Dragon of the Mangrooves

by Yasuyuki Kasai

Something clinked in his haversack—it was Hirono’s finger bone in his mess kit. Now, quite unexpectedly, he became the only one who could deliver

  Hirono’s ashes. As matters stood, he could hardly expect to return home alive, but it was still a possibility. Hirono had died a gallant death, for sure. If only Kasuga could make it somehow, Hirono’s remains could be nicely consigned to his ancestors’ tomb, and his family would know how he had died and how stately his last moment had been.

  But then, what could he do for Tomita? He had not so much as a pinkie bone.

  Not even a chip. How could he show his face in front of Tomita’s family, only to tell them that Sarge had been killed and devoured by a crocodile? How in the world could he report such a word with no glory, with no honor, and with no hope at all?

  His sense of life had been very simple for the past month at the front. He was alive if he wasn’t dead. He wouldn’t go to pieces over every single death of a comrade. Nevertheless, he burst into tears. In this stillness of the night, he found himself unable to hold it back.

  Kasuga had no strength to evacuate further inland anymore, so he climbed a nearby tree and passed the night there. Anything was fine, as long as he could stay away from the water. Sitting on a fork and bending his legs, he didn’t even realize when he fell asleep.

  When the first light awoke him at last, he sensed someone approaching.

  The tide had gone out below the tree. He could see many vertical roots protruding from the mud, which had been submerged completely when he climbed the tree. Threading its way through the maze of roots, a group of figures came toward him. They seemed to be locals, because each man wore a scruffy lungi wrapped around him with a muddy shirt. Except for the leader, they all carried bulging rucksacks on their backs. They might be farmers carrying produce.

  But Kasuga was frightened to see one of them holding a submachine gun under his arm. Are they bandits or guerillas? In any case, they’re not decent Burmese. He wanted to hide himself immediately, but the sparse foliage made it easy for them to see him.

  However, the leading man spoke words that Kasuga did not expect. “Hey! Are you one of Nagashima Force?”

  It was clear, unmistakable Japanese.

  “Yes, I am,” answered Kasuga timidly.

  “Is there anybody around you?”

  “I don’t know,” Kasuga replied and stared at the man. He was a man with bright eyes and a Nambu fourteen pistol at his belt. Then he spoke again.

  “Don’t worry. Its okay, Private. Second Lieutenant Sumi is my name. We are the Fifty-Fourth Reconnaissance Regiment under Tsuwamono Corps. We’re here to rescue Nagashima Force!”

  Thus, the long night of Minoru Kasuga came to an end.

  The sun rose from the hazy ridgeline on the distant continent, dyeing the mist over the creek a pale pink. Its rays coming through the interwoven leaves grew brighter, restoring vivid colors to the culvert-like mangroves. Second Lieutenant Yoshihisa Sumi took a deep breath and expected it to be muggy again that day.

  The rescue party had finally arrived at the destination and worked hard to pick up survivors in the first light. At first Sumi found the superior private of the Machine Gun Fifth Platoon, then they spotted strays of the garrison, one after another. Many soldiers had been hiding in the mangroves, as expected.

  The sum eventually swelled to over forty once they found the soldiers who stayed all night in trees. They all belonged to Seventh Company, late for the assembly two nights before. Complete chaos had reigned in the waterfront when those soldiers made the creek at last. Some jumped into the operation only to get strafed and pull back without success. Others were stranded in the maze of mangroves and ran around almost all night like chickens with their heads cut off.

  Many of the survivors were stark naked; they had lost all equipment, including clothes and arms, during the flight. Some literally didn’t even wear fundoshi or other underwear.

  It was no easy business for them to swim across Myinkhon Creek. As soon as they understood that the rescue party had come all the way from Taungup, they all appreciated it, almost to the verge of tears. Without exception, the dust of a month-long combat had taken its toll on those men. Everyone had shaggy hair and stubble. Some even had skin gnawed away by jungle rot. Sumi lost his words upon seeing those men, almost like primitive mankind, with his own eyes.

  “Though they were certainly defeated, who could anticipate that things would be as nasty as this?” Sumi told himself.

  He couldn’t keep the group, now mounting up to nearly fifty men, in the mangrove forever. He considered what move to make next. Their fleet of rescue fishing boats, led by Superior Private Yoshioka, was waiting for their return at Uga. He had already filled half of the quota. The problem was what he should do with the remaining vacant seats. He could go to Hill 604 to keep searching, but almost all men they had picked up were completely exhausted. Some were injured severely enough to need immediate treatment. He didn’t know how to cope with these men during the search.

  Watching his watch tick mercilessly, Sumi made up his mind to close the search immediately and head back to Uga. Care for the injured was the priority.

  He must avoid wandering aimlessly for no more than fifty vacancies.

  With Sumi in the lead, the group started southward.

  The survivors were exhausted, nearly to the limit. But they tagged along single-mindedly, as if draining their last energies. The rescue party brought them new hope that they might be able to escape from the southern part. Some soldiers made stretchers from bamboo poles, their former temporal buoys and the newly cut branches, and bore the injured on them.

  “We’ve been saved. Let’s make it to the continent!”

  “We’ve come through many showers of iron. No way to die in such a damned place.”

  “Come on! You can get treated if only we get to Taungup. Both your wounds and stomachs!”

  Encouraging each other, they struggled to march forward.

  Sumi had already saved face because of the number of soldiers he had rescued.

  More than that, it was safe to say his magnificent result would enable him to report with his head held high. And, he was finally on his way back, at last. The return trip would be much easier. But he didn’t feel lighthearted in the least, and his step got heavy.

  Fearing hostile vessels and crocodiles above all, he wanted to keep as far as possible from the water. But if they got too far away from the water, he tended to lose direction. After all, part of the course was in damp, swampy areas along Myinkhon Creek. Deep mud and protruding roots made marching there very difficult.

  He looked back many times to see if anyone had dropped behind and checked the figures of men who appeared and disappeared among the entangled prop roots. Each of them was covered with mud and dirt and suffered from fatigue, hunger, or wounds. Of course, there were some healthy ones, but most of the men were unsteady on their legs. Their unsettled looks showed open fright. They reminded him of a flock of animals, rather than a military column.

  Among the survivors, there was a set of soldiers who had tried crossing again, only to be pushed back to the island. All belonged to Fifth Company, except for the machine gunner whom Sumi had discovered first. They had barely escaped from the teeth of crocodiles and had managed a hasty retreat. Sumi didn’t have to hear their report to know how gruesome the event the night before had been.

  The obvious reek of blood and flesh had already intensified the putrid smells of this area. He often saw human limbs torn and stranded in the mud when the tide was out. He also found decapitated bodies floating in the creek. These told of the wretchedness those men had experienced more eloquently than any words.

  Sumi was struck dumb at the horrible sights, appearing one after another. He had no choice but to neglect those remains, because their conditions were too terrible to identify, to say nothing of picking them up.

  As the sky lightened, a large number of birds of prey appeared and circled high overhead. It was a company of vu
ltures. Their wings were well over human height when spread wide. They sailed through the sky like gliders. Circling slowly, the flock flew down to treetop level, one after another. White neck ruffs stood out when they folded their wings. A few of them began to shriek raucously, and they started coming closer to the ground.

  Somewhere ahead, it was likely that another Japanese soldier lay dead.

  Lance Corporal Yoshitake raised his voice from behind. “Shit! Damn disgusting animals! I want to kill them all right now.”

  “Vultures or crocodiles?” asked Superior Private Morioka.

  Yoshitake snapped out, “Both!”

  “If you do, you’ll only run out of ammo, however much you may have left,” said Morioka.

  “You idiot! Of course, I know I will. But each guy here sacrificed himself for the homeland, not for these animals. Every Japanese man knows it. They sent these guys out by waving Japanese flags, didn’t they? How miserable it is! I can’t figure out what these guys have done to deserve this,” Yoshitake said, almost snarling.

  Sumi believed he was right. Looking at the vultures, he had also felt great anger welling up inside. It made him shake. Strangely, it was so fierce as to puzzle him at the same time.

  From the outset, they were fighting a tough war. He could accept death by any bullet. No doubt, it was a death in battle. He could call it even glorious, so long as a warrior met his end in a battle. He could accept death from disease: malaria, dengue fever, amebic dysentery, or jungle rot. Almost all were nearly unavoidable. They had trodden on this tropical land of miasma with full aware-ness of these from the outset. Hygiene was bad, and medicine was poor. What they could do was limited in this situation. It was the grim reality here.

  These men, lying in wait to be picked at by vultures, had fallen prey to crocodiles. What kind of death is that? Man is the lord of creation; he was taught so.

  They were said to be the subjects of the indestructible land of gods. Each is a dear son, a sweet lover, or a breadwinning father back in the homeland. And yet, they met their ends in the teeth of those scaly reptiles, and will be pecked by the company of birds of prey. Sumi had no idea how he could accept it.

  And he probably wasn’t the only one. None of the victims had probably ever dreamed he would meet his end that way. They all died without the least bit of time to consider or accept this fate.

  If people plunge into the creek where ferocious carnivores are roaming around in groups, such a result is almost inevitable. Why did nobody realize it? What the hell was HQ thinking?

  After all, it ordered that reckless operation without the slightest research on crocodiles. It wasn’t only crocodiles; the same with mangroves, Burmese culture, and climate. Had anything been well researched in advance? They had scorned British-Indian forces as no more than humble colony guards. That underestimate

  invited this hard reality. In the end, they found themselves driven into a place almost outside the human world—and devoured by crocodiles.

  There exist many hells never foreseeable for the haughty brass under camp curtains. This time, once again, the lives of the rank and file were simply thrown into one of the hells.

  “Why do we repeat such absurdities over and over?” Sumi asked himself.

  Sumi didn’t know where he should direct the brunt of his anger. Should it be at the regiment commander, the division commander, or the Imperial HQ? He didn’t even have the foggiest idea who was the most responsible.

  The water washing his feet drained into Myinkhon Creek. And Myinkhon

  Creek drained into the Bay of Bengal. And the Bay of Bengal opened into vast-nesses of the Indian Ocean. Then the water changed into rain and came down at his feet again. Reminded of such an endless chain, Sumi became further confused. But he understood one thing for certain.

  Crocodiles were said to be the vassals of Sebek, the ancient deity. Egyptian civilization was out of his field of specialty. Sebek, the crocodile-headed deity, hadn’t rung a bell.

  But now he understood it clearly. To be thrown into a group of crocodiles was war itself. Sebek came and went freely between this world and the next, and governed the night and the darkness. And that’s not all. It also governed wars that engulf humanity. Sebek was the god of war.

  A determination struck him, and Sumi called Sergeant Shimizu. “Come on over, Sarge.”

  Shimizu exited the elongated column behind Sumi, looking uncertain about this sudden call. Sumi handed the worn-out map to him and said, “With this, you can guide the troop to Uga, can’t you?”

  “What do you mean?” Shimizu asked back.

  “You can make it unobserved if you go along the foothills. We don’t look like soldiers anymore. Even if enemies spot you, they can’t see through your disguise very easily. And you can even fight if push comes to shove. Mediocre enemies can’t beat your men to a pulp as long as you command.”

  “I don’t understand what you mean.”

  “Now I leave this rescue party to your command. Let the fleet leave port as soon as you arrive at Uga. Don’t worry about what happens after you leave here.

  Make Taungup, no matter what. You can do it!” Sumi said and saw Shimizu become dumbfounded.

  “What do you mean I can do it? What the hell are you talking about? What will you do?” Shimizu asked.

  “I will remain here to keep rescuing. First of all, I will go to Hill 604 to search for strays there,” answered Sumi.

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What will you do for boats then, if you can find any?”

  “You saw all those local fishing boats in Uga, didn’t you? I’ll requisition those.

  Or I’ll let guys make rafts, even if I can’t. These men are too few for me, in any case. I’m the head of this rescue troop. It doesn’t make sense for me to leave without saving more.”

  “It’s you who doesn’t make sense.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  “No, I’m not. Don’t you see that it’s a drop in a bucket?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Why are you saying this out of the blue?”

  “Because many soldiers are probably still hiding in the mountains. I’ll ferret them out, wherever they are, and take them to the continent.”

  “All right, I will remain with you. No way I’m going to leave you alone.”

  “No! Don’t do that. Some of these men will surely die unless they get to a hospital, you know? I’m asking you to take them back with you first.”

  “Then you’d better come with us all. How much do you think you can do alone here?” said Shimizu, looking bewildered. He seemed unable to gauge this sudden change in his ever-cowardly commander.

  “Murakami was shot and killed,” continued Sumi.

  “I know that.”

  “Guys here were killed and eaten by crocs!”

  “Then what?”

  Their exchange of sharp words had tensed up members of the rescue party behind the two. It wasn’t unusual for them to hear arguments between their platoon commander and squad leader. But they had never witnessed a grave one like this.

  “Many guys hiding in the mountains haven’t been shot by Engli and haven’t been injured by crocs.”

  “Are you going to try to save all of them? You’ll never finish it.”

  “Take the guys we picked up back to the continent. I’m just going to pick up as many more as possible. It’s a general plan. Somebody has to remain here to do this. I’m the commander, and I have information given by the infantry regiment. There is no end unless I go myself.”

  “No, I oppose it. You’ll never finish it. What you have to do is go back to Taungup without making a fuss. We’ve done our duty.” Now even Shimizu, the active and bold veteran, wanted to leave. It was rare, but natural. Slowly Sumi opened his mouth, staring at Shimizu, whose usual vitality had gotten lost somewhere.

  “Enough of your nagging. Do you disobey my order here once again? Huh?”

  Shimizu glared back at him,
but the hostile exchange soon ended. Shimizu withdrew first. He might have read the firm resolution of his commander, and his reply carried some mildness. “All right, Lieutenant. But I feel still uneasy about leaving you alone. You should take Takahashi, your batman, with you, though it’s no use saying it now. Hey, Pondgi! Come here right now!”

  Pondgi stepped forward, smiling.

  Shimizu said to him, “Take care of the lieutenant from now on. Have you got it, Pondgi?”

  “Yes, Master Shimizu.”

  Just behind Pondgi, Yoshitake stuck his head out and presented his Sten gun to Sumi. “Please, carry this if you go, Lieutenant. It’s the best I can do.”

  “What will you do for your weapon? No way I’m going to leave our best crack shot unarmed,” Sumi said.

  “Don’t worry about that. I’ve found a guy with a model ninety-six light machine gun among those battered infantrymen chased into the trees. I’m going to borrow it from him.”

  Yoshitake was good at shooting a light machine gun, as well. His sturdy body enabled him to fire it from the hip. Assured of that, Sumi slung the Sten gun over his shoulder. Then he thrust the magazines into his haversack. The gun was far more dependable than his pistol.

  “Thanks, Yoshitake. I will never use this lightly,” Sumi said. Then he drew a deep breath and stared at the faces of the soldiers standing in front of him, one by one. Though it had been a short time, he knew he had shared in troubles with all these men staring back at him.

  “Well done, everybody! Now you are to go back to Taungup as instructed by Sergeant Shimizu. Be sure to take care of the injured.”

  No one said anything. They had heard the argument, so each face portrayed a mixture of loneliness and uneasiness. Sumi couldn’t tell whether their concern was limited to their own fates, or if it gratefully included their commander. But he was satisfied enough. He thought they’d better worry only for their own safe return. Pondgi stood beside him with his rifle over his shoulder. Apparently this man was heading for the mountains immediately. Sumi was about to take a step toward the continuing adventure of his own.

  Suddenly Shimizu ordered the troop to fall in. He probably realized he would never see Sumi again; this time, his expression was warm for the first time. “To Second Lieutenant Yoshihisa Sumi, our Second Platoon commander of Tankette Fifth Company, salute!”