War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 993 Tobacco Party
As the sun completely jumped out of the sea level, the chill on everyone's bodies was gradually dispelled by the warmer sunlight.On the sparkling sea, three rafters were gradually erected between a dark blue traffic boat and a red and white inflatable life raft.

These three rafters, which are nearly six meters in length, are all made by tying oars in groups of two with paracord.The two ends of the three rafters were respectively tied to the compartment beams and life rafts of the traffic boat, and the two boats were combined into one, becoming a catamaran boat with stronger ability to resist sea wind and waves.

Not only that, using the parachutes obtained in exchange, the remaining oars, and the spinnaker that came with the life raft, Wei Ran and Hawkes, under the leadership of Captain Sterling and Captain Evans, made They built a sail that was not too big, but could barely turn the direction. By the way, everyone also took off their soaked clothes and tied them tightly to the top of the sail with ropes.

"Let me tell you about the working principle of sailing against the wind"

On the bow of the traffic boat, Captain Evans took the notepad and pencil that Hawkes dug out from the pilot's survival bag, and after simply drawing a few arrows, he explained, "We want to use the sails to sail the ship against the wind. The bow of the boat should be slanted to the direction of the wind, and the angle of the sail should be adjusted so that the wind blows on the sail to produce an oblique forward thrust.

In this way, the boat can travel diagonally forward.After traveling a certain distance, turn the bow again so that the other side of the boat and sail is facing the wind direction diagonally, and our boat will move forward diagonally in the other direction. "

"So when the wind is headed, our ship is actually moving along a zigzag trajectory?" Wei Ran was the first to understand the principle of sailing against the wind.

"You're right, Axie! You're right!"

Evans rubbed his nose, and then pinched the corners of his eyes, "Victor, if you were in the age of sail, you would definitely be an excellent sailor."

"Thank you for the compliment"

While Wei Ran was speaking, he had pulled some of the remaining parachute cloth around Captain Evans, and while changing the dressing on his injured left hand, he said, "But now you seem to have caught a cold, and we don't have it in our first aid kit. Cold medicine, so you better wrap yourself up."

"I'll keep an eye out"

Captain Evans said rather indifferently, "We should use these umbrella cloths to build a sunshade as soon as possible before the sun rises completely. We need to consider sunburn more than colds."

"We still have enough umbrella cloth and enough time"

Captain Sterling pointed to the sleeping sailor moose while speaking, "Victor, let's take a look at the moose first, his forehead is very hot."

Hearing this, Wei Ran, who had just changed the captain's medicine, immediately put the mask bag containing all the first aid medicines on the moose's body, reached out and touched the other's forehead, and the scalding temperature from the palm of his heart immediately made his heart ache. sink.

After thinking for a moment, Wei Ran took off the mask on the other party's neck, wet it in the sea water and applied it on his forehead, then untied the gauze on his body, exposing the large burns to the sun, and wiped the other party's face additionally. I smeared the burn ointment and fed him a tablet of sulfadiazine I found in the survival kit.

"Hawks, for the medicine in this box, give him and the two captains a piece every four hours until they are all taken."

Wei Ran said, and handed it to Hawkes together with the watch on his wrist and the waterproof bag containing sulfadiazine, and at the same time he did not forget to ask, "It must be at least four hours apart. If you take too much of this medicine, it will There are serious side effects."

"Don't worry, leave it to me!"

As Hawkes said, he had already taken the medicine package from Wei Ran, and at the same time shook the Devils aviation watch that was already hanging around his neck and said, "I have already got a watch from the wounded prisoner. That's right. By the way, doesn't it need to take this kind of medicine?"

Is that the Devil Pilot's watch?

Wei Ran muttered to himself first, and then answered after he put on his watch again, "I've already fed him just now, we'll see how he's doing in the evening.

Hawks, we don't have much medicine.Adding up all the medicines found in the first aid kit, there are only 18 antibiotics left. "

"I see, I will save my medication."

Hawkes immediately understood Wei Ran's hint, and quickly put the waterproof bag containing the medicine into the iron box, then stuffed it into the small pocket originally used to hold the signal flare, and hung it around his neck.

In the end, some medicine was changed for the wound on the head of the deputy captain Sterling, and everyone seized the time to use the remaining umbrella cloth to make a sunshade for the traffic boat and the inflatable life raft respectively. sunshine.

"Hawks, let's take an inventory of our supplies." Vice-Captain Sterling said as he unscrewed the kettle that was filled with rainwater last night and took a sip.

"Except for the two prisoners, each of us now has two water bottles, and our helmets are filled with fresh water, so our water supply is still sufficient for the time being. Of course, there is no shortage of food, except for the ones found in the survival bag In addition to the few cans, the captives also provided a few cans."

After a short pause, Hawks took out a plastic box from the opened pilot survival bag, and then took out a tin can from Vice Captain Sterling's sailor bag and said, "In addition, we have two sets of fishing gear, and we have two sets of fishing gear. There are meat cut from the pilot's feet as bait, which sounds disgusting, but I guarantee you can catch enough fish to fill your stomach."

"Hawks, you are disgusting."

Sterling grinned and said, then took the tin can that Hawkes handed over, weighed it, and said with great gratitude, "Fortunately, when I was in Hawaii, I stuffed a fishing tackle can in it. I'm going to take it to the beach to go fishing."

"It would be even better if it was a can of beef." Captain Evans, who was wrapped in an umbrella cloth, joked, "Hawks, I don't want to be a Wendigo who eats people."

"I promise, I will replace those disgusting baits with the first fish I caught." Hawkes pointed to the shell shells with the rotten meat in them.

Evans stretched a corner of the umbrella cloth outside the boat to feel the wind speed, and then said regretfully, "There is no wind, otherwise the sail we worked so hard to make will come in handy."

"The next thing is medicine"

Wei Ran took over the topic and said, "Oral antibiotics are in the hands of Hawks. There are 18 tablets in total. You must take the medicines on time. In addition, the sulfa powder is enough to change the dressings for about a week for all the wounded, including the prisoners." .

But there are only 4 morphine tablets left, but the good news is that we found about 50 morphine substitutes from the captives.Considering how addictive these things are, I'll save them for now.

On top of that, the burn cream is only enough for the moose for up to three more coats, but we also have a box of sunscreen that I'm going to save for the moose as a substitute for the burn cream, so everyone do take care of the sunscreen. "

"In the end it's weapons and stuff"

Sterling followed up with the speech and said, "We have two 1911s, a Colt revolver, a submachine gun and a nuclear pistol that doesn't work well. If you encounter sharks, these are very good. self-defense weapons.

In addition, we have three steel helmets, three body armor, and two dinner plates that the moose fastened into the body armor as bulletproof panels. "

As soon as he finished speaking, everyone immediately smiled.Obviously, only sailor moose working on the deck have done such a thing as a bulletproof plate with a dining plate.

"Axe" Captain Evans' own ax reminded, "Captain Sterling, and my axe, it is also a good weapon."

"In that case, there are also my sailor knife and the machete and jackknife in my survival bag." Hawkes also added.

"Yes, and Mr. Captain's ax." Sterling nodded with a smile, "and various props of Mr. Little Chief."

"I'm not some little chief." Hawkes quickly waved his hand.

Little Chief, this is the latest nickname he got this morning, and this nickname was proposed by Great Chief Evans himself and approved by everyone.

"Speaking of the axe, I do have some personal items."

As Wei Ran spoke, he rummaged through the insulated bucket full of supplies, and finally took out a can with a medical bag on the outside and a sleeve on the inside.What is contained in this can is naturally stolen shredded tobacco!

"Tobacco?! Where did you get so much tobacco?" Evans asked in surprise.

"I picked it up after falling into the water." Wei Ran said blankly, "I think it can provide some buoyancy, so I haven't lost it."

"Don't mind me."

"Of course I don't mind." Wei Ran nodded cheerfully without waiting for the other party to finish speaking.

And Captain Sterling also did not wait for Wei Ran to finish, he tore off the condom on it and unscrewed the lid of the can, and took out a pack of Bull Durham shredded tobacco and a bundle of cigarette papers from it.

"Why does this can look so familiar to me?"

While Captain Evans was speaking, he had already pulled out the ax from his waist, "I haven't smoked with this pipe ax for a long time."

"I look familiar too"

Captain Sterling took out the roll of banknotes in the middle of the can and looked at it, then took a look at a photo of a beautiful woman from the middle, and then said affirmatively, "No wonder! This is the can of our gunner Hagen! Look! This beauty is his girlfriend! I saw him show it off."

"I seem to have seen this picture before!"

Captain Evans patted his forehead, "That's right, that guy has been smoking cheap hand-rolled cigarettes, and he said he wants to save money to buy a car."

"His girlfriend is waiting for him in Hawaii," Sterling said, stuffing the roll of banknotes and photos back into the canning jar.

"I don't know if he survived or not"

Captain Evans sighed, sucked the cigarette holder at the end of the ax handle vigorously, held the ax between his knees, and then squeezed a handful of shredded tobacco into it with his uninjured right hand.

Seeing this, Wei Ran also took out the small incense pipe he found from the devil, and shook it together with the matching leather goods, "I found this from the captive, who of you wants to use it?"

"Why is it so small?" Hawkes took it and opened the leather tobacco bag and smelled it, and then returned it to Wei Ran without interest, "This is not the smell of shredded tobacco I am used to."

"Let its owner take a sip too"

After finishing speaking, Captain Evans looked at the two captives tied to the bow and stern respectively, "Gentlemen, whose smoking set is this?"

"mine"

The wounded, who had recovered from two morphines and an overdose of narcotics, said in English with a cold face, "You are despicable"

"Do you smoke?" Wei Ran stretched out the smoking set in his hand outside the boat without waiting for the other party to finish speaking, "If you don't smoke, I will throw it away for you."

"do not want!"

The prisoner immediately said nervously, "Please don't throw it down! It was given to me by my wife."

"Since you don't plan to join our tobacco party, we can only ask her to give you another gift." Before Hawkes finished speaking, Wei Ran stretched out his arms pretendingly.

"No! She...she's dead"

The wounded captive pilot said hoarsely, "Two years ago, she died in the spring. She was a teacher. She and her students were all killed by the bombers you sent to fly to recruit nuclear weapons."

"That was revenge for your surprise attack on Pearl Harbor," Captain Sterling retorted.

"Maybe so"

The injured pilot rarely retorted, "But my wife did die, and my kids lost their mom."

"So what's your name?"

Evans took a big puff of smoke from the end of the handle of his pipe axe, and Wei Ran, who was rather dull, also retracted his hand that was sticking out of the boat.

The injured pilot paused, then changed the subject and said, "My English name is Akila."

"So Akira," Captain Evans issued another invitation, "Would you like to join our tobacco party?"

"Okay. Thank you, thank you." Akira, who was a bit twisted, finally nodded, and let Hawkes help him untie his tied hands.

Seeing this, Wei Ran also handed the smoking set in his hand to the other party.Captain Evans was willing to show kindness to the other party, so he naturally had nothing to say.

Not to mention that both the American and Japanese navies generally have some so-called "gentlemen's demeanor", and the Yankees on board are not like themselves, they are born with a physical aversion to devils.As the reality is, he naturally has no reason to ask these companions to join him in the same hatred.

After receiving the smoking set, Akila, who had one foot wrapped in gauze and a condom, politely smiled at Wei Ran, who looked at him coldly, and took out a small group of hair-like shredded tobacco from the shredded tobacco bag and stuffed it into it He took a sip of the incense, then took out the lighter and lit it and took a sip.

"Would you like to taste it?" Akila took the initiative to pass the incense in his hand to Wei Ran.

"No need." While speaking, Wei Ran picked up the cigarette paper and rolled a toad cigarette himself.

"Your facial features and skin color look very similar to ours." Akira asked tentatively, "So you are."

"Chinese people"

Wei Ran said calmly, "Just as they can't forget what you did to Pearl Harbor, I can't forget what you did in Jinling in China in 1937 and everything you did in every inch of China from 1937 to now."

After a short pause, Wei Ran exhaled a cloud of thick smoke and reminded, "So you better not let me find a reason to attack you and your companions."

"I, I understand." Akila moved back subconsciously, slightly opening the distance between him and Wei Ran.

For a while, the eight-meter-long and two-meter-wide traffic boat fell into silence, only the smoke from everyone's fingertips, mouth and nose was left, and the stern was still tied behind its back, but it was full of anxiety. young pilot.

After a short rest, Hawkes poured some of the little and slightly spoiled cocoa left in his kettle to everyone except the captives. After everyone finished drinking, Wei Ran also poured out the remaining cocoa Most of the jug of Coke was poured out for everyone but the captive.

After eating this overly simple lunch, Evans looked at the simple sail that was still not blown by the wind, and after thinking for a while, he said, "Victor, take the thermos and all the supplies and weapons and go to the life raft. How about it? Of course, if you can, please leave some tobacco for us."

"No problem," Wei Ran happily agreed.

"In addition to helping to steer the sails, you are also responsible for keeping an eye on the surrounding sea conditions. Of course, you also need to keep an eye on us and the prisoners on the same boat as us. If they want to do something, you can shoot them directly. In addition, every morning when you come to change our dressings, Hawkes will replace you on the life raft."

As Evans said, he had already put his revolver and Indian ax into the thermos, and then with the help of Sterling, he took off the binoculars box from his waist and stuffed them into the thermos, "Sterling, You come to arrange duty according to everyone's situation."

"Victor is in charge of the day." Sterling said without thinking, "Let us be in charge of the night."

"Then arrange it like this"

Before Evans finished speaking, he had already helped Wei Ran throw the dried clothes into the insulated bucket, and said confidently, "Gentlemen, we have enough fresh water and food, and we even have medicines and an excellent medical service. Bing, I think we will survive. Mr. Akira, do you know how far we are from the nearest shore?"

"100 nautical miles, about 100 nautical miles." Akira said reluctantly, making it clear that he still wanted to go to Laoshizi Palau.

"As long as there is wind, we can return to shore in four days at most." Captain Evans continued to encourage everyone's confidence, while ignoring the desperate expressions of the two pilots.

"Victor, take your hammock with you," Sterling said, stuffing his hammock and a blanket into the thermos. "It will at least help you get out of the water."

"Thank you"

Wei Ran didn't reject the other party's kindness, but waited for everyone to take off an extra water bottle on their waists and put all the food, weapons and other materials into the thermos, then fastened the lid tightly. With help, he pushed it into the sea and put it on a life raft not far away.

To put it bluntly, the devil's life raft is a circle of inflatable floating bags, with a load-bearing net woven with ropes fixed in the middle.In other words, this is a large swimming ring.

The advantages and disadvantages of this are self-evident. The advantage is that as long as the inflated floating bag does not leak, there is no need to worry about sinking into the water.As for the shortcomings, the load-bearing net in the middle of this circle of inflatable floating bags is not waterproof at all.Although standing on it will not touch the sea surface, but the sea surface has a slight ups and downs, but it does not delay the water splashing through the weighing net to wet everything.

Because he didn't wait for Hawkes to return to the opposite traffic boat, Wei Ran fixed the hammocks on the floating bags on both sides immediately after using the parachute spreader to firmly fix the thermal insulation bucket on the load-bearing net of the life raft. Hands on.

Try to lie on the hammock. Fortunately, the lowest point is about 20 cm away from the load-bearing net, which is quite good.

Sitting on the hammock, he then took out the sun-dried deck suit and hood and put them on one by one, and put on the toad mirror that he had stolen from the Johnston ship.

Before putting on the trousers, he wisely cut the trouser legs below the knee with a gravity knife.

After he got dressed again and hung a 1911 pistol around his waist, the two captives on the ship next door had already been untied from the ropes that bound their hands. Judging from what Captain Evans said, it seemed that The position of the bow was assigned to the two captives.

He naturally knew the intention of Captain Evans in making such an arrangement, to let him bring all the supplies to this relatively safer inflatable life raft, in order to allow the two captives who had recovered their freedom to be peaceful with everyone honestly. Coexistence, and secondly, I was worried that I couldn't hold back for a while and killed the two of them.

Looking up at the awning built with parachutes, Wei Ran raised his binoculars to look at the calm sea around him.Unfortunately, as far as the eye can see, except for the frigate birds that occasionally fly by, there are no other living creatures or any artificial objects at all.

"This mirror is quite clear." Wei Ran weighed the heavy telescope in his hand, and finally put it into the telescope box hanging on his waist.

With the cover of the parachute cloth and the insulation barrel floating between the two boats, Wei Ran took out the oil barrel filled with hot cocoa from the metal book, and prepared to have a cup of hot drink for himself to start a small stove.

However, when he took out the oil drum that was supposed to be boiling hot, he was stunned. This oil drum with a full capacity of 20 liters, made of titanium alloy, and obviously filled with hot cocoa was so light and weightless at all!
After recovering, Wei Ran immediately opened the lid of the oil drum, and even took out the flashlight and moved it to the mouth of the oil drum.

"I'm fucking you uncle"

Wei Ran looked at the empty oil barrel with a livid face, not to mention hot cocoa inside, it was so clean that he couldn't even smell hot cocoa!He even had no doubt that the oil drum that he had filled with cocoa might not even have bacteria before he opened it!
With a sound of "snap!" the lid was fastened, and Wei Ran hurriedly took out the other two oil barrels and opened them one by one.

As expected, the two oil barrels were still empty. The water that was loaded on the boat was gone, and the fruits that were loaded with the water were also gone.However, around the lid of one of the oil drums, there was a piece of mango flesh the size of a fingernail sticking to it like a provocation!

"You are so cruel."

While gritting his teeth, Wei Ran kneaded the tiger's mouth tattoo on his left hand, while putting away the three extremely obtrusive titanium alloy oil drums.

Reluctantly, he took out the British Army P44 kettle filled with hot oil from the metal book. Fortunately, this heavy weight finally brought him a glimmer of hope.

Carefully unscrewing the lid, the hot oil that had been poured in had already condensed into lumps, but fortunately, there was not a lot of that hot oil.

While he was worrying about gains and losses, Hawkes on the next boat had already opened the survival can that Sterling had stuffed into his sailor bag a long time ago, took out a roll of green canvas fishing tackle bag from it, and opened it skillfully. He hung it on his chest, and then took out fishhooks one by one from it, hung the human flesh cut off by Wei Ran not long ago, and hung it into the water from the other side of the traffic boat far away from Wei Ran.

Hawks was not the only one who was also busy fishing, and even the two captains and the two prisoners were not idle.

Except for the dejected moose, the five people on the traffic boat were all holding fishing line boards, lying on the side of the boat with their backs to Wei Ran, staring intently at the sea surface.Obviously, they seem to have reached some kind of agreement to survive together.

　single

　　
　
(End of this chapter)