We Were Soldiers
42. The Hunt
Sentry duty was boring at the best of times, but at least in a foxhole you had someone else to talk to. Someone to laugh with, and bullshit with, and roll dice with. At least in a foxhole you weren't alone in the darkness, waiting tense, hoping that if you had to pull the trigger of your gun, you weren't going to shoot someone you knew.
Bucky fidgeted on the cold, bare ground. The sun's heat had long ago fled the rocks beneath him, and he'd been slowly stiffening in place for hours. At least in a foxhole, you could move around a bit. Stretch your legs. Move your arms. Work the cricks out of your neck. A week ago, Bucky had viewed foxholes with a sort of scornful disdain. Now, they seemed a luxury.
"It's twelve o'clock, and all's well," Mex said over the radio, a grin in his voice.
"No movement here," Tex agreed.
"Camp's quiet from my view," said Hodge.
"And here as well," Agent Carter added.
Bucky didn't bother trying to hide his smile as he pressed the 'transmit' button on the radio and said, "Nothing to report from my end." It seemed Colonel Phillips had agreed with Bucky that Carter would be more use behind the barrel of an SSR-01, watching from afar. He wondered how strongly she'd protested that order.
He swung his rifle back to the 107th's tent. It was in darkness, and had been for over an hour. Down there, the men would be falling asleep, while Wells and Weiss faked sleeping to stay alert in case the spy came calling. Hopefully the men would be safe tonight.
Two more hourly check-ins later, and some considerable time after his legs had gone numb, Bucky's radio crackled quietly with static as someone began transmitting. It was Hodge.
"I got movement over here, Sarge." The excitement in his voice was palpable. Bucky could almost taste it, all bitter and acrid over the musky, loamy spell of the vegetation around him. "Three men, coming out of the 9th's tent. Not making any effort to conceal themselves. They're walkin', and chatting."
"Can you see whether they're armed?" Bucky asked.
"No, I just lost them. They've passed behind the command tent. Heading your way, Tex."
"Ah got 'em," Private Robertson drawled. "They've all got knives and sidearms. No rifles. They don't seem to be in a hurry. They're about to leave my sight; they'll be passing the 107th's tent any moment now, Sarge."
Bucky licked his lips and swallowed, working moisture across his parched mouth. He closed his left eye, peering down his night-vision scope with his right, waiting patiently as his heart raced in his chest and the three soldiers strolled into his view, each one carrying a small flashlight. His left hand gripped his gun more tightly as the men approached the 107th's tent flap… then relaxed as they walked on by. The men continued towards the latrine pits, and Bucky slowly released the breath he'd been holding. He reached out for his radio again.
"It's okay, looks like they're just using the pits."
"Keep an eye on them nonetheless," Agent Carter instructed. As if it wasn't bad enough they had to shit into an open trench; now she wanted him to watch others do it?
"Yeah, okay."
He turned his rifle away by a small degree, to give whichever of them needed the pits a small measure of privacy. He didn't know the members of the 9th as well as he did some of the members of the other regiments. They tended to keep to themselves, probably because of those damn German agents hidden within their ranks. But one of the faces down there was strangely familiar… and he couldn't think why.
A flurry of movement drew his eye. He moved the rifle back, and his heart lurched. The man closest to the pit had drawn his knife and stabbed one of his guards in the back. The guard hadn't stood a chance; he'd turned away, to give the same privacy Bucky had. The knife was plunged deep, and even as he cried out, his attacker ripped out the knife and pulled the man backwards, sending him toppling into the pit.
The second guard was immediately alert; he dropped his flashlight and reached for his gun. The attacker was faster; he brought the knife around in a reverse grip, slashing the neck of the guard. As the man fell, Bucky didn't think; he acted. The attacker turned to run, and Bucky adjusted his aim. When the man stepped into his sight, he pulled the trigger. The bullet flew true, a clean hit, straight to the shoulder. But despite the shot, the man got to his feet and set off towards the periphery of the camp, disappearing into the trees before Bucky could make a second attempt.
"Two men down!" he shouted into his radio, as he pushed himself to his feet. Down in the camp, the commotion had not gone unnoticed. Nobody down there would've heard the report of his gun firing—the silencer Stark had put on it was too impressive for that—but the downed men had probably cried out, drawing attention. "We need to get down there, NOW!"
"Colonel Phillips, we're coming in," he heard Carter report over the radio. "Tell the sentries to stand down. I repeat, tell the sentries to stand down; we don't want them shooting us."
Bedlam met Bucky's eyes as he finished his three hundred metre dash and reached the camp's perimeter. The sentries may have been told to stand down, but a couple of them still trained their weapons on him until he was clearly in the light. He lifted his rifle's muzzle into an upright position, pointing the thing at the sky as he pushed his way through crowds of men pouring out from their tents.
"Send medics to the latrine pits!" he ordered, and calls of Medic! Medic to the pits! was echoed across the camp.
Bucky reached the pits before the medics, and found a group from the 107th, whose tent was closest to the pits, doing what they could for the injured men. Wells and Franklin were kneeling beside the man whose neck had been slashed, trying to stem blood that was pouring out too quickly. Gusty and Weiss had jumped into the pit and were knee-deep in liquid, doing the same for the man with the back wound, whilst simultaneously holding his head above the layer of effluent so he didn't drown in shit and piss.
"We're gonna need a spinal support board down here," Weiss called out as Gusty offered reassuring words to the man whose head he was holding up.
That order, too, was passed down the line, but Bucky didn't get chance to ask where he was needed; Colonel Phillips arrived, along with Colonel Hawkswell, Howard Stark, and Sergeant Haven from the 9th.
"Sergeant Barnes, what the hell happened?" Phillips demanded.
"Sir, we saw three men from the 9th leave their tent and come to the pits. Then, one attacked the other two. Stabbed them and ran off. I managed to shoot him in the shoulder, which should slow him down."
"Haven?"
The moustached man paled beneath the colonel's gaze. "Sir, I gave permission for Private Rutter to use the pits, and told Privates Whittaker and Compton to escort him."
Suddenly, that face from Bucky's memory came back. As Agent Carter, Hodge, Hernandez and Tex arrived, preceded by a group of medics and nurses who took over care of the injured men, he realised where he'd seen the private before.
"He was in the hospital tent, the same day I was," he said, turning to Phillips and Carter. "The man who attacked the others… he went to have his boils lanced. I was so out of it with drugs and pain that I barely remembered him."
"Private Rutter is prone to boils," Haven confirmed.
"Colonel, he must've used that as an excuse to get close to the nurse's tent, and left the first note for Nurse Green before coming for treatment. And that night, when they met, I overheard them talking!"
"Colonel," said a new voice. Dr. Peacock was beside the man with the slashed throat, his white uniform awash with red. On the ground, the injured man's eyes and mouth were open in a silent stare. "I'm afraid Private Compton is dead." He gestured to the group of medics who were lifting the second private from the pits on a spinal board. "We'll do what we can for Private Whittaker, but we need to get him cleaned up and into surgery immediately."
"I'll arrange for additional oil lamps to be sent to the hospital," said Colonel Hawkswell. "And for the chaplain to see to Private Compton."
Phillips nodded. "We'll need teams to go after Rutter. There can be no doubt he's our spy. We need to find him and bring him back or put him down before he finds refuge."
"I can have men ready to go in five minutes," Bucky offered.
"No," said Haven. He stepped forward and rested his hand on his pistol. "The 9th should be the ones to go after him. He's killed two of my men."
"My men already have the experience with the SSR-01s. And no axe to grind."
Haven scowled at him. "Sergeant, if you think I would jeopardise—"
"The 107th will go," Phillips interrupted. "Sergeant Haven, you have an injured man here in camp, and you have footlockers to go through. Have Stark help you go through Rutter's, in case there are any nasty surprises waiting for you."
Haven looked like he wanted to object. Instead, he threw up a rigid salute and about-faced with the rest of his men.
"Sergeant Barnes, I don't have to tell you what's at stake here," Phillips said, when the 9th had gone, and the medics departed. "That man could expose our entire operation. We're behind enemy lines with no support, and if the Germans realise we're here and send in the Luftwaffe, we don't stand a chance."
"Don't worry, sir, we'll find him."
"And I'll help," Agent Carter said, shouldering the SSR-01 she still carried.
Bucky knew better than to argue this time. Instead, he began sounding off men.
"Weiss and Biggs, you're with Agent Carter. Wells and Franklin, with Hodge. Gusty and Davies, with Mex. Carrot and Scott, with Tex. Hawkins and Jones, with me. Get cleaned up, grab your weapons and the essentials. No packs, no ration kits, canteens only; we're travelling light, and we're not coming back empty handed. Meet back here in ten minutes."
The men scrambled for the tent, and Phillips ordered the rest of the camp back to their beds. The dawn might be coming, but the night wasn't over yet.
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They jogged across the loose rocky ground, occasionally losing their balance, sometimes struggling to climb the hills, always cresting the rising ground slowly, carefully, making sure to keep low, to prevent their profiles standing out against the lightening skyline. The Nazi travelled fast despite being injured, and he didn't make it easy for them to follow him.
It hadn't been too difficult at first; there had been blood, lots of it. They found a few bloody rags, strips cut from a shirt to try and stem the flow of blood. But by the time they realised the rags had been left as a decoy, to lure them along false trails, they'd had to double back and lost valuable times. At first they'd travelled as a loose, large group, but now they'd split into their smaller teams, a few hundred metres apart, to cover the ground for any sign of their quarry.
"Another bloody rag," Weiss reported over his radio. "Can't tell whether it's another decoy. Keep your eyes peeled."
"I have spots of blood over here, too," Mex added, from east of Bucky's location.
"You gotta admire the way this guy works," Corporal Jones said to Bucky. "It must be exhausting him, doing all this criss-crossing and zig-zagging across the ground, laying false trails everywhere."
Bucky nodded. "I just wish we knew which of us was following the real trail." He would've preferred it to be his own team. To give him the chance to finish what he started, and do it right this time. A disabling shot to prevent the guy running any further. Maybe something that might cause him to lose a leg. It was the least he deserved, after killing those two men. After almost killing Bucky, and maybe killing Whittaker. Which begged the question… what would Phillips do with the spy once he'd finished interrogating him?
Ten minutes after Weiss and Mex's report, Bucky halted to grab a quick drink from his flask. Jones and Hawkins weren't doing too bad, but Bucky was damn near exhausted. He'd seen too much action and had too little a recovery period, and a whole night without sleep on top of that. Now, the sun was rising above the horizon, and Bucky knew it was going to be another hot day. Hopefully that would work to their advantage more than Rutter's—or whatever the guy's real name was.
They jogged on. If there was one good thing to come from all of this, it was that he had been proven right. Not just to Phillips, and Carter, but to himself. The men of the 107th were not Nazi spies. His friend were not secretly deceiving him. They were good, honest men, and he'd been right to stand up for them in front of the brass. But how the hell had a Nazi spy gotten in with the 9th? He must've been undercover a hell of a long time. No wonder Phillips wanted him stopped. He could've been gathering intel since the moment America entered the war.
A small movement in the canyon below was his only warning. He dropped to the ground a split second before the loud bang of a service pistol being fired shattered the stillness of the morning air. Behind him, Jones and Hawkins dropped too, grunting to expel the air from their lungs as they hit the deck. Bucky reached for his radio inside his jacket's inner pocket. Much as he wanted to be the one to take a second shot at Rutter, he didn't want to compromise the mission for his own personal desire, and his team were momentarily pinned down.
"He's here," Bucky said, transmitting to all teams. He pulled out his compass. "Just south of my location, in a canyon." Not that anybody knew where his location was; he'd lost visual contact with the other teams an hour ago, though he had glimpsed Tex's team briefly.
"Already en route," Wells reported. "We heard the gunshot. Do you need medical?"
"No, we're fine. But we're pinned down." He crawled forward and lifted his head, and was rewarded with the loud BANG of another shot echoing around the canyon, so that it sounded like several shots. Nearby, the ground went plink! and loose stone chippings went flying. He quickly retreated. "Yep, definitely pinned down. If a couple of other teams could circle around, that would be great."
All the other teams replied to confirm they were converging. How long that would take was anyone's guess.
"Did we bring any grenades?" Bucky asked the other two in his team.
Hawkins shook his head, whilst Jones asked, "Didn't the colonel want him in one piece?"
"Yeah, but we could'a used a grenade as a diversion. Guess it doesn't matter if we didn't bring any." Next time he was sent on a mission, he would take grenades, even if the mission didn't call for them. And maybe a whole damn boxful of Stark's 'toys', too.
A volley of gunfire made him jump. For a moment, the telltale bangs of multiple M1s being fired, and the returning bang of a pistol, were so loud that he couldn't even hear his own ragged breaths. When the shooting stopped, the radio crackled, Robertson's Texan twang reporting in.
"Corporal Scott's been hit in the arm. It's not life-threatening, but he's losing blood."
Shit. "Alright Tex, Carrot, get Scott back to camp," Bucky said. He half-expected Weiss to countermand that order. Point out that if it wasn't life-threatening, Scott could go on. But Phillips had put Bucky in command of the mission, albeit in a rather informal, implicit way; maybe Weiss didn't want to rock the boat in the middle of a mission. Maybe he was waiting to see if Bucky could find a balance between being a good man and a good sergeant. "Did you get a shot at the guy with your SSR-01, Tex?"
"Naw, Carrot and Scott were laying down cover fire for me to try, but Scott took a bullet before ah could get him in my sights. We'll make sure Scott gets back safe, Sarge."
"And if you wanna put an extra bullet in him just for me," Scott panted over the radio, "feel free."
"We'll see you back at camp. Everyone else, proceed with caution. We might not be shooting to kill, but our target is."
The good man in him decided he would send back any man who got hit, regardless of how badly he was hurt. The good sergeant in him had been counting how many shots Rutter fired. Two at Bucky, and at least one at Scott. Rutter would run out of ammo before Bucky ran out of men.
A couple of dozen metres to Bucky's west, Wells' team arrived. Wells and Franklin were carrying their M1s, and Hodge the SSR-01 he'd had for the past couple of days. They all hit the deck, crawling forward on a line with Bucky's team, a short distance from the rise above the canyon. At this range, they didn't need radios.
"On three?" Wells asked. Bucky nodded, and waited for his fellow sergeant to count down. "Three, two, one."
The teams advanced together, cresting the hill and aiming down into the canyon. Bucky kept his SSR-01 low, giving himself a wider field of vision until he caught movement… but there was no movement. Rutter wasn't in the canyon any longer.
"Damn," Bucky growled. He held the radio up to his mouth. "We lost sight of the target. Anybody seen him?"
Everybody confirmed back that no, they hadn't seen him.
"Y'know," Wells sighed, "I'm getting damn tired of this guy."
"Who would'a thought a single Nazi could cause so much trouble?" asked Hawkins.
A wry smile tugged at Bucky's lips. "Let's hope our spies are causing as much trouble for them."
Wells nodded at the path through the canyon. "You wanna take the low road? We can go high, cover you."
"Yeah, okay. But be careful; you'll be sitting ducks up there."
"Unless he's already gone high. In which case you'll be sitting ducks in that canyon."
The smile on Bucky's lips turned grim. "C'mon little ducks," he said to Hawkins and Jones. "Let's get back on the trail."
He wanted to make his aching limbs move faster, to jog, or run, to decrease the distance between themselves and their target, but he forced himself to walk, to proceed with caution. Basic training beaten into him—almost literally—at boot camp came tumbling back into his mind. Mantras designed to help keep troops alive were barked at him by the memories of uptight drill sergeants. Of course, none of those drill sergeants had ever chased a Nazi spy through a dry, hilly landscape in southern France. Did the rules of boot camp even apply, here?
"Sarge, we got him!" Gusty's voice bubbled with excitement. "Mex just shot him, a few hundred metres east of us."
Bucky stopped and pulled out his map. "What's your location?" Gusty gave him the co-ordinates, and a thread of unease wormed its way through Bucky's stomach. "Be careful, Gusty," he said. "Remember, he's still got bullets in that gun, and a knife. Don't get close enough that he can shoot you. Wait until I get there before advancing."
"Right, Sarge."
He finally let himself run. The position Gusty had given him was just half a klick away, over another hilly ridge. No point walking, now. Their target was down; all they had to do was find a way to disarm him, and hope he didn't have a cyanide capsule in his jaw. Hope that he wouldn't put the muzzle of that pistol against his own head to stop himself being taken prisoner.
Bucky stepped up his pace.
His team and Wells' reached the location at the same time, and the first thing Bucky saw was Gusty's team and Weiss' team standing around a downed figure. Irritation bubbled within him; he'd told them not to get close. To wait until he arrived. Had Weiss countermanded that order? Instructed them to advance in Bucky's absence?
Mex turned to face him as he approached, his face lined with guilt and regret, his brown eyes devoid of all trace of his usual cheeky humour. "I'm sorry, Sarge." Bucky's eyes went immediately to the downed man. The pistol had fallen from his grip, and his eyes were closed in eternal sleep. A large patch of red was spreading from the centre of his chest. "I aimed for his leg, but my aim must've been off."
A snort from behind turned out to be Hodge, rolling his eyes. "I could'a made that shot."
Bucky hit Hodge with the sharpest glare of rebuke he could manage. He hadn't defended Hodge's shortcomings from Agent Carter just so the guy could lord it over somebody else's mistake. Hodge wilted under the glare.
"I mean, uh… maybe."
Weiss nudged the Rutter's leg with his boot, perhaps to make doubly sure he was dead. Then, he turned to Bucky, his grey eyes betraying nothing.
"Hope his lung was pierced, and he drowned in his own blood. You wanna bury him, or take him back?"
Bucky glanced to Agent Carter, but she merely watched him, and the rest of the men, as if assessing them. For a brief moment, he hated her for being so calm, so unperturbed, for making it all look so easy. Did nothing affect the damn woman?
"Take him back." How the hell were they going to carry the guy? "You think you can find some way for us to get him back to camp?"
Weiss shrugged. "Sure. I brought rope, I can rig up something I learnt the last time I was fightin' Germans. Though, you might wanna send a runner back to deliver the news to the colonels. If we're gonna hump this guy back to camp, he's gonna drip a trail of blood along the way. It'll lead anybody who picks it up straight to us. Brass might wanna move the camp real soon."
Bucky glanced to Wells, who nodded. "We'll go. By the time you get back, we'll be ready to move."
"I'll go with you," Agent Carter said, as she shouldered her SSR-01. Somehow, Wells managed to look completely magnanimous about that.
"I really am sorry, Sarge," said Mex, once Carter and company had departed.
Bucky gave him a hearty pat on the shoulder. "Don't worry about it, Hernandez. Bringing him back alive was preferred, but Phillips gave the go-ahead to take him out, if necessary. The important thing is, we stopped him."
And hopefully, this would put an end to Nazi spies in their camp.
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The medics took the body away for autopsy as soon as Bucky's team got back to camp. Most of the tents had been dismantled already, but Phillips wanted the autopsy done and the body in the ground before moving on. Bucky didn't need to report on how the mission had gone; Carter had already done that. All that was left was to hand over his SSR-01. Stark still didn't trust him entirely with this second rifle.
"Sir, what's going to happen to Nurse Green? I mean, Astrid Bergmann, or whatever her name really is," he asked Phillips, as the man oversaw the packing up of the command tent.
"It's too dangerous to take her with us," said Phillips. His cool gaze scanned the men packing up the camp as if trying to read their thoughts and make sure none of them were additional Germans spies. "And she'd be an unnecessary drain on resources."
Bucky's stomach lurched. Shooting a HYDRA soldier was one thing; those guys were cyanide-happy. They were also men. Granted, Nurse Green had tried to kill him… twice… but she was still a dame. Bucky's dad would be furious if Bucky had to kill a dame like that.
"We'll leave her in the care of one of our allies in the area," Phillips finished.
His stomach stopped lurching. "You mean the Maquis?" Those grey eyes snapped sharply to Bucky's face, a scowl already forming across the colonel's brow. "Stark said this is prime territory for the French Resistance. Come on, Colonel, after everything I've been through, you know you can trust me."
"Report to the hospital tent and have them check you over. I don't want to see you again until you've been declared fit for duty and had a second opinion to confirm it."
Bucky nearly groaned aloud. He should'a known not to push the colonel. Now, he was being punished.
"But sir, I'm fine—"
The colonel snorted so loudly that two nearby privates jumped at the noise. "Son, you look like hell. And I know what hell looks like; I've been there myself. After everything you've been through I want you to get some rest and make sure you're fit for duty. That's an order, Sergeant. I'll have you escorted to the medical tent, if necessary."
"That won't be necessary, sir. I'll go there right away."
"Good. Dismissed."
He saluted and left. At the hospital, the autopsy was well underway at the back of the tent. Nurse Klein directed Bucky to one of the furthest beds, so he didn't have to listen to the squishy, slicey, fleshy noises coming from the other side of the tent. The nurse disappeared whilst he settled himself comfortably and waiting to be poked and prodded and groped. When she returned, she was carrying a tray of cookies and a glass of milk.
"I did say I'd put some aside for you, for when you were up to solid foods," she said, when he aimed a questioning glance at her.
He grinned. "Nurse Klein, you're the best. And you always were my favourite nurse."
She blushed. "Oh shush! Eat your cookies while I check you over."
Before she could start poking around in his mouth, he grabbed a cookie and took a huge bite, savouring the delicious crunchy sweetness. A couple of other nurses came in and began tidying things away ready for the move. One of them had a very nice figure, and twinkling green eyes.
"Who's that nurse?" Bucky asked Nurse Klein, nodding at the young woman in question.
"Oh, Nurse Sanders. But I think she's a little sweet on Sergeant Wells."
Just damn typical. "Sergeant Wells is going to marry Agent Carter," he said very seriously. "He tells me so every day."
"I doubt that very much," Nurse Klein said, a girlish giggle escaping her lips. "Rumour has it Agent Carter already has a man waiting for her."
"You don't know for sure?"
"Agent Carter is a very private person," Nurse Klein informed him. "She very rarely talks about her personal life."
"Is it the guy from whatever project she was working on previously, before coming to France?"
"Oh, I don't know about that. All I've heard about is his name: Steven."
"Huh." Quite a coincidence. But it was a pretty popular name. "My best pal back home's called Steven. It's a shame he's not here; I reckon he'd be right up Carter's street." Of course, the idea of Steve even talking to Agent Carter was completely crazy. He still got tongue-tied in the presence of pretty ones, and Carter was more than pretty.
"Do you miss your friend?"
"Every damn day. Pardon my French."
She gave him a sympathetic smile. Her face became much prettier, when she smiled. "I'm sure he misses you, too. Now, eat that cookie then drink up your milk. Colonel says to give you a full checkup, so you know what's coming next."
He sighed. It really was true that dames gave him nice things right before doing unpleasant things to him.
"Sure," he said. "But could you do me a favour? Warm up your hands, first."