Fortunate Sons

Chapter 35: Warm trails in cold places

Sue and the others kept up their pace as they headed out on the trail in the blistering sun. A filmy layer of sweat coated their faces and their boots scraped against their feet until the skin was burning raw.

"Here," Sue said to a rather weary Dr. Pearlman. "You need this more than I do."

She handed him her water jug from which he promptly took a long, deep swig. The water may have been slightly warm, but it was better than nothing. "Thanks," he replied.

On and on they walked, always on that never ending trail that seemed to bring them nowhere. Hardly anybody had spoken a word. For some it may have been fine, but for Sue, Dr. Pearlman and Leah, the awkward silence was a nightmare.

"So," Dr. Pearlman said rather mischievously. "A little bird told me that a certain nurse is waiting for a certain GI Joe to ask her to marry her."

Sue felt her face grow hot as her eyes grew wide with shock. "Where on God's green earth did you hear that?" she questioned.

"Leah," he snickered.

That little brat!!! Sue thought.

"You deserve him more than anything Sue," Dr. Pearlman said. "At least you won't have to go through what my wife and I went through."

"I can only imagine."

"Let me put it to you this way," Dr. Pearlman said. "When your monster-in-law forbids your wife to marry on the grounds of the husband being born in a non-communist country it makes for one hell of a family feud."

"You never told me about her," Sue said.

"Hannah, my wife, was born in Soviet Ukraine but her father took the family to Israel when she was eighteen," Dr. Pearlman explained. "Her mother had an absolute field day when they defected."

Sue and Doc shared a few laughs as he recalled the memories of when his wife Hannah had first come to Israel, their wedding and life together as they knew it. "God I miss her," Dr. Pearlman sighed. "If I wasn't two thousand miles from home I'd run right back to her.....my sweet, sweet Hannahleh."

They walked on and on until they came to a part of the jungle none of them had ever seen before. The path began to deviate into the woods with strange divots that had been dug on the sides of the road.

"Don't go off the path," Doc warned.

Sue watched as he cautiously made his way along the path, wending his way into the jungle only to stop barely four feet away. When she approached him, she found that Dr. Pearlman was looking at something. "What is it?" she asked.

With the tip of his finger, Dr. Pearlman lifted up the long, black thread that was as thin as a hair. "Tripwire," he said. "These things kill more people than malaria."

Sue felt her insides squirming. Too many soldiers had come to Tran Vong with injuries that lead back to the awful booby traps that the enemy enjoyed laying. To think that they had nearly walked into one was a dreadful thought in and of itself.

Dr. Pearlman followed the length of tripwire to one of the trees, carefully running his fingers along the thin black line and tiptoeing along the ground to avoid setting them off. It was the oddest thing. Inside the tree he had found a pack of gum, a small pack of cigarettes and three square Starbursts.

"Looks like your boyfriend left a little calling card," Dr. Pearlman chuckled.

Sue's heart jumped halfway into her throat. If the pack of cigarettes didn't give it away, then surely the other two items would. Taylor was the only one out of all three of them who smoked Camels.

"They've got to be around here somewhere," she said. "People don't just disappear into thin air."

"Clearly you haven't been to Russia," Dr. Pearlman joked.

"Wait a minute," Sue muttered.

The two of them continued to follow the line, going in circles until something finally clicked in Sue's head. "This is laid out like the Ba Gua," She said.

"Ba Gua?"

"It's a Daoist symbol," Sue replied. "Works the same way a crucifix does."

Dr. Pearlman was intrigued as to how Taylor and the others could have managed to pull off such an ingenious piece of engineering. What he didn't want to know were what sort of traps that they had laid out to snare the enemy or where they were hidden.

"C'mon," Sue said. "I think we're getting close."

The group moved further into the jungle, sticking close to the path when they all began to notice a rank smell hanging in the air. "The stench of death.....the slight hint of hot air.....something is definitely lurking around that shouldn't be." Dr. Pearlman muttered.

They moved deeper into the jungle where they found several bodies near the trees, their chests pierced by wooden arrows. Sue carefully pulled one from the open, bloody wound, its tip coated with a thin layer of crimson red. "Peachwood," she said.

"Here," Dr. Pearlman said. "Grab their weapons."

From the dead enemies, the group pilfered several weapons that would prove to be of good use. They may not have been brand new or top of the line, but something was better than nothing. As soon as they had what they needed, they set out once more, hot on the trail and eager to find their missing friends.