8.(28-32) End of Paradise

Slim Novel 8 - http://adventuresofkimi.blogspot.com - See Homepage


28. Return from Paradise

I sit on veranda beside my darling woman and sip her expertly done margarita, a tequila plus orange liqueur and lime cocktail in a salted edge goblet. It has, according to my 1940 interview with Aldous Huxley, the mind drug mescaline.

   Now I spot a lone motorcyclist barreling between beach and water toward us. Only one man I know is that reckless and feckless - the Fuji. In minutes seven and eight he is at our gate.
   “Well, Kimura, I assume you enjoyed your Rest and Recreation.” He gives body language to the geisha who hurries inside to prepare another ‘rita.

   “Your geisha, Kakkoh, was my personal comforter in Singapore and I brought her here to enjoy South of `Pago-Pago. She is a Kyoto beauty I spotted when a fifteen year old maiko apprentice. Her specialty is back-hole fuck. Guess you figured that out by now.”

   Fuji has no delicacy I have come to love my little comforter and hate to hear her talents bandied about vulgarly. She returns with the marg’, he gulps it, and she runs for more.

   He tells latest plan. Hyakutake is taking the Americans more seriously and for October he is committing a division of combat troops from the Philippines plus tanks and air support. Nominally, Maruyama will be in command but lacking combat experience he relies on Fuji.

   Postscript to the September slaughter, I have been cited for a purple chrysanthemum with bamboo cluster. Fuji has credited me with wiping out 2 Marine machine-gun nests and killing 5 Monkees. My Geisha looks on with new respect as he recounts my exploits. Damn his mouth! It means an end to this too transient paradise and return to that hellhole where I shall be expected to repeat Ye Olde Heroics.

29. Decadent Democrazy USA

Dark midnight at sea with last contingent of Hyakutake’s troop reinforcements, which for 2 weeks have been slipped (and shipped) down the Slot at night by ‘Rat Express’ and ‘Ant Freight’ as the troop-carrying destroyer runs and motorboat forays are called. Below deck in dimly lit quarters trying to stand stiffly at attention beside Fuji despite the pitching floor, I listen to General Maruyama speak from dais. 

  “This will be the decisive battle between Imperial Japan and decadent democrazy USA and it shall decide the future of our empire. If we do not succeed, no one here should expect to return alive and if we are defeated, your fathers, grandfathers and uncles will be killed and your mothers, wives and sisters will become Monkee sex slaves. So we must have victory and to get it each of you must be willing to die for the Emperor.”
   Short pause follows. Then the mechanical cuckoos in clocks all bow in direction of the Palace shouting “Banzai! Banzai! Banzai!”

Pitch black night, no stars or moon. Maruyama, Fuji and I set out from destroyer in launch. A young seaman steers us into the estuary using new-fangled ultrasonic ray. We pull alongside makeshift dock. Fujii and I debark first then help the formally uniformed general over the side. Ragged soldiers meet and conduct us to an unkempt General Kawaguchi, uniform torn, Kaiser mustaches drooping & whitened, and eyes bloodshot & abnormally bright from malaria. Deeply pessimistic he opines that the best troops of the Imperial Army are caught in quicksand. Maruyama is grimly silent.  Fuji counters that our recent reinforcements give a numerical superiority, that evacuation would be a propaganda disaster and that the decision to fight and die on Guada is a made-in-Tokyo affair and hence irrevocable.

30. War Lovers of the World Unite

In days following, I accompany Fuji on launch up and down the north coast between the Matanikau River and Cape Esperance, where fresh troops are being landed. At the Cape we see tanks and field artillery fresh from factory. There, Maruyama sets up headquarters.

   Details of Fuji’s tactical plan – I call it October Orgy – are first we soften up the Marines by small skirmishes in jungle. Meanwhile, hopefully with surprise, Maruyama will lead his division from the Cape to Henderson Field perimeter along a newly hacked route I call the Maruyama Road.

 

21 October 8 PM is Zero Hour and here is plan: Fujii (With me, dammit!) will lead frontal banzai attack on the Marines at south edge of Henderson Field while brigade of commandos led by Colonel Sumiyoshi will cross the Matanikau and puncture the Marine west flank. Next day it is expected the Marines will raise the white flag signaling surrender. Fuji has designated it Y day. Why a Y?  Only the Marx Bros know.

   During the days of preparation I hold interviews with troopers. One exclaims: “Where is the mighty promised power of the Emperor’s Navy? The enemy’s strength increases monthly while our forces continually diminish! How long can this be going on? When I think of it tears come!”

   Guada is where dreams die, where our propaganda becomes undone and where our men finally face the reality of how idiotic this war is! Yes, I too wonder: How long can this keep going on? Only cynics like Fuji thrive and survive.

   War lovers of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but brains!

31. World Champions

The Americans are landing west of the Matanikau so Fujii follows the river, planning an ambush. Thus I am crouched in underbrush by the road the Americans will be along momentarily. Our snipers are positioned behind bush and rock, and in thickly leaved palm tree sighting down telescope rifles. Two camouflaged artillery pieces are on hill overlooking the turn in road. The air is already steamy from hot sun working on jungle moisture. The Monkees now come into view laughing loudly, smoking cigarettes, and one of them carries a portable radio brassily sounding out in the jungle and frightening the real monkeys.

   Fuji gives bird call to sniper who opens up on the Americans then our infantry springs out of bush and finishes off the demoralized dying-dead Yankees with close rifle fire, bayonets and machetes while I remain in rear recording Fuji’s fighting in movie camera.

   “Did you get me beheading that last son of a bitch?” He stoops over the bloody body pulling up the still twitching arm of an American whose upper spinal cord he has just severed with samurai-sword. “No wonder it was so easy. This is no goddamn Marine it’s a dumb army draftee, U.S. Army 5^th Cavalry Division.”

   Thinking "Cavalry?" I ask, “Where are the horses?”

   Fuji gives his ‘What can you expect from a dumb intellectual?’ scowl: “No horses anymore, ninny, it's just a historical title!”

   The portable radio fallen from the American lies next to a mangled corpse and blaring out, of all things, American baseball. Being a baseball fan I understand the excited radio description. World Series, last game, the New York Yankees are up at bat, bottom of the 9^th inning in the Yankee Stadium, trailing the St. Louis Cardinals 2 to 3. At bat is Snuffy Stirnweiss, the Yankee 2^nd baseman, with 2 out and runners on 2^nd base and 3^rd base, representing the tying and winning run.     The count on Snuffy is 3 balls, 2 strikes and the Cardinal's pitcher, Mort Cooper, takes the signal from his brother, the catcher, Walker Cooper, then winds up and throws his fast ball, and Snuffy swings and misses and the umpire shouts “Strike 3, yer out!” and St. Louis is the 1942 World’s Champion.

   Fuji asks what the radio is saying and when I tell him the the Cardinals have  just beaten the Yankees he turns to a soldier who is busy looting the bodies and knocking gold from the teeth with rifle butt and tells him we are the champs. The soldier does not seem interested.

32. Surprise Tourist

Next day, surprise tourist! In the evening, Fuji calls me in sotto shout, “VIP!”, and I join him, Generals Maruyama and Kawaguchi are in full uniform with medals, and the troops line up at attention with local band playing the National Anthem; then, silence as the launch nears the beach and we watch 2 aides assist a bulky man, in Imperial Army general's uniform, over the side and guide him in the shallow surf as flashbulbs pop. For a second I have a vision of General MacArthur carrying out his pledge I shall return! but blink of eye shows it is merely Hyakutake. We stand attention as he reads prepared speech.

   “We shall chase the America from the Solomons. Until now we have allowed its insolent presence to nibble like rat at cheese. Now, trap closes and the Imperial Army will smash the enemy; after that Port Moresby and then Sydney Australia and, after, 10,000 years peace and progress under Co-Prosperity Sphere.”

   We shout rousing Banzais! He tells us he will remain at Cape Esperance while General Maruyama leads the force that secures Henderson Field and afterward he, Hyakutake, will accept the surrender of the Marine General.
   To read on, click 8.(33-38) Final Battle - End Slim Novel 8