"Rene."

Emilie was faintly aware of the voice coming from somewhere behind her, but didn't think much of it. She was too tried for that. One of the other nurses, a beautiful black girl, had given her something for the pain a few hours ago, and now Emilie was constantly dozing off. No one had even asked her what she had been doing with the German soldier yet, of which she was thankful. She briefly wondered what they had done with Drechsler's body, but didn't even want to think about that. He was probably on the pile of corpses outside by now, with flies buzzing around him. She shuddered at the thought. And now the army was down a medic and a soldier. Things just got better and better.

"Eugene," that was Rene's voice now, "Do you need any more supplies? A plane just dropped some more, and I have some to spare."

Eugene? No, it was probably another Eugene. It was a common name (Emilie had never been particularly fond of it before, but, as of late, she could think of no better. Odd). But what would another Eugene be doing here?

As she was now strong enough to prop herself up on her elbows, she turned in her cot; much too quickly, evidently, as it sent a sharp pain shooting up her side and she cringed in pain. But it was good. She needed to keep her blood circulating, even if she couldn't walk. So she persisted, and was then lying on her stomach. Her eyes almost erupted from her head when, lo and behold, there was the beautiful Cajun – no, sorry, the half-Cajun. He was in an adjoining room, telling Rene what he was running low on as she placed the medicine into a box he held to his chest with both arms.

Once it was close to over-flowing, he followed Rene out of the room, seemingly struggling to hold up the heavy box. Just as he was about to make his way back up the stairs, he spotted her, and stopped with one foot still on the bottom step. Rene turned to him when his footsteps stopped, and her gaze flicked between Eugene and Emilie, head tilted slightly to the side. "Do you know her, Eugene?" she asked, absently scraping dried blood off of her fingers.

"Yes," he replied after a brief moment's hesitation, frowning, "Excuse me, Rene."

"Of course. I'm here if you need me."

Rene watched as Eugene made his way over to Emilie, before she was called over by another nurse and hurried over to a patient. The American medic set down his box of supplies beside Emilie's cot and stood over her, frown deepening. She looked up at him, remaining on her stomach for a few moments longer before slowly easing herself up into a sitting position. When she let out a wince of pain, he looked ready to help, but she waved him off and leaned back against the staircase.

"What are you doin' 'ere, miss Demont?" he asked, holding his helmet in one hand. His gaze swept over her one leg that was still extended, and stopped on her bandaged ankle. Some blood had dripped onto the cot. "What happened?"

Emilie didn't respond for a moment. She should hate him. She should hate him for what his army had done to her friends. But, no matter how hard she tried, she simply couldn't. He had probably had nothing to do with it. Finally, she muttered, leaning forward to itch the skin under the bandage where it had begun to rub, "A bullet went right through my Achilles' tendon when your men lobbed all that artillery at us."

What looked like guilt passed over his face. "I'm sorry 'bout that, ma'am," he responded softly, "They didn't have any fireworks. I guess mortars are the next best thing."

She gave a half-smile despite herself. "No one but me was hurt, thank God. Well, that's probably bad news to you," she shrugged, refusing to think about Drechsler. Before he could protest, she remembered something, and added in an urgent whisper, leaning forward, "Oh, and, Gene? Don't tell anyone here who I am. I went through Hell to get here after our aid station was… hit." She drew back, frowning slightly as she hoped their previous agreement of confidentiality still stood. "I'll be getting back to the line as soon as I can."

"You're goin' back?" he echoed, evidently alarmed, "In your condition? That's crazy talk, miss Demont."

"You sound like the doctor at the aid station," she chuckled, rolling her eyes, "I'm just peachy. All I want to do is get back to my army. They need me, and, as insane as it sounds, they… Keep me sane." Emilie raised her eyebrows, "But why would you care, exactly?"

Eugene blinked back at her calmly. "I don't want anyone to go and get themselves killed because they're too stubborn to admit they're hurt."

Not exactly the answer I was expecting. She was almost surprised with herself. What else had she possible been expecting? "Oh, I am stubborn," she agreed with a light laugh, "But the difference is I know I'm hurt, but I'm not leaving my men out on the line without a medic."

"You're the only medic?" he cut in. Everyone, even the enemy, knew how potentially disastrous that could be.

Emilie nodded, letting out a sigh. "If you tell anyone this, I'll personally hunt you down and kill you. But, yeah, it's pretty damn hard to find any town that will welcome us with open arms, so it's taking a long time to get reinforcements. Not that we need any, besides a second medic," she added quickly, still a little suspicious.

He nodded, staring across the room, lost in thought.

Emilie rearranged herself, breaking the lull in the conversation with, "So, you survived the airstrike I warned you about. It's, uh, it's good to see you, I guess."

Eugene bowed his head, and she instantly regretted mentioning it. She should have known from personal experience to never bring up old battles with another medic. She was just about to apologise when he raised his head, his jaw set in that expression he got when he was obviously hurting, as though someone had suddenly pulled the shutters down behind his eyes. "I did," His accent seemed to thicken as his voice quietened, "But not everyone."

She swallowed, staring into his deep, dark blue eyes that could just as easily have been black. "I'm sorry," she whispered, "There was nothing I could do."

"Don't apologise," he muttered gruffly, "I don't blame you." She could tell he was fighting back adding 'I blame myself'. She wanted to comfort him, oh how she wanted to. But she knew there was nothing she could ever say to take away his pain, his guilt, his self-loathing. From the first moment she had met him, Emilie had seen her own over-powering emotions reflected in his eyes. All the torment.

So, instead of attempting a hopeless mission, she instead opted for trying to lighten the mood. She had always been a little awkward at that, and usually ended up babbling like a moron with half a brain cell, but she saw it as her only option. "So," she began with a forced half-smile, and Gene looked up, "Did you end up finding your scissors?"

He echoed her half-smile despite himself, though his eyes still looked distant. "As a matter of fact, miss Demont, I did," he replied, "But I had to raid a few soldier's aid kits in the process, which they weren't too happy about."

Emilie chuckled, tucking a loose strand of ginger hair behind her ear. It felt knotted to the touch, and she was suddenly self-conscious, embarrassed she may look like someone dragged through the mud by a horse for 2 kilometres. But why should she care about how she looked around him? She hadn't given it a second thought before; she rarely did. Even before the war, she hadn't usually worn makeup, while her few friends piled it on like there was no tomorrow. Of course, they had all had someone to look nice for.

"Sorry I haven't exactly looked like a ball of cherries lately," she chuckled, running both of her hands through her hair in a hopeless attempt to smooth it. This was a whole new level of curly. But it was useless, and she eventually gave up and let her hands fall back in her lap, smiling sheepishly.

Eugene shook his head, a small smile on his face that could only be described as cheeky appearing when his eyes settled once more on her face. "You do look a little like death warmed up," he commented, sounding a little amused, as though she was quite the strange creature to behold. Even with his Rudolph-like red nose from the cold, he still looked fantastic.

Emilie let out a snort, grinning. "Warmed up?" she repeated, "Well, I'll take that as a compliment, because I feel positively frozen."

The American medic opened his mouth to say something, but before he could get a word out, a voice from above made them both look up. A man was leaning over the railing at the top of the stairs. "Doc, get your ass up here. We need to get back to the line!"

"I'll be up in a minute," Eugene called back. With a grumble, the other soldier at the top of the stairs nodded once before disappearing from sight. Eugene looked back at Emilie, smiling apologetically, before bending down to collect his box of supplies. "Get well soon," he instructed her, and she salted mockingly back. Letting out a light chuckle, Eugene turned, bid farewell to Rene, then walked quickly back up the stairs, Emilie watching him the entire way with a pathetically wistful look on her face.

Why did she always feel so empty when he left? And why did she immediately start thinking about the next time she could see him? It was foolish. And yet she couldn't shake his pretty little face from her mind for the rest of the day. At least he was a good pain-relief; her foot suddenly didn't hurt, and stayed that way for a few more hours. And then the agony returned, yet she couldn't get that dumb, thin smile off of her face. Her mother would have told her she would get wrinkles with all that grinning.