#carentan

"Already?" I nodded, already making myself as comfortable as possible. McGrath mumbled a complaint and climbed out, shoving his helmet back on.

Luz, who I had most likely been shaken out of a light sleep with my irruption, gave me a wary up-and-down. "What the hell are you doing here?"

That made my brows draw. "What?"

"She probably got stitched up and busted out the aid station." Joe replied, as if I was not sitting right across from him.

"I didn't bust out." My tone, although low, denoted irritation, which was what Joe was aiming for by the satisfied smirk pulling at the corner of his lips. "I just left. Doc gave me the green light."

George's eyes squinted in the dark, searching my profile. "I was half-expecting them to pull you back after that stunt in Carentan."

"Why would they?" sigh. "I can shoot, I can fight, I can run. They're not gonna pull me back for a little shrapnel on my face." I tugged off my own helmet and let it drop with a dull thud before running a hand through my wet hair, slicking it back. "This damn rain."

Joe turned his head to watch me, his tone sarcastic when he quipped, "Thought you liked the rain."

I huffed, locating my rifle strategically for it not to get soaked. "I also like sleeping in a bed, but here we are."

The soil had turned to slush, the rain making sure we felt every inch of our fatigues sticking to our bodies like a second skin. By how unbothered the two men seemed despite the droplets plastering their hair to their skulls, I figured they had given up on caring.

"Ah, fuck." Luz grimaced, staring at his wristwatch.

"What now?" Joe's annoyance was a telltale sign that George had done his fair share of complaining already.

"My watch starts in three hours." The Portuguese clicked his tongue. "Can't a guy get some sleep without a pretty girl dropping beside him?"

"Oh, God." Joe groaned, tilting his head back against the compacted dirt.

George's cheeky grin earned him a light smack on the back of his neck from me. "Go to sleep then."

"Yes, ma'am."

Joe shook his head at our friend's demeanor but refrained himself from speaking up.

George, to his credit, did as he was told and soon enough, he was out cold, his head slumped over my shoulder as his breathing evened out.

Joe and I sat in the quiet, only filled by the soft ricocheting of the water. It was almost eery —the lack of gunfire, mortars and tracers.

"Anything happen while I was on watch?" I whispered in an attempt to break through the unusual silence.

Joe exhaled. "Talbert got stabbed."

"What?"

"Smith got spooked. Talbert was wearing that Kraut poncho—" he rubbed a hand over his face. That damn poncho. "guess it looked wrong in the dark. Smith panicked and stuck him with his bayonet."

My fingers tapped on my thigh in a quick, anxious rhythm. "Is he—?"

"Doc got to him." He waved his hand as a dismissal. "He'll be alright."

I let out a slow breath. We sat with that for a second before I glanced at him again. "You hear anything about Tipper?"

Joe shrugged, jaw tight. "Nothing."

I swallowed. My throat felt dry despite the humidity. "He'll be okay." The words left my mouth without permission.

Joe nodded, his attention fixed on his restless hands. I didn't mention I hadn't seen Tipper at the aid station. Joe didn't ask, either.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

A deafening whistle, a white-hot flash, a crack of thunder that didn't come from the sky breaking through the roof. The blast swallowed the world whole.

Look away. An instinct-driven thought.

The pressure slammed into me nonetheless, flinging me back, out the door I had barely set a foot across, dragging something sharp across my skin.

I made a sound—something strangled that didn't reach anyone's ears over the constant gunfire. Not mine, not Tipper's. My hands were on my face before I even thought to move them, warm and slick.

Blood.

My blood.

My fingertips trembled against my cheek, my jaw, my throat.

Not fatal. It couldn't be. Yet the word medic teared harshly at my throat.

I barely had time to register the pain; the sensation of hot shrapnel gnawing through my profile, digging deeper into the flesh with every move of my jaw, before the ringing in my ears cleared just enough to hear it.

"TIP?!"

Joe's voice, sharp and loud. They must have seen the shell diving into the building Tipper had cleared. They must have heard me yelling for medical aid.

"Tipper!! Answer me, Tip!"

I caught a glimpse of Joe and Strohl rounding the corner, feet scraping the gravel in the streets. They both stood frozen in front of the doorway, too shocked pay any attention to me.

I saw why.

Tipper dragged himself out the dim ruin of the building, silhouetted against dust and rubble. His leg —or what was left of it— was soaked through with red, his foot unrecognizable despite him still planting it. One side of his face was a nasty mix of blood and debris, his eye —Jesus Christ, his eye—

I stopped breathing, the crimson dripping down my face momentarily forgotten.

Joe was the first to move. He dropped his rifle against better judgement and stepped forward. Slow. Careful. Bullets were still cutting through the air all around us, but at Tipper's broken mumble calling Joe's name, his voice slipped into something soft. Too soft for a battlefield.

"Lookin' real good, Tip," he murmured. "Alright, you gotta sit down, c'mon."

Tipper barely reacted, too dazed, too wrecked. Too scared. Joe caught him anyway, guiding him down like he was handling fine porcelain. He forced his hands to be steady, to be gentle, trying not to hurt the battered man further.

"Y/l/n— Jesus..." It took Strohl's panicked grip on my shoulders for me to snap out of it. "Where—" His digits, hasty, pressed on my cheek first, then my forehead; they stayed on neck, drawing a pained breath out of me. They were cold compared to the liquid soaking my face.

Soaking Tipper's uniform.

God.

"We gotta move 'em, Lieb!"

For a brief second, Joe looked at me. Just a flicker of movement darting to my face, now smeared in hot blood.

I wouldn't have known the sight he met with, but he looked away just as quickly.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

More silence.

A part of me wondered if it was just the battlefield's call for sound discipline, or if our dynamic had somehow shifted irreversibly after landing in Normandy.

An exhausted puff of air. My palm rubbing the water off my eyes. Joe's knife tracing pattern into the dirt.

I glanced over my shoulder at the treeline. Just dark shapes against darker shadows; nothing moving, nothing out of place.

When I turned back, Joe was staring. His eyes dragged over my face, lingering too long at my cheek, my jaw, my neck. My skin prickled.

I didn't have the chance to call him out on it. "It's not that bad."

He got a huff as a response. My mind fished for a smart remark, but I wasn't able to find anything that matched his comment.

Joe tilted his chin up. "Does it hurt?"

"The stitches pull when I laugh."

He snorted, just barely audible over the steady drum of rain. "Then it's a good thing I ain't funny."

My lips parted, but no quips came out, just a careful half smile. Joe didn't mirror the gesture, his narrowed stare tracing the small ridges of stitches. My fingers twitched around my rifle.

"Not that bad." He muttered again, more to himself.

"Not that bad." I echoed even quieter. There wasn't much more to say on my part, yet the silence was begging to be broken.

"I thought you got your face blown off."

I blinked, thrown off by his frankness.

Say something.

"Disappointed?"

Wrong something.

"It's not fucking funny." Joe hissed, shoulders squared up. "You didn't see it. It looked..."

His face subconsciously pulled into a grimace at the mere memory of it, bringing back to my mind the way he had averted his eyes.

I didn't even try to stop myself, the words spilling bitter, pointed and accusatory. "Is that why you wouldn't look at me?"

"What?"

"'Cause you were disgusted?"

Joe's expression twitched, caught between irritation and offense. "Jesus, give me a fuckin' break, alright?"

"No, you give me a break."

"I was busy." The phrase cut its way out like it was meant to be shouted instead of hushed. "Kinda had a guy missing half his goddamn leg in front of me." He leaned forward, forearms draped on his knees. "So excuse me if I didn't have time to worry about your" His wrist flicked, vaguely gesturing at me. "little scratches."

"Don't make it sound like—"

"Like what?"

I narrowed my eyes, mentally taking a step back. We can't do this here. "Tell you what, you're so full of shit."

His mouth twitched like he wanted to argue; instead, he just turned his head away with a moue. The conversation had hit a dead end, but I didn't miss the way his fingers tapped rapidly against his knee.

Maybe that was his way of restraining the verbal retaliation which had become second nature between us at that point in time.

I shifted against the damp earth ever so slightly.

Luz mumbled something in his sleep, head heavy against my shoulder.