Sole Survivor

by Derek Hansen

  ‘Speedo! Speedo! Nogoodenah! Nogoodenah!’ The Lieutenant’s voice could barely be heard above the incessant drumming of the monsoon rains on the jungle canopy, but the thin, ragged, bone-weary battalion had no difficulty hearing the whack of his bamboo rod as it connected with some poor sod’s back. They knew the feeling well, the explosion of pain, the bruising, the angry welts, had lived with it day in, day out for what seemed like eternity. They heard the victim cry out. Expected him to cry out. Bravery was wasted; it only infuriated their captors and invited more punishment.

  Red did his best to keep up with Archie, to support his end of the banga, the bamboo litter they used to haul rocks and soil up to the rail line, but he could feel his body giving in. It always gave in no matter how many times he climbed the hill, no matter how hard he dug his bleeding toes into the mud, no matter how hard he tried to keep his feet moving. His body always gave in, always failed him. And he always failed Archie.

  ‘Hang on, Red, hang on. You can do it. Nearly there. Nearly there.’ Archie soaked, exhausted. Eyes haunted and desperate. But mouth still smiling. Archie smiling and encouraging. Don’t give in. Don’t give in. And Red didn’t give in, refused to give in, willed his legs to keep moving, but it wasn’t enough. Three feet from the lip of the embankment his bowels emptied, his legs buckled and he fell. The banga poles slipped from his shoulders, spilling its precious load. Archie grabbing his arm, trying to drag him up but no longer having the strength. Someone screaming at them, the Jap Lieutenant, the BBA – the Big Bash Artist – bigger than his fellows and named for his brutality. Archie pleading. ‘Get up! Get up, for Chrissake!’ And he did try. He tried with everything he had, digging his fingers into the mud, trying to claw his way up on hands and knees, shitting and slipping and crying. Crying in helplessness and frustration because his malnourished body no longer obeyed. Crying because he was letting his mate down. Saying sorry. ‘Sorry, mate, sorry.’ Over and over. So sorry. Then the bamboo crashing down on his head and his back. A rain of blows, skin rupturing, blood flowing and the Big Bash Artist screaming abuse. Then lying, dying, crying while Archie pleaded, while Archie pleaded for his life and bore his punishment.

  ‘Daijobu desu ka?’ Archie asking if it was all right for other prisoners to help him up and refill the banga. Archie placating. ‘Daijobu desu ka?’ The BBA agreeing and clubbing them as they did so. And Red’s mates dragging him, empty and floppy, light and lifeless like a sugar sack of ping-pong balls, up onto the embankment, holding him up as they refilled the banga and put the poles under his arms instead of over his shoulders, taking his load and dragging him, staggering, along the embankment. Mates. Heroes. Everyday heroes. Ignoring the BBA’s screams and the blows from his bamboo. Helping a mate who needed help, and all he had to do was hold on. Hold on! And he tried desperately to hold on, as he always tried. Trying to hold on. Trying to change history. But it didn’t matter how hard he tried. It didn’t matter. He was doomed.

  ‘Speedo! Speedo! Nogoodenah.’ Not good enough. Not good enough. An accusation. An indictment. And perhaps even his epitaph.

  Allied ships had command of the sea and allied planes command of the air. The Japanese needed their railway. They needed it finished and they were behind target. A speedo was on all along the railway, but especially from the One-oh-five, through Three Pagodas Pass, Songkurai, and down into Thailand. The One-oh-five was behind target, Archie and Red were behind quota and the Lieutenant was looking to make an example. All Red had to do was hang on and they’d make it up. Hang on. Stay on his feet. Rest. Get back his strength. They’d make it up. Hang on. Hang on! But he fainted, collapsed his banga and took another two with him when he fell. He came around when a Japanese boot thudded into his ribs, when a bamboo stave split around his head. The BBA was screaming. Calling to the little man with the long rifle, kicking, beating, shouting, ordering the guard to shoot him.

  For the millionth time Red saw the barrel rise and point towards him. For the millionth time he reached out to Archie, to his mate, to say goodbye, to say thanks, to hold his hand as the bullet split his skull and ended his war, to hold his hand so he wouldn’t die alone. Red reaching, reaching, knowing his time had come and accepting it. The BBA turning his back on them and heading down the embankment. And the little man with the long rifle, Private Akihiro Ohira, pivoting suddenly. Shooting Archie instead.

  ‘Namu-saku,’ he said and laughed. Namesake. Pointing first to Red then to himself. Red too stunned to speak, Red stricken with horror. ‘You, Ohira! Me, Ohira! Namu-saku.’ A word Red had taught him to say. A little joke with a simple man who was also their captor but not always cruel. And Ohira had laughed again. Best of friends in a matter of life and death. The example was made. It really didn’t matter who died.

  Red shot bolt upright, lathered in sweat. There was banging. Someone was calling his name, calling his name. That wasn’t how it happened! That wasn’t how it happened! Stunned men blaming him and not blaming him, fighting to come to terms with their loss. Not Archie! It wasn’t possible! Archie was the strong one. Archie was the one they relied on. But they were shouting his name. Someone was shouting his name. And Archie was barking. He dragged himself off his bed, locked in a twilight between dreams and reality, and staggered to his door.

  ‘They’re back, man. Same place. Off Arid.’

  Red opened the screen door, not comprehending.

  ‘Good grief, man, are you all right?’ Angus held his torch up to Red’s face. Saw the sweat and tears and abject despair.

  Red turned away from the light, stumbled back into the room and slumped into a chair.

  ‘You’re not well, man. I’ll make you a cup of tea.’ Angus flashed his torch around the room knowing the generator would be off, looking for a gas lamp, or at least some candles. He found the lamp where he expected it to be, in the middle of the table, and lit the wick. The flickering white light did nothing to improve Red’s appearance. Angus had no wish to intrude upon Red’s domain, held it as sacrosanct as his own, but the madman was in trouble. The policeman in him came to the fore. ‘Dear God, man, will you not tell me what’s happened?’

  ‘Nothing, Angus. A bad dream.’

  Angus was unconvinced. The man looked like he’d seen a ghost. ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’

  Red needed his ch’i kung, to ease into the exercises that could calm him and help him gather his wits, but was loath to begin with the Scot looking on. He sat upright and began to concentrate on drawing in long, thin breaths deep down past his diaphragm to the core of his stomach, to the sea of ch’i. He concentrated hard to centre his mind and stop his thoughts racing away down treacherous paths. He exhaled long and slowly, with barely enough force to cause a candle flame to flicker.

  ‘Here’s your tea. Drink up. It’ll do no harm to allow the Japs their mischief this one night. Mickey can’t expect us to chase them away twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.’

  ‘I’m going after them.’

  ‘You’ll do no such thing! You’re in no fit state. I’ll not allow it!’

  Red sighed. The nightmares always drained him, robbed him of his strength and will, leaving him feeling empty and barely able to muster the energy to think. But he could work through his exhaustion, and the fact was that there was work to do. ‘I’ll be fine. I’ll finish the tea and get ready.’

  ‘Don’t be a bloody fool, man. I’ll not let you go and that’s all there is to it. I’m not leaving here until you’re back tucked up in bed.’

  Bed, the playground of his nightmares, that was the last place Red wanted to be. ‘Just keep an eye out for me, Angus. Come looking if I’m not back by eight.’

  ‘Aye . . . aye . . .’ Angus acquiesced. ‘I guessed there’d be no stopping you. I let you sleep as long as I could. They’re well out to sea now.’ He paused and looked searchingly at Red. ‘They’re not worth it, man. No matter what they did to you, they’re not worth it.’

  Red smiled grimly. ‘I heard a story in Burma. A Jap soldier got ca
ught in a current while he was crossing a river. He had all his gear on and couldn’t swim. One of the Aussies, a bloke from Melbourne, dived in and rescued him. You know what? The Jap officers came by and formally thanked him. They gave him a reward, some coins in the local currency. When the soldier tallied it all up it amounted to less than an Aussie sixpence. Of course his mates blew up over their meanness, but the soldier just laughed it off. “Sixpence is fair enough,” he said. “That’s all the little bastard was worth.”’

  Angus laughed. ‘Fair point. I’d not give you sixpenn’th for the whole lot of them. But there’s my point. Does it really matter if we let them get away with it for just one night? What can one boat do?’

  ‘It matters, Angus. They have to learn that they can’t fish here. Ever. They can’t take our fish and kill our seabirds whenever they please. We have to be as vigilant as they are ruthless.’

  ‘Aye, well, you’re your own man.’

  ‘Angus, could you do me a favour?’

  The old Scot was immediately on guard. ‘Depends.’

  ‘Could you lend me your rifle?’

  ‘My rifle! Now what in God’s name do you want that for?’ His instinct was to refuse, but he saw an opportunity. It wouldn’t do any harm to have Red in his debt, not if he turned out to be the father. It might make him more conducive to persuasion.

  ‘Think of it as a sleeping pill, Angus. If I put a few shots over their heads they’ll stop coming in at night. That way I’ll get some sleep.’

  ‘Don’t you go starting a shooting war, now. The rifle is licensed to me. I don’t want to be answering questions about dead Japanese fishermen.’

  ‘You’ll let me have it?’

  ‘Aye. The policeman in me says it’s wrong, but if you think it’ll help I can’t refuse you.’

  ‘Good man. Give me a moment and I’ll walk down with you. I’ll just get some warm clothes.’

  ‘Aye,’ said Angus distastefully. ‘Any clothes would be an improvement.’

  The crew of the Shoto Maru’s lifeboat searched for a shape blacker than its surroundings, a land mass which would tell them where they were. Reluctantly, the helmsman turned on his powerful spotlight and scanned left and right. The beam picked up the surf pounding in on Arid Island. He knew he should kill the light then and there, but he held it steady while he estimated both position and distance. Their task was perilous enough without making it any harder. Satisfied at last, he turned the light off and carefully motored in to shore.

  Red scanned the sea for a sign of a light and found none. He was mystified. He and Angus had clearly seen a spotlight, which meant that the tuna boat was laying new lines. If so, where was it? Archie stood with his front feet propped up on the foredeck peering intently into the night. Overhead, through a break in the clouds, stars twinkled steely bright, and way behind him Red could see the faint glow from the lamp Angus had left burning by his window to give him a reference point. The light helped, but Red could have managed without it. He knew the water well, knew exactly how close he could go in to Arid Island and where every reef and outcrop was. He ran up close to its northern shore, waiting until the island’s bulk began to block out the stars hanging low in the southern sky and he could pick the faint halo of surf, then turned and followed the contours of the headland until the stars reappeared. Once clear of the island he began to zigzag out to sea in search of the longlines.

  His intention was to use the lines to lead him to the tuna boat. Either the crew had hooded their lights or were working so far out to sea that they were no longer visible. But how had they managed to lay lines so quickly? He completed his third port tack and made another right angle turn to starboard. He couldn’t understand why he hadn’t run across any longlines. Perhaps they’d done the right thing and weighted them down to keep them below the surface out of reach of birds. He decided to risk using his torch. He flashed it towards Arid, but the island was already beyond the torch’s range. He was tempted to turn back and search for the marker buoy but was reluctant to give up his pursuit. He wanted to find the tuna boat so he could send a few rounds from Angus’ Lee Enfield whistling around the crew’s ears. Whistling and whispering an urgent message. Go away! Don’t come back! He knew that he’d find the lines as soon as the dawn sky began to lighten, but by then he’d probably be too late to prevent some birds from hooking up. At least the weighted lines would prevent a wholesale massacre. So he continued to criss-cross, hoping to spot the buoy that marked the tail of the first longline or, better still, the head of the second. He still hoped it would lead him to the Japs. Up forward, Archie had lost interest. His eyes and ears told him there was nothing to see. He’d grown tired of waiting for Red to realise the obvious.

  Around the five mile mark Red was prepared to concede defeat. Maybe the light they’d seen had come from a local boat, not the tuna boat. Maybe the Japanese had worked north-east and not due east. He decided to head back to Arid Island and spend the rest of the night at anchor in the shelter of Homestead Cove. Arid Island, despite its name, had a lush green cover, a fresh-water dam, cows and sheep, and even an airstrip. And it was a hospitable home to the family that farmed it. But, instead of heading straight for the cove, Red repeated his zig-zag search pattern, using his torch intermittently but more frequently. He’d covered just on two miles when Archie shot to his feet and barked. Instinctively Red switched off his torch.

  ‘What is it, Archie?’

  The dog wasn’t propped up on the foredeck but had his front paws on the gunwale, staring due south. Red heard him growl, low and in warning. But in warning of what? If Archie had spotted a buoy why would he growl? No, there had to be someone or something out there. He peered hard into the blackness, but the torch had taken the edge off his night vision. Perhaps Archie had heard a whale blow or a pod of porpoises, but he’d heard them plenty of times before and knew better than to growl. Perhaps they’d attracted a shark. Red stared intently at Archie, trying to judge the angle of his head so he could work out what his mate was looking at. Archie wasn’t looking at the water but across the water. Red felt his blood run cold. Perhaps the Japs were playing his game. Perhaps they’d cut their lights and were stalking him while he stalked them. Perhaps they were angry about the loss of their lines and wanted revenge. Archie barked again. And again. Insistently.

  ‘What is it, Archie? What is it?’

  The dog ignored him. He kept staring south and his gaze never wavered. Red pulled the throttle back and slipped the gear shift into neutral. ‘Hush, Archie!’ The dog reluctantly obeyed. Red cupped his ears and faced due south. If he couldn’t see what was out there, perhaps he could hear it. But the wind was pushing whatever sound there was away from him. He stared into the darkness. At last he saw movement. A star disappeared and then another. And another. He watched as stars were swallowed up into blackness, one by one. Something large, a ship, was headed directly towards them. He looked for a flickering bow wave to give him some indication of speed, saw none and surmised that the ship – or whatever it was – was travelling at low speed. At trawl speed! An unlit boat close in at trawl speed! In a flash Red knew exactly what he was looking at. He pointed his torch directly at the trawler and began to wave it. He couldn’t stop them but thought he might be able to divert them, and having turned them, escort them out to sea. They wouldn’t know who he was. They couldn’t be sure he wasn’t the Navy or a fisheries boat. Natural caution would force them to turn out to sea. He waved the torch back and forth as vigorously as he could.

  The blip Shimojo had observed on their radar screen had at last revealed itself by a waving light. Clearly it wasn’t another of the Lieutenant Commander’s traps, nor did it flash the signal that would indicate that it was his lifeboat. Beneath him his net recorders reported a dense stream of fish flowing into the net. He instructed the helmsman to hold course and sent a man forward with a torch to investigate.

  Red watched the dark, forbidding shape closing in on him. It gave no indication of turning, no indicatio
n of even having seen him. But he knew that was impossible. He saw a light appear on the bow. Someone was shining a powerful torch at him. He turned his off instantly and reached for his rifle. Soon the bow would hide the bridge. He didn’t have much time. He sighted along the barrel as best he could, aiming for the top third of the superstructure as near to the middle as he could judge, and squeezed the trigger. The sudden explosion was deafening and the kick monstrous. Without doubt his shot had gone wide. He reloaded, sighted and fired again, this time with the butt braced securely against his shoulder. Better. He reloaded and fired again. And again. The light had disappeared from the bow after his first shot, but still the trawler held its course. In fury he reloaded and fired, reloaded and fired, reloaded and fired. The noise, the tension! So like the executions of the would-be escapees at Thanbyuzayat. Brave soldiers shot for doing their duty, refusing blindfolds and hurling abuse at their executioners with their last breath. Good men. Young men. Mates. The rest of them had been forced to look on helplessly, to observe and absorb the lesson. To watch their battered and humiliated comrades gunned down. Red began to shake and lose concentration. He forced himself to lower the rifle, fought for control. When he steadied and looked back up at the trawler he immediately saw the danger his lapse had put him in. The bridge was completely lost behind the trawler’s massive bows. They towered above him. He slammed the gear shift and throttle forward. But the old displacement hull was never designed for fast starts. The trawler bore down on him relentlessly, the flickering bow wave not twenty feet away. Archie snarled and barked and snapped at the shape looming above them. Red knew and so did Archie. They were in serious trouble.

  ‘Turn you bastard! Turn!’

  Red realised there was little he could do to avoid a collision. He threw the wheel hard left and turned towards the trawler to avoid being cut in two by the point of the bow. Instead, the flare of the big ship’s bow crashed down onto the gunwale just forward of where he was standing. It threatened to push his boat down and crush it beneath the hull, but Red was saved by the trawler’s wash. It picked his boat up as if it weighed no more than an empty bottle and tossed it aside. It rolled violently from port to starboard, stood momentarily frozen on its gunwale, propeller out of the water and racing, before tumbling back upright. Red knew he was gone, fought desperately to hang on, but succeeded only in wrenching back the throttle. He tried to bring his free arm up to protect his head, to break his fall, but had no more control over his limbs than a rag doll. He hurtled forwards, his head crashing sickeningly into one of his boat’s ribs.