Then Japanese soldiers started falling back through the station. Jane hid herself as deep among the bushes as she could. She feared they would fight from the cover the exotic plants offered. The low ground, though, evidently counted for more than that. Some of the Japs paused to fill their water bottles in the stream. Then they trotted south to make a stand somewhere else.
Before long, their bullets cracked by above her head as they harassed the oncoming Americans. She lay down behind a fallen log and hoped it would protect her. Somebody set up a machine gun on the northern lip of the little valley. Its insane hammering made her fillings ache. She heard shouts that didn’t sound as if they were in Japanese, and then boots padding along the trails tourists had taken to see the elephant apple and the candle tree.
Ever so cautiously, she raised her head. For a moment, fresh fear shook her. Were these men Americans? They were white men, and they spoke English, but she’d never seen those green uniforms before. The helmets didn’t look anything like what Fletch had laughingly called his tin hat, either.
She had to nerve herself to speak. “Hello?” she said, her voice not much more than a whisper.
With frightening speed, two rifles swung to cover her. “The fuck?” one of the apparitions in green said.
“Son of a bitch! It’s a broad,” the other one said. “Come on out of there, lady. We goddamn near drilled you.”
“Goddamn near,” the first one agreed. “What the hell you doin’ here, anyways?”
“Hiding,” she answered. To her, it was the most obvious thing in the world. These-warriors-grinned as if she’d made a joke. “Who are you people, anyway?” she asked.
“Corporal Petrocelli, ma’am,” one of them said, at the same time as the other answered, “Private Schumacher, ma’am.” Together, they added, “United States Army.”
The Army didn’t wear uniforms like theirs. No-it hadn’t worn uniforms like theirs. There’d been some changes made. Schumacher (who was shorter and darker than Petrocelli, which only went to show you) asked, “Any Japs around?”
Jane pointed south. “They went thataway,” she said, as if she had a bit part in a B Western. “I hope you kill ’em all.”
“That’s what we’re here for, ma’am,” Corporal Petrocelli said. He looked her up and down, not like a man eyeing a woman (thank God!) but more like an engineer wondering how long a badly battered piece of machinery could keep running. Taking a couple of small cans out of a pouch on his belt, he handed them to her. “Here you go. Reckon you need these worse’n we do.” Thus prodded, Private Schumacher coughed up some rations, too.
“Thank you,” she whispered, on the edge of tears. Then she proved she did have a little common sense left: she asked, “How am I going to open these?”
“Here-try this.” Schumacher gave her a knife-no, a bayonet, longer and slimmer than the one on his rifle. It looked much too deadly for such a mundane job, but it would probably work. He said, “Took it off a dead Jap a couple days ago. Was gonna keep it for a souvenir, but there’s more. You can get some use out of it.”
“Toadsticker like that’ll scrag anybody who gets out of line, too,” Petrocelli said.
If I’d had it back in the brothel, if I’d stuck every man that touched me… Jane grimaced. If I’d done that, I’d’ve killed so many, the Army would probably be in Honolulu by now.
Not far away, somebody shouted. Jane had no idea what he said. It made sense to the soldiers, though. They trotted away. Schumacher looked back over his shoulder and waved. Then they were gone.
And most of Wahiawa had to be in American hands, and Jane had a weapon and food-my God, real food! She went back into her refuge under the bushes and behind the log. Maybe she’d come out after a while, and maybe she wouldn’t. In the meantime… She used the bayonet to open a can. It was roast-beef hash. She hadn’t eaten beef in going on two years. She thought it was the most wonderful thing she’d ever tasted, which only proved how long she’d gone without.
THE AMERICANS WERE GOING TO OVERRUN WHEELER FIELD. LIEUTENANT SABURO SHINDO could see as much. The Japanese on the ground were doing everything they could to hold back the enemy. They’d taken gruesome casualties, and the Yankees still moved forward. The Americans had more and better tanks than the Japanese. They had more artillery, plus Navy vessels bombarding Oahu. And they had complete control of the air.
Shindo knew how important that was. He’d enjoyed it during the Japanese conquest of Hawaii. Having American fighters and bombers overhead from dawn to dusk was much less enjoyable than being up there himself.
Now he had the chance to get up there again. The groundcrew men at Wheeler Field had cannibalized Zeros and Hayabusas for their weapons. They’d cannibalized half a dozen wrecked fighters to put together one that would-they hoped-fly. Shindo hadn’t even had to pull strings to get to take it up against the Americans. He was, as far as he knew, the last pilot at the field alive and unwounded.
There was an American movie about a man made from parts of other men. The fighter Shindo would fly against the Americans was a lot like that. Most of it came from Zeros, with occasional pieces from Hayabusas. It was a deathtrap. He knew as much. Under normal conditions, he wouldn’t have walked past it, let alone got into the cockpit. Now… The whole Japanese garrison on Oahu would die. How was the only thing that mattered. Shindo wanted to die hitting back at the enemy, hurting the round-eyed barbarians who’d dared strike against his divinely ruled kingdom.
Before he got into the Frankenstein fighter, a groundcrew man handed him a bottle of the local not-quite-gin. He wouldn’t have drunk before an ordinary mission. What difference did it make now? None he could see. He’d have to be lucky to make a proper attack run. He’d need a miracle, and not such a minor one, to come back.
“Good luck. Hit them hard,” the groundcrew man said as Shindo handed back the bottle. “Banzai! for the Emperor!”
“Banzai!” Shindo echoed. He climbed up into the cockpit, closed it, and dogged it shut. The engine fired up the first try. Shindo took that for a good omen. He’d been desperately short of them lately. So had all the Japanese on Oahu.
One more good omen would be taking off without blowing up. He had a hundred-kilo bomb slung under the plane. What passed for a runway was only enough grass to get him off the ground… he hoped. If there wasn’t quite enough grass or if a wheel bumped down into a hole the grass hid-his mission would be shorter than he expected.
Despite the risks, he wished the bomb were bigger. The fighter could carry 250 kilos without any trouble, but the armorers hadn’t been able to find one that size. He shrugged and adjusted the safety harness. Then he released the brakes. The plane rolled forward. He gave it more throttle. When he neared the end of the grass, he pulled back on the stick. The Zero’s nose came up. He couldn’t have asked for a smoother takeoff.
He got a panoramic view of the fighting as he climbed. Wahiawa was gone, lost. So were the Schofield Barracks, just north of Wheeler Field. If the mechanics had waited much longer to get busy with their wrenches and pliers and rivet guns, they wouldn’t have been able to do this.
Below him, Wildcats and the new American fighters dove to shoot up a Japanese ground position. Machine-gun fire rose to meet them, but no real antiaircraft guns opened up. None of the American planes paid any attention to Shindo. If they noticed him at all, they assumed he was one of them. A Zero’s size and shape were a little like a Wildcat’s, but only a little. The biggest help he had was the Yankees’ assumption that no more Japanese aircraft could fly. If he couldn’t be Japanese, he had to be American. Logical, wasn’t it? But logic was only as good as its assumptions. Since those were wrong…