Enlisting in the Army had seemed a good idea at the time. His father had wanted him out of the house after he quit high school. Joining the Army was seen as a way to see the world and get some valuable training he could use to make a career out of. So the Army put him in Nike Hercules surface to air missiles and stationed him in New Jersey. Everyone knew that missiles were a great avenue to future employment. He was sure that when he got out, hundred of companies would compete for his missile system talents. As far as travel went, he could tell his friends on Long Island that he knew what lay over the Goetthals Bridge.

Cleaning the dining room floor in the Mess Hall wasn't exactly the fun and adventure he was promised when he enlisted., although it was a lot better than pots and pans. Today he was dining room orderly, DRO. He was attacking a patch of yellow, built up wax with a putty knife when Lt. Tuck came in.

"Hey Fallica, they finally found something you're capable of. You missed a spot though." The Lt. pointed with toe of his boot toward a small area of yellow.

"Thank you for pointing that out Sir. I can understand now why you're an officer. It takes a leader such as yourself to keep us Neanderthal enlisted people straight. Someday Sir, I'm going to go to college and take ROTC so I can become just like you."

The Lieutenants eyes turned to slits. He didn't like this New York wop. It seemed like every time he offered a suggestion or made a remark a wise answer followed. But this time he had something up his sleeve, something that would take the wind out of this wise ass.

"Like rice Fallica?"

"Sure sir, love it. Eat it all the time. Have it with spaghetti sauce. It's better than spaghetti, I don't have to wrap it around my fork."

"Good Fallica, I'm glad you like it, really glad. In fact, it really makes my day."

Now it was Fallica's turn to burn. What the hell was he talking about? Why this rice bit? Something was up. The warning bells rang in his ears. This Lt. wasn't the brightest guy in the world...

"Yeah, Fallica, you like rice, but in a couple of months, you're going to like rice a lot. Everyday. lots of it. You can have all the rice you want, rice and zips." The Lt. turned and walked toward the mess sergeants office.

Rice, rice and zips. Zips and rice. What the hell was he talking about? It just didn't make sense. But Fallica was sure that something was wrong. The Lt. seemed too cocky and pleased. Something was wrong and he was sure that it wouldn't be long before he knew what it was. Meanwhile he had left his coffee cup on the serving line. Fallica had a little trick for him. It might cost him a few bucks but what the hell. Fallica reached into his fatigue pocket and groped around. What he came up with, was a small piece of tinfoil. Inside the foil were two small pink dots. Two small Psychedelic pink dots, one of which found it's way into Lt. Tuck's coffee cup. Have a nice trip.

After Lt. Tuck left the Mess Hall with his coffer cup, Fallica went to see the mess sergeant.

"What did he say?" asked Fallica.

"About what?'" asked the red nosed burly mess sergeant.

"About rice and zips."

"He didn't say a thing about rice and zips. What the fuck are you talking about anyway?"

"The prick was asking me if I liked rice and zips, he's up to something, I can tell. What did he say""

The mess sergeant who was named Cooloy laughed. He looked at Fallica and smiled an almost benevolent smile.

"Well," he replied slowly, "This is a mystery, only one word comes to mind when you mix two words like rice and zips."

"What is that word Mr. Knowledge?" Fallica asked sarcastically.

"How much is it worth to you?" Cooley asked.

"How much is it worth to you for me to shut my mouth about you and Lt. Tuck's wife?" Fallica shot back.

"O.K., O.K., relax, don't get your balls in an uproar. I'll tell. you. It's not so bad. In fact, it's probably the Army's best kept secret." he said.

"What?", What the hell are you talking about?" Fallica was losing his patience. "What the hell are we talking about?"

"Korea." He answered finally.

He supposed that he would miss everybody. Korea was 13,000 miles away. His older brother told him that the Army was sending him as far away as they could. If they sent him any farther away, he would he coming back. The whole family got a good laugh out of that one. His girlfriend was a slut. He knew that. She wouldn't let him bang her before he left, but that didn't mean she was a virgin. Everybody else had gotten a little. It was a classic case of "I want you to respect me." He guessed she really didn't care if anyone else did. He was kind of happy to be away from her. It was like an addiction. He knew she wouldn't be waiting for him when he came home.

Looking back out of the window he could see the building start to slide by as the plane began its journey to the runway. His little brother was still waving furiously. He felt like crying. He swallowed hard and made a gulping noise. The old lady next to him glanced over and smiled sympathetically. It was the uniform. She probably saw too many WWII movies, or maybe (sizing up her age) experienced something similar.

Anyway, he wasn't going to break down. He was Regular Army, Goddamn it, and crying in uniform was just unbecoming to the military. He imagined Genghis Kahn riding at the head of Mongol warriors blubbering like a baby. It made him chuckle to think of it.

The plane was airborne now and the stewardess came over and asked him if he would like something to drink. Patrick ordered a bourbon and coke. She mixed it up and handed it to him. Great, he thought. No age limits in the sky. Patrick Fallica was only 17 years old.

After three drinks, the old lady became middle aged. After five drinks, she became a fox. Patrick was cut off and succeeded in embarrassing everyone he talked to. The stewardess asked him how old he was. He was too drunk too lie. She apologized for serving him. Patrick accepted, in fact he said he didn't mind being drunk at all. The old lady clucked her tongue.

The stew's name was Mandy. She was cute but a little on the wrong side of thirty. She worried about her job and she worried a little bit about Patrick. He was slobbering drunk. He didn't look seventeen years old.

Maybe it was the uniform. It really didn't matter. He was her responsibility now. She knew what she had to do. She had to take him home. Patty got sober. It was a great way to get sober too. Mandy lived in an apartment not too far from the airport. She served him breakfast in bed and even helped him to get dressed. Patty thought that this was great. She told him that he was great in bed. he took her word for it. he had to, he didn't remember anything. (In reality, nothing happened) The only thing Patty worried about now, was that he was AWOL. A.W.O.L. Big Time. He wanted to stay a little longer but he was afraid of what would happen if he got; to Ft. Lewis later than he already was.. He thought about it in the taxi on the way. What the hell were they going to do to him, send him to Korea?

They put Patty in an old WWII barracks. The tiles were coming off the floor and the latrine had green slime growing on the shower walls. It was really depressing. He was made "Barracks Chief". The sergeant told him that he wanted these barracks as squared away when he left as when he got there. In Fallica's mind, that wouldn't be hard to do. The only thing that could make this place look any worse was a wrecking ball.

It rained all the time in Seattle. The roofing on the houses said so. The shingles were loose and faded. Patty thought the whole place was just miserable. Besides this, he was lonely. They told him that it would be at least five days until he shipped out.

On the morning of the second day, Patrick started to go stir crazy. He almost volunteered for a detail., even KP looked good. He started to drift off to sleep when he felt the bunk shake. Looking up toward the top bunk, he saw a huge body. Fallica had to pop his head over the side and stretch his neck to see what his face looked like. What he saw wasn't pretty.

The guy had to be at least six-ten. He had flaming red hair and a scar running from his ear to his chin and bright green eyes that were definitely bloodshot. The man had a handlebar mustache that was positively against regulation. All he needed was a beard and he would swear that Paul Bunyon had moved into his room.

The guy looked down at him.

"What the fuck you lookin at?" He said with a crooked grin.

Fallica realized that he was staring. He pulled himself over the side of the bunk and stood face to chest with the man.

"Sorry', he said, 'I didn't mean to stare, name's Fallica." And he stuck out his hand.

The red haired man gabbed his hand and pumped it. "I'm Shawnessy, but my friends call me Smokey Joe. Glad to meet you. Been here long?" He asked.

"Got here yesterday." Fallica replied. "Seems like I been here all my life. There's nobody in the barracks except me. I thought that they made a mistake and sent me to the wrong place and then forgot about me."

"Yeah, they do that. The Army don't give a fuck about nobody. You'd think that they would have someplace for guys going overseas to relax in. Like a USO or something like that. This place sucks." He said, looking around the barracks with obvious disgust.

"No shit. Wait till you been here awhile. Gets on your nerves."

"Got bad nerves huh? We'll I got somthin for that." And he proceeded to reach into his travel bag and pulled out a plastic baggie. His other hand reached into his pocket and came out with a pack of Zig-Zag rolling papers. "Let's get high."

Fallica looked around. He couldn't believe that this guy was going to smoke a joint in the barracks with a guy he didn't even know. Anyone could walk in and bust them.

"What the fuck you doin'. You want to get us busted? Put that shit away." he said excitedly.

"Don't you want to get high?" The new man asked.

"Sure, I'd love to get high, but you can't tell who's going to walk in. let's get out of here and find a place where we won't get caught.

Smokey Joe smiled sheepishly and agreed. Fallica liked the guy almost immediately.

They left the barracks and found themselves on the company street. Both of them had no idea where anything was. They found a sergeant with an armband that said "Courtesy Patrol" and asked him where the snack bar was. He told them and he also told Smokey to trim his mustache. Smokey told him to go fuck himself. The sergeant was kind of taken aback, but he didn't press the issue. Fallica asked Joe if he were crazy or what. Joe replied that he didn't think the sergeant would write him up because he probably just wanted to get out of Ft. Lewis and get overseas as bad as they did. Fallica asked him how he knew that the guy wasn't permanent party. Smokey told him he had a First Army patch and that there were no First Army guys west of the Mississippi.

They passed an abandoned warehouse. Fallica and Smokey walked around to the back and sat on the loading dock, hidden from view of the main road. Smokey brought out his stash and proceeded to roll a joint. After a few minutes they caught a buzz. They started talking about themselves.

Smokey was from Oregon. He had joined the Army to escape his drunken father. This was his second tour overseas. He had spent a tour in Thailand in 1966. He said he liked it in Asia. The women were friendly and the dope was plentiful, and the Army didn't play chickenshit games. He got busted when he got back to the States for insubordination to some chickenshit little second looey. He was a Spec 5, now he was a Spec 4., the same rank as Fallica. Fallica himself had been busted three times. It was a miracle that he left his unit as an E-4. The reason Fallica got busted so much wasn't that he was such a bad soldier, in fact he was a great soldier, but every time they let him go home, he would forget to come back.

They talked about Korea. Smokey had heard that it was pretty good duty. Fallica had heard the same. Most of the married men said it sucked. A lot of the single guys said it did too. But the guys that liked to screw around, drink and get high , loved it. Married or single. Fallica really didn't know if he wanted to go or not. He wanted to see Asia, but he wasn't particularly interested in oriental women. Besides, he was only a month away from being eighteen and would have just as well preferred staying home.

They were really getting high. Smokey had rolled another joint and it was pretty good stuff. They started getting hungry and decided they would try to find a snack bar. They walked about a half mile and saw a branch P.X. with a huge snack bar attached.

There must have been a hundred guys inside. Some were playing cards and others were just talking. The garbage piled up at the tables they sat at showed that almost all of them had been there a long time. The place was loud. The sound of the jukebox could hardly be heard above the voices. The first thing Fallica noticed was the pitchers of beer on the tables. He nodded toward one on the table closest to them. Smokey picked right up on it and with a wink , headed for the tap. They bought two pitchers and some burgers and settled down to spend the afternoon.

They had a great time. Most of the guys there were on their way to Vietnam. A few were going to Korea, some to Japan and Okinawa. Patrick was glad he wasn't going to 'Nam. He had volunteered for it to impress his girlfriend and to show his First Sergeant how much he hated him, but you had to be eighteen to go to a combat zone. They played cards and drank three two beer all day. It wasn't too bad. About six in the evening they staggered out, smoked another joint on the way back, and fell into their bunks.

Smokey said balls to that. He said he wasn't about to stand formation and get details thrown at him. Nobody was taking roll call anyway. All they had to do was find somebody to listen for their names. After the formation, all we they did was find out if they were on the manifest. No sweat.

That's what happened. For the next two days they smoked dope and played cards at the snack bar. Playing cards was like taking candy from a baby. Fallica stood behind the players, and if they had more than three of a kind, he would cough. Smokey, facing him, would fold. Sometimes though, he would have a full house or a flush and get wouldn't fold. Most of the time he won. Once or twice he lost. It got boring after awhile though. Nobody caught on, Fallica couldn't believe how stupid they were. (Even though he admitted to himself that if he caught Smokey cheating, he wouldn't say anything either.)

Finally their lookout Casey, told them that both their names had been called. They packed up their things and reported to the orderly room for their boarding pass.

The First Sergeant was working at his desk. They stood by his desk and Fallica cleared his throat. The First Shirt looked up.

"It's nice of you to show up boys. We've missed you around here for the last couple of days."

Smokey and Fallica looked at each other. Their expressions said 'What the fuck?'

The First Sergeant smiled. He stood up and rubbed his hands together. He looked like he was having a lot of fun.

"Well, I suppose that you two expect to be flying out of here soon, am I correct in that assumption?"

Fallica gulped. They were caught.

"Yes Top", said Smokey.

"A top spins around in circles, do I look like a fucking top, soldier?"

"No First Sergeant." Smokey looked irritated. Fallica was afraid he was going to start mouthing off like he did with that first Lieutenant. He nudged him with his foot.

"Can I ask you something First Sergeant?"

"What Fallica."

"How the hell did you know we didn't make formation, you never called roll."

"No, I didn't, but I inspected the barracks, and they were a mess. So went to find the barracks chief. When I couldn't find the barracks chief, I went looking for the assistant barracks chief. You see boys, when we assign the troops to the barracks, we make the first two men assigned to the barracks, the barracks chief and the assistant barracks chief. Understand?" He was grinning like hell.

"So what happens now Top,... I mean First Sergeant." Smokey said.

"What happens now, in that you two assholes are going to live up to your responsibilities and get that barracks ready for inspection. I don't care how you do it, but it better be ready by ten hundred hours or you don't go nowhere. Am I making myself clear?"

"Yes, First Sergeant!" They both said in unison. They left the orderly room.

"What the fuck are we going to do now?" Smokey screamed. "that barracks is a disaster area. It'll take a week for us to clean it."

"Leave it to me, I got it all figured out." Fallica was smiling. "But first, let's get stoned." That's what they did.

Twenty minutes later they were walking into the barracks. Most of the guys were already packed and either playing cards or just bullshitting around. Fallica walked into the center of the squad bay.

"Formation!" He screamed.

Instinctively the men began falling in, kicking trash out of their way as they did so. The place really was a mess and it smelt like shit. Some of the commodes were stopped up and the water from the latrine floor had seeped into the bay. Fallica took a place directly in front of the formation.

"Stand at Ease!" He shouted. The men stood at ease. So far, so good. Smokey stood behind him incredulous. He whispered in Fallica's ear.

"You can't get away with this Fallica, some of these guys outrank both of us put together"

Fallica shot him a dirty look that said shut up. He continued: "We're all in a lot of trouble. We just got back from the orderly room and heard the First Sergeant talking to some full-bird Colonel. The Colonel told The First Shirt he wanted to inspect the barracks. 'Fallica was pleased with himself. He had their attention. "Now I don't know what to do because I'm only a lowly Spec four, but I felt that we're all in this together, so I figured I'd let you guys know. I think that we should all ..." He was cut off in mid sentence by a skinny Sergeant First Class.

"We don't give a rat's ass what you think troopie. Who the hell do you think you are giving orders to your superiors?" A few other Sergeants started muttering their agreements.

"I'm sorry Sarge,' said Fallica, 'You're right, the senior ranking man should take care off this, but since nobody's showed much interest or leadership, (he emphasized the word leadership) I figured that as a responsible soldier I should take responsibility for getting this place squared away."

The skinny SFC walked up to the front of the formation.

"Thank you Specialist, but you're relieved of this responsibility. Let NCO's do NCO work." And he began to hand out details to the other men.

By ten hundred hours the barracks was standing tall. The First Sergeant came in and was amazed. As he walked out he glanced at Smokey and Fallica. Smokey thought that they had blown his mind, but Fallica wasn't quite sure. He remembered him saying "I don't care how you do it." He wondered how many times the same thing had happened.

By early afternoon, Fallica was airborne, and headed toward Korea. He felt bad that he and Smokey had been split up, but they promised to find each other at the replacement station that the old-timers called the repo depo. Fallica looked out the window and felt a tug in his chest. See ya later America, Patty Fallica's leaving for awhile, but stay just the way you are, 'cause I like you that way.

Soon they were landing at Yokota Air Force Base. Patty saw the rice paddies along the countryside and was mesmerized. This was exciting stuff. At that moment he was glad that he had joined the Army. He knew that he would never get here any other way. This was an adventure, and he was going to treat it as such.

He imagined that he was Bond, James Bond, on a mission disguised as an American soldier. He didn't exactly know what the mission was but he'd figure it out soon enough.

The passengers were made to wait in the lobby until the plane was refueled. World Airways, the armed services charter airline. He looked out at the tarmac and saw how many aircraft there were with that big red tail. He guessed (and guessed correctly) that most were going to Vietnam , and he was glad that his plane was going to Korea.

Soon he was airborne again and heading toward his destination. Korea, The Land of The Morning Calm. (He learned that little tidbit from the booklet the Army supplied him. It also had a few Korean words in it that he hadn't bothered to learn.) The pilot came on again and informed the passengers that it was only an hour and a half to Kimpo airport in Seoul.

Soon the plane was over land again. It didn't look good to Patty. The land below looked foreboding. Lots of mountains and hills, and a lot of browns and grays, they were too far up to make out specific details, but it didn't look good to him. In fact it looked like the kind of territory that might still contain dinosaurs. He chucked. He cracked himself up.

Their seat belt sign went on followed by the No Smoking sign. They were going to land. looking out of the window he could start to make out details. The first thing he noticed were the rice paddies, lots of them.

The second thing he saw were roads, all of them dirt. There were houses coming in to view, if you could call them that. They looked like huts with mud walls and grass roofs. Holy Shit what kind of place were they sending him to? Other G.I.'s were peering out of the windows all chattering away excitedly. The land rose up toward the aircraft. They were making their approach to the runway. The chattering abruptly stopped. Surrounding the airport were sandbagged bunkers with anti-aircraft guns in each one of them. Hey he thought, this shit looks real! All of a sudden he didn't want to be here anymore.