This might well be one of the only stories I've ever written in first person. Some of you might've read it over at my "Combat!" website. If so, I hope you enjoy Crossroads as much the second time as the first. To first time readers of this 1997 story, feedback is always appreciated!

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Back in Arkansas, my family will be getting ready for Christmas. In the woods the snow is deep and cleanly white, untouched and undisturbed aside from the footprints of deer and rabbit and the occasional hunter. The air is cold and clear and smelling only of pine and wood smoke.

I can feel it, experience all of it. I can feel home and family and security. I can feel it and I do. But it will pass all too quickly as I wake and roll myself out of a thin wool blanket on the floor of an old shack, the only real shelter I--we've--had in forever.

Here, the snow is disturbed by the feet of a thousand tramping men, turning the beauty of it into an impassable quagmire. There are hunters here, too. Here we're all hunters, but of men.

The air is cold, but never clear of gunsmoke and the clinging cloying smells of war, sweat, decay, death.

The date is December 17th, 1944. I am a medic in the United States Army, 361st Infantry, 2nd Platoon, King Company and the we I speak of are my sergeant, Saunders; Caje, the company scout and interpreter, and Littlejohn, a PFC and a darn good soldier. There are only four of us because we have been assigned as runners. We are supposed to report to Major Callahan, B Battery 285th Field Artillery. I am to stay with the nearby 546th Ambulance Company as a temporary replacement. I guess the Sarge is to receive a verbal message for our Captain Jampel. I don't know what's going on, but communications have been spotty to nonexistent in this part of Belgium for the past twenty four hours. The area is in a state of violent transition, Germans and Allies crossing and criss-crossing paths. Our trip here has been mostly the nightmarish kind of detail.

Some details are of the dream variety. You walk in - no enemy patrols - no mine fields - no foul weather. You do your job and walk back out again. But this has been a nightmare from the start. How it'll finish up is anybody's guess and believe me, I don't plan on thinking that far ahead.

Foul weather, snow and sleet, then bitterly cold; hide and seek with countless German patrols - yeah, a nightmare. My stomach has been tied up in knots and my heart races so fast and loud sometimes it's all I can hear.

To not be afraid for just a little while would be all the Christmas blessing I could ever ask for.

"Hey, Doc...you awake?"

It's Littlejohn's voice and yeah, I am awake but I hesitate to open my eyes and actually admit to it. One more "Hey, Doc!" though, and I do. Littlejohn towers over me, a good-natured smile on his big face.

"Thought there for a minute maybe you were dead!" he jokes.

Here you either joke about death or take it too seriously. Seems the guys who take it too seriously end up that way...dead, I mean.

Sarge and Caje are already up and ready to go. I sorely miss a cup of hot coffee, but Sarge says there'll be time for that once we link up with the major.

We stay to the side of the road. The walking is pretty easy here since the road is all torn up from heavy equipment, tanks and such, probably Allied and German, but for now it's quiet. We pass a sign; St. Vith is south. We're coming up to a crossroads village, Baugnez. This area is all but deserted by the locals and for good reason. Ruined vehicles and buildings are smoking. There's a dead horse, in harness, lying on its side, half blown away but still there. Starving villagers haven't yet had time to butcher its skinny carcass for whatever meat is left.

What happens now is truly odd. Odder still since none of us feels it coming, not even Caje who gives the rest of us the willies when it comes to knowing things are going to happen before they do.

Caje is on point, Sarge next, then me, with Littlejohn bringing up the rear. It's so quiet one minute. I mean you can hear the big guns off in the distance, but nothing close by. Birds are even beginning to chatter a bit in the trees close to the road.

All of a sudden a figure comes running out of the woods, screaming like the hounds of hell are at his heels. I can't see his face yet and as shocked as I am, I freeze right to the ground.

The guy's uniform is so shredded and filthy, I can't even make out if he's one of ours or not. His screams are just that - no words at all.

He launches himself at the sergeant and the two fall back off the roadside. I begin to run when Littlejohn passes me at full gallop.

When we reach Sarge, Caje is there. He tries to pull the guy off Saunders but the soldier is berserk.

"He's got a knife!" I yell but the warning is obviously late. I see now the soldier is bloody. Before I can act, or Littlejohn, Caje unsheathes his own knife. The soldier goes limp and Caje pulls the body off Sarge.

I kneel by Saunders. He's lost his helmet and the Thompson is off a ways in the brush. Littlejohn retrieves both and stands close, on guard.

Caje is checking out the crazy. "One of ours," he observes. There is sadness in his voice.

Saunders is panting from exertion and his uniform, from the wrestling match in the wet snow and mud, is as dirty as the dead man's. His eyes are wide and he looks shocky and pale.

He's also bloody and I search him for wounds. There is an obvious one in his left shoulder from the knife, deep and bleeding a lot. The rest of the blood is coming from a scalp injury. He must've hit his head on a rock when he fell.

I talk to him, question him about any other pain but he answers no. As I clean and bandage him, his color begins to slowly return. The bleeding in the shoulder stops pretty fast, but the scalp wound is stubborn.

"He needs a hospital," I comment to Caje, who crouches down next to me. The Cajun nods.

"It's only a mile or so till we reach the 546th Ambulance, if they haven't moved out. Can you make it, Sarge?" I ask.

Saunders nods yes, sits up with a bit of help from me, then makes it to his feet with help from me and Caje. It takes a minute for him to get his bearings. Littlejohn hands him his helmet.

"Do you want the Tommygun back, Sarge?"

"I'm okay, Littlejohn. I think I actually feel better than I look."

I find that highly doubtful, but help the Sarge sling the weapon over his right shoulder. His left hand I tuck into his partially zippered field jacket. I have no sling nor any extra bandages to rig one.

While I do that, Caje rolls the crazy soldier's body off into the brush and removes one of his dog tags. Without comment, he walks over to the sergeant and hands the ID to him.

There isn't really anything to be said. Caje and Saunders both know the scout did what he had to. An Allied soldier's death is appalling, but in this case it could've happened no other way. There was no time. For Saunders to have voiced his thanks out loud - well, that wouldn't have been right. So the Sarge nods and takes the tag, dropping it into his jacket pocket.

We walk the better part of an hour, more than a mile for sure. We come across a lot of GIs, but none from the 285th or the 546th, and everybody's in a state of confusion. When we ask directions twice we're pointed north and twice south-east toward Waismes, the way we'd come!

Sarge needs a break so we take five. I help settle Saunders down and check him out. He's doing okay, everything considered, and pulls out his map. Caje has gone on ahead, toward Malmedy where Sarge thinks the 285th would head. They were advancing last time we heard - pushing hard at the Krauts. But that was the last we heard and at the front, things change faster than the weather back home.

Caje is running back towards us, fast, not his usual relaxed lope.

"We gotta go! Gotta run! Back towards Waismes! Come on, hurry!" He
grabs at Saunders, hauling the sergeant to his feet.

The Sarge gets real pale, but shakes off Caje's hands. "Wait a minute!
What's going on, Caje? What happened?"

"Sarge...Krauts up ahead...lots of tanks, close by. They got prisoners and they're heading this way!"

"Okay, let's move!"

We start to run and Caje is right. Already I hear mechanized equipment moving up - heavy stuff and tanks for sure. We run, but Sarge isn't gonna make it far. Whatever strength he had is gone.

Littlejohn and I pull Sarge into the brush at the side of the narrow farm road we cut off onto. Caje watches our backs.

I lay flat on my face next to Sarge, one hand on his back so I can feel his breathing. Like mine, it's fast and shallow. Through my field jacket and the sweater underneath and the shirt and t-shirt under that, I feel the cold wet of the snow and mud I'm laying in begin to soak me. Snow is beginning to fall too and I think the temperature is dropping. Bad news for us all but especially the Sarge. But if it's got to snow, I pray it gets heavy enough to hide us from the Krauts.

I wonder why Caje hasn't followed us into the brush and I turn my head and crawl over a bit to see the road. I see Caje. He's looking up the road at something or someone and he's laying down his rifle! He raises his hands in surrender. Germans come into sight and I hear Caje telling them he's alone - separated from his squad. But the Krauts don't buy it that easy. They start to poke into the underbrush.

Littlejohn sees what's happening, too. He looks at me and then at the Sarge, then bolts out onto the road. He lays down his rifle, walks a few steps toward the Germans.

"I give up! Don't shoot! I give up!" He continues to walk away from us, trying to pull them off. It's for nothing.

They drag me out first, then the Sarge. Saunders is in a bad way and they're rough with him. Caje and Littlejohn protest and get a clubbing from a rifle butt for their efforts. I truly hate these Krauts. That I should hate any man is disgusting to me. But somehow I feel a difference in them, an inhumanness, a total lack of morality.

They drag the sergeant up by the back of his jacket. Somehow he stays on his feet and glares at the Krauts. They pay him no mind and move us out.

Farther down the farm road we come to a clearing. There's a lot going on here -- Krauts, tanks, vehicles, and in the clearing a large number of PWs, Americans. Krauts circle the clearing. They're heavily armed and the tanks and jeeps have their machine guns trained on the prisoners. I break into a cold sweat that has absolutely nothing to do with exertion. Caje feels it too. His eyes meet mine over the Sarge's bowed head as we try to keep up with our captors and hold Saunders up on his feet.

"There must be close to a hundred GIs here," Littlejohn whispers to me. "I think we found the 546th too."

I agree. Many of the men wear the red cross armband of the Medical Corps, and they all look as cold and scared as we are. Some are wounded.

We lean the sergeant up against the thick stump of a tree. He rouses himself and takes a look around. "I don't like this...not one bit."

Saunders sees what we've already noticed. In this field we're fairly close to the southernmost edge. A ways beyond the perimeter the woods begin. Trees are a bit sparse, but there is brush cover. Here, where we are, there is none.

"We gotta get out of here, Doc," Sarge says. He's right, I know. We all know.

We try to keep warm, me, Caje and Littlejohn, walking in tight circles, stamping our feet, moving our arms like pinwheels and shaking out our hands. We dare not talk to the men nearest us. Any attempts have been met with threats and shouted curses from the Krauts.

Sarge is beginning to float in and out of sleep. It's hard to keep him warm. Littlejohn tries to give up his jacket to cover Saunders, but I won't let him. Snow is still falling and the cold is getting more intense, deeper, numbing us to our bones.

The Krauts took our watches so I can't be certain of the time, but it's probably around two or three p.m. More GIs have been rounded up and herded in. Sounds like a bunch of cattle. To them that's all we are. My stomach growls in hunger.

Everyone is tense. The GIs are milling around, tired of waiting, freezing. Something is going on at the far end of the field. I want to bolt, make a run for it. Instead I sit down next to Sarge. Without a word Caje and Littlejohn also sit, close, all touching for the warmth and the comfort.

A shot is fired - a single pistol report. Then, within seconds, it seems like the whole Kraut army is opening up on us.

I pull Sarge over and cover his body with mine. Littlejohn and Caje are as flat to the ground as they can get, face down, in the cold slush. Bullets kick up snow and mud and all around us I hear the screams of the wounded and dying. Littlejohn is hit and Caje. I hear their muffled cries and as suddenly as it started, the shooting stops.

I try raising my head. I do it only by sheer force of will. I've been in this war long enough to know what I'll see.

I just want to go home - now. To be transported there somehow. Maybe this is a dream and I'll wake up at home, in my own bed, warm and safe.

These thoughts are mine for only seconds. Because that's all the time it takes for my real situation to kick in.

The screaming is real and too close. I am a medic, after all. But God I'm scared and not ashamed to admit it to myself, so I sit up and tend to my own men first. Sarge is bleeding again from all the rough treatment but he can wait. I check out Caje, who's already sitting up. He's bleeding from a wound high up in the shoulder. The bullet went through mostly flesh, with no bone involvement and no major blood vessels hit. I patch him up using bandaging and sulfa I scrounge from another medic lying dead nearby.

Littlejohn is okay too, but his wound is in his left arm. It's messy but not life-threatening.

Right now there's a lull. It's like the Krauts are wondering what to do next. So many men are dead or wounded. While I'm working on the sergeant, I see two GIs working their way to the edge of the field. In seconds, they're gone. I say a silent prayer they make it.

Sarge, Caje and Littlejohn are all lying flat. Sarge says the Krauts will only be confused for a little while. He says they'll open fire again, this time kill us all.

But I've got to do my job. I crawl over the nearest wounded man. I know it's no use. It's a head wound but I wrap him in bandaging and try to comfort him before moving on to the next man.

Sarge calls out to me. "Doc! Get down! Stay down! The Krauts see you!"

I turn and see two Germans walking toward me. One carries a rifle, the other, the officer, a pistol. The officer yells something at me in German. The words I don't get, but the tone, that I understand. I get to my feet and point to the red cross on my sleeve and then to the dying man on the ground. More angry words in German. They're close now - so close I can see the officer's eyes are a cloudy, milky sky blue. His Luger is pointed at the dying GI. He fires - raises the pistol and fires point blank at me.

I know my face registers surprise, but not pain for I feel none. The cries of horror I hear are from my men, my friends. I see their faces as I fall - Sarge, Caje and Littlejohn.

And for a moment I am home and I am warm and I am safe. The war is over.

xxxxx

"Doc!" I hear myself scream and it's against everything in me to stay put, but I have to stay in control. I'm the sergeant. I'm in command. I reach out with either hand to grab at Caje and Littlejohn and hold them back. They're soldiers and against their own wills, instinct takes over and they remain still beneath my fingertips. My strength is gone and I couldn't hold them back now anyway. The Krauts don't seem to pay us any heed; they seem to be in a hurry now. They walk back quickly, avoiding the bodies of the dead and wounded. They're blind and
dumb.

Some of the tanks pivot their positions and head off up the road. Others are coming.

"Sarge, we gotta get outta here!" It's Caje to my left. I nod and tap Littlejohn to my right, whispering to him, "Now."

We crawl, scramble and finally run, low to the ground. Every second I expect to be seen. My shoulder screams and my head feels like it's going to explode. The pain behind my eyes is so bad it blurs my vision. I hang on to the back of Littlejohn's jacket. The firing begins again, but we make it to the brush. We can't stop, but begin to crawl from ditch to ditch, brush clump to brush clump, in and out of half-frozen muddy water. Blindly I hang on to Littlejohn, do as he does until I pass out. As I feel it coming I swear I hear Kraut voices. I know I still hear the firing.

I wake up too fast and the world goes out of focus. Caje and Littlejohn are with me and I feel pain so I'm not dead.

"We made it, Sarge." Littlejohn pats my arm awkwardly, reassuringly.

Caje agrees, adding, "We made it a couple miles, I figure. We're a ways off the road heading toward Malmedy - a little farm. This is the chicken coop." He smiles and offers me a bit of milk in a beat-up tin dipper. It tastes like heaven.

"Littlejohn found a cow...a very skinny cow," Caje adds as if needing to explain the small amount in the cup.

Both men look exhausted and pale. We must be a sorry sight.

Littlejohn sits next to me, stretching out his long legs, boots touching the opposite wall of the tiny lean-to.

"The Krauts didn't pass this way, Sarge, but we figure they could still be lookin' for survivors. We couldn't run any more." He notices my expression.

"Neither of us could run any more either, Sarge. It wasn't just you that stopped us."

Caje also sits down and stretches out, rubbing at his wounded shoulder. His jacket front is stiff with dried blood. "When it gets full dark, I'll sneak up to the barn over there," he jerks a thumb in the direction behind us, "and see if I can't find a blanket or some food, anything we can use."

I lose consciousness or fall into some kind of sleep. It hits me so fast I only have time for one thought. Even if the Krauts don't find us, we could all still die here, from cold, or infection...But I know one of us has gotta make it. One of us has got to tell what happened here, near Malmedy, Belgium, December 17th, 1944. We owe it to Doc… and to the others and to ourselves.

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Tuesday, December 19, 1944:

The corporal crouched down, cautious, rifle ready. He peered into the tiny coop. For the first time that day, the haggard, exhausted GI smiled.

"Looks like we got three live ones here!"