I’m in Hell.

That’s what it feels like out here in the bush, sixty clicks out of Da Nang. Not a month out of Fort Bliss and I’m here on LRRP duty. I thought becoming a vampire would get me out of the draft. Instead, it put me here on the front lines. Me, a little Russian Jew from Brighton Beach, now a big manly army ranger. Who wouldda thunk it?

But my unit conducts most of its ops in the daytime, and even though we’re in the jungle and the canopy filters out most of the light, some still gets through and I’ve got to cover up. So hot as it is for L.T., Doc, Chappy, Hawkeye, and Bastard, it’s stifling for me. If I could sweat, I would have melted away by now.

War, unlike what the movies would have you believe, is a lot of walking and waiting. We’ve been on patrol for four days now with no sign of Charlie. I’m starving. LRRP rations don’t do anything for me. I need to feed, but the guys have all been issued cedar stakes and machetes should I ever turn on them.

I’m sure Chappy can’t wait to use his.