P. O. W. by Donald E. Zlotnik

Master Sergeant McDonald was on board heading
     to the Command and Control North compound located next to Marble Mountain. Woods looked up at the chopper and saw the skull
     wearing a Green Beret painted on the nose of the aircraft and wondered what Special Forces unit the chopper belonged to. A
     puff of black diesel smoke made David turn his head away and slide over to the opposite side of the truck. Shaw shifted gears,
     and the overloaded vehicle pulled away from the side of the road.
    Simpson turned around on his seat and called back to Woods, “How’s Sinclair doing?”
    “Great! He’s being shipped back to the States this week, and they’re going to try and ship Jean-Paul and Trung back at the
     same time.” Woods adjusted his CAR-15 in his lap so that the charging handle was off his thigh.
    “Is he still fucking around with those half-breeds?” Shaw yelled over his shoulder, keeping his eyes on the road.
    Woods paused before answering the sergeant. Shaw was an easy man to hate. “
Colonel
Sinclair flew in from the Pentagon to pull some strings for the kids—”
    “Sinclair’s father is a colonel?” Simpson interrupted.
    “A full bird colonel.” Woods smiled, knowing Shaw wouldn’t like that at all. “He was at the hospital.”
    “Why would a colonel want to fuck with some Vietnamese street kids?” Shaw still couldn’t understand Sinclair’s motivation—and
     considering what made Shaw tick, he probably never would.
    “Reggie’s an Amerasian….” Woods twisted sideways to light a cigarette.
    “A
what
!” Shaw shifted gears and had to yell to be heard over the engine noise.
    “Man!
I
know what an Amerasian is!” Simpson felt smart, and the marijuana cigarette he had just finished made him feel talkative.
     “That’s half Vietnamese and half American.”
    “I still don’t know why a
colonel
would want to have two lice-ridden, snot-nosed brats living with him back in the States…. Unless he needs a houseboy to shine
     his shoes.” Shaw smiled, having figured out why the colonel would take the kids back to the States with him.
    “I doubt that…. Do you know how Vietnamese treat half-breeds, Sergeant?” Woods didn’t give the NCO a chance to answer. “They
     can’t attend school, own land, or hold jobs that full-blooded Vietnamese want. They’re considered the unwanted offspring of
     the defeated French. There are even cases where Vietnamese mothers have abandoned their Eurasian offspring so that they wouldn’t
     be associated with having had sex with a Frenchman.” Woods looked at the back of Shaw’s head and added, “About the only job
     a Eurasian girl can get is as a whore.”
    “What’s wrong with that?” Shaw looked at the windshield. “Those are some beautiful women!”
    Woods agreed that Eurasians were often beautiful people; they seemed to have taken the best features from both races. “Would
     you want
your
daughter to be a whore?” Woods couldn’t resist making the comment.
    Shaw turned around on his seat and pointed back at Woods. He held the steering wheel in one hand. “You watch your fucking
     mouth!”
    “I thought so…” Woods took a deep lungful of smoke and smiled at the corrupt sergeant.
    “Watch the fucking road!” Simpson grabbed for the wheel as the truck veered off onto the shoulder of the road and a red cloud
     of dust billowed up behind them that covered the windshield of the truck following them.
    Woods leaned back against the railing and relaxed for the long drive back to An Khe. He was feeling better than he had felt
     in months. The talk with Colonel Sinclair had taken a burden off his shoulders that had been destroying him.
    Simpson sat thinking on the passenger seat. The THC from the marijuana cigarette had mellowed him out. He reached into his
     pants pocket and removed a bundle of MPC ten-dollar notes, counted out two hundred of them, and replaced the thick rubber
     band around the rest. He turned around on the seat and handed the