Private Mark Hitchcock was supposed to be on critter watch. Everyone took turns staying up through the bitter cold of night to keep watch for the more unsavory characters that made up desert fauna. Scorpions and snakes especially, though there were times where one of the men accidentally came a little too close to a fennec fox's den and received an earful of high-pitched screeching. At least their danger came more from the sound than viciousness.

So, if Hitch was on watch, why were there dozens of black cobras making themselves comfortable on Sergeant Jack Moffitt and the tarp he slept on?

Uraei. Egyptian cobras. Highly venomous. A common motif of ancient Egyptian art. Symbol of royalty and nobility. They were not exactly small snakes, save for the two that had coiled around both of Moffitt's wrists. They were either juveniles or just happened to have hatched smaller than normal. Either way, it was a hazardous situation to be in.

Unconsciously, Moffitt lifted his wrists, getting a better look at the snakes. Consciously, he wouldn't have moved. Snakes didn't like sudden movements. The slithering mass surrounding him and draped all over him hadn't reacted, and neither had the two on his wrists, looking like serpentine wristwatches, or perhaps a strange pair of bracelets that an unhinged lady would wear to a party. The two cobras were shiny like well-polished ebony, and had brilliant blue eyes, like small rings of lapis lazuli. They seemed more interested in exploration than biting, as were the rest of the snakes. They were cool to the touch, weaving between Moffitt's fingers the way an affectionate cat would between his legs.

"Moffitt."

Sergeant Sam Troy's voice echoed in his head. Moffitt turned his left hand, prompting the cobra to turn with it. Still, the snakes made no move to bite. He wondered if they even meant him harm at all, but why were they there in the first place?

"Moffitt! Hey, wake up!"

The weight of the snakes crawling on him suddenly vanished, as did the feeling of the two small cobras wrapped around his wrists. Moffitt opened his eyes, seeing Troy and Private Tully Pettigrew standing over him. His hands were still in the air, propped on his elbows.

"You okay? Pretty active dream you got going there," Tully said.

"That was a dream? There were…" Moffitt sat up, confused, "cobras, Egyptian cobras everywhere."

"That was definitely a dream," Troy said with a nod. "Hitch would've seen them. You're up for critter and Jerry watch. Last one of the night."

Moffitt picked up the M1928A1 Thompson submachine gun lying next to him before leaving the makeshift tent. He and the rest of the unit known as the Rat Patrol had been lying in wait for a German Afrika Korps convoy expected to pass by around dawn. Rumors had circulated around command that Field-Marshal Erwin Rommel himself was part of that convoy. To get Rommel was considered the ultimate prize, and a key to ending the campaign in North Africa. He would likely be well-guarded, but past experience told Moffitt that Rommel tended to put himself in danger just to be closer to the front with his men. That fact alone would make him easier to kill or capture, but Troy had extra explosives planted along the road, just in case.

The fading brightness of the stars and gradual appearance of a deep red-orange in the eastern horizon signaled the approach of dawn. A Cairo spiny mouse dashed across the sand in front of Moffitt's boots, making a beeline for a burrow tucked under a pair of large, sand-covered rocks a few meters away from the campsite. Further away from that was the road the German convoy would be heading down, partly shielded from view by high dunes. Both sides were laced with explosives, lots of them. The Rats weren't going to pass up the opportunity to get Rommel, and certainly weren't going to risk letting him get away.

The sun was halfway up when the rest of the group woke up and started making their way out closer to the road. With no signs of the German convoy yet, the Rats put together the finishing touches of their plan. They would split up, each pair taking one of their beat-up, sand-blasted jeeps and hiding it behind the dunes on either side of the road. When the Germans arrived, both jeeps would race out, peppering the vehicles with .50 caliber rounds while the Germans were reeling from the explosives.

The air around them heated up rapidly as the sun continued to rise. This would have been a run-of-the-mill operation were it not for the high-value target potentially riding in that convoy. Troy emphasized multiple times that he didn't want to see any vehicle in the convoy intact. The road was now such a massive bomb waiting to go off that Moffitt wondered if the only way to identify if they had killed Rommel or not would be to test every bone that would be scattered around the sand. A dark thought, yes, but a logical outcome.

Moffitt kept his hands wrapped tightly around the spade grips of the M2 Browning machine gun. Last night's dream was the furthest from the forefront of his mind. It was just an odd dream and nothing more. In front, Tully was tightly gripping the steering wheel of the jeep, staring off to his left at the dune they were hiding behind, as if he could see the convoy right through it. Several minutes passed before they could hear the low rumbling of vehicles—trucks, tanks, and half-tracks—coming from the west, directly behind them.

"Not yet, not yet," Tully was whispering to himself.

A couple of heartbeats went by before the first explosion went off, and another went off a half-second later. Moffitt barely heard the panicked and pained screaming of wounded Germans before Tully gunned the jeep's motor and vaulted them over the dune they had been hiding behind. Moffitt couldn't see the German soldiers' faces as they drove by, and perhaps that was for the best. He pressed the Browning's butterfly trigger and unleashed a hail of bullets at the nearest vehicle.

Some of the smaller vehicles, along with several trucks, had been turned over from the explosions. The canvas coverings of the trucks were burning, as was the leaking gas and oil from their engines. Rounds from MG34s and MG42s struck the ground around the jeep as Tully dodged and weaved, trying to give Moffitt as much time as possible to continue spraying the Germans with his own gunfire.

A third explosion was heard, seen, and felt. Smoke and sand prevented either side from being able to see or hit each other, but both kept firing. A fourth explosion caused the jeep to tilt. Tully swore aloud. Moffitt clung tight to the Browning until he felt something slam into his side like a hammer blow. He found himself falling from the speeding jeep, striking and rolling on the ground as dark blood bloomed on his sweat-stained shirt. He stopped facing up toward the cloudless blue sky, coughing up dirt and trying to put pressure on the wound with his own hands. Blood was still leaking through, running around the rocks on the ground like a river, in an almost… serpentine manner.

For a moment, the trail of blood, darker in the shadows of the dunes, resembled an Egyptian cobra.

Lieutenant Andreas Kautner was unable to move as he stared at the small, black cobras coiled around his wrists. He somehow had the impression that they meant him no harm, but it didn't make him any less wary of them. His cot was surrounded by more snakes, all black cobras. He was tempted to scream, but he was also curious. How did so many get in his tent at once? Surely, one of the night patrols would have seen the huge congregation of serpents arriving. Unless they came up from the sand. All under just his tent, though? Even that didn't seem likely.

"Sir?"

A young man's voice pulled Kautner from his sleep. He sat up, immediately looking at his wrists, and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw no cobras. Standing at the entrance of his tent was Sergeant Hartwig Weidrich. "Yes?"

"Our section is moving out soon, sir. The field-marshal wants us all getting ready," Weidrich explained.

"Right. Thank you, Sergeant." Kautner got out of his cot, looking under it for snakes, and began putting on his uniform. The camp around him was coming to life with soldiers preparing for their next big move. He could hear his commanding officer, Colonel Aldrich Lehning, shouting at anyone not moving quick enough to his liking. Not wanting to deal with his seemingly perpetually grouchy colonel, Kautner was quick to get dressed and make sure his belongings were put together.

Kautner stepped out of his tent, seeing tired faces carrying crates of guns, ammunition, and food onto waiting trucks. He spotted Field-Marshal Rommel sitting in the back of his staff car, talking with a couple of officers, and occasionally glancing over at Lehning as he harangued his troops. Tents were being collapsed and packed away. Equipment was being loaded onto vehicles. Kautner looked at his watch, seeing it was very early in the morning. He sighed, knowing they had a long trip ahead of them.

Things began settling down a little as it came time for the men themselves to get into the trucks, tanks, and half-tracks. Kautner stood stiff and saluted when Lehning approached him. The older, stockier man was lighting a cigarette. He seemed to relax a little when he let out his first smokey breath. "Whatever happens, do not lose sight of Rommel," Lehning said.

"I will not, Colonel," Kautner replied.

"I trust you." Lehning took his cigarette out of his mouth. "Do you have all of your stuff ready?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good." Lehning let out a sigh. "Go get settled. We will be leaving in ten minutes."

The first group from the regiment left no trace of its presence when it left its former campsite. Kautner was glad to see Rommel accompanying them, but it was also nerve-wracking as the field-marshal had a tendency to put himself in unnecessary danger. It was no wonder Lehning hadn't slept at all that night; he didn't exactly want to be known as the officer who let the Desert Fox get killed in an ambush. That would be a distinction not one officer in the Afrika Korps wanted, but it would be worse for Lehning as he and Rommel had a pretty friendly relationship, having served together in the Battle of France.

Kautner stayed close to Rommel's staff car. Rommel was standing in the back and trying to interact with troops sitting on vehicles as best he could, even hanging back at one point and letting Lehning and Kautner catch up to him. He was wide-awake compared to everyone else, grinning from ear-to-ear. "How are you this morning, Lieutenant?"

"I am well," Kautner replied. "Quite tired, but well."

"You will get a chance to rest later tonight, I can promise you that," Rommel said.

"You better rest yourself, sir," Lehning grunted. "When did you last sleep?"

"I slept two hours last night."

Lehning sighed, but didn't say anything more on the subject. "Are you not at all concerned about Allied ambushes? That captain you were talking to on the phone yesterday said there is a notorious commando group operating around here."

"I scouted this route myself, and did not find any signs of commandos, Colonel."

Lehning folded his arms over his chest. "Sir—"

"I understand your concern, Colonel." Rommel took on a slightly more sympathetic expression. "I have faith in your regiment to guard me." He ordered his driver to head further up to talk to a group of soldiers clustered on a Panzer IV.

Lehning let out another sigh. "One of these days, he is going to get himself seriously injured or killed doing stunts like this."

"I think he will be alright," Kautner said.

"I am glad you are optimistic."

Kautner's optimism dwindled somewhat as dawn arrived, painting the sky a myriad of warm colors. A knot had begun forming in his stomach. On either side of the road were high dunes, colored red with the rising sun. Kautner couldn't help but notice Lehning was going through his cigarettes faster than usual. Lehning never admitted to it, but Kautner had served under him long enough to know that meant the colonel was nervous. He didn't dare ask, and kept his eyes on the road and vehicles ahead.

It was silent aside from the droning of the engines. The feeling of something not being right gradually became more intense, until one of the leading trucks exploded in a massive fireball. Buried explosives began going off, one by one. Kautner was deafened by the huge bangs and rattling of machine gunfire. In the corner of his eye, a jeep burst up from one of the dunes. "Colonel, get down!" Kautner shouted.

Lehning was firing madly at the jeep with his Walther P38. "Worry about Rommel, not me! Go find him, and take this!" Lehning picked up an MP40 stowed in the back of the car and tossed it to Kautner, along with a couple of magazines.

"Yes, sir!" Kautner clambered out of the car as a second jeep appeared. His problem was that he had no idea where in the convoy Rommel had last been. Horror gripped his chest in its talons when he came across dead and dying soldiers lying in heaps in the sand, badly burned and covered in blood. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Sergeant Weidrich covered behind a turned-over truck, popping up occasionally to fire at the attacking jeeps with his own MP40. "Weidrich! Are you alright?"

"Bruised, but alright!" Weidrich shouted.

"Have you seen the field-marshal?"

"No!"

Panic surged deep inside Kautner. "We have to find him!"

"No! He would want you to fight!"

"Lehning told me—"

"Lehning should know better than anyone how Rommel would handle this! Shoot the men in those damn jeeps!"

Despite Weidrich being lower in rank, Kautner nodded, knowing the younger man had a valid point. Smoke billowed around them from fires and sand was kicked up from the jeeps, making vision nonexistent for either group. Kautner fired blindly into the huge cloud of sand and smoke, holding down the trigger until the magazine was empty. He threw himself behind the cover of a Panzer III, yanking the empty magazine out and shoving a full one in before pulling the charging handle. Realizing that firing blindly was nothing more than waste of ammunition, so he waited until he saw the outline of one of the jeeps passing by before firing again. Kautner cursed to himself when he couldn't see if that did any good or not. He raised the MP40's sights to his eye again, then heard someone shouting, "Cease fire! Cease fire! They are gone!"

The sound of explosions and machine guns continued to echo in Kautner's mind as the smoke and sand settled. He looked around, seeing people start treating the wounded and getting them loaded into ambulances. It had all happened and ended so fast. For a moment, he wasn't even sure it was real. Shaking his head, Kautner tried to assure himself that it was real, and began helping with the wounded.

As Kautner helped put another stretcher into an ambulance, he was stunned to see a dusty and bruised Rommel approaching. Relief washed over Kautner. "Sir, are you alright?"

"I am fine, thank you. How many wounded?"

"I do not know yet, sir."

Rommel's expression turned grave. "How many dead?"

"I am not sure yet, sir." Kautner looked past Rommel, seeing Lehning kneeling by a bloodied corporal on a stretcher. The corporal was sobbing something about being afraid of dying, while Lehning was squeezing the kid's hand tightly. Kautner felt sick as his heart broke, fearing that the corporal wasn't going to make it.

Rommel let out a sigh. "How many of the enemy did you see?"

"I only saw two jeeps, sir."

"The explosions were far too large to have been grenades. I think they set mines of some kind."

Lehning's voice was heard. "This is exactly what Captain Dietrich was telling you about. Two jeeps probably means that it was the group calling themselves the 'Rat Patrol.'"

"We do not know enough to draw any conclusions," Rommel said. "We should focus on getting the wounded to safety and treat them as best we can. Once we are settled, then we can figure out what happened."

"Did you have a medic look at you, sir?" Lehning asked.

"I do not need it. My car was flipped over, but I am alright." Rommel waited until Lehning was looking away before massaging his left shoulder a little. Kautner chose not to say anything, knowing it would just lead to an argument.

"If you insist." Lehning sighed. "We will not leave until all of the wounded are secured. They should be taken care of first. The dead…" He rubbed his face. "The dead might have to wait. We can collect them later."

"I will agree with you on that, Colonel."

A soot-covered private sprinted over to them. "Field-Marshal! Field-Marshal!" He skidded to a halt. "Sir, we found a wounded man, but he is not one of ours."

"Show us." Rommel followed the private. Kautner trailed close behind, stepping over debris and going around corpses.

Several meters away from the front of the convoy, the private knelt in front of a dark-haired man in a British uniform and black beret. For a moment, Kautner wondered if the man was actually dead, but noticed a shallow rising and falling of his chest. The left side of his shirt was almost completely covered in blood.

"It looks like he was shot while escaping," the private said, gesturing the hole in the man's shirt and the gunshot wound underneath.

"If there is a chance he can be saved, put him in an ambulance with the rest of our men," Rommel said.

Lehning raised an eyebrow. "Sir, this man is responsible for getting many of ours killed."

"The battle is over. He will be treated in the same hospital as our own, and then he will be interrogated, but under no circumstances is he to be tortured." Rommel gave Lehning a stern look. "Is that understood, Colonel?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good. Get back to work."

After the British soldier was stabilized on a stretcher, Kautner assisted the medics in getting him loaded into an ambulance. "I take it he will survive?" Kautner asked.

"He will, but he needs to be operated on as soon as possible," one of the medics replied. "There is no exit wound. The bullet is still in his abdomen. As of now, I cannot say how much damage was done internally." The medic offered a weak smile. "I think he will be alright as long as we can get it taken care of quickly."

Kautner nodded. "Rommel wants him interrogated once he is well enough."

"Depending on the extent of the damage inside, that might not be for a while." The medic's smile faded before he leaned in to whisper to Kautner, "At least we have Rommel with us. I doubt Lehning would even allow this man to be treated."

"Perhaps, but we do need answers for this." Kautner got out of the ambulance once the stretcher was strapped down. A medic closed the doors, and jogged over to the driver's side, leaping in and starting the ambulance before the door was even closed.

It took hours for the wounded to be stabilized and cleared from the road. Corpses were moved off to the side. The air quickly became heavy with grief and sorrow. No one there wanted to handle corpses, but it was something that had to be done.

Kautner tried not to look at any of the faces of the dead. It was hard to think that a few hours ago, these men were alive and well, not expecting any of this to happen. He glanced down once, and recognized the face of a private who, just last night, had been talking with Kautner about how much he missed the horses of his father's farm. He had been showing Kautner photographs of some of the horses, included some beautiful black foals with almost perfectly symmetrical white streaks down their noses.

He spotted the edge of one of those photographs sticking out of the left breast pocket on the private's uniform. Gently, Kautner opened the pocket and took out the photograph. He stared at it, and debated whether or not he should send it to the boy's family, or bury him with it. With a heavy sigh, he decided to take it, promising to send it along with the letter every family dreaded receiving.

In the corner of his eye, Kautner saw Lehning approaching him, and stood stiffly to salute him. "Sir."

"At ease," Lehning said. He looked out at the row of corpses. "Thirty dead so far, and we may lose more later."

Kautner nodded. "I hope not."

"Same here, but… it is something we have to be prepared for. Hopefully, this does not happen to the rest of the regiment, but at least we can tell them not to come this way." Lehning took one last look at the corpses, and let out a low growl. "Hopefully, that saboteur will be one of the ones we lose."

"Rommel wants him alive—"

"I know. If he survives, he survives, but if not…" Lehning shook his head. "Good riddance."