was firing every anti-aircraft gun, the streaks erupting off the ship like some sickening fireworks display, and he saw their target now, coming down in a tight corkscrew, impacting the water closer to shore. Now another, the plane low to the water, dipping downward, coming apart, tumbling into pieces on the water’s surface. They continued to come, and Adams felt a strange panic, helplessness, silence from the men around him, the awful show continuing to unfold, the Marines useless bystanders. The noise flowed past them, the thump and chatter of anti-aircraft fire, another wave of Japanese planes swarming across the sky, spreading out, seeking targets. The roar came close overhead, and he saw the plane, a steep dive, pulling up just off the beach, driving straight for the frigate. The guns on the ship poured out low, and he saw one wing suddenly breaking off, the plane rolling over, but the plane was too close to its target, and it plowed low against the waterline, a sharp blast square in the middle of the ship itself. Beside him he heard soft words, Welty, couldn’t look at him, couldn’t turn away from the fireball. Now the sound reached them, a hard rumble, and Adams flinched, felt the sickening knot inside his gut. There was another blast, a surprise from a plane he hadn’t seen, striking the ship close to the bow. The frigate was swallowed by fire, black smoke hiding the gruesome horror. But the anti-aircraft fire from the more distant ships continued, the skies darkening with the sunset and the vast plumes of smoke. He understood now, the insane simplicity of it. The officers had talked of it, how the Americans would meet the incoming waves of planes with as many of the carrier fighters as could be launched. But the Hellcats and Wildcats and Corsairs could only do so much, and those Japanese pilots who survived the gauntlet in the air could not be pursued into the storm of anti-aircraft fire from panicky naval gunners. Many of the Japanese planes would plunge harmlessly into the water, most with pilots already dead, but even in death, some of the pilots had put their planes into a fall that would reach a target. Not even the largest and most heavily armored ships were completely immune to the shock of the explosives that had been stuffed into the Japanese planes, and so any ship that was struck suffered damage that could be fatal, if not to the ship itself, then to many of her crew. Adams stared at the burning frigate, and he felt the thickening silence, the darkness putting an end to the fight, the battle over, the waves of aircraft either fulfilling their mission or dropped into the sea. Beside him, Welty, “My God. Those sons of bitches.”
Adams kept his stare on the flames, the skies now dark, the sun only a faint glow of light, the sea lit by the fires from a dozen ships.
NEAR CAPE HEDO, NORTHERN OKINAWA
MAY 2, 1945
The rains had stopped, the ground drying, the mud now turning to a fine red dust. Adams cursed, rubbed the small oily cloth over the barrel of his M-1, turned sheepishly to Welty, who said, “Yeah, fine. Here. I told you. Use only a little. The looey says we’ll be getting more, but who the hell knows when.”
Adams took the small vial of gun oil, squeezed a single drop into the open breech of the rifle, rubbed the cloth in the tight circle against the steel.
“I never saw this kind of stuff before. It gets into everything.”
Welty blew hard into the breech of his own M-1, said, “Coral. Like the grit on sandpaper. Plays hell with the truck engines too, the airplane engines, anything like that. The mechanics go nuts with this stuff. Don’t think I’d wanna be a pilot chasing some Jap Zero while this crap is grinding my engine down to nothing.”
“Jesus! Bitch bitch bitch! You ladies need a backrub, make all your little pains go away? I’ll find one of the Okie gals for each of you.”
Ferucci was standing over them, and Adams focused more on the rifle, pretended not to hear him. The sergeant bent low, stared at the breech of the M-1, said, “Clean it again. You must be out of practice. This damn vacation