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~Chapter Ten: End of an Era~
The season had turned to autumn, and Easy was continuing their training in Aldbourne, England. Essie enjoyed her time there, when it wasn't raining. They learned how to parry and now she was even able to throw a grown man's body to the ground now. Sink gave them tactical lessons, and Welsh gave instruction filled with dull physics. She was quartered with an old English couple. They didn't say much to her, but fed her well and didn't ask any questions. She liked that about them.
Essie found herself that morning next to Joe Toye. He was loading a clip into his M1 carbine, concentrating on the deadly weapon in his hands. Essie did the same, feeling her heart pace gain speed. Strayer paced up and down the line of men in prone position.
She took a shallow breath and concentrated on getting her heart rate down. Esther tucked the butt of the rifle below her left collar bone, she was a left shot. The trigger finger itched and drew back steadily until the rifle burst in response. Carwood Lipton brought down his binoculars from his eyes, "Half an inch high, Sergeant. Try one more time."
Following the same routine, she aimed once more. Looking through the round steel sights, she slowed her breathing and tucked her thumb against her cheek. She tightened her finger through an exhale and the rifle responded by bursting into another recoil.
A smile was painted on Lipton's face as he lifted his binoculars this time, "Bulls eye. Nice shooting, Esther."
She smiled and looked over at Joe. He clapped her approvingly on the back.
Joe then hit a bullseye with his M1 and a turned to wink as her.
Later in the afternoon, they were off for field practice. Esther shook her head when she found out that her platoon would be led by Sobel, while other men went with Lipton and Winters. She had Luz with her, thankfully. Perconte was also in the group, but after her their encounter, he had finally backed off. They ran through the drizzling rain. It seemed to never let up. You couldn't smoke a cigarette outside without the paper melting away.
Sobel waddled in the center of the running formation of men. Essie looked over and rolled her eyes once again at the ridiculous Air Force sheepskin and leather jacket Sobel has acquired.
"Perconte, Luz, get the men- take… take cover behind those trees." Esther ground her teeth together in impatience. She was low on patience and saturated with anxiety. She was tired of training and exhausted by the waiting.
"Hey Luz, can you do Major Horton?" Perconte asked, hoping to get them moving. Luz scoffed at how easy it was. "Does a wild bear crap in the woods, son?"
"Essie, crawl over there and be a lookout," Muck asked politely. She obeyed and slopped herself under the dripping bushes. She could clearly see Tipper and Sobel conversing and pointing with frustration to a map.
"Is there a problem, Captain Sobel?"
"Who said that? Who broke silence?" Sobel yelled to nobody in particular. Essie could see Tipper explaining something to Sobel. Tipper was his runner for a while, but not for long after this. Luz roared, "What is the goddamn hold up mister Sobel!?" The men were desperately trying to disperse their laughter.
"A fence sir… ah God… a barbed wire fence!" Essie giggled into the damp material of her uniform. Luz bellowed, "OH THAT DOG JUST AIN'T GONNA HUNT! Now you cut that fence and get this goddamnplatoon on the move!" By now they were all laughing through their teeth.
"YES SIR!" Sobel cried out, as he fumbled to find his wire cutters.
B.o.B.
"Hey, did you hear? Winters got assigned to Battalion mess. Shit, Essie, now we really are screwed."
"You shitting on me?" Essie cried out, not believing the news. "That's what I said. Grant said Sobel got a stick up his ass because Winters was late for latrine duty or some shit. The Lieutenant requested trial by court-martial. Can you fucking believe this?" Talbert raked his scalp with his fingers and paced about the barn. Chickens flew off the rafters making their feathers float around. Harris grabbed Floyd and took him towards a table with the rest of the Non-commissioned officers sitting around it.
"We gotta do something about this." Everybody quietly agreed. They all looked up at her with questioning glances. Esther, still a new sergeant, had nearly forgotten that she was an NCO- and being an NCO had brought her into what was about to unwind.
"I don't care about the consequences," Johnny Martin spat out, not looking up from the table. "John, we could all be lined up against a wall and shot." Lipton glanced around and met eyes with each of them. "Now, I'm ready to face that. And every one of us better be too."
Guarnere looked up at her, with a stone serious look on his face. "I will notlet you or myself follow that maninto combat." Bull agreed with a mumbled, "Me neither."
She felt extreme pressure building in her chest as Lipton gave her a hard look. "Ok then, let's do it."
All of the men reached around to get their pencils ready, Esther drew hers from her breast pocket. She looked up at Talbert, he was nervously tugging at his lower lip. Grant dotted the tip of the graphite on his tongue and set it against the scrap of paper. Before Guarnere started reciting, Essie lit up a cigarette with her trembling hands. She was confused as to what was happening, but trusted these men.
"I herby… no longer wish to serve… as a non commissioned officer… in Easy Company."
With a flourish of their wrists all of them signed the bottom of their page. Essie paused, hovering the pencil under the statement. It wasn't true, she did want to serve as a NCO in Easy… but she did not want to do so under the command of Herbert Sobel.
She felt all of their eyes on her as she still hesitated to sign. In Lipton's hands were all of the papers. He blinked and looked from her eyes to her motionless hand. Esther signed quickly, her cursive shaky and hardly readable.
"Good luck boys," Lipton stood, giving them a look that was laced with a final farewell.
Once he had left, Essie stood to leave. She leaned against the edge of the large barn door, watching as the rain beat down the smoke coming from her lips. She suddenly felt warmth beside her. Floyd has approached, tugging on his lip inbetween draws from his own Lucky Strike.
"Sink will kick me out, Tab," Essie blurted out, tears stinging her eyes for the first time in a long time.
He dipped down to catch her eyes, "Essie, no he won't. You're his prized possession. He's not going to kick somebody like you out of the regiment."
She blinked and looked away from him, "I'm here to be a good example, to be a decent soldier, not to retaliate against anybody."
"The reason we did this is because we can't go into combat with Sobel. You know him as well as all of us. He'll get us killed, and that's the truth of it all. We need Winters, Esther, we need a leader."
She nodded in quiet agreement, still avoiding his piercing grey eyes. "I wouldn't agree to anything that I thought would get you booted from this company, Essie. Okay?"
Finally she looked up at him and gave him a gentle smile, "Thanks, Tab."
"I ought to have you all shot! This is nothing less than an act of mutiny while we prepare for the goddamn invasion of Europe."
Her immediate response was to look down, but as she was at attention she could only look out the window. "Sergeant Harris."
"Sir."
"Turn in your stripes and collect your gear. You are herby transferred out of my regiment. Get out." Harris saluted and walked out without a word. Her chest pounded as Sink scanned the men before him.
"Sergeant Ranney."
"Sir." He spoke quietly, knowing his turn had come.
"Consider yourself lucky, I'm only busting you to private."
He raised his voice, "All of you NCO's have disgraced the 101st Airborne! You can consider yourself lucky that we are on the eve of the largest action in the history of warfare, which leaves me no choice but to spare your lives."
Sink flipped through some pages on his desk, disgust lining his aged face. "Now get out of my office and get out of my sight… except you Sergeant Fusillade."
Stomach acid burned her throat and escaped into her mouth. Her chest pounded in panic as nauseas swept through. "Sir."
With the rest of the men exiting, she felt a sense of power go out the door with them. He was going to make her suffer alone.
"Esther, I am so disappointed in you. What do you have to say for yourself?"
She had a lot to say for herself. "Nothing, sir."
"Then I have nothing to say to you. Get out."
With a trembling hand, she saluted and marched out. Once outside in the thin air, she saw her fellow NCO's walking past Winters and saluting. He looked past them and looked on towards her. Half walking and half running, she saluted him before meeting up with the familiar men. Questions did not come from his mouth, but his eyes said it all.
"I'm going to be sick-" before she could finish, she ran off and threw up behind the hedgerow. Tears filled her eyes as her throat stung, but she did feel much afterwards.
Esther turned to find the NCO's of Easy standing and waiting for her, with unblinking eyes and stern looks on their faces.
"Glad you did that for me, Essie. I feel just about the same," Grant broke the silence.
Ranney joined, "I've never been so goddamn scared in my life."
Though some air of relief had washed over them, Lipton still had a stone serious look on his face. "Now we wait and see what happens."
"Essie! It worked! Sobel's out- Sink sent him to Chilton Foliat!" Talbert jogged up to her, and wrapped his arms around her waist. He held her so close she had to lean back to look at him. "Poor bastard chaplains and medics are going to get trained by him."
"No shit?"
He squeezed her tighter. She hadn't felt the comfort of his closeness since their short dance. "The Sobel era of Easy Company has come to an end."
Finally believing him, she rested her forearms on his shoulders, "Thank God for that. Now what will happen?" The bright grey sky of England reflected against his steely eyes.
"Sink made 1st Lt. Sweeney from Able to be our X.O. and Meehan is C.O. And Winters is 1st's leader… just how we wanted it."
Esther drew away from him, "Well, we almost got killed doing it, but we got our damn way."
May 31st, 1944
Upottery, England
A few long truck rides later, Essie found her uniform soaked and her feet swimming in mud. She followed Muck and Luz into a small square tent, hoping to sit for a few moments and dry off. There was a loud game of craps going on inside, and Essie's idea of relaxation was off the table.
She found herself next to their fresh new Lt., Lynn Compton.
"Call me Buck," was the first thing he said to her.
She sat quietly with her boots off and feet propped on a bucket, chain smoking like usual and watching the game go on. Luz, Muck and Perconte were practically addicted to craps. They were always loosing their money, and in turn always asking Essie for smokes. She was easy on Luz and Skip, but still refused to do any favors for Frank.
She liked the new guy, even though he hadn't trained at Toccoa with the rest of them. He was relaxed and he was gambling with the men, something unheard of if you were considering Winters.
As if he heard his name in her mind, Winters quickly opened the flap of the tent and poked his body in.
"Buck, please come out here."
Everybody in the tent fell silent as he stood and exited the doorway with Winters. They held their silence, trying to listen in. Moments passed, and Buck stuck his head in, drug his index finger across his throat in a cutting motion and dashed outside once more. Essie blew out a laugh with smoke, and looked over at Luz who was laughing amongst himself as well.
Lieutenant Meehan paced fiercely before prints of graphs, maps of French Towns and arrows pointing to causeways. Essie tried desperately to concentrate on the words he spoke, but she couldn't help but ponder how it had been nearly two years preparing for all of this.
"-thus linking Omaha and Utah into one continuous beachhead. Each trooper will learn this operation by heart and will know his and every other outfit's mission to the detail!"
Meehan shot her a glance before turning his attention to Dukeman's questions. Essie leaned her elbow against her knee, sucking down a Lucky Strike in an attempt to keep focused. Her mind raced, partly because Talbert was fidgeting beside her and mostly because this was finally it. The time had come for them to drop.
"And we will drop behind this Atlantic wall five hours before the 4th Infantry lands at Utah." Meehan tapped the map of Normandy's beaches and continued to speak to the smoke lingering tent, "Between our assembly area and the battalion's objective is a German garrison. Right here in this area is Sainte- Marie- du- Mont. Easy Company will destroy that garrison."
B.o.B.
"Three day supply of K-rations, chocolate bars, Charms candy, powdered coffee, sugar, matches, compass, bayonet, entrenching tool, ammunition, gas mask, musette bag with ammo, my weapon, my .45, canteen, two cartons of smokes, Hawkins mine, two grenades, smoke grenade, Gammon grenade, TNT, THIS BULLSHIT, and a pair of nasty skivvies!" Joe Toye bitterly slapped his gloves against the pavement of the air field.
"What's your point?" Frank Perconte's balance struggled as he stood.
Essie agreed with Joe, it was a ridiculous amount of stuff they were strapping onto the paratroopers. She thought back to their first five jumps, and how light it felt to just have the jump pack and her uniform on.
"Sergeant Talbert!" Vest yelled to the scattering of men. Essie looked up from her gear, and saw Vest hand Tab a parcel. A sly smile drew across his face as he pulled out a striking revolver.
"Don't let your families miss out on 40,000 dollars, boys!" Lipton walked past, Essie only catching the last part of his information.
"Does anybody know how the hell this thing works?" Essie squinted against the sun as she saw George hold an unnamed object in his fingers as if it possessed a disease.
"Colonel Sink," a short, pink-eared man shoved a tri-folded letter in Bill's face. He licked the ice cream from the corner of his thin lips before dashing his eyes through the dry literature. Esther plopped herself right next to Bill and tried to read the paper as he held it in his sticky jump gloves.
Luz jumped at the chance and dramatically recited, "Soldiers of the Regiment! Toniiight! Is the niiight! Of nights… Today as you read this, you're in route to the great adventure you have trained for over two years…"
"So that's why they gave us ice cream," Bill mumbled, spooning the last amount of soupy slop into his mouth. He turned to Essie and frowned.
"Damn, this is happening," Malarkey said out loud what they were all thinking. It grew silent as they worked away at their gear. Suddenly, Meehan's voice echoed out across the airfield. Talbert walked up to her and Bill and helped her up.
"I see you got something in the mail?"
His face lit up, "Yea, a pistol from Chief of the Kokomo police."
She simply smiled up at him before they walked together with the men.
"EASY COMPANY, LISTEN UP!" Lieutenant Meehan was standing on the hood of a jeep, his face slathered in camouflage paint. She looked over at Luz, whose face was equally dark.
"The Channel coast is socked in with rain and fog. No jump tonight!"
One trooper groaned in pure disappointment while the rest of the men looked down at the concrete beneath their booted feet. Esther looked at Liebgott who swore loudly. "The invasion has been postponed- we're on a 24 hour stand-down."
Alright, on to action/drama writing which is my favorite! If you read, please let me know what you think! Thank you!