“I found the PPSH, but nothing else.”

“We’ll continue on then,” Lukas breaks cover and jogs the hallway, stepping over the first body and then the others. “You’re a bold bastard, Graeber.”

Emil is second. “You just wanted to get your blade wet.”

Graeber’s bayonet is as dry as it was when he first attached it. He groans before replying. “I’ll be with you a moment. I’m taking this gun and looking for ammo.”

“3 minutes,” Lukas warns. “3 minutes before we come back from you.”

“That’s nothing,” Graeber comments. “I’ll get out here soon.”

When Lukas and Emil are out of earshot, Graeber looks back at the Russian girl. “Don’t you know who I am?”

Terrified, she shakes her head, so he sighs. “I let you free a few days ago.”

She blinks. “You’re… still alive!?”

“Yes!” He shouts. “I’m amazed your little army buddies let you back in without question or that none of my guys found and killed you!!”

The girl smiles slightly. “I’m very fortunate that it’s you again. I’m not sure if your friends would have…” she looks at the body behind Graeber and frowns deeply.

“I shot the shit out of the first guy, and I threw the grenade in here. What was in this room?” Graeber hasn’t let his guard down, and he doesn’t trust the girl completely.

“Radio, uhm, communications, mostly. Some storage.” She replies. “Now everything is ruined.”

“I don’t feel bad,” Graeber says. “You should have…” he trails off.

“Should have what? Surrendered to be **** by you invaders or been blown up by your grenade?”

“Shut up!” Graeber shouts, raising his rifle. He could shoot her and get this over with, but some moral compass is telling him not to. She’s unarmed and practically harmless.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “I should be thankful you’ve saved and let me go. And a second time in the same week.”

“Small world,” Graeber coins.

“What now?”

“I should take you as a prisoner,” he thinks. “But, I know there’s an SS unit coming in, so they’ll probably **** you or something else horrible. Honestly, I don’t know what to do with you.”

“You can let me go again,” she suggests.

“Our machine gunners will kill you, or our riflemen will,” Graeber reminds her. “If neither of those, then a bomb will tear you to shreds, or one of your own will kill you for running away.”

The girl frowns, holding her hands. “I get it.”

It was likely for Graeber and the rest of his platoon to stop here for the night. The SS would probably use a few extra Wehrmacht hands to help the mess. With the SS, it was probable that a newsreel team would be with them, filming how busy and hardworking they were.

The girl nods. “Good idea?”

“No,” he says bluntly. “But stay in here. As soon as I’m able to, I’ll come back in. STAY. HERE. OKAY?”

She says nothing but looks at the dead body. He sighs and shrugs. “Sorry your pals had to die.”

The girl looks at the body almost longingly. “At least it was quick…”

Graeber picks up the PSSH and reverses into the hallway. “Play dead or something. I’ll be back before tomorrow.”

She nods, tucking herself closer to the corner of the battle-torn office.

Somehow, Graeber and friends manage to escape the rest of the battle without getting shot or injured, and as Graeber had predicted, the SS divisions and they are adored by a news team with cameras.

Schnieder joins the circle of men that has Graeber, Emil, Felix, and the rest of the platoon. Even Felix, the most pro-Nazi of the group, seemed to take offense from the shower of praise. Graeber is one of many who watches with distaste.

“We take the factory, and they get the praise?” He spits, rubbing his hands together. “What is this?”

Schnieder sucks in on a cigarette, his eyes heavy with weariness. “Well, they can get all the pictures and praise they want if we get to hunker down here for the rest of the day.”

Suddenly, Graeber remembers the Russian girl. He puts on a face before looking down. How was he going to keep her hidden from not just his own people but also the SS? While his mind ran through all the possibilities, the others around chatted.

“So, that’s the plan then?” Emil chews on a wurst, his eyes fixed on the SS in the streets, posing and answering questions.

“You guys have earned yourselves some rest. I’ll– uh, we’ll work something out with our reinforcements. We’ve steamed ahead of the regular infantry and will have to wait to get resupplied,” Schnieder says this, but no one has the energy to cheer. “We can bury the dead and work out sentry duty in the meantime.”

Felix adjusts himself. “We should keep moving,” earning himself a few displeased groans from the others.

“Oh, what is this?” Felix looks at the others. “We ought to press the advantage while we’re still awake.”

The man speaks as though his own eyes aren’t weighed down by bags the size of bricks. Emil spits. “Where is it?”

Felix regards Emil with confusion as they meet each other’s gaze. “Where’s what?”

“The Pervitin,” Emil deadpans. “Because only a man on Pervitin would have the energy only to sleep 3 hours a night, march all day, and then want to continue that process after fighting for 30 minutes for a FUCKING FACTORY.”

“I’m not using that!” Felix stands up, red-faced and flaring.

Before things can become physical, however, Schnieder shouts. “Are you both idiots? If you act like this while there’s a camera crew nearby, everyone will believe that it’s them winning us the war!”

Lukas sighs, rubbing the tiredness from his face. “Let’s just follow the orders and get this day behind us.”

“Everyone, sweep the factory. Be wary of the Russians; there still might be leftovers in there, for all we know. These rats tend to be everywhere when they migrate to a building,” Schnieder finishes. Felix shoots Emil a dirty look, but no others words are exchanged between the veteran and the young soldier.

…The night has started to turn dark blue when Graeber had enough time set aside to check on the Russian. It felt like he had spent most of his time keeping everyone else away from the office, but he never went inside to check if she was still in there or not…He has a can of what he thinks are peaches but can’t confirm what it says; their translator was killed during the engagement.