W.E.B. Griffin - The Corps VII - Behind the Lines

The first thing that happened was his pistol belt and the Springfield were returned to him, which made him feel like a fool.

Everly came aboard a moment later. One of the Filipino seamen took Wes-ton's arm, led them to a small hatch in the deck, and motioned them through it. A match flared, and in its light Weston saw the Filipino lighting a primitive oil lamp, nothing more than what looked like a six-inch piece of clothesline stuck into a bottle of oil. But the flame caught, and the small compartment was dully illuminated. The Filipino handed him the lamp and then left the compartment, closing the hatch after him.

Weston looked at Everly.

"Well, we seem to be on our way," Weston said. Everly did not reply.

Weston saw Everly make sort of a pillow out of his rucksack and then lie down on the deck. Weston had no rucksack, and tried to make himself comfort-able without one. But the confinement of the compartment and the curve of the hull made this impossible; his head hung down painfully. Finally, he took off his shirt and rolled it up. This seemed to work.

He heard creaking sounds from outside; and then he had a sense of motion, as if the boat were getting under way.

"Have you got a match, or a lighter?" Everly asked. It was the first time he had spoken.

"Both," Weston replied.

"Why don't you put that lamp out?" Everly said, his suggestion again sounding more like an order. "If we need it, we can relight it. If that lamp spills, lit, there's likely to be a fire."

"Right," Weston said, and blew the flame out. There was an unpleasant-smelling smoke, and the coal on the wick took a long time to die out.

Then the darkness was complete. There was no question now that they were moving. The hull was canted-which forced Weston to readjust his po-sition on the deck-and he could hear the splash and gurgle of water on the hull.

He started to think. The idea that they were going to be robbed and killed no longer seemed credible. He was almost embarrassed that he had had it. But what was real was that he had now deserted. That was a fact. He had deserted in the face of the enemy, in the foul-smelling bilge of a crude Philippine fishing boat. It was not what he had had in mind when he joined The Corps and went through flight school.

He fell asleep trying to put things in order, telling himself he was going to have to stop dwelling on the desertion business. It wasn't as if he was running away to avoid his military duty; what he really was doing was evading capture, so that he could make his way to Australia and get back in the cockpit of a fighter to wage war against the enemy as he had been trained to fight.

Weston woke in shock and confusion. That immediately turned into terror.

He tried to sit up-a reflex action-and became instantly aware that some-thing-someone-was lying on him. And then whoever was lying on him was thrashing about and making horrible guttural sounds. And then-again without conscious effort-when he tried to push whoever was on top of him off, or to slip out from under him, he realized his hands were slippery.

"Mr. Weston, you all right?" Everly hissed. Before Weston could form a reply, he sensed movement; and then the weight on him lifted.

"What the hell?"

"You all right?" Everly asked again. "Did he cut you?"

"Oh, Christ!" Weston said. "What the hell happened?"

"I cut his throat," Everly said almost matter-of-factly. "Are you all right?"

The sonofabitch is annoyed that I didn't answer him quickly enough.

"I'm wet, my hands are wet," Weston said.

And then he realized what made his hands wet and sticky, and was quickly nauseous. Not much came out, but his chest hurt from the effort, and there was a foul taste of bile in his mouth.

"What the hell happened?" he asked, now indignant himself.

"Here it is," Everly said. "I found it."

"Found what?"

"The knife, a filet knife, it looks like," Everly said. Weston felt something pushing at him. "You take it."

"I don't want it!"

"There's three more of them outside," Weston said. "In thirty seconds, they're going to suspect this guy fucked up."

"He tried to kill me?" Weston asked, his brain not quite willing to accept that fact.

"Just be glad he went after you first," Everly said. "If I'd have had to fight the sonofabitch, no telling what would have happened."

"Jesus Christ!"

"Load your pistol," Everly ordered.

"There's shit-there's blood-all over my hands."

"Wipe them, for Christ's sake, on your pants. Get your pistol loaded. Qui-etly!"

Weston slapped his hands against his trousers to wipe off the blood, then somehow managed to get the.45 pistol from its holster. The first time he tried to pull the slide back to chamber a cartridge, his fingers slipped when it was halfway back, and the spring forced the slide forward again without chamber-ing a cartridge.

"Quietly, for Christ's sake!" Everly said. And then, as a flashlight played in the compartment, blinding Weston with its sudden light, he added, "Shit!" A moment later there were half a dozen deafening explosions, each accompa-nied by an orange flash.

Now everything seemed to move in slow motion.

Weston frantically wiped his fingers on his trousers and felt for the serra-tions on the rear of the pistol slide. He jerked it back violently. His fingers slipped off, but when the slide moved forward again, he heard-and felt-a cartridge being chambered.

He now recognized the noise. It was the Thompson firing, and it was in-credibly loud, painfully deafening. His ears rang, and he felt dizzy. Though he was nearly blinded by the light from the flashlight, he vaguely saw Everly div-ing for it. Then he covered it with his body, and the light went out.

An orange ball in Weston's eyes faded slowly. After what seemed like a full minute but was probably far less time, he could make out a slightly lighter area in the blackness. This was the hatch to the compartment, he realized- now open. A moment later, he saw the reason the hatch was open: There was a body in it.

He could now make out Everly, not clearly, but clearly enough to see that he was grasping the hair on the head of the body in the hatch. He pulled the head back and cut the man's throat.

"They don't have any weapons," Everly said. "Guns. If they did, they would have used them by now. But how the fuck do we get out of here?"

"They'll be waiting for us," Weston said, and immediately felt like a fool.

Everly moved close to the hatch, then rolled onto his back.

"As soon as I'm through the hatch, you follow," Everly ordered. "Come up here!"

Weston moved toward the hatch. When he put his hand to the deck, it slid in what had to be blood. The bile returned to his mouth, but he was able to restrain the impulse to vomit.

He had just reached Everly when Everly fired the Thompson at the side and overhead bulkheads, ten or twelve rounds in two- and three-round bursts. The noise and muzzle flashes were again blinding, deafening, and painful.

When partial sight returned, Weston could see Everly shoving himself through the hatch, still on his back. Additional flashes came from the Thomp-son. But, with the muzzle outside the compartment, no more painful explosions assaulted his ear.

Weston dove through the hatch the moment Everly had cleared it, then rolled onto his back.

"Shoot the sonofabitch!" Everly ordered.

Weston looked frantically from side to side, and finally saw one of the Filipinos, scurrying aft on all fours.

"Shoot the sonofabitch!" Everly screamed.

Weston held the Colt in both hands, lined up the sights as best he could, and fired. The Filipino seemed to hesitate. Weston shot him again. And again.

"Make sure he's dead," Everly called, somewhat more calmly.

Weston rose to his feet and walked unsteadily aft. The Filipino-he was "their Filipino," the one who'd arranged for the boat, taken the money-was on his stomach, his legs pushing as if trying to get away. Weston did not want to shoot him again. But then, as if with a mind of its own, the hand holding the.45 raised the pistol until it was pointing at the base of the man's skull, and his finger pulled the trigger.