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Chapter One
Copyright 2005 James P. Slusser, Sr.
This story is a work of fiction. The characters portrayed and their stories, while based and inspired partially by factual events, exist solely in the imagination of the author. Any resemblance to any persons or events, living or dead, past or present, is coincidental. (That means that some of this stuff really happened, and some of it didn’t. And I’m not going to tell you which is which.)
This story is a work of fiction. The characters portrayed and their stories, while based and inspired partially by factual events, exist solely in the imagination of the author. Any resemblance to any persons or events, living or dead, past or present, is coincidental. (That means that some of this stuff really happened, and some of it didn’t. And I’m not going to tell you which is which.)
It is not the time of your dying that matters. It is how you lived that is important.
SPOOKS By James P. Slusser, Sr.
He dozed under one of the few trees still standing, when the whop-whop of the incoming Huey intruded on his solitude. He shifted the 12 gauge riot gun wrapped in a green T-shirt in his lap with his right hand, took another pull on the half-full bottle of Jim Beam in his left hand, and opened his eyes to watch the medi-vac land. Dog-ass tired, his ingrained survival instincts ground into him at Little Creek, Holabird, Benning, Gordon, Langley and the last year-and-a-half in the jungle demanded he stay aware of all events going on around him. As the Chopper approached the Pad at the 125th Army Surgical Hospital, Da Nang, South Vietnam, Major Winslow idly wondered why somebody would choose the tree next to the Landing Pad to sit all alone. The figure quickly forgotten, she prepared to get her patient out of the aircraft and into the hospital as soon as the dust settled from the landing. Just before the Huey with the big Red Cross on the nose touched down, he caught a flash of blonde hair in a pony tail at the door and thought, what the hell is some crazy female doing flying medi-vac. The bird settled in its own dust, and when it cleared, Lieutenant Commander James Cooper, USN/ONI (Office of Naval Intelligence) was treated to a ringside seat as Major Mary-Ellen Elizabeth Winslow, U.S. Army Nurse Corps, started backing out the door, one hand on the stretcher beside her, the other holding a plasma bag high enough to keep the fluid flowing. Even the army issue green trousers could not hide a near-perfect heart-shaped tukas as she bent over the stretcher and tended to her patient. She reached down with her right boot, searched for the skid-step, missed, and fell backwards out of the Huey, landing smack on that cute little butt. She jumped up to look around to see if anybody witnessed her somewhat embarrassing one-point landing and remembered the figure and turned to see a half-full bottle of Jim Beam hoisted in a silent toast in her direction. My God, she thought, what the hell is that? The man in all black cammies sat with two belts of shotgun shells crisscrossed across his chest against a tree. He was filthy dirty, his eyes, two reddened, narrow slits, his face, head and hands covered in green and black camouflage paint. He had no hair and a gold fishhook stuck in the lobe of his left ear. Probably shaved his head, she thought, and then noticed at least a dozen human ears on a piece of line hanging from that fishhook. She turned to the crew chief of the helicopter and verbalized her original thought, "What the bloody fucking hell is that thing sitting over there, Sergeant?" she yelled over the roar of the engine and rotor blades. "You don't want to know, Ma'am,” yelled back the Sergeant. "And you never saw him. He's a "Spook." So, she thought, that's what a Spook looks like. She turned to get her patient inside where the surgeons could finish saving his life, which she started in the field. She made a mental note to have the Security Detail remove it from the vicinity of "her" hospital as soon as she got the wounded Marine in her charge into the operating room. As soon as the young boy on the stretcher was turned over to the Scrub Team, she walked out to the Security Desk to see the MP on duty. "There's a groady son-of-a-bitch sitting out by the pad, drinking. Get somebody out there now to tell him to find someplace else to get bombed,” she told the Corporal at the desk. "What the hell is he doing in this area, anyway?" "He's waiting for me to get sewed up, Major," a deep, resonant voice behind her said. "And unless you want somebody killed or hurt real bad, I wouldn't disturb him right now." She turned to find a huge man, only a half-shade lighter than his black cammies and with a fresh, white bandage on his left shoulder that only accentuated the total effect. "Holy shit, another one." She noticed no markings, no name patches, no designators of any kind on his “uniform,” if it could be called that. "Who the hell are you and what's your Unit, Soldier?" she demanded in the most obnoxious Major voice she could muster. "And who the hell is that 'thing' sitting out there?" "You can call me Woody, Major,” he said in a crushed velvet, gentle voice that somehow didn't reflect at all the ferocity she saw in his eyes. "That 'thing' you refer to is my Boss, and anything other than that, Major, you don't have a need-to-know." The cold, black eyes appeared to soften ever so slightly. "Look, Major, I'm sorry if we intruded on your little corner of Paradise, here. I'm through being repaired, so we'll be leaving now, anyway." "Good." She watched Woody turn and walk out the door. Wonder if that‘s his real name? She didn't know why, but she followed him outside and watched, hands on her hips, while he walked across the Landing Pad and spoke to his Boss, who stood up when he saw Woody approach. Two other black-clad figures sprang up from out of the earth and joined them. As if on cue, all four figures laughed, turned to look in her direction and waved before they walked toward the beach on the other side of the Pad. Then the rage boiled inside of her, because when they got to the tide line, that arrogant bastard, the one with human ears hanging beside his head, stopped, turned back to look at her and blew her a kiss. "Get me the 'skinny' on that one,” Cooper said as they walked down the beach. "You got it, Jim," Woody replied.
* * *
The next morning Major Mary "Dusty" Winslow woke, stretched, sat up, looked around, and immediately reached for the .357 magnum under her pillow and quickly scanned her quarters. She opened the door and stepped outside, magnum at the ready and checked left, right, and only succeeded in scaring her neighbor, Nurse Lt. Margie Rockingham nearly to death when the gun swung in her direction. "What the hell, Major?" a very wide-eyed Margie screamed. "Somebody's been in my hooch, Margie. Did you see or hear anything during the night?" "Not a thing, Major. Did they attack you? Are you all right?" "Whoever it was, was damn good,” Dusty scowled. "Got in and out without even waking me, and you know what a light sleeper I am." Margie should know, since Dusty caught her sneaking that Corpsman into her hooch next door last week. "Then how do you know somebody was in there?" "Look for yourself,” Dusty pointed into her hooch. "I don't see anything out of place, Major." "Look again, Lieutenant. Just where in hell do you think that came from, over here?" There on Dusty's nightstand about eighteen inches from her pillow, sat a cut-glass vase, holding a single, perfect, blood red rose. "Gee, I don't know, Major," Margie grinned to ease the tension with a little humor. "Ghosts?" "Yeah ... Right." When she went to see Col. Sam Waterson, the CO of the hospital to report the incident, Dusty told him her own theory of how a rose got in her hooch. "I got a real strong gut feeling that this bullshit is connected to those assholes in the black cammies, Colonel." She went on to explain her encounter with Woody and the "thing" sitting by the Landing Pad. "I've heard talk about Spooks before, but never saw one until yesterday. Then when I asked for his Unit Designation, that Woody character had the gall to tell me I don't have a 'need-to-know.' Just who and what the hell are these people anyway?" Sam Waterson only had another eight months before he could retire to a nice private practice back in “The World” and one thing he didn't need right now was a bunch of grief from this twenty-two year-old piss-ant Nurse Major who had her feathers ruffled by somebody in Jim Cooper's Black Ops Group. He knew these particular Spooks, since he and only a couple dozen doctors in Country were authorized to treat them if they were lucky enough to get back from a mission hurt and alive. Officially designated, somewhere deep in the dungeons of the Pentagon, as SPecial Operations Ordinance, Covert Situations, the Government didn't consider them as people, but weapons. "All I know is, Major," he said, "I got a call yesterday telling me that a man with a stab wound in his left shoulder would come in for treatment and I should fix him up, ask no questions, and make no record that he was ever here. The person on the other end of the phone had an unquestionable position and authority to issue such an order. So I sewed the guy up, asked no questions, made no records, and I've already forgotten about the whole incident. You know more than I do, since he at least spoke to you, and you have a name." He got up from behind his desk, walked to his office door and opened it. When she walked by him, he said, "By the way Major, I suggest you forget about it too." Before he closed the door, he watched Major Winslow walk away from him to the end of the hall. He told his secretary not to disturb him under any circumstances and closed his office door. When he turned back to his desk, he said aloud, "Her tukas is cute, but I wouldn't call it 'perfect', exactly." "That just proves that you are a man of absolutely no taste at all in asses,” said Jim Cooper as he came out of Sam's private latrine. "Do you actually wear that French-whore smelling shit in your medicine cabinet?" Sam knew this man and his team of intelligence specialists routinely went places nobody else could or wanted to go, where they had to get in, find out what the “brass” wanted to know, then get back with the information without anybody ever knowing they were there. That meant if they happened to “bump into” any unfriendlies, they had to make sure there were no survivors to tell the tale. Sam felt a cold chill when he remembered the one time he was privy to a mission planning session when Cooper told his men, "Remember, there are only two orders I'm giving you once we're on the ground. If it moves, kill it. … If it don’t move, use it for cover." That pretty accurately reflected what, as one of his Doctors, Sam read in Cooper's medical records and psyche profile. While Cooper wasn't a homicidal maniac, he had little regard for the sanctity of life, and was bothered very little, if at all, if the situation required that he snuff out another human life. On the one occasion he approached the subject, Cooper looked him dead in the eye and in a voice as cold as death, said, "Our job is to capture information, not prisoners, or to make sure whoever has to be neutralized, gets neutralized.” Sam never tried to discuss the subject again. "Did you actually put a rose on her nightstand without waking her up?" Sam asked. "Fuck no. I was too friendly with Jim Beam last night. I had Woody do it. The 'word' I get on that one is, she's a widow and don't have nothing to do with any male personnel. She turn 'butch' when her husband died?" Cooper asked. "No, I don't think so. From what I gather in her background checks, she married real young to a guy quite a bit older. A Korean War fighter jock. Was well off enough financially to get her through Nursing School with a Master's Degree in Nursing before she even turned twenty and…” "How old is she now?” Cooper interrupted. "If I remember right, she turns twenty-three in a week or two. Getting back to her husband, he was still young enough to get recalled for this little fracas here, and rather than go back to war, he flew his twin-engine bamboo bomber into the side of a mountain somewhere in the Poconos. She found out about it when her next-of-kin got a call from the State Police saying that she and her husband had been killed in a plane crash. Seems her flight bag and pilot's license was in the aircraft, and the cops assumed that the female body in the wreckage was hers. The Shrinks feel she's trying to erase the fact the cheatin' son-of-a-bitch killed himself and his girl friend rather than go to Vietnam. She's probably the best Evac Field nurse I've ever seen. I've certainly never seen any nurse as dedicated to her patients. As a matter-of-fact, she's about due to get recommended for her silver oak leaves, and then she'll outrank you. Unless," Sam went on with a wry grin, "you call the Pentagon and have them promote you to Commander." "Want me to have them bump you to Major-General at the same time?" One of the few regulations Jim Cooper abided by was the one that required him, and every member of his Team, to have a physical check-up after every mission. The fact that every doctor on the list was not only an M.D., but was qualified in psychiatry and psychology was not lost on LCDR Cooper. So the next thirty minutes of what seemed friendly conversation about friends and family came as no surprise. He always passed and didn't figure any different this time. As soon as all the prodding, and needle sticks were over with, he and his Team would go to Bangkok, Thailand for a couple weeks R & R. "You ready to give me my clean bill of health?" he asked, prepared for the actual physical examination. Sam paused for maybe a heartbeat, "I'm tied up solid the rest of today. Let's make it first thing tomorrow, okay? At 0800. And stay off the sauce tonight. I don't want the nurse drawing 80 proof out of your veins." "Okay, I gotta make sure all our travel arrangements are set for the Liberty run anyway. See ya tomorrow." As soon as Cooper left his office, Sam turned to the cabinet behind his desk, unlocked it and took out a telephone. He picked up the handset, pushed a button on the instrument, waited a brief moment and said, "Good morning, General. This is Dr. Waterson. We're doing the physical at 0800 tomorrow, but Pathfinder4 passed his psyche examination." A short pause—a laugh. "Yes sir, he's still crazy as hell."
***
"Where you headed in such a hurry?" Dusty asked Margie the following morning as she rounded the corner with a basket in her hand. "To assist Dr. Waterson with a physical on four guys in Treatment 3. I gotta take these blood samples to the Lab and wait for the results." She paused. "Look at this, Major. This is weird.” She showed Dusty the labels on the sample tubes in the basket. "All Col. Waterson put on these labels are first names. I'm supposed to take them to the Lab, observe the tests, make sure the samples are destroyed afterwards, and bring the only copy of the results back to him, ASAP. Weird, huh?" Dusty checked the sixteen vials of blood in the basket; four were labeled Mike, four Bob, four Jim, and four Woody. "What do these people look like?" "Nasty. The black guy, Woody has six fresh sutures in his left shoulder and a couple older scars that look like gunshots. Mike and Bob, both white guys, don't have any significant scars, but have some heavy bruises like they'd been in a hell of a fight. The bald white guy, Jim, is the weirdest one of the bunch. Wears a little gold hoop in his left ear, built like a pro wrestler, and has legs like tree trunks. Never said a word during the whole exam. But if I had to pick one of them to get to know 'real well,' if you know what I mean, he'd be the one. Only problem is his eyes are absolutely dead, and when he looks at you, it's like they bore right through you." "Well, forget it, Lieutenant," Dusty countered. "These probably aren't their real names anyway. Did you check their dogtags?" "They aren't wearing dogtags, Major. But these are their real names. The one thing they all have in common is a tattoo on their left bicep. It's a blue and red cross about four inches long, with their name on a ribbon above it." "And they're all the same?" "Not exactly," Margie frowned. "The letters around the crosses are different. Jim and Woody have the letters U-S-N around theirs. Bob has U-S-A, and Mike has U-S-M-C." "Well, if Waterson wants those results STAT, you better get going." "Yes Ma'am." Margie continued down the hall toward the hematology lab. Later that evening, Lt. Rockingham knocked lightly on the door of the Head Nurse's hooch. "Who?" came from inside. "Lieutenant Rockingham, Major." "Come." Margie opened the door and stepped inside. "What can I do for you, Margie?" asked Dusty. Dusty and Margie were not only good nurses, but also became friends during their tour of duty at the 125th, so when they were alone, military formalities were rarely observed. "Jesus, Dusty," said Margie, "this just keeps getting stranger and stranger. Remember those blood test reports I took to Col. Waterson?" "Don't tell me," said Dusty with a half-grin as she handed Margie a drink from the bottle of Jack Daniels she always kept in her footlocker. "They all had the clap, right?" "No.” Margie laughed aloud. “They were all clean as fresh laundry. But when I got the paperwork back to Dr. Waterson, he read all the reports then burned them in the trash can in Treatment 3." "Burned them?" Dusty asked, incredulously. "Yeah. Then dumped the ashes in the Biohazard Waste container. He dismissed me and said to forget I was ever there. Who the hell are those guys, anyway?" "I'll give you the same answer I got the last time I asked a similar question. ‘You really don't want to know, Lieutenant. And you never saw them. They're Spooks."
Pathfinder4 |
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| Started By | Thread Subject | Replies | Last Post | ||
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| Anonymous | Chapter One | 0 | Apr 12 2008, 2:49 PM EDT by Anonymous | ||
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Thread started: Apr 12 2008, 2:49 PM EDT
Watch
You now have me hooked and I want to find the book. I am going to check out the library and see if they have it. Glad I went into the profile on pogo and saw this. I think that my husband would enjoy it also.
Good luck and God Bless you for your time in the service. Teachqhr |
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| Anonymous | chapter one | 1 | Feb 10 2008, 2:13 PM EST by Anonymous | ||
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Thread started: Jan 28 2008, 4:59 PM EST
Watch
Just finished reading chapter one. I have to admit, I am usually not a military 'genre' type of person but this really caught my interest. Love the characters and how their personalities hit you right in the face. Looking forward to chapters two and three.
Lucie |
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