Casca 14: The Phoenix (15 page)

Phang's men listened to the screams of the dying with mixed emotions. There were feelings of exultation that their hated enemy was being destroyed and those of revulsion at their grisly deaths. War was war but there was something to be said about being eaten alive by reptiles that even their toughened hides couldn't bear. Van said nothing, the tears running down his boyish face evidence enough of his anguish.

Phang wondered how his long nosed friend was faring inside that watery place of death.

Casey sat still in his tree, stunned and in a state of half-shock at that which he had wrought. The huge reptiles were piled on top of each other snapping and gulping down the torn pieces of flesh that had once been living men. The grunts and groans of the hundreds of sea crocs in their feeding frenzy was a form of madness he had never expected to let loose upon the world.

Colonel Ho screamed in panic as the waters around him erupted with monstrous feeding reptiles. One was coming straight for him. He pulled his pistol and fired three rounds straight at the head. The slugs from the Tokarev didn't even phase the monster; it came on. Xuyen tried to break and run but his feet were held fast in the sucking bottom. Ho moved behind him. The croc was nearly on them. Xuyen reached out his hand to Ho for help, but the colonel shot him between the eyes, pushed the body in front of him and moved away. The sea croc took Xuyen between his jaws and sank beneath the water.
A small enough sacrifice for your leader, Xuyen
.

Ho stopped trying to fight his way by wading. His boots had already been torn off by the sludge so he lay face down in the water and began to half swim, half crawl his way out of the swamp. By now the horrible cries of dying men were beginning to fade.

Ho bumped into several bodies in his flight to escape the reptiles. None of them had all of their parts. Some were torn in two; others had no arms, legs or heads. He yelled at one man whose upper body blocked his passage. The man didn't respond. Ho pushed at his shoulders. The upper torso leaned over to sink head down. He had been torn in half, the air in the upper chest cavity keeping the corpse afloat.

Fearful of looking behind him, Ho kept his eyes to the front. Every shadow or swirl of water caused his heart to pound in terror.

As he moved away from the place of slaughter, lone survivors tried to join him. Recognizing him as an officer, they wanted someone, anyone to tell them what to do. He moved away from them, fearful that the sounds of too many men would draw more of the crocs to them. Ho went on alone veering off to the right. He reached out to push a half-submerged log out of the way when it whipped around and looked at him. The hinged upper jaw opening. Ho couldn't even scream. His bowels let loose draining down the inside of his pants leg and he didn't even know it. Somewhere he found strength he didn't know he had. Grabbing the base of the nearest tree, he used the broken trunk of the mangrove to get him out of the water and high enough so he could shimmy up the slick trunk into the nearest branches. The croc below him was not one of the huge creatures who had destroyed the two companies of the 213th Regiment. It was a baby weighing in at only three or four hundred pounds.

Ho was not going to go any further this night. He had found a refuge and there he would stay; let the others do what they wanted. Here he was safe. As for the rest of the two companies, there weren't too many who had made it away from the crocodiles. Of the over two hundred men who had gone into the marsh less than fifteen made it within sight of land.

Straining his eyes, Phang tried to see into the mist and beyond the first line of swamp grass. His men looked at each other as they listened to their enemies die. Most made signs to ward off evil or touched amulets to protect themselves from the spirits of those who were dying. The Kamserai were not men who were noted for their deep altruistic feelings, but this manner of death had something that felt unclean about it.

Phang was of the same stock. He too touched his amulet, prepared by a powerful shaman. It was made of secret things which would protect him from the unseen and keep unfriendly spirits at bay. Phang could read and write. He had been to the big cities of Phnom Penh and Saigon. He knew of penicillin and of television. He was not an ignorant savage. Like most tribesmen who had been raised in an animistic society, he feared nothing that he could touch or see, but no matter what else he had been exposed to in the outside world he still believed in the spirits of the dead and their ability to do good and evil to the living. He found no contradiction in this. Did not the Catholics believe that their invisible god could touch them and do good and evil?

Van heard them coming, the cries of fear and the whimpering of grown men, the sloshing of weary feet in the water. He almost hated to do what he had to do. They had been through a nightmare that no man could ever imagine, unless he were mad. Van took the safety off his weapon. He would do what he had to...

They were to hold their fire till he was sure that most of the Viets were all together or they were spotted.

One by one the VC began to emerge from the dark, deadly waters. No man helped another. Each was driven by his personal instinct for survival. Once out of the marsh they collapsed, trying to breathe as they fought to control the shaking of their limbs.

Phang waited a few moments more till a
Chung uy
from the 213th stood up and looked around him. He saw the lieutenant from the 213th lock on the face of Van looking back at him from a distance of no more than twenty feet. The exhausted lieutenant was glad to see anyone who might help. He reached out his hands in supplication. Van raised the Savage 12 gauge automatic shotgun and put a solid slug through the lieutenant's mouth taking the back of the man's head off. When he fired, Phang gave the order to the rest of his men. They opened up with all they had. It was a relief for them to kill something themselves rather than leave everything to the swamp. Machine gun and rifle fire poured down on the few survivors. Some of them could have escaped Phang's ambush by going back into the marsh„ but not one man did that. All chose to stay where they were and take the easy way out. Phang rationalized that at least their death was easier this way than in the marsh. He went to check the bodies, putting single pistol shots into each man's skull. It was always best to make sure.

Phang wondered again about his scar-faced friend with the gray-blue eyes, whose soul had such a feeling of desolation about it that just being around the man sometimes made him feel as if eternity's breath had touched him for just a moment. What was this man doing now in the marsh, where so many were dying?

Casey stayed in his tree as he must till the tide turned again. The firing from the edge of the marsh was less than he'd expected. Phang must not have had to work as hard as he thought he would. The sounds of feeding had abated now. The crocs' voracious appetites were sated. Some took cadavers with them to bury in secret places in the mud, till they ripened enough to please the reptiles' palates. Several times, one or another of the monsters would crawl up to the base of his tree and look at him with its golden eyes, but they left him alone. The tree was his sanctuary.

Casey never slept in the safety of his tree. His mind stayed in a kind of half-daze that let the remaining hours till dawn pass without notice. The tide had gone back out and with it most of the crocodiles. There were probably a few left behind who preferred to wallow in the deep pools of cool mud, or sleep in their burrows after a heavy meal.

The trail was again visible when he slid down the tree to stand on the mound. His body ached; every muscle in his limbs creaked and cracked. Stretching them out to loosen up, he breathed deep and looked around him. All was quiet.

Taking the trail as far as he could before going back into the waters, his stomach churned. Several times he wanted to throw up, and would have if there'd been anything inside him. Scattered about were the signs of last night's reptilian bacchanalia. Scraps of uniforms floated here and there, and at times he saw pieces of meat floating loose on the surface. An entire arm, still wearing a khaki sleeve, moved gently in the water, vibrating and jerking as fish and crabs competing with each other tugged at it. The crocs were gone but the blue marsh crabs were everywhere. Thousands of them. It was a normal thing in nature's scheme. After the big creatures fed, the smaller ones cleaned up the mess. He kicked them off the trail with his bare feet, ignoring the clacking pincers.

By the time he reached the edge of the swamp and had stepped over the bodies of the dead Charlies Phang had killed, the heat of the morning had burned off the last of the mist, leaving the marsh quiet and serene—a completely different picture than the one of the previous night. Herons and waterfowl came as they always did to nest and feed. Flowers opened bright petals to the sun. He looked back at the still waters and shuddered.

Phang came to him, his dark face filled with concern: "It was a bad thing to see, was it not, my friend?"

Casey nodded. "Yes, it was a very bad thing. I don't believe I could do it again."

Van stood silent, his shotgun lowered to the earth. Casey went to him. "It's over now. We'll leave soon."

Walking back to the bodies he looked them over. Ho wasn't among them. He shrugged, too tired to worry about it. Either Ho had been taken by the crocs or he was still alive. Right now it made no difference. He just wanted to get away from there. Most likely his protagonist was firmly settled in the belly of one or more of the sea crocs.

Still he had a feeling that his mission was not yet over. Not until he had either hard confirmation from intelligence sources that Ho was dead or he saw the body himself. If Ho was among those taken by the crocs he'd find out sooner or later. He hoped that the enemy colonel was dead. He was growing very weary of this game of hide and kill.

Ho couldn't leave the marsh. The small crocodile had settled down on a mud bank to rest in the sun. Every time Ho made a move one of its eyes would blink and Ho would freeze. He wasn't going any place until the beast left.

Casey replaced his missing boots with a pair of rubber sandals made from the tire off a
¾ ton truck. Phang gave his men orders to strip all the bodies and bring any papers they had on them to him. He would translate them later. Right now, he like everyone else, wanted to be away from this unclean place.

Forming in a single file with flankers out, the Kamserai and the scar-faced man with Van behind him headed back to the north, to where they belonged. All that day they marched in silence, each man left to his own thoughts. Casey stayed in the middle of the column. It felt somehow reassuring to have men in front and in back of him, living men.

They passed through two villages that day where women prepared food and cared for their babies while their men worked the small fields outside the hamlet, as they always had. They looked at Casey with curiosity, for many of them had never seen a white man in person and, if they all looked like this one,
then they did not wish to see another one. When they asked what had happened, the Kamserai said nothing. They only shook their heads and moved on. This was not the time for the telling of tales. Later, when the memory had a chance to fade and the horror was a bit less real, they would then tell the story of the night of the crocodiles. It would be told and retold around the campfires of their longhouses, and with each telling the story would grow and so would the fear that only a legend with the taste of truth brings with it. In centuries yet to come, the salt marsh would be avoided at all costs, and if one heard the harsh, honking cry of a crocodile he might have a momentary vision of hundreds of men being devoured by the largest of the world's living reptiles.

Near the outskirts of Kompot, Casey suddenly called a halt. Phang went to him. "What is it? Why do we stop? Have you seen something?

Casey shook his head. "No! It's not what I've seen. It's what I have not seen that bothers me. I'm going back to the marsh. I've got to know if Ho is still alive. I grow very weary of this game and wish to see an end to it. If he is alive in the swamp, I'll find him. If he is dead, then I'll know that too. Anyway, the answers are back there."

Phang started to order his men to turn around to head back, but Casey stopped him. "No! This is one thing I need to do by myself. You and your men make camp here. If I'm not back by dawn, two days from now, go on to your homes and I'll catch up with you later."

Phang would have preferred to return with his friend, for the swamp had always been a place of evil and one should not go there alone.

Casey knew what Phang was thinking. "Trust me, Old One.
I'll return. I always do and always will."

Phang felt there was a certain truth in the words, but he could not say why. But he believed. And that was sufficient.
"As you wish Big Nose. We will wait till the dawn, two days from now."

Van was still in a kind of soul shock. When Casey said he was going back he half stumbled as he turned back the way they had come. He was stopped by a firm but gentle hand on his shoulder.

"No! This is not for you. I want you to stay with Phang till I get back." Van looked up at him with sad brown eyes that told of his inner torment. He nodded his head in acceptance of his friend's order. He would go with the Kamserai and wait.

Casey faced back to the sea. He would have to hurry if he wanted to get there before nightfall, and he did. Settling into a mile eating half trot, he went back the way he had come. One mile after another he ran, letting his mind detach itself from his body as the miles passed behind him. He had to find out. He knew that if he waited he would know in time, but he didn't want to wait any longer. This had gone on too long and it was time for it to be finished. If Ho was in the swamp alive, he'd find him.

From his perch, Ho watched the crocodile. His arms and legs trembled from the strain of remaining in one spot so long. He moved a leg and wiggled the foot to get the circulation flowing again. When he did the croc blinked once and Ho was still again. Even though he knew the beast couldn't get to him in the tree he didn't want to draw any
more attention from it than necessary. If he stayed up there long enough perhaps the beast would lose interest and go after an easier meal. As the sun came and went overhead, and the heat of the day grew greater, the crocodile moved back into the water and lowered his body to where just the large golden eyes showed above the surface.

Ho was miserable. Flies and mosquitoes picked at his flesh, sucking his blood and leaving itches that couldn't be scratched. Thirst and worry turned his mouth slimy and foul tasting. All of his misery he credited to the damned one
who should have died long ago but still stayed to haunt his every hour. Was he a
Thay phu
, a wizard with powers outside those of normal men, or was he a
Tao vat xe Hou nguc
, a creature from hell? Ho had long thought himself to be too sophisticated and well educated to believe in witchcraft and devils, but of late his mind had turned more frequently to those stories told in the villages by old men and women, stories of demons that walked the earth in human form and brought misfortune. Surely, he had been given over to the forces of evil, for his luck had gone from bad to worse. He looked down from his safe limb. Where was the
Con cu sau?
It had disappeared. He looked hard at the water. From this height he should have been able to see the body of the croc, even under water. It was nowhere in sight. He twisted around the tree trunk and looked as far as his eyes could see, checking every patch of swamp grass, every mound of mud where the beast could have gone. It wasn't to be seen. Perhaps it had given up, as he had hoped it would, and had gone to seek another meal. He waited a bit longer. The lengthening of the shadows said that another night was on the way and, if he was going to leave, it would have to be now. The idea of spending one more night in this place of death gave him the courage to crawl down from his limb and place his feet back into the water. It was still shallow; the tide hadn't begun to come in yet. If he hurried he could be out of the swamp before it did, bringing back with it the dreaded crocodiles.

His only weapon was his pistol, and that he kept in his hand, the hammer cocked and ready to fire. One step at a time he moved, afraid to go too fast because of the noise it would make and the creatures it might attract. Every shadow was a terror. Every jumping fish made his heart leap into his throat and nearly choke him.

At last he could no longer restrain himself. The shadows were growing too long and the dark was going to be coming very soon to the swamp. He moved faster, more confident that he had a chance to get out alive. If he did, he would go so deep in the jungles that no one would ever hear from him again. He'd had enough of everything. His confidence was broken and the ideologies that he'd believed in and had been ready to die for no longer seemed of any importance. They were only shallow things that had served to give him the feeling of a mission in life, something to live for. Now he had another mission, and that was simply to live.

Through a break in the trees he saw a rise in the land, a hill that was not part of the marsh. Tears of relief came to his eyes. He sobbed with joy! He was going to make it! He was going to be all right. He had survived. Any thought or concern for the nearly two hundred men who had died in the marsh for him never entered his mind. He was going to live; that was all that was important. He was going to get away. Splashing his way now, he tore at the swamp, forcing his legs to go as fast as they could through the sucking mud. He ignored the whipping lashes of branches and vines that cut his face and tore his uniform. The pain was nothing. He was going to live!

Ho reached the first patch of solid ground. Beyond it he could see there was no more water. He was out! He fell to the earth, grateful, sucking in great gasps of breath to feed his oxygen starved system. Every muscle and nerve in his body trembled with relief and exhaustion. Sobbing, he gave thanks to the spirits of his fathers for his salvation.

A shadow fell over him. A sudden chill started deep in the pit of his stomach. He raised his face from the safe, good earth.

Casey stood on a small rise, the sun behind him. He watched Ho as he struggled to his feet on weak, shaking legs.

Eyes wide with shock, Ho pointed his finger at Casey. His words came out thin and ragged.
"
Qui than!
Demon!" Casey stood silent. Only his eyes moved as he watched Ho. He knew the man was on the razor's edge of madness, needing only a small push to send him over.

Ho began to raise his pistol. The Tokarev felt as though it had weights tied to it. His arm barely had the strength to get the pistol up to shoulder level. His arm and hand trembled with the strain. Tears came to his eyes as he cried
out again,
"Qui than!"

Casey thought that perhaps Ho was closer to the truth than even he knew. If there were demons to be found on the face of the earth, surely he had to qualify as being one.

The Tokarev pointed in his direction and still he didn't move. Ho's entire body was shaking as he mustered the strength to pull the trigger. The bullet passed over three feet away from its target. Ho groaned and fired again. The shaking of his body was so bad that he couldn't have hit a tank at ten feet. "Die!" he screamed. "Why don't you die and leave me alone?"

Casey shook his head almost sadly as he answered. "I would die if I could." Ho didn't hear him. He tried to fire again but the magazine was empty. He dropped the weapon. Madness was on him, riding his soul like a dark wind.

He choked out, "I know that you have come to steal my soul. But you can't have it. I won't let you." Tears streaming from his eyes, he turned blindly and ran back into the marsh, laughing insanely, repeating over and over to the wind and sky, "You can't have me...."

Casey didn't follow. When he saw that Ho was mad, he knew the chase was over. He no longer wanted to kill him. Something much worse had already taken his prey from him.

Ho stumbled, crawled, and beat his way back into the darkening marsh. His eyes sightless, he saw nothing. He ran till the heavy shadows of night sat on the waters. The very fabric of his mind had ripped. He didn't even see the golden eyes directly in front of him, or the gaping maw that rushed to meet him. Only when the jaws closed on his leg to drag him under did he scream, and then it was because he thought the demon had taken him. He tried to scream again, but it was stopped when pointed teeth severed his head from his body.

Casey heard the death cry and shuddered. He knew what had happened and how Ho had died. "The fool should have let me kill him. It would have been much better...."

There was nothing left for him here; he could go back now.

Phang wondered how his friend had fared in his quest. That he would return was never Phang's doubt. Still, he and Van, who had begun by now to return to the real world, stayed awake all that long night and waited. It was only when the cooking fires of the morning were lit and rice was being prepared that a hail from one of the Kamserai sentries brought them to their feet. Casey was back.
Van and Phang rushed to meet their friend. From the expression in the gray-blue eyes both men knew the long hunt was over.

Casey said nothing, only nodded his greetings and went to a grassy spot under a tree and lay down. Taking one deep breath he closed his eyes and went to sleep. He was very, very tired.

Phang squatted on his haunches to wait till Casey awoke, then he would have the last of the story. When Casey lay down to rest so did Van. Both men needed the healing powers of sleep.

It was the next morning before Casey stirred from his deep slumber. He told Phang and Van of Ho's death and the Kamserai touched his hag of charms. "
My friend, it is time for you to leave and go back to your own kind."

Casey smiled grimly and
thought,
my own kind? There is none that I can call my own kind.

The column formed up and they moved out. Phang would provide an escort for him and Van back to South Vietnam.

For the next three days they moved steadily on, re-crossing the same fields and rivers until they reached the flat rice lands of the upper delta, near Ha Tien. That night they rested only a few miles from an American outpost. They would wait till full light before going in. That way there would be little chance that they'd be mistaken for Vietcong.

When they neared the outskirts of Ha Tien they encountered a small fortified guard post where fifty ARVIN and a dozen American soldiers guarded the western approach to the city. At a distance of seven hundred meters from the main gate, Phang said his farewells. He had no need to go any further and two men would not be as likely to excite a trigger happy soldier as would his band which, from a distance looked much the same as any other band of guerrillas or bandits.

He held Casey's arm and squeezed. "Live long and well, my friend. If ever you have need of me you have but to call and I will answer. As long as there is life in my body and strength in my limbs I will come. Live long! Live well!" To Van there was little that could be said. They merely smiled at each other and that was the end of it. There was no need for words.

Casey returned the squeeze and hugged the old barbarian around the shoulders before turning his back. With Van at his side, he walked toward the outpost. Phang and his men faded away, back into high grass. They turned back to their homelands in Cambodia, where their wives and children awaited their return.

A sentry on the main gate called out to the sergeant of the guard.
"Hey, Sarge, there's someone coming in. There's two of them. One of them looks like a GI. He's too damned big to be a gook.”

SFC Lansing climbed on top of the sandbagged wall and looked out. "You're right, it is an American. Take a couple of men and go out and bring him in. But watch the Viet with him. It might be a trap of some kind."

The sentry took two PFCs with him, opened the main gate under the protective sights of an M-60 light machine gun, and went out. They were about four hundred meters from the main gate when they met.

Casey raised a hand in greeting as the corporal began to question him about what the hell he was doing out in the boondocks with just a single Viet for company. The questioning was abruptly stopped when the corporal disappeared in an exploding cloud. Casey felt a hammer blow hit his head and then darkness took him. He wasn't aware of the rest of the half dozen 81 mm mortar rounds that came in around them. A Vietcong mortar crew had snuck in close during the night and was laying down a few rounds of harassing fire. After they got off their six rounds they grabbed their tube and ran for it. Unfortunately, they ran right into Phang, who was pleased to acquire such a valuable addition to his armory.

The two surviving privates covered Van as he somehow hoisted the larger man onto his shoulders and hauled Casey across the field into the gates of the outpost. The two privates decided quickly that there wasn't any sense in trying to bring in the corporal. There wasn't enough of him left to make an armful. Besides which they hadn't liked him very much anyway.