“That’ll be that hot Captain Greaves.” One of the men said. “For a Spec, she’s not bad!”

As Andrew rather agreed with that thought, there wasn’t much he could say, so he just nodded in agreement. He pointed to the right rear.

“I’m going to keep following the railway line to get a better feel for our position here. Catch you later, guys.”

“Yeah. Later.” One of the men said.

Andrew continued to follow the railway line, which curved right around the entire area, making a large horseshoe shape. The Japs apparently stayed with the creek line, leaving a very wide no man’s land between the Ostryan defense line on the railway and the Jap forward positions in the creek bed. A road came down from the town at about a forty-five-degree angle that crossed the railway line, and that bridge marked the end of his unit’s operational area. Studying the terrain as he walked along the railway, he decided any major offensive would almost certainly be directed at the curve that was essentially at the bottom of the battalion’s deployment area.

The only redeeming feature of the area was the fact that the curve of the railway line rose above the surrounding ground level on a bank with the highest point where it crossed over the main south road. Of course, in truth, it was the ground dropping down rather than the railway rising up, but even so, the bank the railway was on would provide a good cover against anyone trying to attack out of the streambed.

Chapter 10

Combat

Over the next two days, Andrew settled in as the time passed without any excitement occurring, apart from the fact that it rained heavily on the first day. Just before dawn on the third day, Andrew was awakened by the crump of mortars and the boom of artillery shells landing close by. His tent wasn’t far from the headquarters building, although it was covered with a camouflaged netting, along with three other tents in the immediate vicinity. He threw his uniform on a raced over towards the vehicle park, where he jumped in the first vehicle heading south. The ute already had four other soldiers in the rear, but they squeezed over the let him sit on the tailgate. The driver floored it, throwing up dust everywhere as they headed for the front.

They didn’t have to go far to find the war. There were Japanese infantry and cyborgs all over the railway bank where the road passed underneath it, and the driver of the ute had no option but to pull over to the side of the road behind a line of trees and scrub, bouncing over the property’s barbed wire fence as shots came their way. Andrew had thrown up a shield so no one was hit, and as soon as the vehicle stopped, they all piled out and took cover in the trees and bush, returning fire against the Japanese troops.

It was a basically untenable position, particularly as Japanese troops began pouring off the railway embankment to their right, flanking their position. More troops were coming down the road behind them but were stopping further back under enemy fire. Then he realized that the Japanese troops out in the open to their right were not taking any casualties despite the fire being directed in at them from both Andrew’s own group of men and from the increasing numbers of troops that had stopped further back up the road and were deploying into the paddock to the right of the road facing the Japanese.