“What now?”
When he opened his eyes and focused, he wondered how much time had passed, because Akil and Dawkins looked older and thinner, and both men’s faces were covered with beards.
“Boss, look.”
It hurt to even turn his head.
“Where?”
He saw headlights approaching through mist and rain, and was mindful enough to know that this wasn’t good. They were in a field with nowhere to hide. Instinctively, he felt for the grenades in his pocket and the pistol in his belt.
Fifty feet ahead was a little brook with a bridge over it. He lifted the tarp and continued walking.
“Boss!”
“Let’s go!” Somehow his legs responded and he broke into a sprint. In his right periphery, the headlights rounded the bend and reached the straightaway. The vehicle or vehicles were maybe sixty feet away and closing quickly.
Realizing that if the people in them were paying attention, they could be spotted, he lunged for the embankment and felt his feet slip out from under him. His legs hit water and the tarp holding Sam crashed into his right shoulder. He bit down hard on the urge to scream. In the background he heard an engine idling and music: “Like a Virgin” by Madonna, sung in Korean. When he opened his mouth to comment, Akil slapped a hand over it.
Next thing he remembered, he was on his feet again, walking up an incline. He saw a glowing yellow line in the distance. Wasn’t sure whether it was a mirage or not.
“What’s that?” It hurt to move his mouth.
“A fence, I think,” Akil answered. “Maybe it’s the border.”
“South Korea?”
“Fucking better be, or…”
“What?”
They left Dawkins and Sam in the bushes behind them and crossed the mist-covered field where rabbits scattered. Helped each other over a patch of gravel and railroad tracks, and stood before a twenty-foot-high fence. Crocker touched it to make sure it was real.
“Nicest thing I’ve seen in months,” Crocker said, emotion building in his chest.
They had no wire shears to cut through the links, only one eight-foot-long thin metal blade that Akil found in the PRS kit and started using.
Crocker asked, “You’re kidding, right?”
“You got something better?”
Crocker felt strangely giddy as he looked up at the fencing covered with curls of razor wire. Given his weakened condition, it seemed as challenging as summiting Mount Everest. But somehow he knew there had to be a way to reach the other side and the lighted two-lane strip of concrete road in South Korea.
“Get the tarp and blankets,” he said weakly.
He blinked and found himself halfway up the fence, holding on and reaching down for the covers, then tossing them over the razor wire one at a time. Next thing he knew, he was pushing the tarps and blankets down and watching Akil climb over like it was a dream.
But it wasn’t. Because when Akil was halfway down the opposite side of the fence and asked, “Now what?” he saw that his smart suit was a shredded rag.
“Wait there,” Crocker said.
He hobbled back with Dawkins, who muttered to himself as Crocker and Akil held down the razor wire as best they could and he clambered up and crossed over.
Despite minor cuts to his right thigh and arm, Dawkins didn’t complain. He just looked back at Crocker through the fence with tears in his eyes and asked, “Am I really standing in South Korea? Are you sure about that?”
“Sure as I’m standing here,” Akil remarked. “You’re a free man now.”
Crocker tried climbing the fence with Sam on his back, but when he reached the top, the pain in his shoulder was so intense his arms started giving out. They weren’t high enough for Akil to reach over.
Seconds after Crocker and Sam returned to the ground, sirens started to wail on their left and right.
“Let me try!” Akil shouted over the sirens, starting up the South Korean side of the fence.
“Fuck that,” Crocker replied. “Sam, get on top of my shoulders and we’ll pull up together.”
“We tried that already…You can’t.”
“Don’t tell me what I can’t do!”
Crocker took a deep breath and reminded himself of one of his favorite SEAL mottos: Pain was weakness leaving the body. He didn’t care if his body completely gave out. He was going to get Sam over the fence whatever it took, inch by excruciating inch.
All he felt was pain-not his hands on the metal fence, or his legs moving, or Sam atop his shoulders. The only way he could tell he was making progress were the encouraging words from Akil and Dawkins. The siren grew louder, until it sounded like mocking laughter.
“You’re getting there!”
“More, boss! Another four feet!”
He felt himself losing consciousness. Pain hammering his head, he willed himself a few links higher. It was just enough for Akil to grab hold of Sam, and help him down.
Still clinging to the fence, Crocker smiled at them on the other side. When he tried to move his arms and legs, however, they wouldn’t respond.
“Wait there, boss!” Akil shouted. “I’m coming to get you!”
Crocker knew he couldn’t last much longer. Out of his right periphery he saw a vehicle approaching behind him. Swinging his right arm over, he felt a strand of razor wire slice into his forearm. The new pain seemed to cancel out the old. He pushed off on his left leg.
With a reserve of energy he didn’t think he had, he swung his weight over and let go, scraping his face along the fence and hitting Akil, who helped break his fall.
Their eyes met and they smiled for a second-a moment he knew he’d never forget.
“We did it, boss,” Akil muttered.
“Fuck, yeah.”
Warm blood dripping down his wrist and thigh, he stumbled with Akil, Sam, and Dawkins across the road, up an embankment and into a cover of sweet-smelling eucalyptus.
He felt hands reaching under him and sliding his body onto a stretcher. He sat up and reached for the pistol. It wasn’t in his belt.
“Hey!”
“Easy. Easy, big guy.” A wide grin beamed down at him from the face of an Asian man in military garb. “You can relax now, sir. You’re in South Korea.”
He wasn’t sure whether he was seeing reality or dreaming. “Where’s Akil?”
“Sir, my name is Sergeant Minjoon Kim.”
“Sergeant Kim, where are my men?”
“Two have already been taken away in the first ambulance. The other is waiting for you.”
“Where?”
“Close by. You’ll see him soon.”
When they slid the stretcher into the ambulance, he saw Akil’s heavily bearded face ahead and thought he looked like a terrorist. Didn’t realize that he resembled one too, until he saw his reflection in the stainless-steel strip along the side panel.
“We look like shit,” he groaned.
“Where are the dancing girls to greet us?”
It hurt to laugh, but he knew exactly how Akil felt.
He still had a duty. He said, “Sergeant Kim, you said my men are okay. I need visual confirmation.”
“Sir, you’ll see them soon. You can relax now. You’re in safe hands.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Nobody who ever gave his best regretted it.
– George Halas
Four days later the smile on James Dawkins’s face seemed to permeate his entire being as he walked hand in hand with Nan and Karen down Waikiki Beach in Honolulu, from the Ala Wai Canal to Diamond Head. He didn’t want the moment to end. So when they neared the zoo and Nan offered to hail a cab to take them back to the hotel, James declined.
“I think I’d rather walk together.”
“Whatever you want, sweetheart.”
“Yeah, whatever you want, Daddy,” smiling Karen echoed.
“You sure you’re not tired?” Nan asked.
He shook his head. “I’m fine.”
As they passed the Marriott, Dawkins started to hum the lullaby Sung had taught him.