Gustav Hasford - The Short-Timers

General Motors and his staff had stopped by to catch the show. They did that sometimes. General Motors liked to keep in touch with his Marines.

Rafter Man fell off the rafters like a green bomb, crashing through the general's table, spilling beer, smashing pretzels, and knocking the general and four of his staff officers on their brass behinds.

Hundreds of enlisted men, having assumed that Rafter Man was some kind of unconventional mortar round, were one mass of green laundry. Then heads began to pop up.

The staff officers jerked Rafter Man to his feet and started yelling for the M.P.'s.

General Motors raised his hand and there was silence. Unlike many Marine Corps generals, General Motors looked exactly like a Marine Corps general, eyes as gray as gun metal, a face that was tough but sensitive--a Cro-Magnon holy man's face. His jungle utilities were starched, razor-creased, with shirt-sleeves rolled up neatly.

Rafter Man stood there, staring at the general, grinning like a goddamn fool. He wobbled. He tried to walk but he couldn't. He was having enough trouble just standing in one place.

General Motors ordered the broken table cleared away. Then he offered Rafter Man his chair.

Rafter Man hesitated, looked at the general, then at the staff officers, who were still pissed off, then at me, then he looked at the general again. He grinned and sat down on the metal folding chair.

The general nodded, then sat down on the floor next to Rafter Man. With a wave of his hand he ordered the staff officers to sit on the floor behind him, which they did, still pissed off.

With another wave of his hand the general ordered the performers to go on with the show.

The Australian comedian and the sweating belly dancers hesitated.

Rafter Man stood up.

He wobbled, then sank down to the deck beside the general. He put his arm around the general's shoulders. General Motors looked at him without expression. Rafter Man said, "Hey, bro, I can fly. Did you see me fly?" He paused. "You think...am I drunk? I mean, am I hammered or am I hammered?" He looked around. "Joker? Where's Joker?" But I was still stumbling over angry poges. "Joker's my bro, sir. We enlisted personnel are tight, you know? Indubitably. I am in love with those sexy women. I roger that..." His face got serious. "Who'll take me through the wire? Sir? Where's Joker?" He looked around, but didn't see me. "I'll fall in the wire. Or blow myself up. Sir? SIR? I'll step on a mine. I got to find my bro, sir. I don't want to fall into the wire, not again. JOKER!"

General Motors looked at Rafter Man and smiled. "Don't worry, son. Marines never abandon their wounded."

Rafter Man looked at the general the way drunks look at people who say things they don't understand. Then he smiled. He nodded. "Aye-aye, sir."

The Australian comedian and the meaty belly dancers resumed their act, which consisted primarily of double-takes from the comedian every time one of the belly dancers slung a big tender breast out of her tiny golden costume. The act was a smashing success.

By the time the show was over, Rafter Man could stand only if he had a wall to hold onto. General Motors took Rafter Man's arm and put it over his shoulders and helped Rafter Man out of the E.M. club and, leaving the staff officer's behind, helped Rafter Man to stagger down the hill, along the narrow path through the tangle-foot and the concertina wire.

As the enlisted men left the Thunderbird Club, they watched this small event and they smiled and nodded and said, "Decent. Number one."

And: "There it is."

Now the C-130 Hercules propjet is taxiing to a stop. The heavy cargo door drops and slams into the runway. Rafter Man and I hop out with our fellow passengers.

There are three damaged C-130's pushed together on the port side of the airfield. On the starboard side of the airfield is the gutted carcass of another C-130, charred, still smoking. Men in tinfoil spacesuits are squirting the torn metal with white foam.

Rafter Man and I ditty-bop off the airfield and we hump down a freshly oiled dirt road until we come to the perimeter of Phu Bai Combat Base, about a mile from the airfield and thirty-four miles from the DMZ.

Phu Bai is a vast mud puddle cut into sections by perfectly aligned rows of frame hootches. The largest structure at Phu Bai is HQ for the Third Marine Division. The big wooden building stands as a symbol of our power and as a temple of those who love the power.

We stop at the guard bunker. A big dumb M.P. orders us to clear our weapons. I click the magazine out of my M-16. Rafter Man does the same. I stare back at the big dumb M.P. to assert my principles. He is scribbling on a clipboard with a stubby yellow pencil.

Suddenly the M.P. punches Rafter Man in the chest with his walnut baton. "You a New Guy?" Rafter Man nods. "I got a working party for you. You're going to fill sandbags for my bunkers." The M.P. hooks his thumb toward the guard bunker in the center of the road. A big bite has been taken out of the bunker. A mortar shell has blasted through one layer of sandbags and has split open a second layer, spilling sand.

I say, "He's with me."

Sneering, the sergeant draws himself up inside his crisp, clean stateside utilities, his white helmet liner with Military Police stenciled in red, his white rifle belt with its gold buckle bearing the eagle, globe and anchor, his shiny new forty-five automatic pistol, and his black spit-shined stateside shoes. The big dumb M.P. is smugly enthroned in his power to exact the trivial. "He'll do what I say, motherfucker. Cor -poral." He thumps his black metal collar chevrons with the tip of his walnut baton. "I'm a sergeant."

I nod. "Affirmative. That's affirmative, you fucking lifer. But this man is only a lance corporal. And he takes his orders from me ."

The big dumb M.P. shrugs. "Okay. Okay, motherfucker. You can tell him what to do. You can fill my sandbags, cor poral. Many, many of them."

I look at the deck. An explosion is building up inside me. I experience fear, and a terrible strain, as the pressure grows and grows, and then release, relief. "No, you dumb redneck. Negative, you fucking pig. No, I'm not going to fall out for any Mickey Mouse working party. You know why? Huh?" I slam the magazine back into my M-16 and I snap the bolt, chambering a round.

I'm smiling now. I'm smiling as I jam the flash supressor into the big dumb M.P.'s jelly belly and then I wait for him to make one sound, any sound, or just the slightest movement and then I'm going to pull the trigger.

The big dumb M.P.'s mouth falls open. He doesn't have anything else to say. I don't think he wants me to fill his sandbags anymore.

The clipboard and the pencil fall.

Then, walking backward, the big dumb M.P. retreats into his bunker, mouth open, hands up.

Rafter Man is too scared to say anything for a while.

I say, "You'll get used to this place. You'll change. You'll understand."

Rafter Man remains quiet. We walk. Then, "You weren't bluffing. You would have killed that guy. For nothing."

I say, "There it is."

Rafter Man is looking at me as though he's seeing something new. "Is everybody like that? I mean, you were laughing. Like..."

"It's not the kind of thing you can talk about. There's no way to explain stuff like that. After you've been in the shit, after you've got your first confirmed kill, you'll understand."

Rafter Man is silent. His questions are silent.

"At ease," I say. "Don't kid yourself, Rafter Man, this is a slaughter. In this world of shit you won't have time to understand. What you do, you become. You better learn to flow with it. You owe it to yourself."

Rafter Man nods, but he doesn't reply. I know how he feels.