Chapter 23

They pushed into an area of the island they hadn’t been before. It was a secondary cove area that Jeremy and Naomi had noted on their initial survey. “Uh, Jeremy?” Naomi said.

“Hmm?”

“Those buildings are concrete,” and she pointed out two large, flat buildings that had been all but swallowed by the jungle.

“What is it?” Nicole asked.

“Hell if I know,” Naomi said.

“Let’s go have a look see, shall we,” Jeremy said finally. The three advanced cautiously into what had once been a compound of some kind. Nicole swung out on his left and Naomi on his right. They covered about a half the distance to the first building when Nicole let out a piercing scream.

“What?” Jeremy said, racing over to where Nicole stood, one hand over her mouth, the other pointing to a half-buried skeleton.

“Oh wow,” Jeremy said.

Naomi took one look and said, “I think I may barf.”

“You act like you’ve never seen a dead body before, Naomi.”

“I haven’t, at least not one like that. I mean, not a REAL dead body, anyway.”

Jeremy took Nicole by the shoulder and turned her around. “It’s okay,” he soothed. “Just walk away, breathe nice and it’ll be okay.”

“Jeremy I, I don’t think I can um go any further.”

“Okay, Naomi, you stay with Nicole and I’ll check it out.” Naomi gave him a thumbs up between her retching.

Jeremy looked in the first building. It was maybe twenty feet tall and wide enough to be a hangar. He noted a few more rejects from night of the living dead along the way, nothing that really told him anything, and then he opened the door to the first building.

It was a hangar. He stood there gaping for several minutes. There, hanging a few inches over the floor, well no, it looked like what used to be a floor, most of the boards were gone and it was a channel. It was a flying boat.

There were no engines on it, but it was a flying boat. What were the odds? It was painted white, and it had a large red insignia on it. IJN markings.

Jeremy stood there in complete and total disbelief. It was a Japanese flying boat; he hadn’t even realized that the Japanese had flying boats. The damn thing had to be 60 or 70 years old. He walked up to it and touched the side. The paint flaked a little, but for the most part, it seemed sturdy enough. And these dead people were ground crew for the plane, Jeremy decided.

He walked on to the next building. There was a vat of oil, it was covered with a metal lid that had started to rust, though the concrete had kept the elements off of it for the most part.

There were some other smaller buildings. One was a radio shack, though it appeared that the radio had been smashed some time ago. There were quarters for the men who used to live here. It looked like about ten enlisted and two officers. A few of the enlisted men were still in their bunks and it looked like at least one of the officers was still trying to follow whatever last orders he had been given. Jeremy walked back to where Naomi and Nicole were waiting.