Winters walked over to Joe and Camilla "What the… I can't believe it, you are alive" Winters pulled Camilla to him and hugged her.
Camilla felt a tear trickle down her cheek, she knew who this man was, that was THE Richard Winters and he apparently knew her and had missed her.
Winters turned to Joe "What are you doing here?"
Joe looked at Camilla and then at Winters "I want to head back to the line, sir"
Winters shook his head "You don't have to do that, get back to the aid station, get yourself healed up and take Lieutenant Hamlin with you"
Camilla got scared, no way was she going back, but Joe came to her rescue "I really want to head back to the fellows sir, and I think the lt, she needs to get back too"
"Alright, go on then" Winters noticed his wife dragging Charlotte behind her toward the grub line
…..
A woman came running towards Joe and Camilla, she hugged Camilla like there was no tomorrow "oh god, you are alive, I just knew it"
Camilla looked at the two officers, she had no idea who they were, but Camilla guessed that the women had to be special to be with Easy, in the middle of Bastogne.
Joe looked at Charlotte and Emma "Ma'am, the lieutenant don't remember anything, she lost her memory when the church got bombed"
Emma looked at Camilla, this was bad, Lip was going to be devastated, for him to get Camilla back and then loose her again, and it was absolutely going to kill him.
Emma and Charlotte walked back to the CP, leaving Camilla with Joe, he was the only one she knew and she refused to leave him, he was her security.
Emma looked at Charlotte "Time for some grub, I can't believe, she can't remember a damn thing, wonder if she sees Lip it will help?"
Camilla was walking with Joe towards the grub line, when a man with a heavy south Philly accent approached them.
Bill greeted Joe and then he noticed Camilla "Well aren't you a sight for sore eyes" Bill looked at Camilla, she looked like hell.
Well, there was no doubt she was a part of the company and all the men seemed to know her.
Bill turned to Joe "What are you doing here?"
Joe shrugged "I had to make sure you were on top of things"
Bill smirked "I am on top of things, I tied me own boots once last week, all by me self" Bill and Joe laughed.
Camilla followed them to the grub line, the men became quiet when they noticed her, but Joe came to her rescue, "Ok fellars, the Lieutenant don't remember a damn thing, so leave her alone"
A replacement who hadn't met Dana yet, because she was hiding from Dike over by Dog Company's line looked at Camilla, "What's with all the broads in this Company?"
Talbert immediately smacked him "Don't talk that way about the lieutenant or captain Grey, they are some of the best leaders here"
Joe looked at the replacement "What's that" he asked
"That's Webb, a replacement" Skip told him
"Really, I thought it some guy I have known for two years and I forgot his face" Toye retorted
"Joe got hit in the arm, a New Year's Eve gift from the Luftwaffe" A Penkala told the replacement
"Have a lot of you been injured" The replacement asked
Charlotte who was skipping the line, smacked the poor guy upside his head "It's called wounded peanut, injured is when you fall out of a tree or something"
Camilla who had gotten her grub and sat down on a log with Emma and Dana on each side of her, smiled when Skip turned and told the Kid "Don't worry there is enough grab flying around here, you are about to get dinged sometime"
Camilla kept looking at a sergeant, who was leaning against a tree, and staring at her with an intense gaze, she knew he looked familiar, but who was he?
Skip decided to guide the replacement through the Company's wounded list "almost every single of these guys and girls has been hit a least once"
Skip looked around "except for Alley he is a two timer, he landed on broken glass in Normandy and got peppered by a potato masher in Holland, Bull he got an piece of exploding tank in Holland, now Luz here, he never been hit, lucky bastard"
Luz looked at skip, who had never been wounded himself "Takes one to know one, Skip" he retorted
Skip just continued "consider us blessed, now Liebgott, the scrawny little guy, he got pinged in the neck in Holland"
Liebgott pulled down on his scarf so Webb could see his scar "And next to him, that other skinny little guy, that's Popeye, he got shot in his scrawny little butt in Normandy"
Skip then turned to Buck "And Buck got shot in his rather large butt in Holland" Buck pointed to where he was hit.
"It's kind of an Easy company tradition getting shot in the ass" Penkala mumbled.
Skip then looked at the Charlotte, Emma, Camilla and Dana who had joined them "And then there are the pretty edition to the company, now Captain Winters, she got hit by a flying piece of bridge in Holland"
The Replacement looked at Skip "I thought Captain Winters was a man"
The men laughed "Well, this pretty lady thought it was a good idea to get married in the middle of a war"
Skip continued "Captain Speirs and before you ask, she is lieutenant Speirs wife, she took one to the side during a barrage right here in the forest, Captain Kahne took one to the lung in Holland and we almost lost Nixon at the same time, And lieutenant Hamlin got hit when they bombed the church in Bastogne, she just lost her mind though"
Skip then turned to Lip "even first sergeant Lipton here he got a couple tank shell burst in Carentan, he took one to the face…" before Skip could finish
Camilla continued "The other almost took out his nuts, I remember, I remember you and everything else" Camilla was so happy she cried
Lipton ran over and hugged her, "Oh god, I am so happy, it was killing me, just to look at you and know you didn't remember anything"
Camilla and Lipton walked of wrapped up in each other. The Company let out a sigh, thing were good again or at least as good as they could be in the frozen hell.
On January 3rd Emma and Winters decided to pull 2nd and 3rd Platoon, out of the advanced position, they left 1st platoon attached to Dog Company, which like most of the company in the 101st was down to 50 percent or less strength. Dog company needed help maintaining the MLR, Dana offered to stay with first platoon and let Buck take charge of third platoon.
This way Dana could stay with Speirs and Buck would get a small break.
Christenson. Perconte and a replacement was sharing a foxhole. First and second platoon walked by, the men teased the guys, "don't drink too much" and Malarkey walked by and pointed his riffle at them, "don't accept, if he offers you a cigarette"
The replacement looked at Christenson "What are they talking about"
"Speirs, lieutenant Speirs, not the Captain" Christenson told the replacement
"Captain Speirs, is she his sister?" The replacement asked Christenson
"No, his wife, the stories about Speirs, is probably just bull shit anyways" Christenson was toying with his machine gun.
"What stories? What stories" the replacement asked
Perconte looked at him "Speirs shot one of his men for being drunk"
"That's unbelievable" the replacement said
"And another one about him giving cigarettes to twenty POV before shooting them" Christenson continued
"Well I heard it was more like thirty" Perconte said between brushing his teeth
None of the men had heard Dana and Speirs sneaking up on them "Christenson, I got the name right, it is Christenson right?" Speirs asked the scared soldier.
"Yes sir" Christenson answered
"What are you men doing out here" Speirs asked the men
Dana was hanging back and none of the men in the foxhole had yet noticed her, she was trying not to laugh at the frightened look on the men faces.
"Watching the line, Sir" Christenson answered
"Well, keep up the good work and while you are at it, you might want to reinforce your cover" Speirs motioned to the foxhole, which was in a poor state
"Actually, lieutenant Dike said, not to bother we are only going to be here one day" Perconte said
"Lieutenant Dike said not to bother, well then forget what I said, carry on" Ron got on his feet and started to walk away, he turned "Anyone care for a smoke"
"Quit bothering my boys, Sparky" Dana finally stepped out from the shadow and slapped Speirs on the back
Speirs just turned and smiled to his wife "Hey, I was just making friendly conversation" Speirs slapped Dana on the butt and walked of laughing.
Dana shook her head "Everybody ok here?" the three men nodded and Dana walked of in the direction her husband had disappeared.
She found him in his foxhole, he was smoking and when he saw Dana a big smile appeared on his face, Dana jumped down in the foxhole "Don't mess with my boys, you scare the shit out of them" Dana scolded him.
"I didn't do anything just talking" Speirs smirked
"Yeah, whatever you say" Dana cuddled up to Speirs and she fell asleep.
…
The lead unit decide to take a short cut across the open field to get to the foxholes before dark, the other units followed and the Germans spotted them.
When the men ducked into the woods, they noticed that the German had zeroed artillery in on the position. There were shell holes and branches from tree bursts all around the foxholes. The shell were big, indicating heavy artillery.
Joe jumped into his foxhole to work on strengthening it "Argh, you gotta be fucking kidding me, someone's gonna die, someone's gonna fucking die, look at this shit, one of those first battalion fuckers took a shit in my foxhole"
Guarnere was looking around at the mass destruction "They took a shit in everybody's foxhole, I don't think they wanted to spend much time above ground"
Camilla, Shames, Buck and Lipton was standing in a circle talking, Lipton was explaining to them what he had observed in Foy, "They are just waiting for us to reoccupy our position" Buck said
"It's our job to hold the line here, we got pretty good foxholes, we just need to strengthened our covers" Lipton told the other officers
Shames chimed in "If they got us zeroed in maybe we should…"
Buck interrupted him "We hold the line here, sergeant Lipton is right, we are gonna strengthen our covers and we are gonna hang in, we are not gonna fall back" Buck let out a small laugh and yelled "Right lieutenant" to Dike who was standing ten feet away from the group
"Fine, you all take care of it, I got to go talk to regiment" Dike walked of and disappeared once again.
Camilla and Lipton was working on strengthening their foxhole, when a barrage began. Lipton and Camilla ran thru the woods yelling to the men to take cover, before finally jumping into a small open hole, someone had started to dig and then abandoned.
Lipton was on top of Camilla, who was shaking, this was worse than anything they had experienced before.
Toye was in the open, shouting orders to his men to take cover, a shell exploded just above him. Shrapnel all but tore off his right leg and hit him in the stomach, chest and both arms.
Suddenly the shelling stopped. All through the woods men were calling out for a medic, Camilla started to get on her feet, Lipton got of her "You head for the foxhole, it's gonna start again"
Camilla ran toward their foxhole trying to block out the calls for a medic, she knew Lipton was right
Toye called out for someone to help him, Guarnere jumped to his rescue and just as he started to drag Joe towards his foxhole, the shelling started again, a shell burst over Guarnere's head. Shrapnel tore into his right leg, mangling it. After a few minutes the shelling ceased.
Camilla and Lipton ran out of their foxhole, half way too Joe and Bill they encountered Dike.
Dike shouted to Lipton "first Sergeant Lipton, you get thing organized here and I'll go for help" And with that he left.
Lipton was shocked, Camilla turned and looked at Dike's retreating form "Lieutenant Dike, get back here, Dike…" Camilla shook her head "Fucker" she mumbled.
Camilla and Lipton ran toward the cries for help they could hear coming from Toye and Guarnere.
Camilla came to a skidding hold and threw herself down next to Toye" its ok Joe, It's gonna be ok"
Malarkey showed shocked to see what happened to his two friends "What can I do to help" He asked Camilla and Roe, who had showed up two minutes before.
Guarnere was sitting next to him shaking, he looked up at Lipton "eh Lip, they got old Guarnere this time"
Bill was put on a stretcher and just before they walked away with him, he said "hey Joe, I told I would beat you back to the states"
Joe Toye was in a lot of pain, and Camilla tried to ease his pain, best she could with her limited supply of morphine.
Dana came running to the scene and threw herself down on the ground next to Joe "Hey Joe, you don't look to hot" She nudged him, Joe just smiled, and looked away.
Dana looked over her shoulder, Luz came walking up to her, and Dana knew she would never forget his shocked expression, when he saw Joe on the ground.
Dana put a hand on his shoulder and turned him away from the scene "Luz, how is Buck?"
"Fine, but you should probably go talk to him" Luz said and walked away, it was too much for him to see his friend on the ground.
Dana looked around, Joe was on his way, so Dana decided to have Camilla talk to Buck. Dana patted Camilla on the arm "Go talk to Buck, I think it needs to be you and if you can, get him off the line"
Camilla walked over and sat down next to Buck "Buck, how is that trench foot of yours?" she asked him
Buck wouldn't look Camilla in the eye, he knew what she was doing and he was grateful for it, she wasn't going to talk to him about what he just witnessed, but she was giving him away out.
Buck just looked at Camilla with big empty eyes, Camilla motioned for him to stand up and she walked Buck to a jeep "Let me handle this, you just go and don't come back until you are ready"
Camilla hugged Buck and the jeep drove off, Camilla found battalion CP and informed Winters, she had sent Buck off the line with a bad case of trench foot.
…..
"Problem is, with Buck gone, there is no real alternative to Dike, as long as Sink won't promote Captain Grey" Lip said.
Dana, Camilla and Lipton was walking thru the woods, discussing the leadership problem Easy had, they were stuck with Dike and as far Dana was concerned, he was an empty uniform.
Another barrage started and Lipton, Camilla and Dana dove into a foxhole, a scrambling Luz threw himself in and over the noise he told them that Muck and Penkala got hit.
Malarkey took Muck and Penkala's death pretty hard, his best friends in the company had been Buck, Muck and Penkala.
Dana found him in his foxhole "Didn't I hear you wanted to take a Luger home to your kid brother?"
Malarkey looked up at her "Yeah"
Dana pulled out Hobbler's Luger and handed to him "Take care" she said, Dana nodded to Lipton who was on his way to talk to Malarkey about him going off the line for a bit.
Charlotte walked up to Dana "Ready?"
Dana looked at her and smiled "Ready as I'll ever be"
Dana and Charlotte walked away, they hadn't told anybody about their mission, they were on their way down to Foy to collect Intel.
Dana and Charlotte walked thru the wood and when they got to the edge they hunkered down and waited for the dark and for their chance to run across the field and closer to town.
Lipton was watching the line, when he noticed to silhouettes running towards town and he knew who it was, he mumbled something under his breath, this would mean a visit from Speirs soon and he didn't have to wait for long before the angry lieutenant showed up.
Speirs looked at Lipton and Shames "Have any of you seen my wife?"
Lipton tried not to look at Speirs "Well sir…"
"Yes first sergeant" Speirs looked at Lipton
"Captain Kahne and Captain Grey is down in Foy" Lipton tried to avoid looking at Speirs.
Speirs felt the blood leave his face "Did you just say, she was in Foy?"
"Yes Sir" Lipton said
Speirs turned and marched to the CP, he walked over and stood nose to nose with Nixon "Why is my wife and Captain Kahne in Foy" Speirs sneered
Nixon eye grew big "What? What did you just say?"
"The two of them snuck down into Foy" Speirs informed the officers gathered at the CP
Winters looked at Nixon "Did you know anything about this?" he asked him
Nixon sat down and ran his hands thru his hair "No, I swear, I knew nothing"
Speirs sat down on an old crate and looked at Emma "Did you?"
Emma squirmed, she had heard Dana and Charlotte talk about sneaking down into Foy to collect some fresh Intel "Well, sort of, but I didn't know they would actually do it"
The CP fell silent and no one moved, the only interruption was when Lipton showed up and expressed his concerns about Dike's leadership abilities.
Just before dawn Charlotte and Dana showed up, when they saw the gathering at CP, they knew they were in trouble.
Speirs got on his feet and grabbed Dana's arm and dragged her away, when they were about ten feet from the CP, he let go of her "What were you thinking? Sneaking away like that"
Dana looked at Speirs, she knew he was worried and that he would be pissed, when he found out, "Please, you are just pissed because you didn't think of going down there first, besides let's talk about doing stupid ass things after the attack tomorrow"
Dana walked away from him, she stopped and turned she kissed her husband "I love you"
Speirs pulled her close to him and mumbled down in her hair "I love you too"
Nixon looked at Charlotte, he was shaking, Charlotte was briefing Winters and Emma on the Intel she and Dana had collected
When she was done, she walked over and took Nixon's hand and dragged him outside, she pushed him down in their foxhole "I never been so fucking scared in my entire life, I love you a lot, I ain't going down there tomorrow. I think we can take the town, but Dike is going to get a lot of good men killed" Charlotte ranted
Nixon didn't say anything, he just looked at the love of his life, he was afraid he lost her again, when Speirs informed him, she and Grey had wandered down to Foy "Don't ever…" He said
Charlotte kissed him "I won't"
"Charlotte, when this is over, I am going to marry you and I am never letting you go ever again" Nixon kissed Charlotte
"Well good, because I am never letting you go" Charlotte snuggled up to Nixon
Charlotte was in love for the first time in her life, she was happy, and she intended for it to stay that way.
…
"Third platoon on your feet" Dana ordered her men, the attack on Foy was under way and Dana was leading her men, down thru the open field, they had machine gun fire covering them.
Dana knew Dike would order the company to stop and take cover before they got half way, so she had her men run towards whatever cover they could find and when the order came they had somewhat cover, but the squad which had followed Dana was hunkered down behind a haystack.
"He does know hay isn't bullet proof right?" Popeye asked her
Dana just looked at the scene before her, Dike had choked, and men was getting killed.
…..
Winters and Emma was looking at the scene which was unfolding before their eyes, Emma knew what would happen, but Dick wasn't prepared for it.
Winters was running towards the battle before him eager to get Easy to safety "You got to keep moving, keep moving forward" he yelled
"Dick get back here" Emma shouted
"Dick, Dick, Captain Winters, you do not go out there, you are the battalion commander, get back here, now Dick I understand your attachment to Easy Company…" Sink shouted at Winters
Dick just blazed past him "Speirs, get yourself on over here, get down there and relief Dike and take that attack down on in"
….
Dana turned her head and saw her husband run thru the field, he jumped over an exploding mortar and ran down to Dike and told him he was relieved. Speirs assessed the situation and did what Winters had told him, he got the remainder of the company down into Foy.
Lipton and Speirs had taken cover behind a bombed out building "What do you see Lipton"
"Infantry, a lot of infantry" Lip told him
"I Company is supposed to be on the other side of town, can you see them?" Speirs asked Lip
No, Sir, I am afraid they are gonna slip away, if we don't connect with them" Lip said
"Right, wait here" Speirs started to get up, before he got any further, he noticed his wife run thru the German infantry, towards a small wall and jump over it, Speirs headed that same way and jumped over the wall.
Speirs practically fell down on his wife, who was talking to the CO of I Company "What the hell are you doing?" He asked her
"Nice to see you too, connecting with I, same as you, now let's get going" Dana said and jumped over the wall, Speirs shook his head, he loved his wife, but he was sure she was crazy.
…
The attack was over, and the whole regiment was celebrating, when a shoot rang out and a man fell down.
The men all took cover and suddenly the whole town was quiet.
Charlotte, Lipton, Dana and Shifty took cover behind a building, Lipton quickly spotted the sniper. Dana and Charlotte looked at each other and nodded, "Building on the right, second floor don't miss Shifty" Dana said and took off running to the right and Charlotte went to the left, Shifty got the sniper
Dana smiled until she felt a slap on the back of her head, Emma looked at her "Do you want to be divorced before the war is over?" Emma asked Dana and pointed towards a pissed off Speirs.
Easy took Noville and the Rachamps. In Rachamps the company spend the night in the convent.
Emma, Dana, Charlotte and Camilla sat together and took inventory of the last seven months of their life "Can you believe eight months ago, we were sitting in a camp in Afghanistan talking about ,how we would love to be fighting with these men?" Camilla asked her friends
"I can't believe we are here, but I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world" Emma looked at her husband, Dick looked tired and fatigued. He had aged ten years during the months they had spent in Bastogne, but she didn't care, he was her husband and the best man in the world.
Charlotte looked at Nixon, Camilla noticed the look in her eyes "You found him, your soul mate, heck you got him to stop drinking, you are so lucky"
Charlotte smiled "Yeah, I did, and what about you and Lip, you change your mind?"
"Yes I have, I will marry that man and as soon as possible" Camilla smiled
The girls then shifted their attention to Dana "And you and your suicidal husband, I know you got what you wanted" Emma nudged Dana
"I did, and you know what? It's hard work, but so worth it" Dana laughed.
The men turned their heads in the direction the noise came from, and three officers and one NCO thought about how the three girls had changed their lives.