May 1940

The sleepy village of Perdue Ciel was nestled a little way back from the shores of Dunkirk, just in front of an ever-reaching forest that on sunny days glowed in dappled greens and yellows. Today, however, was not such a day.

The swelling sea and bloated sky were both overcast, steel-iron grey. The approaching storm had blurred the horizon, making the separation between the heavens and endless waters indistinguishable.

Inside the little cottage, Ares (he had had a mother with a particularly strange love for the Greek myths) LaRue was bent over his tiny radio, rough hands fumbling with the dials. The room was still dim with the paleness of the early dawn; chill gusts of briny wind echoed mournfully through the room, tugging at sheets of paper.

The news was not pleasant: The invading German armies had been steadily sweeping down the country, and were at this moment, not far away from the little village at all. Suddenly consumed by a fiery rage, LaRue banged his fist on the table, upsetting a clay bowl of cold porridge. He wiped his hand across his lips, cursing whatever gods may be for his predicament.

-x-

The next afternoon was a sunny one, and Clarisse LaRue had one of her father's pistols in her hand. Eyes screwed up a little to see clearer, she aimed at a nick in a gnarled tree and shot. Her father had taught her how to shoot a year ago and she desperately wanted to be good at it. With a triumphant smile, she noticed that this time the bullet had slid cleanly into its target.

"Stop wasting my bullets!" an angry voice from behind her boomed, and she whipped around. Her father was walking towards her, a pipe set between his teeth.

Clarisse shrugged too nonchalantly and tossed the pistol at him; he deftly caught it.

"Any news on the Germans?" she asked eagerly and he shrugged.

"They're coming. That's pretty much it." LaRue noticed the precise nick in the tree and for a moment he wanted to give his daughter a word of praise. He was however, not used to that, so he managed to refrain from saying anything.

Realising that their meagre conversation had reached its end, he pocketed the gun and walked back into the house.

-x-

When the soldiers came, Clarisse was skipping school for the third time that week (it was a Wednesday, so she hadn't gone at all). She was sitting idly in the grove next to the Church, carving patterns into the trees with a knife she'd gotten from the kitchen.

The Church was undoubtedly the pride of Perdue Ciel, carved entirely out of blackish-grey stone. Twisted demons and writhing gargoyles cowered under delicate etchings of Saints and the Seraphs, whose engraved eyes stared heavenwards. There was a tower atop the building, filled with a cluttering of bells; they ranged from the biggest (which in its hollows seemed to hold the very depths of the ocean) to the littlest (as clear and high as Alpine air).

These soldiers were a mixture of French and British, Allied forces being pushed further and further to the shores. Judging from the wounds some of them were sporting, and the general air of weariness that surrounded the group of not more than thirty, Clarisse assumed they'd just been out of a fight.

News travelled fast in a village as small as this little sea-side one, and in minutes at least half of the locals were gathered in the chapel with all manner of food, drink and medicine. Someone was playing a tune on the organs to spruce up the tired spirits.

Clarisse and her father were there as well, even though they were too rough to be healing, and of a disposition that was too callous for light small-talk.

A soldier with blonde hair and a scar on his lip was well enough to stand and talk. He came to sit on the pews by LaRue, the speckled lights from the stained glass windows making kaleidoscopes on his arms.

"Got a lighter?" he asked in choppy French, holding out a shrivelled cylinder.

LaRue grunted as he took out one, "Got a lighter, sir?" he corrected gruffly as he lit up the end of the cig; it glowed bright amber before petering away in the cool darkness of the chapel. "What the hell do they teach soldiers about manners these days, eh?"

"Sorry sir." The boy muttered, abashed, as he took a drag. "Thanks."

"So, what's the plan? How far off are the Germans?"

The boy frowned. "We last saw them yesterday morning… We're on our way to Dunkirk." He hesitated, "The battle's… well, it's lost, frankly speaking." Here, Clarisse jerked her head up sharply. "Them in high-ups have planned to evacuate our lot tomorrow night; that's why we're going to Dunkirk."

Clarisse glared at him. "You're running away?"

"I'm just following orders!" he protested. "Besides, what more can we do, there're not many of us left. Who's going to fight if we're all gone?"

Clarisse made to retort but her father silenced her with a look. Turning to the boy, he added brusquely, "My daughter doesn't understand enough of military strategy."

Clarisse blushed. "Whatever." She muttered angrily, stalking off to another bunch of smoking soldiers.

"You'll be ready to continue tomorrow?" LaRue asked, ignoring the outburst (perhaps he had been too harsh).

The boy nodded. "That's the plan."

"I'll be leading you. Don't protest, I led a division back in the Great War, I'm more than capable. Besides, what you need is a local to bring you down, even if it's only half an hour off by foot. You'll screw things up, I bet." He clapped the boy on the shoulder a little too firmly and got up to talk to his superiors.

-x-

"I want to go too!" Clarisse said angrily as her father stood in the doorway of the house. She could smell fried fish wafting in from the neighbour's and the brightening sun scratched at her eyes.

LaRue pulled on his boots. "Stay here and, hell I don't know, cook lunch or something. Don't fuss, Clarisse." He stood up and walked towards where the soldiers were clustered in the square, looking better from a good night's rest and a decent meal.

Clarisse stood there for a minute, her brain racing furiously. No way was she going to be left behind when something like this was happening. She looked closely at the soldier's uniforms, picking out the colours. Her father had shirts and slacks in those exact colours, she knew. And he had a helmet as well; like the snaking scars on his arm, it was a souvenir from the Great War, the war to end all wars… They were wrong, apparently.

Clarisse rushed back into the house.

"Like hell I'll be the one cooking." She muttered.

-x-

The blonde boy who'd offed a cigarette was making up the back of the line when the soldiers departed. He did not notice the new addition to the crew until about five minutes into the walk. The weather was nice and pleasant.

He caught sight of a figure behind him, slightly shorter and less stocky than the rest. His helmet seemed to be set a little too strangely and his uniform…

Well that wasn't a He.

Realising that she'd been recognised, Clarisse grabbed his arm. "Don't you dare say a word," she hissed, "I just want to walk along."

"What on earth for?" he whispered back.

"This is where the action is, and I am not going to miss it." She said as if that settled the matter. "Now you can turn around and pretend you never saw me, punk."

"But I did see you." He replied uncertainly as they marched along, walking past rolling dunes of sand with long, soft tufts of grass poking out of them.

"God, no one cares! It's just a walk to Dunkirk."

A part of him wanted desperately to tell, not out of snitching, but just because this wasn't properly aligned with the Rules. But the girl was looking at him eagerly and angrily, and he knew how it felt to want to be a part of the action, that was why he had signed up early. He also reckoned that between the thirty of them, and the nice weather, and the fact that Dunkirk was only twenty minutes away now, it would be fine for her.

"I'm Jason." He said.

"Good for you."

That pretty much ended all conversation.

-x-

The beach was just ten minutes away from them, they could see the sun-sparkling sea and feel the salty air on their lips. It was evening, and a crescent of silver-milk moon had risen.

While the scenery was pretty enough, everything else wasn't. The beaches were being torn apart by fighting, little boats bobbing furiously in the ocean. Other soldiers had already reached, accompanied by German soldiers, and the battle had begun in earnest. Jason turned back to find the girl and possibly get her out, but she seemed to have disappeared. He cursed himself and grabbed his weapon, ready to charge into battle with the rest of his comrades, but a furious burst of gunfire from behind him caught him off guard.

In minutes, his troop was surrounded by a gathering of German soldiers and his vision swarmed with blood and bits and bullets.

Clarisse, meanwhile, had grabbed a long, lethal looking stick off the sand and was walloping everything within reach. She felt the fight in her bones as the cacophony of battle echoed in her ears. The sky had turned stormy and the waves had started to crash wildly. It was all a sudden blur, but through sheer luck and technique (when she was younger her father had taught her well; how to fight like a boy, or so he claimed) she was making her way through it.

And then she was next to her father and his eyes were wide with fear for the first time that day; he was used to battle, LaRue was used to this and
death was nothing to him, but his daughter was at risk-

"What the hell are you doing here?" he barked as she narrowly avoided a falling body.

"What the hell does it look like I'm doing?" she responded in kind. LaRue groaned and passed her one of his spare guns which she took gratefully.

"I told you to stay-"

He was cut off a vivid burst of bullets; they tore into his skin and he fell towards his side, wincing at the onslaught of pain.

"Papa!" Clarisse hadn't used that expression in years, opting for the colder, more grown-up 'father'.

She knelt beside him as the fight raged on around them, the wind howling in their ears as men screamed and fell. There was death that night, and so much of it. "Are you alright?"

"Are…" he managed to sputter, "are you stupid?" It wasn't mean spirit or spite, it was just his way.

Clarisse had tears in her eyes and she felt so hollow and afraid. She was nothing, nothing more than a little girl thinking herself more than she was.

Her father was dying.

"You're going to be fine." She protested, her hands hovering over the spots where the bullets had dug into his flesh.

"Clarisse," LaRue said brusquely, but no unkindly; he didn't feel like being aloof now, "I'm not." Regret at his distance and coldness filled him now even as he battled with the burning in his sides.

"You are!" Clarisse said, "You are!"

LaRue realised something there and then. His daughter was a warrior, and he was proud of her. He had always been, in fact, even though he lacked the means to show it.

"Go back," he choked, "Fight." He reached up a hand to smoothen her hair but the light in his eyes dimmed before he could make it. His hand fell limply into the sand.

Clarisse watched in horror as her father died before her eyes. Filled with a sudden glint of anger, she took the gun and stood up. There was no giving up, that was not the way of the LaRues. She was still alive and she was still going to fight.

-x-

It could have minutes, it could have been hours, but no matter how hard and fiercely they fought, the Germans were surrounding them. The Allied forces were being pushed further and further towards the sea.

Jason saw a slice of red dart past him- it was the girl- and he turned to meet her. Her eyes were blazing and she was cutting through the fray with a primal grace. All around him men were falling, staining the sand with red.

"Get over here!" He could hear the voices of his country-men from the boats, civilians who had braved the storms of the English Channel to rescue their men.

"Go!" It was Clarisse, her hair spiralling around her as the wind screamed through it. "This is what you came for isn't it, go! I'll keep them!"

He looked backwards towards the boat, this was a gaily painted trawler, the Mary Susanne. He saw that soldiers were rushing towards it.

"Where's your father?" he shouted back as she aimed her gun at into the thick fray.

"He's dead!" Her voice was hard.

"Do you have any relatives?"

"For God's sake, no! Just get the hell out of here!"

He hesitated, two metres away from the trawler. "Come with us, then!" It was nothing more than a soldier stretching a helping hand towards a civilian. Clarisse stared at him disbelievingly.

"You have nothing left!" he tried again. A bomb went off somewhere in the dunes, lighting up the night with its fiery glow.

He could see tear tracks on her face; she was tempted, sorely tempted.

Clarisse hesitated, the gun smooth in her hands. There was a spit of ocean, a stretch of sand and a deep navy sky. The stars were out, the moon was still silver-milk. She realised the soldier was wrong. She did have something left.

It could have been something as small as the scent of fried fish on early mornings, or the glorious and triumphant chorus of the church bells on a dusty Sunday evening. It could have been something as big as her fighting the enemy to protect her home, to ensure that others could make to safety. Her father had died with the fight still in him, and that fight was in her bones, in her skin. She could never leave it. Perdue Ciel was her home, France was her home, and she would not leave. The soldier had no debt to pay, he was simply retreating and would one day return, but Clarisse could never- would never- leave.

She would stay and she would fight because there was no way in hell was she running.

"I'm staying." She said.

Recognising the fact, the soldier nodded. "Bon courage?"

"Bon courage."

It was French for good luck. Curious, how the word courage is in that expression, as if it is agreed universally that fortune favours the brave; or maybe it means that the brave forge their own luck. Either way, Clarisse was determined that if she died then, she would die alive.

And if she did not, if she made it back to Perdue Ciel, by which time the Nazis would have no doubt taken France into their grip, she would make sure she would give them hell.

She was Clarisse LaRue, and she was the fight personified.