No more bewilderment. No more exhilaration. Just simple fear. Artillery rounds continued to pass overhead, sounding in the stillness of the night like freight trains rushing past. Cherry had smoothed the dirt he and Egan had pulled from the foxhole into a two-man sleeping area. He had spread his poncho out over the dirt and put his and Egan’s rucks into the vegetation at the uphill end. Egan had gone to the CP meeting and left him alone. Occasionally, in the first hour after Egan left, runners from the squads came to report the LPs were out or the claymores deployed but mostly Cherry had been alone. He surveyed his body. His arms were bruised and burned. He knew that. That had happened on the CA. But now his shins and his ass were bruised too. There were scratches on his face and the backs of his hands. Just when they occurred Cherry was not certain. Probably during the mortars, he thought. Or possibly when the jets dropped their bombs. Cherry’s shoulders and back and legs were sore too.
