Whenever You're Ready

Whenever you're ready, whenever you're ready

Can we, can we surrender

/ Surrender (natalie taylor)

Part 1

October 1943

ONE

Screams. Gunfire. Explosions.

These sounds had become the soundtrack to Dr. Patrick Turner's life. For the prior month he heard them practically every waking moment and sometimes even as he slept. He could hardly remember a moment of silence since he, along with the British Eighth Army, had landed in Italy. This was why, as he found himself pulled towards consciousness, the silence of his surroundings felt more alarming that comforting. He wondered for a moment if the blow to the head he'd received had rendered him deaf, but when, a moment later, he felt a piercing pain in his skull and groaned as a result, he was able to hear his own anguish. He wasn't deaf, which was a relief, but he was in agony. The pain radiated from just above his left temple, spreading like a spiderweb across the nerves in his face and scalp.

Even though he still walked the line between sleep and alertness, the doctor began to self-diagnose. Loss of consciousness after a blow to the head meant he experienced a severe concussion. The butt of a handgun could do that to a person when wielded with enough malintent. Seeing as his captors had been quite careless with his head once his helmet had been removed, he very much doubted they would be overly generous in treating his condition, which mean he needed to do the best he could with the resources he had available.

He gave himself a several second mental pep-talk before forcing his eyes to open. He braced himself for even more discomfort brought on by sunlight, but it never came, because the space he was in was quite dark. Given the flickers of light he could see at the edges of his vision, he suspected the room was lit by candle or gas flame, not electricity. With the intensity of the pain beginning to make him feel nauseous, he sucked in a slow breath through his nose and tried to brace himself for sitting up. He did not want to sit up and knew it would cause him immense discomfort, but he had to. He had to figure out where the Italians had taken him and what might be available to abate his headache and nausea.

With two more slow breaths, he steeled himself and pressed his hands against the surface below him, but before he could rise more than a few centimeters, his progress was restricted by a hand pressing into his shoulder. Alarmed, he whipped his head to the right to discover the owner of the hand, half expecting it to be one of the angry Italian soldiers who had murdered the other men in his unit, but it was not.

Kneeling beside where he lay on the floor was a petite figure—female, he guessed by the size of her. His vision remained blurry, so he blinked a few times, and her outline became a bit clearer. He could see that she wore a blue dress and had a light-colored scarf tied around her hair. His vision had not cleared enough for him to discern the details of her face, but his level of alarm still began to decrease. A small woman was most likely not a threat to him. She confirmed this suspicion a moment later when she held a teacup up in front of his face and tapped her finger against it.

"Ah." He made a pitiful noise as he collapsed back against the floor. "Grazie, signorina," he managed, though his tongue felt thick in his very dry mouth. His Italian was rubbish, as the army had only taught his unit a few key phrases before shipping them off, but at least he could thank her for the water she provided.

Despite the fact that he wanted a drink quite desperately, he the pain in his skull was weighing him down. He hoped that she would leave the drink so he could roll over and try to consume it in his own time, but it appeared she was determined to help him. She placed her one hand gently at the back of his head to lift it up and with the other brought the cup to his lips.

This first drops of liquid to hit his tongue tasted so foul they made him cough. He wondered briefly if the woman was trying to poison him, but quickly rationalized that thought away. If the Italians who captured him had executed the others in his unit, they would not have held him captively only to poison him several hours later; that would be illogical when a bullet to the head would have done the job much more efficiently. No, his position as "un medico" had granted him clemency—at least for the time being.

As the second sip of water tasted better than the first, he took a few more gulps. The water felt luxurious on his throat and the relief of it abated the pain in his head slightly. When he opened his eyes again, they focused a bit more clearly on his surroundings. He saw wooden roof trusses above him and a withered window to his left, which lead him to conclude he was in some sort of primitive shelter, and it was nighttime.

He tried to push himself up on his elbows and this time the woman did not stop him. He gazed around for several more moments before he tried to move his feet to help him feel stable enough to sit up, but he felt another restriction. Sliding his left leg against the floor revealed a chain shackling his ankle to a bolt in the floor. Adrenaline from shock giving him a boost, he sat fully upright and shot his hands forward to tug at the chain. He knew the effort would be futile before he even touched it, but still he had to try. He tugged and clawed at it for half a minute until he felt a hand on his shoulder once more. That time, he recoiled away from it.

The woman's face was obscured by the dimly lit room, but he could see she was shaking her head slowly.

"Please—er—per favore," he began, not sure of how he would continue to communicate in a way she could understand as he was nearly at the limit of his knowledge. It seemed that didn't matter, though, because she said nothing and instead began to turn away from him.

He watched as she gathered up the cup and a lantern and walked a meter away to where he could see the ends of a ladder poking up above the edge of the floor. She put the cup and lantern down in front of the ladder, turned around, and began to descend. She took the cup down first and then he saw the top of her head and hand return above the floor so she could grab the lantern. As it descended the ladder along with her, the area where he sat, presumably some sort of loft, slowly succumbed to darkness.

Patrick sat rather stunned for several moments, unsure of what to do next. With his leg chained up, he had very few options and the pulsing pain in his head certainly was not helping him think with any clarity. After a few moments, resigned to the fact that his fate was now in the hands of the Italians, he lay back down on the blankets, tucked his arm beneath his head, and tried his best to rest in hopes that he could sleep away what remained of his headache and awake the next morning prepared to formulate a plan to return to the British army.

The following morning, Patrick awoke once again to near silence. He could hear the hum of the motor to a large truck, and distant voices, but there was no gunfire. As much as he welcomed the break from the noises of war, he could not conclusively say he felt relieved considering the chain that remained around his ankle. He opened his eyes slowly and though there was a dull ache pushing against both of his temples, he no longer felt intense pain and the morning light touching his eyes did not cause any nausea. Both these factors told him he was healing well from his concussion, which was beneficial as he needed to remain as alert as possible while in his current predicament.

He sat slowly and observed his surroundings now that he had the advantage of light. His initial assessment that he was housed in some sort of rudimentary structure seemed accurate. The building was perhaps a barn, though he didn't smell any livestock in the near vicinity. Looking directly up caused him to see that some tiles were missing along the roof's peak so the shelter would provide spotty protection in poor weather, but that was the least of his concerns at that moment. First and foremost, he needed to free his leg.

He scooted himself forward and bent his knees so he could be in as close to the shackle as possible for better leverage. He folded up the hem of his trousers and felt immediately discouraged for the iron links surrounding his ankle were at least a centimeter thick. He gave them a halfhearted tug but knew they would not release using his hands alone. He then followed the chain to where it was affixed to the floor, thinking that if he could free the anchor, the chain around his leg was less of an immediate concern.

The anchor was about a half meter from him, made from similarly sturdy metal, and screwed into the floor. Fortunately, the wood planks appeared old and almost splintering around one of the screws. Perhaps if he could find a tool that enabled him to dig into the soft wood then he could begin to disrupt the integrity of the anchor and with enough torque could pull it free from the floor.

Before he could give much more thought to what sort of implement he could procure with barely a meter's worth of slack in his chain, his attention was drawn to the sound of loud footsteps. He pushed his trouser leg back into place and turned his head to see a small tray being placed on the floor of the loft just in front of the ladder. A moment later, a woman's head appeared. When her eyes met his, she offered a small smile.

"Hello," he said instinctively, but then a moment later corrected his statement. "Er, ciao."

The woman finished climbing up into the loft and then brought the tray over to rest on his lap. On it he could see a cup of brown liquid that might have been tea but given his geographic location he assumed it to be coffee, and a single slice of crusty bread. While he appreciated this delivery, he was a bit too concerned about his state of captivity to be interested in it for the moment.

"Can—can you help me?" he asked her. When she continued to stare at him with a rather blank expression, he assumed the answer was "no." Trying again, he pointed towards his ankle and said, "My leg. I can't move."

She looked to where he was pointing and then back to him before shrugging and giving her head a little shake.

Patrick grumbled and reluctantly picked up the teacup. Of course, this young girl could not understand English; that would have been far too convenient. He sipped from the cup and discovered it was, in fact, coffee—very, very weak coffee. It was lukewarm, though, which was better than cold. There were barely a few sips of coffee in the cup, so he finished it swiftly and then turned to the bread, which was so stale and dry it make him choke.

"May—may I have more?" he held up the cup with one hand and pointed into the empty vessel with another. "Mas? Er, no, that's Spanish. I don't know the word for more."

She continued to smile kindly at him as she held out her hand for the cup. He gave it to her along with a muttered, "Grazie." As she departed, he took a reluctant second bite of the bread and attempted to gnaw his way through it.

The young woman was not gone for very long and, when she returned, she handed him the cup once more. This time, it had clear liquid, which was disappointing, but he wasn't going to complain especially when he needed something to aid with swallowing the bread. He thanked her again, took a big gulp, and nearly choked with surprise when she handed him a small scrap of paper.

Sarah. No Speak, was written on it in delicate writing with small loops on the s's.

He looked at her and said, "You're Sarah?" She smiled and nodded. "And…you cannot speak English?" She tapped her throat with her fingertips and then shook her head. "You…can't speak at all?" he guessed; she nodded. "But you can understand me—er, English?" She nodded enthusiastically that time and he felt a wave of relief wash over him. His situation was still quite precarious but encountering someone who spoke English was more than he'd hoped for.

He handed the scrap of paper back to her and said, "Well, Sarah, it is nice to meet you. I'm Patrick."

She appeared positively delighted and the grin on her face made the back of his neck prickle with intrigue. She was a pretty girl with blue eyes, pale skin, and a bit of brown hair that could be seen around her white headscarf. She was young, but no longer a child—twenty or twenty-one, he guessed. He wondered who she was in the context of his captivity. Surely, he had been taken somewhere by the Italian officers. Did that make her a maid in one of their homes? Or, perhaps, a kitchen girl since she was bringing him food. Was she an employee or some sort of captive as well? And, most importantly, could she help him escape?

He had barely finished the scrap of bread when a loud bang was heard from down below. Sarah jumped, snatched the tray and teacup away from him, and scurried away as quick as a mouse. A minute later, he discovered the reason for her escape, because heavy footsteps could be heard. Two Italian soldiers lumbered their way up the ladder and joined him in the loft. They shouted at him, but he did not understand what they said. Instead, he remained calm and simply looked at them. The smaller of the two men knelt down and unlocked the chain from its anchor, pulling it free from his leg. Patrick hardly had the chance to savor the relief, for the next moment he was grabbed under one armpit and hauled to his feet.

"Vai. Go," the solider said, pointing at the ladder.

Carefully, Patrick climbed down the ladder and found himself in a small room with a stone floor and what appeared to be an animal pen on the opposite wall, though no animal was inside. He did not have a chance to look at anything else before he was once again grabbed under the armpit and dragged out the wooden door. He struggled to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground and did all that he could to scramble along without falling.

After several meters of walking, the man stopped in front of what appeared to be an outhouse and silently directed Patrick inside. Though he had no desire to be caught with his pants down (quite literally) around the enemy, he did have a need to use the facility, so he did so as efficiently as he could. When he exited the outhouse, he was able to see the surrounding area for the first time and took a moment to take it in.

To his right was the stone barn in which he had been chained. Behind that appeared to be two other stone structures, both similar in size, though only one remained functional. The other was only half-standing with its roof and two of the walls caved in, decimated presumably by some sort of shelling incident. Diagonally to his left was the most substantial building on the property. It was just one story in height, but it was much wider and deeper than the barn. When the Italian soldiers got him walking again, this was the building they led him towards.

When they entered through a small door, Patrick could immediately smell antiseptic. He found this to be a positive sign, for if he, a doctor, had entered some sort of field hospital, that did speak positively towards his odds for survival. He was marched through a narrow hall until they reached a shut door. One soldier pounded on it, and he heard a gruff, "Entrare," from behind the door.

The door swung open, and Patrick was unceremoniously shoved inside. He stumbled a few steps forward and reached out for the back of a chair to steady himself. Once he was sure of his footing, he looked to the small, dark-haired man sitting behind the desk wearing a uniform with multiple medals pinned to it. From the large desk the man sat at and the filing cabinets and bookcases behind him, Patrick presumed he had been delivered to the office of the officer in charge of the hospital. The officer gazed at him as though Patrick had interrupted his very important day for an inane reason.

"You are British doctor?" he asked in a thick accent. Patrick nodded. "Are you surgeon?"

"Er, yes. I was trained-"

The officer held up his hand to silence him. "We need surgeon. You are now surgeon here. If you harm, we kill you. If you help, you live. Capisci? You understand?"

"I understand," Patrick repeated, though it was obvious he had no choice in the matter if he wanted any hopes of surviving beyond the next ten minutes.

"Buono," the officer said, giving him what could almost have been considered an expression of approval. Then, he waved his hand dismissively, so Patrick slowly turned and walked into the hall where he was met by a different Italian soldier, this one wearing a white coat.

"Chirurgo?" the white coat wearer asked.

"Er…non capisco. I don't understand Italian."

The doctor sighed with obvious frustration. "Surgeon?" he asked. Patrick nodded and the doctor gestured for him to follow. They walked down another narrow hall and stopped at a starkly white room where a soldier lay centrally in the room. He still wore his uniform pants, but his upper half was bare; a woman dressed in all white pressed a wad of gauze to a bleeding wound in his abdomen. "Help him," the doctor instructed before leaving Patrick alone in the room. A bit dazed, he turned back to watch the doctor walk away and one of the soldiers who had retrieved him from the loft step up to guard the door to the operating theatre.

Knowing he had no choice, he looked at the nurse and held up his hands, wiggling his fingers, hoping it conveyed that he needed to sterilize them before beginning surgery. She nodded towards the opposite corner of the room, and he spotted the sink behind a try of surgical instruments. He walked over to it, turned on the faucet and reached for the bar of soap. "No pressure," he muttered to himself as he scrubbed his fingers, trying to lower the rate at which his hear hummed inside his chest with a bit of levity. "Just save this man's life or they'll kill you."

With his hands clean and dried, he reached for a pair of gloves, took in a deep breath, and got to work.

Sister Bernadette finished her abbreviated late afternoon prayers, crossed herself, and then hurried back into the kitchen before Maria noticed she was missing. Of course, Maria did notice. Maria always noticed, but her prayers were the only thing keeping her sane; she could not give them up!

"Ragazza stupida! Dove si andato?" Maria scolded, slapping at her with a kitchen towel.

Sister Bernadette gazed at her with what she'd come to define as "Sarah's" classic vague look before drifting towards the stove, on which there was a large pot of simmering soup. She began to ladle out individual servings for the hospital's patients, loading all the bowls up onto trays save for two: one for herself and one for the British doctor.

As her understanding of Italian was improving but far from proficient, she did not always need to fake her blank expressions, but she'd come to learn it behooved her to continue to appear confused. As long as she was known as the mute village girl Maria had stumbled upon one day and taken pity on, she felt she was safe from harm. The moment she was discovered as a British national separated from a group of nuns on a humanitarian mission…well, she didn't want to think about that.

After adding a slice of bread to the side of each bowl of soup, Sister Bernadette picked up the first tray of food and carried it to the cottage hospital. She passed out the first round of meals to the most able-bodied patients who would have no difficulty eating on their own. She then returned to the kitchen for the second tray of soups. She passed out those bowls to each of the remaining patients before going back to assist those that needed it. One man, who had one missing hand and the other under many layers of bandages, needed fed by her completely, but she didn't mind; she had dedicated her life to helping others and helping an injured man eat was just a small part of that.

With one man served his full meal, she moved on to another who was in an even more pitiful state. He had injuries to his head such that it was fully bandaged down to his nose. She knew him to not always be conscious, so she gently touched his arm and attempted to spoon some of the soup broth into his mouth. He accepted it, but it was a slow process. As she was helping him eat, she glanced up to see the British doctor being frogmarched past the ward, presumably on his way back to the barn. She smiled to herself at the idea that she might be able to sit with him again that night, if only for a little while.

Sister Bernadette wished she knew how long she had been an unofficial captive of the cottage hospital in Southern Italy. Her best guess was that it had been about a month, but it was difficult to keep track of how much time had passed as the days seemed to run together. She knew the rough date on which she had been separated from her group so access to a calendar would help her ascertain how much time had passed, but the only calendar she was aware of was in the commander's office and she had not yet had the opportunity to get close enough to read it.

She had arrived in Italy along with other members of her Order in September against the recommendation of quite literally everyone. They were determined to help based on a call from God and knew their assistance would be valued by whomever received it, so they pressed on despite many obstacles. The first week had been alarming to say the least. She had been prepared for injuries and distress, but the utter savagery of war had rattled her. Had her faith not been so strong, she would have found it difficult to carry on, but she managed to keep her head above it through her daily devotions.

As their group made their way from small village to small village, helping women, children, and whomever else was left behind that needed assistance, they stumbled upon a rogue Italian unit. Though their clothing could not have more plainly identified them as humanitarian aid, the Italians waged an unexpected attack for a reason Sister Bernadette was certain she would never comprehend. Several of the nuns were immediately killed, but she had managed to escape into nearby trees and brush. A brief lapse in her faith had led fear to overtake her, and she'd tried to flee, shredding her habit on underbrush and the remains of barbed wire. With her clothing now bordering on indecent, she'd pilfered a blue dress from a washing line as soon as she was able to.

As she walked through that village, she concluded she not only had no idea where she was, but also had little hope of orienting herself. Her knowledge of Italian was limited to what she could decipher from her decent grasp of Latin plus a few key phases she had learned on the journey from England, none of which were sufficient to navigate her back to her order—assuming any of them had even survived their attack.

She wandered aimlessly for another day before breaking down with tears of fear and frustration. She apologized to God for abandoning Him and repented as best she could. He then guided her to the cottage hospital, which frightened her originally, until she saw the hunched over woman walking towards it with her arms full of packages. She dropped several and Sister Bernadette realized this was the moment God guided her to.

Rushing forward from her hiding place, she picked up the packages and helped the older woman carry them to the building that housed the hospital kitchens. At that point, she had been so stunned and worried about how the woman would react to her, she had not said anything. It was only when the woman said to her, "Tu parli?" that she instantly decided to pretend to be a mute. She had seen the Italian soldiers in the yard and feared her obvious accent would send her right into their clutches where she would be taken hostage, assaulted, or killed. If she pretended to be a mute Italian, she would at least give herself the advantage of time to discover what plans God had in store for her.

Somehow, without ever saying a word, and using only rudimentary gestures to communicate, Sister Bernadette had not only gained the trust of the woman she learned was called Maria, but she had managed to convince her she'd make a decent kitchen maid. She lived most of her days in fear of being discovered, but she had food and shelter, which was more than could be said for many in the war-ravaged country.

As the days wore on, she began to formulate a plan. She had no idea where she was, but she was surrounded by those who did—or, at least, had a bit more of a general idea than her. She noticed when she brought coffee to the officers, they continued their conversations as though she simply did not exist. If that continued, it was possible she could glean information from them that would help her find her way to safety. She was not under the delusion that she could find any members of her order again, but if she could find any member of the Allies, she could surrender to them and hopefully either put her nursing degree to use or, at the very least, be sent back to England via a safe means of travel. God would decide her fate, but she had to first find an opportunity to escape.

After all the men in the hospital ward had been fed, Sister Bernadette collected all the used bowls and spoons and returned to the kitchen. Once the washing was done, she was finally permitted to eat her portion of soup, which was now pitifully cold, but it was much better than not eating at all. Even better: for the first time since arriving she would have a companion other than surly Maria for her meal.

Just twenty-four hours prior when she'd been washing up from that evening's meal, Maria had stomped into the kitchen in a sour mood. Sister Bernadette had only caught about half the words during her rant, but the prospect of a "medico americano" had certainly caught her attention. Though she knew the risk of speaking to the man in English was too great—particularly since he was obviously being held as a captive—the mere fact that there was another English speaker so close to her lifted her spirits. Only when she was climbing up into the barn loft did she begin to feel nervous for fear the man would be afraid and possibly lash out at her. She'd said a quick prayer and God had rewarded her with a delightful surprise.

Hearing a familiar accent from the captured doctor was almost too much for her heart to bear. The urge to reveal her true identity to him had been almost too strong, but she'd managed to suppress it knowing it would be equally dangerous for both of them. Still, speaking with him and stirred a homesickness in her of which she was not previously aware, which was why that morning she had surprised him with her handwritten note. That, too, had been a great risk, but she stood by the choice. The doctor seemed so miserable upon realizing he was chained up—not that she could blame him—at least she'd been able to provide him some relief with the knowledge there was one person he could communicate with without struggle.

She loaded the tray with both their bowls and slices of bread, hooked the lantern around her wrist, and made the trek out the kitchen door and around to the entrance to the barn. The sun had already set, so it was completely dark inside until she brought the light. Climbing the ladder with both tray and lantern was too dangerous, so she left the tray behind and climbed the ladder enough to lift the lantern up onto the loft before retrieving the tray of food.

Once up in the loft, she noticed the doctor was curled up on his side with his back to her. She felt disappointment, thinking he might have been asleep, but when she took a step towards him, he sat up with a start. When his eyes fell on her, she watched his expression relax and he said softly. "Oh. Hello Sarah."

She moved both the tray of food and the lantern closer before sitting down near his knees. When she saw him from that angle, she gasped, for there was a small cut on the left side of his mouth as well as a bruise blooming along his jaw. She touched her face in the same spot than pointed to him and tilted her head with curiosity.

"Ah…" He gingerly touched the cut by his mouth and then winced. "I was told to perform surgery on a young man who had taken shrapnel to his gut. He didn't make it and this," he gestured to his face, "was a warning from il capitano."

She frowned, then reached out to touch his arm gently as her only way of showing sympathy to his plight. Then, she picked up his bowl of soup and handed it to him. He thanked her and they ate in silence for several minutes. As they ate, she studied his face, trying to determine his age. He was older than her, certainly, but seeing as he was a surgeon that put his age in his mid-twenties at minimum. She guessed he was closer to thirty, though, because his features had begun to lose their youthful edge.

"Sarah, could I ask you for a favor?" he said after putting his empty bowl back on the tray. She arched her brow at him, and he pointed towards his ankle. "They have me chained up, you see, and I'd like to try to get out of here. Do you think you could bring me some sort of tool? Like a screwdriver? Or even a knife from the kitchen?"

She felt herself flush at the suggestion. She certainly sympathized with his predicament, but she could not help him escape! The grounds of the hospital were patrolled heavily at night—she had seen the men herself while refreshing supplies at the hospital in the very early morning. She had seen others try to sneak through the line only to be shot on sight and she certainly could not have that on her conscience!

When she shook her head, he asked, "You can't access any tools?"

She thought for a moment of how to mime her response to him and settled on holding out her forearms pressed together at the wrists as though she wore handcuffs.

He frowned. "Oh, you're being held captive too, so you don't have access to those things."

As this was close enough to her intent, she gave a small nod.

He sighed audibly and said, "Well, I suppose it was worth a shot. Thank you, for the food. And for eating with me."

She gave him a pleasant smile before beginning the process of leaving the loft with the empty tray and lantern. As she made her way back to the kitchens, she started her evening prayers by asking God to watch over Patrick and to guide his hands during surgery so he could not only keep the injured men safe, but himself as well.

A/N: There will be 16 chapters & an epilogue divided up into 3 parts.

I have wanted to write a WWII story for quite some time since that is my favorite historical time period and i am quite pleased with how this turned out. I hope you enjoy this journey along with me.