Disclaimer: 'Inglourious Basterds' and all associated thingies belong to Quentin Tarantino. I'm only writing this for fun.

Prologue.

(October 1943)

Lt. Aldo Raine stopped in front of the neat like of seven soldiers assembled at the court of the military building. To his left, somewhat behind him, stood Sgt. Donny Donowitz.

These men would be his men for the next few… Well, he didn't exactly know how long this little mission he was given would take. His authorities had been pretty vague about it, but Raine could guess they probably wouldn't be home before the end of the war. It wasn't a very encouraging thought, but at least things weren't worse – that's how it went in life. Things could always get worse. Keeping this in mind kept him going generally.

Raine looked over the men for some time, stretching the moment a little bit longer, to keep their full attention. Then, he slowly started pacing up and down the line, and begun to speak.

"My name is Lt. Aldo Raine and I'm putting together a special team, and I need me eight soldiers. Eight Jewish-American soldiers. Now, y'all might've heard rumors about the armada happening soon. Well, we'll be leaving a little earlier. We're gonna be dropped into France, dressed as civilians. And once we're in enemy territory, as a bushwackin' guerilla army, we're gonna be doin' one thing, and one thing only… killin' Nazis."

At this point, he paused for a few seconds, to allow his words to sink in. Raine was a good speaker, capable of kicking up the morals of any soldiers under his command. In fact, if he hadn't been such a pain in the asses of his superior officers, he probably would have made it to general by now.

"Now, I don't know about y'all, but I sure as hell didn't come from the goddamn Smokey Mountains, cross five thousand miles of water, fight my way through half of Sicily and jump out of a fuckin' air-o-plane to teach the Nazis lessons in humanity. Nazis ain't got no humanity. They're the foot soldiers of a Jew-hatin', mass murderin' maniac and they need to be dee-stroyed. That's why any and every son of a bitch we find wearin' a Nazi uniform, they're gonna die."

Another short pause. Raine was really warming up now.

"Now, I'm a direct descendant of the mountain man Jim Bridger. That means I got a little Injun in me. And our battle plan will be that of an Apache resistance. We will be cruel to the Germans, and through our cruelty they will know who we are. And they will find the evidence of our cruelty in the disemboweled, dismembered and disfigured bodies of their brothers we leave behind us. And the German won't not be able to help themselves but to imagine the cruelty their brothers endured at our hands, and our boot heels, and the edge of our knives. And the German will be sickened by us, and the German will talk about us, and the German will fear us. And when the German closes their eyes at night, and they're tortured by their subconscious for the evil they have done, it will be with thoughts of us they are tortured with. Sound good?"

"YES, SIR!" the men said in unison.

"That's what I like to hear." Raine said. He wasn't finished yet, though. He had said 'Apache resistance' and he meant it. And what did the Apache do with their dead victims? Take their scalps, of course.

"But I got a word of warning for all you would-be warriors. When you join my command, you take on a debit. A debit you owe me personally. Each and every man under my command owes me one hundred Nazi scalps. And I want my scalps. And y'all will get me one hundred Nazi scalps, taken from the heads of one hundred dead Nazis. Or you will die tryin'."

Raine looked at the soldiers. On or two of them had been shifting rather nervously when he had mentioned their possible deaths, but, judging from the looks on their faces, they seemed more than ready for the task at hand.

"Dismissed." He ordered, and turned on his heels to address Sgt. Donowitz, as the rest of the men spread out.

"So, what do ya think?" he asked.

"To be perfectly honest, I'm already glad we don't have to join the armada. That's probably going to be even messier then what we're going to do." Donowitz answered.

"Yeah, guess you're right. But you didn't quite answer my question. What do ya think?"

Donny Donowitz grinned, and said: "Well, sir, I'll be happy to serve under your command."

Author's note: I started with a scene from the film, simply because it works. I'm not a 100% satisfied with it though, since I had to rely on my memory as to how it all happened again. Luckily, I could find Aldo Raine's speech on the internet :). About the date… the film's pretty vague about when the Basterds arrive in France, so I'll just make them leave fall 1943. Why? Because I'm the writer and this is my fanfic. I could let Hitler smoke weed and do the funky chicken if I wanted to. Plus, it gives me more time spam for the Basterds crazy adventures :) TBH, I also have no idea what armada they're talking about. Maybe I should read about WWII a little… Tell me what you think, I'm not writing this purely for myself.