The Final Storm (23 page)

“Not this one. I’ll take credit for him, but I know your BAR ripped hell out of the trees, could have nailed him too.”

The sergeant was beaming, the star of his own show, his squad gathering up through the trees. He stood now, still held the Nambu, aimed it upward, his words directed toward his men.

“Pretty light weight. If this is the best they can do, it’s gonna be a short fight.”

Adams saw Porter looking away, toward his own men, ignoring the sergeant’s bluster. Porter seemed to freeze now, pointed past Adams, said in a low voice, “There!”

Adams followed the man’s eyes, saw a fat tuft of grass, a patch of raw earth a few yards away. He felt a jolt, a nervous stab in his stomach, pointed the M-1 at the odd clump. He stepped slowly, aiming, saw it was another hole, round and deep, like a home for some giant worm. Porter moved out to the side, covering him, and Adams said, “It’s another one!”

Behind them, the sergeant was dismissive, said, “Passed a few more on the way up here. Looks like they skedaddled, left this one stupid asshole behind to keep us honest. Guess it didn’t work.”

Porter moved up close to Adams, examined the hole, ignored the sergeant’s arrogance.

“Let’s get moving.”

Long pointed back into the trees.

“My looey sent his walkie-talkie guy with us. He’s right back there. You wanna use it?”

“Use your head. We’re on a damn ridgeline. Anybody holding a walkie-talkie is a target for every Jap around here! We’re not sightseeing. Get your asses back down to the road. Your looey and I need to fill in the captain. But not from up here.”

Long was still holding the Nambu, admiring his trophy, but it was too large, too clumsy for a souvenir. He tossed it aside, and Adams was drawn back toward the Japanese soldier, could smell a sweet stink, blood and filth, felt a turn in his stomach. Long was watching him, still with the
smile, suddenly launched a hard kick into the body, a sickening crunch against the dead man’s side.

“You ain’t seen too many of these, have you kid?”

“No.”

“Well, I seen a bunch. Before this is over, there’ll be so damn many, you can make a necklace out of their teeth. Nice gift for your girl, huh?”

Adams wasn’t sure if Long was kidding or not, said only, “Sure.”

Adams tried to avoid the wide smile on the sergeant’s face, didn’t know what else to say. Long leaned out closer to him, put one foot on the Japanese corpse, said in a whisper, “Give your looey credit. He led you guys up here. Mine stayed down on the road. Mine might be smarter, but yours has bigger balls!”

Adams nodded, and Long laughed now, waved one arm toward his men.

“Let’s go!”

On the hillside behind him, Porter had waved the men back down the hill. Adams began the descent, blew more dust through the crust of blood in his nose. He tried to spot Porter, but there was just the green, no faces, every man moving quickly through the stubble of brush. They settled back down on the roadbed, no one standing, all of them returning to their cover. He eased himself off the large flat rock, dropped down, grunted from the pain in his leg, saw he was next to Porter again, the lieutenant looking both ways, a silent head count. Adams wiped a rough hand on the crust of blood on his face, saw Porter look back up the hill, then he looked at Adams, said, “No casualties, thank God. But you … you’re one lucky son of a bitch. That sergeant is full of it. Jap weapons might not measure up, but don’t let anybody tell you they can’t shoot. Only reason that bastard didn’t rip you to pieces was because he thought he’d gotten you. Yep, you’ve got luck on your side. I’m betting a twenty on your next fight.”

Adams nodded toward the lieutenant, wasn’t sure how to respond.

“Uh … thank you.”

Porter moved away, past the others, to the head of the platoon, toward the walkie-talkie. But there were sounds on the road behind them and Adams saw Captain Bennett walking a short distance behind the other lieutenant, Berkeley. Berkeley’s platoon spread out in the ditches, most down on one knee, some with canteens, faint clouds of cigarette smoke. Porter came back, and Adams heard him take a deep breath, moving close to the captain, and Porter said, “Problem solved. Charlie two got him.”

“Yeah, I saw. Good job, all of you. I want us out of this hilly stuff, where we can dig in tonight and watch our flanks. Maps show a road that goes down the hill, flatter ground closer to the beach. We’ve got two more companies joining us along the way and the colonel is making sure we get some heavy support pretty quick. Recon reports that the enemy was seen in force all over the next hill, just beyond the intersection. They seem to be pulling away from us every step of the way, but in case they decide to stick around, there are some 75s coming up on the road behind us. The artillery boys will raise hell all over that place, bust up whatever might be there.”

Porter nodded, and Adams looked at the other lieutenant, who kept his distance. Adams thought of the sergeant on the hilltop. Yep, I guess your looey’s smart. One mortar shell comes down right here, and we’d be in a fix.

Bennett turned, scanned the road in both directions.

“We get to the intersection, the whole company will go to the left. Once we’re on flatter ground, I’ll set up a CP on the beach side. The colonel will give us orders, probably in the morning. Let’s not lose anybody tonight. Eyes sharp!”

Bennett moved away, and Porter said, “Saddle up! Let’s go! Keep your gap!”

Adams saw Ferucci, realized he hadn’t seen him on the hillside. The sergeant was pulling thorns out of his pant leg, said, “Well, we got the bastard. The looey’s right though. You’re one lucky son of a bitch. But for chrissakes, wipe that crud off your face. You look like hell.”

Adams obeyed, a rough sleeve scraping the crust around his nose. Ferucci moved away and Adams waited for the prescribed five yards, and then began to move as well. The road made a wide sweeping curve to the right, dropping down into a narrow gully, out of the line of sight of whoever might have been in the trees above. He moved down the hill, kept a close watch on the brush and rocks above him, could see the beach far below. He felt the cold wetness in his shirt, soaked with his own sweat, realized now, his pants were wet. He had tried to ignore that, knew it had come when he had been pinned down by the Nambu gun, so close to being hit. He cursed to himself, carried the rifle low across his front, glanced across the road, saw Yablonski, the others, no one staring at him, no humiliation, at least not yet. He thought of Ferucci’s words. Lucky? Maybe so. Maybe stupid. You wanted someone to climb up on that rock and see what was beyond those flat rocks. And so I shot my mouth off. Private Adams,
volunteer
.
Next time, don’t be Mr. Stupid Ass Rock Climber. If the sarge wants to see over the next hill, let him climb his own damn rocks.

Welty came up close, violated the gap between them, hard breathing, a hand on Adams’s arm.

“Damn, that was something. Surprised hell out of me, that’s for sure. You did good.”

Adams looked back at him, was beginning to wonder if the whole world had gone stupid.

“
Good?
That Jap nearly blew my head off. I stood up there like a damn lighthouse, for all the world to see. And then I froze, didn’t know enough to get my ass in gear. If the other platoon hadn’t found that damn Jap, he might have shot hell out of all of us. You see those holes up there? Could have been dozens of them, just waiting for us to walk past them. We’re stupid as hell!”

He realized he was nearly shouting, Welty backing away, his response coming in a low voice.

“Well, yeah. He coulda killed a bunch of us, but he didn’t. Seen a lot of that happen before. Saipan.”

Adams was surprised, had never heard Welty mention anything about Saipan. He waited for more, the redhead silent now, dropping back, had said all he wanted to say.

They reached the intersection, and Porter held them up, a low rise in front of them, one fork of the road dipping away to the left. Adams still felt the wetness in his pants. Damn you, anyway. You a coward? You gonna piss on yourself every time you see the enemy? He thought of the sergeant, Long, casual hatred, the man utterly immune to the death of the Japanese soldier. He
wanted
to be the one who killed him. He was
proud
. God, I need to be like that. I need to be the tough son of a bitch. He glanced at his right hand, made a fist. Yeah, they think you already are. Hey, put boxing gloves on him and he beats the crap out of everybody. Must be a really
tough guy
.

Up ahead the men were following Porter to the left. Adams looked down, the stain on his pants. Yeah, you asshole, there’s a good story to tell your brother. Hey, Jesse, a Jap shot at me and I pissed my pants. Pretty impressive, huh? He stared ahead, focused on the distance between him and Ferucci. It happens to everybody, right? Everybody’s scared. You saw it in the looey’s eyes. Maybe that sergeant, before that Jap was killed, maybe he pissed his pants too. Adams looked across the road again, the others spread
out in line, no one looking his way. Damn you, he thought, you better not be a coward, not out here, not when everyone will know. You better find a Jap and blow him to hell, and maybe make one of those necklaces that sergeant bragged about. He thought of the Japanese soldier, the blood and the stink, could not hide from that. That sergeant was proud, he thought. He
liked
it. That’s what I need to do. That’s what a Marine’s supposed to be. Dammit, you better get good at this.

N
ORTHWESTERN
C
OAST
, O
KINAWA
A
PRIL
12, 1945, 8
P.M
.

T
he darkness was already oppressive, more of the same routine, one man in each foxhole standing watch while the other tried to sleep. Adams stared out, the ground more flat than the rocky hills, but far out to the east he could see the taller ridgeline, thickets of pine trees. He held the M-1 close, ready, obeying the harsh instructions from the lieutenant, as though no one had done this before. Porter had seemed rattled after the experience with the Japanese machine gunner, and whether anyone else paid attention or not, Adams had seen something he didn’t want to see. Porter was a veteran, like so many of the others, had done all of this before, Saipan mostly, or Guam. Like Welty, the lieutenant didn’t seem interested in telling his stories, that loudmouth baloney Adams had heard from that other sergeant, Long. Adams had paid much more attention to the
eyes
, both Welty and the lieutenant showing hints of that odd stare that the men in the hospital had talked about. Not sure what that’s about, he thought. I know a little about Saipan, I guess, stuff I heard in the hospital. He stared into darkness, thinking about Welty, yeah, he’d know how much of the newsreel stuff was crap, and how much wasn’t. But I can’t ask him about it. I just can’t. That’s what the new recruits do, happy stupidity, gee, Buddy,
what’s it like? How many Japs did you kill? Well, we killed one today. Doesn’t seem like something to tell the grandkids about. I know damn well Sergeant Long will tell somebody about that, part of his
big adventure
. Some of these guys … that’s just how they are, and that’s what the recruits want to hear. But if the lead starts flying, I’d rather be close to the lieutenant, or even Welty. If one of them grabs his ass and hauls it the other way, pay attention to that.

He had finally been able to eat, but the K rations were just as awful as ever. Welty had given him a chocolate bar, but that didn’t sit any better in his gut. Before dark the lieutenant had gone through the platoon telling them all not to forget their Atabrine tablets, what was supposed to protect them from malaria. Maybe that’s what I got, he thought. Not sure what’s boiled up in my gut, and I don’t know what the hell malaria’s supposed to do to you. I’ve seen a few of the others taking a haul-ass squat in the brush, and nobody’s said anything about some tropical disease. Funny how nobody’s scared of snakes anymore. Haven’t seen a single damn one, and that Nambu gun changed a lot of these idiots. Yeah, there’s worse things to worry about. He poked his stomach, felt the painful response, thought, no, you’re not sick. Just tied up in knots. Some of these green beans they got in those fields would help, for sure. Hell, I don’t see why that fertilizer should change anything. The damn Okies seem fine, and they eat this stuff all the time. Their own crap. He pondered that for a long moment. Well, maybe I’ll skip the beans. He thought of the unfortunate goat herd, all that fresh meat we blew to pieces. Nobody ate any of that, but hell, if the Okies raise them for food, they can’t be all bad. It’s just meat. Real meat, not this stuff in the K rations. Hell, maybe we been eating goat all along. They’re not gonna tell us one way or the other. He felt his stomach rolling over, a hard knot down low, whispered, “Oh hell.”

He probed Welty with his foot, heard a low grunt, Welty awake, alert, sitting upright.

“What is it?”

“Sorry. I gotta hit the head. Bad.”

Welty was up on his knees quickly, the M-1 coming up. He leaned close to Adams, the whispers staying low.

“The password … you remember the password?”

“Lollygag.”

“Say it out loud.”

Adams knew the routine, that if any man left his foxhole in the dark,
he had better make sure his buddies knew who he was. The password was one of those delicious pieces of lore that inspired someone’s clever inventiveness. The intel officers had spread the word that the Japanese couldn’t properly say the letter
l
, and so every password contained a mouthful of
l
’s. Yeah, he thought, I guess if some Jap overheard our password, and hollered out
rorrygag
, it wouldn’t be too good for him. Adams felt the turmoil increasing in his gut, tried to see the small pile of dirt that marked the hole they had dug, just beyond arm’s reach of the foxhole. The luxury of a slit trench for the whole platoon was a thing of the past now, each duo digging their own small latrine close by. It wouldn’t do for anyone to get lost in the dark, password or not. He stayed still for a brief moment, then forced the word out loud.