sweet french. peaky blinders

59

Lucille

Tommy said he wouldn't shoot. He needed those men alive. So when the gunshot went echoing through the air toward the back door where she was tucked against the wall, Lucille's heart sunk. It was a sound she could never forget, having heard it ringing through the warm, French air for nights on end. She couldn't begin to imagine how it felt for Tommy, and especially for Dawson, who's hands still shook at the mere memory of the war.

Sucking in a breath, Lucille pushed against the wall, slipping through the door into the main room of the Garrison. The gun was held shakily in front, her finger as far away from the trigger as possible. A crash rang through the room, a jarring clang, like a hammer against metal.

Tommy was thrown to the floor, the arms of his attacker wrapped tightly around his neck, the gun in his hand just barely holding on. They struggled together, rolling around the floor, neither one gaining the advantage. Behind, the body of a second man lay, blood already pooling around his battered torso.

Dawson was crawling across the floor, his whole body now shaking, wracking him from side to side on his knees. His face was pale, blanched of all emotion except from panic. Lucille's eyes drew to what he was edging away from: the gun in the corner of the room. The gun that had shot the man.

Lucille hurried toward him, pulling him away from Tommy and his attacker. The man had his gun raised toward them, aiming to shoot as Tommy rolled on top of him. Dawson's breathing raised, his eyes blazing wild as they landed on his friends beetroot race.

Tommy

The air was thin in the tunnels- one catch of a breath left you gasping for clean air that wasn't contaminated with dust and the stench of blood and dirt. Tommy reached out in front of him with one hand, his other hand reaching toward his neck. Something was gripping it, two ice-cold hands clenched around each side. Was it a German, broken through the side of the tunnel, or was it the horrid draft, choking him from the inside out? He was suffocating, the cold metal of his shovel no longer in his palms but clanging to the ground at his useless feet.

Tommy choked out, finally pushing the unseen force back toward the tunnel wall. He almost expected to see the walls come caving in, crashing metres of thick mud down upon them, suffocating him for a second time. But no dust came splattering down.

A harsh grunt sounded from behind him. Tommy felt the feeling of a man's torso on his back, the outline of a pocket watch or something similar sticking into the skin below his shoulder blades. And behind that, another metallic clatter shouted out. Not the sound of shovels, but the sound of a gun, jumping to hard, real floors.

Tommy's eyes flashed open. The golden detailing of the Garrison's walls was blurred in his eyesight. The struggles breath of his attacker suddenly became obvious. To his side, Lucille was crawling toward the dropped gun, a second held up in her hands, with no chance in her position to shoot.

With a war-like roar, Tommy lunged forward, hands moving from the grip on his neck to the man's elbows, and threw him forward, landing on top of the man on the floor. With the hands removed from his neck, he spluttered out, lurching forward out of his reach. His hands stretched to the side, scraped finger tips scratching over the empty metal container under the table.

Tommy left no time to pause. He threw his body forward, projecting his full strength into the hit. With an ugly crunch, the makeshift weapon battered against the man's face... Again. And again. And again.