A/N: Ah, the lost chapter is finally up! I am so sorry, I really don't know what happened. obviously hates me ahahah. Thank you to everyone that pointed everything out and made me aware of all that had gone wrong. You saved this. I was so close to just abandoning this fic after everything went to crap, but your support inspired me not to. Thanks. And, if anyone did read my notes for where the story is going that were accidentally put up here, oh well! I hope I don't let you down. :D
Enjoy. xx
By the time the Jeep came round, Emilie was fading in and out of consciousness. The sweet man, who she had since remembered was called Drechsler, had stayed with her, his hand in hers, squeezing her wrist every time she closed her eyes for more than 20 seconds. She wanted to snap at him to just let her sleep and die already, but she refrained, too tried to do anything more than breathe; she knew that, soon, she wouldn't even be able to do that so easily. He must be so terrified. Soldiers are trained for everything, but nothing can prepare them for seeing someone die right in front of them. Even Emilie wasn't yet used to it.
She wasn't even scared for herself. She had accepted she may die a few months after she had been drafted. What terrified her was the thought: what will happen to them after I'm gone? What will my brother do? She wasn't selfless. No, a lot of the time she was selfish. But when you don't have many people close to you, you learn to put the needs of the few you do have before yours. Maybe that was why she was lying there, struggling to stay awake, choking on her own blood.
But she knew she would still have to wait a little while longer to die; she could still feel the pain, and she was burning hot instead of ice cold. She learnt that quickly as a nurse: as soon as the patient says 'I feel cold', you can pretty much guarantee they're fucked. 'Why are you doing this to me?' she wanted to scream. But she already knew the answer to that, and it was a long, long list.
Finally, someone drove up the Jeep, headlights off so the Americans wouldn't notice them, and her CO scooped her up easily and laid her down gently in the back. Drechsler ushered the current driver out of the driver's seat and took his place, driving off without looking back, having to concentrate extra hard to see in the darkness and not run over anyone in their foxhole. But, somehow, they made it out of the line, and they were soon speeding along one of the roads the Germans had blocked off. He looked back every few minutes to make sure she was still alive; by that point, she was wheezing, but still very much in agony, continuing to stain the back seat with her blood. She could smell it, above all the car fumes that danced around her. Her head was throbbing and she had since broken into a cold sweat.
In her semi-conscious, somewhat delirious state, she felt as though she were flying as the car barrelled down the black road, faster than she would have thought possible. But quickly the blissful feeling turned into wanting to vomit.
Emilie closed her eyes. The cold, fresh air did little to nothing for her sickness. When she flickered open her eyes again, she was surprised to see dim lights in the distance.
"Where are we going?" she slurred, cringing when the muscles in her churning stomach tensed when she spoke and made her feel even worse. Maybe she should have asked that beforehand.
Drechsler sped up, and she was sure his boot must have been pressed right against the floor of the automobile. "Don't hate me for what I'm about to do, Emilie," he replied softly, almost pleadingly, as though begging her forgiveness.
She let out a groan, head lolling to the side to look at the back of his head. "What are you talking about, Drechsler?" She sounded drunk and, at that point, she wished she did have a drink.
He didn't reply; he didn't need to. From where Emilie was lying, she couldn't see much, but she could see that they were driving towards the town of Bastogne; even from this distance, Emilie could smell the stench of rotting corpses. Well, at least, she hoped that wasn't her.
"I hate not knowing things," Emilie grumbled, "What are we doing here? This is enemy territory." She was finding it hard to even care anymore. Territories, boundaries, potato, potahto. They were all human.
Drechsler reached back, not taking his eyes off the road, and she weakly raised her hand she wasn't lying on to touch his fingers. "I'm just trying to help you," he answered, "Like all the times you've helped us."
I haven't managed to help anyone, dumbass. And yet she couldn't help feeling slightly flattered.
He pulled the Jeep over a few hundred metres away from the entrance to the town, and clambered over the seat so he was crouched in front of Emilie. She blinked drowsily at him, eyes half-closed, too weak to protest or ask any further questions. So she just lay there as Drechsler ripped the symbol of her regiment from her uniform and pulled out a woman's thick grey coat he explained one of the men had picked up from their lover in Eindhoven when they were last there. She tried to assist him by wriggling out of her parka and putting it on herself, but it was a mostly futile effort.
But, eventually, she was lying in the backseat with, for the most part, no sign that she was a German soldier. She felt strangely empty now, but she had to admit, it was nice to have some fresh clothes. Emilie looked up at him. "What's this for?" she asked, voice raspy and barely a whisper.
Staring at her for a moment, an unexplained glint of sadness in his ice blue eyes, he leaned forward and placed a light, lingering kiss on her forehead. She didn't protest like she had with Zimmermann. Of course, she was in no condition to slug him in the face if she was annoyed. But she wasn't. He pressed his forehead to hers, and they stayed like that for a few seconds that didn't seem to last long enough, their lips tantalisingly close, one of his hands running through her hair. She felt a little light-headed, but, for once, it wasn't the blood loss that was causing it. Fuck it, she was dying, she could enjoy this.
But what bothered her, and ruined the moment, was that, the whole time, she couldn't help imagining it was Eugene instead of Drechsler. And she hated herself for that. Why did she even want that? She wanted Drechsler, not him. At least, that was what she struggled to convince herself. She had known the German for years, whereas she had met the American, what, two times now? But they had left quite an impact, nevertheless.
Finally, Drechsler pulled away, and Emilie let out a small sigh. He hopped back into the driver's seat, restarted the engine, and drove on towards the lights. "When we get inside the town, get yourself to the hospital," he instructed her, "I've been told there has been a makeshift one constructed in a church. Speak English and no one should even suspect you're German. Say I found you injured in the woods. Who knows, maybe that'll show them we have a little compassion."
"What about you?" she asked, drawing out the last word as she broke off into yet another pained groan.
Once again, to her chagrin, he didn't respond.
What happened next happened to fast she could hardly comprehend it. At the last minute, mere metres from the entrance gate that had been reduced to rubble by bombs, something occurred to her. How had she been so stupid as to not realise it before? "Wait, they'll shoot you on sight!"
He drove straight into the town and skidded to a halt, the tyres spitting up dust as he did so. She was right. Some Americans who were walking through there turned to the car, now fully visible in in the light emanating from various sources, and must have thought Drechsler was there to kill them all. They really over-estimated the Germans. They fired one after the other and Drechsler slumped in his seat, letting out a choking sound. Since he had glanced back at her just as they fired, he was staring at her with huge eyes as life drained from his body and he collapsed into the space between the two front seats. The bullets had gone straight threw his chest.
Emilie made no sound. She swore her heart faltered. She stared at the young man in front of her, who just minutes ago had been caressing her cheek. And as she stared, all the pain in her leg and stomach and head faded away, only to be replaced by a feeling that felt like her soul was literally splintering. This had been a suicide mission. He had known he would be killed, and still he did it, for her. Why did he do it, the stupid bastard? She wasn't worth it. In what universe was she worth this? How could he have loved her? Why hadn't he just stopped on the road and allowed her to drag herself to the hospital. Or, better yet, why hadn't he just let her die in his arms? She wanted to die. It would have been a better way to die. Now she had the prospect of living, with more guilt and heart-breaking sorrow and self-loathing to look forward to. Just like that, Maximillian Drechsler was dead.
As she lay there, staring at his body, feeling her heart crumble bit by bit and still not making a single sound, she was vaguely aware of the three American soldiers that had shot him walking towards the Jeep.
"Damn Krauts," one of them was saying, "Think they can waltz wherever the fuck they want. Well, we showed 'em!"
But, as they got closer, another man must have spotted her as he asked, "Hey, what's that in the back?"
"Jesus Christ, I think it's a woman. Look smart, boys."
"Is she dead?"
"How the fuck should I know, Eddie?"
They gathered around her, but she still didn't look up. She didn't want to see their ugly mugs.
"She's bleeding," one of them exclaimed, "Phil, Arthur, help me carry her inside to the hospital."
Another one let out a grunt. "She's a good-looking skirt. How the hell did she end up in the back of a Kraut vehicle?"
"Maybe she's a Kraut?"
"Yeah, and I'm King George. Well, what would she be doing here?"
"She could be a camp-follower. Either way, I don't care. Maybe she'll repay us for savin' her with a good roll in the hay."
"Guys!" one of them broke in irritably, "Just help me."
They began to lift her up, one slinging an arm under her shoulders, another under her lower back, grabbing a feel of her ass as he did so, and the last one holding her under the knees (it did not take three men to carry her, she knew that much; she was as light as a feather), when she let out a screech of "fucking put me down", startling them all and making them drop her back onto the seat.
Questions like 'what's wrong with her' ensued, and continued until a dark-haired woman in a simple, blood-stained dress with a blue, checked piece of material tied at the back of her head, came rushing out of what must have been the hospital, pulling her white coat around her. She took one look at the dead German soldier and asked in a heavy Belgian accent, "what is going on here?"
All the men turned to her, suddenly seeming like the very poster-boys for innocence.
One of them spoke up. "We found her in the back of this Kraut Jeep. She's injured. There's a whole heap of blood; it's a mess, ma'am. We had to kill the man when he started shooting at us."
Liars. Emilie bit back the accusation. She was going to honour Drechsler's final request. She was going to play dumb.
The woman nodded. "One of you, help me take her inside. I've sent most of the other nurses to bed, but I can still operate. Follow me, and keep her head up."
Suddenly, none of the men seemed particularly eager to carry Emilie. They stood there bickering for a few moments before the woman told them to hurry up. The task fell to the man she had already deduced was Eddie, the less pushy and sex-oriented of the trio. He bent down and hesitantly, gently scooped her up, trailing after the nurse as she led him inside the church. Emilie didn't scream or thrash this time, simply because she was too weak and exhausted. Damn, dying sure took a lot of effort. And was it really worth it? She was almost positive she would be going to the deepest, darkest recesses of Hell.
As soon as they entered the makeshift hospital, the over-powering smell of sickness and dying crashed over them. The soldier coughed and Emilie fought down the bile that rose in her throat. As she descended the stairs, she was confronted with the sight of what have must have been at least a hundred men, crammed in wherever there was space. They weren't being evacuated. Jesus, this was what was becoming of the Americans. This was what her people were inflicting on them. And yet, though she usually supported the Yanks, she couldn't help feeling a little pleased, which went against all her medical training and empathetic nature. She was almost too empathetic; she fed off other people's emotions. But not now. Now she almost rejoiced. And that made herself sick. What was she becoming?
