"All right fly boys, listen up!" Sgt. Drake Alexander walked into the abandoned house, and looked around. Broken furniture was strewn across the floor, and the two windows on either side of the room, were shattered but other than that, the room was completely empty. "Damn it," Alexander whispered, pulling out his pistol. "I told you guys to stay in one place."
Holding the pistol ready, Alexander looked around the ground floor. Finding no one, he slowly stepped towards the stairwell. "Smoke? Joker? Are you guys still here?" Without waiting for a response, he silently started up the stairs. Once he reached the top, Alexander found himself looking down a long, dark hallway. There were no windows here, and all the doors in the hall were closed, so the only light came from downstairs. "Hunter? Robin? Pyle? Come on. If you guys are here talk to me." Still no answer.
Alexander moved down the hall, listening for sounds in each of the rooms. As he got closer to the end of the hall, Alexander swore that he could hear a group of people whispering. "Alright guys, is that you?" The sounds died down. Moving to the very end of the hall, he put his ear on the very last door. There were definitely people inside. Alexander spoke again, but the time in German. "I am going to walk in the room now. I would ask that you refrain from shooting as soon as I open the door."
Alexander moved away from the door, slowly turning the knob with one hand and holding his pistol in the other, ready to fire. Cautiously, Alexander let the door swing open and entered the room.
"Hey boss!" Alexander instinctively fired at the corner of the room where he heard the voice. For a second, there was only silence. Eventually, a nervous laugh came from behind the bed "All right boss. We get it. That wasn't too funny. Now we're going to come out, and we really hope you don't kill us."
"Joker! Pyle! What the hell do you think you're doing?" One of the men, a skinny youth with light skin responded. "Oh come on boss, we were just having a little fun." He yawned. "You were out there forever! You were gonna bore me to death." The skinny man turned towards the wall and pointed at the spot where Alexander had fired. "Damn boss. You could have shot me!"
Alexander rubbed his temples. "Joker, if you were standing up, I would have. Now where are the others?" He needed to have a word with them.
Private Pyle, the second of the two men, nervously pointed a chubby finger towards a closet in the corner of the room. "T...they are in there sir." With that, three similarly dressed men walked out of the closet.
"Hunter, Robin, Smoke." Alexander began with a sigh. "I'm not going to pretend to know what the hell you all were thinking." Joker spoke up. "Well boss, I already told you. We were just having a bit of fun."
Alexander glared at him. "And if I would have hit you right then, would that have been fun?" Alexander shook his head. "Damn it guys we don't have time for games like this. Unless you haven't realized, the whole countryside is infested with those Nazi bastards. We aren't back home in America where we can slack off! This is their land!
"Sorry Sarge." It was Smoke, small, mousy man that spoke. Another voice chimed in, "Yeah. We didn't mean any harm." It was Robin, an intimidating, bear of a man. Alexander threw his hands in the air. "Whatever. Just don't let it happen again."
Alexander looked at the men. Ever since these five had parachuted out of an airplane two weeks ago, he was supposed to be in charge of them, a task that he found nearly impossible. Back in the States, they were known as the Airborne Elite. They were supposed to be the best that America had to offer. Alexander had to admit, they proved proficient in a firefight, but they simply refused to follow his orders outside of battle.
"So while you guys were here playing around, I was doing a bit of scouting. I found a town about a mile north of here. The place is filled with Hitler's SS, but I talked to some of the civvies and they told me that they should be leaving tomorrow morning." He looked at his men. "There are at least a hundred of them, so we will not be trying to fight them. We'll just slip by them tomorrow, but for now, let's set up here for the night. We wake up tomorrow at sunrise." Alexander pointed at Hunter. "Everyone else can go, but I need to talk with you."
Hunter gave a silent nod, and the room began to clear out, leaving only Alexander and Hunter. Sitting down on the filth-stained bed, Alexander sighed. "What am I going to do with you guys? Here I am chin-strapped and all of you still have energy for pranks." The lanky soldier responded with a shrug. Alexander looked at him. Two weeks and he still couldn't get the man to talk. "Anyways, I needed someone trustworthy for this night shift. I want you to stay up here tonight and wake us if you see any Nazis wandering too far this way. We definitely don't want them to find us here." He stood to the bed and walked to the door. "Oh yeah, and try not to shoot anyone. You do that and the whole swarm will be on us. Dinner's in around an hour so you can come downstairs then."
Alexander went downstairs to meet with the rest of the group. "Hey Boss! We just started a poker game. Want to play a hand or two?" He smiled. "Sure Joker, why not?"
They played a few games the sun started to set, at which point they opened up a few cans of rations. After a while, Smoke stood up and said, "I'm going to go bring Hunter some grub. He hasn't eaten all day." Alexander got to his feet as well. "I might as well go too. Don't want the man to get lonely."
They walked up stairs together with a few cans of rations. They found Hunter sitting on the bed, staring intently out the window. "Hunter, my man!" Smoke said. "Me and Sarge were getting worried about you. Even you have to eat at some point." Hunter looked up gratefully at the two of them and took the food. "What are you looking for anyway? There's nothing out here."
"I asked him to take a shift tonight. He was making sure that the Nazi's didn't get too close to the house." Smoke walked up to the window and peered out into the darkness. "Well," He started. "He wasn't doing too great of a job at it. I can see a light from here."
Both Alexander and Hunter rushed towards the window. Sure enough, there was a light not too far off. "Wait a minute..." Alexander whispered.
"Uh, Sarge!" Smoke said, backing away from the window. "The light's getting closer!"
"Damn it! It's a jeep!" Alexander shouted, rushing out the door. "Guys! Pick up your guns and get ready! We might have company real soon!" Within moments, everyone was downstairs with a rifle in hand. The sound of the jeep was close now. A minute passed and the sound was at the front of the house. Suddenly there was a knock at the front door.
"Citizen!" A gruff voice called out in German. "We have been informed that there were American soldiers in the area. We are patrolling the land in search for them. Would you mind opening the door so we could have a look inside your home?"
Alexander swore under his breath. As he gestured for his unit to be silent, he replied, "Yes sir, we saw those American hooligans! They wanted to stay in our home tonight, but we refused. You see, we barely have enough food for ourselves."
The man outside snorted. "Yes well, we would still like to take a look for ourselves." "But sir…"
Alexander wasn't sure exactly who shot first, but within seconds he found himself in the midst of a storm of bullets. "Get upstairs! We could hold them off from there!" One at a time, his men started to run up to the second floor. Soon enough, it was only him, Pyle, and the Nazis. Taking cover behind a wall, Alexander called out to the Private. "Pyle! Get your ass upstairs!" Reloading, Pyle looked back to him. "Y…yes sir!"
Pyle turned his back to the window and ran to the steps. But when he reached the base of the stairway, he suddenly toppled to the ground. "Pyle!" Jumping out of cover, Alexander grabbed Pyle and brought him to his feet. "Come on now! We can do this!" Dragging him to the top the stairs, Alexander handed off Pyle to Robin. "Put him on the bed. I think he's hu…"
There was a bang, and all of a sudden, Alexander's vision went white. He felt himself rolling down the stairs. There were two more bangs and then, silence. "Oh shit! Boss! Get him to the bed. The bastard shot him too! Damn it, I see another jeep outside! Shit!" Blood began to rush to his ears. Alexander tried to move, but a sharp pain ran through his body. So, this is it.
Alexander felt his breathing slowing down, and the pain starting to fade away. The white he saw started to brighten. Maybe Heaven won't be so bad…
"Don't worry my brother." A soft voice whispered in his ear. "This is far from the end…" With that, everything went black.