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Last Time: Easy Company took Berchtesgaden without opposition and entered Germany.

"The harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph."- Thomas Paine

"Build me a son, O Lord, who will be strong enough to know when he is weak, and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid, one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat, and humble and gentle in victory." – Douglas MacArthur

Now: Easy Company takes Hitler's prized Eagle's Nest.


-Chapter 52-

The mood was jubilant as Easy Company pushed up the mountain crowned with Hitler's stone fortress. Climbing the mountain felt like conquering the world. They were as deep into Hitler's stronghold as they could be, about to seize his southern headquarters without a fight.

There was no doubt the war was all but over.

Eve led the scouting party – hand selected by Captain Speirs, all Toccoa veterans – ahead of the slow moving convoy. Soon they were racing up the hill with only the loosest sense of a formation as the run devolved into a bizarre form of tag; cheered on by the echoing cry of the company motto.

"Currahee!"

Malarkey, Grant, and Alton More were racing to see who was actually on point. Eve was next, with Popeye and Speirs close behind. But the group, both as a collective and as individuals intermittently paused to wave down at the rest of Easy Company, riding up the mountain in style. Privately, Eve thought it was worth the hike to get out of the trucks they'd been stuck in since Holland.

"Hi-Ho Silver!" Eve hollered, amidst many similar cries as they raced up the switchbacks with glee, so like those endless races up Mount Currahee a lifetime ago in basic training, when all they'd had to worry about was making it up the hill under time and Sobel yelling at them.

The feeling of triumph overtook her.

How far they'd come from then, when Germany was a distant, unimaginable goal with death a far likelier outcome. She'd never, in her wildest dreams, hoped to accomplish all this: becoming the First Sergeant for a company that had been a part of every major advance since D-Day – a company that had earned two presidential unit citations.

She threw away years of decorum as she lifted her head to the cloudless sky and released a cheer of exuberance to the open air below, only a sheer drop separating her from the ground and the winding convoy slowly maneuvering through the lynchpin turns.

Eve raised her fist in victory. She spied Talbert and Liebgott echoing the symbol from the road below.

Her joy turned into a laugh as Malarkey and Popeye tackled her in an overenthusiastic hug. In their exuberance, they very nearly toppled her to the ground. They held her up as she regained her balance, the three of them laughing with elation, her own happiness doubling as she realized her friends were just as joyful as she was.

She was especially glad that Sergeant Malarkey, who'd been far too reserved after Bastogne and Foy, was returning to his normal outgoing self.

It was like all the fear they'd been holding onto, all the uncertainty of war, had washed away. It was like suddenly being a kid again.

She made out Liebgott's shout of "Currahee!" amongst the commotion below as she untangled herself from the boys, laughing.

"Race you, First Sergeant!" said Speirs.

She took him on, laughing all the while.

It only took about an hour to make the climb, what with the sprinting they'd all indulged in to burn off their excessive energetic joy.

They made it to the Eagle's Nest long before the trucks did.

It was a beautiful house with a modern aesthetic. It definitely wasn't the mountaintop stronghold she'd expected it to be. Whoever designed the place had done so with a priority of both luxury and comfort over fortification.

The inside was elaborately laid out and adorned it with priceless prints and sculpture. Someone had obviously stripped much of what had once been there, shadows of removed paintings lightened patches of the walls.

They made their way through the complex methodically, not allowing the general splendor to distract them from the potential danger – they were too well trained, too experienced to make such a silly mistake.

On Speirs's order, Malarkey and Grant pushed opened the dark wooden doors of the inner keep. The Captain had his pistol drawn at his waist, Eve and More both had their M1s up and ready, just in case there was some kind of resistance beyond the doors.

The room was empty.

Spiers strode forward, keeping his pistol out as they entered the room, allowing their captain to be the first to enter. With a pointed finger, he directed Malarkey down one of the off shooting hallways, just to be thorough.

With no resistance in sight, Grant forwent his weapon, walking forward carefully, but with awe. The curved nature of the room allowed for panoramic views from every angle of the surrounding mountains and the valley below.

It was breathtaking. The soaring mountain peaks, so close she felt like she could reach out and grab a handful of snow from their frosty tops.

Bottles of champagne still in silver ice buckets adorned the tables, the ice long melted. More snagged one on his way by.

The large fireplace dominating the room and the massive piece of art hanging proudly above it snagged Eve's attention. It wasn't really a style of art she favored, but it was magnificent all the same.

Before she lost herself in the loops and swirls of paint the artist had woven into the scene, she pulled herself away to continue her sweep of the room.

Something on the floor threw her pm full alert, gun in her hand before her mind fully registered what she was seeing; instinctively recognizing the German uniform sprawled out before her.

Everyone froze, reacting to Eve's change in demeanor – a remnant of being in combat with each other, where instincts were all that separated them from death.

She advanced on the prone Nazi officer. He was on his belly down behind the coffee table. She kept her gun leveled at him, despite the face down sprawl of his form, ready to shoot if he so much as twitched.

Soft footfalls echoed on the rug covered wood floors as Speirs crossed the room. Eve made sure she had a steady aim as Speirs knelt and flipped the Nazi over, revealing the bullet wound in his head. The Kraut must have done it when he'd seen them entering the town, because he didn't stink of decay yet. Or maybe she'd just gotten used to the smell.

Eve sighed and relaxed as Speirs took the Luger from the dead man's hand. He gave her a reassuring nod – the man was well and truly dead.

She slung her gun over her shoulder and watched Speirs pocket the weapon, suddenly remembering how much Hoobler had wanted one, and how Malarkey had almost died on D-Day trying to find one. And here one was, easy as you please for someone to pick it up. It was almost laughable how easy it was to find Lugers now that the Germans were surrendering – which involved turning in their weapons to the nearest allied troops who happily pocketed a few.

A loud pop shattered the silence.

She whirled on the culprit, catching Speirs as he sighed in exasperation – and Malarkey's unrepentant grin as he held the incriminating champagne bottle, still leaking bubbles all over the wood floor.

Malarkey glanced at the dead German, utterly unconcerned and declared, "Here's to him!" before taking a long swig.

"Hey, Ev?" More called from where he was standing by the lace covered round table.

"Yeah?" she said, making her way over to him, and abandoning Malarkey to his quiet, but stern reprimand from Speirs about noise and itchy trigger fingers.

"Take a look at this?" said More, pointing at a picture of Nazis parading through what might have been Berlin. He flipped a page and there was Hitler himself, meeting various prominent Nazis and another of the man eating in this very room.

"That's pretty neat," she said, watching him flip through a few more before leaving him to it. She wanted to search through the rest of the Nest for abandoned artwork to save before the rest of Easy arrived and there wouldn't be any peace to be found.

XxX

Once everyone else had arrived, it was easy enough to find the rest of Easy Company's Sergeants and relay the rotation she and Speirs had decided on for the necessary patrols around the Eagle's Nest and Berchtesgaden. Though the men were disappointed at the lost opportunity to loot, no one complained. No one mentioned her own acquired pieces either, though she did get a few smiles.

After assigning guard duties and OPs, Eve was on the first truck back down the hill from the Nest, the two pieces she'd saved – a Rembrandt etching and a Degas – were gently cradled on her lap.

She spent the bumpy ride mentally organizing the patrol squads that she'd need to comb the woods. No one wanted to take any chances, though she figured they would really just be exercises to keep the men from boredom.

As soon as she disembarked back in town, she tracked down Winters in the OP and set her newest finds aside with the pieces he'd saved for her, tucked away in the corner of the bedroom he obviously intended for her to use. It was utilitarian enough, with a bed and a large desk overlooking a window, complete with a typewriter and a mountain of paperwork.

She hated using typewriters; it made her feel like a feeble female, especially when her hands and fingers started to ache from jabbing at the letters. Surely the army had given her enough muscle that a silly machine should never tire her out? She always had the nagging desire to toss it out the balcony and see if it would bounce or shatter just so she didn't have to use the stupid thing for another second. It was maddening. But it saved more time than it wasted so was spared from her wrath.

Eve put it off for a few minutes, lingering over the delicate artwork she'd gathered – admiring it the way it should always be admired – before resolutely pulling herself away.

Regretting her promotion more than ever, she got started on the backlogged paperwork that had inevitably arrived before anything useful, leaving her door purposefully open to invite distractions in the form of reports or even complaints.

With the tasks she'd set everyone else there were precious few of those distractions. She'd made her way through a sizable chunk of the paperwork, a good two-thirds of the stack, including the necessary forms for shipping home the artwork as loot, before becoming too stir-crazy to take another moment of blurring lines and useless drivel asking her to rationalize each and every decision Easy Company had made, but basically boiling down to a long, never ending list of who got what supplies and why.

She had a brief reprieve when Luz came up and reported that they'd established the various staples of an Army camp, including mess hall, aid station, and post office. She gave him a general idea of where she wanted the various platoons stationed and let the radioman come supply officer do what he was best at.

Four hours later, Eve prudently decided to take a walk before she screamed. Spying the paintings in the corner, she figured she could kill two birds with one stone.

It was the work of a few minutes to find the spare linen closet in the hotel and pilfer some sheets and towels to use as wrappings for the artwork so the frames wouldn't be crushed in the mail. Paperwork in hand, despite nearly forgetting it on her desk, as well as a few of her chocolate bar bribes, she left the stuffy hotel room to pay a visit to Vest.

"Sarge!" the man cried, beaming as she walked in.

Eve smiled and gingerly placed her burden on the counter. "Hello, Vest. Do you think you could ship these things home for me?"

He was nodding eagerly before she'd even finished her sentence. "No problem, Sarge. You got an address?"

Eve handed over the paperwork, and the bribes to make sure her stuff got to the front of the line. Vest grinned at her again and assured her he would take care of everything.

Satisfied, Eve waved goodbye and resigned herself to another few hours of monotony before she'd be able to escape for dinner.

When she got back to the CP, Speirs was still nowhere to be seen, probably still looting the Eagle's Nest, and Eve was loath to resort to disturbing Winters or Lipton, even though she was desperate for a distraction to keep away from the paperwork for just a little longer.

With nothing for it, she steeled herself and got back to work.

Luckily, reports from the patrols started filtering in which was by and far more interesting than the never ending supplies inventory that had absorbed her whole afternoon. It took the edge off the frustration that had been steadily mounting as she typed along that this at least was more interesting than a long string of numbers. It was still incredibly tedious work, especially since she had to slow down and verify each and every letter she touched lest she make some miniscule mistake and have to start over again from the beginning, but she went along with determination. If she got it all done today, she wouldn't have to do it again tomorrow.

An hour after her break, something finally came along to call her away from her desk. It was Christenson's squad who – once again – made the most exciting discovery. And it was Perconte – once again – who'd come to break the news.

"Sarge?"

"What is it?" she said as she finished punching out the word she was in the middle of, trying to cement what she'd planned to say in her head so she could come back to it. She looked up, hoping her frustration with the stupid contraption wasn't lingering on her face – though she was almost dreading his answer. The last time Perconte had news still haunted her at night.

This time, Perconte was nearly dancing with excitement.

"Sarge, we found something on patrol."

Eve had already guessed as much, and though Perconte didn't seem inclined to share more information, gleefully keeping it a mystery, Eve was completely willing to be lured away from her reports for a little while to see what had put a bee in Perconte's bonnet this time.

She grabbed her helmet and, putting all thoughts of reports on hold, followed the Italian out of the CP and into the sunlight.

A jeep was idling in front of the steps, a beaming Joseph Liebgott at the helm. "Hop in!" he implored.

Eve huffed a laugh at the men's barely concealed impatience and took her time getting situated in the passenger seat just to tease them.

Liebgott barely waited for Perconte to perch on the back seat before he gunned the throttle and peeled out. "You wanna tell her, Perco?" Lieb asked, blithely ignoring the glare the shorter man sent his way.

"It's Goering's house," he announced, forgetting both his irritation and his desire to keep Eve in suspense.

She could feel her eyes widen. Herman Goering was Hitler's number two for most of the war, and one of the Nazis most prolific pilferers. His mansion was a prize akin to the Eagle's Nest itself.

"Was it picked clean?" she asked, anticipating the disappointment of a positive response.

"Nope," pronounced Liebgott, popping the word like a bubble. "Looks like we got here first."

"We thought you'd like the first crack at it, Sarge," said Perconte, implying it was the whole squad's decision. "There was a lot of art on the walls."

Eve was touched by the gesture. She hadn't told anyone that she was looking for art, though it must've been obvious. Her friends had noticed, anyway.

Ahead, the road blossomed to reveal a whitewashed mansion nestled in a glen. Candy striped shutters were thrown open, but the most striking feature was the caved in roof. The house looked like it had been bombed.

Eve's heart sank, fearing for the art collection she knew must be inside.

Liebgott seemed unconcerned as he parked the jeep. Perconte hopped out of the back and made a beeline for the front door. Eve followed at a more sedate pace, much to Liebgott's frustration. She ignored him with the deftness of long practice.

The interior of the grand house actually managed to steal her breath away. She used the familiar motion of removing her helmet as a means of composing herself.

Masterpieces lined the walls. Every artist she could name, and more than a few she couldn't were all crowded together, largely without rhyme or reason with respect to origin or period, just a bizarre amalgamation that was somehow cohesive in a way Eve couldn't possibly describe.

She had no notion how such a blasphemous thing was possible, and yet the evidence was before her. Perhaps the man had just grabbed anything he deemed valuable and thrown it on the walls?

The furniture was all covered in white drop cloths to prevent dust and other debris from landing on the precious wood furnishings. Eve noticed that someone had unveiled a marvelous Greek or Roman statue. The beauty was hunched as though she were being crushed under the weight of the world, but her serene smile put Eve at ease.

"Hey, Ev, what do you think of this one?" asked Liebgott, pulling a painting off the wall.

She went over. "Vermeer," she said, recognizing the artist. "He was a Dutch painter in the 17th century."

She flipped the frame over in a fit of curiosity and gasped.

"Ev?" Liebgott asked.

Eve ran her fingers over the back of the picture, tracing the curators stamp on the back, deeply familiar with it.

It was like a punch in the gut.

She looked up, tried to speak – she could tell Liebgott was growing increasingly concerned – but she couldn't, tears spilling down her cheeks as she realized the ramifications of her discovery.

Eve had to clear her throat and try several times before her voice came out. "It's my uncle's stamp," she said, in pain, knowing it didn't explain. "He was an art curator in Paris. I went to his house before Bastogne. They were gone and the whole place had been ransacked. Pierre said the whole family had taken into custody for being Jewish. Apparently, it didn't matter whether they were or they weren't. There was nothing left. Everything was just gone, they were gone, like they'd been erased."

It took him only a moment to put together the pieces the same way she had.

"Jewish" art in a Nazi leader's house could only equal one thing.

Her uncle, and his family, had been sent to one of those camps. Falsely accused so Goering and his ilk could steal the art without recourse.

It made a horrible kind of sense. There was no way her uncle, who had loved art so deeply, would have sold the art to someone who was not the right buyer to appreciate it. He would never have been pressured into selling the works at a discounted rate, not even for Nazis.

He'd paid the price for it. God only knew if any of them had survived.

She turned and vomited in a vase probably worth a small fortune.

Liebgott took the art from her hand and patted her on the back while she tried to control her horror.

Well and truly sobbing now, she gasped and forced everything back down into that box of emotions – ever darker – to deal with later.

Horror receding, anger took its place.

She took the artwork back from Liebgott and hung it back on the wall gently, trying to ignore her shaking hands, and missing the hook several times in her agitation.

Finally, she had to let Liebgott rehang it, disgusted with her own ineptitude.

"What can I do?" Liebgott asked, several other questions he wasn't asking on his face for her to see.

Eve pulled herself together, pushing her personal tragedy down in the face of getting back to work. "Search the rest of the house. I want it under a double guard. I'm going to head back to the CP and get Winters and Lipton. Let's let them decide what to do from here."

XxX

They found an enormous wine cellar beneath the house – enough to make all of Nixon's dreams come true – and Dog Company found another cache of artwork and priceless artifacts stored in a nearby salt cave. Winters called up the ladder and soon Eisenhower and Bradley were coming to view the collection they'd discovered. The whole of the 101st was given credit for the discovery. It was only then that Eve and the rest of Easy Company learned of the Roberts Commission, an organization that was on the hunt for the stolen Nazi art so they could restore it to its rightful owners.

There were hundreds of paintings and cultural artifacts stored in and around Berchtesgaden and the nearby Hohnstein castle. They were gathered up and processed above Eve's head, even her uncle's works.

Winters found her an hour after the brass and the press had left Goering's house to see the salt mines. Eve was staring up at the spot she'd taken the Vermeer from the wall, thinking about the family that used to own it and where they were now, if any of them were even still alive.

What will I tell my mother? she wondered, fighting another bout of tears.

"Ev?"

"Yes, sir?" she said, not turning away even as the major studied her.

"You did a good thing," he said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

Eve sucked in a deep breath through her nose. "It feels like too little, too late," she confided.

"It's never too late," he said.

Eve bowed her head to hide her tears. Liebgott hadn't told him. "The stamp I recognized was my uncle's." She relayed what she'd found in Paris.

Winters listened to the whole tale and didn't push for more even when tears slipped down her face again.

She wiped at them impatiently. She couldn't afford to be weak even now.

"Come on," said Winters, steering her away from the wall with the hand on her shoulder. "Let's get some chow."

As the sunlight touched her face, Eve forcefully shook off her grief.

She glanced back towards the house one last time, and let out a huffed laugh that was more a sob than actual laughter when she saw Perconte, guarding the wine cellar.

"What?" said Winters, settling into the driver's seat of his jeep. They were the last to leave aside from the guards still at their posts.

Eve shook her head, clearing her throat of the wet sound. "I was just thinking about Nixon's face when you tell him about that cellar, sir," she said, sliding into the passenger seat.

Winters chuckled and put the jeep into gear, leaving the collapsing house behind.

XxX

The next morning, Eve let herself be dragged from the Company office by an enthusiastic, and slightly drunk, Harry Welsh. The last thing she wanted to do was spend another day inside with only paperwork to distract from her grief.

Welsh was already on his way to intoxicated, with every intention of becoming utterly wasted before the morning was through. Eve might have been concerned, but they were joined by Nixon and Speirs, who were both more-or-less sober.

It wasn't until they'd somehow coaxed her into the jeep that she figured out they were heading for the Eagle's Nest.

"Why?" she asked the men, fairly certain she'd already seen everything interesting the Nest had to offer.

"We're off duty," Speirs smugly informed her.

"We are?" she verified. It was a rare day indeed that both the Company Commander and the First Sergeant were off duty, but she wasn't willing to question it further.

"We all are," said Nixon, sounding very smug. "So we're going to celebrate!"

Scrutinizing the barely concealed glee on the three Captains' faces, Eve was certain she'd just walked into a trap of some kind.

"We are?" she said again, incredulous this time.

"Yes," confirmed Welsh, still grinning.

Eve squinted at the manic smile adorning Harry's face and decided that he was probably more drunk than she'd guessed.

But there was no arguing with them. At least I'll be able to keep an eye on them, she thought as the jeep got underway.

As she had already guessed, the first thing the men did upon entering the jewel of Hitler's empire was find the abandoned, still unopened, champagne bottles. It became some form of bizarre scavenger hunt, or even a competition to find the most bottles and cart them out to the grand stone patio.

The observation deck wound its way around the outside of the Nest, offering a splendid view of the breathtaking mountain range. The day was warm, and the terrace was furnished with several lawn chairs that were suitably protected from the bitter mountain breezes by a stone railing.

Eve, unable to say no to her friends, let alone her commanders, allowed herself to be tugged along and roped into their shenanigans.

But there was a line.

"No," she said.

Welsh wiggled the bottle in his hand, doing very little for the champagne inside as he tried to entice her. "Come on," he cajoled. "You know you want some."

She glared. "I already said I didn't."

"We'll take care of you, I promise," bartered Nixon, already reclining on one of the deck chairs.

She shot him a glare. "I don't need 'taken care of'. It's not a good idea for all of us to be drunk at once," she reasoned.

Speirs snorted. "Ev, for God sake, loosen up a bit, relax. Nothing is going to happen to you all the way up here."

"On my honor," promised Nixon.

"On my honor," parroted Welsh, still grinning even as he swayed.

Outnumbered, Eve recognized her defeat with a resigned sigh. She swiped the bottle from Welsh's hand and spent a long moment staring at it, quelling her nerves.

It wasn't that she was afraid to drink, or even that she'd never been drunk before – vivid memories of the half forgotten night in Paris at L'épine de La Rose and another even foggier recollection of an evening enshrouded in grief and drink only a few months ago, days before Easy Company stumbled upon the camp – but there were so many other people who'd decided to spend their afternoon drinking, and the Fourth Army was due to roll in at any time. It didn't seem like a good idea.

"We'll look after you, Ev," said Speirs with grim sincerity she couldn't deny.

Giving in, she took a long pull from the bottle, hoping to satisfy them, but as soon as the familiar sweet taste of good champagne hit her tongue, Eve melted. It was sure a lot better than the tepid beer or a random bottle of cheap wine. It was the good stuff, achingly familiar. It tasted like home.

She deftly ignored Welsh and Nixon's cheering and stole the lawn chair next to Nixon's to enjoy the view.

Honestly speaking, if there was ever a time to celebrate, it was now. Berchtesgaden was the easiest town they'd ever taken – and one of the most significant prizes of the war – with more than enough loot to go around, and plenty of alcohol.

Eve was well aware that most of Easy Company was also spending the day drunk, but here alone on this alcove, with three of the men she trusted most in the world, she felt safe enough to enjoy herself. Safe enough to set aside the pain of losing her uncle all over again and let herself relish the fact that she was alive.

If the alcohol helped dull the pain, well, she wasn't admitting to it. She'd allow the indulgence just this once, but she knew it would be far too easy to fall into the bottom of a bottle and never come out.

Just this once, she let down her guard.

XxX

An hour later, Eve was feeling happily tipsy.

She lounged, her boots occasionally nudging Harry Welsh as she laughed – easier now that her cares had lessened for a moment, and took the occasional sip of champagne – still relishing the taste of the good stuff – and listening to Nixon tell terrible jokes he was too drunk to keep straight.

"No, Goddamn it, listen!" cried Nixon, after failing to tell the joke for the third time, counting off on his fingers. "Hitler, Hitler – No."

"You're telling it wrong again," she complained, voice louder than she'd intended because of the alcohol.

Sure, the guys had talked her into drinking, but she was trying to keep it to a minimum, swiping swigs from Speirs and Welsh's neglected bottles rather than guzzling from her own. There was already a line of empty bottles underneath Nixon's chair that was ever growing. As such, she was almost sober – maybe it was closer to 'less drunk,' and then only by comparison – when Winters strolled out of the Nest with Lipton, smiling happily when she saw them.

"You don't know how to tell a joke," Welsh complained, so Nixon started again, waving a hand so they would disregard his last attempt. She guessed that Nixon was on his fifth or sixth bottle now. Welsh, who'd already started slightly tipsy, was now definitely three sheets to the wind.

"Hitler, Himmler, Goering, Goebbels, and the Pope walk into a bar," Nixon said, finally getting it.

"That had to hurt," she said, interrupting him. Her filter had long since gone in the wake of the last bottle of champagne she'd split with Welsh.

"Because he drinks too much," rebutted Nixon immediately, flapping a hand at her so she'd shut up, and stop interrupting his joke. "That's how it starts!" he protested as she laughed at him, almost doubling over. "I almost had it that time."

XxX

Winters grinned at Lipton when he'd realized what was going on. He started forward just as Ev interrupted Nix's joke, and from his reaction she'd done it a couple times before. She just laughed in response.

It didn't really matter, though, because Harry noticed them. "Hey, Adolf!" the man cried, clapping his hands together as he spotted Winters. "Love your Eagle's Nest!" The man got unsteadily to his feet and clasped the Major into an awkward, drunken hug. "I hope you don't mind, we –"

Winters grabbed Harry to keep him from falling. He shook his head in despair, looking around the group for someone sober. His gaze lingered on Eve, likely his only hope. She was limp and draped bonelessly on the chair Welsh just vacated. She gave him a nod, considerably bigger than she probably would have if she'd been sober, but she had a beaming grin on her face to his relief. She'd seemed so sad yesterday. It was good to see her in better spirits.

Welsh swayed a bit, despite holding onto Winters's shoulders. He could feel an answering grin bloom on his own cheeks and smiled down at his fellow redhead, now clinging to him like a limpet.

"-we made ourselves at home!" admitted Harry, like it was a grand secret.

"Lieutenant Lipton," said Speirs, also overly loud, maybe feeling a bit left out. Winters glanced to his left in time to see Lipton grin and a nod at the drunken foursome.

"Love what you've done with the place!" continued Harry, slapping Winters on the chest before stooping down to scoop up a bottle from where it had ended up by Eve in a movement so complicated only a man too drunk to know just how unbalanced he was could it pull off.

"Here!" Welsh cried holding his prize aloft. "Have a drink," he cajoled, holding the bottle out to Winters with a grin. "Come on, just so's we can say we saw you do it."

Winters gave Harry an indulgent smile but didn't take the bottle. It had always amused him how the usually feisty man acted so blissfully happy when drunk.

"Listen up," said Winters sternly, tucking away his smile despite the deep feelings of fondness still in his chest – these were some of his favorite people after all, and it was wonderful seeing them so carefree after almost a year of hardship.

He couldn't wait to share the news. He pulled the official copy of the orders free from his breast pocket, knowing they'd need to actually see it with their own eyes to be satisfied at their validity, much as he had.

He looked around to make sure they were ready for it.

Welsh was still swaying, but had made an attempt to straighten into attention.

Nixon picked up the bottle he was working on and brought it to his lips; when no liquid came out, he looked at the empty bottle dejectedly and set it back down. His free fingers quickly found another bottle which he pulled from instead.

Eve was still giggling quietly, watching Nixon's antics. Speirs was quietly staring at the bottles that had accumulated at their feet, looking like he was bracing himself for bad news.

"From the Corp, all troops are to stand fast on current positions," announced Winters, watching them carefully.

"Standing fast," said Nixon, reclining.

"What does that mean?" asked Speirs, meeting his eyes.

"How do you stand fast?" asked Eve. "Isn't standing supposed to be still?"

Welsh snorted a laugh as he tried to stand at attention, head tilted back on his neck and unable to keep the drunken grin from his face as he swayed slightly on the balls of his feet. His badly suppressed laughter made both Winters and Lipton laugh as well.

"Wanna hear it?" asked Winters with a large grin.

Welsh nodded with a hum.

"Mmhmm?" Winters echoed making sure they were ready.

XxX

Eve had never seen Winters so giddy. Probably because he'd never been giddy drunk in her company, like Welsh was, but it was somewhat puzzling. Why was he drawing out the moment? What could the news possibly be?

Winters clasped Welsh on the shoulder. "Ready for it? Listen up. The German Army's surrendered."

Eve felt her whole body lock up. Her breath froze in her chest, stolen by the mountain air as she tried to process the sentence into something that made sense.

Winters met each of their eyes somberly, so they could see for themselves that he was not joking; so they could absorb the sheer gravity of what he was telling them. They were done. After almost two years of fighting, they were done.

Eve searched his face, and then Lipton's, and then Speirs's and Nixon's – they would know more clearly than she if he was joking.

They didn't seem to think so.

Winters was serious.

It was over.

The tight knot in her belly dissipated as the news sank in. Giddy relief – more potent than any alcohol – sank into her bones and a new grin stretched across her face.

Winters patted Welsh's cheek twice in quick succession, beaming at the man's dumbfounded expression.

Welsh was still processing, brain running slower with all the alcohol clouding it as he looked at the major with wonder.

Eve herself could hardly believe she hadn't imagined the whole conversation. A part of her still couldn't believe it. Three years, one in combat, two preparing endlessly for it, and it was over. How the hell had she survived?

Jesus Christ. It was over.

She'd survived.

Winters started to leave, but caught Nixon's attention with a sharp finger.

"I've got a present for you! Come on," he said.

Winters winked at Eve, to her puzzlement. Her eyes narrowed as a thought tugged at her memory. A grin broke on her face as she abruptly recalled what they'd discovered yesterday that might interest an already inebriated Nixon.

Just as quickly, her thoughts cycled back to the news she was still trying to process, trying to make sense of it.

How can it possibly be over?

Nixon grabbed his webbing and got up readily enough to follow his friend – not even unsteady despite the obscene amount of champagne he'd inhaled, the bastard – but obviously still dazed by the news. He'd seen it coming; they'd all seen it coming – for Christ's sake they were at the Eagle's Nest, crown jewel of the Nazi empire! – But it was one thing to realize, and quite another to know.

Eve didn't know whether to laugh or cry. And she wasn't alone. Welsh was still staring, shell-shocked, at Lipton. Speirs had put his head down between his knees, looking dizzy with relief.

"Is it?" asked Welsh, tentatively asking the question they all needed confirmed. Winters wasn't capable of playing such a cruel joke, but a part of her needed it to be verified, needed someone else to confirm it too, just in case this was all some elaborate dream.

Lipton nodded with a laugh.

"Yeah?" said Welsh. Getting another gleeful nod from Lipton, he pulled the man into a hug, and then turned around to yank Eve onto her feet to give her one. He even went so far as to try and spin her around; it must have been some spectacle since Lipton and Speirs both started laughing uproariously – she was a good four inches taller than Welsh after all. She was laughing too hard herself to care.

Lipton pulled her free from Welsh's grip and gave her his own hug, far more successfully lifting her into a circle; and then Speirs did the same thing. She felt like a ragdoll – and nauseous after being passed around with so much bubbly in her stomach – but she was too deliriously happy to give a fuck.

XxX

Easy Company spent VE-Day drunk.

Winters had "discovered" Herman Goering's well stocked, and very expensive, wine cellar. After giving Nixon pick of the litter, he had 10,000 bottles delivered to each of second battalion's companies in huge over-laden trucks. Easy Company spent the day of victory sampling some of the finest liquor, wine, and champagne from around the world.

Eve, already tipsy, found herself pressganged into overindulging, by Welsh, Speirs, and the returned Nixon.

Nixon had picked out only the best of the bottles and insisted that she try a little bit of them all.

"Ev," he wheedled when she protested the newest decanter of whiskey, after having already had five. "When are you ever gonna get the chance to taste all this again? Live a little!"

She was drunk enough to give in to the coaxing without much protest. They'd promised to look after her. They'd promised.

So, with not an ounce of remorse, Eve drank her share with everyone else.

Just this once, she allowed herself the freedom to enjoy the party, just enjoy being alive.

Overnight, Easy Company had gone from an aggressive combat unit to an occupational force. No more fighting, no more war.

Some of the replacements lamented the fact that they hadn't even been able to get their ODs dirty. Eve politely told them to shut up and be grateful, goddamn it, but they mostly ignored her and bitched anyway.

She would never remember the precise details of that day, but nor would anyone else.

XxX

The next morning, Eve dragged herself out of bed despite the (well deserved) splitting headache pounding in her skull. She was standing before she realized that she was in the wrong room, but at least she'd somehow managed to at least make it back to the CP.

She spied Speirs, his head buried under a pillow on the floor in a vain attempt to drown out reveille, and smiled, relieved.

The man must've tipped her into his bed sometime last night, taking care of her as he'd promised.

As she was still in her gear, and thus as ready as she was going to be to assemble, Eve nudged the man into getting up, laughing as he glared up at her, in no little amount of pain from his own hangover.

"Let's go, sir," she said, offering a hand to the prone man.

He sighed like she'd just asked him to run up Currahee and helped lever himself up.

Eve bit her lip and valiantly neglected to mention the fact that Speirs was still in his boxers as he stomped out of the room, not even bothering to lace up his boots properly, just jamming them on his feet.

He wasn't alone in his state of undress, much to her amusement. Nearly the entire company had turned up in their undergarments. After a disgruntled look around, Speirs dismissed them and the Company rolled right back into bed.

XxX

The rest of the week passed in a similar manner, but Eve didn't participate again. One hangover was quite enough for her, thanks.

Instead, she spent the majority of the week hiding away with Winters – the only other sober person in Berchtesgaden – back to taming the mountainous stack of backlogged paperwork.

Boring though it was, it beat babysitting her drunken company by a mile.

It didn't take long for conversation between herself and Winters to flow as easily as ever, despite the gap between their ranks.

"We're heading to Austria," Winters said one evening.

Eve pulled herself from the report she was reading to blink at the man, registering that he'd said something, but not understanding the words just yet.

"In two days," said Winters, and then quirked his lips in a smile at her sheepish expression. She'd been completely absorbed in the reports. "Just got the orders in. We're heading to Obersalzberg, in Austria."

"Really?" she said. "What happened to standing fast?"

"It's the army," he said with a nonchalant shrug, fighting a grin.

It was as good an answer as any. "What's in Austria?" she asked.

"A German regiment. We're the closest unit, and Colonel Sink has instructed me to accept the surrender of some of the German brass."

"Sounds fun," she said. "Should I get the men ready now?"

"It can wait until tomorrow. Everybody not in their beds already will forget by morning anyway."

Eve laughed. "I guess that includes me. I should probably turn in."

Winters stretched and glanced at his watch. A yawn split his face, brought on by his realization of the late hour.

"Good night, Ev."

"Good night, sir."

Eve slipped out of the room and didn't let herself dwell on her regret that the distance between their ranks kept them from ever really being friends.

Maybe now that the war was over that would change.

XxX

The next morning, Easy Company loaded back into the transport trucks and the halftracks and left Berchtesgaden behind.

Eve had tried – and mostly failed – to appreciate the scenery the first time they'd crossed the mountains, but now, in the wake of the German surrender, she looked on it with wide, wonder filled eyes. Had the mountains been so beautiful headed the other way, soured by her anxiety?

What a pity I don't remember, she thought trying to absorb the glorious panorama like a sponge and imprint the entirety into her mind. She wanted to recall this instead of the frozen barren waste of Bastogne – when all she could see when she closed her eyes was her friends in pieces.

It was easy to forget the biting frost of winter with the sun warming her face, a gentle breeze tousling her ever growing hair and cooling her scalp. It was a lovely day. The bright sun glittered on the foliage, evoking bright emeralds and jades that turned to deep purple as the forest stretched beyond what the eye could see, upwards to the gray edifices, lightly dusted with snow despite the turning of spring and topped by an ice blue sky sheltering Easy Company from any prying eyes. It could have been claustrophobic if it wasn't so breathtaking.

Surely this was paradise.

The road wound ever upwards again as they headed back into the Alps.

Every so often they passed German troops headed the opposite way. The bedraggled enemy soldiers looked exhausted – defeated – and yet as they marched sedately in tactical columns, heading for Germany, and home, they maintained their pride. Not a single head was bent in shame.

Eve didn't know if these were deserters, or if they'd already surrendered to someone somewhere up the road; either way, Easy Company didn't stop to ask.

Still, there were a hell of a lot of them; and they just kept coming.

Each time Eve's heart demanded that she offer a K-ration to the weary walkers, she steeled herself and remembered her uncle and the camp they'd found at Landsberg. It assuaged her empathy even as she wondered where a particularly haggard soldier – limping along determinedly despite being supported by crutches and only one leg – was heading.

She tried not to think of Guarnere or Toye, but it was difficult not to see her wounded friends in these survivors.

The truck suffered a particularly violent jerk as the tires caught a bump in the road. Thankfully, it yanked her from her thoughts even as it sent her careening into Roe.

He looked amused, much to her irritation. She tried not to scowl at him, but Talbert and Shifty both laughed, so she didn't think she'd succeeded.

"You all right there, Ev?" Talbert asked when he'd stopped laughing at her.

"Just dandy," she informed him, eyes already drawn back to the scenery.

"So," he said, eyeing the scenery himself, "do you reckon they'll make us run up those? Or ski down them?"

"Your lips to God's ears, Tab," said Eve. "Do us all a favor and shut up before you give Speirs any ideas?"

"Yeah," said Shifty, "If we end up running up those, I'm blamin' you."

The young man didn't hide his own awe at the peaks though. Shifty's entire face was alight with boyish excitement. Eve would've laughed if she didn't know the same wonder was etched on her own features.

As the sun reached its zenith, the sky turned into a bright robin's egg blue, dotted with fluffy white pillow-like of clouds, slowly rolling through the sky like great barges wading through the ocean, pierced and framed by the sharp granite monoliths planted among bejeweled fields wreathed in trees.

It should be a crime to race past such splendor the way Easy was; it left an ache in Eve's breastbone as she tried to savor every moment of being in a panoramic utopia. Each turn offered something new for her to wonder over. Each time Eve thought she'd seen the best of the world, that there was no earthly way anything she could see next would ever compare, she was forced to revise the opinion.

Finally, she understood the appeal of traveling through Europe. It had been hard to fathom people coming here for recreation when she'd everything she'd seen of the continent had been torn to pieces.

And suddenly, around another turn in the road, there were women – beautiful blonde haired women, with bright blue eyes and well-fed, hourglass figures. Coming up from working in the fields, they shouted "Hallo!" to the excited American boys; most of whom were waving back with enthusiasm.

Eve rolled her eyes as these war hardened, combat veterans turned back into schoolboys at the first sight of pretty girls. Even Roe got involved, shyly waving as he, and the other men seemed to realize that it wouldn't be fraternizing with the enemy anymore, now that the war was officially over and there was no more enemy to be had.

The sight of willing women seemed to drive home that they were done fighting in a way that the booze really hadn't.

As their antics became increasingly ridiculous, Eve realized that she felt indulgent, not jealous as she'd assumed she would.

It had been so long since she'd become one of them that she couldn't even imagine herself with any of them – not even Winters, despite her one time crush.

It wasn't that Eve didn't love the boys, she did – she'd die for them, and knew they'd do the same, but after living with them for three years, without any notion of privacy, depending on each other for survival had eliminated every mystery, had drawn them closer than siblings. She certainly didn't know Eliza as well as she knew Gene. There was no comparison to be had. She trusted Gene with every part of herself, she'd had to to survive everything they'd seen, everything they'd done.

With that in mind, it was incomprehensible that they would ever look at her the way they were lusting after these Austrian dames – just as she would never look at them.

It had been her goal once – a lifetime ago when this journey had just begun – to blend in with the other soldiers; for the men to forget that she wasn't one of them, that she wasn't just another one of the boys. And she'd never realized how completely she'd managed until right this moment.

It had been three years – years which felt like several small lifetimes as parts of her died and were born in the face of war – since she'd desired a man, or wanted to be desired as a woman.

Smiling, happily being ignored as a potential female companion, she let them have at it.

The small part of her that was envious of these well-done ladies wasn't as easily silenced. Seeing them, perfectly coifed and clean made her long for home anew. She was far cleaner – by comparison –than she'd been even a month ago, but she was a long way away from baths every day and time to waste primping and agonizing over her outfit choice and her hair and her makeup, not that she'd ever indulged in these things overmuch even when she'd had the time. The lack of any options made getting ready in the morning as easy as waking up and rolling to her feet, but a part of her missed being able to make the decision to dress up and be acknowledged as a woman.

She thought she might like to do that more often once she got home. Maybe. She knew it was okay to want to feel pretty and be acknowledged. Sure, she'd never be the beauty that Elizabeth was, but she wouldn't be dressing up for anyone but herself anyway.

Eve shoved the thought away with a smile at her own folly. Still, a deep realization struck her.

I'm happy, she knew. The kind of happy that's hard won – a quiet serenity gained with the absolute certainty that she'd made the right choice – and was pleased with the outcome. She couldn't imagine being anywhere other than right where she was, grimy ODs and all.

XxX

Winters sat as rigidly as he knew how at the utilitarian desk pulled into the center of a sunlit hall, Welsh and Nixon flanking him on either side as he surveyed the Nazi officers standing before him.

Colonel Sink liked the hotel in Berchtesgaden so much that he'd directed Winters to secure the one in Zell am See. The small Austrian town was perched over a glorious lake – which was such a deep shade of emerald, it put the trees to shame.

The hotel in town was just as elegant as Berchtesgaden Hof, though perhaps a bit less austere. It seemed only fitting that this white room, full of style and class was where Winters set up a desk to accept the formal surrender of the German high command.

Today, it was a Colonel and his aide.

The man had obviously gone to some effort in presenting himself. His uniform was clean and pressed, his tow-colored hair gleamed in the ample sunlight almost as brightly as his polished medals. Winters to meet the man's eyes evenly, twin chips of ice staring down a ruler straight nose and met his gaze. The man didn't sneer, didn't show any hint of upset at being asked to surrender to an officer of junior rank to himself.

The Colonel had introduced himself, some long, incomprehensible name Winters couldn't really remember, and then began to speak in barely accented English.

"I wonder, what will happen to us, to people like you and me, when there are finally no more wars to occupy us?" remarked the Colonel.

Winters couldn't find anything to say. It had been a long time since he'd left for war. And some days, it seemed like he'd been fighting all his life – like it was what he was meant to do. But his heart, his heart cried for peace.

It was no way to live, waking up each day wondering which of his friends was going to go where he couldn't follow.

How many men had he seen die in front of him?

Far too many, he thought as faces flashed before his eyes between blinks.

Winters longed for nothing more than an easy life, with a woman he loved, and an end to anything even remotely like the constant fear of war.

He kept his face smooth by force of will. He wondered if the comment was meant to wound him as deeply as it had. He knew he was nothing like this colonel, nothing at all like a man who needed war – and all the needless bloodshed it entailed – to occupy him.

"Have all your men collect the weapons, deposit them at the church, the school, and at the airfield," Winters instructed instead of making a direct reply.

The Colonel blinked, and then gave a small smile, understanding. "Very well," the man said and pulled out his sidearm, a Luger, and presented it to Winters, handle first. "Please accept this as my formal surrender, Major."

Winters stared at the gun, remembering all the trouble the hunt for a prized Luger had brought to Easy Company and countless others, and could not make himself take it. They were plentiful now that they were in Germany and he needed no war prizes from this man.

He looked up and found himself pinned again by the colonel's chilling stare. "It is better than to lay it on the desk of a clerk," said the Colonel, voice filled with hard-earned pride. Pride earned from the heft of the sacrifices of the men he'd commanded.

Maybe we aren't so different after all, thought Winters.

Winters stood, balancing the equation of power, and addressed the man, feeling his own respect for the defeated colonel renew. "You may keep your sidearm, Colonel," he said, glancing at it again before meeting the man's eyes.

The German officer was surprised but gave a small smile – understanding without the need for speech the measure of respect Winters was offering him – and tucked the gun away again. He clicked his heels, his aide a beat behind, and saluted in the American style, his right hand touching his brow, instead of the famous Nazi extended arm.

Winters responded in kind, feeling for the first time since Landsberg that peace between enemies was possible.

XxX

On the other side of the room, Eve observed the mutual respect between officers and felt like she was witnessing something monumental.

It was like watching two titans, two mountains, nod at each other, acknowledging each other's might and giving the respect each was owed. These two powerful men had held the lives of thousands in their hands, and here they were, in the same room, civilly carrying on a conversation, violence forgotten (or at least pushed aside) as they discussed peace.

A knot in Eve's breast, right behind her lungs, that she hadn't even acknowledged, loosened and dissipated.

-End Chapter-


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