We stepped cautiously through the metal door leading into the tunnel. There were two battle lantern–sized red-lensed lights in the tunnel, one of which had miraculously survived the grenades and was still on. It was definitely a man-made tunnel, low-ceilinged, wider than the other ones we’d seen, and more like an anteroom than an actual tunnel. A half-dozen dead soldiers lay in various positions, their bodies viciously flayed by the fragments from five grenades going off practically in their faces within the concrete confines of the room. There was a wall of radio gear on one side, cans of water, and rifles stacked on another wall. It looked like a squad room. The cans of water leaked copiously, as did the former occupants.
We’d been hoping for a cave that wouldn’t have been too deep and wouldn’t have been connected to anything. That tunnel entrance at the back meant that more soldiers might be already on their way from some underground complex to investigate all the racket. Twitch and Monster dragged the bodies outside, while Goon and I studied the steel door at the back of the tunnel. It looked a lot like a watertight hatch that had been taken from a ship, frame and all, and then bolted into the concrete.
“Cover me,” Goon ordered, and then swung the operating lever up, releasing the locking dogs. The hatch swung open on greased hinges, revealing a long concrete tunnel that disappeared into darkness for at least a hundred feet before making a turn. I lowered the muzzle of my Thompson as we both studied the ceiling of the tunnel. It was made of what looked like railroad ties joined closely together, but not concrete.
“If we could make it look like the tunnel caved in, they probably wouldn’t look any further,” I said.
“Sorry,” Goon said, sniffing the air in the inner tunnel. It smelled of sulfur, damp concrete, and diesel fumes. “We’re fresh outta dynamite.”
“How’s about our C-4 cubes?” Twitch asked from behind us.
Goon looked at me. “Loot, you got one?” he asked. I nodded. I’d never used it to heat rations; I’d always borrowed the remains of someone else’s. But now we had freshly packed utility belts. Four cubes of C-4 might just bring down the tunnel roof. We’d need a detonator, though, and none of us carried one of those. Goon started giving orders.
“Twitch, go get a rifle from back in there and Monster’s C-4. Loot, you go to the front hatch, step outside, get small, and listen.”
It was still dark out there. I could smell the bodies that had been piled up like cordwood. Blood, death excrement, spilled gut contents. If I ever get off this island, I thought, the one thing I’ll never forget will be the hideous smells. There was a small breeze stirring so I moved to take advantage of that and sat down with my back to “my” rock. I parked the Thompson across my knees and waited, suddenly fighting the need for sleep. Then I remembered to check the ammo and chamber status of my typewriter. Finally, I was learning.
Moments later my three compadres joined me. Goon was laying down a piece of wire as he backed out of the outer door, which he left cracked. We repositioned ourselves to where I’d first hidden, and then he tightened the wire. We heard the crack of a rifle shot, followed instantly by a surprisingly powerful high-explosive blast. That in turn was followed by the muted roar of what sounded like an avalanche. We waited for several minutes before going back inside. The anteroom to the main tunnel was unchanged, but the steel hatch leading back into it was bulging outward, its mechanism visibly deformed and probably jammed.
Four little cubes of C-4. I gained a new respect for plastic explosive. Any investigating patrol that came up on the tunnel from the inside would conclude that something big had hit the tunnel anteroom and that there was no point in digging their way through to see what had happened. But at least now we had a “hide.” When the big push started as daylight broke, I could get to work. Monster suggested that we should probably leave once our guys started getting close. Great thinking, Goon responded solemnly.
Back inside, we laid out our comms gear and a makeshift grid table. Monster took the first outside sentry watch. We’d debated what to do with the bodies outside: bury them, leave them, or move them? Goon decided to make it look like they’d been blown out of the cave, in case a patrol passed by. Which meant we were going to have to find some “debris” to strew around the front of the cave. Or, I pointed out, I could call in a dozen or so rounds of five- or eight-inch in the vicinity of the tunnel entrance. All three Marines started shaking their heads. Why not, I asked, with as straight a face as possible. They gave me a collective are-you-shitting-me look. I tried to look surprised and offended at the same time.
A real problem materialized at sunrise, when Regiment told us that the big “offensive” had been delayed twenty-four hours until they could get more men up on The Line. The Meat Grinder had lived up to its name and several units were still badly under-strength. That meant the Japanese would have an entire twenty-four additional hours to come investigate why “our” tunnel had gone quiet. We were not in a position to hold off a company of Japanese infantry who suspected there might be gaijiin in this hole.
“If you call for fire, will they answer?” Twitch asked. “Seein’ that the big push hasn’t kicked off yet?”
“Yes, I think so,” I replied. “A call for fire is a call for fire. That’s why they’re out there and I’m here. But, hell, we could always test that theory.”
I laid out the grid map, which showed where Goon and Twitch thought we were. Then I set up an area-fire mission which extended five hundred yards on both sides of our hidey-hole’s entrance and from the shoreline to about three hundred yards behind and up the slope from where we were hiding. Five-inch, high explosive, time-on-target, but on my command. Then I drew up a second area mission to the south of the first one, to make it look as if the Marines hadn’t made up their minds as to where that fake landing was going to land. Nobody was going to land, of course, but area-fire missions would certainly suggest to the enemy that we might. The new radio worked as advertised, and, an hour after sunrise, the bombardment began. I’d plotted the actual position of our tunnel’s entrance out of the area-fire box, but that didn’t mean a “long” round might not come whistling through the door despite my best efforts.
Monster came rolling smartly through the tunnel entrance once the shells began to land out along the coastal area in front of the cave. If there had been a patrol out there, they’d have been scrambling for cover by now, too. What none of us had anticipated was where they’d be scrambling to—which of course turned out to be “our” tunnel, pursued by the ear-splitting blasts of five-inch shells going off right out front, their fragments clattering against the steel door.
Thank God Monster still had his Thompson. For one surreal moment, Marines and Japanese stared at each other in total amazement, and then the gunfight at the OK Corral erupted inside the cramped confines of the tunnel’s concrete-walled anteroom. Monster and I had gone flat out of pure habit, so most of the ricochets slapped and spanged a few inches over our heads but right back into the faces of the half-dozen Japanese soldiers transfixed by the sudden appearance of Marines in what they thought was sanctuary from the endless shore-bombardment.
“Cease firing,” Goon yelled once he realized that all of them were down. The four of us collectively exhaled while fumbling for our zippers. I could still hear that hornets’ nest humming noise, from rifles and submachine guns firing simultaneously in a space not much bigger than a colonel’s office, even though it was all over. I was amazed to be alive. I think Monster’s initial burst had saved us all.
But not my radios. I stared in horror at my brand-new radio sets, which had been hanging on the wall, and whose batteries were dripping some kind of evil mung onto the concrete floor, courtesy of several prominent bullet holes. Holes that size meant that one of the Thompsons had most likely shot the radios. Our only radios. Super.
By then the area-fire barrage had also finished up outside, so things got really quiet.
“Anybody hurt?” Goon inquired. The rest of us patted ourselves down and reported negative. But then I shared the news. “Hurt, no,” I said, finally. “Hosed, yes. The radios are toast.”
Goon looked at the bleeding radio batteries. His head sank down on his chest. Our moment of misery was rudely interrupted when Twitch leapt up with a frightening shriek and drove his K-bar into the mouth of one of the bodies on the floor. We’d forgotten to make sure that all the dead were, in fact, dead. This one had opened his eyes.
You volunteered, I told myself for the millionth time. Great God Almighty: now what are we going to do?