Satan's Cage

by Len Levinson

“Because I know.”

  “But how do you really know?”

  “Because I really know!”

  Private Yabalonka wheezed. It was impossible to have a reasonable talk with religious people, but he couldn’t get mad at Billie because Billie had saved his life.

  “Okay Billie,” he said. “Okay.”

  The Reverend Billie Jones held the Bible up in the air. “You can’t even believe when the proof is right in front of your eyes!” he shouted. “If Jesus Christ himself walked up to this foxhole right now, you wouldn’t even recognize him. You’d think he was a Jap or something because your soul is blind, Yabalonka!”

  “Calm down. You’re talking too loud.”

  The Reverend Billie Jones grinned. “I guess that’s because I’m an old jackleg preacher. Sometimes I get carried away.”

  “That’s okay. Don’t worry about it.”

  The Reverend Billie Jones held out the Bible. “Here.”

  Yabalonka took it.

  “Put it in your pocket there where it was before,” the Reverend Billie Jones said. “It might save your life again someday.”

  Yabalonka dropped it into the same pocket and buttoned the flap. “I don’t think a bullet could hit the same spot twice.”

  “You never know,” Jones said. “Why don’t you lie down and get some sleep? Both of us don’t have to be awake.”

  “I think I’ll take you up on that.”

  Victor Yabalonka sat down in the foxhole and leaned his back against the dirt wall. A monkey chattered somewhere nearby, and Yabalonka took off his heavy steel helmet, laying it on the ground beside him. He leaned his head back against the wall of the foxhole and closed his eyes, drifting into a reverie.

  Mosquitoes and flies buzzed around his face. The sun shone with brilliant intensity, and the humidity of the jungle was so thick it was like trying to breathe with your head submerged in a bowl of soup. Yabalonka’s uniform was soaked with sweat, plastered to his body. The jungle stank like rotting vegetation and Yabalonka stank even worse; he hadn’t bathed for days. He thought of a nice cool shower and a pretty girl with big tits scrubbing his back. He wished he could drink a cold glass of beer. Gradually his heartbeat slowed down. His breath became more shallow. His jaw hung open and he snored.

  White fluffy clouds resembling cotton balls appeared in the sky during the morning, and by late afternoon the clouds thickened and spread out. Colonel Bob Hutchins, commanding officer of the Twenty-third Regiment, sat in his jeep at 1600 hours (four o’clock in the afternoon) and looked up, a frown on his gnarled weatherbeaten face.

  “It’s gonna rain,” he said to his driver, Pfc. Nick Bombasino from South Philly.

  Pfc. Nick Bombasino didn’t reply. He was too busy trying to keep the jeep from rolling off the shoulder of the road. A deuce-and-a-half truck rumbled toward him from the other direction and Bombasino wanted to stay out of its way.

  The deuce and a half came closer. Colonel Hutchins held on to the dashboard of the jeep. Two wheels of the jeep were over the shoulder, and two wheels were on the road. The deuce-and-a-half truck also had two wheels on and two wheels off the road.

  “They should make these roads wider,” Colonel Hutchins grumbled, bracing himself in case the jeep tipped over.

  The deuce and a half rolled by. Its driver kept his eyes on the road and wrestled with his steering wheel. Colonel Hutchins wrinkled his bulbous red nose as he smelled the stink of the truck’s exhaust fumes. The truck passed and Pfc. Bombasino steered the jeep back onto the road. Colonel Hutchins looked at his watch. He was supposed to see General Hawkins, commanding officer of the Eighty-first Division, at 1615 hours, but it looked like he’d be late.

  “Get a move on,” he said to Pfc. Bombasino.

  “I can’t go any faster,” Bombasino replied. “The road’s a mess.”

  Colonel Hutchins looked at the road through the filthy windshield. It was a dirt road full of potholes, with big rocks sticking up. Soldiers dragged their asses on the other side. Another truck was coming from the opposite direction.

  “I guess I’m gonna be late,” Colonel Hutchins said.

  “If you started earlier, you woulda been okay.”

  Colonel Hutchins turned and looked at Pfc. Nick Bombasino. “Who asked for your opinion?”

  “Just thought I’d tell you, sir.”

  “Next time you think of telling me something, think about something else.”

  Bombasino steered to the side of the road to get out of the way of the truck. Colonel Hutchins held on to the dash with his left hand, while his right hand grasped the door. The jeep bounced up and down. Colonel Hutchins wondered what General Hawkins wanted to talk to him about. He hoped the general wasn’t mad at him again. The two right wheels of the jeep went over the shoulder of the road. The truck came fast, bringing a cloud of dust with it. The driver didn’t know a colonel was in the jeep, and didn’t bother slowing down. He swooshed past the jeep, and the jeep became enveloped in a cloud of dust and smoke. Pfc. Bombasino couldn’t see. He coughed and his eyes smarted. Since he couldn’t see, he lifted his foot off the gas pedal. The jeep came to a stop, half on the road and half off.

  “What in the hell are we stopping for?” Colonel Hutchins asked.

  “I can’t see.”

  “Change places with me. I’ll show you how to drive this fucking thing.”

  “But sir—”

  “Get over here.”

  “Yes sir.”

  Colonel Hutchins jumped out of the jeep and walked around its front. He was five feet, eight inches tall and built on the porky side. His big beer belly hung over his belt and the holster containing his Colt .45 slapped his leg as he approached the driver’s side of the jeep and jumped in. The engine was running and the emergency brake was pulled up. Colonel Hutchins let it down and shifted into gear.

  “Hang on,” he said.

  “Yes sir,” replied Pfc. Bombasino, grabbing the seat with both hands.

  Colonel Hutchins let out the clutch and stomped on the gas pedal at the same time. The jeep leapt forward like a jack rabbit with a firecracker up his ass. Colonel Hutchins steered the jeep back onto the road and snap-shifted into second gear. He kicked the gas pedal down to the floor and the jeep roared down the road. Pfc. Nick Bombasino’s eyes goggled in his head because he saw a bend in the road straight ahead and Colonel Hutchins wasn’t slowing down. What if a deuce and a half was coming from the opposite direction?

  “Slow down!” Pfc. Bombasino shouted.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Colonel Hutchins asked. “You got piss in your blood?”

  “What if—”

  Colonel Hutchins leaned into the turn, not letting up the gas pedal one iota. The jeep skidded around the turn, and straight ahead Pfc. Bombasino saw his worst nightmare coming true. A deuce-and-a-half truck was headed straight for them, and Colonel Hutchins had the jeep directly in the middle of the road.

  “Watch out!” Pfc. Bombasino screamed, covering his eyes with his hands.

  Colonel Hutchins set his grizzled jaw and hit the horn. He shifted into third gear and gunned the engine. The truck came closer. Pfc. Bombasino couldn’t see it, but he could hear it.

  “Oh my God!” he said.

  Colonel Hutchins glowered at the driver of the truck, whom he could see rather clearly. The driver bounced up and down on his seat and cut the wheel of the deuce and a half hard to his right. The deuce and a half veered off the road and rolled down the shoulder, rocking from side to side. The driver hit the brakes a few feet before the truck would’ve hit a tree.

  Colonel Hutchins sped through the cloud of dust and smoke left behind by the truck, and then the road was clear again.

  “That’s the way I want you to drive from now on!” Colonel Hutchins said. “You don’t get out of their way! Make them get out of your way—understand!”

  “Yes sir!”

  Another bend in the road appeared, this one to the left. Colonel Hutchins bared his nicotine-stained teeth as he t
urned the steering wheel. Pfc. Bombasino closed his eyes again and held on for dear life. I’m gonna transfer into the infantry, he said to himself. I can’t stand this fucking lunatic anymore.

  Lieutenant Hiroshi Akiyama crouched in a thicket beside the road Colonel Hutchins was driving on. Next to him was Sergeant Mastomo Okamoto, and behind them were the twenty-one survivors of his company. They were cut off and trapped behind enemy lines.

  Lieutenant Akiyama was twenty-three years old, and he’d graduated from the military academy only six months ago. His father was as count, a distant cousin of the Emperor, which meant Lieutenant Akiyama was an even more distant cousin of the Emperor. Lieutenant Akiyama had attended numerous receptions at the royal palace throughout his life, and had been in the presence of the Emperor many times. He was no ordinary Japanese officer.

  He was slender and tough like a stalk of bamboo. His face was long and oval. He had stern eyes, high cheekbones, and “a small mouth. He’d shaved his head before the big attack and it still was smooth underneath his helmet. His cheeks also were smooth; he had little facial hair. Sometimes he looked younger than he was, and sometimes he looked older. It all depended on the light.

  “Something’s coming,” he said. “Get ready.”

  His men raised themselves and prepared to attack whatever vehicle was coming on the road. They hadn’t eaten since before the attack, and the meal had consisted only of a small amount of white rice. Lieutenant Akiyama thought they could keep going and eventually work their way back to their own lines if they could get something to eat. He supposed the American Army trucks carried food and other useful supplies, and that’s why he and his men were preparing to ambush one of them.

  The sound of the vehicle came closer. The men tensed themselves and prepared to strike. They were weak from hunger but the thought of food gave them strength. They licked their chops and then swallowed the bitter spit in their mouths.

  “It’s coming awfully fast,” said Sergeant Okamoto.

  “Get ready,” Lieutenant Akiyama said. “When I give the signal, move out quickly.”

  His men got up on the balls of their feet. The muscles in their legs were like compressed springs. The road was only six feet away. The plan was to charge the truck with guns blazing. Lieutenant Akiyama and three men would kill everybody in the cab. The others with Sergeant Okamoto would handle anyone in back. They’d plunder the supplies and disappear into the jungle.

  The vehicle came closer. Lieutenant Akiyama’s face was expressionless but his eyes glittered like diamonds. The vehicle came into view. It was a jeep with two Americans in the front seat, and it was coming fast.

  Zooooooom!

  It sped past the Japanese soldiers before Lieutenant Akiyama could open his mouth, and a rooster tail of dust was kicked up by the wheels of the jeep. The breeze blew the dust at the Japanese soldiers, and they coughed in the bushes beside the road.

  “They were going terribly fast,” Sergeant Okamoto said.

  “Indeed they were,” Lieutenant Akiyama replied. “Usually they don’t go that fast. It wasn’t a truck anyway. We want a truck.”

  The men relaxed. Lieutenant Akiyama took off his helmet and wiped his sweaty head with his hand. Then he put the helmet back on. The heat and lack of food made him dizzy for a moment. He took out his canteen and sipped some of the warm water. His canteen was almost empty. He and his men would have to find water too. They were in bad shape, but at least they were alive.

  “Here comes another one,” Sergeant Okamoto said.

  Lieutenant Akiyama perked up his ears. He heard the vehicle, and it was coming from the direction in which the jeep had just disappeared. It didn’t sound as though it was moving too quickly, and the engine had the big sound of a truck, rather than a jeep.

  “I think this is the one we’ve been waiting for,” Lieutenant Akiyama said. “Get ready.”

  The men prepared to attack once more. They held their Arisaka rifles tightly in their hands and took deep drafts of air. The sound of the vehicle grew louder and then it came into view around the bend. It was a deuce-and-a-half truck, and everybody smiled.

  “This is it,” Lieutenant Akiyama said.

  The men dug their toes into the muck and prepared to charge. Lieutenant Akiyama held his Nambu pistol lightly in his right hand. His uniform was torn and bedraggled, and he had a cut on his left cheek. The big truck came closer and he saw two men in the cab.

  “Now!” he hollared.

  He and his men exploded out of the jungle and ran up the shoulder of the road. The GIs in the front seat of the truck saw them coming, but before they could do anything bullets were whistling around their heads. The driver kicked the accelerator onto the floor, and Lieutenant Akiyama jumped onto the running board of the truck. He aimed his pistol at the driver and shot him in the face. The driver’s head blew apart and he let go of the wheel. The passenger tried to grab Lieutenant Akiyama’s pistol, and Lieutenant Akiyama fired again. The bullet blew through the right hand of the American soldier and struck him in the throat. Blood spouted out and the truck veered off the left side of the road. Lieutenant Akiyama jumped off the running board as the truck fell down the shoulder and tipped over.

  Eight GIs had been in back of the truck, and they couldn’t get out in time. The Japanese soldiers fired their Arisaka rifles at the tarpaulin that covered the rear of the truck, and when the truck came to a stop they got behind it and fired several volleys through the wide opening in back.

  “Hold your fire!” Lieutenant Akiyama shouted, running toward them.

  The Japanese soldiers stepped back. Lieutenant Akiyama looked into the rear of the truck and saw something move. He fired his pistol, and an American soldier went slack. Nothing else moved. The GIs had been tossed around like a shipment of rag dolls, and they bled from numerous holes in their bodies.

  Lieutenant Akiyama was chagrined to see no crates of supplies in the rear of the truck, but the American soldiers had light field packs on their backs.

  “Everybody take one of those packs!” he said to his men. “Hurry!”

  His men climbed into the tipped-over truck and tore the packs off the backs of the dead GIs. They jumped out of the truck, holding the packs in their hands, and Lieutenant Akiyama aimed his pistol at the gas tank of the truck.

  “Everybody stand back!”

  The men ran away from the truck. Lieutenant Akiyama pulled the trigger of his Nambu pistol.

  Blam!

  His bullet pierced the gas tank and the gasoline spurted out, bursting into flame. Lieutenant Akiyama ran toward the side of the road and jumped down the shoulder, following his men into the jungle. The gas tank on the truck exploded and burning gasoline flew into the air. Lieutenant Akiyama could feel the heat on the back of his neck.

  “Get out of here!” he said. “Hurry!”

  Lieutenant Akiyama ran in a zigzag line into the jungle, dodging around trees, jumping over fallen logs, and in seconds he and his men were swallowed up by the thick tangled vegetation.

  Colonel Hutchins entered the headquarters tent of General Hawkins and approached the desk of Master Sergeant Abner Somerall, the division sergeant major.

  “I believe the general is waiting to see me,” Colonel Hutchins said.

  “Go right in,” Sergeant Somerall replied.

  Colonel Hutchins walked into the next section of the massive tent network. Sergeant Somerall was amazed at how well General Hawkins and Colonel Hutchins had been getting along lately. They’d been at each other’s throats for months, but ever since the attack last night they’d been buddies. They’d even got drunk together after the big battle. Sergeant Somerall had no idea of what had happened. All he knew was that he had to be more respectful to Colonel Hutchins in the future, even though he thought Colonel Hutchins was a loudmouth and a drunk.

  General Hawkins looked up from the documents and communiqués on his desk as Colonel Hutchins entered his office. “You’re late.”

  Colonel Hutchins saluted in fron
t of the desk. “There was a mess on the road. A deuce and a half was ambushed by Japs, and everybody inside got massacred. It happened right behind me and I turned around to find out what was going on. The Japs were gone by the time I got there.”

  “How many were killed?”

  “Twelve men, approximately. It’s hard to say because the Japs blew up the truck.”

  “Have a seat.”

  Colonel Hutchins sat on one of the folding wooden chairs in front of General Hawkins’s desk. General Hawkins inserted a Phillip Morris cigarette into his ivory holder and put it into his mouth. He was fifty years old, tall and lean, with blond hair and a blond mustache. He was the son of a general and the grandson of another general, and had graduated from West Point in 1922.

  “Want a drink?” Colonel Hutchins asked.

  “I think I had enough last night.”

  “Mind if I have one?”

  “Help yourself.”

  Colonel Hutchins pulled out his canteen and unscrewed the top. He raised it to his lips and threw his head back, drinking down the homemade booze known as white lightning, brewed for him by Pfc. Dunphy, one of his cooks. The recipe had originated with his former mess sergeant, the legendary Sergeant Snider, who’d been a moonshiner in Tennessee before the war. Sergeant Snider had been transferred back to the States as the result of wounds he’d sustained shortly after the division arrived in New Guinea.

  General Hawkins watched Colonel Hutchins guzzle the white lightning down. At another time General Hawkins would’ve been disgusted, but now he was just plain amazed. General Hawkins was hung over and thought he might puke if he drank any more of that ferocious white lightning, but Colonel Hutchins still was swallowing it down.

  Colonel Hutchins screwed the top back on the canteen and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “We’re moving to a quiet part of the line.”

  “When?”

  “First thing in the morning.”

  “Where’s this quiet part of the line?”

  “At the southern extension, near Afua.”