Page 49 of Semper Fi

“A w, come on, Husky. You finally found an excuse to go home, huh?” Cal said, clearly putting on a smile.

Slipping in the mud, Jim rushed over to join Cal as he walked alongside the stretcher. “Take care of yourself, buddy,” Jim added. “You’ll be fine.”

Ashen and somehow smaller than Jim had ever seen him, Husky smiled weakly. “I sure will, Johnny. Finally going home. Tell Sully he’d better keep his scrawny ass out of trouble. Same with you, Hollywood.”

“Since when is my ass scrawny?” Cal feigned offense as he patted his rear end with both hands. “This is one hundred percent prime beef right here.”

Then the corpsmen were loading Husky into the transport, and he was gone, the truck rattling over the uneven road. Jim rubbed his face. He felt as if he hadn’t slept in days. “Think he’ll make it?”

“Fifty-fifty, I’d say.” Cal’s smile and jocular tone had vanished.

“At least it’s over for him now. One way or the other.”

They watched the truck go.

When Sully found out Husky was hit and already evacuated, he disappeared into his foxhole by the gun pit and curled in on himself.

The rest of the squad sat on a cluster of rocks and ate cold K rations.

The canned beef loaf was gelatinous and mercifully tasteless as Jim forced it down.

They were off the line for the night, at least.

After dinner, Cal left to get briefed by one of the new replacement lieutenants.

Along with the enlisted men, officers were getting killed left and right.

Captain Brown had gotten nailed a week before, and there seemed to be a new officer every other day.

Jim watched as Cal and the other NCOs nodded, their faces grim.

“That doesn’t look so good.” Gambler jerked his chin toward the huddle.

“No.”

As the rain began again, Gambler pulled his field jacket tighter around him. “God, I wish the rain would quit.”

Jim resisted the urge to snap that they’d lived through the rainy season twice already, and that this was nothing. But the rain had indeed been getting heavier and more frequent, so instead he just chewed on a biscuit that crumbled like dust on his tongue.

After a minute of silence, Gambler suddenly shook with a sob.

Jim perched on the rock next to him and patted his back. “It’s all right. You’ll be okay.”

“No, I won’t, Johnny!” Gambler shook his head, trembling. “I’m so scared. Marines aren’t supposed to be scared.”

“We’re all afraid. Every last one of us.”

“Look at them.” He nodded to Cal and the other NCOs. “The brass is sending us back in. All these weeks it’s just nonstop. Even when we’re off the line, it still doesn’t ever stop.”

“I know.” It was quieter in their camp, but in the distance the rumble of battle continued unabated.

Army and Marine divisions made painfully slow progress against the Japs, who true to form were not giving up the island without a brutal fight.

Even off the line they had to constantly be on guard for flanking Jap attacks or paratroopers plummeting from above.

Resting now at the edge of a small forest, they were all worn down—thin, hollow, and battered. Two of their squad’s replacements were dead, and now Gambler and the others knew for themselves the hell of battle .

Gambler sniffed quietly. “I’m never going home, Johnny. I’ll never see my folks or my little sister again.”

“We all feel like that.” Jim had to tamp down a swell of emotion as Sophie’s little face filled his mind. “All we can do is keep our heads down and pray we’re one of the lucky ones.” He didn’t feel very lucky at the moment.

Gambler swiped at his red eyes. His shorn blond hair was splattered with mud. “There’s a girl. Prettiest girl in all of Rhode Island. I was going to ask her to marry me.”

“What’s her name?”

“Louisa. Hair like coal and big green eyes like a cat’s almost. All the boys were after her in high school, and senior year she picked me. Said I made her laugh. She writes me letters and says she’s waiting for me to come home. She’ll be some other fella’s wife. Won’t even remember me.”

“Of course she will. Besides, you’ll be there. You’ll make it.” Jim put his arm about Gambler’s shivering shoulders.

When Cal returned, he roused Sully and sent him and one of the new boys on patrol. Jim offered Cal the candy bar from his ration, grateful their supplies had been refreshed at least. “You look like you could use this.”

Cal sat next to Jim on the rocks. “Thanks.” He unwrapped the chocolate and snapped it in two, handing half back to Jim. Nodding to Gambler’s foxhole, where the boy had settled into a fitful, sniffling sleep, he asked, “He all right?”

“As he can be.” Jim sighed. “Are we making a push?”

Shoulders hitching up with a deep breath, Cal nodded. “Heading south.”

“Think it’ll be bad?”

Cal met his gaze. “Yeah. We should get some sleep.”

It was almost dawn when Jim stirred in his foxhole.

The rain had let up, although he was still soaked to the skin, cold and clammy as he stretched his aching limbs.

The fighting had quieted in the night, and it was almost eerily calm as he shuffled toward the trees to piss.

As he passed the rest of the sleeping squad, he blinked at two empty muddy foxholes.

Without another thought, he raced into the forest with his rifle at the ready.

He was already too far gone when he realized he should have woken Cal and the others.

He followed the route Sully and the replacement would have taken, darting his eyes left and right in the gloom.

Everything faded away behind him and he listened intently.

Stopping in his tracks, he peeked around a large patch of scrubby bushes.

Ahead, two figures sat against the wide trunk of a tree.

Adrenaline bursting through him, Jim raised his rifle and fired as he dropped to his belly in the muck.

The shot echoed through the leaves, but the two men didn’t so much as flinch.

As his heart clobbered his ribs, Jim got them in his sights again.

It was as though time stood still, everything silent but for the blood rushing in his ears. Jim stared at the unmoving men, and finally realized what he was looking at.

Who he was looking at.

He blinked, certain his eyes were betraying him. He pushed himself to his feet and took a tentative step. Then another, and another, until he stood trembling in front of the bodies.

Sully’s red hair was almost the only distinguishable feature left.

Where his hazel eyes had been were now empty, bloody sockets.

His mouth was horribly stretched around a hunk of flesh.

As Jim tried to make sense of the gore and slashed uniforms, he realized it was Sully’s penis that had been shoved into his mouth.

The replacement was equally brutalized, and Jim choked on a scream and surging bile. He looked down and realized he was standing in the blood and guts that had been strewn across the forest floor.

By the time he registered the footsteps, they were right behind him. Jim yanked his Ka-Bar knife from his belt as he lunged around. Cal raised his arms as he barely dodged the blade.

“Whoa! It’s me! ”

Cal. He’ll fix it. He’ll make everything okay. Jim lowered his arm and swayed on his feet. Cal caught his shoulders, and his fingers dug into Jim’s flesh.

“It’s okay. You’re okay. Come on, let’s get back.”

“We can’t go without them. Did you see? Do you see them?” Jim felt as though he would disintegrate if not for Cal’s grasp.

“I see them, Jim.”

“Sully…and…I can’t remember his name. Lord, I should know his name!” Jim forced his lungs to expand, and a sob escaped his lips. Sully’s voice echoed in his head—the twang of his accent so familiar. He’d never hear it again. Jim tried to remember the last thing he’d said to his friend. He couldn’t.

“It’s all right.” Cal’s voice caught as he peered at the carnage. He cleared his throat and urged Jim to take a step. “Davis. His name was Davis.”

Gambler was on his knees heaving, and the others clearly struggled with the urge. One of them cried, “Sweet Jesus, look at them.”

Despite himself, Jim’s gaze returned to Sully and Davis. Davis’s hands and feet had been chopped off, along with his ears. Rage boiled up in Jim’s gut, and he’d never hated the Japanese more than he did in that moment. “I’ll kill them all.”

Cal’s breath was warm on his cheek, his arm steady around Jim’s shoulders as he urged another step. “Okay. Let’s go. We’ll come back with stretchers and make sure they have a proper burial.”

Gambler wept. “They were supposed to wake me and Logger up when it was our turn. I should have woke up myself and realized they weren’t back. I should have looked for them. Maybe—”

“It would have been too late.” Cal’s voice was thin, but even. “If it’s anyone’s fault for not realizing, it’s mine.” He turned Jim around and prodded him back to their camp. “We have to go.”

Jim shuffled through the leaves and dirt, telling himself not to look back.

Hours later as the sun set and the skies opened, Jim huddled behind a boulder on the outskirts of a village as bullets ricocheted overhead. The war waged on, indifferent and relentless.

Gambler was beside him swearing under his breath, cursing the Japs for surprising them, and the women and children for being in the way. “Why the fuck aren’t these people cleared out? And what the fuck are the Nips doing here? We aren’t even at the ridge!”

The rock was rough against Jim’s cheek, and he closed his eyes, seeing not the blackness he craved, but Sully’s final empty, terrible gaze.

He opened his eyes again, wishing the noise would just stop.

He was so tired. He vaguely remembered packing his gear that morning and moving southward with Cal at his side, murmuring words Jim didn’t understand.

Now he was here in the growing darkness with the rain pouring into his eyes. He closed them again.

“Jesus Christ! Help me with this mortar! The riflemen can’t do it all, Johnny!”