Combat Infantry

Before dawn, my platoon leader came to my hole. “I need you to take three men and do a recon. Don’t take any chances. Just take a look around and get your ass back here,” he whispered. “Right,” I said, looking past him, out into the mist. I tapped three men and motioned for them to follow me. We knelt in the runny mud, in the middle of the perimeter, while I told them what I wanted them to do. There was to be no firing, if at all possible. If we met any Japs, we would use knives. We would go out as far as I deemed necessary, make a short sweep, and come back. Word was quickly passed down the line. “Patrol going out...” We slowly went out through the perimeter, the ground thick with the decaying Japanese dead, picking our way, carefully watching for any movement in the bodies. The Japs often booby-trapped themselves before attacking so that even if they were killed, they could still inflict casualties on the enemy attempting to move the body. We moved ahead, stepping around the foul-smelling, ballooning corpses. The heavy downpour drowned out the sounds of the muck sucking on our shoes. Raindrops formed millions of tiny explosions as they impacted the water running over the ground, sounding like a fire hose hitting a flat rock. The cold slop washed around our ankles as it ran downhill into the perimeter behind us. After about 10 yards, the dead bodies thinned out until they were only a few scattered about like fat, soaked, stinking bundles of discarded clothing. I tried to see through the swirling fog, but it was hopeless. Using my compass, we headed out to the northeast. There were a few water-filled craters from artillery shells but nothing else. We went out about 75 yards and stopped. We knelt down in a small circle, weapons pointed out, listening for any sound we could pick out from the rain. After waiting for a few minutes, we moved out another 25 yards and listened some more. I signaled with my hand to move west on an arc to cover more ground before we started back. The ground became even more rocky and less muddy. It was definitely rising higher as we pushed farther to the northwest. No surprises there. The Japanese were always up higher than we were. The land was definitely favoring the defenders. We still hadn’t heard anything. Opening and closing my hand three times, I signaled that we would stay out for another fifteen minutes and then head back. We headed slightly more north and slowly picked our way over the rough ground. We had to be extremely careful not to trip or knock any rocks loose, giving away our presence to the enemy. We also had to watch for Japanese patrols out doing the same thing we were. Suddenly, I stopped dead in my tracks. The hair on the back of my neck and hands stiffened and a twinge shot through me. An all-too-familiar, sour stink wafted toward us through the fog. Dried fish, moldy rice, wet leather and human sweat. Japs! I silently dropped to the ground. Instantly, my men did the same. I looked back at the next man in line and motioned slowly to my front. He nodded and did the same thing to the other two behind him. He looked back at me and pointed to his nose. Then he pointed ahead into the fog to the right. He slowly waved his hand and pointed back the way we had come. I motioned for him to wait, while we listened for any sounds. We lay there on the rocks, cold water running through our soaked, muddy coveralls, gripping our weapons, every nerve jangling. My whole body tingled. It was a defensive mechanism telling the brain it was time to get the body up and get the hell out before something bad happened to it. Fight or flight. There! Off to the right...a cough! The Japanese seemed to be out to the north of us about 10 yards or so. Discretion being the better part of valor, there was no need to get any closer. They might find us at any second. We were much closer than we thought. We had probably been crossing their front for the last five minutes. It was time to go. We started back as quietly as we could. The heavy rain had masked our approach and was the only reason we had been able to get as close as we did without being spotted. After slithering and crab-peddling our way for about 50 yards, we stopped to get our bearings with the compass. “We should check over to the west, too,” I barely whispered. “The whole fucking Imperial Army could be out there and we wouldn’t even see ‘em!” whispered one of my men, as the driving rain painfully lashed our faces. “Let’s get the hell out of here and go back!” said another. The third man simply squatted in the rain, eyes wide, water pouring off his drenched fatigue hat like a miniature waterfall. “What the hell. Let’s go. We got what we came for,” I said. We slid and stumbled back using the compass, because we seriously couldn’t see where we were going. The fog had closed over everything with an impenetrable gray wall. As we approached where we hoped our perimeter was, I whispered the password as loudly as I dared. Nothing! We went ahead another ten yards and stopped. Again, I stage whispered the password. “Luscious—” We always used a password with “ells” in them because the Japanese had trouble pronouncing them. Still nothing! I checked the compass and we moved over about 20 yards to the left. The men were holding on to each other’s cartridge belt so we wouldn’t lose anyone in the thick fog. I licked my lips and mentally crossed my fingers as I stared into the rain. “Luscious—” “Lola!” answered from just ahead. We made it.