A/N: Welcome back for another week and as promised this chapter focuses back on the main squad. Hope you all are enjoying it so far.
And I have been asked (Lieutenant Bird) about Mad Jack Churchill (if you don't know who he is look him up, it is great)...Maybe, plus given what I've said it may even turn out to be Mad Jill Churchill ;)
So on with the Show.
Muse Section Chapter 7
6th June 1944, Village of Manneils Normandy
Eli gazed at the rays of orange that crested over the buildings illuminating the village that was now in British hands, the air was still sticky but somehow just the mere sight of the sunrise made it seem less humid, as though Eli's body knew that morning meant a fresh new day.
"Perfect invasion weather" she muttered to herself, breathing deeply she adjusted the rifle on her shoulder, before turning her back on the sun and heading back into the square that had seen so much combat last night; the scars from the battle last night still very visible. At least we got the bodies buried. They may be an enemy but they deserved that at the very least.
The square now was busier than the night before, after they had taken it with a little help from Fumiko & co. paratroopers had been filtering in gradually through the night and were still arriving now, most seemed like they had seen combat, but at least Eli and the others wouldn't be taking on every objective on their own.
Eli gazed at the activity in the village, her boots clacking dully against the cobblestone. Some women preparing to go back out there to face whatever their assignment was, while others tried to catch those precious few moments of rest that they could, and there were a few who ran back and forth running errands. Yet despite the activity that only a beehive could rival, Eli knew that there were still too few people here, and that the rest were either lost, fighting or shot down in the night.
As Eli tried to take her thoughts away from their section's missing members she strolled over to the café she and Nozomi had used as a machine gun position the night before. Looking at the five girls collapsed against the wall outside.
"Hey" she waved at the rest of her section, who were gathered around a small stove preparing and eating breakfast. "Have you guys seen Nozomi anywhere?"
"I think she's inside" Honoka chewed a piece of chocolate thoughtfully.
"But none of us are really sure." Nico chipped in
Eli's eyebrow twitched, "How can you not be sure? The café is right behind you!"
"But we're tired Eli-chan" Honoka whined
Eli sighed, rubbing her eyes in exasperation. If only Umi was here. The corporal was normally what kept Honoka in line or at least thinking like an NCO should.
"I get that Honoka, but weren't you supposed to sleep last night? That's why Kotori took first watch. I mean look at Hanayo and Rin you could take a page out of their book." Eli waved her hand the sleeping brunette whose head was resting on Rin's lap.
"It's not that simple Eli-chan, the excitement is too much" Honoka pouted
"So what are we supposed to be doing after this Honoka? We need to look for Maki and Umi." Nico asked pouring water into a mess tin hat had been placed over the fire, while ignoring the on-going attempt to straighten out her sergeant.
"uuuuh…I'm not sure." The ginger scratched her head displacing her beret slightly.
"What do you mean not sure?" Eli scolded "You're our NCO Honoka! You're supposed to find out." another sigh escaped her lips.
"But Eli-chan." Honoka pouted again.
"No buts go and see the lieutenant and find out what we're doing. Like are we attacking our original objective, or have plans changed? You know the sort of thing that a Sergeant is supposed to do." Eli put her hands on her hips pointing in the direction the town hall.
"You're so mean Eli-chan! It's just because you're one year older than me."
"We'll let you know when breakfast's ready Sergeant." As Nico called after her Honoka got up and stomped her way across the square.
"Honestly sometimes she forgets how rank works doesn't she?" Kotori gazed in the direction of their sergeant, speaking to no one in particular. Eli noticed some faint emotion in her eyes whenever Kotori looked at Honoka but she could never tell what it is.
"Is breakfast nearly ready?" Eli looked over the now boiling water, only to be disappointed when she saw it to still be empty."
"Patience…" Nico cautioned dumping in a measure of rice "…it'll be a while, go and entertain yourself in the meantime." Nico smirked jerking her thumb at the café behind her
Eli sighed at the obvious insinuation before entering the café all the same.
The cafe was a simple affair really, chairs were still stacked on the tables and light filtered through the curtains into the dusty air casting beams everywhere, adding to the atmosphere of abandonment that hung over the village.
Eli opened up the bar making her way through to the back room, the faint smell of coffee still permeated the air as though it had been absorbed into the fabric of the cafe. The soft sound of music drifted across the café from a slightly ajar door hinting at Nozomi's location
"Nozomi?" Eli asked, pushing open the door quietly. No response. She probably can't hear me. A smile tugged at the corner of her lips at the thought of surprising the mysterious girl.
Her smile fell when she saw that the room really was empty except for a few chairs and a table with a gramophone playing a record in the middle. Light flowed in through a dirty window that looked out onto a small garden giving a slight amount of colour to the peeling yellow wallpaper.
"Guess she's not here…" Eli sighed propping her rifle up against the wall, before tracing her fingers lightly along the table edge; the lilt of jazz reverberating off of the walls, lulling her into a slightly lethargic state.
Two hands suddenly gripped her breasts causing her to yelp and jump forward.
"My Eli-chi, you've grown again haven't you?" Nozomi's green orbs danced with mischief just over her shoulder.
"S-Shut up Nozomi! There are more normal ways to greet a person."
"Like what?"
"Hello might be a start." Eli retorted, her arm protecting her chest from further advances.
"That's no fun though…" Nozomi sulked, her lips pouting like they always did when she faked being upset.
Eli smiled at the act; despite all her faults and quirks she loved Nozomi just the same. She collapsed into a chair before letting out a contented sigh, as the weight was taken off of her feet.
"Hey Eli-chi…" Nozomi slinked around the room grabbing a chair lightly before dragging it next to the blonde with a slight scrape.
"What?" Eli mumbled her acknowledgement, the fatigue of the past day, and the sight of Nozomi's seductive aura taking hold of her, increasing her lethargy.
"Doesn't this music take you back?"
"What do you mean?"
Nozomi plumped herself on the chair before resting her head on Eli's chest, lightly clutching her hand. The hard metal of her helmet contrasted with the silky smoothness of her hair and the softness of her skin. Nozomi was a very soft person anyway, in both personality and body, the warmth of her body reminding her of the cat she had at home. It was one of the things that Eli loved about her, the fact that no matter how hard the world appeared Nozomi was there to comfort her, to let the blonde lose herself in her. Eli was always grateful to have the purple haired fool in her life.
"I mean listen to the music."
Eli listened to the smooth jazz, before giving a little gasp.
"It's our song…Monte Carlo" Nozomi nodded showing that she'd got it right.
"We thought we were just ships passing in the night, turns out you're a bit harder to lose than that." Eli rolled her eyes , and Nozomi giggled lightly.
"Do you remember much about Monte Carlo? It's been seven years now." The blonde asked.
"A little. The sun, the sea, the bars. But I think you are the only thing that I'll ever care about from that summer."
Eli smiled at the memory of the family holiday she'd been on when she was 17, the stifling boredom of the endless parade of parties, exiled Russian aristocrats and boring conversation; led her to seek out a more exciting time in the seedy underbelly of the town, she loved her life and family but sometimes it just became too tedious to bear. She was exploring the bars near the port that sailors frequented when she had seen a flash of purple hair and a glint of green eyes as Nozomi had entered the bar, through the dense cigarette smoke and summer heat she was a vision. They had spent the entire summer together while Nozomi spent her pay on 'fun', eventually after a particularly romantic evening Eli and Nozomi had shared a kiss on top one of the cliffs overlooking the city in the glorious sunset. Eli was heartbroken when she discovered that Nozomi's ship had left port the next day, and that her parents wanted to return to London. But fate had reunited them eventually.
"I don't think I ever felt that way about any other person, before or since. Don't you wish you could go back and re-live it sometimes, before all this madness happened?" Eli murmured close to burying her face in the mess of magenta hair on her chest. Nozomi's lips brushed against her knuckles causing Eli's breath to hitch.
"No not really…" Nozomi's sudden admission caught Eli off guard.
"Why not?! Didn't you have fun that summer?" Eli practically screeched.
"You know my ship was gun running for the Republicans that summer right? I've seen a lot, but Spain was all kinds of messed up…not something I'd like to see again…you were all that kept me sane that summer." Nozomi mumbled into her lover's hand.
"You what?" Eli's ice blue eyes temporarily widened in shock at the revelation, a slight giggle escaped her lips. "You really are a mysterious piece of work Nozomi."
"You've got that right; even I don't know half the stuff about myself that I should." Nozomi stared forlornly at the gramophone.
"Hang on a second…" Eli fumbled slipping her hand into Nozomi's breast pocket.
"My Eli-chi…so bold…"
"It's not like that." Eli blushed at the insinuation; finally she got a hold of one of the tarot cards that Nozomi always kept there. "Gotcha…well Nozomi what does this one mean?"
Nozomi looked at the card, she perked up a little "it means that things that are lost will be found."
"Does that mean..?" Eli dared not to say what they were thinking lest she jinx it.
"It might do…the future works in strange ways."
"Hey there you two are!" Nico poked her head around the doorway scowling at the two girls sat down who had now jumped out of their skin.
"Nico-chi don't do that you scared us."
"Well sorry for interrupting you two lovebirds but breakfast is ready, and Hanayo is eating all the rice, so if you'd like to eat…" the Nico's gestured out of the doorway, her black hair bobbing as she did so.
Eli blushed at the accusation and stammered out a response"N-Nico don't say things like that…people will misunderstand."
"Come on Eli-chi we need to eat." Nozomi stood up pulling Eli gently by her hand stalking her way towards the door, to join the others.
"So, to answer the question of what our operations are today. I will be leading the attack on the Dives Bridge."
The section sat in stunned silence at their Sergeant's announcement. Eli raised her hand tentatively
"Why you? I mean…won't the bridge be too heavily defended even for us?" the assembled section nodded their heads in agreement.
"Eli's right," Nico declared "this is the sort of thing you entrust to a platoon with an officer at the very least, plus none of us have any experience with explosives." More murmurs of agreement flowed throughout the group.
"That's what I said to them," Honoka interjected "but the problem is apart from Fumiko-chan the only other officer here is Captain Minami and a few of her staff."
"Rin wants to know what happened to the rest of them nya~?" the orange haired girl asked her hand waving in the air crazily.
"They haven't arrived yet…some have been wounded and some just didn't make it." A silence descended on the section while Honoka let her words sink in.
"In other words…there is only one officer we can have in combat as an entire battalion…" Hanayo mumbled through mouthfuls of her rice which she had been consuming at a superhuman rate.
"That seems to be about the size of it." Nico agreed. No one looked pleased at the idea of destroying a bridge just the seven of them.
"Come on guys!" Honoka jumped up her fist raised in a rallying call, "We went through Sicily without any officers, this'll be a cake walk in comparison to that. We're Muse Section remember. We don't need officers, you've got me."
"Somehow that doesn't sound like a comfort." Hanayo mumbled eliciting a tense laugh from the assembled girls.
Honoka's eyebrow twitched at the slight insult. Gathering her wits together, she continued. "We're not doing this alone anyway, if you're worried about troop strength…Fumiko-chan said that she'd lend us her section while she gets things organised for their other objective. Also we're going to get a detachment of at least five royal engineers plus any volunteers we can scrounge up." As Honoka counted off the people joining them the section realised the seven of them weren't going to be taking on a heavily defended position alone, the heavy silence that had dominated before evaporated.
Eli sighed with relief at the realisation "Honoka…next time lead with that." Her supposedly calm tone accompanied by a fiery expression that would intimidate the hardest of men.
"S-Sorry guys…" The subtle reprimand inducing a look of fear in the NCO, who bowed asking for forgiveness.
"So when do we move out?" Nozomi asked
"Hmmm…" Honoka paused thinking she thought, "oh I forgot to say, in order to get this done on schedule we need to leave in twenty minutes…"
All six girls looked up from their breakfasts, half stunned at the announcement, before wolfing down what remained of their breakfasts. There wasn't even time to complain.
Damnit Honoka Eli chuckled ironically at the ad-hoc way they all operated.
Eli trudged across the edge of the field, the chirp of birds being the only sound that she could hear; the group was straggling along the edge of the green expanse in a single file line. Regardless of the difficulty this imposed on conversation after half an hour of the same routine the girls had started chatting and joking to pass the time.
Along with a few extra volunteers, Hideko and Mika had joined them once more, Jenkins having been left behind due to a rather underhanded trick on their part. The engineers were less talkative and mostly kept to themselves rarely talking and they had an annoying habit of occasionally stopping to "check the charges" they had brought along to do the task in hand.
Eli kept her eye out for Germans while making small talk with Nozomi over her shoulder, Eli really hated marching in single file…it somehow felt lonely, plus the constant turning around to see and talk to Nozomi made her neck ache.
The signal for them to all halt was passed down the line, stopping the murmur of conversation, each girl got down on one knee. They all looked around nervously at the surrounding hedges and the open ground to their right for signs of enemy activity. Honoka signalled for them to gather around her.
The section closed in quickly deploying around so that they could see Honoka, but keeping their weapons trained on their surroundings.
Honoka explained the situation using a map that was spread out on Nico's knee.
"We're about ten minutes' walk from our target." She pointed to the road that crossed the snaking blue line on the map. "We need to keep it quiet from here on out." The ginger haired girl now speaking in hushed tones
A grudging low "Understood" was heard from the section.
"We can assume that the Germans are prepared now so we need to be careful" Nico noted.
"Honoka nodded her head, "We'll split into three for the attack; Eli you take Nozomi , Kotori and three others make your way into this orchard here." Honoka traced a route with her finger stopping at a rectangular green splodge that was near the bridge. "You will provide cover fire suppressing the enemy defences."
But Honoka…" Kotori began her protest.
"No buts Kotori-chan you need to keep your distance remember…Honestly sometimes it's like you actively try to stay next to me" Honoka's quiet voice made it clear that this wasn't negotiable.
Eli inwardly cringed at Honoka's cluelessness to Kotori's reasons. While Honoka continued to outlay their plan of attack.
"I'll take Nico Hanayo, Rin and the PIAT we'll work our way around to the riverbank on the left side." Honoka looked to see nods of agreement from the named people "After that you move up and we storm the opposite bank, once we have the bridge secure the engineers can do their thing as the third team."
"I guess Rin acts as a runner keeping us connected as usual?" Eli asked, earning a nod from Honoka in response.
"We split up now." Honoka said with finality, folding up the map. "Muses, Move out."
The girls got to their feet and quickly assembled into their teams. The earlier conversation gone, everyone now tried to keep their head down knowing that it was likely that the enemy was in the area.
The time passed in an instant and soon the orchard was in sight, a smattering of trees hidden behind a low stone wall that bordered the entire orchard. Eli scanned it for any visible German defences, while unlikely it was possible that the enemy might've deployed out this far to keep an eye on approaches to the bridge. Seeing none she gave the signal to move out in a wide sweeping arc across the meadow that lay before them. Her team stood up cautiously, moving as quietly as possible; at a brisk walk that made it clear they wanted to get out of the open.
The crack of a rifle shattered the peace that had existed before. The head of one of the girls who had volunteered snapped back with a sickening crunch when the bullet hit her head, passing through like a bolt of lightning causing blood and brown hair to explode out the back.
"Sniper!" Eli yelled to her team as they all hit the deck. Her cry drowned out by the chatter of machine gun fire that echoed across the peaceful meadow.
"Contact Front!" the shout went up, while everyone hit the deck. Eli threw herself forward behind a small rise in the meadow, the sudden impact against the ground jarring Eli's bones slightly.
The bullets kicked up dirt and tore the flowers and grass that had been drifting softly in the breeze. As rounds flew overhead, they filled the air with the fast zip like sounds, which sounded as though a hive of bees had been disturbed. Eli looked up to see at least two persistent muzzle flashes coming from the Orchard wall.
"Shit!" Eli swore, cursing herself for not noticing the troops hidden behind the wall, who were now spraying bullets across the entire field.
Her team pinned down Eli looked around frantically to find Nozomi. The Bren gunner was lying like Eli was, trying to take cover behind a small hillock gunshots tore up the earth surrounding her keeping her head down.
The Sniper's rifle cracked once more, sending up a clod of dirt that was much too close to Eli's head for her comfort. Ducking back down to avoid the same fate that had befallen the unfortunate volunteer she could do nothing but listen. Over the sound of battle she could hear more distant gunfire making it clear that she wasn't the only one in trouble.
Well this is a fine way to destroy a bridge. Eli thought bitterly.
A/N: So yeah not going to plan is it. Next week, some special guests A-rise, I mean arrive, slip of the tongue there.
One other thing I have a poll on my Profile and it would mean a lot to me if as many of you answer it as possible, since I need to know what's popular amongst you lot.
Glossary:
Mess Tin: metal container used by the army for cooking and eating
