Part Seven - Tenno Heika Banzai!
Iwo Jima - Dai Nippon Teikoku
1945
The battle was over...The fighting fought; the bodies high. The Heroes in the sands, in the black soil of the volcanic island. All were dead; or preparing for their final stand. They had been fools to stand here; against the unstoppable wrath of the Great American Empire. But they had done so without fear or hesitation; because that was their duty, that was their task and they completed that task. The final radio transmission had been simple; the mainland was ready for the barbarian hordes, their services were no longer required.
It sent a sobering message indeed. Die Well.
General Kuribayashi Tadamichi stood in the final bastion of Japanese resistance on the entire island. There were two hundred of them left. Two hundred only...Everyone else, everyone else who had dared to hold the lines were dead; and the ones who had surrendered, they were intelligent; he would give them that merit. They were cowards, perhaps. But smart ones. Now, all that remained were these men. A palard one stood before him, the young man was of unique circumstances, the Private was a conscript like so many others, at this point there were no free men in the employ of the Imperial Japanese Army. There were no young men left at all besides him, it seemed.
"What did you do?" The General spoke to the young man who's distant look and wild fear filled eyes came back into focus.
"I was a baker..." The Private said. "And a father, once." He sighed sadly; it would be depressing knowing that his legacy would be left by a child that had yet again, a broken family. The Barbarians had destroyed everything they came across; and nothing was sacred any longer, not even the notion of family. "A-and I will never see him, or my wife again."
The bunker shook, nay, the mountain shook beneath the wrath of the American Dragon. "You will. I have one final order." The General said as he turned to the young man anti-dramatically as his hand fell to his sword. "Live well."
"Sir?"
"You will survive; I order you to survive. Live well; so that your family is not another one shattered by this war that we cannot win."
"I will try." The Private said softly as he pulled the bolt closed on his empty rifle, the action was a reaction now; he was no longer a baker; a soldier like the rest, waiting his turn to die.
"These." The General lifted a bag, letters, journals, memoirs, orders, transcripts. "Make sure the enemy never finds them. Ever."
"Yes sir." The young man took the bag and retreated into the command bunker as the General looked to the men. "I told you before they came here. We are all dead men. Let us make sure these cowards never forget us!" The troops began to file out as the young man dug his hole; the General simply said something he'd said twice before. "Everything comes in threes."
"Let it be known. This day, here; we who died. We did so with honour." There was no speech, the General drew his sword, but also his sidearm, American in design...The silver and white construct. No bullets...
"Tenno Heika Banzai!" The surge forward, the wave of men and steel that fell upon the Americans; startled as they were men did die this time; and they were not just Japanese. The cowards had their victory, but they had been shown something; they had seen the audacity of the Japanese on their own soil, and their blood covered the lands, not just the Japanese. They had taken as much as they had been given.
The American Empire was not so invincible.
Fin.