Page 5 of Cry Havoc

Still nothing.

“Prairie Fire Emergency! I say again, Prairie Fire Emergency!” he transmitted.

Radio silence, when extraction was a team’s only means of survival, had a way of infecting the psyche of even the most hardened of warriors.

Quinn and Tom shared a glance.

As Quinn gave the signal to move out, the radio, turned to its lowest volume, broke squelch.

“Havoc, this is Covey, say again your last, over.”

The voice from the heavens, heavy with an American southern accent, was a lifeline. A chance to survive.

“Prairie Fire Emergency! I say again, Prairie Fire Emergency! We’ve been compromised and are in heavy contact! Request extract ASAP!” Quinn said, throwing a VS17 orange panel at the edge of the small clearing.

As Quinn relayed their coordinates Tom scanned the jungle to their rear.

Pretty fucking convenient that the NVA just happened upon us.

Happens frequently.

Yeah, too frequently.

Later. Keep your head in the game.

Game. It’s no fucking game.

I need a cigarette.

When you get back to Phu Bai.

The buzz of the Covey aircraft caught their attention.

“I’ve got you, Havoc. I identify an orange panel. Tough to see through the clouds. You have a company-sized element moving in your direction, two hundred yards to your November.”

Company sized? That’s anywhere from three hundred to five hundred soldiers.

“Kingbees and CAS inbound but I need you to move…”

The FAC came off the radio as the NVA element caught sight of the aircraft through the clouds and began firing.

Though it could be hard to tell in the jungle, they seemed closer than 200 yards.

“Havoc, I need you to move about a klick and a half to your Sierra,” the FAC said, using the military terms for kilometer and south. “Hit a creek and follow that another klick downstream to a clearing for extract. Get there. I’ll keep an eye on your six.”

“Roger, Covey. We’re moving.”

Quinn gave the hand signal to move out, his squad in the lead with Tom’s trailing.

Air support changed the equation. If weather grounded them, Tom knew that with a company-sized element in pursuit, the odds of surviving this mission were not in Havoc’s favor.

Fuck the odds.

As Quinn’s squad disappeared into the thick vegetation, Tom removed a claymore from his tail gunner’s pack and primed a ten-minute time fuse.

That should slow them down.

Tom felt the humidity fall as evening shifted toward night. If they had to RON—or remain overnight—the NVA would not be their only enemy. The rain soaking their cotton fatigues paired with the wind off the mountains would chill them to the bone. They would survive the elements, but the cold would make them far less combat effective. Tom knew all these concerns were on the mind of his One-Zero. Quinn would get them out. He always did.