The lieutenant looked around at his team. For days now, Patrol Easy had been working in coordination with the guerrilla snipers that Father Francisco had brought them. Shortly after bringing them the sniper recruits, the priest had moved on to other corners of the city where his faith and organizational skills were needed. Father Francisco held no rank, but among the guerrillas he was as good as a general.
“I don’t know where he found these people,” Honcho said, referring to the Filipino sharpshooters. “But I’ll take another bunch just like them.”
After giving the new recruits a crash course in sniper warfare, Honcho grouped his troops into twos or threes, trying to pair at least one of the Filipinos with the more experienced Americans. More often than not, Deke had found himself paired with Juana. That was just fine by him. She was an excellent shot, she didn’t say much, and he had to admit that she was easy on the eyes.
Deke wasn’t easily distracted; when it came to fighting, he was like a tractor with a stuck gear. He had one speed and one purpose only, ignoring everything else. But when he looked into Juana’s soft brown eyes, it was as if he were transported by thoughts of mountain spring mornings, the smell of fresh-baked pies, the music of cool running streams, and something that he longed for but could not identify. He felt a similar warmth in Juana’s gaze, like heat off a cast-iron griddle, shimmering in the morning light. Though pleasant, he hoped the distraction didn’t get them both killed.
The Filipino snipers had shown themselves to be quick learners when it came to hunting the enemy. Also, they seemed motivated by revenge in a way that was hard for the average GI to grasp, because it was the Japanese who had occupied their country, after all. The enemy had ruined their fields, taken over their homes, stolen their freedoms. Simply put, they hated the Japanese with every fiber of their being.
So far, just one of the Filipinos had been killed when he had tried to run between buildings and had been picked off by a Japanese marksman. Since then, his countrymen — and women — had paid back the Japanese many times over.
The battle for the stadium promised to be a difficult fight, but the Japanese there had to be eliminated. The stadium could not be left as an enemy stronghold while the American advance encircled it.
“Deke, I want you and Juana to get to third base,” Honcho said. “See if you can find some cover in those weeds and start picking off the Japs in the stands on that side of the stadium.”
Philly laughed. “That’s a good one, Honcho!”
“What’s so damn funny?”
“I’m not sure that Deke has ever gotten to third base before.”
Honcho did not appear amused. “You’re a regular comedian, aren’t you, Philly? Just for that, you can take the outfield. There are enough bushes growing out there to give you some cover.”
Nobody but Philly seemed to have much of a sense of humor considering that they were about to face at least a hundred dug-in Japs. Deke glanced at Juana, who made no sign of having picked up on Philly’s joke about third base. He wasn’t about to explain.
Besides, he and Juana had barely exchanged more than a few words during the last few days. In the field, they had made do with hand gestures and nods. It was the only communication they needed, and they had made a good team. After that Japanese sniper had taken out one of the Filipinos, Juana had rigged a helmet on a stick to draw the Jap’s fire, enabling Deke to spot his hiding place and put a nice fat chunk of lead into him.
There wasn’t time for much conversation when you were busy fighting and trying to stay alive. Deke wondered if he even wanted to get to know Juana any better. In his experience, combat situations could lead to a very short life expectancy. Maybe it was better not to get attached, but it was getting so that he trusted Juana almost as much as Philly, Yoshio, or anybody else from Patrol Easy.
He pushed any stray thoughts from his mind to focus on the task at hand, which involved shooting the enemy without getting shot himself.
Deke scrambled forward, crawling on all fours. Juana moved behind him, a little off to his left. Somewhere off to his right, he reckoned Philly would be moving into position. A couple of days ago, it might have felt strange being teamed up with Juana instead of Philly. But they seemed able to read each other’s minds. She was a natural and a much better shot than Philly.
Deke was developing a theory that women made better snipers, in the same way that female cats were better at catching mice than tomcats. Everybody back home knew that if you had a barn overrun by mice, the thing to do was to get yourself a mama cat and put her in there. Then again, Deke mused, you didn’t want to mess with a mean tomcat.
Thankfully, the machine guns that they knew to be in the dugouts did not open fire, perhaps not wanting to waste ammo on the sparse targets presented by Patrol Easy. Instead, they were going to let the Japanese snipers in the stands pick them off.
The weeds were tall enough to reach above him, but he worried that the snipers in the stands had a good view of anything moving on the infield. The crack of a rifle and the snap of a bullet overhead verified his concerns. He pressed himself lower to the ground and moved more slowly to create less of a disturbance in the sea of weeds. Another bullet whined overhead, and Deke wished that he could burrow like a box turtle into the infield.
After a few minutes of crawling, he reached the vicinity of third base. Fortunately, there was more than brush to provide cover out here. The wing of a downed plane lay in the weeds, having been there long enough that a few vines crept over it. He could see a chunk of the fuselage in the outfield, which might give Philly some cover. Deke couldn’t tell if the plane was Japanese or American, and he didn’t much care. In addition to providing decent cover, the broken wing also made a good bench rest.
Juana joined him, and they both rested their rifles on the metal skin of the plane’s wing, searching for targets in the stands. Deke had the advantage of having a telescopic sight on his Springfield, although Juana had proved herself more than capable with the iron sights on the Arisaka rifle.
Through the scope, the details of the stands sprang closer. A long, deep overhang protected the stands from the elements, but in this case it created shadows that hid the enemy. The baseball stadium had mostly been constructed out of concrete, which is what made it an appealing defensive position for the enemy. The stands themselves were mainly filled with plain wooden benches, draped with patches of weeds and ivy that had grown up during the wartime years of disuse. A small Japanese soldier could worm himself under a bench while having a commanding view of the baseball field. The entire baseball field spread below him, like a shooting gallery. With a rifle in his hands, that commanding view made that soldier a very effective sniper.
The challenge was finding him. Or them. There had to be several Japanese hidden away. Maybe even dozens of them. Deke wondered, Where the hell are these Nips?
Finally, one of the Japanese got trigger happy and fired. Deke spotted his muzzle flash.
“Got him,” he whispered to Juana.
He squeezed the trigger and saw the figure of the enemy sniper go limp.
One of the Jap snipers got the bright idea to shoot back and received a bullet from Juana for his trouble.
Beside him, he heard the slip-snick of Juana working the bolt of her rifle. The sound brought a grin to his lips.