The following morning, Danforth went to the Dak To hospital to meet Shelley and Ortega.
Truth be told, Ortega was first on that list.
Duty first – he thought.
Outside the hospital walls, the sun was shining and the city seemed relatively peaceful.
Danforth found Ortega sitting in the corner all on his own.
After some small talk and the usual jokes, Danforth pulled up a chair and sat himself down right in front of Ortega. It didn’t take them long before a sort of private debriefing got underway, as per team leader and the next in command would have on their own.
Initially, their conversation was coherent and professional-like, but neither was able to keep up their civil demeanour.
As to be expected, the topic of casualties and losses eventually came up. The lost hostages as per Lowell and, most of all, of the loss of two team members, Johnny and Jorgenson.
The two men openly discussed the plan they had, which was to reunite with Johnny and Jorgenson after their diversion. It was a plan that, considering the outcome of events, had failed miserably.
They were supposed to create a diversion but that’s all – thought Ortega.
Not instigate combat.
Besides, in hindsight, it was suicidal right from the start.
We all knew how it would end.
Those thoughts may have passed Ortega’s mind, but he certainly didn’t say them out loud.
Not exactly in those words anyways.
Ortega and Danforth relived those moments together, contemplating the options they were unaware of at the time, and when they acted irrationally, too slowly or generally performed badly overall.
The benefit of hindsight and ample time to contemplate your options obviously produces hypothetical results that pan out better than the real ones did.
You can't always make the “right” move when everything around you is moving at the speed of light. You’re never able to manage everything perfectly, or at least not entirely anyways.
They gave vent to how they were feeling, and especially how the previous months had changed them. The entire team had changed.
From the time their fight in Vietnam began, they grew to become much more than close friends. Time had made them brothers.
They continued for an hour.
When neither had anything more to say, they sat across from one another in silence.
Danforth put his hand on Ortega's shoulder and the two of them sat there for a while longer
Despite “taking” a bullet in the chest, Ortega still felt guilty.
Between the two of them, he was the one who felt dirtier for sure.
-In the end, the burden was on his shoulders and nobody else’s.
He was the one who allowed the team to blatantly disregard initial orders and instead proceeded with the raid.
He had decided against doing anymore recon, to avoid unnecessary risks, completely unaware that there could be and were civilians present in one of the structures, and that decision had cost about a dozen civilians their lives.
It was his decision to use a diversion, the very one that cost Johnny and Jorgenson their lives.
Last, but not least, Lowell’s death was on him too.
Despite being shot in the chest as he covered his team on the exfiltration, it wasn’t nearly enough to shut his conscious up. If anyone should have died in there, it should have been him.
That’s not the way Danforth saw it though, at all.
“Manuel. Johnny and Carl had volunteered so in the end, they offered themselves up.”
“That’s true, but if we hadn’t attacked in the first place, there wouldn’t have been so many Vietcong all over in the first place. By no means was attacking that damn outpost a smart decision either. If we hadn’t attacked, we could have marched with no POW’s and a lot less Vietcong too.
It would have been completely different.
It would have been a walk in the park”
“We knew all of that beforehand, but we still made the decision we did. Once we made sure Vuong really wasn’t there for ourselves, we could have turned right around and gone straight home. We all knew we could, but still didn’t. You may have given the final order, but we all made the decision together. Don’t you remember?”
Ortega nodded.
He nodded, but there was something else.
There was always something else.
-
Danforth took a better look at the clear signs of suffering on Ortega’s face, and it only served to convince him more.
Absolutely.
There was definitely something else bothering him, and since Danforth had been a close friend to Ortega for such a long time, it didn’t take him long to notice it.
Something else, something big
Unable to dismiss it, he decided to ask.
-
“What’s the matter with you, Manuel?”
For a moment or so, Ortega hesitated, but ultimately decided to tell him. Let them go ahead and court martial me. He might have felt a lot better if someone had actually done it.
“I let go of Lowell.”
“Meaning what?”
“I couldn't hold him any longer and he was dragging me down with him. So, at that point, I got rid of him, you know, to save my self.”
“So what?”
“So, I killed him, that’s what.”
“You were dying, Ortega: I saw it. We all saw it. If you hadn’t done it, you’d both be dead now. You did the only reasonable thing there was to do. What's the matter with that?”
“What the fuck, Eagle. Come on, I killed him to save my own life.”
“Well, you know what, you may be right. If you had gone down with him, you’d be a fucking dead-hero but at least you’d have a medal already. That’s exactly what we need a lot more of. “Well, you know what?”
Danforth pointed his finger directly at Ortega.
“I’d rather have a living soldier than a dead hero any day. Dead heroes, on the other hand, are completely useless if the fucking war on this side, is going to last a few more years at the very least!”
Ortega shook his head anyway.
“Okay, then listen to me,” said Danforth.
“Lowell’s arm didn’t work and he couldn't drag himself along that damn rope and you know it. I was there. You gave this fucking mission one hundred and twenty per cent. No one can blame you for a single thing.”
Danforth concluded, giving Ortega a few pats on the shoulder and rose from his chair.
“Trust me: there’s no way you could’ve saved the two of you. It was impossible.”
“I slept for twelve hours last night.”
“Then you should probably get a nurse to wash you up a bit. You smell like a goat, for Christ's sake.”