Take Me Home.

6

They passed through the town of Gorizia and could see the houses had been hit. There stood two villas, dark as something dead; the river had risen up and overflowed so that the roads were very muddy and all the fields appeared as marshes in the dark. From there, they dispersed gradually.
Some went farther into base as others loitered, awaiting news of the offensive; Seokjin followed the muddy road to the villas and found the Major sitting with his head resting in one hand.

The major spoke to no one, to everyone, when he said, “It's bad. The worst since the start.”

“Sir?” said Hoseok. He mirrored Seokjin perfectly with his rucksack over one shoulder, his cap pulled off and held in one hand. “How bad is it, sir?”

“The worst,” the Major said. “I’m glad as hell to see you here. Oh, it’s the worst.” It was unnerving to see the dregs of exhaustion marred across his aged face. He was very tan, but appeared pale under the sallow light of the lanterns.

“But the summer is over,” the Major said. “I’m grateful for that. It was a hard summer.”

“Indeed, sir,” a soldier said. “We have made it far.”

“Nothing to get comfortable about."

The Major turned to Seokjin. He said, "Kim, take an ambulance up the road. There was a hit near the front.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I dispatched one already, but they may need help.”

He stopped to observe the troops before him. “Glad as hell to see you. Now get moving. We have an offensive to carry out.”

He left the villa and many troops followed, but Seokjin stayed back with Hoseok beside him.

He said, “Would you like me to come with you?”

“Why not?”

They moved over the embankment quickly to the vehicles and took their weapons and loaded the ambulance. Then they drove up the road. Wet leaves fell onto the windshield and would not blow away and it was too dark to see; but they drove up the road and pushed on until they came to an abandoned truck eight miles from camp. A short ways up the road they found what they had come for. Two wounded lay on the road as the driver loaded up the back of the ambulance. He took three wounded and told Seokjin that he did not need help.

“But there are civilians,” he said. “Up there, on the road.”

“What am I to do with civilians? I am not here for the civilians.”

“You must do something. We cannot leave them.”

“The hell we can’t, man. Do you want to bring civilians into camp? Do you want them to stay in the villa with the Sergeant Major? It is up to you. You take them, but I will not.”

Hoseok unloaded a stretcher. Together they raised one wounded from the road onto the stretcher and loaded him into the back of the ambulance.

“No!” said the driver. “Bring him into my ambulance. There is room. Then you take my ambulance back to camp and I will get the civilians.”

“you?”

“Yes . I will drive them to Portogruaro.”

“You’re an idiot,” Hoseok said. “The Major won’t have it.”

“Has he said as much?”

“No. But you know his temperament. It’s the middle of the night. We’re due for an offensive. And you want to go through the hills where the Germans are? Because of civilians? Sounds a little peculiar, doesn’t it?”