Hi All,
Thank you to BobtheFrog and lightweight101 for the review *hugs*. And also thank you for the new followers and readers who favorited this story. You guys are the reason I keep writing.
As usual, this chapter is un-beta-ed and since English is not my first language, if you have any ideas or see any mistakes, please poke. I'll really appreciate it.
This chapter still take Easy men POV. I hope you like it ^_^ and please leave your review. I really want to know what you think.
Nixon
D-Day + 217. In the span of only 7 months of the war, I've spent 122 days in the front line with Easy. Dick won't leave Easy, and since said Ginger Eskimo need someone to lose him up and I need his footlocker to hide my precious babies, ergo…this Yale student willingly freezing his ass off along with the men.
Ha! And Dear Old Stanhope once told me that I "will not survive" the war?! Eat that, dearest Father!
Okay…so…122 days. That's 23 days in Normandy, 78 days in Holland and 21 days in Bastogne. But the last 21 days in Bastogne was a test for everyone's endurance. Mentally and Physically. For some people, it's the last straw. 21 days of constant tension, sleep deprivation, limited ammunition, hunger and harsh winter. It had cost Easy its best men.
The thing is…Dick was very attached with Easy. Well…yeah…me too actually (we survived Sobel together, for Christ's sake), but now he's leading a whole battalion, so he got the other three companies to take care. I had to repeatedly remind him that.
To say that Dike was just plain stupid was a major understatement. It's like equate this war to Roosevelt and Hitler clawing and bitch-slapping at each other like some teenage girls fighting for boyfriends. Dick already reprimanded Dike when that obtuse cow didn't report Hoobler's death. But Dike always found new ways to test Dick's patience. When we found that dickass left Easy because he's "gonna go for help", for example, Dick went ballistic. I never saw Dick that furious. I mean...Dick was the epitome of all things good (sober all the time, favorite among senior citizen, shitting roses, sun rises from his ass… shits like that). He is the first person I know who nicknamed Dick without actually being a dick. So when Dick Winters got mad, you know you had done something really bad.
But even with all aforementioned Neanderthal's solid proofs of incompetency, Dick couldn't do anything with Dike. Dick's hands were tied and in not a pleasurable way. I generously offered my help to eliminate (or at least apply a bitch slap or two or infinite) that dumbass, complete with the elaborate 'cleaning plan' afterward (I'm the intelligence officer after all. I can be stealthy and shit.). But Dick only shook his head and I couldn't help to realize that, for a 27 year old man, he looked so much older in a very short time. Perhaps that's what happened when you suffered from a serious case of emotional constipation…or maybe it's because he's doing the job of a major while he's still a captain.
And with Buck leaving, all Easy platoon leaders are replacement officers. Foley as 1st Platoon leader was okay, so much better in tactical and leadership skill than Peacock (Jesus, that sorry excuse of a man shouldn't pass the OCS in the first place), but Foley's not experienced in leading into combat. And 2nd Platoon was having serious leadership crises. With Buck, Guarnere and Toye leaving, Malarkey took the job as Platoon leader. And judging by his appearance lately, it's taking its toll.
"Lew…I think I will pull Malarkey back from the line for a day. Maybe he can work for you?"
Malarkey never got hurt since D-Day so he always in the front. I understood Dick's way of thinking. We have to take Malarkey back from the front line for a while before we're attacking Foy. Because getting even 50 yards back from the line for an hour or two could make a big difference in a soldier's state of mind. Although, I admit, not every man liked this arrangement. Like Liebgott, for example. Dick brought him back to Battalion CP to be his runner and my translator for Krauts POW. But after a while, he begged me to be back with his buddies. Loyalty wins over a chance to rest up.
"Sure thing. I…"
I couldn't finish my sentence because the shelling was started. Again.
Oh for fuck's sake! I had enough of this shitstorm!
I shouted in the top of my lung "Come-the- fuck-on! Fucking surrender already, you asshole!"
Dick rolled his eyes. How the hell he can be this calm during a bombardment.
Dammit… I need my Vat69!
When the barrage finally stopped, shouts of "Medic!" rang through the forest. Somehow, the sound of it was much more frightening than the actual barrage. The Battalion radio crackled and Perconte's voice come over "Lightning, Lightning. This is Easy Red. We have KIA. Muck and Penkala. Direct hit. Over."
Dick's face paled before he muttered "Damn…Malarkey…". And when Dick Winters cursed, you know that shits had hit the fan.
Frank
After that last barrage, I found George was digging frantically on a location that I know it was Skip and Penk's foxhole. Their foxhole has taken a direct hit. Babe besides him looking up, hoping that Skip or Penkala blown up into the trees and miraculously survived. But there's nothing. Not in the foxhole, or in the trees. They only found some pieces of bodies and a part of a sleeping bag. And a piece of Skip's rosary. George held on it tightly, I was sure it will leave a dent on his hand. Babe and I have to drag George from the foxhole.
"They want me to jump into their foxhole. They're still in there, Frank. Please…help me dig." George rasps.
It broke my heart to see George like this. The same George that called me midget in hourly basis now shaking and his face paled.
"No, George. They're gone. They took direct hit. You saw it. Let it go, George." I said. George's shoulder sagged in defeat.
He mumbled, "Right". He took several deep breaths and rubbed his face. "Right" He mumbled again.
"George…here, buddy…here…have a smoke." Babe offered him his cig. Babe himself was still recovering from losing Bill and Toye, both were his mentors. Last week? Several days ago? It's hard to keep track of time in this shithole.
"Malarkey…where's Malarkey. I have to tell him. Skip's rosary. Gotta give it to him." Even in his distress, George Luz still taking care of other people.
"George, Lipton will take care of it. Just smoke, okay? You got Babe and me." I said.
George finally sits down and receives Babe's cigarettes. His hand still shaking. "Malarkey…I hope he's gonna be okay. He nearly shot himself, you know? After Hobbler died. He told me. We can't lose him. Not after Buck."
Shit! I didn't know about this. Loosing Hoobler and now his best friends, Skip and Penk, Malarkey must be very traumatized.
"George?" Oh God! It's Mal. "What happened?" He's walking towards us, still not realized that his best friends were dead.
George seemed snapped from his distress and he braced himself to rose up to meet Mal. When he talked, his voice was somewhat steady, "Mal…It's Skip and Penkala. They're gone…I'm sorry. I think you wanna have this." And he gave Skip's rosary to him.
Malark received the rosary in dazed…as if he's dreaming. His face lost its remaining color. He nod and said faintly "I'll write to Faye". He left silently towards his foxhole.
Lipton eyed him wearily. He then ordered me to report casualties to Battalion CP.
I switched on my radio and started to send report "Lightning, Lightning. This is Easy Red. We have KIA. Muck and Penkala. Direct hit. Over."
Five minutes later, Captain Winters and Nixon approached us. "Gents…" Winters nodded.
George took a deep breath and then said in a hollowed voice "Muck and Penkala's foxhole got a direct hit, Sir. Mine and Lipton's got a dud."
Nixon whispered "Jesus"
George grimace "That's the way it was, Sir. We got nothing to salvage…from both of them…except Muck's rosary. I already gave it to Malarkey."
George was very calm when reporting this while just minutes ago, he saw his friends shredded in front of him and he himself got a little bit hysterics for a while. But maybe this was his mechanism to deal with all this horror. Maybe…this calm-border-line-indifference attitude was George's version of breaking point.
Winters watched him closely. He pated George's back and said "Hang tough."
George smile weakly "Will do, Sir. One step at a time."
Liebgott
There were times when I wanted to forcibly gag George Luz and throw him from a flying airplane without parachute. But not tonight. Tonight that crazy Portuguese need some distraction.
You see…tomorrow we will attack Foy and I heard that he's been assigned as Dike's radio man. Well, he's our best radio man and becoming an 'Easy Six' was always an honor, but if said 'Six' was Dike…you can say that Joe Liebgott can commiserate (Yeah I know fancy word. You got a fucking problem with that?!) to one annoying Portuguese.
George had changed. A lot. The men could see that Becca's close call, Bill & Toye incident and Skip & Penk death were deeply affected him. He's still crazy though, dutifully carried out his role as company clown with those jokes and impersonations, but it's a little bit subdued.
"Hey George. Still alive?"
"Hey Lieb. Still an asshole?"
"That's my middle name. Where's Frank?"
"Midget's brushing his teeth. Somewhere. Let's just hope his teeth were not too shiny or Speirs would want to forcefully remove them from Frank's mouth. Seriously…that creepy Lieutenant got easily distracted with something shiny."
"Hmh...yeah…tell me about it" Speirs's legendary creepiness could only be surpassed by his legendary kleptomania tendency he'd shown since Holland. "But George, unless you're wearing a skirt, don't call me Lieb. It means Love in German and I still like tities. Fortunately you're lacking on that specification."
"You let Becca call you Lieb."
"She's a broad, isn't she? And I love her."
"You WHAT?!" George sputtered.
"As a sister, ya dickhead." Christ! Sometimes George was very oblivious that he had no valid reason to be jealous. Both of them were head over heels for each other.
"Oh…okay…right" he had the decency to look embarrassed.
"So…you stick with Dike tomorrow?"
George groaned spectacularly "Please…don't remind me about that. Do you know what happened at briefing this afternoon? Well…you can say that our CO is obviously not the brightest crayon in the box."
"We're fucking doomed, aren't we? But what if I….let say…accidentally throw my grenade to his general direction, do you think anyone would notice?"
"I will be in those 'general direction' too, asshat."
"Oh yeah…right. By the way…Becca will come tomorrow? I bet Colonel Sink will be there to supervise the attack."
"Well, she recovered greatly. So…yeah…I think she will be there. But, to be honest, I'm not too peachy about it."
"Hmm…yeah…she can see you got shot or blown off."
"Thank you, Joe. That's very nice of you. I really appreciate that. You optimistic, you." he said dryly.
"No worries, buddy…if there's something happened to you, I'll take care of her. Maybe marry her at some point."
"You cocky motherfucker!"
"But only the best Moms." I winked. And George burst out laughing, in which Lipton had to shush us down.
I flipped Lipton off.
Lipton glared.
I lowered my helmet to hide from his glare.
George grinned.
The fucker!
"Thanks, Joe. I really need a laugh right now."
"Yeah…I know…don't we all."
We sat in silence for a while before I asked "Becca is a very special girl, right?"
George smiled when he answered "Yeah she is. She made me want to be just me. Warts and all."
"Yeesh…you got warts?"
"It's just a metaphor, dumbass! And that's not the point I was talking about."
"Yeah yeah…I was just messing with you, George. It's a sport, ya know."
"Fuck you."
"No thanks. I'm into tits."
George actually slammed his palm into his face and left me, saying "I'm off to cry manly tears now"
"Yeah…manly" I scoffed. He affectionately flipped me off without even glanced back. And then I realized, that was my first winning in the Battle of Sass with George Luz. I'd take that as a good omen for tomorrow assault.
Speirs
Well…I feel bad for Easy for having such a Stupid (with capital S) CO in this dire moment. I saw Captain Winters brief Dike for the last time this morning, and said ass (Dike. Not Winters) was nodded lazily and even yawned (FUCKING YAWNED!) after that. I usually had respect for my fellow officer, but for this sorry excuse of a creature, I didn't have any. This kind of officer that would make his men killed due to his own stupidity. Even though as a soldier we have to accept that we already dead, but that's our own death; not other people's death. And especially, not our men's death.
Then I saw that Becca girl (I hope I got the name right. I'm not good in remembering names). I heard she survived the bombing of Bastogne. She's still wearing bandage on her head, but in general, she looked okay. She glared at Dike and slowly clenched and unclenched her fist in desperate attempt to control her emotion. I saw her and that radio man (Damn, I forgot his name) looked at each other as if they want to say something but the circumstances was not allowed them to. That's just depressing. To become that close but couldn't say anything.
When the radio man took his place beside the dumb CO, I walked toward her because she looked like she needs to talk to someone.
"Morning…Becca."
She nodded. Still tense "Morning, Lieutenant Speirs." Oh…Good. I got her name right.
I lowered my voice so no other can hear us "Your radio man will be fine, Becca. He's a fine soldier."
"Oh I know he's a fine soldier, Sir. It's just…" she seemed want to say something derogatory about Dike, but she caught herself.
"Yeah, I know. Dike is a dunce."
"Your word, Sir. Not mine" She grinned.
"But you think about it and maybe in a much worse words."
"Touché."
"Don't worry. Easy is the best, Becca. Why do you think the Colonel chose them to lead this attack?"
She nodded but we have to finish our conversation because the attack has begun.
And what a disaster it was.
The situation went from wrong to royally and catastrophically fubar when Dike ordered the men to hold up. He doomed his men into sitting duck for Krauts' arties while he's cowering with his tail between his legs behind a haystack. Winters lost his cool and getting more and more agitated when Dike was not responded on the radio. I know the transmission was just fine because I can hear the radio man's voice (Dammit! What is his name?) demanded Dike to answered Captain Winters, but that stupid son of a bitch (Dike. Not the radio man) just keep silent. Becca looked livid. An angry and worried tear rolled of her eyes.
You know that shits had hit the fan when a hybrid of Saint, Angel and anything Holy that was Dick Winters lost his temper and surge forward with his rifle to take charge. The Colonel and Nixon hold him back. But before the Colonel finished his speech (Winters must be beyond furious to cut the Colonel like that. I like Winters), Winters shouted "Speirs! Take over that company, relieve Dike and take that attack on in!"
About damn time!
To be honest, the next event was kind of bit blur. I just moved based on instinct and muscle memory. I ran across the open field to reach Dike position behind the haystack (Krauts' arties were quite impressive, to be honest). Then I barked out orders: 2nd platoon this way, 3rd platoon that way, get those mortars humping, all-out with those machine-guns, let's go. You know…strategic stuffs, plans and shits like that.
And I took off and not looking back, assuming the men will follow. Thankfully, they're not stupid like their former CO. They did following me. It would be embarrassing if they didn't.
But then we realized that we will lost I company if we didn't connect with them. Radio (I'll just call the radio man 'Radio' until I remember his name) tried to contact them but to no avail.
Well…desperate times call for desperate measures. So I just run towards the I Company. It's a short distance anyway. I faintly heard Radio said "what the hell?" How eloquent of him.
After a little chat with I Company leader, I ran back to Easy. During my return run, I finally remember Radio's name. It's George Luz. Good job, Brain.
When the shits finally over, Winters immediately relieved Dike officially and promote me as Captain and Easy's new CO. On one side, I was honored to lead the best company in the ETO. On the other hand, I have to remember new names. Oh goodie. I'll just use that stupid memory trick like it's my first day teaching Kindergarten (not that I ever had teach one). But if I can get through this day without mangling anyone's name that can ruin my legendary badass reputation, I'll take that as a win. The men acted like toddlers anyway, if the kids were highly trained killer machine, behaving inappropriately, currently depraved from sex and with a worrying love for anything explosive and lethal.
So…let's start. Crazy, Radio, Portuguese is George Luz. Italian, toothbrush, got shot in the ass is Frank Perconte. Mama bear, scar on cheek, 1st sergeant is Lipton. I heard stories about him since Bois Jacques. Sniper, southerner, soft-speaking is Shifty. Ginger, Philly, baby is Babe. Cajun, pale, with Babe is Doc Roe. Okay…that's easy enough. I can do this.
"Lieutenant Speirs, Sir."
"It's Captain now."
"Oh…Sorry Captain."
"It's fine. I have not received the badge yet anyway. Private George Luz is it?"
"Yes, Sir. I'm your radio operator. Your call sign will be Easy Six now. Do you want me to explain the other designated radio call sign for Easy? "
"Yes. Thank you, Private. But maybe in an hour? I have…things to do." I gave him my signature glare so he can leave and I can continue remembering the names.
"Okay, Sir. Permission to speak, Sir?" Well, I guess this radio man was immune to The Glare.
I nodded and schooled my face as icy as possible. Maintain a reputation was always an important thing.
"We're lucky Winters appointed you to replace Dike or maybe we will have more casualties. Finally Easy has a good leader."
"You and Lipton also did a good job, Private. From what I've heard."
"It's our job, Sir. With a dickass as a CO, what else can we do? Someone has to un-SNAFU-ed the SNAFU."
I lift one of my eyebrows involuntarily. I guess I had to guard my expression more carefully if I have to work with this man.
"One more thing, Sir." He added. "That run across the German line thing…Seriously… That was the motherfucking best." And he grinned.
I couldn't stop myself to smile. Honestly, that was the most genuine compliment I've ever had. "Glad I can entertain you, Private."
"You damn right, Sir. It's gonna be a legend. So…um…I'll go check on Perconte. His ass got shot. That's kinda Easy's tradition, Sir. Getting shot in the ass and went AWOL from hospital. Just so you know. Welcome to Easy, Sir."
Well, I guess I had to change Perconte's 'got shot in the ass' into something. Maybe midget. Yeah…he's short anyway. So…Italian, toothbrush, midget is Frank Perconte.
I realized I was smiling again, a little bit warmer this time since I feel welcomed. God forbid the men hated me like they hated their former CO. I know I will have a great time leading this crazy bunch of dysfunctional paratroopers. I managed to nod and said "Thank you for the notification…Luz."
He grinned and walked toward the aid station.
I like this man. I think I will make him my runner.
Now what's that shiny thing I saw over there…