May 9th, 1968 - Vietnam

  Thankfully, the next several clears went without issue, and the fire team reached the far side of the village without incident. They encountered a few of the villagers, whose reactions ranged from bewildered to terrified, but offered no resistance as they invaded their homes.

  For every life they turned upside down, Henry felt a pang of guilt. He had long since become disillusioned with the reality of this war or his role as liberator. His father had warned him of the realities of war, but he hadn’t believed it until he lived it for himself.

  A loud crash abruptly interrupted his musings, causing the members of the fire team to whirl around and raise arms in unison at what appeared to be a chicken coop across from the hut they had been clearing.

  “VC! Eyes on VC!” Miller screamed, his voice bordering on hysteria. The M16 clutched in his shaking hands pointed toward a water barrel next to the coop. A small figure seemed to have fallen there was peeking around it at the small troop of men.

  Henry moved to get a better angle, suspecting it was just a kid who had fallen off the roof and was now hiding in terror.

  “Hold fi-” But Henry’s command was cut off by the report of an M16 firing right next to him.

  The acrid smell of burning gunpowder filled the air as Henry slowly turned to look at the shooter. Miller stood frozen except for his shaking gun, smoke trailing from the barrel. The big man's face was a mask of terror, and his lip trembled in an almost comical display of fear. Henry’s ears were ringing as he looked in disbelief at the private.

  “Sarge, I-I-,”

  “What the fuck did you just do, Miller?” Henry shouted before whirling around and racing toward the small figure crumpled in the mud. He rolled the small body over, revealing the face of a terrified child. The small boy was coughing up blood and looked at Henry with terrified eyes that seemed to accuse him.

  “Williams! Get me a bandage,” Henry called as his hands scrabbled to staunch the blood pouring from the boy's stomach. Williams was immediately at his side, his med kit already unclasped and a bandage in hand. Henry briefly caught his eye and saw that the other man had already judged the small boy a lost cause. He handed Henry the requested bandage regardless, his face a mask of resigned sorrow.

  “He’s not gone yet, dammit,” Henry growled, turning back to the boy and applying the bandage to the wound. The spurting blood that poured profusely from the small boy almost immediately dyed the white bandage crimson.

  Henry could vaguely register Simms talking to Ruiz over the radio while Hester seemed to be trying to calm or at least contain Miller. Miller was ranting and raving about VC in the village around them.

  Henry tuned everything out as he tried to staunch the blood, his hands and arms now painted a dark crimson that stained his uniform. Just need to stop the bleeding, he thought feverishly.

  As if from far away, he felt someone shaking his shoulder. He shrugged it off, but it persisted.

  “Sarge! Sarge!” Williams was shouting at him and shaking his shoulder. Henry looked up at him, feeling disassociated from reality and his ears still ringing. “He’s gone, sarge.” Guilt and sadness wracked Williams’ face, but his hard gaze held no argument and reminded Henry of his responsibility to the mission.

  Henry looked down at the little boy. His cold, dead eyes stared back at him accusingly. He looked away, unable to bear the guilt he felt from that dead gaze. He whirled, his eyes filled with a white hot anger that was laser-focused on one man — Miller.

  Rising to his full height, Henry began to stalk toward the murderer. Miller was raving and swinging his gun at the area around him, putting everyone in the vicinity in danger. Simms had been trying to calm him down, but now he was slowly backing away with his hands raised, trying to speak placatingly to diffuse the situation.

  “Stop looking at me like that,” Miller said, a note of hysteria entering his voice. “That’s what the VC do! They hide among the civvies and then shoot you in the back when your guard is down.”

  “Miller, you need to put the gun dow-” Simms started to say.

  “No!” Miller screamed, clutching his gun even tighter. “You stay back, I’m not going to be caught in an ambush again.”

  They all took a step back from Miller, except for Henry, who stepped forward and set an icy gaze on the young man. “Put the gun down, Private. You’re a danger to this mission and my men, and you will stand down.”

  “Sarge, why can’t you see?” Miller cried, his features contorting maniacally. “These motherfuckers are all around us. Hiding in plain sight.”

  Henry took a tentative step forward, hand out placatingly. “That may be, son, but we need to sort out this mess. That kid was unarmed, and now he’s dead. Just give me the gu-”

  “Why won’t you believe me?” Miller squealed hysterically. He was shaking worse than ever and pointing his M16 right at Henry, a quivering finger hovering over the trigger. Henry took a careful step backward, hoping the space would help Miller remain calm.

  “I’ll… I’ll just show you then,” Miller spat before he whirled and sprinted toward one of the larger huts they hadn’t cleared yet.

  Henry shot a baffled look at his men before tearing after Miller. “Hester! Simms! Keep an eye on our backs! Williams, with me!” He sprinted forward, terrified of what Miller might do in his rage-filled, unstable state.

  Ahead of them, Miller had burst into a hut, and the sounds of screaming and pleading rang out through the village. Henry’s blood ran cold, and he sprinted as fast as he could, dread filling him with every step.

  “Miller!” he screamed as he ran. Please, God, don’t let this happen, he prayed silently. Just a few steps away, the unmistakable, thunderous crackle of an M16 firing on full automatic reached his ears.

  Henry charged into the hut and froze at what he saw there. A slaughter. A horrific scene of dead bodies piled on top of each other. Over a dozen people dead or dying in the span of mere moments.

  Before him, Miller was facing a young man who had his hands up in surrender and a look of terror plastered across his face. Miller had dropped his M16 and was tugging free his sidearm to no doubt gun down the last standing civilian.

  “Miller!” Henry bellowed before he swept forward and rammed a shoulder into the large man with all his considerable strength just as the pistol discharged with a loud bang. Miller flew through the air and crumpled into a heap in the corner of the hut. Henry quickly snapped up the gun and handed it to Williams, who had frozen in the doorway.

  He had been too slow. The damage was already done. Henry’s soul screamed in protest, and he clutched his hair in horror at the scene before him. Dead or dying people littered the interior of the hut. His vacant stare froze on the corpse of a mother cradling a child — her last act attempting to shield the child with her own body. It hadn’t worked.

  Bile threatened to spew forth, and a pounding filled his ears as Henry took in the horrific scene. He raised a hand to his mouth in disbelief as he looked around wide-eyed.

  They’re just meat now. This whole village is a pile of bleeding meat in here. The shocking thought thrust itself into his brain and made him physically recoil. So many lives irretrievably thrown away. Henry couldn’t even begin to fathom the ramifications of this savagery and his growing sense of culpability for not having prevented it.

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  Slowly, his gaze turned to fix on the murderer who committed this atrocity. Miller lay in a crying heap, his eyes locked on Henry. One of his hands raised in something between supplication and warding Henry off.

  “What did you do, Miller?” Henry said, his voice flat and devoid of any emotion. He took a step toward the man. “What the fuck did you do?”

  “S-sarge, I made em’ stop,” he blubbered, tears and snot running down his face. His whole body trembled as he lay in the dirt that was now mixing with blood. “I-I had to stop em’, Sarge.” Henry could see the sincerity on the man’s face. His true conviction that this is something he thought he had to do, and that scared Henry to his core. This man was truly insane.

  Henry turned away, beginning to check the casualties for any survivors.

  “I’m sorry!” Miller wailed behind him. “There was no other way!” Henry ignored the broken man’s supplications as he methodically checked each person. Blood now stained his knees and boots to match his crimson-coated hands. Person after person he checked showed no pulse.

  As Henry checked the body of the boy Miller had shot last, his breath caught in surprise. A boy, maybe thirteen years old, looked up in terror at him. He raised his hands in surrender and began to babble in Vietnamese. Henry couldn’t understand much except for a word here or there, but he raised his own hands and shushed the boy placatingly.

  “You’re alright, son, we’ll get ya patched up,” he said, forcing a reassuring smile onto his face. He extended a hand down to the young man, who took it cautiously. Henry asked for the boy's name in broken Vietnamese.

  “Bùi,” the boy replied in a trembling voice, terror still clearly etched on his face as he took in the scene around him. Luckily, he appeared to only have a single wound on his neck that was bleeding, but didn’t appear to be critical.

  “Williams, can we get this kid patched up?” Henry said, turning to Williams. To his shock, Williams was standing over Miller, the Colt 1911 Henry had handed him clutched in his trembling hand. He raised the gun slowly to point at Miller, who was wailing and pleading for his life.

  “Private, you stand down,” Henry said, unable to produce more than a wavering plea rather than the commanding bark he usually employed when giving orders. “This isn’t the way we handle things. If you do this, you’re no better tha-”

  BLAM. A single deafening shot rang out, leaving Henry’s ears ringing again. Henry dropped to his knees in disbelief. The weight of his sorrow forcing him to bow his head in shame, the feeling overwhelming and consuming him at his failure in his duty to these men.

  This is just too damn much for a country kid, he thought. Why’d they ever think someone like me could handle this?

  Williams turned slowly toward Henry, tears streaming down his face. The two men looked at each other for a long moment before Williams turned and strode out of the hut. On his way out, he tossed the gun to land next to Miller in the blood-filled dirt.

  Henry slowly got to his feet and stood there, frozen in disbelief and shock.

  After an interminable amount of time, Ruiz burst in and took in the scene in growing horror. He looked at Henry, his mouth agape. Ruiz’s eyes came to rest just behind and to the left of Henry, reminding him that Bùi was still standing there, shaking in terror and shock. Blood streamed down his neck to stain his shirt, but he hadn’t dared move an inch from his place behind Henry.

  Seeing the boy in need snapped Henry out of his stupor, and he wrapped a comforting arm around the boy. He led him forward, pushing past Ruiz out of the hut. He walked him toward the medic, supporting him with each step.

  “Doc, this is Bùi,” Henry told the medic. “He needs to be patched up.” The medic nodded and jumped into action, immediately beginning triage.

  Henry dropped back, letting the medic take over. He spotted a nearby rock and walked over to sit on it, his eyes staring off into the distance. Faces flashed through his mind. The dead faces of the little boy and the villagers. The mask of deranged fury and horror on Miller. Williams’ face. They flipped through his mind like horrific flashcards he couldn’t unsee.

  He dropped his head into his hands, pressing his palms almost painfully into his eyes as if that could somehow erase what he’d seen in the last hour.

  I should have acted, he chastised himself. I saw he was broken, and I did nothing.

  His jaw clenched hard enough to ache, and he stared at the dirt with a haunted intensity. His chest rose and fell in shallow bursts, as if he were trying to outrun the weight crushing down on him.

  When he heard footsteps crunching softly toward him, he didn’t look up right away. But something in the pace, in the quiet care of the approach, told him it was Ruiz coming toward him like you would a cornered animal.

  “Here,” Ruiz said, extending a damp handkerchief. “For your, uh, everything.” He gestured to Henry’s face and arms. Henry took the handkerchief limply and began to clean his face that he’d inadvertently smeared with blood.

  As he washed, Ruiz took a seat next to him. They sat in silence for a time, Ruiz eyeing Williams, who sat huddled against the wall of a hut. Ruiz sucked his teeth, breaking the silence.

  “Shit intel,” he said simply, letting the silence grow again for a long moment.

  “We’ll need to clean up the story of what happened here, Thompson,” he said, his voice carefully devoid of emotion. “What… what really happened here can’t leave here, ya understand?”

  Henry looked slowly over to Ruiz, his gaze holding no room for disagreement.

  “But what he did… it was a war crime, Sergeant. And Williams… I don’t think I can-”

  “Shit got messy, and one of our boys is goin’ home in a long wooden box,” Ruiz interrupted. “He died trying to do his duty to his country. His mom and pops back home deserve that peace of mind.”

  “And what about the families of those people in there?” Henry asked hotly, pointing back at the hut he’d just left. “Do they get peace of mind?”

  “No, they do not, Sergeant,” Ruiz replied without hesitation. “And neither do you, or me, or Williams over there.”

  Henry turned away, unable to bear what he was hearing.

  “None of these boys will know peace. Not really. Fifty years from now, you'll be old and fat, lyin’ in bed thinking of all this shit. It’s not fuckin’ fair, but it’s the hand we were dealt.” He placed a calming hand on Henry’s shoulder while he said this. “Now… you know what to say when they ask what happened here?”

  Henry’s only reply was a shrug and a sad shake of his head. Ruiz nodded as if the matter was settled. He gave Henry’s arm a squeeze before he rose to bark orders at the men to prepare to roll out. Ruiz turned back to consider Henry.

  “You’ll get through this, Thompson,” he said gruffly, but with understanding in his eyes. “What’s that they call ya back at base? Comeback Kid, right? Henry winced at the unwanted nickname. Seeking to end the conversation as soon as possible, he only nodded silently, to which Ruiz saluted and turned to stride away.

  Shakily, Henry rose to his feet and walked over to check on Bùi.

  “How’s he looking, doc?” Henry asked.

  “He’s good, Sarge, just needed a patch job and he’ll be right as rain.”

  Bùi was looking at him, his eyes containing something Henry couldn’t identify. The young man appeared to be taking Henry’s measure and judging him. With a curt nod of the head, he seemed to come to a decision, and he spouted off a long string of Vietnamese to the doc, who listened intently.

  “He said he was just visiting here, and that he wants you to come visit his home,” the doc translated. “His father and sister are waiting for him back at their family farm, and he’s saying it’s thanks to you he’ll get to see them again.”

  Henry shook his head, which seemed to distress Bùi. “He’s got it all wrong, doc. All this mess is my fault to begin with.”

  The doc translated, Bùi listening keenly before responding in a long string of Vietnamese punctuated by wild hand gestures and pointing at Henry.

  “He seems pretty adamant, Sarge. He really wants you to come visit his farm. It’s near that small village, about 40 minutes north of base.”

  Henry didn’t have the energy to fight anymore, so he knelt next to the young man and placed a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll do my best to stop by, son, but no promises.” The doc relayed the words, and a wide grin spread across Bùi’s face. He reached up to shake Henry’s hand, which he reluctantly accepted with a disbelieving shake of his head.

  Henry stood to gather what remained of his men, eyeing Williams as he trudged back to the boat with his head down. Miller’s body was being carried on a stretcher between Hester and Simms. He had to fight down the bile that threatened to rise again.

  Ruiz’s men were dousing the hut with gasoline, preparing to cover up the atrocity committed within. Hating and condemning himself, Henry turned and hefted his M16 while walking away. Tears he refused to let fall stung his eyes as the heat from the flames pressed against his back, pushing him onward and seeming to judge him.

  As he settled into the patrol boat, he forced himself to take a spot next to Miller’s body. Not wanting anyone else to shoulder that burden. As the boat pulled out into the river, he closed his eyes, wishing the op had gone any other way than how it had. The faces flashed through his mind, rapid-fire. Each one more accusing than the next.

  God help me, he prayed desperately as the blame and guilt rose within to try and choke him.

  In the approaching night, he forced himself to turn back and look at the burning village they’d left in their wake. The flames and smoke shot high into the sky, their mirrored reflection on the water seeming to reach for him as they sped away.

  “Dead God… I’m so sorry,” he whispered. But no one heard his apology over the sound of the roar of the boat’s engine.

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