John Musgrave in “Unfinished Business”

I was assigned a listening post at Con Thien in the fall. That's like getting a death sentence at a trial. Because it's just three Marines out there with a radio at night. You're listening for the enemy. They call you on the radio every hour, "Delta Lima, Papa 3 Bravo, Delta Lima, Papa 3 Bravo, this is Delta 3. If your sit rep is Alpha Secure, key your handset twice. If your situation report is all secure, break squelch twice on the handset." And if it's not, they think you're asleep, so they keeping asking you until it finally dawns on home that maybe there's somebody too close for you to say anything. So then they say, "If your sit rep is negative, Alpha Sierra, key your handset once," and you damn near squeeze the handle off, because they're so close you can hear them whispering to one another. (beat) And that's real scary stuff. I'm scared of the dark still. I still got a nightlight. When my kids were growing up, that's when they really found out that Daddy had been in a war, when they said, "Well, why do we need to outgrow our nightlights? Daddy's still got one."