We Happy Few | Band of Brothers

Chapter 35: Everything in Stride

Easy was on the move again, but if anyone thought they were heading somewhere warmer or maybe just even a little bit less miserable, they were sadly mistaken. Easy Company had done such a good job at holding the line that they were called upon to help hold the Bulge and clear the Bois Jacques, the woods outside of Foy, in preparation for the eventual assault on Foy itself.

The journey through the forest was long, and even though there were a few German machine gun attacks, there was relatively little resistance. The most action anyone saw that day was when Hoobler ran into a German officer on horseback. After a rather impressive headshot on Hoobler's side, the Easy Paratrooper finally had that Luger he had been looking all over Europe for. 

As the company dug in, Hoobler moved from foxhole to foxhole, showing off his prized possession like a kid on Christmas morning. Compton was doing much of the same, but he wasn't showing off something he had, he was looking for something he had lost—or more accurately, someone he had lost. Like always, Lieutenant Dike was nowhere to be found.

Stabbing the sharp, pointed end of her shovel into the frozen ground, Margot inhaled before using what little strength she had left to dig up as much dirt as she could. Annie was beside her, digging away as well. If there was one thing that either woman—or hell, any of the men—could go without ever having to do again, it would be digging foxholes. 

"How's your side doing?" Annie asked as she straightened up, wincing at how sore her back was getting. "Does it still hurt sometimes?"

Margot speared the ground with her shovel and took a seat on the edge of the hole. "Every once in a while it's a little tender, but it's still all closed up. The scar leaves much to be desired but hey, at least I'm not dead, right?"

"Right." Annie sighed. She wanted to ask Margot how she was holding up ever since Joe Toye got hit in the back with shrapnel and was pulled off the front lines, but she had no idea how to even pose that sort of question. Annie could see the two had grown close since Normandy, but she didn't know much more than that. Maybe they were good friends, maybe they were more. 

"What about you?" Margot flipped the question on her friend. "You doing okay?"

Annie forced a smile as she kicked at some of the loose dirt with the toe of her boot. "Yeah, of course, I'm doing fine. You know me. I'm always fine."

"Mmhmm," Margot hummed in response, not sure if she believed the medic or not. "Well, if you ever need-"

A single gunshot rang out, cutting off Margot's sentence and sending the company into a state of panic. In the blink of an eye, the half-dug foxholes were filled with men, everyone taking cover from what was assumed to be another German attack. 

Margot and Annie threw themselves into their hole, not even caring about the pain they felt when their weak, stiff bodies collided with the frozen earth.  "Does anybody know where that came from?" Margot called out as she swung her rifle off of her back and poked her head up from the hole in the ground.

There was no direct answer, instead just more questions and theories. Some thought it was a sniper but Shifty shut that down by saying that the gunshot did not sound like any sniper he knew of. Then, the answer was made clear.

"Ah, Jesus, it's Hoob, he's shot!" someone called in the distance, the snow and fog making it too hard for Margot to tell who it was.

"Sniper?" Buck asked.

The man in the distance shook his head. "No, no, he shot himself."

"Medic!" Perconte called, and just like that, Annie was up and out of her foxhole. 

The blonde girl was already digging into her bag for sulfa and bandages as she darted through the snow and trees, and by the time she reached the scene, Hoobler was surrounded by men on every side. "Move!" she ordered, pushing past Lipton.