The Spirit of the Corps » Band of Brothers

102: Not A Single Purer Soul

"The docs say he's gonna be in the hospital for a while," Floyd replied, running a hand across his eyes. "But, yeah, he should make a full recovery."

Charlie sat down at one of the tables and sighed, resting her cheek in her hand. "That's awful luck," she said.

"At least he's alive," Mabs offered. She turned back to where she'd been cleaning equipment.

"Yeah," Floyd said quietly. He was looking at Charlie like he wanted to say something else, but the instant he opened his mouth he closed it again and shook his head. "Well, I gotta be getting back. Just came by to deliver the news."

Charlie nodded while Mabs hummed her acknowledgement of the fact.

"We've got weapons training again after dinner but I'll come see you after," Floyd said next. He smiled when Charlie seemed to brighten just a little bit.

"Okay," she agreed. Pushing herself to her feet, she forced a smile and crossed the room to Floyd before pressing a quick, soft kiss to his lips. "Have fun," she said, smiling for real this time when he grinned at her stupidly. It was fascinating what a kiss could do to him.

"Will do," he said. With that, he disappeared back up the stairs, off to go and help train some rookie paratroopers.

It was only a couple of hours later, when Charlie was sorting through some of the new replacements' paperwork, that they got their second lot of bad news of the day.

"Charlie!" someone yelled down the stairs. "You gotta come now!"

There wasn't time for the question of why to pop into her head. Before she'd even properly registered what was happening, Charlie had dropped the papers and vaulted up the stairs, and a second later she was jumping into a jeep with the orderly who'd called for her.

The driver drove them to one of the checkpoints outside of town where the road had been closed off. Even from a distance she could see the steaming wreck of a car accident. Her first thought was of Shifty but her second dismissed this theory; Floyd had said Shifty was already in the hospital in France. This was a new wreck.

The jeep skidded to a stop and Charlie jumped out. Her eyes found Webster, standing dumbfounded as he spoke to a German officer wearing a raincoat.

"It's Janovec," Webster informed her as she ran up to him.

Her heart dropped. She curled her hands into fists at her sides, digging her nails deep into her palms, forcing herself to focus on her job. "Where is he?"

"Still in the jeep," Webster hurried to explain. "No one wanted to move him before -"

Charlie didn't linger to hear his explanation. Instead, she rushed past him and towards the site of the accident, where the jeep was crumpled alongside a troop transport in a ditch on the side of the road.

"Janovec!" Charlie called as she climbed down into the ditch. "Get a surgeon!" she called back to Webster, who sent the orderly off again.

The jeep was sideways in the ditch, its passenger side door to the floor, with Janovec face down and the driver crumpled on top of him. The driver of the troop transport had gotten out unscathed, it seemed, as he began shouting to Charlie about how one of the barrels had fallen off of the back of the truck and into the road.

Charlie ignored him.

"Janovec!" she called again. She found as secure footing as she was likely to get and wrenched the driver's shoulder back. His face was pale, his eyes wide open and unseeing, and she knew in a moment that he was dead.

A terrible, tingling cold filled Charlie's stomach as she attempted to haul the driver out of the way to get to Janovec.

"Help me get him up!" she shouted back to Webster and the German officer. Both of them came running to help her lift the driver up and out of the ditch.