(Other Side #2) - Bill quickly realized that most of the people in Vietnam seemed indifferent to if not hostile towards the American troops, and after a few weeks he grew to hate the country and the people. Bill’s unit went on a search and destroy mission, and his fellow soldiers assured him they wouldn’t see any enemy combatants, and they would just end up wasting ammo shooting into the jungle. Pvt. Bindurup passed the time reading DC Comics, and told Bill he used to love them, but he’d come to see them, especially the war comics, as part of the lie that glorified war and landed them in battle in a foreign country Sniper fire periodically hit the unit, with Binderup getting hit in the chest, and Sgt. Bayer called in an airstrike, setting the jungle ablaze. The troops scoured the wreckage, and Bill saw a pig devouring a Vietnamese man who’d been burned to death. He vomited, then shot the pig to death, but heard the dead pig speaking to him, telling him he’d die in Vietnam. Bill passed out, remembering the simple joys of home, and wishing he could go back.

(Other Side #3-5) - Everette’s unit was dropped into the Khe Sanh military base to back up the 1/26 Marines, who were under assault from VC who’d taken the nearby hills. The base was constantly being shelled by heavy artillery and Bill found that many of the Marines were resigned to the fact that they’d eventually be overrun. Bill could no longer sleep because of the constant shelling and retaliatory bombing. He went to his Sgt. And told him he was going out of his mind, but Bayer told him to go crazy on his own time. Bayer said he didn’t want to be in Vietnam any more than Bill did, but he should just focus on surviving and not getting in anyone’s way. He also warned Bill not to tell any of the other Marines that he was seeing dead people. Vo Binh Dai of the People’s Army of Vietnam, a young man having visions of the dead similar to Bill’s, brought down an American helicopter with a hand grenade, and Bill’s unit responded to the scene. The enemy forces engaged in a firefight, and Bill ran around telling everyone to cease fire because a butterfly, which he thought was speaking to him, was in danger of being hit in the crossfire. Sgt. Bayer grabbed him, telling him to get down, and Bayer was fatally hit in the neck by enemy fire. Back at base Everette read a letter from his mother, telling him he was an American hero and that God was on his side. The ghosts of dead soldiers read the letter over his shoulder, and Everette realized that his parents’ view of the war bore no relation to the reality he was experiencing. Bill thought back on growing up in Alabama, attending church, chasing lizards in the spring and eating his mother’s home cooking. He had a vision of his younger self in church when the entire congregation turned was slaughtered, then turned into VC soldier, then into charred corpses. He asked his fellow soldiers what they thought of God, and one man said there was no God, and another said there was, but he wasn’t in the trenches with them. Bill wrote back to his mother, assuring her everything was just fine, and that he was a hero just like she said he was, and the highlight of his day was seeing a pretty butterfly. Bill Everette, now completely shell-shocked, waited in the trenches for the VC to overrun Khe Sanh and kill him. Dai and the People’s Army made an assault on the base, and as soldiers on both sides were brought down Dai and Everette locked eyes. Bill shot Dai, who crumpled into the barbed wire, dead. His last thoughts were of his pride in being a soldier and farmer in this life, and wondering what he’d be in the next. Bill found Dai’s journal and the pocketwatch his father had given Dai before going off to war. Bill desperately wished he could read the journal so he’d understand why Dai had to die, and why Bill had to be the one to kill him. He had a vision of a fire pit opening beneath him and the dead soldiers that haunted him trying to drag him to Hell. Bill was wounded in combat before the war ended, and was brought back home to Alabama. Home no longer felt like home, and his family no longer recognized the young man that had gone off to war. Bill spent almost all his time sitting alone in his room in the dark, his only company being the ghost of Vo Binh Dai.

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