. It leveled out
and headed toward the figures in the grass.
He’d glimpsed Peter alone in the belly, looking out the other side.
He hadn’t seen any guns. No M-60 hanging at the door. It was just like
Peter to ride in on an unarmed helicopter. A snow-white, unarmed helicopter.
Face, Peter was going to tell him—and then give him another of his long,
involved, oh-so-boring lectures on the importance of face to the Oriental
mind.
The helicopter slowed as it approached the waiting figures, skids just
above the grass, holding a hover about fifty meters from the four Chinese.
He put the rifle to his shoulder and leaned across the tree branch,
cheek on his thumb on top the grip, and squirmed around until the crosshairs
were dead steady on the chest of the Chinese with the pistol. The scope
was dialed to the full nine power. At that distance he could make out
facial features. The Chinese looked like an arrogant bastard. He’d lost
his hat to the rotor wash. He pushed the safety off, but kept his finger
away from the trigger. The other three Chinese were staring without
emotion at the helicopter. One had lost his hat, but the other two had
stuffed their hats behind their magazine pouches. Wind from the rotors
rippled their fatigues, pressing the Tiger-stripe material tight against
their bodies. The rotor wash was also serving to keep the mist away.
All of the Chinese still had their AKs slung. The lead Chinese had his
pointed toward the Huey, but his arms were folded across his chest.
More face, no doubt.
He moved the scope to a point between the helicopter and the waiting
Chinese, and watched as Peter—wearing jeans and a bright red Hawaiian
shirt with yellow flowers—jumped out, a metal ammo can held in one hand.
Peter’s Browning HighPower was in a shoulder holster under his left
armpit. Jesus. A Hawaiian shirt and a 9mm in a shoulder holster. Face,
my ass. This was going way beyond face. What Peter was doing was comparable
to throwing rocks at that cobra. The shirt and the shoulder holster
and his black skin made him look like a Jamaican gangster—whatever a
Jamaican gangster looked like.
The lead Chinese gave an arm signal and the crosshairs again settled
on his chest. One man stayed put, and the other two bent and picked
up the large bag and carried it to the helicopter. Grass blew in concentric
circles away from the helicopter.
Peter waited to the side, watching as they heaved the bag into the belly
of the helicopter. The two Chinese turned and double-timed back through
the grass to their original position next to the man who had stayed
put.
Peter walked a few paces forward and stopped ten feet from the leader.
He put the ammo can—filled with money and rubies—down in the grass.
One of the three Chinese bent and picked up the smaller bag. Through
the scope he could see that the bag had been folded into a square a
couple of feet across. The contents of the bag seemed to squirm beneath
the gray-green covering, making it difficult for the Chinese to keep
a solid grip on it as he handed it to the lead Chinese.
The first man moved back to the other two.
The lead Chinese held the body bag out toward Peter. Peter made no move
to take the bag.
The Chinese shook the bag, making the contents move and slide. He laughed,
and began throwing the bag up and down, shaking it as he caught it,
the objects inside bulging and distorting the plastic. Peter stood hands
folded across his chest, watching.
The Chinese threw the bag two handed at Peter’s feet. He pointed down
at the body bag, pointed at his slung AK, pointed at himself. The three
Chinese behind him spread out, a five-yard interval between them.
He took a breath. Exhaled half of it. Put pressure on the trigger. Held.
Peter reached down in the grass and picked up the ammo can by the metal
handle and threw the can underhand at the lead Chinese. The can struck
the Chinese in the chest, knocking him a step backwards. His hand went
to the slung AK, and as it did the crosshairs stabilized at the center
of his chest and the rifle fired and the lead Chinese was down in the
grass.
He shifted a fraction toward the other three and the rifle fired, and
the scope settled, and the rifle fired, and the scope settled, and the
rifle fired. As always, the rounds seemed to come more from his mind
than from the rifle. Chest shots above the magazine pouches. One hundred
sixty eight grain jacketed spiral boattails. Two thousand five hundred
fifty feet per second. All of the Chinese were down. Only one, the second
one, had been able to unsling his AK before the bullet punched him into
rippling grass.
He took the rifle out of his shoulder and stood upright, scanning the
far side of the valley with the binoculars. Nothing moved. All he could
see was forest. There had to be others there. Peter was firing his 9mm
down into the grass, moving quickly from man to man. Peter holstered
the pistol and bent toward grass flattened by rotor wash and picked
up the square body bag and the ammo can, and ran toward the helicopter.
The helicopter was already up on its skids.
Holding the rifle in his left hand, he picked up the ruck and the radio
with his right, and ducked under the branch and forced his way through
leaves and branches, out from under the tree and through grass, stumbling
and hurdling over the remnants of an old stone or concrete crypt that
he hadn’t seen in the grass, an image of a long, black snake raising
its head forever etched in his mind as he jumped a recessed portion
of the crypt.
Across the valley, the white Huey lifted from the grass and pivoted
and, nose down a few degrees, tail up, headed straight for him. Forty
yards out, it settled and slipped sideways toward him, skids dragging
grass. Shit hot pilot, he thought. At least Peter had done that right.
Rotor wash whipped and snapped at his fatigues, pressing against him
as he charged toward the helicopter.
He threw his ruck and the radio ahead of him into the belly on top of
the body bags, and handing the rifle to Peter staring open mouthed at
something behind him, jumped in, twisting to sit with his ass in the
doorway, feet on the skids as the Huey dipped and accelerated toward
the end of the valley. The metal floor beneath him abruptly lifted,
the g-forces like in a high speed elevator. Tree tops flashed beneath
his feet. Blue-green tracers arched far behind into grass and trees
on the hillside.
As they crested the saddle and immediately descended into the next valley,
he hauled himself up into the seat across from Peter.
Peter handed him the rifle, shouting something, his voice lost in the
wind coming through the open doorways.
“What?”
Peter grinned. “Face,” he shouted.
He shook his head, and looked out the doorway. Looked down at the bags.
The bags jiggled loosely on the vibrating floor.
The helicopter surged upward, headed for a safer altitude.
Face, he thought. What Peter meant was that selling dope to the barbarians
and delivering their dead at the same time had not been enough for the
Chinese. The Chinese had planned to shoot them, too. “If I throw the
ammo can, light them up,” had been Peter’s instructions. “If I throw
it, it means they are going to shoot us.”
He watched the zipper on the small bag work its way open. The remains
of a face, forehead and eye socket torn open, bone and tatters of gray
flesh and clotted matter populated with colonies of squirming maggots
pushed up out of the bag.
• • •
Two hours later, after he’d taken a shower and changed clothes, they
sat on the veranda.
“Did you see those snakes?” Peter asked.
“What snakes?”
“Two of the biggest snakes I’ve ever seen were about ten yards behind
you. Their heads were sticking up above the grass. I’ve never seen anything
like it. Scared the shit out of me just looking at them.”
“I think they live in that old grave I jumped across.”
“Damn.”
“Yeah.”
“You must have spent the night right next to them.”
“I reckon.”
The sun felt good on his bare chest and legs and feet, the heat and
the exposure to air drying out the usual assortment of bites and scratches
and sores.
“You need to understand,” Peter said. “They hate us. In their minds
people like us have raped their country for centuries. Putting that
head in there like that was their way of coping with the fact that they
are business partners with people they despise. The head in the bag
just wasn’t enough face for the guy I threw the ammo can at—no pun intended.”
Fucking Peter, he thought. No mention of the white helicopter or his
Hawaiian shirt. Behind his eyelids the sun was orange and yellow, hot
and clean on his face. From somewhere the sweet smell of flowers wafted
across the veranda.
But underneath the smell of flowers and sun-baked veranda lingered the
stench from the body bag. He could taste it at the back of his throat.
And he knew that no amount of brushing his teeth or washing his body
would be able to eradicate that smell from his memory. Not for a long
time, anyway, and depending on how often he wanted to take it out and
look at it, maybe never.
He’d thought they were doing it for the remains of somebody’s son—and
they were—but in the end the MIA remains had been secondary to the thing
between Peter and the Chinese.
He wanted to blot the day out of his mind, wanted Peter’s voice to go
away, wanted to forget the head rising out of the bag like that—wanted
only to concentrate on the sun and the heat.
He liked the heat. Liked to sweat. It made him feel clean.
After awhile, Peter’s words, like everything else, went away.
And in his mind only the snake watched.
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