“Are you through?” Chapel said.
“Yes, sir,” McNulty said. “I guess I am.”
“Okay, now that you’re finished with the primer on formation classification of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, please allow me to report, Private Second Class McNulty, that extra-agency recon has discovered that along the back side of the ridge and dug in over in the next valley is the 276th Regiment of the NVA.” He glared at McNulty, who found something interesting about his boots at that very moment. “This fun group of well rested and fully outfitted boy scouts are planning on joining their brothers and sisters in the fight against the United States military and our ARVN allies as soon as they breach the border, which they will in a matter of days, just in time for Tet. Remember Tet, gentlemen? Do all of you here remember Tet?”
The men nodded, each recalling in their own way the Tet Offensive three years prior in ’68, when eighty thousand NVA struck a hundred targets simultaneously, killing four thousand Americans in a matter of days. It was a blitzkrieg of slaughter.
“We’re not going to let that happen again,” Chapel said. “Ever. We’re out here to win this goddamn thing, on their turf, taking the fight to the heart of where the enemy finds care and comfort. We’re bringing the horror to their bedrooms, bathrooms, war rooms, and hospitals.”
The group was quiet, processing this.
“Sir?” Broussard said to Chapel.
“Yes?”
“I think it’s time you told us why we’re out here. Specifically.”
Chapel took a deep breath and exhaled, then nodded to Morganfield, who approached with a round steel canister, painted bright red. He set it on the ground, opened it, and from inside lifted out a recording reel and held it up for view. “Gentlemen, we are here to deliver this.”
“What is that?” McNulty said.
“Magnetic audio tape,” Morganfield said.
“We gonna play them some good ol’ country music,” McNulty said, “and blow their zip minds?”
“This is most certainly not a music tape,” Morganfield said. Chapel was silent, arms crossed across his chest, watching everyone’s reactions.
“See, country ain’t music,” Render said to McNulty. “I told you, dummy.”
“What’s on that tape, sir?” Broussard said.
Chapel didn’t answer. Still working the process. Gathering intel.
Broussard clenched his jaw and two fists, fighting back anger, frustration, and the sickening ball of fear that had been growing in the pit of his stomach for days. He pointed a finger at Chapel. It shook as it jabbed at the pale face standing across from him. “You tell us, goddamn it. You tell us just what the fuck we’re doing out here, and why you marched five strangers across the border to feed us to a thousand VC waiting behind a mountain.” Broussard was breathing hard. He was scared, but the fear made him feel strong. Standing this close to the unknown, without a tether, he had nothing to lose.
The men were surprised, and by the identical look each of them fixed on Chapel, for the first time in the entire operation, they seemed to be standing as one single unit.
Chapel nodded, as if waiting for this, and seemed to fight back a smile. “Okay,” he said. “Okay then.” He unlocked his arms and motioned the group forward. “Come close, gentlemen.”
The men formed into a tight semicircle, Broussard the last to join.
Chapel regarded each face in turn. “I don’t work for the United States Army. Not anymore.”
None of the men seemed particularly surprised, but finally hearing it aloud did stir something in each of them akin to anxious wonder. They were all now officially off the books, with everything that carried with it.
“But I do still serve my country, running my own PSYOPS department.”
“See, I knew it,” Render said. “Boss a spook!”
“I wouldn’t necessarily call me a spook,” Chapel said seriously, then smiled. “But now that I think about it, that is the nature of our mission.”
The men laughed nervously.
“Some background,” Chapel said. “We’ve known for years that the VC were moving from Vietnam into Laos to lick their wounds, retrain, and generally arm themselves to the eyeteeth with the latest and greatest Chinese hardware to roll off the factory floors of Shanghai. But Laos is Laos, and subject to sovereignty that takes them outside our theater of war, and therefore outside of our official rules of engagement. So naturally we’ve sent no troops to chase down Charlie other than those flying American aircraft in an attempt to bomb these bastards back to the Pre-Cambrian Age. This, of course, didn’t work, as air power is messy and is about as precise as firing a shotgun to kill a spider, and the majority of our unconfirmed but easily assumed kills were civilians whose relatives then took up arms to fight with our enemy against the monsters who dropped fire from the sky on an unengaged populace. Because of this, more unusual measures were needed, and not necessarily those condoned by the government or the military brass of the United States.”
“This is an illegal mission?” McNulty said.
“Give the man a cigar!” Render said.
“What about killing another human being is legal to you, Chicago?” Darby said.
Chapel held up the tape. “Gentlemen, we are out here to relay a message to the 276th Regiment, and this,” he tapped the reel with his finger. “This is our message.”
“What is it?”
“You’ll see soon enough.”
“Don’t you mean hear,” Broussard said.
“No, you’ll see.”
“When?” McNulty said.
“Sundown,” Chapel said, walking away from the men. “When the ghosts come for us all.”
31. Somewhere Along the Highway
“Wake up, Broussard.”
I’m dreaming, because I’ve heard that before. I’m in an aquarium inside a jeep rumbling through a river of mud.
“Wake up, Broussard.”
I’m flying over the jungle, and Chapel’s in the other chopper, looking out into the night, directing without a map.
“Wake up, Broussard.”
It’s the man from the bar. He’s wearing sunglasses and standing on the ground outside the open fuselage door. Below those blacked out lenses, his teeth peer out from between his thin lips, and laugh at me, each tooth in turn. “I thought I lost you there for a second.”
I wipe off my mouth and sit up, the reality of everything slowly sinking back into me. I’m sick as shit.
“What’s happening?” I say.
“We’re here,” he says.
He helps me get out of the chopper and stand on smooth grass, feeling for my legs and taking it on faith that they’re down there. Everything around me looks just like it did before, but I recognize nothing. I don’t know where I am.
The man stands in front of me, and hands me something. I take the object and look down at it.
“What’s this?” I ask.
“What do you think it is?”
I hold it out at arm’s length, pointed at his forehead. “I remember now,” I say.
“You going to be all right?” he says, not the least bit thrown by the .45 caliber barrel pressed against his forehead.
“I don’t know.”
He raises his eyebrows up over his sunglasses and waits. I lower the gun, and scratch absently at my face with it.
“Which way?” I say.
The man turns and points to a hillside, the tall grass blowing in the slight breeze. “Follow the trail.”
“I don’t see one.”
“You will. When you get close enough.” He looks at me, noting the vomit on my clothes, the slack of my jaw. “You going to make it out here?”