Pacific Sniper

Chapter Twenty-One

Deke was exposed to the Japs on the hillside above, and bullets smacked into the dirt. Lucky for him, it was windy and throwing off their aim. Also, he knew from experience that there was a tendency to undershoot when firing downhill — it was thus no surprise that most of the bullets were hitting beneath him. He thanked the powers above that the Japs didn’t have a machine gun and that the attention of the sniper seemed to be elsewhere.

Then again, Deke knew that his luck wouldn’t hold forever. He had to either get to cover or get rid of those Japs.

Deke’s first instinct was to fight. He thought about stopping to fire a few shots at the Japs, but he resisted the urge and kept going. He had to get to Ingram before he bled out and it was too late.

Above him, he could see Ingram slumped beside the path. With a final scrabble, Deke was able to reach him.

“You came back,” Ingram managed to wheeze.

“I said I would, didn’t I?”

“You’re all right, Deke,” he said. He winced in pain. “Dying is a bitch.”

“Hush now and save your breath.”

Deke took the bandages and pressed them against the pulsating wound in Ingram’s throat. He realized that there weren’t enough bandages on Guam to save Ingram.

Blood soaked the front of Ingram’s shirt and even reddened the ground. He had simply lost too much blood.

Deke fiddled with the bandages, which were already soaked through.

Weakly, Ingram pulled Deke’s hand and didn’t let go. Ingram’s eyes had taken on a glassy look, but he managed to focus them on Deke. Deke saw fear in those eyes. He looked away, feeling surprised and a little ashamed for Ingram. He knew that wasn’t the way that Ingram would want anyone to see him leaving this world.

Ingram had been a big athletic bastard. He’d also been confident in himself. Deke couldn’t help but wonder what someone would see in his own eyes, if he happened to be the one lying there with a bullet through his throat. With any luck, he’d get shot through the head and never feel a thing.

Ingram’s eyes had grown more distant, his grip on Deke’s hand weaker. The big man shuddered once or twice; then the light went out of his eyes. Ingram was gone.

If the Japs had managed to kill someone like Ingram, strong as a bull, what chance did the rest of them have?

Deke slumped back into the bushes, suddenly aware that bullets were still spitting past him from time to time. Son of a bitch. He was sick and tired of these Japs. They had killed Ingram and shot Lieutenant Steele. They were still busy trying to kill him and the rest of Patrol Easy.

He reached for his rifle, madder than a hornet.

They had known that the ravine might be an ambush, but they thought that they’d taken care of that when Deke had eliminated those two snipers. As it turned out, there had been yet more Japanese hidden down in the tall grass, completing the ambush. But the ambush was even more multilayered than that. Not only had the Japs been waiting for them in the ravine, but there were a handful of the greasy yellow bastards on the hill above them. At least one of the Japs was a damn good shot — it hadn’t been random bullets that had brought down Ingram or the lieutenant. No, Deke decided, that had been a very deliberate shooting.

He was a sitting duck up here on the steep path, without any real cover other than scrubby bushes that wouldn’t hide a skinny cat.

“Sorry about this, ol’ buddy,” Deke said, and rolled Ingram’s body onto its side. He grunted with the effort, reminded again of how big Ingram was. The result was that Ingram created a barrier between Deke and the Japs on the hill. He managed to spoon against Ingram, making himself nearly invisible behind the larger man. It wasn’t comfortable, but Deke twisted himself around to set his rifle on top of Ingram’s shoulder.

Desperately, Deke searched for a target, pressing his eye tight to the scope. Ain’t none of us gettin’ out of here alive if I don’t nail some of those Nip sons of bitches.

On the hillside, he spotted a Jap, the enemy soldier’s head and shoulders visible above the pointy blades of kunai grass. Deke put the crosshairs on him and dropped him. He worked the bolt, swung the rifle, and shot another Jap.

Two down, maybe three or four to go. There hadn’t been more than a handful of them up there. But the Japs had quickly figured out that someone was picking them off, and they’d settled into the deep grass, out of sight. All that Deke could see was a sea of grass, the tops moving in the breeze.

It didn’t help that the Japanese rifles, with their lighter cartridges, made what sounded like a faint pop that was hard to pinpoint. Not for the first time, the smaller caliber seemed to be a distinct advantage. The grass, the wind, the hills themselves worked to absorb the sound, adding to Deke’s frustration.

Another Jap showed himself, rising slowly from the grassy hillside as if he were growing out of it. Through the scope, Deke saw the white headband with its bloodred symbol. Deke had started thinking of him as the Samurai Sniper. He realized that this was the same sniper that he had seen during the all-out Japanese attack. More than anything, he recognized the man’s cold stare, even across the distance separating them.

He wasn’t sure if the enemy sniper was challenging him to a duel or, worse yet, taunting him. To hell with that. Deke put the crosshairs right on the center of the Jap sniper’s headband and squeezed the trigger—

Nothing happened. He had forgotten to work the bolt and feed another round into the chamber.

Cursing his foolishness, he ran the bolt, then fired.

But not before the Samurai Sniper sank back down into the grass and disappeared.

Deke never saw where his bullet went, but he definitely hadn’t hit the sniper.

Down below, he could see what was left of the squad trying to scramble up the path leading out of the ravine. Rodeo and Alphabet appeared to be carrying Lieutenant Steele between them. Either he was still alive, or they didn’t want to leave the officer’s body behind with nothing but dead Nips to keep it company.

On the far side of the ravine, they would be safe from the Japanese riflemen. The steep angle meant that they would be in defilade so that the Japanese couldn’t look down and see them.

A bullet smacked into the body with a meaty sound. Deke kept his head down and willed himself to sink into the ground. He and the Japs were at a stalemate. He knew that it wouldn’t last long, but at least it was buying the rest of the squad time to get out of the ravine.

Another bullet whacked into the body, but peeking out, Deke couldn’t see where the shot had come from — just the empty hillside. He decided not to shoot back and pinpoint his location for the Jap snipers.

They couldn’t get to him, and he couldn’t get to them. Deke was no wordsmith, but he muttered to himself, “Well now, I reckon that what we’ve got here is a Mexican standoff.”

Okubo felt frustrated by the situation that had unfolded. The ambush had started out as a success, but the sniper on the slope was now causing problems. In the ravine below, the Americans had moved out of sight. Soon the Americans would be making their way up the steep path, and when they reached the top, that would be a complication for Okubo and his squad.

Meanwhile, the sniper on the slope was using his dead comrade’s body for cover most effectively. Although it was just what he would have done had their roles been reversed, it now meant that Okubo and his team were essentially pinned down. If any of them moved, the sniper would pick them off. Perhaps the enemy sniper was more than a worthy adversary — he was dangerous.

As a sniper, Okubo was patient — to a point. But he recognized an impasse when he saw one. He needed something to break loose. What he had to do was to get the American sniper to reveal himself.

He turned to a soldier, lying prone in the grass to Okubo’s left. “Private, why are you hiding like that? Stand up and fire at that soldier.”

“Sir?”

“Do as I say!”

The soldier looked reluctant. He hesitated, then seemed to gather himself. With a shout, he jumped up and fired wildly at the enemy on the slope.

Almost instantly, he collapsed back into the grass and did not stir, dead from a single shot.

“That was too quick,” Okubo muttered to himself. Having remained hidden in the grass himself, he had not spotted the enemy sniper’s muzzle blast. He would have to use another soldier as a decoy. He looked over to his right, where Kimura lay. He hesitated, only because the private had been a useful kosho.

“Private Kimura! It is your turn now. Rise up from the grass and shoot that American!”

“Sir?”

“Do not disappoint me, Kimura. Remember your duty to the Emperor.”

The young soldier looked at him with pleading eyes, but Okubo stared back pitilessly. He did not have time for this. He needed the enemy sniper to reveal himself before the rest of that American patrol climbed out of the ravine.

Reluctantly, the young soldier appeared to make up his mind. The hands holding his rifle trembled as he got to his knees.

Slowly, Kimura gathered his resolve. He knew that what he was doing was nothing short of suicide. Like Okubo, he had recognized that this was the same sniper that they had faced earlier. The American was a good shot — he wouldn’t miss. However, Kimura knew that he had no choice but to obey a direct order.

Meanwhile, Okubo kept his eye on the target.

That did not prevent him from saying impatiently, “Go on. What are you waiting for?”

Kimura stood. A split second later, he gave a cry of pain and collapsed back into the grass, writhing in agony.

Okubo ignored him. The ruse had worked. This time, he had spotted a flicker of movement.

He fired.

Deke spotted a Japanese rise from the grass, showing himself plainly. It was not the samurai-looking guy this time, but he shouted what might have been a battle cry. Deke had been waiting for a target and was ready for him. He fired and was sure that he had nailed the Jap right in the head.

Another one down. How many were left?

Incredibly, another Jap showed himself.

Damn, but that one popped up like a gopher. Deke was so startled that he barely aimed, just put the sights on the enemy soldier and pulled the trigger. He got lucky. The Jap fell back into the grass.

Immediately, a bullet came in and grazed his cheek, producing a burning sensation as if someone had just rubbed his scarred face with a hot coal. Too close for comfort. Deke hunkered even tighter against the big man’s corpse.

More shots thudded into Ingram’s body. The sound was more than a little sickening. Unseen in the grass, the Japs were now targeting him. He fired blindly, hoping that it would at least make them keep their heads down. It didn’t, and the firing continued. He just hoped that meant the squad below was safely out of their line of fire.

He didn’t have a prayer of hitting enemy soldiers that he couldn’t see. On the other hand, the Japs knew exactly where he was. He touched his burning cheek, a reminder that it was only a matter of time before the Japs got a lucky shot.

Staying put was not an option.

The thing that Deke was learning about war was that it broke down into a series of life-and-death decisions. Your actions would either get you killed within the next few seconds, or they might save your bacon so that you lived to a ripe old age. The only thing that you couldn’t do was sit still and let somebody else make your decision for you — not when their decision was to kill you.

“Now or never,” Deke muttered to himself.

He took just one second in his mind to say goodbye to Sadie and his ma. He pictured the spring green of the mountains back home one last time, thinking that it might be the last thought he had, and then he sprang up from behind Ingram’s bullet-riddled body and ran down the ravine.

To call it running was an exaggeration. The path was so steep that he was basically falling down the slope, but somehow his feet managed to stay just ahead of gravity. His arms pinwheeled wildly. More bullets whistled around him. His boot caught on a root, and he went down, tumbling the rest of the way down the path to the bottom of the ravine. He hit so hard that it knocked the wind out of him, but he forced himself to keep going and crawled into the shelter of some rocks.

Gasping for breath, he took stock. His descent down the slope hadn’t been pretty, and one of his knees hurt like hell, but he didn’t have any bullet holes in him, which seemed to be the main thing.

On the other side of the ravine, he could see that the squad was more than halfway up. He lay there a moment, catching his breath, then dashed across the ravine and started after them. This side of the ravine was out of the Japanese sight line. The Japs couldn’t shoot down at them unless they put themselves in the Americans’ own line of fire. If the Japs were smart, Deke reckoned that they would just roll a couple of grenades down the hill and call it a day.

“Thought we lost you,” Philly said. “You’re like a bad penny, Deke. You keep managing to turn up.”

“Ingram is dead.”

“Let’s get out of here before we end up the same way.”

They struggled up the steep path, making their way out of the ravine. Tony Cruz was leading them, seeming not to care that he was headed toward the Japanese with nothing but a single-shot rifle and a machete. His legs pumped tirelessly up the slope, and the Americans had no choice but to follow.