by Mark Tufo
Another two weeks passed before Viktor returned to Joseph’s tent.
“It's time to go,” he said to Joseph. He immediately turned around and left.
Joseph grabbed his bag, helmet, gun, and more importantly the picture of his wife he kept under his pillow. He followed Viktor to a German truck that had been stolen from a previous operation.
Joseph threw his gear in the truck.
“Do you like it? It was my idea, “a familiar voice called out as he approached the truck.
“Vlad, are you here to see me off?”
Joseph’s face lit up as his good friend Vlad walked up.
“See you off? Always the jokes with you. No man, I’m here to make sure you don’t take another unnecessary bullet to that pretty face of yours.”
“I went over the mission briefing hundreds of times and Viktor didn’t mention anything about a partner. Plus, this is one of the simplest things I’ve ever been assigned.”
“Ah, well I see you’ve lost your touch lately. I mean you did get shot! I’m just here as some added protection. And what? You wanted to go off and finish your final assignment without me? Let me ask you something Joseph. How many times have I saved your ass?”
“How many more times have I saved yours?” Joseph countered
“Clearly that is beside the point. But I couldn’t let you go off and kill this man alone. This could be our last time spilling blood together. Enough of the chitchat—get in the truck.”
Vladimir threw his equipment in the back and quickly jumped into the driver’s seat before Joseph had a chance. Joseph settled for the passenger seat.
“You two pussies done making out over there? Get the hell out of here already!” Viktor yelled at them as he walked towards his quarters. Joseph laughed and prepared himself for a three to four day drive to Berlin, where the factory and the German man Joseph had grown to hate were.
“So tell me Joseph. How did you manage to take a bullet to your thigh dealing with a MEDICAL caravan?” Vlad asked with a snicker as he drove off towards Berlin.
“Do you want the whole story? Or do you want me to tell you that a German pointed a gun at me and pulled the trigger?”
“Eh, we got time, give me the whole story.”
“That’s the truth. Well, it was Nikolai, that tall stupid man Viktor picked up from some deep part of Siberia and me. We were driving to an interception point on some hill where we would be able to see the medical caravan and its escort at a good vantage point. We got there about an hour early so we could set up. We covered ourselves in brush and pointed a rocket propelled grenade or RPG at the road where the leading escort would have to drive past. Time passed until we could finally see the Germans approaching. They were about 45 minutes late. I lined up a perfect shot and pulled the trigger. The explosion blew up only about a foot in front of the lead truck, lifting the front end and sending it crashing back down, breaking the front axle. With the front truck unable to operate, the caravan and truck behind it had nowhere to go. Germans came pouring out of the two escort trucks like a goddamn clown car to see what caused the explosion. So with stupid ass Nikolai next to me we grabbed our scoped Mosin Nagants and proceeded to slaughter the dirty rats where they stood. Shot after shot I blew men’s heads clear off their shoulders. Fifteen soldiers came rushing out of the trucks and I’d say I killed a good eight of the bastards before they even spotted our position. Once they knew where we were they started spraying us with rounds. I jumped up and ran for our truck. But stupid Nikolai just lay there and got peppered in bullets. He looked like he went through a goddamn meat grinder when they stopped firing at him. They literally severed limbs with all the bullets they put into that poor fool. He was just a pile of blood and chunks of meat afterwards. Lucky for me though he managed to kill about three Germans in his, oh I don’t know, 12 shots fired. He always was a hell of a shot.”
“I never did like that Nikolai guy. It was like talking to a damn rock. But go on.”
“So I was pinned down behind my truck and had four Germans slowly marching up the hill towards me. I had one grenade on me, so I pulled the pin on that bitch and hoped to hell it would get them as I chucked it over my shoulder.”
“No way, you’re trying to tell me you killed four Nazis with one grenade?”
“If you’d quit interrupting me, I’d let you know.”
“Sorry, it’s just I’ve personally seen how bad you are with grenades, but go on.”
“So I threw that bad boy right over my shoulder. It landed a good 30 feet away from them and proceeded to roll down the hill.”
“That’s what I expected to hear,” Vlad said as his face turned into a big smile.
“Yeah, so I lift my head over the bed of the truck to sneak a look at my failure exploding at the bottom of the hill by a tree and got right back under cover again. Then I peaked my head up one more time, popped off a few more shots with my rifle and only managed to pick off one guy with my last few rounds. Now I was out of ammo, grenades, and dumb ass partners. I’ll be honest I panicked a bit, but the second I heard a footstep on the other side of the truck I slapped the bayonet on my rifle, threw my helmet in the truck bed to distract them, sprinted right around the front of my vehicle and threw my bayonet right in the upper shoulder of one of the Germans pretty goddamn hard. As the blade of the bayonet ripped through his shoulder, blood spattered all over my face and torso and he let out a high-pitched screech. I pulled the blade from his shoulder and quickly gave him one smack to his face with the butt of my gun. With one loud cracking sound I know I got him right in the temple. He dropped to his knees, spitting up more than a mouthful of blood and fell to the ground face first. As he hit the ground I swung my bayonet at the next German, who was only just turning to see his brother die. My swing was almost perfect! I nearly sliced his head right off his shoulders! As the skin ripped apart on either side of my blade, blood spurted out on me again. When he hit the ground, he reached for his neck uselessly trying to stop the blood flowing from his wound. But he wasn’t dead yet. I didn’t want a good kill to go to waste so I, being the good man I am, decided to put the scum out of his misery. I lifted up my boot and brought it down as hard as I could on his pathetic whimpering face.”
Joseph smirked in an almost evil way. This really grabbed Vlad’s attention. He looked Joseph right in the eyes with an excited look on his face and said “Details, I need details goddamn it!”
“Well, as my boot crashed through his skull, which you could hear from a mile away, bits of his brain flew onto the truck, my pants, his dead friend next to him, and littered the ground with little pink and red chunks of head residue everywhere. I’ve been picking that man’s thoughts out of my boots ever since,” Joseph said, laughing at his own joke.
“Wait a second, you’re one Nazi and a shot to the leg short in this story,” Vlad said, interrupting Joseph’s laughter.
“Yeah, you’re as surprised as I was. I looked up from the second man to find that the third was nowhere to be seen. I figured he was about 10 feet away, aiming down the sights at me. I set my gun on the ground, ready to die honestly, but then I heard some scuffling in a nearby bush. I immediately knew it was him. Who knew he was going to be terrified out of his mind and out of ammo? So I walked over to the bush and pulled it back to see a young German no more than 18 years old. He was sitting there crying with his eyes closed, rocking back and forth!”
“Please tell me you left the poor kid alone and came back to camp.” Vladmir said sarcastically.
“That’s exactly what happened. After the little bastard accidently shot his gun at me right into my goddamn thigh.”
“Accidently?”
“The kid wasn’t even holding the gun; it must have brushed up against something and went off, right into my leg. I dropped to the ground and lay there right in front of this little bitch in the fetal position.”
“So this kid had at least three opportunities to kill you by now?”
“At least, but after laying
there for a minute or two bleeding, I rocked myself onto my knees, grabbed the kid by his face, pulled him out of the bush and threw him to the ground. I don’t know what happened to me though; I mean I knew I wanted to beat this kid to death with my fists, slowly and painfully. And trust me I know I should have too, but something clicked in my head and I decided to just kick his face in with my good leg instead.”
“God damn morals always get in the way.”
“Tell me about it.”
“So what happened to the medical caravan?”
“Oh yeah, the whole reason I was there. I stumbled down the hill to the medical truck and opened it from the back. I don’t know what the hell the Germans are doing nowadays. I mean I expected when the door swung open to see a ton of medical supplies like syringes, pills, bandages, crutches, and all that good stuff. But instead I open it up to find four Jewish men, who were beaten pretty badly with broken arms and gashes on their legs and chests. I only knew they were Jewish because they had the Star of David on the black and white uniforms they were in. They were just skin and bones. It also seemed like someone tried to dye their eyes blue. I asked them what the hell was going on, but none of them had the strength to speak. Probably didn’t understand me, anyway.”
“What the hell?”
“That’s what I said.”
“So you left them there?”
“I couldn’t bring them all back. I thought they had a disease or something—they looked like the plague had hit them. Plus this wasn’t in my briefing.”
“What did Viktor say when you told him about the Jews?”
“He said he knew the Germans were up to something but that it didn’t seem like that big of a deal. He thought that maybe they were just trying out new chemical warfare on some random Jewish men.”
“That’s weird man. I wonder what the hell they were doing in the back of that truck.”
“Beats the hell out of me.”
After Joseph’s story it grew quiet in the truck for the next few hours. Joseph grabbed the picture of Maria and just looked at it, thinking of all their good times together. Vlad just blankly drove until it was too dark to see in front of the truck. When night fell Vlad pulled over to some old house that was pretty badly damaged. The building must have taken an artillery shell right through the middle of it.
“Ahh…I could call this place home!” Vladimir yelled into the night as he slammed the door to the truck and headed for the old, crumbling house.
“Brilliant. Let's just alert every goddamn Nazi in the area that we’re going to be sleeping here tonight.”
“The more Nazis that I invite to come fight me right now, the less I’ll have to deal with in my future. This isn’t the last mission for everyone, you know.”
“Oh really, you’re going to pull that card now, huh? Maybe if you killed half as many men as I have, old Viktor would be letting you go too.”
Vlad didn’t reply. He was standing on what was left of the doorstep. He knocked on a wall next to where the door would be standing if it still existed, and yelled, “Knock, knock is anyone home?”
“You’re an idiot. I’m honestly surprised you aren’t dead.”
“You and me both,” Vladimir said as he walked over to the burnt remains of a couch.
“I call this couch!” Vlad shouted to Joseph as he jumped onto the decrepit piece of furniture. Joseph continued exploring the other rooms.
“That’s fine by me. I found a fully intact bed in this room!” Joseph shouted back with a grin.
“You lying bastard!” Vladimir yelled, jumping off the couch and running through a coffee table on his way into Joseph’s room. When he got to the entrance of the room he looked around to see Joseph lying on a huge king sized bed. The room was fully intact and was the only place in the house not affected by the bombshell. Vladimir looked around once more and threw up a specific finger to Joseph before leaving.
“Goodnight buddy. I’ll see you in...,”
“Fuck off,” Vlad yelled at Joseph, cutting him off.
“Love you too,” Joseph whispered under his breath before he quickly fell into a deep sleep.
Vladimir walked out to the truck and searched around for a minute or two looking for something. Finally he found it—his bayonet.
“Ahh, Sasha, you didn’t think I’d sleep without you, did you? Come on, let’s go.”
Vladimir’s relationship with his blade was a strange one, but it didn’t bother him, Joseph, or the men he thrust it through. Vladimir returned to the doorstep of the house, but before he entered he heard the crack of a branch in the distance. He looked up in the direction of the noise as adrenaline quickly started to fill his body. Unfortunately it was near to pitch black and he could only see the grass about two or three feet in front of him. He stood there for a few minutes before deciding it was probably just a deer or something. He stepped into the house. Giving Sasha a goodnight kiss before setting her down on the table next to his couch, he lay down and proceeded to fall asleep. After a few hours of sleep, Vlad was awakened by the sound of Germans yelling at him with the barrel of a Gewehr pressed to the back of his head. The moon had taken this opportune time to rise and was shining through the many cracks in the side of the house.
“What the fuck?” Vlad yelled as he quickly put up his hands as if to show he meant no harm. The yelling woke up Joseph in the next room. He got out of bed silently and crept over to the doorway to see what was going on. He saw three Germans surrounding Vlad, guns drawn. Two soldiers grabbed Vlad and hoisted him up off the couch as the third soldier kicked the table out of his way. The bayonet skittered and spun across the dirty floor.
“If you’re going to shoot me, just do it you pussies!” He yelled at the uncomprehending Germans, hands still above his head. Joseph continued to peek around the doorway, a military issue knife in his hand. The knife was so long, it looked like a borderline samurai sword. He stood there waiting for a good opportunity to strike. When he saw the Germans force Vlad to start walking out of the house, he noticed Vlad stopped right within reaching distance of Sasha. Vlad turned around right at that moment to see Joseph in the doorway. The entire time the Germans were screaming at Vlad to keep moving. When Vlad and Joseph locked eyes, Vlad gave a nod, and Joseph darted full speed towards the three soldiers, whose backs were turned towards him. Reaching the soldier closest to him, Joseph lifted up his knife and gave one swift thrust into the back of the soldier’s neck. The long blade went in one side and out the other. The German tried to scream but only managed a bubbly gurgle as Joseph pulled the blade out. Drowning in his blood, the solider collapsed into a bloody heap. The second soldier turned in time to see two blue eyes coming towards him. Before he could react, the soldier felt a sharp intense pain. Joseph had shoved his blade into the meat of this man’s intestines. With shaking hands, the soldier grabbed Joseph’s arm and looked down at the blade. Joseph turned the blade to the left and then quickly to the right, cutting into the man’s intestines and destroying what was left of the man’s dinner. Screams filled the room. The soldier switched his gaze to Joseph’s eyes once more as if to see death itself. Joseph smiled slightly and removed the blade, watching a rush of blood pore out. Blood lust drove Joseph to stab the man several more times until he was far past deceased.
Hearing the screams, the third German spun around, turning away from Vlad. As he did Vlad grabbed his beloved Sasha from the floor and flung it into the ribs of the German who had the gun pressed to his head. Vlad swung the bayonet with so much strength it ripped through skin and muscle like a hot knife through butter and smashed its way through the man’s rib cage. As the blade broke through one of his ribs the man fell to the ground, screaming in agony. Joseph was done with his second kill in time to see Vladimir hop onto the screaming German soldier and beat at his face with his paw like fists. Vlad was in a rage and threw one bone breaking punch after another. Vlad continued relentlessly, even though the man had stopped screaming around five punches in. The sound of the man’s sku
ll cracking mixed with the blood flying around the room was the sign for Joseph to pull Vlad off the man. Joseph looked down at the beaten man and noticed what little remained of his face was nearly level with the floor. The man’s eye sockets were beaten to tiny little slivers of bone and ground into the floorboards and into the back of the man’s’ head. Joseph adjusted his gaze to Vlad, grabbed his arm and pulled Vlad’s fist closer to his face to get a better look. Past the thick layer of blood you could see tiny little bone pieces lodged into his knuckles and fingers. He let go of Vlad’s hand and gave him a grin. Both men burst into laughter. It was a truly sickening scene.
“You literally, I mean literally beat that man’s face into the ground!”
“He shouldn’t have pressed a gun to the back of my head.”
“Ahh that’s funny. But of course you wouldn’t have been able to do that if I didn’t save your ass,” Joseph said as he put his hands on his hips and struck a heroic pose.
“Save my ass? You were in your room sleeping like a princess. I would have been able to deal with the situation.”
“I had to kill two of them!” Joseph yelled.
“All you did was take two thirds of my fun away.”
“Fuck you. You’re welcome,” Joseph said as he threw up two middle fingers and walked back to his room. Vladimir returned to the body of the soldier he brutally killed and removed the bayonet from his ribcage.
“We would have been able to deal with these three, huh Sasha?” Vlad said with a smile on his face as he used the collar of the dead German soldiers jacket to wipe the blood off his bayonet before wiping the blood off his own hands on the soldiers chest. He dragged the dead down the hallway and into an empty pantry. Then he righted the table and set Sasha back down with the same goodnight kiss. He lay back down on the couch to fall asleep, hopefully this time without anything hindering his sleep.