One

Clumps of mud rained on David Storm, staining his soaked green fatigues and obscuring the lieutenant insignia on his uniform. The rattling of gunfire was starting to let up. David sunk down to the bottom of his muddy foxhole and let out a shaky breath of relief.

His eyes turned up to the gray, cloud-covered sky as he silently thanked the Lord for letting him survive again. The bullets that flew from the trees and underbrush like mad hornets had not touched his flesh. His feet had not stepped on any hair-trigger landmines. He had found shelter in this tiny hole in the ground, where he could wait out the firefight and safely call for reinforcements on the fieldphone.

While he prayed his thanks, his lips muttered curses for the Viet Cong that started this fight. His aim soon turned toward the US military for sending him to this God-forsaken place. The mutterings started to influence his prayers, requesting that God administer slow, agonizing deaths to Victor Charlie and Uncle Sam. He repeated his spiteful prayer with each smoke trail that arced through the sky from a rocket. He repeated it twice every time he heard or saw a useless signal flare coming from the landmine victims.

David shifted uncomfortably in the inch-high water and cursed anew when the mildewy smell of his fatigues invaded his nostrils. As the rockets and flares become more infrequent, he shivered slightly. A small, hacking cough escaped him while he tried to ignore the smell of the heavy saturated fatigues clinging to his body and the animal excrement floating around in the water.

David's eyelids were becoming heavy. He unsuccessfully tried to remember when he landed here. Sleep looked like a promising prospect, but the scream of another rocket expelled that idea out of his mind. He had to stay awake, so he again started muttering curses at his government and the enemy.

He was so focused on his mutterings that he hardly noticed more small clumps of mud raining down onto him as someone crawled to the edge of the foxhole. Finally David heard a hoarse moan coming from the person and rose up to reach for him.

"Easy there, soldier," he said as he helped the man to safety. The man fell through the foxhole's opening and into the water at the bottom. David propped the man up against the dirt wall.

"Betty kicked my ass," the man said, waving a hand towards the mine-littered field surrounding them.

"Yeah, she'll do that. Charlie sure knows how to use that whore. Just drove us right into the bitch. What's your name, soldier?" David spoke in a light tone, pausing to put a cigarette in his mouth and light it. He could have just as easily been talking about his dog.

"Private Mills, sir." David passed the pack and matchbook to him. The private accepted the offer with quiet thanks.

"Got a first name?"

"Richard."

"So how do you like the Mekong scenery?"

Richard looked through the hole's opening at the lush jungle foliage and undergrowth. "Green."

David laughed through his smoke ring. "Yeah. It's green all right. Fucking deadly as hell, too. Charlie's one slick little asshole. Caught us with our heads up our asses again."

Richard puffed on his cigarette with a bitter smile. "Can't afford to be caught off-guard, sir." The field around them had become as quiet as a cemetery at midnight. The squawking fieldphone on David's hip was like the sound of a raven guarding the dead.

"Lieutenant," said a crackling, tinny voice from the fieldphone, "there's going to be a delay. We can still get your boys out, but it's going to take at least twenty minutes to get the reinforcements down there."

Richard gave a yellow-toothed grin at David's weary groan. Richard may have even laughed at the situation if it was appropriate. "Looks like we're going to be here for awhile."

"Damn straight."

"Might as well make the best of it. How'd you wind up in this lovely hellhole and commanding us fine young men, sir?"

The young man's joviality made David smile despite his irritation. He leaned back and forced himself to relax so he could form a witty response. "Oh, I heard 'Nam was great this time of year. Kids no older than my son running around carrying AK-47s, the joys of jungle rot and nonstop rain, and gut decorating tips free of charge from the Reds. I got the papers from the office and I figured, "What the hell? I only make a decent living with the desk job, have a beautiful wife and son with a little girl on the way. This should be a fucking riot."

As he remembered the papers that sent him here, David's face drew together into a bitter scowl. "Fucking government. Let the damn Reds have this country for all I care. I just wanna get home."

"How old's your son?" Richard sat up and listened intently to his superior.

"He'll be 10 in May. Smart as a whip, too. That boy's going to college. I don't care if I have to clean toilets in some strip club after some wino's been there and run through the fucking sewers to search for loose change. That kid is going to be a college graduate."

"And your new daughter? How far along?"

"Shit. I forgot. I think 7 months. Jesus H. Christ, I'm gonna have a baby girl. How great is that? If I can get my ass through this mess, I'm gonna see a brand new baby girl. Holy Christ."

David noticed that Richard's grin was getting wider, as if he just gave Richard the opportunity to go on leave. Richard's eyes were getting moist as he listened to David rant about his children. "And your wife? How did you meet?"

"Ah, we were high school sweethearts. She's the best woman in the world. Don't take shit from nobody. Tough old gal. Remember when some dumbass jock grabbed her breast. Decked him and broke his fuckin' nose. Earned my respect and my heart."

Richard finally looked away from David and up at the dark, gray sky that threatened rain. "Sounds like a great family."

"Well, Private, what about you? I've seen you in the platoon asking everyone about their families and hanging on every word. But you ain't said shit about yours. You got one?"

"I did, sir," Richard said quietly. His eyes didn't stop their examination of the sky, but he smiled as if he was happy that David had asked. He puffed on his cigarette leisurely as he spoke. His voice was toneless; the words slow and deliberate. "I had a wife. She was no Raquel Welch, but she was a saint. Always helping people out. Even took a homeless person into our house and helped him get back on his feet. We had two little girls. Twins. Both of them were angels. They're why I volunteered."

David's jaw dropped, releasing the cigarette into the water beside him. He took a minute to compose himself and resist the temptation to beat Richard senseless. "You volunteered? Why? Why would you risk dying in this stinking hellhole and leaving your family holding the bag?"

"Hell, sir. They probably would have drafted me anyway. Might as well volunteer and get it over with."

"But that's suicide!"

"Yeah, it is. Not like I have much to lose."

"A wife and kids? I'd go and kill the goddamn President if it meant I could go home to mine."

Richard found himself crying and silently laughing at the same time. "Who said that they were at home waiting for me?" Richard watched David's scarred face furrow in confusion. "They're dead, sir. Run over by some punk strung out on weed. Thought they were monsters or some shit like that." Richard spit a brown glob out of his mouth and returned to his vigil on the sky.

David bit his tongue and lit another cigarette. As he returned the cigarette pack to his flak jacket, his fingers grazed upon a small locket that his wife had given him before he left. David closed his eyes as he imagined his wife and the new life growing inside her stomach. His son's picture perfect salute returned to his mind's eye. He tried to imagine what his life would be like if they died, but he couldn't. No, he could imagine it, but he didn't want to think about the type of void that their absence would leave. Quietly, he said, "I'm sorry, man."

"Don't be." Richard smiled up at David as gunshots sounded over the foxhole. David put his head between his knees and groaned. Reluctantly, he unstrapped his gun and mentally prepared himself to shoot at the invisible enemy.

"Hey, Lieutenant," Richard said as he watched David slide the safety off. "You think there's a heaven? Like your spirit goes somewhere after you die?"

"I guess so. I'd like to think that we'd get an ultimate reward for all this bullshit."

"That's good. I think they went there. Maybe I'll find them. It's been so long. The first thing I'll do is tell them that I love them. Spending eternity together. That would kick ass."

David watched Richard's eyes glaze over. He took the cigarette still dangling out of Richard's mouth and snuffed it out in the water. They had been in the foxhole for about five minutes, but David never noticed Richard's mangled back until he actually turned Richard over and saw the shrapnel there.

The muddy water turned red as the gunshots rang above their heads. The fieldphone crackled again. "Lieutenant, the reinforcements are on their way. How many dead can you account for currently?"