“Just stating the obvious. She’s clearly—”
“Shut up, Bob,” Joliet said, a little more forcefully than Hawkins.
Hawkins started to remove his shirt.
Bray turned his head to the sky once more. “I’ll just lie here and—”
“Oh my God.”
Bray turned to the sound of Joliet’s voice. Her eyes were locked on Hawkins’s chest and the four long scars etched across it. Bray sat up fast. “Holy shit. What did that?”
“You’ve never seen him without a shirt on?” Joliet asked.
Bray shook his head no. “Never without a T-shirt. The hell did that to you, Ranger?”
“Later,” Hawkins said.
Bray raised a single eyebrow. “Ask yourself this question: Will Bob ever stop asking me about my big-ass freaky scars?”
Hawkins sighed. Bray was persistent like no one else on the planet. He wouldn’t have a moment’s peace until he told the man the truth. “Grizzly bear.”
“Geez,” Bray said. “I know you were a ranger, but shit, you stood up to a grizzly?”
“Shouldn’t have,” Hawkins said. “We could have gone our separate ways, but I’d lost respect for nature. It’s not something I’m proud of.”
“Not something you’re proud of—holy shit, did you win?”
“Bray…” Joliet said, her tone a warning. “Let it be.”
Hawkins was lost in the memory as he spoke. “I killed it.” He drew his hunting knife. “With this.”
Bray smiled wide. “Your parents should have named you John Rambo.”
“What I did was wrong,” Hawkins said.
“What? Why?” Bray asked. “A bear attacked you. You defended yourself.”
“Actually,” Hawkins said, “it was the other way around.”
“What?” Joliet said.
Even Drake looked surprised.
“I was taught how to fight predators by Howie GoodTracks, an elder in the Ute tribe. After my father headed for the hills and Howie’s son died, we kind of adopted each other. Howie taught me that when a predator attacks, the best way to defend yourself is to be the more aggressive predator. If you’re a dangerous meal, most animals will back down. But that’s not what happened. The bear didn’t attack me. I attacked it. I killed it. And I shouldn’t have.”
A weight fell over the group. Bray didn’t say another word. Joliet silently finished patching up Hawkins’s shoulder. When the two long bandages were taped in place, she quietly said, “You can put your shirt back on.”
Hawkins slipped into his shirt and pulled it over the old wound. “Thanks,” he said to Joliet.
“Did you say something about Japanese characters?” Drake asked as he strolled out of the pillbox.
“Above the door,” Bray said. “But we don’t know Japanese, so we couldn’t read them.”
Hawkins stood up and rolled his shoulder. The wounds still stung, but the bandages felt secure. “Meant to show you earlier, but—well, you know what happened.”
Drake moved the fallen vines to the side. The muscles in his face tensed. “Seven thirty-one.”
Bray gasped and then choked. After a brief coughing fit, he said, “What? What did you just say?”
Drake looked grim as he spoke the words again. “Seven thirty-one.”
Bray looked like he’d been sucker punched in the gut. “You’re sure?”
“Wish I wasn’t,” Drake said.
Hawkins and Joliet just stared dumbly at the pair.
“Seriously?” Bray said. “This doesn’t ring a bell for you two? Unit seven thirty-one.”
When they didn’t reply, Bray stood, walked to the pillbox, and looked at the numbers again. He shook his head. “Chapter twelve. Sinister Science. Did anyone read my book?”
No one had. He sighed. “There have been several nations and individuals who have done horrible things in the name of biological scientific progress throughout history. But none hold a candle to Unit seven thirty-one. They were Japan’s covert R and D division during World War Two. They performed sadistic experiments on human beings.”
“The Japanese tend to gloss over that bit of their past,” Drake said. “They’d prefer it didn’t exist. A lot of Japanese know nothing about it. Most schools even teach that the U.S. was the aggressor in the Second World War. Modern Japan has very little in common with the 1940s version. It was a dark time. They fought ruthlessly with little regard for the sanctity of human life, on the battlefield or in the laboratory. Was kind of a mass corruption that sometimes happens to nations.”
“Like Nazi Germany?” Hawkins asked.
“I don’t recall the Nazis eating POWs, conquered peoples, or little girls,” Drake said.