The Black Bat and The Fox

January 11, 1970. South Vietnam

A CRESTED ARGUS swallowed a caterpillar on the edge of the river as nine men disembarked from an anchored PT Boat. Though the pheasant had no concept of warfare, an instinctive alarm blared at the impending death march, so it tried to fly away. Just as it made it past the palm tree peaks, however, a black blur collided with the poor peafowl. Down to the ground they crashed, and the Argus was powerless to resist as a savage, Stygian-skinned bat plunged its fangs right through the tender skin of its abdomen and drank its vital fluids.

The men entered the jungle through a small opening between two thick trees. They did not notice the Argus or its whimpering screams. Moving in a tight formation, they made little noise while navigating the exotic foliage. Anyone who saw them would know they were soldiers, but it would be challenging to ascertain their affiliation.

They all wore the same cargo shirts, tactical pants, and military boots that were colored hunter-green. Complimenting this aesthetic were utility belts, ammo pouches, and pistol holsters of a darker and dirtier shade. M-16 Rifles, the signature weapon of the American GIs, hung on long straps circling their torsos. Three of the men were Indigenous Khmer Krom trained by Special Forces in counterinsurgency. Four were commandos hand-picked from the SEALs, Force Recon, and Army Rangers.

Leading the formation from the front was the squad’s designated point man, Master Sergeant Carmine Whealer. The 29-year-old stood at 6 feet, 3 inches with a broad mesomorphic build accentuated with sharply toned muscles. The golden-toned olive brown color of his skin signaled an idiosyncratic ancestry that confounded or angered nearly every stranger he came across. Nevertheless, such ignorance and prejudice had hardened his heart for the grim but necessary mission of MACV-SOG.

Far above his unblinking forward gaze, on top of towering bamboo trees, the black bat hopped from trunk to trunk.

The last man moving in the middle of the formation, CIA spook Raymond Harris, carried himself differently than the others. They all wore a stoic professional facade, but this man seemed almost detached from the situation. His eyes were almost bored by his surroundings, and he didn’t even carry a rifle, just an M1911 resting on the right side of his utility belt. It was because he knew that, if push came to shove, he was surrounded by expendable meat shields. He was also about a decade older than the others, with some faint scars on his face and forearms hinting at some particularly close-quarters battle experience.

Excitedly flapping its wings, the black bat snickered to itself and continued its silent pursuit.

*

The squad continued their forward march for another half hour before Whealer raised his right arm with a clenched fist. The others acknowledged and stopped in their tracks, except the man in the middle. Harris did not miss a step as he advanced to join Whealer in front of them. The black bat had also halted its stealthy advance, its small red eyes obsessively fixated on its intended prey.

They all had stopped at the edge of the jungle, and just ahead of them, there was a break in the dense foliage that opened up to a flat and wide grass field. A few dozen meters away from the village of Vinh Sanh Chi, their objective. Intelligence had indicated the village was a significant meeting place and supply depot for the VC, so the nine-man team had been dispatched by Command to conduct a close target reconnaissance on Vinh Sanh Chi for the next three days.

The rest of the squad carefully spread out to establish their observation points. Whealer and Harris stayed in place, pulling out two pairs of binoculars. Peeking into the window of a wooden-framed house, Whealer noted a young mother holding an infant. Harris surveilled the village’s entrance, spying on a teenager walking out while carrying a fishing rod in his right hand. They did not see any signs of soldiers or combat provisions, nor did their squad-mates radio in any suspicious activity, but the reconnaissance had only just begun.

Seeing the teen with the fishing rod disappear behind tall grass in the distance, Harris refocused his binoculars on the entrance. But something was different than before: a fox sat right in front of the village. An adult fox covered in bright orange fur with three waggling tails and piercing yellow eyes that stared unblinkingly into Harris’s. The spook was spooked, his muscles paralyzed and his heart beating 120 times a minute. “What the hell is that?” he hissed at Whealer.

The master sergeant put down his binoculars. “What?”

“The-the goddamn fox with th-the tails!”

Carmine looked to his right, shooting Raymond a confused look. It sounded like a bad joke, yet he could feel the stunned fear and confusion emanating from the CIA agent, who had begun to frantically point in the direction of the village. So Sergeant Whealer retrained his optics in the direction that Harris was pointing. He answered with the utmost brevity and honesty, “What fox?”

Harris kept pointing. “That fox!”

Whealer looked again. He could see no fox nor anything similar looking near the entrance. He looked back at the agent, wanting to assertively contradict him, but losing his nerve at the sight of the unhinged look on Harris’s face. “Ray-”

A blood-curdling scream cut the conversation short. Suddenly, from Ray’s perspective, the three-tailed fox was growling in front of him with protruding claws and blood-stained teeth. He jumped backward and unholstered his gun.

Carmine could see none of this. The soldier could only see his commanding officer pointing his sidearm at the air, seconds away from compromising their position. Through their walkie-talkies, their fellow squadmates attempted contact, desperately trying to clarify what was happening. “Sir!”

The sincere outreach, so sensical in Carmine’s perspective, sealed his fate. In the pit of delirium, Ray responded to the sudden auditory input by reflexively turning his gun and firing at its source. The .45 caliber hollow point exploded through Whealer’s chest before he could register that the trigger had been pulled. He fell backward, his vision going blurry and the strength vanishing from his muscles. More screams and gunshots tore through the air, barely distracting Carmine long enough to miss the black bur that collided with his chest. As he sank into unconsciousness, he swore he could feel the twin prick of sharp needles.

When the black had finished feeding, it looked up at the chaos. At the center of the firefight that was set off by the gunshots was the three-tailed fox, sitting and rocking its body in joyous ecstasy. Exchanging congratulatory glances, the two uncanny predators went their separate ways, searching for their next prey.