The Japanese positions weren’t terribly obvious until he brought up his distant viewing spell, and the bushes leaped toward him visually. Ah, there you are. He thought to himself with a smile. He could see several of the Japanese troops in a trench they had dug on the far side of the creek. The trench didn’t look that long and only appeared to hold five or six men. He turned his view slightly to his left and could see that there was another trench maybe twenty meters further along the creek. Presumably, the trenches were only dug in areas are soft ground. He briefly considered trying out some of the longer-range spells on them but then decided that keeping his presence on this front a secret was probably a better idea.

He dropped back down to the other men and grinned at them.

“No shots. My lucky day, I guess.” The other men just shook their heads at him, so he grinned and pointed further along the railway line, where it curved around towards the road. “I’ll just do a recce over there and see what’s happening.”

The railway actually passed over the road on a wooden trestle bridge, and the creek curved up towards the railway at that point. He eased himself up the side of the bank and carefully looked over the top. The Japanese weren’t actually positioned on the opposite side of the creek bank here but further back along the ridge, where a line of interlocking dugouts covered the area. You couldn’t really call them trenches so much as hollows. It looked to Andrew as if they shoveled out a bit of dirt which they piled up at the front of the hole they were digging, and that would do for a defensive position. Given that they were on the high ground, relatively speaking, it was probably good enough.

He looked around and saw a group of soldiers dug in on the other bank at the bridge’s western end and gave them a wave. They just shook their heads at him. He shrugged, clambered back down the slope, and then ran across the road to their side. A couple of bullets whizzed past him, fired from somewhere, and then he was across the behind the bank on the south side of the bridge.

“Ya mad!” One of the men yelled at him as he climbed up the bank to their position.

“Na. I was prepared.” He said and tapped the patch as he turned his shoulder so they could see it clearly.

“Well, I’ll be blowed; we got our own medallist!” The man was Corporal’s stripes on his sleeves said.

“Yep. I’m not going to make any rash promises, but hopefully, it will come as a bit of a surprise to those fellas when they attack.”

“You know when they’re going to attack?” The corporal asked.

Andrew shook his head. “The Captain thinks it will be real soon.”

“He’s been say’n that for a month, mate.” Jason shrugged. “I just got here, so I’ve got no idea. But my Captain seemed to think having me over here was a good idea.”