This story uses the headcanon that nation have an accerlerated rate of healing that accerlerates more in times of crisis. An LCT is a Landing Craft Transit. More information after you read the story.


America came to choking on salt water.

What the freaking hell?

Why had he passed out?

Why was it so loud?

Why had no one pulled him out of the water?

Where was he?

Why couldn't he get up?

Why did his head hurt so fucking much?

Gingerly, he attempted to probe the pounding side of his head. Damn!

His thumb hurt. He had slashed it on the side of his helmet.

He was wearing his helmet because-

Omaha Beach.

Fucking Omaha Beach.

60% first wave casualties expected.

So many more dead so far.

Dead.

So many dead

Dead.

Dead.

Bang!

Fuck!

A shell exploded less than twenty feet away from him. He scrambled to his feet, only to slam back to the ground.

The sand was slippery and Hhis side was covered in blood and-

his

head

hurt.

He jabbed his fingernails into his palm so that he did not feel the pain in his fingertips as he felt his head. There was a horizontal scrape in his helmet- probably from when his landing craft had hit a teller mine- and a rough edged hole in the scrape. A bullet hole.

He had been shot in the head.

Damn it.

Who knew how many soldiers had died while had lay in the sand unconscious?

Damn it!

He struggled to get a grip in the wet sand.

A tank exploded. Orange flames flared out, the concussion flipped him over, the noise slammed through his already pounding head, and someone gave a horrid desperate scream.

Why had he joined this godawful war?

Oh right.

Because Japan bombed Pearl Harbor.

Because Britain was fighting on his own.

Because he had to be a hero for Philippines and China and-

France.

There was something underneath his hand. A partly destroyed beach obsticle, ot a piece of landing craft. Whatever. It was solid. He grabbed it, planted his right foot next to it, and started hauling himself upright.

Machine gun fire screamed over his head.

Fifty yards to his lift an LCT was unloading.

Soldiers were splashing into the water and slipping and getting shot dying and dying and dying.

His left leg folded underneath him

Holy fucking Hell!

His knee hurt. There was a chunk of metal in it, caught beneath his knee cap. He Ow! dug it Fuck! out. Hell that hurt.

He had to get to the sea wall, where his mean were hurt and dying and dead.

Dead.

He stomped on his hurt leg until it was numb.

A shell exploded near him.

He noticed his gun was missing.

The U.S.S. Satterlee pulled up along the shore, so close America thought it would ground itself- please don't run aground, please don't- and fired at the pill boxes on the cliffs with 5" guns.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

He dragged off his mangled helmet, scraping his head in the process, and grabbed one from a dead soldier- Rick Neal, from Philadelphia, 18, lied about his age on enlistment, obsessed with rock music, girlfriend waiting at home- and took and M-1 from a soldier whose face and left side were full of shrapnel- Johnathan Shalhank, card shark, 22 next month, from Detroit, has a wife and three year old praying for him at home- and set off in a lopsided run for the sea wall, where his soldiers were huddled, scared and hurt and dying and dead and about to die.


Thank you for reading. Both soldiers America takes gear from are fictionel. The places where America is thinking 'So many dead' where intended to have actual numbers, but casualty estimate for D-day are pretty shaky, and I didn't want to guess. The reason the narrative jumps from America's thoughts to description, is an attempt to bring to life the absolute chaos of Omaha Beach. The thing with the U.S.S. Satterlee is true, the navy off shore of the beach got tried of watching soldiers get shot, so they pulled in as close as they could and shot at German entranchments and fired at them with their big guns. I think I got stuck with this story's chopy style.

Thank you very much for reading. Most of this was typed on an iPof touch, so if you noticed an typos, please let me know.