Love You Till The End (Robert Zussman x Reader)

48 - Ronald "Red" Daniels

Morning of December 26, 1944
The Ardennes, Belgium, Luxembourg

"Daniels, wake up."

I jolted up before my eyes were open. As I wiped the sleep from my eyes, I quickly touched the snow-covered ground with my other hand, feelin' for my rifle.

"What's goin' on? Are the Krauts attackin'?"

"Woah, woah, calm down, Corporal. There ain't no Krauts," Aiello said, standin' up from his kneeled position.

"Well, anyone care to tell me why y'all are up before me?" I looked down at my watch to see it was 0624*. I didn't have to be up to start wakin' up soldiers until 0700*.

"L/N appears to be...missing. Zuss woke up and she wasn't next to him, so he's been going around looking for her," Stiles explained.

"What? She's missin'? I think it's too early to start thinkin' that."

"That's what I tried tellin' Zuss, but that boy is whooped." Aiello slightly shook his head. "She probably got up to get coffee or somethin'."

"Aiello, I'd be quiet if I were you," Stiles mumbled, motionin' his head towards Zuss who was comin' towards us. "Zuss isn't looking too great and I swear you're really good at easily getting on his bad side without saying much."

As Zuss walked towards us, he was lookin' down at the ground with his helmet in his hand, bitin' his bottom lip nervously.

"Fuck!" He threw his helmet at the ground as soon as he got near us. It made a loud THUNK! as it hit the frozen ground.

I approached him, but he didn't let me get one word out.

"Don't even think about tellin' me to calm down, Daniels! I checked the whole damn camp and she ain't here!"

"She could be off takin' a leak," Aiello suggested.

"It's been almost half an hour since I woke up to her gone. If that was the case, I think she'd be back by now."

"Hey, maybe she got a bad case of diarrhea."

"Aiello, you're really pissin' me off!" Zuss shot a glance at him.

"It's practically a talent by now," I heard Stiles mumble.

"Alright, enough. Fightin' really isn't gonna help anythin'. You two should know that by now," I said. "Zuss, take a seat. You need to calm d-."

"Fuck no! Our comrade is missing and you guys are lookin' at me like I'm crazy! Daniels, L/N isn't here!"

"Alright, Zuss, I understand why you're worried," I said before turning to the two other men. "Now that I think about it, if none of y'all have seen her since last night and if Zuss checked the whole camp and didn't find her, then I think it's reasonable to be worried now."

"I don't see her as the type to get up and desert us, so I think that option can be left off the table, especially since her stuff is still here," Stiles said. He pointed at her bag, canteen, tin cup, and poncho still near the tree where her and Zuss had slept last night.

"Yeah, I agree with College there," Aiello said.

"What if...what if the Krauts have something to do with this?" Zuss spoke slowly. "What if...they took her?"

"You really think Krauts came walkin' up to our camp and just took her?" Aiello asked. "No fuckin' way, Zuss. We've had men on watch all night, plus Krauts wouldn't care for just one soldier. They know we're closing in on 'em; they'd want to take out as many of us as they could."