The Last Phoenix Read online

  Richard Herman

  The Last Phoenix

  In memory of my mother,

  Mildred Leona Herman

  The nation that will insist in drawing a broad line of demarcation between the fighting man and the thinking man is liable to find its fighting done by fools and its thinking done by cowards.

  —Sir William Butler

  Contents

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  Tel heard it first. “Captain,” he called in Malay, “something’s…

  One

  The formal dedication ceremony of the Matthew Pontowski Presidential Library…

  Two

  The Annex, the nondescript office building where the real work…

  Three

  Butler leaned against the wall in the corridor outside the…

  Four

  Zack hunched over the chart spread out on the worktable

  Five

  The shiny black 1956 Ford pickup eased into a parking…

  Six

  It only hurts a little, Pontowski thought as he pushed…

  Seven

  Maddy’s mother, Maura O’Keith, was fixated on the TV as…

  Eight

  Kamigami dropped his bergen by the door of his quarters…

  Nine

  It was after midnight when the taxi stopped at the…

  Ten

  The tour bus was within walking distance of Mentakab, a…

  Eleven

  Don’t jump to conclusions, Bloomy cautioned herself for perhaps the…

  Twelve

  The guard at the security checkpoint on the Pentagon’s main…

  Thirteen

  It was the little things that impressed Kamigami as he…

  Fourteen

  The woman noted the time the lights came on in…

  Fifteen

  Brian Turner stuck his head into Zack’s room. “Going to…

  Sixteen

  The rain slugged down, working its way through Tel’s poncho…

  Seventeen

  The dark green minivan pulled to a halt on the…

  Eighteen

  This isn’t as easy as it used to be, Pontowski…

  Nineteen

  The silver-haired senator followed the president through the door of…

  Twenty

  Maddy Turner sat at the head table in the new…

  Twenty-One

  Turner was sitting in the battle cab surrounded by generals…

  Twenty-Two

  The sure knowledge that the war had made her a…

  Twenty-Three

  Kamigami, Tel, and Waldo were with the battalion’s headquarters company…

  Twenty-Four

  This is a win? Pontowski thought. He was sitting with…

  Twenty-Five

  The small group of officers from SEAC headquarters deplaned quickly…

  Twenty-Six

  Zack and Brian arrived ten minutes early for the afternoon…

  Twenty-Seven

  Tel wanted to warn the lieutenant that they were moving…

  Twenty-Eight

  The airliners formed an unbroken procession in the night as…

  Twenty-Nine

  It was still dark when the pilots gathered at the…

  Thirty

  Kamigami maintained a relentless pace, pressing his men to make…

  Thirty-One

  The first explosion shattered the two windows on the end…

  Thirty-Two

  Smoke from the still-smoldering fire in the fuel dump drifted…

  Thirty-Three

  Paul, a young airman called Spike, and Jake lined up…

  Thirty-Four

  The Army staff car bringing General Mike Wilding and Secretary…

  Thirty-Five

  The six team leaders who trooped down the ramp and…

  Thirty-Six

  Janice Clark felt her heart pound as the C-130 taxied…

  Thirty-Seven

  “We got wounded coming across the runway,” Clark said. She…

  Thirty-Eight

  Twilight in the tropics is very brief, and it was…

  Thirty-Nine

  The teams moving into position were little more than shadows…

  Forty

  Waldo nervously paced the floor of Maintenance’s deserted shelter, frustration…

  Epilogue

  Air Force One was parked at the western end of…

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Praise

  Other Books by Richard Herman

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  South China Sea

  Thursday, July 22

  Tel heard it first. “Captain,” he called in Malay, “something’s out there.” He stood at the bow of the small fishing boat and looked into the night.

  Victor Kamigami strained to hear, but his fifty-eight-year-old ears weren’t up to it. Luckily, the boy had excellent hearing. “He’s not a boy,” Kamigami said to himself in English.

  “I’ll be twenty in two months,” Tel said in Malay.

  “And with good hearing,” Kamigami replied, still speaking English. He had a voice that was unusually soft and high-pitched for such a big man. “Look away from the sound so your night vision can work better.” Automatically, he checked the small handheld GPS that dangled from the throttle lever. On course and four nautical miles to go. At five and a half knots, they’d make landfall in forty-five minutes. He glanced at his Rolex watch—the only clue that he was not a poor fisherman struggling to feed his family on the eastern shore of Malaysia. They would be on the beach and home in time for breakfast.

  “I hear two engines now,” Tel called. From his rigid stance Kamigami could sense Tel’s worry and made a mental promise to install a radar set. It wasn’t a question of affording it, but he didn’t want to spoil the simple, classic lines of his prahu, a traditional Malay fishing boat. After his family, it was the pride of his life.

  Kamigami retarded the throttle to idle, and they coasted to a stop in the calm waters. Now he heard the deep rumble of diesels at high speed. He started to count. “I can hear two, maybe three,” he said. “Can you see anything?”

  “There!” Tel screamed, his voice tight and filled with fear. He pointed to a spot slightly aft of the starboard beam, as a large shadow emerged out of the darkness and bore down on them.

  Kamigami’s reflexes were still rattlesnake quick as he shoved the throttle full forward and hit the horn button to blare a warning. A searchlight clicked on and swept over Kamigami’s prahu, blinding him with its brightness. The ship’s big diesels roared as it turned onto Kamigami’s boat. “Jump!” he shouted. He dove over the side and swam down the wake his boat had carved in the water. He was a big man and still physically fit, as befitted a former command sergeant major in the U.S. Army. He took fifteen powerful strokes before the ship smashed into the prahu, crushing it like matchwood. The wake kicked up by the ship’s bow engulfed Kamigami and pulled him under.

  He came to the surface sputtering and coughing. Another ship cut by him, outlined by the glare of the searchlight. Son of a bitch, Kamigami thought, a fast-attack patrol boat. Who in hell? Singapore? He didn’t know. He watched as the large craft slowed to a crawl. Its searchlight swept the water looking for survivors. The familiar bark of a heavy machine gun echoed over him. “Bastards,” he said aloud. The light moved toward him. He simply let his breath out and dropped below the surface. His proportions may have matched those of a sumo wrestler, but he was more muscle and bone than fat. He sank like a rock. It was a long swim back to the surface.

  A much bigger ship ghosted by him. An LST! What the hell is a landing
craft doing here? None of it made sense to him. Now one of the patrol boats circled as its searchlight again swept the water. Then the light was doused and the boat raced after the landing craft. He waited, treading water. He mentally urged Tel to be quiet—if he was still alive. He kept checking his Rolex as the minutes passed. Seven more minutes, he calculated. Is that long enough? He reasoned that was how long he would have waited.

  Six minutes later a diesel roared to life, and a patrol craft cruised by with its two searchlights sweeping the water. Again Kamigami exhaled and sank. But this time he didn’t let out as much air and it was a much shorter swim back to the surface.

  He patiently treaded water for another five minutes. Finally he judged it was time. He felt for the flat gold whistle on the chain around his neck that May May, his wife, had given him for good luck. It was about the size of his old dog tags and was engraved with a dragon on one side and a tiger on the other. He gave a short toot and waited. Nothing. He blew hard on the whistle—a long blast that carried for a mile.

  “Captain!” a faint voice called. “Is that you?”

  “You bet your sweet ass!” Kamigami roared, relieved to hear Tel. “Keep talking and I’ll come to you.” He took three strokes and stopped to listen. Tel’s voice was louder. He took an even dozen strokes before stopping to listen. He was getting closer, but there was panic in Tel’s voice. “Keep cool,” Kamigami urged as he stroked hard, pulling ever closer. His hand touched something in the dark. It was Tel, and the boy jumped on him, holding on for dear life.

  Kamigami easily broke his death grip and turned Tel around in the water. His big right hand held him by the back of the head. “Lie on your back,” he ordered. “You’ll be okay. I won’t let you drown.” Tel’s breathing slowed. “The ocean’s our friend. Don’t fight it.” He could feel the boy’s body relax. “Much better.”

  “Are we going to die?” Tel asked.

  “Not tonight. It’s only four miles to shore.”

  “I can’t swim”—he gulped for air, the panic back—“that far.”

  Kamigami snorted. “Who said anything about swimming? Give me your pants.” He held Tel’s head above water while he struggled out of his light trousers and handed them over. “Okay, you’re gonna have to tread water for a few moments.” Kamigami let go of him and quickly tied an overhand knot in the end of each leg. He grabbed the waistband of the trousers and found the drawstring. Then he gave a strong kick and rose out of the water. At the same time he waved the pants over his head and filled them with air. He held the waistband underwater as he tied it closed with the drawstring. The pants legs stuck out of the water like two overstuffed sausages. Kamigami handed the pants back. “Here’s your life preserver. Lie on it. Keep it wet and it’ll stay inflated.”

  Kamigami did the same with his pants and lay across the crotch with a leg under each arm. “That’s not fair,” Tel said. “Yours are bigger than mine.”

  Tel’s spirits were definitely improving, and Kamigami played on it. “You want a quick drowning lesson, boy?”

  “Not tonight, sir.”

  Much better, Kamigami thought. “I need to get my bearings,” he said. He studied the sky, looking for familiar stars. Finding Polaris was out of the question, as they were too close to the equator. “Okay,” he said half aloud, “what’s in the west at three in the morning this time of month?”

  “Nothing good,” Tel answered. “But the Belt of Orion is above the eastern horizon, and you can see Sirius.” He pointed to their left.

  Kamigami breathed more easily when he found the constellation and the bright star. He was impressed with Tel’s knowledge. “Very good,” he said, wondering what else was hidden behind that pretty face. “Swim away from it. We’ll have the sun later.” They started kicking and stroking. There was no doubt in the older man’s mind that he could make the long swim, but he hardly knew Tel. The boy might not be up to it. Normally Kamigami was a quiet man and never said much, but an inner sense told him he needed to talk to keep Tel’s spirits up. “So you know astronomy?”

  “My father left a star chart on the wall when he left. My mother kept it.”

  Kamigami heard resignation in Tel’s voice. He was a very lonely young man, and as long as he lived in a kampong, or village, he would stay that way. That was the main reason May May had asked him to take Tel on as his crew in the fishing boat. “Do you remember your father?” Kamigami asked.

  “A little. He’s English, very tall and skinny. He had a beard.” That was at the root of Tel’s problems. He was too different. Not only did he have Eurasian features, with doe-shaped eyes and light skin that made Kamigami think of a teen movie heartthrob, but he was tall and slender, towering above the average Malay. It wasn’t a question of virulent racism—the Malays were very tolerant—but rather the pervasive influence of ethnicity in Malay society. Because he was a very visible half-caste, Tel was simply excluded from the mainstream of village life. Kamigami and his family had experienced some of the same rejection when they first moved to the kampong. But thanks to his Japanese-Hawaiian heritage and his wife’s beauty—she was a Zhuang from southern China—his children were very Asian in looks and readily accepted by the villagers. It also helped that he was a wealthy man and always ready to help the villagers in time of need.

  “Why doesn’t your mother move to Kuala Lumpur?” Kamigami asked.

  “My father still sends her money. It’s not enough for us to live in the city but enough for her to be important to the family.” Like most Malays, Tel’s family was very aware of economic reality.

  Two hours later something rough brushed against Kamigami’s leg. “Don’t move,” he said. “Stay absolutely still.”

  “What is it?” Tel asked, the panic back in his voice.

  Kamigami lied. “Just a big fish.” He suspected it was a shark.

  “I need to pee.”

  “Don’t,” Kamigami ordered. Urine in the water acted like a homing beacon for sharks. The two men waited, but whatever had been there had left. Kamigami could see a faint glow in the east. “Keep paddling.”

  The sun was just below the horizon when Tel gave up. “How much longer?” Despair etched every word.

  “What difference does it make? We keep going until we get there.”

  “I can’t make it,” Tel announced.

  “At least wait for the sun to come up.”

  “Why?”

  “So you can see the shore and know how close you are.” There was no answer. Kamigami took two quick strokes in Tel’s general direction and dove. He reached out in the blackness as he swam in a circle. His lungs were bursting for air when he felt skin. He grabbed a handful and kicked for the surface, dragging Tel with him. He broached like a whale, spouting and gasping for breath. He grabbed Tel’s face and blew a lungful of air into his mouth. Tel coughed and threw up water. “Damn,” Kamigami growled. “We lost our pants. Lie on your back and start kicking.”

  “No,” Tel replied.

  “You’re stubborn. I like that. Now, start swimming or I’ll cut off your balls and feed them to the first passing shark.”

  “How? You don’t have a knife.”

  “Okay,” Kamigami groused, “so no plan is perfect.” He thought he heard a laugh as Tel lay on his back and kicked for the shore. Kamigami did the same as they watched the sun break the horizon. He turned to look where they were headed, and saw land. “There,” he said, gesturing in the general direction. Tel turned and looked. His spirits soared, and he kicked harder. They were making good time when a series of dull explosions echoed over them.

  “What’s that?” Tel asked.

  Kamigami didn’t answer and maintained his even pace. Mortars, he thought. The explosions kept up a steady rhythm, growing louder as they swam. Dark smoke rose up and drifted over the shore.

  “I can touch bottom,” Tel said.

  Kamigami looked down and saw a coral formation. He dropped his feet and gingerly felt for the reef. He found a smooth place and let his weight
come to rest. “Be careful,” he warned. “Don’t cut your feet.” The explosions abruptly halted, only to be replaced by the sharp report of gunfire. Now he could see flames licking at the bottom of the smoke.

  Tel looked at him, his eyes full of concern. “It’s our kampong, isn’t it?”

  Again Kamigami didn’t reply. His eyes squinted as he studied the shore, obviously looking for something. The gunfire stopped. “I don’t see the ships that ran us down,” he said. He set off with a powerful stroke, plowing the water. Tel fell in behind him but was rapidly outdistanced. It was a long swim, and Tel was two hundred meters out when Kamigami waded ashore and disappeared into the foliage behind the high-water mark. Tel struggled ashore and followed Kamigami’s footprints into the dense underbrush.

  “Over here,” Kamigami said quietly. There was something in his voice that cautioned Tel to be silent.

  They waited for over an hour.

  Kamigami came to a half crouch. “Follow me,” he commanded in a low voice. “Do exactly what I do, and don’t make a sound.” Before Tel could stand, Kamigami drifted silently into the brush. Tel followed, astounded by the speed of the big man. It defied all logic that Kamigami could seemingly disappear at times and then emerge twenty meters farther on. Tel blundered after him, panting hard, following familiar landmarks as they neared the kampong. The stench of burning meat and wood filled his nostrils, and his eyes burned from the smoke. He ran into Kamigami’s back.

  Tel was barely able to see as Kamigami led him to the upwind side of the village. Kamigami stopped and stared into what was left of their home. “Nothing’s alive in there,” he said. He sat down to wait for the fires to burn out.

  Tel sat on his haunches, overwhelmed with grief, as Kamigami examined the ground around their kampong. He motioned Tel over and pointed out a distinctive footprint. “See the ridges on the sole and heel,” he said. “They’re everywhere.”

  “What does that mean?” Tel asked.

  Kamigami spat. “Soldiers.” He found a stick and poked through the ashes of his home. One by one, the big man carried out the blanket-wrapped remains of two of his children and then his wife. He gently laid her body next to the children’s. “Mai Ling isn’t here,” Kamigami said, his words barely audible. He stood and went in search of his twelve-year-old adopted daughter.