Free Mad Dogs by James Grady Page A

rivulets trickling down his cheek obeyed gravity. Fell off him like kamikaze drops. Hit the black pajamaed machinegunner.
    A monkey screamed.
    Black Pajamas whirled, machinegun scanning the walls of jungle.
    Wild orchids opened to scent the dawn.
    An NVA Captain joined Black Pajamas. The NVA Captain barked orders and Black Pajamas passed him gear stripped off the dead Hmong.
    Zane swayed in the trees above that jungle’s execution ground.
    Three Hmongs stumbled into the clearing, hands clasped behind their necks. Five new NVA soldiers and two guerrilla warriors kept guns trained on their prisoners, dropped the Hmong’s gear in a heap at the Captain’s boots.
    Black Pajamas removed the conical peasant hat.
    Pathet Lao guerrilla , thought Zane, under NVA command.
    Woman , he realized as he saw black hair tumble to her shoulders.
    Pretty , was the truth.
    Hot, so damn hot baking in this flight suit & dangling from a tree…
    Can’t risk unzipping the belly bag. Not just the noise. If my gear has shifted, if something falls out before I can swing out the AK-47, chamber it, and start firing, they’ll look up— shoot up, even if they don’t have a clear view of me through the leaves. But—
    Snake slipped down a silky tangle of vines to land plop! on Zane’s head.
    DON’T SCREAM!
    Don’t move.
    Don’t blink.
    Don’t breathe, but sweat’s pumping out in gallons, hot so hot , as a rope uncoils on Zane’s head, as it slides down his face, as that three foot long jungle strand arcs out in front of Zane’s DON’T BLINK eyes and met Zane’s gaze with its own beady black orbs.
    Don’t. Move.
    Viper. Maybe it’s a Ten-step , for how many you can take after it bites you. Maybe it’s an Eyelash , because it likes to hang head-down from the trees at just that level, bites you dead right there, right where the snake now flicked its black tongue.
    The serpent spiraled down the peculiar monkey hanging in a tree. The snake looped its tail around a left boot while stretching its head straight out, seeking—
    Zane kicked his boot and flicked the snake off him.
    Mojo , keep your mojo working.
    In the clearing below where he swayed, soldiers were tying the Hmongs’ hands.
    Time! Got no time! Can’t get to my AK-47 but shoulder hol-ster, 14 silenced shots and at the first dropped guard, the Hmongs will–
    Jodrey flew into the clearing and crashed, stripped naked, at the Captain’s boots.
    The dozen NVA soldiers who threw him there laughed.
    The Captain booted Jodrey to a kneeling position and—in English—yelled the question that changed the universe: “Why were you late?”
    Jodrey told the Captain: “I had to fuck your mother.”
    The Captain slapped the kneeling naked prisoner.
    â€œWhere’s the other one of you? Other American?” the Captain yelled at Jodrey.
    Who said: “You got a sister?”
    Zane froze as the Captain’s boot arced toward Jodrey’s face:
    Change plan. Escape now not the priority.
    Zane’s hand slid to the pouch around his neck carrying his FCT communicator.
    Jodrey caught the Captain’s boot mid-kick, upended the officer, dove on top of him and swung a skull-smashing rock high above the Captain’s head.
    Miss Black Pajamas shot the foolish American.
    Hanging in a tree, Zane watched Jodrey die.
    Don’t give a damn now, thought Zane. It’s only me dangling in Hell’s tree. Hmongs won’t make it out of this clearing. They’re worth nothing to the enemy.
    Slowly, painstakingly, Zane pushed the FCT keys to build a one word/eight letters message in that thing called a chip.
    The Captain barked orders and sent his patrol of had-to-be 40 soldiers out in a wide search pattern for the missing American spy from the sky.
    Zane was on letter seven of his first FCT message when his parachute ripped.
    Not a loud rip. Not a long one. Hot, so hot . Baking in the