"Fucking Christ," George raked an impatient hand through miles and miles of thick brown hair. He bit his lip; an irate sigh escaped through gritted teeth. "Max, please tell me this is a dream. A really, really wet one."

George Luz.

Joker extraordinaire.

And best friend of over fifteen years.

I could say that I had joined the paratroopers for glory. For honor. For the extra fifty bucks a month that my family could've used in a time like this. But those would all be lies and, truthfully, I was no liar. I had morals…even if I was committing fraud by claiming I had a penis hiding in my pants when, clearly, at least to myself, I was sorely lacking one.

No, it was George Luz that brought me to good old Georgia. To Camp Toccoa. Of course, it had been involuntary on his part. Perhaps it could be better explained as…motivation. He was my muse. My inspiration. The nagging thought that gnawed and tore and hacked away at any hope for a good night's sleep the day George announced to our small group of troublemakers that he was joining the paratroopers. I could kill him for it…for abandoning us to go get killed in some foreign country. But then again, it would be a sin, to have all the fun. I was sure that someone else would want to do it for me, and with the sort of relish that only men seemed capable of cultivating, before the first week was up.

"Was that a confession of love?"

He was clearly not amused. "Get your ass up."

I was dragged out the back of the supplies truck with bone-crushing force and nearly landed on my ass, but George made sure that didn't happen. No, he had a firm grip on the collar of my shirt. One that, if I hadn't made such a scene clawing at my throat and wheezing and being completely melodramatic, might have strangled me.

Luckily for me, his selective hearing had, for once, worked toward my advantage.

"What the hell are you doing here?" He hissed. "Are you trying to get me killed?"

"Never mind getting me killed," I retorted with an unladylike-like snort. "Just skip on over to guilt by association. That seems logical."

"It's legal for me to be here," George replied. "And I've got a penis to prove it and a whole lot of suffering coming my way for getting involved in this shit too."

"C'mon, Luz," I bit back a derisive current of laughter. "This is me you're talking to here…you don't gotta lie! When have you ever had respect for the law?"

"Since my dumbass friend of the female persuasion decided to stowaway in the back of a truck heading for boot camp," he said, then paused and sniffed me. "Wearing perfume. You know like twenty guys asked me if I had a nice little run through the flower garden before I left?"

"They thought it was you?"

"There were traces of it on me," he deadpanned. "They assumed."

"You know what assuming does."

"Makes me smell like a fucking girl?"

"Well, last time I heard it was 'makes an ass out of you and me', but I guess your version make sense too," I scrunched my nose, recalling his insult. "And hey, buddy. That's a low blow! Why would you say I smell like a whore? That doesn't seem fair."

I could feel his breath on my face. That was how close he was. My long-harbored, but never confessed attraction toward him began to flutter around the empty spaces of my stomach like butterflies. He still smelled good. Like old cigarettes mixed with the musky notes of cologne.

His grip on me tightened. Underneath the moon, his eyes looked half-wild, but it was just the way the light reflected off them. In the sun, they were dark and mild. Perhaps a little mischievous as George was, and would always be, an impish little boy at heart.

But this was serious George. Not the boy who put tacks on the teacher's chair or mocked the principal at recess. This was him on the brink of making a change. One that would affect him for the rest of his life. On the eve of his first day of boot camp, George Luz was a force to be reckoned with. All nerves and severity and there was no room for jokes. Not now.

"Maxine, I want you to go home," he said. "Where it's safe. War is no place for a girl. And what are you doing in the back of a truck? What if someone else had been ordered to come over here and do the drudge work, huh? What would you have done then?"

"Well, I didn't think that far ahead. Besides, it's no place for you either, George. I'm not going," I crossed my arms defiantly across my chest. "You can throw me over your shoulder like a sack of mushrooms but like any fungus…I'll just keep coming back."

A ghost of a smile. I saw it there in the corner of his mouth. "Not if I lop of your legs you won't."

"That would fall under the category of 'not safe'," I rebutted pointedly. "How will I get back home with no legs? Not to mention how will I get around?"

"I'll throw you in the back of a taxi. Let you bleed a little."

"That sounds like a perfectly foolproof plan."

"I mean it," he said, transitioning back into serious George. "You're going home. Tonight."

"Back to what? Moping around, wishing you were here, working tables at the local grease pub?" I scoffed, digging my feet a little deeper into the Toccoa sand. "There is no way in this hell or the next that I am going back to that filthy excuse for a burger joint."

"Get this through your fat fucking head, Max." His voice raised, his eyes flashed. "You are going home."

He might have been taller, more muscular and had a deeper voice, which made him all the more intimidating and fucking alluring in my eyes, but that didn't mean shit. I'd dealt with his masculinity for as long as I could remember, back in a time when our voices matched. When all George seemed to wear was a patched up grin and scabby knees. And even as it began to expand and George changed, for the better and for the worst all at the same time (this made it so confusing and my hormones were simply not ready for it), I still got used to it. Acclimation is the soul of survival. This was especially true when dealing with the likes of good old George Luz.

"I'm afraid not," I replied calmly. Collectedly. It was a woman's job to be the calm in the middle of the storm of a man's out of control temper tantrums. "You see, I am now enlisted as Maximilian Austen in the highly esteemed 101st Airborne Division. Congratulations to me, huh?"

He stared at me. Incredulous. I had half a mind to ask him if he meant to catch flies that way but knowing the precarious situation I was in, risking his wrath didn't seem like the best idea I'd had. Then again, this one probably wasn't considered a stroke of genius either.

For a moment, there was only silence. The moon filtered through a thin layer of clouds that had begun to form in front of a black veil sky stitched with stars. All around us, the camp was still. There were bouts of laughter that swelled up out of the barracks here and then, but mostly it was as quiet as a graveyard. Perhaps less welcoming than one as well.

At last, he breathed. I hadn't noticed, but neither of us had taken a breath for a long time. It was no wonder that my lungs were burning as I heaved an impatient sigh.

George ran a nervous hand through his hair again. It protested and bristled for a moment before falling back into what looked like a deliberate mess. "All right, but if you die it's not my fault. You don't have permission to come back and haunt me for the rest of my life because you were the one that decided to follow me out here," he said. "God knows why anyone would want to put themselves through boot camp."

"I could ask the same of you, but I would bet on not getting a serious answer."

"You're probably right." He said.

"So you're not going to tell me?"

"Who says I didn't?"

"I never got a straight answer."

"That's because you never asked a straight question."

"Okay George Luz, you want a straight question? Well here it is. Don't miss it cause it's heading your way," I said. "Why did you join the paratroopers?"

He cast a disapproving look at my hair. "We've got some work to do before we hit the sack."

For a moment, I was struck dumb and I forgot all about my question. The word sack got my attention faster than if he would have pulled down his pants right in front of me without warning. Damn the hormones…I still wasn't free of adolescence; it was like plague. You never really got rid of it.

His tactic had worked. I was completely uninterested in his rationality at the moment. All I could think of was us. Together. Naked. In a bed.

God it was a beautiful sight.

Still, despite the unlikelihood of such a situation coming to fruition, I was hopeful as I stared after him. He was walking away; this didn't look good for a fantasy struggling to come true.

I scuttled after him. "Hit the sack…together?"

The next morning, we were roused before dawn.

It wasn't the most pleasant wake up call I'd ever had. If I wanted to be honest, it was the worst fucking way to wake up after only four hours of sleep in my life. But I wasn't quite sure if our new Captain was even human yet. I had to make sure. The last thing I wanted was to learn he could read minds the hard way after fantasizing about all the beautifully gruesome ways I could kill the son of a bitch with a rusty bayonet.

It was about four in the morning when he came through the door. We had all been snug as bugs in rugs in our cots, a euphemism used to describe the piece of shit pile of springs we were given as beds. Complete with scratchy wool sheets and a paper-thin excuse for a mattress. Sleeping on it was like sleeping on a bed of nails, but after a long day of scheming and grueling travel, I was ready for a bed of hot coals if that was all there was available. At least I'd be warm.

For the last minute of the sleep we scrounged up from a night of tossing and turning, most of us dreamed pleasantly.

Then the nightmare on legs walked in.

Banging a wooden spoon against a pan.

While blowing a whistle.

I could've killed the bastard and been praised for it by my peers. Probably given a medal of fucking honor for it too.

Next to me, George groaned, but leapt out bed faster than a jackrabbit. I was a little slower, much to George's utter dismay, and was promptly yanked out of the twisted sheets before our C.O. walked by and witnessed my sluggishness.

I yawned as the man addressed us.

"Attention!"

We all snapped into stick-straight postures and hoped to sweet Jesus above that we could stay on our feet long enough to hear the entire welcoming speech.

"So, this is the future of combat," The man scrutinized us as he walked along the rows of empty cots. He didn't look impressed. Not in the least bit. "This is the group of misfits, hot-heads and runts I've been stuck with this summer to train and pass off as able-bodied soldiers."

He paused in the middle of his lecture at the first sign of impermissible stirring. "Did I say you could move, private?"

"No, sir!"

The C.O.'s heavy stomping could have probably been heard in China. The poor souls probably thought it was an earthquake. Alas, it was only an asshole superior asserting his undeniable authority in Toccoa. "Are you deaf, Private? I said no moving!"

The private kept quiet. Apparently he knew better than to dance with the Devil. The C.O. began moving through the cots again. I struggled to stay completely motionless and, more importantly, awake as the seconds wore on into torturous minutes. Across from me, George was as still as a statue.

"My name is Captain Sobel. When spoken to, you will answer, without fail, to me as sir. You are to address me as Captain. We are not buddies from college, we are not even friends. One slip up and I will make you wish you were never born. Got it?"

"Yes sir!" Was the chorused reply.

"Good," he said, looking us over one more time. His gaze flickered to me and he appraised my lack of stature.

"Private."

I knew he was talking to me. I was just…wishing I was invisible and he was speaking to the wall behind my cot. Or the cot itself. Whichever one he preferred. I swallowed hard and attempted to meet the eyes of my superior. Show him I wasn't soft.

I had to incline my head. It felt like I was looking up at a towering skyscraper or the summit of a very steep mountain. Captain Sobel's eyes danced in a sort of amused spark of light. He found it funny that I had to tilt my head upwards to look at him. Apparently he was a jackass.

"Did I say you could kneel, Private?" Sobel inquired.

It was funny. For a moment, I could swear on my mother's life that he actually sounded serious.

I didn't move a muscle. Didn't betray the thoughts that slithered through my head like a rogue snicker. "Kneel, sir?"

"Answer the question, Private."

I straightened up a little more. "I am not kneeling, sir."

"So you really are…that short." He clarified.

"Yes, sir."

A laugh escaped the tyrant's composure and he walked on. My innermost desire to torture the man to death was intensified tenfold. A few of the other men found it hilarious as well; a few chuckles reached my ears and my cheeks burned with a ferocious blush.

"Today's schedule is as follows," Sobel continued as the laughter died away. "Your first lecture begins at 0700 hours. Before lecture, there will be breakfast in the mess hall which promptly begins at 0500 hours. And between these two miserable hours, we will begin physical training. It will be grueling. It will be painful. But you will do it or you will not get your wings. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir!" Another unanimous reply.

"Change into your P.T. gear. Since it's your first day, I'll give you five minutes," Sobel turned and walked hastily toward the entrance. It was still dark outside.

Before he left the building completely, however, he turned and with a wicked grin, said, "There is someone who I'd like you all to meet. You'll be well acquainted by the end of your training, I think."

We had been through a month of boot camp and already we had survived multiple encounters with Sobel's undisputed insanity. Thirty days of torture; only eighty two to go.

The spaghetti incident, for example, was much talked about. It was a favorite topic amongst those who hated Sobel, which was mostly everyone who wasn't completely devoid of pride, as a companion to the discussions of 'infractions', otherwise known as minuscule details that only the Devil himself would know to look for. We all agreed that Sobel (now the official Lieutenant Asswipe) was not human. He was most certainly Lucifer incarnate. If only we could prove it.

A week prior, we had been promised not only a light lecture afternoon, but also a substantial lunch. After nearly a month of being pushed to the brink of starvation on nothing but army slop, we were all thrilled to hear about the change in the menu. None of us had stopped to think of Sobel's diabolical plan to sit us down, let us stuff ourselves until we were nearly bursting with noodles and 'army ketchup' (so said Perconte, but I wasn't Italian...noodles and red sauce meant spaghetti to me), and then proceed to change the plan at the last second and make us run Currahee. I wasn't the only one that lay awake that night completely drenched in sweat from intense stomach pain.

This particular day found us in lecture. It was a Friday, a few hours before our weekend passes would be handed out, and everyone had been on their best behavior this week so we could have one two day period without Sobel breathing down our necks or having latrines to scrub. A group of us already planned on going to the local pub, where the guys would drink beer, be rowdy and maybe find some attractive company to soothe their sore eyes. After weeks of looking at Sobel's ugly mug with absolutely no female reprieve, I couldn't blame the poor fellas. I'd be going completely batshit crazy too if I wasn't already loony from exhaustion.

George and I, on the other hand, would be playing darts and ordering hard liquor. Back home, we'd played darts frequently. I always lost, of course, on the grounds that I was a girl and all girls had a poor arm when it came to sports. Of course this was George's chauvinistic point of view. I found no flaw in my aim; just badly manufactured darts and that was not my fault at all.

It was a relatively light afternoon. Sobel had been called away to meet with Colonel Sink on an urgent business matter and Easy Company was given a breather. The moment we all heard the announcement, a widespread sigh of relief filled the barracks. I had immediately smelled coffee and stale cigarettes laced with peppermint. And it got unbearably stuffy with so much body heat and hot breath being emanated all at once.

George ruffled my short hair. God, I was so glad to just be able to sit and not run up fucking Currahee. After the war, when I got home, all I wanted to do was blow up that mountain and watch it burn and crumble beneath me. That would be a dream come true. The only thing that would make it better would be knowing Sobel had been running it as an early morning exercise and I had happened to catch him off guard.

Daydreams were so sweet sometimes.

So sweet that, the moment I started thinking about the far-fetched image of Sobel and Currahee going up in flames, I missed the last ten minutes of lecture. George delivered a crushing blow to the ribs and my pen was projected off my lap like a bullet.

"You fucking twat."

"Now, now," George teased, watching with a barely contained smile as I attempted, in vain, to rub the ache out of my skin. In an impression of my father, whose distinctive voice was often hard to imitate, he added, "that there is called swearing. And it is not considered polite young – whoa man!"

I snarled and gave him a violent shove as he threatened to expose me in front of at least fifty men. "Fuck polite; I'm in pain."

"Who's in pain?" Doc Roe's deep Louisiana accent rose up out of the crowd of scattered murmurs. I looked over at the dark-haired, dark-eyed Cajun and motioned toward George with my free hand.

"Oh, it's nothin' serious Gene," I replied. "Just being cruelly brutalized by a comrade in arms."

Roe's sixth sense calmed as he caught the note of levity in my voice and he gave a distant nod of understanding. As quickly as he had come into the conversation, he bowed out. I watched him merge into the crowd of Easy men; the boy seemed to have no sense of humor, at least from what I observed.

Looking to George in confusion, I gestured to the silent, aloof medic. "Does that boy ever say more than two words put together?"

"He doesn't like to get close to nobody," George answered with a shrug of nonchalance. It wasn't considered masculine to care about anything. "It's a typical medic rule, or so goes the lecture in medic duties brought to you by Ralph Spina…so, how about those passes? I'm dying for a cold beer."

"You're always dying when it comes to alcohol."

"Well, save me or have me committed," George replied.

"You'll have to be saved tomorrow. We've got a twelve mile march tonight."

"Do you always have to rain on my parade?" His entire expression lit up, suddenly, like a moth caught in a flame. It was a beautiful sight to behold; his eyes turned to liquid amber and my insides proceeded to melt like ice pops on a hot day. "'Ey! 'Ey Liebgott. Going my way?"

Joe Liebgott's pale, handsome face crept into view. An arrogant smirk was perched on the corners of his mouth like the smooth, polished feathers of a narcissistic bird. A Jewish bird, no less. "If your way is going to get a fucking pass to get out of this shithole tomorrow night."

"A beer on me then?"

"You bet your ass."

"Great, as long as I get to keep it."

"The beer or the ass?" I asked.

"Nobody I know wants your scrawny ass, Luz," Guarnere quipped from behind us.

"As opposed to your very large one then? I suppose that's in high demand."

"Shaddup."

"I don't know how you manage to keep all that extra fat on when we are worked to the bone on a daily basis," George continued, almost philosophically. If it weren't for the sarcastic lilt he put on the end of his words, I would've believed he was actually serious. For a second or two. "Sobel practically runs us to death."

"It's called good genes. You can thank my mother for this fine view," Guarnere drawled with a sardonic grin, lifting a cigarette out of his breast pocket.

In a matter of one month, we'd all become addicted to nicotine. It was like clockwork – join the army, gain a bad habit to go along with it. Cursing and smoking seemed the obvious choices that would make mothers all over the world sob in horror and dismay and, therefore, were the most popular.

"Hey, help out a charity case here?" I asked. Guarnere handed me one of the snow-white sticks and tossed me the lighter.

George took one too. He inspected it for a moment before pressing it against is lips. "Basketcase is more like it."

I held up the lighter to the end of my smoke. "Suck my dick, George."

"If you had one."

Guarnere's frame shook with deep, hearty laughter. It was a blessing that he had found it so comical as I had just begun to turn the palest shade of white the world had ever seen. I looked almost ghostly, walking there beside my best friend. "Ah fuck!" He wheezed, packing away his remaining nicotine. "God, Luz. You kill me."

"That's what I'm here for," He raised his hands, as if to look innocent. The impish grin on his face gave him away. "To kill."

I rolled my eyes as I tore open the door to our barrack and prepared myself for a long three hours of overdue fatigue duty.

We had only two hours before the passes we were given the day before were valid.

George whistled as he scrubbed his boots with a toothbrush. If I didn't know any better, I'd think it was Perconte's; the boy was always brushing his teeth. It really was a miracle that they hadn't fallen out already from overstimulation. But I'd made sure that he took it out of his own kit and not Frank's, which was in dangerous proximity of George's wayward hands.

"Ready for a good ball busting tonight George?"

"I'm always ready for a good ball busting," he replied, holding up his spit-shined boot in the light. He appraised it with one eye, then decided it wasn't clean enough and set to work once again. "However, I always like to be prepared so I don't look like an ass while I receive it. What is it that is busting my balls again?"

"Me. You. And the darts that I'm going to whip your ass at tonight."

"I think you have an ass whipping on your calendar, my good friend," he rebutted. "You are completely confusing my ineptitude with yours."

"No, I've got it right," I explained, throwing one clean boot on my pillow. One down, one to go. "You're going down in flames, George my boy."

"And you, Max, are deluded."

I looked over my shoulder for a prospective victim. One, an honest and rather blunt fellow, immediately caught my eye. "Malarkey!"

He didn't even look up from his work. "Yeah?"

"Who do you think would win at darts," I asked. "Me or Luz here."

"Is that even a fair question?" Malarkey snorted. "You throw like a girl."

George fell apart in a fit of giggles that almost sent me back a few years in the past. The image of a little boy with too much hair and knobby, scarred up knees came to mind.

I scowled and inwardly cursed Malarkey's underwear to disintegrate on a run up Currahee. "Kindly shut the fuck up would you George?"

"Even Malarkey knows you're shit at darts!" George wheezed. Fed up, I chucked my toothbrush at him and it pegged him square in the temple. At least the laughter stopped; it came flying back at me, however, and I took a blow to the lip.

"You two have some growing up to do," Malarkey shook his head. "What's the matter, huh? Sobel's endless torture making you regress back to childhood or something?"

"Speak for yourself Donald." I retorted. George and I shared a peel of snickers.

Ten minutes picked up the pace and time flew by quickly as we worked in silence. Before long, my boots were shined to perfection, so flawlessly, in fact, that I could spot a pimple on my ass in their reflection. I reached deep into the pocket of my fatigues and felt the sharp paper edges of the signed, dated and completely authorized pass against my fingertips. Hi ho silver indeed.

"George, you ready?"

He yawned and stretched, stiff from hours of sitting in one unchanging attitude. His boots lay before him on his cot, shined and ready for inspection. He'd been working on cleaning his gun, making sure that the dust on the sight aperture that had gotten his pass revoked last time had not returned.

"I was ready twenty minutes ago. But apparently you weren't."

"Stop complaining. At least we're getting out of here."

"You guys leaving already? Thought you were gonna wait for me." Liebgott's voice carried over from the other side of the room. Malarkey, Guarnere and Toye looked up from their toils as well.

"I never said that," I answered, looking to George. "Did you ever say that?"

"Nope."

"Asswipes," Liebgott's mouth turned upward, forming into a cheeky grin. "You're waiting for me."

"Is that an order, sir?" George quipped.

Another pair of footsteps echoed across the nearly empty quarters. Sergeant Lipton appeared in the doorway. He looked relaxed for once. "Who's going down to the local tavern for a beer?"

"And a round of craps Sarge?" I added.

"That goes without saying," Lipton replied.

"All right, people, let's move our asses," George announced to the room. "The night is young and so are we so let's not wait until we all get old here! Everyone who gets out of this room in the next five seconds gets a free beer on me."

Every man who had been present to hear such an offer, one they could never refuse, was suddenly propelled off their cots. The sound of animals fighting for the doorway ensued as George and I got up and followed them outside at a leisurely pace. I gave him a punch in the shoulder and he swayed to the side a little.

"God, I'm just so good at motivation aren't I?" He sighed happily, yanking me under his arm. Even at five foot eight, George towered over me, and so I was buried in his armpit. Luckily he had showered that afternoon and didn't smell like a sweaty old sock. "Maybe I should be a drill sergeant. I'd love to give old Sobel a nice kick in the teeth."

I was too busy admiring the smell of George's bath soap to really care what he was saying.

But I agreed with him anyway. I mostly always did.

A/N: FIRST AND FOREMOST - This is based on the mini-series not the real George Luz. So, of course, artistic license has and will be taken during the course of this story. Sorry it's so long, but I wanted to establish everyone's character. Well, at least some of everyone. More 'brothers' will appear in the next chapter. And if you wanna know what Maxine looks like, I'll have a picture up on my profile page. Hopefully I find one and it shows up before you read this. Haha. If not! Then there's always checking back later. Please let me know what you think! If I got anything wrong, if I got someone's character wrong or if there's something I should change grammar-wise...don't be afraid to let me know! I don't bite...at least not that hard. ;) And hopefully my OC doesn't come across as a Mary Sue. She's got a lot of growing up to do before this story is over. Right now, she is an eighteen-year-old wise-ass who knows nothing outside of high school, George Luz and hormones. A sad sheltered life that will soon come crashing down all around her. :]

So, reviews are like chocolate! Everyone loves them and those who don't are weeird. And for those of you who didn't catch that, that was what I liked to call a bad joke. ;)
But seriously. Reviews are appreciated and will be rewarded with special cookies. I won't tell you what's in them, but you'll get one anyway. :P

Disclaimer - If I owned Rick Gomez's George Luz, he'd be my sex slave. Band of Brothers belongs to Ambrose, Spielberg and Hanks. 3