“Baker.” said Krakauer.
“Baker” he said again.
“Fuck, Lowell. Didn’t you hear me? I fucking said Baker. It's over. Everything's ok. It's us...”
“Where the fuck did he go?” Danforth asked, looking around.
It was coming up to twilight by then.
The team had already found everybody else but Lowell was the last one left.
Rambo eventually found him.
“Here he is,” he said.
“Fuck” grumbled Messner as he pulled him up to sit.
“Gimme a hand, Raven”
Lowell was pale, drooling at the mouth and couldn’t keep his eyes open.
Rambo slapped him in the face, but not too hard, to help him snap out of it, while Messner poured some water into his mouth at first and then all over his face.
“Are you all right?”
“Hey buddy,” said Chester from a distance.
They were all there standing around him.
“He’s dehydrated, and seems a bit feverish too” said Messner.
“Is it serious?” asked Ortega.
“Not yet. But we can't stay in the jungle for much longer, boss. I mean, in order to make a real difference, I’ll need stuff we just haven’t got available here. We’ll absolutely have to do something for him soon though, within the next few days otherwise…”
“Ok Doc. I’ll have the re-entery route ready to go by tomorrow morning” said Ortega as he turned to walk away from the rest of the group.
Before walking too far off, he added:
“Raven, Snake, Eagle, you guys come with me”
*
Once there was some distance between them and the others, Ortega said:
“You did a fucking unbelievable job Johnny, seriously, a fucking masterpiece. Really”
Rambo did not say anything.
“You all did an unbelievable, but you Johnny, you were completely out of your mind out there. How many did you pull in? Fifty? And they did not even get the chance to shoot at you”
Rambo shrugged his shoulders indicating he’d done nothing special.
“Let me ask you something though. If you hadn’t gotten rid of them all, the way you did, what the fuck would you have done? Would you have fought the entire lot of them, on your own?”
Rambo didn’t actually know the answer to that.
When he realized the VCs were going to find Lowell's hiding place, he decoyed them over to his side instead by making noise, and that was it.
He hadn’t really thought about the consequences.
Nor had he worried about being shot at either.
As far as he was concerned, if the only thing you worried about was your own survival, and nothing else when you were at war, it made things more difficult.
“I’m going to recommend you for another fucking medal for all of this and you too, Delmore. You were even crazier than he was, if you want my humble opinion”.
“Why’s that?” asked Delmore.
“Because you sliced a guy’s throat open, that’s why. Did Trautman teach you that? I don't think so”
“I wanted to hear him scream before I left, just one last time”
“I got that. Did the two of you plan all this beforehand, or what?”
“No” answered Barry for them both. “Rambo made sure they heard his decoy and I left one of them on the ground, screaming. I’m sure they’re all still there, shitting their pants, worrying about another ambush. In any case, we haven’t got much time”
“Yep” said Ortega who was already absorbed in thought by then.
“We have to change direction again. Hand me the map”