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Tropic Thunder

It was a warm mid July night that complemented the scorching day that that made me stay in the shade. I was just sitting on the back porch looking out over the farm land that that went on. Distant lights of the town casting a halo over the hill. I was just winding down from a long day at work. A cool wind blows by with the sweet smell of rain. Man, I thought, its going to be a rough storm hitting, good thing too we need it.

I sat back in my chair and enjoyed the smell of the on coming rain and the cool breeze it brought with it. I closed my eyes for just a minute, just one minute to let my mind wonder with out worry of how I am going to pay my rent and the other bills that came in last week. The clean cool air feeling good on my skin and the feeling you get from being as calm as you can get swept through my body. "Why can’t my life be as easy as this?" I whispered.

I did not realize that I had fallen asleep until the crack of thunder smashed its way in to my ears. I fell over out of my chair. The storm was roaring all around me, I must have been out for a while, I thought. I went to go in to my house to jump in to my soft warm bed and sleep the night off. As I opened the door to my house it opened to a place that was impossible. "A thick jungle!? What the hell is going on?"

My mind was taken by this. A Jungle in my house, how is this possible. I decided to step in thinking that it was just me or maybe my Palm had fallen over and my sleepy eyes were seeing things in the dark. I walked through the door, it was quiet no sounds at all. No foot steps on my hard wood floor, no ticking toc of my wall clock that was always loud enough to hear from any ware in the house, and no cat loving up on me. I took several more steps and realized that this was not my house. I turned back to go through the door and try to sort it out. The Oak door was no ware to be found. I spun around looking in every direction trying to figure out what the hell was going on. Then it hit.

A down poor of rain. The drops small and stung like bees. I looked around for cover but found none. "Micky!" a voice yelled out. confused my eyes darted around looking for who was calling out. "Mickey get you're a** down before Tojo blow what little brains you have left out!" I looked down and a man in a small fox hole was looking up at me. With a painful jerk of my leg I fell to the mud and the man pulled me in and closed the lid.

"Damn it Mickey, you and your sleep walking is going to get us all killed." I looked at the man with sober eyes. He was dressed in World War II tropic assault cloths. My grand father had shown me pictures of him decked out in the same thing. "Where the hell am I?" I asked. The man looking at me with a baffled expression. "Damn Mick you must have been hit in the head really hard. We are on a jungle island deep in Jap turf. Can't remember the name, Fukna or some s**t like that. This is the last Island we have until we hit Japan. Boss man says we got something that will knock them back to the Stone Age, Some kind of super weapon. No one knows what it is but I sures to hell hope it takes them out for good. I don't know about you but I am sick of being ambushed every day and squeaking away with my life while every one is shot all to hell."

I looked at him, blinked hard and tried to get my mind around every thing. "What year is this?" The man looked at me with an expression of concern. It’s August 5, 1945. And the God damn Tojo has been hammering our unit for the last three months. Our CO is on his last leg literally. And our rations are almost out. We can’t take too much more of this s**t." I was dumbfounded with the answer. The morning paper I was reading had July 5, 2010 on it. I could not figure out how or why I was in the middle of a Pacific island in the end of World War II. I asked the man his name and he shook his head and handed me his dog tags. Jimmy (Slick) Wilson. Jimmy took his tags and put them back under his jacket.

"Micky what happened to your guns? You loose them in the last assault?" I shook my head yes just so I did not look any more ignorant than I was. "Christ! You would loose you're a** if it was not strapped to your back. Here." Jimmy reached over and handed me a Springfield rifle and a Russian PPSH that one of the foreign corps that Jimmy told me had been hit when we landed, and a pistol. "Mik we are moving out in two hours try to get some sleep. I'll keep ya from walken around again." I looked over at Jimmy and took in the expression of exhaustion and fear on his visage. "No Jimmy I'll keep a look out you get some rest." And with out any objections Jimmy went out like a light.

The storm raged on for the next two hours with out showing any signs of letting up. I went through the pockets on my jacket that I found my self wearing. I found a journal. I went through the last several pages. This Mickey was quite the odd guy. He did not write about the war in this journal but more so how he misses his girlfriend back in the states. He talks about how he is going to marry her and settle down and have some kids. "The American Dream" as he put it. The last entry was from the day before.

-Aug, 4

Its looking like rain to day, from the last several storms we have had to fight in, I can guess that this one is going to be like the rest of them, Loud and long lasting. No matter I still have the picture of my Betty, her shining eyes and amazing body makes it all worth while. Allot of the guys make fun of me about her but I don't care. She shines for me in the night and keeps me warm in the rain. I can’t wait to get back to her. Word has it that our top egg heads have made a weapon that could end this thing. I bet the guys fighting in the European side are hoping for the same thing. Gosh it feels like a life time since I was last with

The text ends. I was only guessing that the last fight had interrupted him. This guy that is now me this Mickey, I could not let him get killed. I was not sure if I was going to see my own girl again or if maybe Mick was at my house wondering what the hell was going on. The only thing I knew was that I was going to fight hard to get Mick back home to his woman.

I had fallen asleep from the sound of the rain's drumming on the covering.

Boom!

The sound hit close and hard. I felt a stinging in my ears.

Boom!

Another explosion, this one was spot on it hit just out side of the fox hole I was in. I opened my eyes as I was flying through the air, and the only thing I could see was mud and brilliant flashes of lighting. When I hit the ground and stopped sliding I managed to fumble to my knees and recover my PPSH, the Springfield was buried in to the Palm tree 20 feet away. "Jimmy!?" I shouted, frantically looking around for him. More explosions hit around me, I couldn't tell if it was from the thunder or from artillery but it didn't matter. I crawled towards the fox hole we were sleeping just a minuet before. I was just about to the hole when my hand slid across the ground and caused me to fall flat on my face. The feel of warm liquid on my hands and face were in stark contrast to the cold rain. I picked my head up to look around only to find Jimmy, or at least what was left of Jimmy. The shell that hit must have been on his side. Part of Jimmy was no longer in existence and what was left was quivering in front of me. Both legs and most of his left arm were no ware to be found and a good bit of his chest and abdomen were shredded. Jimmy looked up at me with bloody eyes before slipping away. I took his tags and his Thompson and the only ammo clip not fused to his side and started to fire in the direction of the initial boom of the artillery.

I ran the first drum dry then switched to the last clip. Got up on both of my feet and charged. It was me and three others, all of us going at the enemy as fast and hard as we could. 'Out of all of the guys in the platoon we four were the only ones left? What the hell am I doing I don't know how to fight, I am not a naval foot grunt. Why am I doing this?' That ran through my mind a thousand times.

Then the first hail of bullets ripped by us, no one hit. The guy in the back lobed his grenade belt at a bunker hidden in the foliage. None of us had seen it. Ten Japs got out just as it exploded, all but one died in the blast and the last one that was trying to crawl away. He was knifed in the back as we ran past. Another hail of led. Two of us went down, the one exploded in spasms as holes popped up all over his body, the other went down fast from a shot to the head. "Oh god what am I doing here? I don't belong here, I belong in my bead 65 years from now dreaming. Not fighting the Japanese."

I pulled my Russian gun and the Thompson up and let fly with the bullets. I did not know what to the shoot at so I just sprayed the trees and foliage. When both guns ran dry every thing fell silent. No guns, no artillery, just the soft sound of the rain letting up. "Did I do it? Did I kill them all?" I looked around for the other guy that was with me. He was face down in a puddle, the water turning darker from the blood. All I could do was stand still.

Then in a flash out of the ground several Japanese came out and surrounded me. Wailing and shouting in a language that I could not understand. All of them pointing rifles with bayonets at me. Had to be thirty of them over all. The Thompson was dry, the PPSH had another 50 drum to be loaded. The yelling continued. I got on my knees and placed the gun behind my back and loaded it slowly. None of them realized what I was doing until I Fired.

I spun around trying to hit as many as I could. It seemed like a week for me to spin all of the way around the thunder erupting in my ears again and a wave of pain fell across my body. When my gun just clicked and no bullets came out I dropped it and took out my pistol and fired at any one left standing.

More pain fell across my breast and it became hard to breath. 'Dizzy, every thing is spinning and the night is getting deeper.' I fell to my back after the second shot came out of the thousand pound hand gun. I was looking up at the storm clouds wishing it were the stars. Every thing grew darker.

'Sorry Micky, Guess neither of us are going home to our girl.' I thought.

No more yelling. Just the soft pat of rain drops on my face and a cool breeze with the sweet sent that calmed me. The sound of the thunder in the distance hardly a whimper.

Then nothing.