Shadows of War

“You think they’re getting more soldiers?”

“I don’t know.”

Mara wore a cross around her neck, outside her clothes. Josh thought of asking her about faith — asking what she believed, and whether she was praying. But the ground began to shake, vibrating in sympathy with the rotor of a helicopter as it approached. There was a gust of wind through the basement, and then a pop, as if a balloon had burst. Something crashed above. Josh gripped Mara and M? tighter.

The helicopter moved away.

M? began to cry.

“It’s okay,” Josh said, bundling her close to him.

“Em,“ said Mara. “B? lamasao?”

“What are you saying?” Josh asked.

“I’m asking her what’s wrong.”

“It’s going to be okay,” Josh told the girl. “We’re not going to let the bad people hurt you.”

“Does she understand any English?”

“She understands that.”

Mara reached across him, her hand grazing his chin as she felt for the girl. She found her forehead.

“I think she has a temperature,” said Mara. “She seems warm.”

“Maybe.”

Mara put her hand on his forehead as well. Her hand felt cool, and soft — softer than he would have expected.

“You feel warm too,” she said.

“Take two aspirin and call you in the morning, right?” he said.

This time the joke fell flat, and neither one of them laughed.

The air smelled more dank than smoky. Josh’s nose burned with the irritants. He leaned over and pressed his face into his shoulder, muffling a sneeze.

“Maybe we should see what’s going on,” he suggested after it had been quiet for a while. “If we just push the door up a little bit.”

“Good idea.”

The trapdoor wouldn’t budge at first, and Josh had to angle himself against the steps to get more leverage. When it finally started to rise, it made a very loud creak; he gritted his teeth, worried now that they had done the wrong thing.

“Can you see?” he asked Mara.

“Just junk.”

She turned and covered her mouth, beginning to cough. Josh leaned forward, pushing to the side to lift the door farther. Suddenly the mower shifted, sliding back with a crash.

He stood on the steps, waiting for the soldiers to run into the battered barn. Light streamed through the left side of the building; part of the wall had collapsed. There were charred beams nearby. A haze of smoke drifted through the interior. But the fire itself seemed to be out.

Where were the soldiers?

Outside, waiting?

It was a trick to make them think they’d gone.

M? ran up the steps past him, into the barn.

“M?. Wait,” he said. He pushed the door all the way open and followed her. But by the time he got to the floor, she had slipped through the plows and fallen debris and disappeared.

“Damn it.”

“Are they gone?” asked Mara.

“I don’t know,” he yelled, rushing toward the door where he figured the girl had gone. It was wide open, scorched but intact.

This is where I’ll die, he thought, springing into the open air.

M? was standing nearby, gulping the fresh air. The Chinese soldiers were gone.

15

Northwestern Vietnam

Contacting General Perry to give the launch go-ahead proved to be much easier than getting the troops off the bridge. Perry was waiting at a command bunker at the Hanoi airport; as soon as Zeus called in, he passed the order along to launch the Tomahawks.

Thieu’s controller, meanwhile, claimed he was in touch with the troops’ commanding general, and that the order had been given for them to withdraw. But if so, it had no effect, and after ten minutes, they remained on the bridge, roughly thirty feet from one of the Tomahawk’s detonation points. The missiles were just under twenty minutes away.

They spent five more minutes on the radio, trying to contact the unit and its parent themselves. As they banked around the southern end of the reservoir, Zeus saw the soldiers still on the bridge.

“You sure they’re not Chinese?” he asked the pilot over the interphone.

“Negative. They are our guys.”

“We have to get them out of there.”

“Yes. Hold on.”

Thieu pitched the plane forward. Zeus’s stomach immediately began doing flip-flops.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Sending them a telegram,” said Thieu.

A second later, the aircraft began reverberating as the pilot sent a few dozen cannon rounds into the bridge.

“That’ll get them moving,” said the pilot.

Thieu was right: the troops began running toward the other end of the bridge — fortunately toward the southwestern side.

They also started firing at the plane. Zeus saw their muzzle flashes as the plane banked away. “They’re trying to shoot us down,” he said.

“With those peashooters? Not a worry.”

Zeus tightened his restraints.

They climbed back up through fifteen thousand feet, sailing high over the water and nearby ground. The highways faded from thick ribbons to infinitesimal threads, dissolving into the fur of the ground.

The missiles would be coming from the east. Zeus lifted his binoculars, curious about whether he would see them coming. He scanned out of the left side of the cockpit first, then realized the plane was going east and he was looking north; the missiles would be coming from the other direction. As he turned, something caught his attention, a fleeting blur in the corner of his eye. He looked back and saw a silver finger in the air, tiny and small, not quite parallel to them. He thumbed the focus on the binoculars, trying to bring the blur into focus. It separated into two small sticks.

“We have company!” shouted Thieu, his voice reverberating in the helmet. “Chinese MiGs.”

16

Northwestern Vietnam

Mara surveyed the damage as she caught her breath. All but one of the houses had been burned to the ground. The exception was a charred ruin with its roof caved and two sides down. Two of the barns were fairly well desiccated, more piles of charred black wood than buildings.