The day is August 12, 1942, and you have been assigned to a 25-man patrol on a mission to pick up Japanese deserters on the island of Guadalcanal

in order to gather intelligence that would be needed to assess Japanese troop strength on the island.

Your Marine Regiment has landed just five days before

and been able to capture the airfield that the Japanese had been building.

Up to this point, with the arrival of the Marines being a total surprise, there had been

little resistance.

Your CEO is Lieutenant Colonel Frank Brian Getke, a 47-year-old Marine Corps veteran and senior

officer for D-2 intelligence who had served in the Ardennes offensive in World War I that knew his way around.

Also attached to the patrol was translator Ralph T. Corey, who in civilian life had held a government job as a Japanese translator.

There was Lieutenant Commander Malcolm Pratt, regimental surgeon, and other intelligence scouts and infantry.

You are the platoon sergeant.

It's 9 p.m. and you're with your platoon supporting this group of intelligence officers,

cruising in a tank lighter crafted 9 p.m. at night, seeking a landing west of Point Cruise on the north shore of the 90-mile-long

tropical island called Guadalcanal.

The Japanese, you have been told, are amassed near the shoreline west of the Matanikau

estuary, which your patrol is assigned to enter, traveling upstream for the purpose of picking up

surrendering Japanese. A captured Japanese naval warrant officer had informed intelligence

that there were many men who would surrender if given a chance. In addition to this,

some of the Korean laborers forced into service by the Japanese had made it through

the lines to surrender, providing additional information on defenses. Commander Getki was

hoping they could avoid losses on Guadalcanal if they could persuade the Japanese to surrender,

a critical part of this mission. There was no moon tonight, only the darkness and the dim form of the jungle that began where the thin strip of sand marking the beach ended.

...