Then And Back Again

[F2d5thCav]

The muzzle flash from the shot immediately drew fire from the Germans crossing the creek and coming up Harold's side of the valley.  The area around his foxhole was hit several times and tracer projectiles gently arced before impacting nearby.  By now, Harold was fixated on a single thought.

RUN

Amidst the slugs impacting the soil and flying by, Harold sprung out of his hole and began running.  The darkness helped him, as did the first hesitant return fire from stunned American troops higher on the ridge.  A GI manning an automatic rifle walked his fire into the Germans and was almost immediately suppressed by return fire from machine guns.  A crazy quilt of tracer fire covered the rise leading to the American defense line, most of it from the German side.  Running in sprints and then halting for a moment, Harold attempted to keep distance from the tracer streams.  The impact of other slugs with no tracers punched up his fear.  Just then, he heard a sound like a windbreaker's zipper being rapidly opened, followed by a sharp blast and a blossom of orangey-yellow fire.  German mortars were working the American line.

Taking off to an area that wasn't under fire, Harold entered a draw and followed it for a while before climbing a spur, descending, and then doing the same thing several times.  The sounds of the battle were growing more distant and now only small arms fire could be heard.  He only stopped long enough to catch his breath, and then plunged forward into the woods again -- down into the draws and up over the spurs.

Consumed by fear, Harold only wanted to reach an area where he wasn't being shot at and at which other American soldiers could be found.  He was steadily feeling colder, and with heavy heart, realized he had left his pack behind.  This meant he had no rations.  Pausing for a bit longer, he drank a swig of water from his canteen with trembling hands.  The shooting from which he had ran had stopped, but he had no firm idea of how to return to where his platoon had been, and furthermore had no desire to go back that way.  By now, the sky was lightening in color but the thick clouds kept the early morning dark.

What now?

This was not a situation for which the military had trained him.  He was all alone, lost, and in proximity to enemy forces.  Harold was a country boy who, in a firmer mental state, could have perhaps oriented himself and survived long enough to find friendly troops.  But in his fearful state, he latched onto the first indication of other people that he heard: a distant rumbling of motors.

As it turned out, the sound was not so far away as he had first thought.  The contours of the terrain and the dense woods had muffled the noise, so after coming out of the draw he was in and crossing a lightly wooded plateau, Harold descended a thickly wooded ridge.  He worked his way down through the trees towards the sound of the motors, glimpsing a road at the bottom, a road that twisted through a tight valley.  The road was occupied by a column of walking soldiers with what looked like jeeps.  As Harold reached a berm with a good view over the road, he stopped.  With a sinking heart and rising horror, it dawned on him that the soldiers were Germans.  Mixed among the sound of marching boots, he could hear bits of conversation ... conversation in a language he did not understand.

Sinking to one knee, something snapped within him.  Cold, hunger, and terror had done their work.  Harold could see no way out.  He closed his eyes and began softly praying.  Gripped by fear, he began shaking, slowly at first, and then more violently.  He knew only that his eyes were tightly shut and that his heart was loudly pounding.  Pounding, pounding, then ...

What's that?

A sharp, wrenching pain in his chest.

Can't breathe ...

Still clutching his rifle in his right hand, he lost consciousness and sagged to his left.  A mature spruce caught him, and almost gently held him among its boughs and branches.  His final sensation was of the damp needles of the spruce caressing his cheek.  And with that, Harold slipped away from this world, dead of a heart attack at the age of nineteen.

~ ☼ ~