A/N: Thanks to the reviewers! I hope to deliver for the rest of the story!

Kinchloe opened his eyes. It was night. After a few breaths, he located the pain he was feeling. Mostly it was his head, but now that he thought of it, his arm was smarting something awful, along with... his shoulder? No. His collarbone. He groaned softly, and realized it was the only sound he could hear besides a brisk breeze blowing through leaves and billowing out his parachute silk. He untwisted his good arm from under him, and brought his hand up to examine the wetness he felt on his forehead. He stopped before he got there. He couldn't see his hand in front of his face. It was very dark. Had a thick cloud layer rolled in? It shouldn't. They had checked the weather before they left, as best they could from London, and there was no sign of a storm. Well, weather could be unpredictable. There was a reason he hadn't become a meteorologist. Or a navigator for that matter.

He gingerly fingered the wound on his forehead. It was bleeding all over the place, but it couldn't be too deep, seeing as how his skull was right under the skin. A stronger wind passed over him, and suddenly he was being dragged along by his shoulders. He almost cried out at the sudden pain from the broken bone. He tried desperately to unlatch the chute pack, but with no light to guide him, he was unsuccessful, and was dragged along several more yards before the breeze let his parachute down. His breath was heavy. He hoped no one could hear him. They probably wouldn't see him in this light, giant chute or no.

The breeze died and he paused in trying to remove the chute to listen carefully to the crickets around him and any noise they might be hiding. It was so difficult to hear anything over frogs, crickets, and dry grass being disturbed. Wait. The wind was gone entirely. Dry grass being disturbed?

Kinchloe almost jumped out of his skin at hearing a rough, foreign-sounding voice. He jerked, wrenching his injuries trying to get up even though he knew he couldn't run. He didn't even know where to run. He couldn't see his assailant. And then he was rolled onto his back by his jacket and he registered the words being spoken to him. "It's alright! Calm down. Quiet."

It was English. Accented English, but it didn't sound German. He didn't fight. Besides that, his head had started spinning again and he was worried about losing consciousness once more.

"You wouldn't believe how hard it is to find you people," the voice continued in a whisper as Kinchloe felt him get to work untangling the chute enough to free him. "Main! That's all we had to go on."

"Wait. That was me," Kinchloe said, a little dazed.

"Yeah?"

"Ow! Careful. It's my right arm."

"Right. Sorry." He worked the strap off more carefully, but still couldn't avoid causing pain. To get his mind off it, Kinchloe explained himself.

"The radio conked out before I could say more and we were bailing."

"Aw, that's fine," the voice said. Kinchloe thought he could pick up an apologetic tone through the accent whose origin he was still too dizzy to place. This man probably hadn't anticipated finding, of all men, the radioman they had contacted. "I can understand wanting to bail out fast in a falling, flaming plane. You were just lucky you landed in a field with this parachute blowing around on a windy night, or I never would have seen you."

"Seen me?" Kinchloe responded, confused. "How can you? It's so dark."

"Uh oh," came the quiet voice again. Kinchloe felt him stop with the parachute. "How many fingers?"

"I can't see your hand. It's too dark."

"By any chance," the voice asked, "Do the Americans allow the blind in the air?"

"What?" Kinchloe exclaimed, too loudly.

"Shhh! You want the Gestapo after you? Look, I'm sorry to break it to you, but the moon's almost full and their isn't a cloud in the sky." He got back to work on the parachute, perhaps to avoid Kinchloe's palpable reaction.

"What? You're telling me—" He broke off, trying to comprehend the thought.

"You lost your vision."

"But how—?"

"You fell from the sky. Hit your head on anything?"

The pounding in his head told him the answer, though he didn't remember anything. "I guess. But... is it permanent?"

"I'm no doctor, but I've heard of these things happening before. You hit your head, you'll probably be able to see in a few minutes."

"You'll be right as rain," came a new voice.

Kinchloe started and the first voice cursed. "Why must you always sneak up like that?"

"Can I 'elp it if you blokes don' 'ave ears?"

~~HH~~

With the help of the person belonging to the second voice, they had Kinchloe out in no time. He could hardly get a word in edgewise as the two bickered almost constantly. Somewhere in their ramblings, Kinchloe picked up the fact that the second voice had been looking for downed fliers too, and had happened to see him just as the first had. They mentioned more about others, and about camp, and deadlines, but Kinchloe didn't pick up much. After they had set him on his feet, he had been concentrating hard on keeping upright. He had also been able to determine what kind of accent the first had with the comparison of the second to help. A Russian had found him, and an Englishman had joined. Suddenly, he realized said Englishman was speaking to him.

"Oi! Come on, old fellow. We don't 'ave all night. Gotta get you back to camp."

Kinchloe couldn't help his first reaction. "Who are you calling old fellow? And— camp? What are you talking about?"

"We've got a shipping point in Germany 'ere to get downed fliers back 'ome, and it's time to get you back there."

"What about the rest of my crew?" Kinchloe asked.

"The others are out to find them. That's what Minsk is off to do." Kinchloe hadn't even noticed the other man leave. "We'll do the best we can to get them to camps too. Finding you means the others must be close by, right?"

"Right," Kinchloe said, mind still hazy as he tried to remember where they'd gone down and who had been bailing out when he was.

"Can you walk fine?" asked the Englishman.

Kinchloe tested his feet and legs out. Besides a pain in his thigh, they were in working order. "Yeah. It's just my arm and shoulder. Right side."

"A'right, then I'll lead you from your left."

Kinchloe felt a hand take him by the elbow, and gently begin to lead him. At first, they were quite clumsy. Kinchloe couldn't see the uneven tufts in the ground, and though the Englishman tried, he couldn't very well warn him of and describe each one. After a few too many painful jolts and nearly tripping (almost bringing the Englishman down with him), Kinchloe finally got the hang of it, placing his feet loosely, ready for them to turn in any direction.

Once the Englishman was confident that he wasn't about to hit the ground, he whispered, "Name's Peter Newkirk, Corporal. RAF if you couldn't guess. 'ow about you?"

"Sergeant James Kinchloe. US Army Air Corp, if you couldn't guess."

Kinchloe could hear the smile in his voice. "A'right, then. Turnabout is fair play." The hand on his arm tugged him a bit to the left. "Shrub 'ere."

Kinchloe paid a little more attention to walking carefully, especially when his guide warned him, "Goin' into the forest here. Just pay attention to me guidin' 'and. I'll get you 'round the trees." It took another few minutes of tangled brambles and unseen saplings to get to the clearer interior of the forest. They may have gotten annoyed at each other if they weren't equally bad at getting through. It gave Kinchloe some time to think about this faceless voice leading him. Based on the accent, which wasn't exactly what you'd hear on the BBC, he sounded like an Eastender. An RAF pilot in the middle of Germany. Pilot?

"So are you groundcrew, radio, pilot?"

"I was the latter, old fellow. Everyone's air force back at camp."

"I cannot have that many years on you. Can't you just call me Kinchloe? Maybe Sergeant?"

"'at depends. 'ow old are you?"

Kinchloe almost rolled his eyes. "Thirty three. You?"

"Thirty two. I guess I can't. I cap it at three years. Gonna 'ave to duck 'ere. Low branch."

Kinchloe didn't know how much to duck, so he hazarded a guess, and missed, smacking his already injured and dizzy head into the tree, and promptly falling. He blinked hard to clear the lightheadedness and perhaps abate the headache. It didn't do much. He just pressed his newly freed hand to the side of his head and groaned. He heard the Englishman—Newkirk—pick himself off the ground and ask "Are you alright, old— mate?"

"My name is Kinchloe," he said carefully, trying not to antagonize the headache.

"Well I can't very well call you that, now can I?"

"Why not? Everyone else does." Kinchloe felt the lightest of fingertips on his forehead.

"That really is a nasty cut, that is. 'ere." He began to help him up by the shoulder. "Kinchloe's just too long. Too awkward."

Kinchloe finally regained his feet. Where's that tree? he thought. He felt for it, and Newkirk helped him lean against it. "It's two syllables."

There was a pause. "Point taken." The merry-go-round his head was on was starting to slow down. "I'm just gonna call you 'mate'. 'ow 'bout that?"

Kinchloe wasn't going to put up any more argument. "Sure."

"A'right, mate," the voice said happily. "Sorry about that fall. Now let's get to camp. We're goin' slow, and I gotta be back before roll call."

"Roll call?"

"I'll explain. Come on."