Deadline by Randy Alcorn Read Free Book Online

know. Moving in and out of his dream were three little boys in Benton County, playing war in the wheat fields, back when losing meant you had to buy the other guys a bottle of pop at Miller’s store, rather than be sent home to your family in a pine box.
    Wasn’t that Slider, the grunt from Pensacola with the dense accent and the big smile? No, it was happening again. Slider, don’t go over there. Get back! The VC mine, not nearly as potent as a Claymore but deadly nonetheless, blew off Slider’s leg and splattered Jake with his blood. Someone cried out in pain. It wasn’t Slider. He was too far gone. It was Jake himself. Exploding with anger and anguish, he held his right ear, which felt like it had been punctured and still plagued him periodically twenty-six years later. Instead of rushing to Slider he turned away, later ashamed that in his own pain he’d let someone else reach his buddy first. Commotion and panic trailed off into silence, the silence of surrender that always followed death. Then the vacancy. The loss of a familiar voice, and smile, a familiar snore. Slider, a guy who choked on cigarettes but smoked anyway, a guy with a lousy poker face that would never play poker again. A guy who always carried his girl friend’s picture, who would never see his girl again.
    Death. That was the enemy, wasn’t it? The only real enemy. The one enemy of all the young men in that jungle. The one enemy Jake had in common with the NVA he fought.
    Jake writhed on his back, drenching the hospital bed with sweat from a jungle heat twenty-six years old. He saw disturbing images now he hadn’t seen until coming home, some of them worse than war itself, moving pictures of protests and debates and politicians’ lies. They’d made a promise to those good people, Hyuk’s people, and they hadn’t kept it. Men died, some of them his friends, to keep that promise, and the nation broke it. Then they turned and looked at those they’d sent as if they were bastard children, reminders of an ugly episode they just wanted to forget. Jake trembled with anger even now, and the anger gave him energy, pulling him back from the dreams and memories that consumed him, pulling him closer to the present time and place.
    Jake saw light and heard noises. Were these incoming mortar rounds? He couldn’t hear the dreaded “whump” sound that warned of the coming blast like lightning warns of thunder. He had a splitting headache. He reached to his pocket for the aspirin he chewed like candy, but couldn’t seem to find it. There wasn’t even a pocket there. What was he wearing? Why couldn’t he get his bearings? Funny, it didn’t seem as hot as it should be. And the noises weren’t the right noises.
    He heard voices, hoping they were English. Yes, English. Something besides a rock or blanket was under his head. Wait. Was this a hospital? He must be at Cam Ranh Bay. He frantically wiggled both sets of toes. Yes, he still had his legs, both of them.
    He was so tired. Vietnam was a year without real sleep, only catnaps and dozes. I can’t fall asleep. My buddies’ lives are in my hands. I can’t fall asleep. His body obeyed. It would not fall back asleep. He would not let it. Jake opened his eyes again and held them open, stung by the light. Good. The pain would wake him up.
    In the white and blue swirls above him Jake saw fleeting images of busy figures hovering about. One of them was mumbling and another nodded her head. Was this still a dream? No, he could feel the tension of the sheets against his toes. He also felt localized discomfort he couldn’t identify, from an IV and catheter.
    “Where am I,” Jake tried to ask, but it came out garbled. The woman in white looked surprised.
    “Mr. Woods. Glad you could join us.”
    “Where…?” Jake sensed the word coming out his mouth wasn’t the one he was getting at. He hoped someone would fill in the blanks.
    “You’re in Lifeline Medical Center,” said white dress. “It’s Monday