Platoon
JUNIOR (pissed now) Fuck! I gotta be on this hole with YOU man. I just know I shouldna come!
Bunny finds it funny, laughs.
BUNNY Don’t you worry bout a thing Junior, you with Audie Murphy here, my man …
EXT. PERIMETER #3 – COMPANY CP – DUSK
At the Company CP, Captain Harris is talking urgently into the radio.
HARRIS Bravo Three Alpha! Send me a grid. Send me a grid, over!
A young inexperienced VOICE screams back into the radio amid intense background FIRING filtered by radio and sounding disembodied.
RADIO VOICE We’re pinned down sir, they’re in the fucking trees! The trees –
HARRIS OK, Three Alpha, calm down now, son. I’m gonna get you a fire mission ASAP. Smoke’ll be first …
RADIO VOICE (panic) Lieutenant’s dead sir, radioman look dead sir, I don’t know where the map is Captain! They’re all around us sir. They’re moving! Hundreds of em! I can hear em talking gook!!! Jesus Christ!
HARRIS (calming him) … Just spot the smoke son and tell me where to shift. We’ll get you out of there. Just hang tough and tell me where the rounds hit, over.
EXT. PERIMETER #3 – PLATOON CP – DUSK
At the Platoon CP, Barnes stands, legs akimbo, watching the jungle, anticipating the coming fight as overhead we now hear the 155 SHELLS whistle from a 10-mile distance – passing above them – then pounding down into the jungle in the near distance. Barnes turns, glances at Wolfe, smiles.
EXT. PERIMETER #3 – COMPANY CP – DUSK
At the Company CP, Captain Harris is back on the radio.
HARRIS Bravo Three Alpha six. How bout those rounds son? Can you adjust fire? (waits) Three Alpha, if you can’t talk, just key the handset twice over. (waits)
Silence, then a vague MURMURING – becoming clearer and clearer. It’s in Vietnamese. The radio is then bashed in, the sound like thunder in the Captain’s ear. He looks at his RTO, both of them shocked.
EXT. NVA JUNGLE – NIGHT/DUSK
In the Jungle itself, the ENEMY is moving. Flurries of movement and sound, blurred visuals. Hands taping a piece of cloth to a tree, moving on – revealing a luminous arrow pointing left … Figures moving past it.
Hands unraveling a thin wire waist-high, backwards.
Hands sliding along another wire. We now see a moving helmet with a luminous plaque on the back of it, leading a file up the wire. To a Jump-off point about 50 yards outside the U.S. perimeter. Figures crouch. Whispers. Movement. A pen flashlight on a drawing of the foxhole positions. The NVA moving out in several directions at once.
EXT. PERIMETER #3 – CHRIS’ FOXHOLE – NIGHT
On their foxhole, Chris and Francis wait anxiously. Overhead the ARTILLERY keeps pounding into the ambush area. Now SMALL ARMS FIRE can be heard picking up at random spots along the perimeter. The battle, like a tide, is obviously moving closer to them.
FRANCIS Oh shit me I wish I was back in Memphis now, oooh baby this is gonna be a motherfucker!
Chris says nothing. Suddenly off to their right, about 80 yards, a BLUE FIZZLE of light erupts.
CHRIS Trip flares! … Rodriguez’s hole.
Rat-tat-tat-tat, rat-tat-tat. Machine gun, outgoing, followed by a sharp explosion. A ROCKET!
CHRIS (CONT’D) RPGs! Shit!
VOICE (crying) MEDIC!! DOC! DOC!
A FIGURE thrashes up through the foliage behind them.
RHAH (a fierce whisper) Taylor! Francis!
CHRIS Over here!
Rhah jumps into their hole with them, out of breath.
CHRIS (CONT’D) Rhah! What’s going on. Rodriguez’s hole just got …
RHAH (gets his breath) Okay, here it is – one, we got gooks in the fuckin’ perimeter.
FRANCIS Oh shit! Dat’s it, dat’s it …
RHAH They got through Alpha Company! Anything behind you don’t identify itself, blow it away. Two – air strike’s coming in. They gonna lay snake and nape right on the perimeter so stay tight in your holes and don’t leave ’em.
FLARES now shoot up over the perimeter. Reds, greens, yellows, squeaking as they float doen on their parachute hinges throughout the ensuing battle. The perimeter is illuminated at spotty intervals – sometimes arctic bright, sometimes inexplainably dark til new flares shoot up.
Chris, Francis, Rhah all look up at the light, and hug their holes even tighter, feeling naked in the light. Flares cut both ways.
RHAH (CONT’D) … they’re probing us, they gonna go up and down this line all night trying to get through. Stay cool … I’ll be back …
Runs out of the foxhole. Chris suddenly reacting to a noise out front, gripping Francis and pointing to the sound.
A BODY is thrashing towards them, about twenty-five yards, not yet visible but a little awkward and lungy in it’s movement, as if desperate.
Francis, tense, is about to pop his grenade when Chris grabs him.
CHRIS Hold it! (loud whisper) WHO IS IT!
But the body keeps coming, lurching now, falling.
FRANCIS Come on man!
CHRIS No!
A POP! – then a fizzle of BLUE LIGHT as the Figure hits their trip flare – revealing itself to be large, with no helmet, and gasping, terrified of the trip flare.
TERRIFIED SOLDIER DON’T SHOOT! DON’T SHOOT!
CHRIS It’s the ambush! (calling out) In here, man! Hurry.
The SOLDIER now runs in like a fullback going down for the tackle, sprawling into the hole, knocking Chris and Francis down beneath him.
He is sweating, terrified, a white boy with an unrecognizable, filthy face, no rifle, no helmet, his fatigues torn all over.
TERRIFIED SOLDIER Water! Water!
Chris gives him his canteen, his shoulder and neck hurting from the collision. The Soldier sucks down the canteen.
TERRIFIED SOLDIER (CONT’D) (between gulps) They’se all over the place, hundreds of em moving this way! They wiped us out man, we didn’t have a chance! Where’s the CP?
FRANCIS (points) Back there.
The Soldier struggling out of the foxhole.
TERRIFIED SOLDIER You guys get outta here! They’re right on my ass and they ain’t stoppin’ for shit!
He tears off, leaving Francis in a state of incipient panic. He looks at Chris.
FRANCIS Taylor, let’s di-di man!
Chris adjusting position, facing the front, anger in his voice.
CHRIS You go.
Francis hesitates, stays.
INT. PERIMETER #3 – BATTALION CP – NIGHT
At the Battalion CP, the Major is inside his BUNKER, busy between his radio nets.
MAJOR (to RTO 1) Get me Bravo!
RTO 2 Charlie Company reports hand to hand on the perimeter sir. Three holes are down. They need help!
MAJOR (looks at his watch, to his XO) Okay move two squads from Alpha down there. Where’s that goddamn air strike, you bet your ass if we were the First Cav they’d be here now.
RTO 1 (handing him the transmitter) Bravo Six sir.
EXT. PERIMETER #3 – BATTALION CP – NIGHT
Just outside the Bunker, a MASTER SERGEANT spots something in the flarelight. TWO FIGURES with helmets running towards him at an angle.
MASTER SERGEANT Hey you boys! Which Company you …
A sudden burst of FIRE cuts the Sergeant down in his tracks and the Figures fly by.
Soldiers in the immediate area spot them.
SOLDIER #3 SAPPERS!
SOLDIER #4 THE BUNKER!
A burst of fire. One of the RUNNING FIGURES goes down. An Explosion engulfs him.
INT. PERIMETER #3 – BATTALION CP – NIGHT
But the SECOND SAPPER runs right into the bunker in a kamikaze charge, the light from inside momentarily revealing a bulky satchel strapped on his person and the face of the astounded Major.
RTO 3 SIR!!
EXT. PERIMETER #3 BATTALION CP – NIGHT
The Bunker EXPLODES with a deafening roar.
EXT. PERIMETER #3 – CHRIS’ FOXHOLE – NIGHT
In their foxhole, Chris and Francis look at the curling ball of flame, stunned.
CHRIS Oh no!
EXT. PERIMETER #3 COMPANY CP – NIGHT
In their foxhole, Chris points.
CHRIS There!
SHAPES moving in the trees. Chris blows his claymore handles. One explosion on top of the other out front. Then return fire. Flashes from a muzzle, rak-a-tak, rak-a-tak, rak-a-tak, the heavier sound of an AK-47.
Chris opening up with his 16. Then being blown down by a grenade explosion at the edge of the foxhole. Then nothing. A pause. Chris’ ears ringing, slightly concussed.
