Savage Sniper

“Honestly, we were all mostly too tired and worn out to chew the fat. I do know that he’d been a sailor who went in the drink when his ship went down. All I really knew about him aside from that was that he was married. He had a little girl back home somewhere in New Mexico. She’d been born while he was away, and he’d never even seen her. Imagine that? He said the Japanese took away the only picture he had of her and his wife when he was captured. Bastards.”

“A sailor from New Mexico? Don’t that beat all,” Deke replied.

“Dammit, I should have been a little faster,” Faraday said. “Maybe I could have stopped him. He wasn’t in the right frame of mind.”

“He went loco,” Deke said, more to the point. “Can’t blame him — and you sure as hell can’t blame yourself. If anybody is to blame, it’s me.”

Faraday gave him a look, his eyes bright and almost feverish in what remained of the daylight. They had all been without enough food and water, and the effects were starting to show. “What the hell are you talking about?”

He and Deke were off to one side of the bunker, talking quietly. Although the former flyboy was an officer, that line between them had disappeared, if it had ever existed at all. What they had been through together in this short time had made them equals. It was true that they were very different, Deke with his country ways and Faraday with his officer’s polish, but Deke had come to trust the man every bit as much as any member of Patrol Easy.

Steele had already announced that they would try to break through the enemy encirclement, so they just needed it to get darker. Then again, it came down to a coin toss whether the Japanese would launch another attack first.

“I feel responsible for each and every one of these men,” Deke said. “I put them all at risk with this escape attempt. Hell, I promised them freedom, but maybe it’s just not something that I can deliver.”

“Don’t say that,” Faraday replied.

“I went in there thinking we were gonna kick some Japanese ass and take names later. Cut through them like a hot knife through butter. That was the plan, anyhow. I could tell that some of your boys weren’t keen on it, and maybe they knew better. Who knows, in another few weeks, they might have been freed anyhow when the advance reached them.”

Faraday shook his head. “I doubt it. You said yourself that maybe the enemy was looking to erase any evidence of the camps. That meant erasing their POWs. No, it’s likely that we were on borrowed time.”

“Look where it got us,” Deke said. He wasn’t one to give up easily, but he suddenly felt down and out. “Now we’re trapped.”

“So we’ll die fighting. You saw what it was like in that camp. It was only a matter of time before those bastards worked us all to death — or worse.”

“What are you planning on fighting the Japanese with?” Deke asked. After all, the former prisoners were unarmed.

Faraday looked away. He didn’t have a good answer for that.

Deke had to admit that he hadn’t felt so down in a long time. It was seeing Yamagata fire that arrow into Truslow so triumphantly that had set him on edge. He had hoped to get Yamagata in his sights by now, but the colonel had proved too elusive. Fortunately, the same couldn’t be said of Mr. Suey. What was left of him now lay beyond the bunker door, attracting flies and ants.

Still, that small triumph hadn’t been enough. Deke had the nagging feeling that maybe they had won the battle but lost the war, so to speak.

Faraday moved closer and took hold of the front of Deke’s uniform shirt, bunching it up in his fist. It was not a threatening gesture, but a way of making sure he had Deke’s full attention. Deke tried to pull away, but Faraday wouldn’t let him go. Given his current condition, Faraday had a surprising amount of strength.

“You listen to me, and listen good,” Faraday said. “Not just anybody could have come into that camp and done what you did. Right away, you got under Mr. Suey’s skin, and Yamagata’s too. That showed me right away that you were the right man for the job.”

“Some job I did—”

“Hold on. I’m not through yet.” Faraday tightened his grip on Deke’s shirt. “I’ve heard your buddies talk about what a great shot you are, and I saw some of that today. If anybody is going to take out that snake-eyed Yamagata, it’s going to be you. Hell, you told me that you fought a bear and lived to talk about it. You got us this far, so don’t give up now. I know I haven’t pulled rank much with you, but that’s an order, by the way.”

“Yes, sir,” Deke muttered.

Faraday let go of his shirt. Deke still wasn’t entirely convinced, but Faraday had given him something to think about.

As they waited, the men of Patrol Easy shared around what was left of their food. Divided among so many, it didn’t go far. That was all right — Deke didn’t feel much like eating, anyway.