A World in a Grain of Sand.

The children playing on the pebble beach, skimming rocks, had been the first to see the unusual movement in the rocks... of something rising and falling with the gentle waves.

There appeared to be a hand, waving at them.

They hesitated, warily, looking at each other as they decided what to do, but they did not hesitate for long.

Such things were always of interest, considering what sometimes washed onto their shore and that had value to their community. They investigated, as children will, and then ran excitedly, up the slope to the small school, which was also the hospital and the doctor’s surgery, as well as serving the village in a host of other ways… even as a small library, as well as the church.

‘There’s a body in the rocks!’, was their frantic message.

Within minutes, adults were investigating; taking charge.

There was a man, an airman, still dressed in his flying gear, and he seemed to be still alive.

Everything was so treacherous in those rocks, constantly bathed by the sea, and always slippery with seaweed in the intertidal zone, that he had been difficult to access and recover, without two men having to swim, hauling him back into the open sea in front of the beach, before they could get him landed without doing any more damage to him.

They were in the middle of a war, though they were far enough from the conflict that they rarely saw any evidence of it.

Those in the small hospital, preparing for him now that they had been warned, heard him being carried up the slope from the beach on one of the stretchers that had been rushed down to where he was now lying.

Six men had difficulty carrying him once they got him onto a stretcher.

The footing was not the best, and it was a steep slope; difficult, even after they got him onto the stone steps leading, in zig zag fashion, up the hill. They had to pause often to get the stretcher level, so that he wouldn’t slip off and wind up back on the beach, even more battered and bruised. And likely, dead.

His retinue of excited children and men, as well as curious women, announcing his approach—they saw few strangers—gave those in the hospital; the doctor and a nurse (it was a very small hospital) some time to prepare; not sure what to expect.

The way he was dressed, he was clearly a pilot. His snug-fitting, leather flying helmet, had been removed when he’d been found, but if he’d had goggles, he’d lost them. He could have been in the water for days, the way his exposed skin was wrinkled.

He must have been shot down in the action of the days before, in one of the many dogfights out to sea, or attacking shipping. It had happened once before, two years earlier when the Japanese had steadily driven McArthur out of the thousands of islands making up the Philippines… to his great shame and annoyance… while leaving the native islanders to the not-so-tender mercies of the invading Japanese; and those other foreigners, left behind, to the infamous Bataan Death March.

It was happening again, but this time the Americans were now returning; driving the Japanese out of the Solomons, as well as New Guinea, and were in process of retaking the Philippines.

For the last two hundred years the people had been invaded by foreigners, with the Spanish leaving the greatest mark on the country; in the peoples’ names, though a couple of native dialects, and English, seem to have been the only surviving common languages.

The people were now, as then, just pawns in a bigger game played by both sides as they ‘see-sawed’ for supremacy and control. It had always been this way. They resented it, and they did what they could to protect themselves without attracting the attention of... or incurring the wrath of the invaders, but it was always a losing game for them.

The Americans had already invaded somewhere to the south… Leyte... so the fleeting news reports suggested, driving the Japanese out… merely exchanging one enemy for another. But a much less demanding and bruising enemy… if one co-operated. History recounted what happened to those who did not co-operate, even with the Americans.

The airman was cut and banged about from the abrasive rocks… as well as wounded in some way; still dressed in his flying gear, which is what had kept him afloat, and protected him, but he was unconscious. His hands had suffered the most obvious damage from being abraded on those rocks as the waves had moved him around.

Many thoughts flew through their minds as they looked at him: fear for themselves, concern… protective, selfish, thoughts. However, being a basically moral people, with good principles, they had no choice about looking after him.

God help this man, and God help them if the Japanese found him in their hospital before their enemy had been totally expelled from around them.

‘If’, they found out about him.

It must not happen. It was 'doo-able'. They were a close-knit community.

The one redeeming feature which might make discovery unlikely, was that their village was on the poorly inhabited, and poorly-accessible strip of coastline, not easily accessible from inland, or the sea, and many tens of kilometers away from the most travelled roads... and the Japanese.

It was far off the end of any highways, and at the end of a rough, jungle track, not passable for any four-wheeled vehicles, with its sharp turns and constant washouts, and which was barely passable at the best of times, especially not in the Monsoon season of May to October, and which was now coming to an end.

Most supplies (their needs were few) came in by sea in smaller boats, from trading up and down the coast. Others came by mule, bicycle, small motorbike, and even by human backpacking after it had first got up to the Reyes estate on the hills behind them, and at the end of another poor road, but one that 'could' accommodate larger vehicles. Such slow-moving vehicles were also visible for almost an hour before the estate was reached… time enough for many protective changes to be put in place, and for people to leave, or escape.

The village occupied a small, headland-protected, fishing harbor, with its twenty or so homes, sheltered in the palms and other trees, protected from the sea and, thankfully, also mostly invisible from the sea and air.

When storms threatened, they hauled their three, small fishing boats, on cradles, up the peeled logs lying up the slope and above the reach of most of the storm and of the pebbles that were constantly thrown up at them by the crashing waves.

There was nothing strategic about it to invite attention.

They hunted, harvested timber and fruits, and fished, as well as keeping some livestock... chickens, pigs. They prospered in isolation. They wanted it that way. It was safer. History had taught them that.

The doctor, and the one, part-time nurse on duty, Maryann, who lived in the hospital some of the time if she did not stay with a sister, nearby—told them where to put him.

The doctor, about forty-years old, was a respected man. He had grown up in the area, but had moved away to school. He had returned, after he’d qualified as a doctor in Manila, where he’d served his internship. He was the first real doctor the village had ever seen.

Of necessity, he was also the dentist, and the veterinarian for the surrounding area, as well as the go-to arbiter for small disputes. He brought the wisdom of Solomon with him, favoring no one.

They trusted him.

He was married to one of the local girls, ten years younger than him. She had been one of the ‘Reyes’, living on the family estate, some five kilometers away, inland, before they’d married, and now, they lived across from the small hospital. They had decided to postpone their family plans until after the war had ended.

When he’d first heard of this casualty, he’d sent one of the boys to let Maryann--one of the three nurses who served in the hospital--know what had happened, and that she was needed. She had already been on her way down to the hospital.

The other two nurses were out ‘on call’, farther along the coast.

Like their doctor, Maryann had gone away to be educated and trained- in a distant convent hospital - returning only to escape the invading Japanese. In the few years she had been gone, everything had changed in the village… and yet nothing had really changed. Her parents and grandparents still lived here. Although, she now saw things through different eyes. She had grown away from her own people, and 'they', from her. The course of her life was already being determined by that war, their isolation, and by her distance from those she had once played with.

It was about to change again.

They had dragged a table into the middle of the entryway, to lay him out upon, and to see what they could do for him, as they undressed him and saw to him. He may not have been conscious at any time after his crash, or he would surely have undressed himself. ‘Not undressing’, may have saved his life a little longer, trapping some inner warmth and protecting him from predators.

School was immediately cancelled for that day. There were only six students of various ages in the school anyway. Their teacher, Maryann, was the nurse, so it was a decision of the moment for her.

When she’d heard of a body in the rocks… alerted by the raised, and excited voices, she’d come down the hill in less than a minute, almost running, still dressing, to see how she could help, but still fearful of what she would find.

She’d heard the early morning clamor at the beach, and had already changed, hurriedly, in preparation, knowing that she would be needed as a nurse, rather than as a teacher.

She was still finishing off a rushed meal.

That table in the entryway served many purposes: as a study area in the school (which also was housed in the same building): women gave birth upon it, either inside, or outside. It was their operating table, and… when scrubbed off, school meals were served upon it.

It was where he would be undressed, with his clothes dropped, or tossed outside to be examined; the pockets, emptied, and then they would be either hung up to drain, or were to be washed, then hidden, with him.

“Get him onto the table and get him undressed. But be gentle with him until we know more about his condition. Be careful with his hands...” and everything else. His hands were raw.

Doctor Soriano left Maryann to see to him, directing other helpers, while he added another comment.

“Cut his clothes off if you need to.”

They didn’t need to.

They started on his boots, which he was lucky not to have lost, while others… under Maryann’s supervision… unzipped his jacket and started on his shirt buttons and the rest of his clothes.

There was little formality to anything, just yet.

He would probably live. He had a pulse, and he’d got this far.

Doctor Soriano looked him over as he helped undress him, seeing a heavily sunburned individual; his face even more sun-burned by floating, as he had, exposed to the full sun, and at sea. He’d need some lotion on his forehead to counteract that sunburn.

He also had about two days of stubble on his face, so he had likely been in the water for at least a day, if not more. He was lucky to be alive. Not many pilots survived a crash at sea, and most of those were often too injured to survive for long.

There was nothing out of place or broken, that he could see, but his hands were swollen and badly injured from being washed about in the rocks. He may have been there for some time.

The man had a weak pulse, and was cold and clammy to the touch, but he would soon warm up in the confining heat of the hospital, so one of his needs was already being met… that of warmth… once his wet clothes were off.

Soriano spoke as he worked, pausing to look around at his audience as more of the man was revealed.

"Well. he's certainly been caught up in war, figuratively, and literally." His body was covered with older, war wounds and even older injuries that were older than the war. There were the pockmarks of bullet wounds on his upper shoulders, and healed gashes on his lower legs.

He saw others grimacing at some of those early wounds. They saw many wounds like that for themselves, from their woods work, using machetes and axes.

“Warn those who saw this, to keep quiet when they go to work on the Reyes' estate, or we will have too much trouble drop on us.”

Most of those workers had gone to work... some hours earlier... and would not be back before evening, so the problem had been put off for another day.

They already knew about saying nothing to the Reyes brothers, but a careless remark in the wrong place or to the wrong people…? And the present members of the ‘Reyes’ family... two brothers... were the wrong people, collaborating with the enemy, and striving to survive in their own way, even by betrayal of their own people.

After the war, they would pay a price for that.

Soriano spoke his orders, softly, making eye contact with those working with him, so that there was no misunderstanding as to 'who', was to do 'what'. They obeyed without question.

He talked while they worked on the man, undressing him.

“We know what the Japanese are capable of, as well as the Reyes brothers, so we may have to relocate too, for a short time… for a few weeks, at most… if the news reports are correct about the Americans, and this new phase of the war.”

They had known this moment was coming, and could empty the village in minutes, if they needed to. They had prepared for it, for years.

“It is easy to hide along this coast, and no reason for there to be Japanese patrols. There is nothing here to interest them. Until now.”

He hoped it stayed that way. But this man...?

...Unless they heard of this man, and also became more curious about the whereabouts of that fuel-lighter that had gone missing.

If word got out about this man, it may just put them on the wrong map, and bring the wrong kind of attention to them… never a good thing, in times of war.

The ‘fuel-lighter’... covered with seaweed on the shingle beach... was another good reason not to let their guard down. If the Reyes brothers knew of that, or the Japanese learned of it... there would be trouble.

There was a hundred tons of aviation fuel in that, that they’d effectively stolen from under the noses of the Japanese, and the Japanese were looking for it. There had been a patrol boat up and down the coast looking for it over the last few days… searching.

They hadn't found it.

Two of the village fishing boats had encountered it adrift, by accident one evening, and had taken advantage of the opportunity in the falling light, to get a line on it and to tow it back to the village, where they had beached it, and covered it with seaweed to hide its shape.

The Japanese patrol boat had stood well out to sea because of the submerged rocks off the point, so had not been able to make anything out, on the small beach. The locals always collected piles of seaweed, using it as fertilizer so they had no need to question it. They had seen no one. The village might well have been deserted.

Refined fuel was always hard to come by, so that 'lighter', would keep their boats in fuel for at least a year. All they had to do was to stop the Japanese from finding it and then destroying them and their village.