𝐛𝐫𝐨𝐤𝐞𝐧 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬; band of brothers ✔

PART THIRTEEN

Word count; 2,390

Dianne

— September 17-8th, 1944. Nuenen, Holland.

The retreat was called faster than the assault had started - it seemed. I had stuck with Randleman and his squad, until a hidden Tiger I forced us apart. I followed onto an end of soldiers falling back, only for a burst of machine gun fire to cut us off again. German Infantrymen were swarming the town.

I ran through an alleyway, finding myself in a small courtyard of apartments, blockaded from the firefight. My chest heaving, I glanced at each of the windows, no doors in sight. Nearly puking from the overload of adrenaline, I bent against a wall, tossing off my helmet. Two shots landed on the bricks beside my nose, propelling me away. Back to the wall near the alleyway, I brought my pistol up to eye level. A Kraut sprinted through the gap and I clutched the trigger, the man collapsing. No time to think, I unscrewed the bayonet from his rifle, using it to force open a window. Climbing inside, I fell onto the floor, only to jam the window back shut when other voices grew nearer outside.

Gazing through the curtain, I watched as two other German soldiers found their friend, examining the hole in his head. For a second, I couldn't move, not until one of them looked at the window I stood behind and started to shout. My helmet was still outside.

I scrambled up as many stairs as I could find until I reached the top floor. Easy Company was evacuating onto trucks stationed on the same road we had entered the town. Men were dashing, being picked off one by one by mortars, grenade launchers or snipers. Black smoke filled the air, the clouds turning pink from the fall of the sun. A drop of water fell from my cheek and onto the windowcill I was leaning on. Down below, glass smashed against the ground.

Everything was racing. Within the last three hours, I had shot six men - and that was following the orders to only shoot at those who shot at me. The Kraut in the courtyard made that seven. By the end of the evening, who knew how many it would be?

Two shots came from the floor beneath me, sharp and static. Currently, I was in an apartment kitchen, looking through the window above the basin. At the sound of the rounds, I positioned myself as I had in the courtyard; back against the wall, pistol up and raised. The door to the apartment had been ripped off, leaving it completely vulnerable to the stairwell. Footsteps ascended the wooden landing. A second passed. Then another. A figure emerged into the room, completely missing my presence. I lowered my sidearm, unsure whether to feel relieved or concerned. 

The boy heard me move. He whipped around, pulling the trigger of the luger in his hands as he did so. The round landed just above my ear and I ducked. When I regarded him, the luger was still raised in my direction, his crystal blue eyes sharpening my soul. I clamped my eyes shut, sliding down the wall until I was sitting.

"Open." He said, his voice bereft of adulthood. "Open your eyes."

I didn't understand Dutch but my eyes opened anyway, too curious.

"American?"

I nodded.

"You're in green. Why are you in green?"

I said softly, "I can't understand you-"

He interrupted loudly, "You're green! Why are you green?!"

Tears were rolling down my cheeks, "I don't want to hurt you-"

"Why are you in green?!"

My pistol hidden in my lap, I clutched onto it harder.

"I don't want to hurt you!"

He fired a shot. I fired too. But, alas, he was a child, twelve or thirteen at most. He hadn't been taught how to use a luger - he probably stole it off of a dead German officer. He didn't know that the most accurate shot is the one taken from eye level. I did. My round peirced his shoulder. His hit the floor.