Chapter Seven
Fighter

She thought of her camp, her group with whom she'd spent her time during the war. Zafrina, Senna, and Kachiri, together with Bella and herself had been the ladies of the group. Alistair, Charles, and of course Jacob and Edward were the males. With Alice being caught by this brute, the group now only consisted of five people. Originally they were a group of nine. She couldn't stop her mind from wondering if they would look for her. She imagined how they could find their three dead comrades and assume Alice had forgone the same faith. Even if they didn't find her body.

"Where are we going?"

He shushed her and Alice flinched. It had never been in her nature to be silent.

"Where are you taking me?"

"Schneller," the Nazi said, pushing her with his hand.

Alice talked. She couldn't help herself. It was her mentality.

"I have nothing of importance to say to your leader. I'm just a nurse."

He didn't comment.

She tried a few times to keep her mouth shut. He must understand a few words of English, as she also caught a few words German. She didn't want to give the Nazi ammunition to her own character.

Staying quiet wasn't easy when the minutes turned into hours.

"How are you even walking? Those wounds must hurt. There's the damage to the skin, the muscle and then of course all that blood loss."

It was only getting darker, it seemed.

"When will you pass out? Then I can finally get away from you."

She had a hard time seeing what was ahead of her. The moonlight provided little light.

"Are we going to walk all night?"

At some point, she didn't know what her energy source was. Her legs moved. They pushed. She went forward. But she didn't know how her body could withstand it.

So this was the other side of war.

Her eyes and ears were on alert, but not at all times. Exhaustion was going into her head and it was slowly eating her alive.

For a long time she was able to ignore it, but now the pain in her bladder was unbearable. She'd drank little, but she really needed to go.

It was only when they patrolled in the thickened forest that she felt it was safe enough for her to vow the pain between her legs out loud.

"I need to pee," she said, pointing at a bush and walking to it.

He followed her and she scoffed at him.

"You know, pee. Preferably alone. Can you untie me?"

She turned around a little and tried to raise her hands up to him. She moved with her legs as the feeling became uncomfortable. She'd waited too long.

"Oh, for the love of...pee!" she said, jumping once. "I need to...urinate."

She made a whooshing kind of sound, in the hopes he'd understand she was imitating a peeing sound. He steered his head, obviously wondering if she'd finally gone mad.

"Pee, restroom, a chair with a big hole in it, so you can sit on it and dump a pool of yellow in it, except men, who can stand and pee," she tried hopelessly, instantly mortified she said that out loud.

For the first time she grateful he couldn't understand the language that she spoke. His expression seemed too passive. It made Alice wonder if perhaps he caught a few words of what she way trying to say to him.

He stayed before Alice. Her message wasn't received.

"Please just untie me!" she said with her eyes low and ashamed, turning her back to him and hoping he got the message.

In case he did understand her, he probably thought she would run away.

"It's not like I could outrun your bullets..."

To her surprise, his hand came on hers and he untied her. Then he stepped away, giving her a few well yards to make Alice at least less uncomfortable. Once done, she went to him with slumped shoulders.

The rope was back on her wrists in no time, her hands again in that position behind her back.

He pointed at the bushes, his eyebrows raised.

"Pee," he said mockingly, walking to them with what Alice thought was a conceited look.

Oh, Alice thought of him as a disgusting creature.

Apparently, he had no shame as he stood with his back to her to pee in a way that sometimes made women envious that they could not pee like that. Alice also turned her back to him, not wanting to see anything by accident, something which she'd never seen before.

He was done much quicker than she had been, and with a nod of his head, they were back on the roads.

"Was it so wrong of me to want to join the war and expect a good outcome? Was that too much to ask for? Were my expectations very improbable?"

In the distance, Alice saw a shape. It wasn't large, but definitely a small house or a cottage. She stopped walking, but the Nazi took hold of the rope on her wrists and pushed her forward. She whimpered as she struggled. Of course she knew being caught by a Nazi was bad news. She only didn't expect for the torture to start in less than a minute, once they were in that enclosed room.

"Please, I have no value. I know nothing. Our camp probably already moved when you killed the GPS of our phones. They must think I'm dead. I have no idea where they could have gone to."

The Nazi pushed her harder, pressing her own tied wrist into her lower back, which already ached from the previous fall.

"I really know nothing!" she exclaimed loudly in pure panic.

The whimpering stopped when the Nazi pressed his hand on Alice's mouth, this time his lips close by her ear.

"Halt die Klappe!" he hissed in a whisper.

That sounded like a curse. This Nazi guy really didn't seem pleased with Alice.

He wanted her to be quiet, Alice guessed. The hand on her mouth and his hushed whisper gave away that much.

If he wanted silence, she would scream. It was the only logical thing to do; to act in the opposite way the other person wants from you. She bit into his hand and found her voice.

It was quite possible that everyone in Germany heard her call for help.