“Are we now officially on the Ho Chi Minh Trail?”
“Yes,” Narith said. “This a major crossing point for many trails that make up the Ho Chi Minh Trail.”
Kiera said, “So this is the most bombed piece of real estate in the history of war. It looks so quiet, so peaceful.”
Porter said, “So do graveyards.”
They started out. She tried to imagine what it must have been like. And she thought of those people in the village with missing limbs. A war that kept on giving.
Every step made her tighter and tighter. They were moving very slow now, the guide and Narith talking, looking, deciding.
It was easier for her and Porter. They just stayed in the guide’s footsteps. But it was excruciatingly slow.
The guide seemed to know what he was looking for and crept forward like a hunting cat, stopping, studying, keeping low to the ground, then moving on.
They had gone about half an hour when, as they crossed another opening, Kiera abruptly stopped.
She waited a moment to be sure she wasn’t kidding herself. She couldn’t believe this could be happening to her. She’d been very careful, but her left foot definitely was on something she didn’t like.
“Porter.”
Porter turned. “What’s the matter?”
Now the guide and Narith also stopped and turned back to her.
“Probably nothing.” She was irritated with herself, but scared as well. “I stepped on something that feels…wrong.”
“How so?”
She stood in some high grass, her foot solidly on an object. “I’m on something and it’s not a stone. It feels round and…I don’t know. Just not normal for rock.”
Porter said, “Don’t move a muscle,” as he retraced his steps back to her.
“Not much chance of that,” she said. “It’s probably nothing. It’s definitely round. It just feels like something nature didn’t make.”
She had been so careful to follow in Porter’s footsteps. She didn’t remember losing concentration, but she must have.
“Where? Heel or—”
“Left instep,” Kiera said, “more to the front.”
“Any pressure from it?”
“I don’t think. I don’t know.”
Porter turned to Narith and the guide. “Get on back behind those rocks and let me check this out.”
He turned to Kiera, “Just stay calm and very still and let me have a look.”
“Still, yes. Calm, no. Not when I’m standing on something that could blow my leg off.”
She took deep slow breaths as Porter checked the ground around where he wanted to go, down on all fours.
“I have a good jump,” she said. “What would happen if I jumped away from it?”
“You’d lose a leg. Maybe two. Then you’d bleed to death because we have no way to save you, or get you help. That’s why I want you to stand there like you’re bolted down and stop thinking about doing anything.”
She obeyed.
Porter checked the area around her foot. He dropped carefully to his knees, pushing the grasses back with his left hand, putting his face to the earth so he could look under her foot.
“All things considered, you doing okay?” he asked.
“Fear is a great stabilizer. I don’t like the idea I might get blown up by ordinance dropped here thirty-five years ago by a plane possibly flown by my grandfather or his colleagues. I like life’s little ironies, but not all that much.”
“He was a hard rice guy. Not a bomber. And if this is an explosive it will more likely be a mine, not ordinance dropped from a plane.”
“Well that’ll surely make getting blown up much easier.”
She watched him reach under her arch with a finger, and then come back out. He took a pocket knife out and opened the blade.
“What are you doing?”
“Just want to move a little dirt. See what you’re standing on.”
“You touch it, that might be all it takes—”
“Don’t talk. Don’t think. Just breathe very slow and stand still. I’m not going to aggravate it. Just need to see what it is. Just keep breathing and stay cool.”
“You know what they look like?”
“You’re still talking. I know what most of them look like. Stop asking questions now. Let me figure this out.”
Porter turned and checked the ground behind him so that he could lay flat and put his legs back.
It made her nervous because he was a big guy and had to spread out over a lot of ground.
Then he put one hand in front of her foot, his fingers wrapping around her toes to hold her foot steady just in case the nerves got to her, she figured.
With his knife he worked the dirt around whatever it was she stood on.
“Well, you were right about it not being natural. It looks metal. Manmade…but I can’t get a good look.”
She didn’t like the sound of that.
Fuck
. “Now what?”
“We assume the worst. Build a blast shield. It’s the only thing we can do.”
Kiera stared off across the world around them. This might be the last thing I see, she thought. She turned back to Porter. He had her life in his hands and she had to trust that this guy knew what the hell he was doing. He always had this confident cool and it was a good trait. But then he’d also had that same attitude in the plane and that hadn’t turned out well. So now she was very nervous.
She glanced over where Narith and the guide were peering over the top of a boulder.
She turned back to Porter. He could just go over behind the rocks and let her take her chances jumping, but he seemed determined. Guys like him weren’t the kind destined for long, safe lives.
Kiera couldn’t decide if his matter-of-fact attitude was in his DNA, or just because he’d been around Buddhists so long.
He got to his knees, and then stood.
She asked, as calmly as she could, “Where do you find a blast shield?”
“We make one,” he said. “You okay? Not getting shaky or anything? I need you to be still and keep with the nice slow breathing.”
He bent to her and kissed her lightly on the mouth. “I’ll get you out of here. We have unfinished business.”
Even the gentle kiss threatened to make her heart start pumping fast, so she did her best to ignore her natural response…at least for now.
After a couple even breaths, she said, “What are you going to make a blast shield out of?”
“Rock. There’s plenty of that. We’ll build it on one side of you. That way, when I pull you away and down, we’ll be protected as best we can be. It’s not looking like a big device. Might be just a foot killer. And most likely a dud.”
28
Part of Kiera wanted to argue, protest, but Porter seemed to know what he was doing and, besides, she didn’t have any good alternate ideas.
She thought of those guys in Afghanistan and Iraq with their blast shields, all that body armor, helmets with blast proof glass and what good was it? She thought of the Kevlar outfits her company was designing for women in combat. She wished she had some of it on right now. Maybe she should start traveling with some.
Here she was in the open, standing in the full bore of the hot sun, nothing to protect her but this wild, croc-loving guy thinking he would build a blast shield out of rock.
“This works,” she said, trying to lighten things up. “That next…dance…is going to be one you won’t forget.”
“I’m pretty happy with the build up to it. I don’t know if I can take an encore. Now, shut up and let me do my thing.”
Porter gave the others orders about what size rocks he wanted and when he wanted them, handing over their packs to Narith when he arrived with the first one. More rocks started coming over carefully, one at a time.
Porter engineered the wall of rocks extending out from her left side. He was very careful. He laid a foundation that extend about three feet in front of her, then widened it, and began to build up. He put the rocks together like a vertical puzzle.
He continued directing Narith and the guide to bring him certain sized and shaped pieces that changed as the wall grew. He was very specific.
He threw dirt into every gap as he built the main part of the wall three feet high in a half circle, with nothing out in front. Directly behind her was an opening where the wall was only a foot high where he intended to pull her back and down behind the highest point.
Then, apparently finished to his satisfaction, he told the other two to get back behind the rocks.
“I’m going to test this.”
Porter looked over his handiwork, and then said, “Here’s what’s going to happen. I’m going to count down, then pull you back and to the side behind this rock wall. I’m gonna jerk you down really hard and fast.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Nothing. Don’t anticipate. Don’t try and help. You just let me to the work. Don’t even think because that’ll make you anticipate. Anticipation is what can kill us.”
“If it does explode can you really pull me away that fast?”
He gave her a look. “If there’s something under your foot that’s live, it’ll blow instantly. But if we get you behind the wall, you have a chance. Like I said, your instincts are what can kill you. Let me do the work. I’m skilled in Brazilian jujitsu. I can pull you back a lot faster than you can move.”
“You ever done something like this before?”
“Not exactly. You’re nervous. That’s expected.”
“You really don’t need to be here to pull me,” she said. “I’m serious that I can move very quickly.”
Porter put a hand on her arm. “I believe you. But it won’t be quick enough. Let me handle this. I’m stronger and faster. What I’ll do is count down. You’re going to take a deep breath while I count down. It’ll go like this. Five thousand…four thousand…and so on. When you hear the one thousand…followed by
now
…that’s when it’ll happen. Okay?”
“I hate this. Get it over with.”
“We’re about ready.”
“I’m serious about you just letting me do it,” she said again. “I’m a well-trained athlete. I can move pretty fast when my life’s at stake. That way, things go a little bad, you won’t be hurt. I’ll need somebody to help me if I lose my fucking foot.”
“You obviously don’t know what shut up means, so let me change vocabulary. Be quiet. Focus on the most perfect calm you’ve ever felt in your life and let me control the action. You’ll have plenty of opportunities to say thank you in whatever imaginative ways we can think of. But right now, let’s do this. You ready?”
No, she thought. But then she said, “I guess I have to be.”
“Don’t jump the gun or you’ll catch me off guard and kill us both. You need to trust me and follow exactly what I say.”
“Yes. Fine. Do it. I think I’m starting to shake a little.”
Kiera stared down at her left foot and waited. If she lost it at least he will have gotten her out alive, right? They made pretty decent prosthetics these days. Except they wouldn’t be able to get her out alive because they didn’t have a MedEvac. Here, wounded meant dead.
He got behind her and locked his hands below her breasts and tightened up against her, one leg outside her left leg and the shorter part of the wall, one between her legs.
“That’s it,” he whispered in her ear. “Good. Just relax. Let me get the right hold. What I’m gonna do is spin you around and down like a wrestler with a good throw. It’ll be very fast. You won’t believe how fast. But if you resist, that’s bad. Trust me. You ready to give me your full concentration.”
“I’m all yours.”
“Now, cover your face with your arms, elbows tight in front of you. Breathe nice and deep.”
“Okay.”
“You are lying in a hammock watching the birds. How many birds are there? Count them. And breathe deep and let it out slow. I’ll count down out loud. Here we go. Wait until you hear me get to two thousand and then just close your eyes and let me do my thing. Okay?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Here we go. Five…thousand…”
29
Kiera inhaled on the
five thousand
.
“Four…thousand…”
She exhaled as he tightened his arms around her and she struggled to remain calm, to let him do this, give herself over to him.
“Three…”
She was about to take in another breath when he shocked her, caught her completely off guard. Before getting to the
thousand
, he twisted and jerked her around and slammed her into the ground so fast she didn’t know if it was him or an explosion. He landed on top of her.
She lay that way with him for a moment in the stillness, the shock, waiting for something to explode, for the ground to awaken under them.
Nothing. A beautiful long silence.
She said, “That was fucking fast, dude. Not the usual way I like it, but I’ll take it this time. Thanks.”
“You’re most welcome,” he said, giving her a quick kiss on the mouth. “So far, so good.”
He rolled off her. Kiera, still in shock that she wasn’t blown up, rose to her knees.
Porter pulled her up and they both looked at the object. All that was visible was one round metal edge.
“Get your butt over behind those rocks with Narith. Move it.”
She needed no inspiration to get away from whatever it was she’d been standing on.
She headed toward the rocks, careful to use the same path she’d seen Narith and the guide use when they retreated to safety after bringing all the rocks for the blast shield.
When she reached them she was so thrilled to be in one piece she nearly cried.
Then Kiera turned and looked back and couldn’t believe what she was looking at.
Porter hadn’t followed her. He was down on his knees, half visible behind the rock shield, looking at whatever she’d been standing on.
“Porter,
Jesus
, just leave it,” she yelled, stupefied, shocked that he’d continue to risk himself.
Porter seemed at times to be some testosterone-crazed teenager. She knew the extreme sports mentality, the risk junkies, but this was in another league of madness.
“Don’t mess with the damn thing,” she yelled at him when he didn’t react, now getting really angry.
Porter ignored her. She could see that he was working with his knife at the offending object. It was crazy. “Porter!”
She turned to Narith. “What the hell is he doing?” Looking for some assistance from the monk, he just shook his head as if saying trying to tell Porter anything was impossible.