Hey guys,
first, I'm really sorry for the delay (again!). Let's just say as a kind of explanation that my day would right now need at least 36 hours for me to complete all the things I'm supposed to do.
Second, we passed the 100-review-threshold, hooray! A big round of thank-yous to all of you wonderful reviewers!
Third, yes, I realize this chapter is rather short, but I felt like posting another chapter soon, so this is what you get for the moment. :-)) More next time.
Special thanks to: Ophelia (Yes, Harry is a complete sweetheart, I really love him (and funny thing is, with every time I watch BoB I love him a bit more! :-) *lol* And yes, Lizzie is definitely going to jump Dick soon... :-) She just waits for the moment he least expects it... :-))) Loved your review!), beth-rodrigues.77 (Hehe, yes, Lizzie definitely has many naughty thoughts. :-) And she can certainly be quite a handful, especially for innocent Dick... *g* Thanks for the wonderful review!), Crazyforkasey (Yes, Harry is just great. He'll be around in the future chapters as well, so there'll be more of him. :-) Loved to hear that you like the way I write Winters! And yes, Lizzie will definitely warm up to Nix. They actually like each other, but they just can't admit it. ;-) Thanks for the review, loved it!), autumnescapade (*lol* I really had to laugh when I read your review! Yes, I think she will tie him up soon if he doesn't comply. :-))), ScarletLeon (Hehe, I laughed that you said you kept imagining Damian Lewis acting through my story, because that's what I'm doing all the time. :-))) I really love him and the way he's acting, he's the reason why I keep watching Homeland. And I loved that you liked the Dizzie time and I really loved all of your review!), indifferentshell (Thanks so much for your two very detailed reviews, loved them so much. I'll write you another PM for the second review!), ChocAndSnow19 (Thanks so much for your review! :-) I loved to hear that you like my way of describing things, this means a lot to me. Especially for a non-native speaker like me, this is just great to hear, because I could also picture someone saying that my descriptions are just weird. :-))) Hehe, and yes, of course I agree that Dick and Lizzie were made for each other. *g* Have a lovely day, too!).
-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-
The next few days were harsh.
Dick spent them trying to keep up with the hard pace Sobel had set for Easy company. Trainings were long, starting before the break of dawn and finishing long past the sun had set, and all of Easy was groaning under the captain's strict rule. It seemed as if Sobel took it personally that Dick continued to show up every morning, even after a 24 hours maneuver and only a few hours of sleep. Dick tried to look as inconspicuous as possible whenever his CO approached him or eyed him closely despite every bone in his body aching and complaining. His long recovery had pretty much stripped him bare of any stamina and strength he had had before falling ill. Which was why he had never before struggled so hard to make his body suffer through all the different kinds of tortures his captain had prepared for them.
The only goal he set himself in the mornings was not to give in to Sobel and that goal was the only thing keeping him going. When he was not on his feet and being chased around by his captain, Dick tried to let his body get some much needed rest. Twice so far Nix had to nudge him awake because he had nodded off over dinner. There was no time at all to see Lizzie, which troubled Dick even more than the mass of soreness he called his body. Still he kept going, because he was sure that Sobel could not keep up that sort of training for long, because it would only result in running them all completely into the ground.
It was the morning after having a half-day off (which meant a few more hours of sleep) that Dick felt that things were slowly starting to look a little brighter. Getting up was not such a trial as it had been the days before and for the first time in weeks he felt absolutely famished, his stomach gurgling unhappily with hunger. Beforehand, eating had almost been as much a struggle as running.
Thirty minutes later, Dick felt the eyes of both Nix and Harry on him as he devoured his own and half of Nix' breakfast in the mess hall.
"Don't forget to chew", Nix commented with raised eyebrows, "And don't eat the plate, alright?"
Dick ignored the comment and instead drank deeply from his coffee to convince the rather dry bread to move down his throat. There was nothing left to eat in front of him, but he had spied a lonely hard-boiled egg on Harry's plate a while ago.
"Take it", Harry sighed and pushed over his plate to Dick. "Just stop looking at it like that. Jeez, you're worse than our neighbor's dog last summer when we had a barbecue back home. Only the whining is missing."
"Thanks", Dick murmured and moved to devour the egg with the same speed as before while he looked at his wrist watch. Only two more minutes and they would have to move or they would be late.
"What's on the schedule today for Easy?", Nix asked as they got up from their benches and walked out of the mess hall.
"Field maneuver", Dick replied around chewing and swallowing down the rest of his breakfast.
"Yeah, finally", Harry added and shook his head to himself. "And here I thought we would spend the rest of our days in England training for the next Olympic Games in the category running. Seems like Sink decided we would also need to learn fighting and killing and stuff."
Nix snorted, then replied, "Then I wish you a pleasant day. I do remember that the combination of Sobel and field maneuvers always resolve in something... let's say 'interesting'."
"Shut up, Nix", Harry replied, but chuckled despite himself. "Don't they miss you already back in the chairborne division?"
"Actually, they do", Nix replied, not letting himself be goaded, and looked at his watch. "Can't keep the chair waiting too long."
With that he was off and Dick walked together with Harry to the briefing room where they received their assignment for the maneuver. Easy company's objective was to take control over a road section and lie in waiting for enemy troops. Platoons one and two set out from different starting places and were supposed to meet on the way, then take the objective together.
Dick had assembled second platoon quickly and set out to reach the designated meeting point. However, when they arrived after two hours, there was no trace of Sobel. Dick let the men crouch down behind some hedges before he called for Lipton who carried the map. They studied the map together in silence but Dick could see the sergeant frowning.
Dick checked his watch, then said quietly, "Sobel's late."
"Sir, do you think he'll make it?", Lipton asked lowly.
"I don't know", Dick replied. "We'll wait for five minutes, then we'll have to move out."
"Without Sobel and first platoon?"
"If he isn't here by then, yes", Dick answered and gave the sergeant the map back. He had it memorized by now. "It's a T-intersection. We'll improvise. We have to get used to functioning without him anyway since there's no guarantee he'll always be with us after the invasion has begun."
Lipton gave a careful, but definitely crooked smile.
"If you don't mind me saying, sir, that doesn't sound too bad for me."
For one moment, Dick was tempted to call him out on that, but then he decided to let it go. After all, the last few days had been hell for all of them, maybe for second platoon it had been even worse than for the others. Their team spirit, however, had not suffered, quite the contrary, these days had bonded them together even more tightly. Dick had never trusted his men more than right now and he knew he needed to give that trust back somehow.
"I didn't hear that, Lip", he decided to reply wryly, then checked again his watch. "Alright, this is it, we'll move out. Double envolvement, lay down a base of fire to cut the road in all directions, hook right with first squad. Tell Guarnere to move left with second, I'll be right in the middle with third. Go."
"Yes, sir."
They got to their objective at a quick pace and without incident. Right on time, they took control over the road (the only small resistance coming from an old man on a bicycle) and got into position when Dick saw Sobel and first platoon running up the road.
"Good work, second platoon", Dick called out to his men. "We took the objective."
A small cheer rose from second platoon when Sobel came to a halt beside him, eyeing their position with slight incredulity.
"Where have you been, Dick?", the captain asked him, out of breath and obviously looking for a scapegoat for his own failure.
"In the woods, sir", Dick replied and could not bite back a hint of cheek. "Waiting for you at the meeting point. Since you didn't show up, sir, we took the objective on our own."
"You had orders to wait for me", Sobel ground out between gritted teeth. "You disrespected your orders."
"Sir, I had orders from Colonel Sink to take the objective and that's what we did", Dick replied coldly. Second platoon and some of the men of first platoon standing around them had turned eerily quiet. Dick knew they were all listening in on what they were saying, but he would certainly not back down from his position.
Sobel narrowed his eyes dangerously, then motioned with a hand for Dick to follow him and walked a few paces away from the men.
"I won't tolerate your disrespect much longer, Dick", the captain told him sharply in a low voice. "Your orders are coming from me and I want you to follow them minutely and without talking back, is that understood?"
"No, sir, it isn't", Dick answered, feeling himself bristling. "I was following orders, they were coming from you and from Colonel Sink, I..."
"That's enough!", Sink interrupted him harshly. "Another word from you and I swear I'll bring this matter before court-martial."
Dick remained silent and swallowed every other comment that was burning on his tongue. It was the very epitome of unfairness what Sobel was doing, but he knew he needed to keep quiet. The captain was studying him intently, then finally turned around to walk back to the men. Dick followed him more slowly. Some of the men muttered something he was sure was in his favor, but he did not try to make out the words and kept his eyes on the ground. He could not help but feel humiliated in the face of Sobel's accusations. In front of his men.
As they marched their way back to the base in loose formation, Guarnere suddenly walked up to Dick.
"Sir", the sergeant said lowly, keeping his eyes fixed on their CO's back walking at the head of formation. "Do you wanna know why Sobel was late?"
Dick lifted his eyes from the road and looked at Guarnere. Was there a glint of mischief in his eyes?
"I'm not sure", Dick replied slowly, eyeing the sergeant carefully. "Do I?"
"Well, sir, you decide", Guarnere answered a bit too nonchalantly for Dick's taste. "I certainly don't regret hearing it from first platoon."
"Alright, tell me", Dick prompted, his curiosity getting the better of him.
"Major Horton told him to cut a barbed wire fence of a cow pasture", the sergeant said with a barely suppressed grin.
Dick frowned, then pointed out, "Major Horton is in London."
Now Guarnere could not hold back the smirk any longer.
"I know that and you know it, too, sir. Just seems like Sobel didn't know."
Slowly Dick began to understand. A prank? Come on, they really had better things to do than waste their time with pranks. But then again... picturing Sobel telling everyone that Horton had ordered him to cut the fence... Dick felt a smile tug at his lips. Before him walked Luz, who had heard everything, and turned around to give him an innocent smile. Dick tsked his tongue and shook his head.
"You know this might get you into trouble, so why are you telling me this?", he asked with raised eyebrows.
"I don't know, you looked like you could use some cheering up", Guarnere replied and shrugged his shoulders. "And you wouldn't rat us out to Sobel."
Dick just shook his head again to himself and stayed silent. He knew he should not encourage such behavior against his CO, but then he also had no intention of letting anyone of his ranking officers know about it either.
Maybe Sink would make Sobel rope the cows as a punishment... Dick snorted inwardly.
-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-
"You hold the rifle like that, then steady it before you pull the trigger", Lip heard Bill instruct the mousy, dark-haired nurse, Jean Robbins, if he remembered her name correctly. The young nurse took over the rifle hesitantly, Lip could even see her fingers trembling. It looked like the weapon would be ripped from her hands as soon as she pulled the trigger, but Lip held himself back, since it was Bill's job to instruct her and Lip was only there to supervise the training.
All around him, second platoon of Easy company was paired up with the women from the different units stationed in Aldbourne. Lip was quite impressed that there had been no scandals and no molestations from the boys so far. Although some of the men did their best when teamed up with one of the prettier ladies and their instructions were bordering on flirting. Good thing was that hygiene had improved greatly whenever there was mixed battlefield instruction on the schedule. Some of the boys looked like they were going to a ball, clean like a whistle.
"Good, you're doing great, Lieutenant Robbins", Bill cajoled and made some small corrections about the way she held the weapon. "Just hold the baby tight, alright?"
The nurse nodded timidly, then finally aimed at the target and pulled the trigger. Lip saw the rebound almost knock the rifle from her grip, but she managed to hold on to it and even looked up to give Bill a shy smile.
"Very good, ma'am", the sergeant said patiently. "Next time just try and hit the target. Do you think you can reload on your own?"
Lip gave a nod when Bill looked at him, then moved on to the next team. Luz and Lizzie.
"Wow, that was great, ma'am", Luz commented and gave a whistle, when Lizzie almost hit the center of the target. "If you ever want to see some action, just apply for Easy company and I wouldn't mind at all to share a foxhole with you. And you wouldn't need to stop playing doctors and nurses, you see..."
The way his eyes roamed over her body, although dressed in overly large fatigues, told Lip everything he needed to know about Luz' intentions.
Lizzie just laughed in response and reloaded the weapon, then commented slyly, "Well, that's usually what your medic is there for."
Luz made a face and replied, "Oh honey, no... that's not the games I had in mind."
"Everything alright?", a new voice intruded and when Lip turned his head he saw that Winters had joined them. Face stony, arms crossed. Lip bit back a grin and took a step backwards to enjoy the show. This might be fun to watch.
"Yes, sir", Luz replied at once, face carefully composed. "I was only instructing Lieutenant Weiss. Complimented her on her aim. That's all."
"Everything perfectly alright, Lieutenant Winters", Lizzie stressed, raising her eyebrows.
Winters ignored her and focused solely on Luz.
"I want no improper behavior on the training grounds, George, this also applies to that quick tongue of yours. Is that understood?"
"Yes, sir", Luz replied unwillingly.
"Lieutenant, maybe you didn't hear me", Lizzie tried again, now beginning to sound annoyed. "I said everything's fine."
"Alright, carry on", Winters just said and sent another warning look to Luz before he went over to Teller who was calling for him.
"Jeez, what was that all about? Did someone piss in his coffee this morning?", Luz complained and looked to Lip. "He behaved strangely all day."
Lip could not quite bite back a snort at that. 'Strangely' did not quite hit the mark, more like 'completely distracted'. In all the months he had been around Winters he had never seen him so unfocused as in the last two hours. He had suddenly started to mix up the squads, forgot the orders he had just received from Captain Teller and had set up the targets the wrong way. Lip was just glad Winters was not taking a weapon in his own hands today or there would certainly be some kind of accident. Poor Teller, whom Winters had met for the first time today, must probably think that their lieutenant was a complete scatterbrain.
And all because of Lizzie. Lip had seen Winters check on her every two minutes, at least visually. It was a miracle the Easy men had not picked up on it yet. Maybe Winters' reputation as a teetotaler and moral core of the company prevented the boys from even thinking about the possibility that a woman could be the reason for his distraction.
"Maybe your platoon leader just felt that acting like a complete dick would improve the training", Lizzie said, enervated. Lip did not begrudge Winters the discussion that would undoubtedly follow today's events.
Luz snorted and remarked, "Funny that you say that, his first name is Dick. Well, nickname."
"Is it?", Lizzie asked, feigning surprise. "How fitting."
Lip cleared his throat, then announced, "Alright, that's it for today. We'll continue the training in two weeks."
"Can I try out the mortar next time, sergeant?", Lizzie asked innocently, getting up from her crouched position. Lip really was not sure if she was serious or not.
"No, ma'am, I'm afraid not", he replied. "Next time we'll practice map reading and orientation in general."
"Oh", she said, trying to sound disappointed, but Lip could now see that her eyes were twinkling teasingly. "Then at least the machine gun?"
Lip just shook his head and Luz beside her burst out laughing, then suggested with raised eyebrows, "I'm sure I could organize something, babe, if your that keen on handling something big and thoroughly dangerous..."
"That's enough, George", Lip interrupted, while he discreetly checked if Winters had overheard them. No, he was still deep in discussion with Teller for which Lip was glad. Luz's expectancy of life would drop drastically if their lieutenant caught him hitting on Lizzie again.
"You're a sweetheart, you know", Lizzie replied laughingly, "but do you really think a pick-up attempt like that will ever work on a woman? Boy, you got a long way to go."
Having said that, she quickly packed up her things and left together with Jean, while Bill came to stand beside Lip. The sergeant had obviously heard Lizzie's last words, because he was shaking his head sadly in Luz' direction and at the same time tried to suppress a grin.
"What?", Luz asked challengingly, shrugging his shoulders. "She likes me! Give me another hour with her and you can already book a table for our first rendezvous."
Lip knew that now was the best time to try and dissuade Luz from chasing Lizzie, but Bill beat him to it, "It's not gonna happen, George, so just forget it, alright?"
Lip knew that Bill was the only other person in Easy who knew about Winters and Lizzie, so he had probably decided just like himself that Luz needed some discouragement.
"Why?", Luz asked again, far away from just giving up. "Do you think I can't win her over?"
Wincing, Lip realized that they had made everything even worse, because now Luz thought he had something to prove to them.
"No, but she's already seeing someone", he decided to say, hoping this was enough to make Luz step down from his plan of making Lizzie his latest conquest.
"Oh for Christ's sake...", the soldier exclaimed, then suddenly paused, before adding with a slow grin, "So what? Wouldn't be the first time a gal has chosen me over her main squeeze."
Lip was hard pressed not to slap a hand to his forehead. He tried again, "She's seeing someone from Easy company."
"No way!", Luz burst out. "Who's the lucky bastard...?"
It was in that moment that Winters had decided to join them again with his brow furrowed, asking, "Have they left already? The nurses... and... well, the women from the... ah... other units as well."
Lip could practically see everything dawning on Luz. The soldier looked stunned, disappointed and mischievously happy all at the same time.
"They left two minutes ago, sir", Bill answered at once. "You might still catch them."
"Alright", Winters replied, trying to act as inconspicuous as possible. Not that anyone bought it. Lip could have wept, so bad were their lieutenant's acting skills. "It's really urgent business."
"Of course, sir", Lip replied dutifully, while Luz turned red with the effort of not bursting with laughter. But Winters did not seem to notice. He just gave a short nod and off he was, chasing after his lady-love.
"You got to be kidding me!", Luz finally blurted out. "That's... that's... fucking unbelievable! Didn't know Red machine had it in him. And a woman like her!"
"Would you believe me if I told you I have no idea what you're talking about?", Lip tried, feeling all of a sudden weary.
Broad laughter was his answer.
"No way!", Luz exclaimed. "I know what I saw. No wonder this training got his knickers in a twist."
"Luz", Bill cautioned insistently, "keep it to yourself, alright? I know that must be very difficult for you, but don't go blabber it to everybody."
"Why's that so important to you?", Luz asked slyly, looking at both Lip and Bill.
"We don't need any more rumors right now", Lip explained with a bit more force than necessary, slowly getting annoyed. "And Weiss... well, she's alright. Don't go and ruin it for her. And stop hitting on her, or Winters will skin you alive."
"Alright, alright", the soldier finally relented, lifting his hands in a gesture of appeasement. "I'll be silent as a grave. But, in return I expect to be paired up with the hottest of these other chicks in the next training."
Lip sighed deeply and exchanged a long look with Bill, before he finally nodded.
"Okay, George, I'll see what I can do."
-tbc-
This last scene was ghosting in my head for months, so I hope you'll forgive me for writing this piece of humor, instead of pushing on with the story. And we finally hooked up with the real storyline of the series ... Seen like that, my story is just one huge missing-scene fic... *g*