Lieutenant Jack Harding hit the ground hard, his parachute tangled in the limbs of a burning orchard outside a village crawling with Nazis.

The impact knocked the air from my lungs. Above me, silk canopy threads melted in the flames, raining hot polymer onto my flight jacket. Pain shot through my left leg—warm blood seeping through my torn pants where flak had shredded the muscle. The parachute harness cut into my shoulders as I dangled half-suspended, the orchard fire spreading rapidly through drought-parched branches.

I fumbled for my combat knife, my fingers clumsy with adrenaline and pain. The German shepherd barks echoing across the darkening countryside told me everything I needed to know—I had minutes, maybe seconds.

My knife finally sliced through the last stubborn strap. I dropped the remaining three feet, unable to stifle a grunt as my injured leg crumpled beneath me. The apple tree above me groaned, branches snapping as the fire consumed it. Burning debris showered around me, igniting the dry grass.

“Shit,” I muttered, rolling away from the spreading flames. Each movement felt like glass shards grinding in my thigh. My B-17 was somewhere north, a smoking ruin. My crew—I pushed the thought away. Later. I’d think about them later.

Smoke filled my lungs, turning each breath into a battle. Using a broken branch as a makeshift cane, I dragged myself toward the tree line. Behind me, my blood left a damning trail in the charred earth.

The fading twilight painted the unfamiliar landscape in deceptive watercolors of blue and purple. The pain in my leg had settled into a steady throb, each heartbeat pushing more blood through my makeshift bandage.

I’d been moving for an hour, maybe two, sticking to irrigation ditches and hedgerows. The map in my survival kit showed I’d landed near Saint-Denis-sur-Vire—deep in occupied territory. My orders had been clear: if shot down, make for the coast. Rendezvous with friendlies at pre-arranged points. Don’t engage. Don’t linger.

Orders written by men sitting behind desks in London who’d never bled on French soil.

A Wehrmacht truck rumbled along the nearby road, its headlights sweeping the darkening fields. I pressed myself flat in a dry irrigation ditch, holding my breath as the vehicle passed twenty yards away. The soldiers inside were laughing, passing cigarettes, oblivious to my presence. Not a search party. Not yet.

When the sound of the engine faded, I continued my halting progress toward the village. Saint-Denis-sur-Vire appeared deceptively serene in the distance—stone cottages with sloped roofs, a church steeple rising above them like a silent sentinel, and surprisingly, red geraniums blooming in a few windows. Signs of normal life persisting under occupation.

I knew better. Behind those quaint facades, people collaborated or resisted. Informed or sheltered. There were no neutral parties in occupied France, only different kinds of survivors.

My vision blurred at the edges, black spots dancing across the rural tableau. Blood loss. Dehydration. I’d gone too long without proper medical attention.

“Keep moving,” I whispered to myself, the words more a rasp than speech.

I’d reached the outskirts of the village when my body finally betrayed me. My good leg buckled, and I collapsed behind a crumbling stone wall, my back against cool limestone. The world tilted, then dimmed.

Just a minute, I told myself. Just one minute to rest.

The sound of footsteps jerked me back to consciousness. I reached for my sidearm, but my arm felt leaden, uncooperative.

A woman stood ten feet away, frozen mid-step. Young—mid-twenties maybe—with dark hair pulled back severely from a face that might have been pretty in peacetime. Her eyes widened, taking in my uniform, my wound, the blood.

I tried to stand, to run, but my body refused to cooperate.

“American,” she said softly, not a question but an assessment. Her accent was unmistakably French, her English precise.

“I’ll be gone by morning,” I managed, though we both knew it was a lie.

She glanced over her shoulder, scanning the empty street, then back at me. Her face hardened with decision.

“You’ll be dead by morning,” she corrected, setting down the satchel she carried. “Or worse.”

She disappeared from view, returning minutes later with a weathered wheelbarrow. The incongruity of it almost made me laugh—rescued by garden equipment.

“This was my father’s,” she said, as if that explained everything. “Can you help me? I cannot lift you alone.”

Using my remaining strength, I half-crawled, half-rolled into the wheelbarrow. She covered me with a tarp that smelled of manure and fresh earth, then carefully arranged her satchel and what felt like kindling on top.

“Be silent,” she whispered. “The bells are tolling curfew.”

The wheelbarrow lurched forward. Each bump sent fresh agony through my leg, but I bit down on my lip until I tasted blood. Above me, muffled by the tarp, I heard the distant peal of church bells counting out the hour. Counting down my chances of survival.

The woman—my rescuer or my captor, I couldn’t yet tell—navigated the streets with practiced calm. Twice we stopped, her casual greetings to passing patrols delivered in flawless German.

“Just firewood, Officer. From my parents’ farm.”

“Yes, curfew, of course. My students’ essays took longer to grade than expected.”

I held my breath during these exchanges, my hand tight around the grip of my pistol. If they discovered me, I wouldn’t go quietly. And I wouldn’t let her face the consequences of my capture.

After what seemed like hours, the wheelbarrow stopped. A door creaked, then closed. The tarp lifted.

“Quickly,” she said. “Inside.”

The cottage was spare but clean—a single main room with a hearth, a table with three mismatched chairs, and a curtained alcove I assumed was her bedroom. She led me to a worn rug, which she pulled back to reveal a trapdoor.

“My father built this during the last war,” she explained, lifting the door to expose a root cellar. “Now, it hides more dangerous things than potatoes.”

I descended awkwardly, favoring my wounded leg. The space was cramped but orderly—shelves of preserved foods, a narrow cot, a chamber pot, and a small oil lamp. The air smelled of earth and onions.

“I am Claire,” she said, following me down with a basin of water and clean cloths. “Claire Marchand. I teach at the village school.”

“Lieutenant Jack Harding,” I replied automatically, then cursed my stupidity. “You shouldn’t know my name.”

“And you shouldn’t be in my cellar,” she countered, removing a bottle of clear liquid from a hidden compartment. “Yet here we are.”

She cut away my blood-soaked pant leg with practiced efficiency. The wound looked worse than I’d hoped—jagged metal had torn through muscle, leaving a furrow of angry red tissue.

“Clean exit,” I noted, focusing on the facts rather than the pain. “No shrapnel inside.”

Claire nodded, uncorking the bottle. “This will hurt,” she warned, then doused the wound with moonshine before I could protest.

Fire exploded across my senses. I bit down on the leather strap she offered, muffling a scream that might have alerted the entire village.

“My brother makes it,” she said, grimly satisfied by the wound’s reaction to the alcohol. “Strong enough to kill infection or start a truck.”

Claire worked methodically, cleaning, stitching, and bandaging with old linens. Her hands were teacher’s hands—ink-stained but steady. I studied her as she worked, trying to gauge her motives.

“Why help me?” I finally asked.

She didn’t look up from her task. “Because the Germans shot my father for helping another pilot. Because my brother fights with the Maquis. Because I am tired of being afraid.”

She tied off the bandage with a precise knot. “Rest. I will bring food when it’s safe.”

Claire climbed the ladder, leaving me in the dimly lit cellar. My training told me to stay awake, to plan, to assess. But blood loss and exhaustion pulled me under, into a fitful sleep haunted by burning planes and screaming men.

I woke to voices—Claire’s and a man’s, tense with suppressed argument. My hand found my pistol as the trapdoor opened. Claire descended first, followed by a lean, hard-faced man in his early thirties. His eyes were Claire’s eyes, suspicious and intelligent, but lacking her compassion.

“Luc,” Claire said, “my brother.”

Luc didn’t waste time on pleasantries. He leveled a battered revolver at my head, his stance screaming military training.

“Identification,” he demanded in accented English.

I reached slowly into my flight jacket, extracting my dog tags and papers. “Lieutenant Jack Harding. 398th Bomb Group, U.S. Army Air Forces.”

Luc examined them without lowering his weapon. “The recognition phrase?” he asked, eyes cold.

I hesitated, searching my memory for the current code. Intelligence updated them weekly, and I’d been briefed just before this mission.

“The blackbird flies at midnight,” I recited, watching his expression.

The gun lowered slightly, but the suspicion remained. “Convenient, an American pilot falling into our laps.”

“Not convenient for me,” I countered, gesturing to my bandaged leg.

Claire moved between us. “He needs time to heal, Luc.”

“We don’t have time,” her brother replied sharply. “The Germans will comb every inch of this area looking for him.”

I pulled myself upright, ignoring the shooting pain. “I’m trained in demolitions, communications, and field operations. I can help you until I’m able to make it to the extraction point.”

Luc’s eyes narrowed, reassessing me. “Demolitions?”

I nodded. “Five years of engineering before the war. Then advanced training with the OSS.”

The calculation played across his face—weighing risk against opportunity. “We’re planning something,” he said finally. “Something that could use your expertise.”

“Luc, he’s injured,” Claire protested.

“And he’s a liability unless we make him useful,” Luc retorted. He turned back to me. “Can you walk?”

I stood, putting weight on my injured leg. It hurt like hell, but it held. “I can do whatever’s necessary.”

Luc nodded, decision made. “We’ll take him to Father Henri tonight. He has medical supplies and can keep him hidden while we make arrangements.”

Father Henri’s sanctuary lay beneath Chapelle Saint-Martin, accessed through ancient catacombs that predated the church itself. Claire and Luc guided me through tight tunnels, the walls occasionally opening into chambers carved from limestone. The air grew damp, heavy with the scent of mildew and wax.

The priest who greeted us was not what I expected. Father Henri Dumas was rail-thin, with intelligent eyes in a gaunt face. His cassock hung from sharp shoulders, but his handshake was firm.

“Lieutenant,” he said softly, “welcome to our humble resistance.”

The chapel’s crypt had been transformed into an operations center. A large wooden table dominated the space, covered with maps and papers. Radio equipment sat in one corner, while wooden crates marked with the Cross of Lorraine lined the walls. I glimpsed rifle barrels and ammunition boxes—this was no symbolic resistance.

“Please, sit,” Father Henri gestured to a bench, offering bread and a cup of dark red wine. “You look like you could use sustenance.”

As I ate, he moved around the room, lighting candles and murmuring Latin prayers. It struck me as incongruous—prayers amidst plans for sabotage and rebellion.

“God’s work takes many forms in dark times,” he said, catching my expression. “Sometimes it requires turning the other cheek. Sometimes it requires driving the money changers from the temple.”

The raid came before dawn.

I’d been moved to the schoolhouse attic—Claire insisted it would be the last place they’d search, with the school itself being so visible. The pain in my leg had subsided to a dull throb, allowing fitful sleep on a makeshift pallet.

The sound of trucks and shouted German orders pulled me from unconsciousness. Through a gap in the roof tiles, I watched as soldiers fanned out through the village, pounding on doors, dragging sleepy villagers into the street for questioning.

“They’re looking for you,” Claire whispered, appearing from the trapdoor. “Someone must have seen the parachute.”

I nodded grimly, checking my sidearm. “You should go. Be seen. Act normal.”

She pressed a canteen and a small parcel of food into my hands. “I’ll return when I can.”

Alone in the attic, I watched the methodical search unfold. A Nazi officer—tall, with a scar running down his right cheek—directed his men with cold efficiency. Sergeant Kurt Weiss, I would later learn, known for his tracking skills and lack of mercy.

Hours passed. The search continued house by house, moving inexorably toward the school. I calculated escape routes, made peace with the likelihood of capture or death.

Then footsteps on the stairs.

I pressed myself against the wall beside the trapdoor, pistol ready. A soldier pushed it open, climbing halfway into the attic before noticing me. His mouth opened to shout—I lunged forward, clamping one hand over his mouth while driving my combat knife between his ribs.

The soldier struggled, eyes wide with shock and pain. I held him tightly, feeling his life drain away with each gurgling breath. His fingers clawed at my arm, then went slack.

I eased the body onto the attic floor, my hands slick with blood. This wasn’t the clean distance of dropping bombs from 20,000 feet. This was intimate killing—feeling another man’s final breath against my palm.

My hands shook as I wiped them clean on the dead soldier’s uniform. I’d killed before, but never like this—never face to face on foreign soil, with the victim’s blood soaking into floorboards that had supported generations of French children.

I dragged the body deeper into the shadows, covering it with old classroom materials. Seconds later, a voice called from below in German.

“Heinrich? Was ist da oben?”

I froze, waiting for the inevitable discovery. But the caller moved on, assuming his comrade had already cleared the area.

The village bells struck noon. The Germans withdrew, taking several villagers for further questioning. I remained in the attic, a dead man at my feet and blood on my hands.

“You’ve compromised us all,” Luc hissed, pacing the crypt floor that evening. “A dead German soldier? They’ll burn the village for this.”

“I had no choice,” I replied, too exhausted for apologies.

“There’s always a choice,” Luc spat. “You could have surrendered, drawn them away from us.”

“And revealed your operation under torture? Is that what you’d prefer?”

Claire stepped between us. “Stop it, both of you. What’s done is done.” She turned to her brother. “They didn’t find the cellar or the crypt. We’re still operational.”

Father Henri nodded agreement. “God has preserved us for a purpose, Luc. Perhaps the Lieutenant is part of that purpose.”

I looked at the three of them—Claire’s determined face, Luc’s barely contained fury, Father Henri’s calm resolve. I didn’t believe in divine intervention, but I did believe in making meaning from chaos.

“I’m committed now,” I said quietly. “Whatever you’re planning, I want in. I need maps, tools, and information about German patrols.”

The tension in the room shifted. Luc’s anger didn’t disappear, but it redirected toward potential action. Trust, still brittle between us, temporarily realigned around a common enemy.

“Show him,” Claire urged her brother.

Luc hesitated, then produced a folded paper from his jacket. “Captured Enigma transmission,” he explained, spreading it on the table. “German cipher. We’ve been trying to decode it for days.”

I studied the message, recognizing the structure from my intelligence briefings. “I’m familiar with this format,” I said. “Do you have a cipher wheel?”

Claire produced a rudimentary one, along with Father Henri’s notebooks full of intercepted communications. For the next hour, we worked in silence, breaking the code section by section.

“Got it,” I said finally. “Train schedule. Munitions transport crossing the Viaduct de Chêne at 12:37 p.m., three days from now.”

Luc’s eyes lit with purpose. “Perfect. We can—”

“Wait,” I interrupted, decoding the final line. “There’s more.”

The second encrypted text revealed a list marked Verräterschatten—”shadow of traitors.” Several names appeared, all local. Then, like a pistol shot: Claire Marchand.

Luc’s face drained of color. “What the hell is this?”

Claire stepped back, stunned. “That’s impossible. I’ve never—”

“Yet your name is right here!” Luc shouted, stabbing his finger at the paper.

I moved between them. “This could be misinformation. The Germans could be trying to divide you.”

“Or they could know something we don’t,” Luc countered, glaring at his sister.

Father Henri placed a calming hand on Luc’s shoulder. “We must investigate before we judge. Trust—even between siblings—is the first casualty of occupation.”

Claire’s face hardened with resolve. “I am not a traitor, Luc. I would die before betraying France—or you.”

The tension crackled between them, years of shared sacrifice suddenly poisoned by suspicion.

“I’ll speak with my unit,” Luc said finally, his voice cold. “We need to verify this.” He gathered the papers and headed for the tunnel entrance, leaving Claire trembling with anger and hurt.

“Why would your name be on that list?” I asked Claire later, as we sat in the crypt’s dim light.

She looked up, eyes shining with unshed tears. “I taught their children,” she said simply. “When the occupation began, we were told to continue, to maintain normalcy. One of the officers—Captain Dieter Fleischer—was billeted with my family.”

“You were friendly with him?”

“Civil,” she corrected sharply. “He spoke of his own daughters in Munich. Showed me photographs. Treated us with courtesy.” Her hands twisted in her lap. “Some in the village saw it as collaboration.”

“And now he’s using that connection to cast suspicion on you,” I finished.

“Perhaps.” She met my gaze. “Or perhaps he truly believes I can be turned. The Germans understand leverage, Lieutenant Harding. They know Luc is Maquis. They know I would do anything to protect him.”

I studied her face, searching for deception but finding only determination and fear. “Call me Jack,” I said finally.

A ghost of a smile touched her lips. “Jack, then.”

In the candlelit crypt, Father Henri gathered us for a final council. Luc had returned, still suspicious but unwilling to abandon the mission. Claire stood apart, isolated by the shadow of accusation.

“The plan,” Father Henri began, spreading a map of the railway viaduct, “must proceed despite our… complications.”

I nodded, examining the structure. “It’s a perfect target. The viaduct’s keystone arch is vulnerable. With the right placement of charges, we can bring down the entire span.”

“And the list? My sister’s involvement?” Luc demanded.

“We use it,” I said, forming the plan as I spoke. “If Claire’s name is truly being used as bait, she helps us draw out the real traitor.”

Claire stepped forward. “I’ll do whatever’s necessary.”

Father Henri nodded approval. “Then we are agreed. The mission proceeds.” He placed his hands on the map, a gentle blessing. “Three days to prepare. Three days to establish truth.”

I began sketching demolition placements on a scrap of parchment, my mind already calculating explosive requirements and timing sequences. Outside, the bell tower rang midnight, the twelve solemn tones marking the formal start of our mission.

The real test—of trust, courage, and survival—had begun.

 

I hit the table with my fist, sending a jolt of pain up my arm. “Both of you—enough!”

The candlelight in Claire Marchand’s cellar cast long shadows across the stone walls, highlighting the fury on Luc’s face as he jabbed his finger at the decoded message.

“Her name is right there, American,” he spat, not taking his eyes off his sister. “Claire Marchand. Known informant.”

Claire’s face had gone pale, but her spine remained straight as steel. “You know me, Luc. You know what I’ve risked for the resistance.”

“I thought I knew you,” he whispered.

I stepped between them, my wounded leg throbbing with each movement. These siblings were my only chance of survival in occupied France, and I couldn’t afford to lose either of them to this rift.

“The Germans could have planted her name deliberately,” I said, keeping my voice low and steady. “Create distrust, divide the resistance from within.”

Luc’s eyes narrowed. “Convenient theory.”

“It’s what I would do,” I countered.

Claire’s fingers trembled slightly as she folded her arms. “I have never betrayed our cause. Not once.”

The tension in the room was thick enough to cut with a knife. I’d been shot down just four days ago, and already I was mediating between two French resistance fighters who didn’t fully trust me either. The irony wasn’t lost on me.

“We need to focus on the mission,” I said, tapping the railway map spread across the table. “Not tear each other apart.”

Luc finally broke his stare. “Fine. But I’ll be watching.”

I caught Claire’s eye. The hurt there wasn’t just from her brother’s accusation—it was deeper, more complex. I looked away quickly. Getting emotionally entangled was the last thing I needed.

The next morning, Claire called me to the window of her small cottage. “He’s here,” she whispered.

I peered through the lace curtains to see a sleek black Mercedes roll into the village square, its Nazi flags fluttering in the breeze. Everything about the vehicle screamed authority and menace.

“Who?” I asked, though I already knew the answer.

“Captain Matthias Vogel. Abwehr.”

The name sent a chill down my spine. German intelligence. Not the regular Wehrmacht or even the SS—these were the professionals. The hunters.

A tall figure emerged from the car, removing his cap to reveal close-cropped silver hair. His movements were precise, almost graceful. He adjusted pale leather gloves as two armed soldiers flanked him.

“Mesdames et messieurs!” Vogel’s voice carried clearly through the square, his French flawless and refined. “I bring a message from the Reich.”

Villagers had frozen in place, their market activities suspended in a tableau of fear.

“Saint-Denis-sur-Vire harbors enemies of Germany,” he continued, pacing slowly around the well at the center of the square. “Traitors who coordinate with terrorist elements. And—” he paused for effect, “—an American pilot whose aircraft we shot down four nights ago.”

My pulse quickened. I instinctively stepped back from the window.

“These individuals will be found,” Vogel stated, his voice carrying the certainty of a man who rarely failed. “And when they are, their collaborators will be dealt with publicly and definitively.”

Claire’s face had drained of color. Her fingers clutched the curtain edge with white knuckles.

“He doesn’t make empty threats,” she whispered.

“Neither do I,” I replied, more to steel myself than reassure her.

That evening, a Maquis courier slipped into Father Henri’s chapel through the cemetery entrance. Luc met him in the shadows of the vestry while Claire kept watch by the door and I studied the church’s layout, memorizing every exit, every hiding spot.

When Luc returned, his expression was grim.

“The munitions train,” he said quietly. “We have forty-eight hours. After that, they’re rerouting it through Caen.”

“Heavily fortified German garrison,” Claire added.

“Then we move now,” I said, spreading out the railway map on the altar. “The best position would be here—the viaduct outside Torigni. It’s vulnerable, elevated, and the explosion would take out both the train and block the line for weeks.”

Luc shook his head. “Too heavily patrolled.”

“What about here?” I pointed to a curve in the track. “Approaches are covered by woods. We could set charges on the outer rail, force a derailment down the embankment.”

“That… could work,” Luc admitted reluctantly.

Claire moved beside us, studying the map. “The patrol schedules change at midnight. We’d have a twenty-minute window at most.”

I felt her shoulder brush against mine, and I shifted slightly, maintaining focus on the map. “We’ll need to split the team. One group for demolition, one for lookout.”

Luc’s jaw clenched. “I’ll handle the explosives. My team, my operation.”

The unspoken implication hung in the air: he didn’t trust me with the crucial part of the mission. Or perhaps he didn’t trust Claire to be alone with me.

“We don’t have time for grudges,” Claire said, echoing my thoughts. “Every minute we waste arguing is a minute closer to failure.”

She was right. But the fracture between these siblings was widening by the hour, and I was caught in the fault line.

Later that night, we gathered in the church crypt to finalize our plans. Father Henri lit candles around the small stone chamber while Luc’s resistance contacts—three men and a woman—crowded around a makeshift table.

“The German patrol patterns suggest this window,” I said, pointing to the timeline I’d sketched. “We should be able to set charges here and here, then—”

“Angel Nine inbound,” I added reflexively, using the phrase we’d used for mission completion back in my bomber squadron.

A sudden silence fell over the room. I looked up to see René Vaillant, a resistance courier who’d been captured and mysteriously released last week, staring at me with widened eyes. He recognized the phrase—which was impossible unless he’d been briefed on American air force codes.

Our eyes locked for a split second. Then he bolted.

“Stop him!” Luc shouted, drawing his pistol.

René was already racing up the stone steps. By the time we reached the chapel, the door was swinging open and his footsteps were fading into the night.

“Damn it!” Luc raised his weapon toward the darkness.

I grabbed his arm. “Too late. And the shot would bring the entire village down on us.”

His eyes blazed with fury. “You and your American code just compromised everything.”

He was right. I’d slipped up, fallen back on muscle memory and training. A rookie mistake that could get us all killed.

“He’s heading straight for Vogel,” Claire whispered.

Father Henri quickly closed the chapel door. “Then we have very little time.”

Dawn broke gray and misty over Saint-Denis-sur-Vire. I woke to Claire shaking my shoulder.

“Henri needs you. Now.”

I followed her through the village, keeping to the shadows. When we reached the chapel, Henri was standing on the stone steps, his face ashen. Luc was already there, staring at something on the heavy oak door.

As we approached, I saw it—a large rat, nailed to the wood by its tail. Blood dripped slowly onto the steps. A piece of paper had been pinned beneath it, red ink still glistening.

Henri carefully removed the note and held it toward the light.

“You kneel before liars,” he read, his voice barely audible.

Without a word, the priest took both the rat and the note inside, placing them in a brass incense brazier. The smell of burning fur filled the air as flames consumed the grisly warning.

I watched Henri’s hands shake as he struck the match. For the first time, I saw genuine fear in the old man’s eyes.

“They’re closing in,” Luc muttered.

“Or want us to think they are,” I countered. “Fear is a weapon too.”

That afternoon, Claire and I descended into Henri’s crypt to use the resistance radio. We needed to alert the regional Maquis headquarters about the munitions train and request backup.

Claire adjusted the frequencies while I stood watch at the top of the stairs. The familiar hiss of static filled the small space as she put on the headphones and began tapping out the encoded message.

I watched her frown, then tap again. She adjusted dials, checked connections.

“Something’s wrong,” she finally said. “No response.”

I took the headphones, listening to the empty static. We tried every frequency in the resistance network. Nothing but white noise.

“Battery?” I suggested.

We changed it. Still nothing.

“Antenna?” Claire offered.

We rewired it. Same result.

After exhausting every possibility, we faced the grim reality: either the Germans were jamming all signals, or the other end of our network had gone dark.

Claire’s fingers lingered on the radio key. “We’re on our own, aren’t we?”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t need to.

 

The village market was our next stop. We needed bread, supplies, and most importantly, the forged papers Henri had arranged for me. With Vogel in town, moving around without documentation was suicide.

Claire, Luc, and I kept close together, mixing with the thin crowd of villagers. German soldiers stood at the corners of the square, watching everyone with bored suspicion.

“Keep your head down,” Luc whispered. “The baker has your papers.”

I focused on the cobblestones, counting steps to maintain calm. Twenty to the baker’s stall. Fifteen. Ten.

“Jack!”

The name—my name—rang out through the square like a gunshot.

I froze, then slowly turned. A small boy, no more than seven, was standing in the middle of the square, pointing directly at me. It was Émile, the mute child Claire had told me about—traumatized into silence by the bombing of his home.

A German corporal turned sharply in our direction.

In that split second, Luc deliberately knocked over a basket of apples, sending them rolling across the cobblestones. People scrambled to help, creating instant chaos.

Claire grabbed Émile by the shoulder and pulled him into a narrow alley. I followed close behind, heart pounding. Once we were safely hidden, she knelt before the boy.

“Émile, you’re speaking!” she whispered, genuine joy in her voice despite the danger.

The boy just stared at her with wide eyes. “Jack,” he repeated, then fell silent again.

Claire looked up at me, confusion written across her face. “How does he know your name?”

I had no answer, and we had no time to find one. The boy’s unexpected breakthrough had nearly exposed us all.

 

That night, Luc arranged a meeting at the abandoned Roux Mill outside the village. A Maquis informant claimed to have information about Vogel’s next move.

“This feels wrong,” I said as we approached the crumbling structure, its water wheel long since rotted away.

“Your American paranoia,” Luc replied.

The mill stood against the night sky like a skeleton, all broken beams and jagged edges. Wind whistled through its gaps, carrying the damp smell of the river.

We entered cautiously, Luc taking point with his pistol drawn. I followed, my borrowed Luger heavy in my hand. The floorboards creaked beneath our feet.

“Monsieur Duval?” Luc called softly. “C’est Marchand.”

The attack came without warning. Two figures lunged from the darkness—German soldiers in combat gear, not uniforms. One tackled Luc while the other came at me with a knife.

I barely twisted away in time, feeling the blade slice through my jacket. The soldier crashed into a rusted grain machine, then recovered and came at me again.

We grappled in the darkness, his knife inches from my throat. My leg wound screamed in protest as I fought for leverage. Finally, I managed to get my arm around his neck. One sharp twist and I felt the crack beneath my hands.

The sudden absence of resistance sent me stumbling backward. My thigh erupted in pain—somewhere in the struggle, he’d buried his knife in my leg, right where my parachute wound was still healing.

Across the mill, Luc was locked in his own desperate fight. I saw the flash of a bayonet, heard a grunt of pain, then silence.

“Luc?” I called hoarsely.

“I’m here,” came the breathless reply. “Mine’s finished.”

He appeared from the shadows, blood splattered across his face. “You’re hit,” he observed, nodding at my leg.

“It’ll hold,” I lied. “We need to move before they’re missed.”

 

Claire’s face went white when she saw the blood soaking through my pants as I stumbled into her cottage.

“What happened?” she demanded, already gathering her medical supplies.

“Trap,” I grunted, collapsing into a chair.

She cut away the fabric to reveal the knife wound—deep and angry, reopening the barely-healed parachute injury. “You men and your pride,” she muttered, cleaning the wound with practiced efficiency.

“It wasn’t pride,” I argued, wincing as she applied antiseptic. “It was necessity.”

“You’re running out of blood to spare, Lieutenant,” she said sharply. “And we’re running out of time.”

The candle’s flame cast dancing shadows across her concentrated face as she began stitching my wound. I gritted my teeth, focusing on her steady hands rather than the pain.

“We’re not soldiers,” she said quietly. “We’re just people trying to survive.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” I replied. “The moment you joined the resistance, you became a soldier. Whether you wear a uniform or not.”

Claire tied off the last stitch with a bit more force than necessary. “And Luc? Is he just another soldier to you?”

“Luc is reckless,” I said. “He nearly got us both killed tonight.”

Her eyes flashed up to meet mine. “He’s reckless because he cares more than anyone. This is his home, his people. What is it to you beyond another mission?”

The question struck deeper than I wanted to admit. I looked away.

“Get some rest,” she said, her voice softening slightly. “Tomorrow won’t be any easier.”

As she turned to leave, her hand brushed my shoulder—the briefest of contacts, but enough to make me acutely aware of how long it had been since I’d experienced a gentle touch.

 

The next morning, Father Henri didn’t appear for his usual blessing in the village square. Claire immediately sensed something was wrong and hurried to Chapelle Saint-Martin. I followed, ignoring the protest from my freshly stitched wound.

The chapel door stood slightly ajar. Claire pushed it open and froze.

Henri’s body was slumped at the altar, a single gunshot wound to the back of his head. His hands were clasped over a charred Bible, arranged in a grotesque parody of prayer.

“No,” Claire whispered, her voice breaking.

I quickly checked the rest of the chapel. Empty. The killer was long gone, but had left his signature—a white rose crushed under a glass paperweight, placed carefully on the pulpit.

“Vogel,” Claire said when she saw it.

Luc arrived minutes later, his face hardening when he saw the scene. Without a word, he went directly to the hidden door leading to the crypt.

Claire and I followed him down. The radio equipment had been thoroughly searched, but not destroyed. Luc immediately went to a loose stone in the wall and pried it open, revealing a hidden compartment. The resistance documents were still there.

He flipped through them quickly, then stopped. His hand shook slightly as he held up a Maquis access list. Four names had been marked with red check marks.

The last one was Claire Marchand.

Luc exploded. He grabbed Claire by the shoulders, shaking her. “The truth! Now!”

“Luc, stop!” I stepped between them.

“She’s been marked as a verified informant!” he shouted, shoving the paper at me. “Not just suspected—verified!”

Claire’s composure finally cracked. Tears welled in her eyes. “I never betrayed the resistance,” she insisted. “Never!”

“Then why is your name checked?” Luc demanded.

She hesitated, then seemed to collapse inward. “Because… because of Dieter.”

“Who the hell is Dieter?” I asked.

“Captain Dieter Fleischer,” she whispered. “He was billeted in our home last year. Before I joined the resistance.”

Luc’s face went slack with shock. “You were with a German officer?”

“It wasn’t like that,” Claire said quickly. “I used him for information. Let him talk about troop movements, listened when he was drunk. I passed what I learned to Henri.”

The silence that followed was deafening.

“We move now,” I finally said, taking command. “Tonight. The viaduct demolition happens as planned.”

“I’m coming,” Claire said firmly. “I need to prove myself.”

Luc didn’t object, which told me more about his internal conflict than words ever could.

As we gathered our gear and the remaining explosives, I paused at the threshold of the chapel, looking back at the altar where Henri had fallen. The old priest had sheltered me, a complete stranger, without question or hesitation. His death would not be for nothing.

“We’re out of time,” I said quietly. “Let’s finish this.”

 

My blood ran cold as I watched the dawn break over Saint-Denis-sur-Vire. The Germans moved with mechanical precision, kicking in doors and dragging families into the streets. Captain Matthias Vogel stood in the village square, a statue carved from ice, observing the chaos he’d orchestrated with clinical detachment.

I pressed myself flatter against the attic beams of the abandoned milliner’s shop, focusing my field glasses on the growing crowd below. A Wehrmacht truck crawled through the narrow streets, its mounted loudspeaker crackling with threats.

“Any person harboring the American pilot will be executed alongside him.”

The words sliced through the morning air. I’d heard similar threats before—in briefings, in training—but never with my name as the catalyst. Never with innocent lives hanging in the balance because of me.

Then I saw her.

Claire Marchand’s wheat-colored hair caught the early light as two soldiers seized her arms, roughly pulling her toward the square. Seven others were rounded up with her, but when the sergeant called out names, Claire’s echoed loudest. My stomach twisted as I recognized the methodical cruelty: they wanted me to hear it, to see it, to break cover.

They were using her as bait.

Through my glasses, I caught Claire’s eyes darting across the crowd. For the briefest moment, her gaze seemed to find me, impossibly, across the distance. Then Sergeant Weiss shoved her into the back of a transport truck, her head disappearing beneath the canvas flap.

I swore under my breath and scrambled backward across the dusty attic floor. My fingers brushed against an object—a child’s forgotten wooden horse, gathering cobwebs. The simple toy felt obscene in the midst of such brutality.

“They’re moving,” Luc whispered from behind me, his voice taut with barely controlled rage. “That bastard Vogel just nailed something to the chapel door.”

I crawled back to the window. A sheet of paper fluttered in the morning breeze, visible even from our hiding place. A list of names. Claire’s at the top, marked with a red X.

“We need to get to Henri’s things,” I said, my mouth dry as sand. “Before they ransack the crypt.”

Luc nodded once, his jaw clenched so tight I could see a muscle jumping beneath his stubbled cheek. We slipped out the back of the shop as the last German patrol passed, moving like ghosts through the shadows of the village.

Father Henri’s crypt smelled of damp stone and spilled candle wax. Our footsteps echoed faintly as we descended the narrow spiral staircase beneath the chapel’s hidden trapdoor. The space felt emptier without him—a sanctuary transformed into a tomb.

“Check the prayer bench,” Luc said, his voice hoarse. “He kept messages there sometimes.”

I flipped the worn kneeler over, finding nothing but decades of scratches in the wood. Henri had left us little to work with. His death had been too sudden, too brutal.

“There must be something,” I muttered, running my hands along the stone wall. “He knew this was coming.”

Luc stood frozen before the small altar, staring at the carved wooden crucifix. “He always said God provides a path even when the road seems darkest.”

“With all due respect to your faith, we need more than prayers right now.”

Luc didn’t respond. Instead, he reached for Henri’s worn prayer book, left open on a simple wooden lectern. As he lifted it, several folded pages slipped free, yellowed with age.

“Jack,” he said softly.

The pages contained detailed schematics—railway drawings from the previous century, overlaid with handwritten notes in Henri’s spidery script. I spread them across the floor with trembling hands.

“Roman catacombs,” I whispered, tracing the faded lines. “Running beneath the Viaduct de Chêne.”

Luc’s eyes widened. “The same viaduct where—”

“Where the munitions train will cross.” My mind raced, calculating possibilities. “If we could access these tunnels…”

“We could place charges directly beneath the tracks,” Luc finished. “Unseen.”

For the first time since Claire’s capture, something like hope flickered in my chest. I studied the schematic more carefully, identifying a collapse point noted by Henri’s careful annotations. We’d need to dig through, create an access point for the explosives. It wouldn’t be easy, but it was possible.

I glanced at my watch. “How long until the train?”

“My contact says 17:32 hours tomorrow. Still on schedule.” Luc’s voice had regained some of its strength.

I looked back at the schematics, marking the tunnel’s access point with my thumb. “This will take hours to dig through, even if we work continuously. And that’s assuming—”

“That we have the explosives,” Luc interrupted, his momentary hope withering.

We stared at each other in the dim light, the unspoken question hanging between us: How do you derail a train with nothing but desperation and dirty hands?

The milk cart creaked beneath me as I guided the ancient mare through the village outskirts. I’d pulled my cap low over my eyes, hunching my shoulders to disguise my height and bearing. The disguise wouldn’t withstand scrutiny, but it didn’t need to—I just needed to blend in long enough for Luc to make contact.

I watched him slip into the back entrance of the Maison de l’Ordre, the old town hall now serving as the German command post. The kitchen boy—Paul, I think Luc had called him—emerged moments later, accepting a small package that disappeared quickly into his pocket.

Five minutes, I reminded myself. Five minutes, then we move.

The wait stretched like taffy, each second an unbearable eternity. I counted my heartbeats, focusing on the rhythm to keep from scanning the streets too obviously. One-twenty-one, one-twenty-two…

Then Luc was beside me again, swinging up onto the cart with practiced ease despite his limp. I clicked my tongue, urging the mare forward before he’d even settled.

“Well?” I asked, keeping my gaze fixed on the road ahead.

“They’re transferring the prisoners tonight,” Luc whispered. “Fort Étoile.” His voice caught on the words. “That’s where Vogel conducts his… interrogations.”

I’d heard about Fort Étoile from the resistance fighters. No one who entered for questioning ever returned whole—if they returned at all.

“Route?” I asked, my mind already turning to ambush points.

“The Vierville Aqueduct road. Only one truck, minimal escort. They’re not expecting trouble so soon after the roundup.”

I nodded once. “Then that’s where we hit them.”

The Vierville Aqueduct rose like a skeletal ribcage against the darkening sky, its crumbling stone arches spanning a shallow ravine. I crouched in the thick underbrush, sweat trickling down my spine despite the evening chill.

Luc lay beside me, his breath coming in controlled, even counts. We’d stolen Wehrmacht uniform jackets—not enough for a proper disguise, but enough to cause crucial seconds of hesitation in the dark.

“Remember, no heroics,” I murmured. “We get Claire, we disappear. The others too, if possible, but she’s the priority.”

Luc didn’t respond. I knew what he was thinking—the same thing I was. If we failed here, Claire wouldn’t last the night at Fort Étoile.

Headlights cut through the dusk, sweeping across the road as an engine growled in the distance. I gripped the smoke grenade tighter, its weight reassuring in my palm.

“Three… two… one…” I counted down as the truck approached the narrowest part of the road, where a sharp turn would force it to slow.

I pulled the pin and hurled the grenade into the road. Thick smoke billowed upward, engulfing the truck. The brakes squealed as the driver cursed loudly in German.

We moved.

I sprinted toward the road, keeping low. The chaos was immediate—shouting, the slam of truck doors, the click of weapons being readied. Through the smoke, I glimpsed shadowy figures: two soldiers, the driver, and Sergeant Weiss barking orders.

I tackled the nearest soldier, driving my shoulder into his stomach. We went down hard on the gravel. His rifle jabbed into my ribs as we struggled. I slammed my elbow into his throat, once, twice. His grip loosened. I wrenched the weapon away and struck him across the temple with the butt. He went limp.

Somewhere in the smoke, I heard Luc shouting in German—an impressive imitation of authority that threw the others into momentary confusion.

I reached the back of the truck, throwing open the canvas flap. Wide, terrified eyes stared back at me—Claire among them, her wrists bound with cord.

“Jack,” she whispered, disbelief etched across her face.

I hauled myself into the truck, pulling a knife from my boot to slice through her bindings. “Can you run?”

She nodded, already turning to help the woman beside her. I cut through more cords, working quickly as shouts and gunfire erupted outside. We didn’t have much time.

“Go!” I pushed Claire toward the truck’s exit. “Stay low, head for the trees!”

She hesitated, looking back at the others—four women, three men, all wearing the same expression of terrified hope.

“I’ll get them,” I promised. “Go!”

As she jumped from the truck, a shot rang out, followed by Luc’s pained cry. My blood turned to ice water.

“Luc!” Claire screamed.

I vaulted from the truck, landing hard on the gravel road. Through the thinning smoke, I saw Luc sprawled in the underbrush, clutching his thigh. Blood seeped between his fingers.

A figure emerged from the haze—Sergeant Weiss, pistol raised. I lunged forward without thinking, taking a rifle butt to the face as another soldier appeared at my flank. Pain exploded across my cheekbone. I staggered, tasting blood.

Weiss took aim at Luc again. I threw myself at his legs, tackling him to the ground. His pistol discharged harmlessly into the air. We grappled in the dirt, his superior weight nearly pinning me. I drove my knee upward, connecting with something soft. He howled.

“Claire!” I shouted. “Get Luc! Go!”

I caught a glimpse of her dragging her brother into the thicket, his face contorted with pain. Then Weiss’s fist connected with my wounded side, and stars exploded across my vision.

Somehow I broke free, rolling away and scrambling to my feet. The prisoners were scattering into the woods. German voices shouted orders, flashlight beams sweeping wildly across the trees.

I ran, my lungs burning, following the shallow trail of blood that would lead me to Claire and Luc.

“You lied to us,” I growled, pacing the cramped hayloft above Marceau’s Grain Mill. “To me.”

Claire didn’t flinch from my accusation. Her hands remained steady as she tightened the bandage around Luc’s thigh. The bullet had passed clean through the muscle, missing the bone and major arteries. Lucky, but not enough to keep him mobile.

“I never betrayed you,” she said, her voice soft but firm.

“Your name was on their list,” I countered. “Marked. Why would the Germans single you out if you hadn’t given them something?”

Luc watched us through pain-glazed eyes, his skin pale beneath a sheen of sweat. The morphine from my field kit had taken the edge off, but not enough.

“Tell him, Claire,” he murmured.

She sat back on her heels, wiping blood from her hands with a cloth already stained rust-red. Something in her posture changed—a subtle straightening of her spine, as if bracing for a blow.

“Last winter, Luc was captured during a raid on a German supply depot,” she began, not meeting my eyes. “Captain Fleischer had him. There was talk of sending him east, to the camps.”

I stopped pacing, waiting for her to continue.

“I went to Fleischer. I begged him.” Her voice caught. “I promised I would keep quiet, stay out of resistance activities. I would teach the children and nothing more. In exchange, he released Luc with a warning.”

“You made a deal with them,” I said flatly.

“To save her brother,” Luc interjected with unexpected force. “Not to betray France.”

Claire looked up at me then, her eyes bright with unshed tears. “I never gave them your name, Jack. I never told them about the resistance cell, or the tunnel, or the train. I swear it on my parents’ graves.”

I wanted to believe her. But war had taught me to question everything, to suspect everyone—especially those who stirred something inside me, those who made me vulnerable.

“Then how did your name end up on their list?” I demanded. “How did they know to take you first?”

“Because I stopped honoring our arrangement,” she said simply. “After Father Henri was killed, I couldn’t stay silent anymore. I began helping again—passing messages, hiding supplies. Fleischer must have noticed.”

I studied her face, searching for deception, for the telltale signs of a practiced lie. I found only exhaustion and a resolute certainty that I recognized all too well—the look of someone who had made impossible choices and lived with the consequences.

“The explosives,” I said finally, changing tactics. “We need them for the tunnel plan.”

Claire nodded. “They were hidden beneath the Donelle Bridge. Luc can tell you exactly where.”

I turned to Luc, who gestured weakly toward the east. “Behind the third support pillar. Under a pile of stones marked with yellow chalk.”

Thirty minutes later, I returned empty-handed, mud caked to my boots and panic clawing at my throat.

“They’re gone,” I announced, my voice hollow. “All of it. The plastic explosives, the blasting caps. There’s nothing left but an empty crate and bootprints leading east.”

Claire’s face drained of color. Luc tried to sit up, grimacing with pain.

“That’s not possible,” he insisted. “Only four people knew about that cache—Henri, Claire, me, and—”

“And whoever took it,” I finished grimly. “Without those explosives, we can’t sabotage the viaduct. We can’t stop the train.”

The realization settled over us like a shroud. Tomorrow at 17:32, a train loaded with munitions would cross the Viaduct de Chêne. Those weapons would arm the German forces pushing back against the Allied advance. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of lives hung in the balance—and we had nothing to stop it.

I sank onto a hay bale, burying my face in my hands. My side throbbed where the bullet had grazed me days earlier. My cheek pulsed where the rifle butt had connected. But the physical pain was nothing compared to the weight of failure.

“There must be another way,” Claire whispered, more to herself than to us.

I lifted my head, about to tell her there wasn’t, when a new thought struck me. “How far is it to Saint-Denis from here?”

“Three kilometers,” she answered, confusion creasing her brow. “Why?”

“Because we need help,” I said, already reaching for my jacket. “And I think I know where to find it.”

The village of Saint-Denis-sur-Vire was unrecognizable in the darkness. German patrols had increased, forcing us to approach through the apple orchards, using the trees for cover. Claire kept pace with me, her movements nearly as silent as my own. I found myself grudgingly impressed by her stealth.

We slipped between buildings, working our way toward the old bakery where Luc had arranged to meet his remaining contacts. As we rounded the corner, a figure detached itself from the shadows, then another, and another.

Too many for a covert meeting.

I reached for my stolen pistol, but Claire caught my wrist. “Wait,” she whispered.

A match flared in the darkness, illuminating the face of Marcel DuBois, the village blacksmith. The brief light revealed at least a dozen others behind him—villagers armed with hunting rifles and ancient pistols, their expressions hard.

“So,” Marcel said, his deep voice carrying in the still night air. “The American returns.”

I stepped forward, positioning myself slightly in front of Claire. “We need to talk.”

“Talk?” Marcel spat on the ground. “My son was taken today. Nineteen years old. Dragged away because they think he knows something about you.”

Murmurs of agreement rippled through the gathered villagers.

“And now you bring her back,” Marcel continued, gesturing toward Claire with a meaty hand. “First Henri is killed, then the explosives vanish. And you expect us to believe she’s not the reason?”

I felt rather than saw Claire stiffen beside me. The accusation hung in the air, igniting something primal within me. Blood pounded in my ears.

“You want someone to blame?” I growled, stepping closer to Marcel. “Blame me. I’m the reason Vogel’s here. I’m the reason your lives are upside-down.”

Marcel didn’t back down. “We needed those explosives to—”

My control snapped. I lunged forward, driving my fist into Marcel’s jaw with a force that sent him sprawling to the cobblestones. The crowd surged forward, then froze as I raised the pistol.

“But if we don’t stop that train tomorrow,” I continued, my voice deadly quiet, “none of this will matter. Not your son, not Henri, not any of us.”

Silence fell over the square. Marcel slowly got to his feet, rubbing his jaw. The anger in his eyes hadn’t diminished, but something else had joined it—a reluctant respect.

“What do you propose, American?” he asked finally.

“We need to reach the tunnel beneath the viaduct,” I said. “We need to dig through to the tracks. And we need something, anything, that can explode.”

One by one, the villagers exchanged glances. Then, slowly, several stepped aside, creating a path through their midst.

“Follow me,” said a thin, weathered woman I didn’t recognize. “My husband worked on those catacombs before the war. I know another entrance.”

The smell of wet stone and ancient decay filled my nostrils as we descended into the catacombs beneath the viaduct. Claire held Henri’s lantern aloft, its flickering light casting grotesque shadows across the curved walls. Behind us, Luc limped stubbornly, leaning heavily on a makeshift crutch, his face ashen but determined.

“This way,” he murmured, consulting Henri’s map. “The collapse should be just ahead.”

The beam of light caught the edge of a massive pile of rubble—stones from above that had given way decades ago, blocking the tunnel’s path beneath the viaduct. I set my jaw, assessing the challenge. It would take hours to clear enough space for even a small charge.

“We should start here,” I said, pointing to a spot where smaller stones had gathered. “Work our way inward.”

Without discussion, we began. I lifted the larger rocks while Claire and Luc cleared away debris. The work was backbreaking and painfully slow. Sweat soon drenched my shirt despite the underground chill. Dust filled our lungs, making each breath a struggle.

An hour passed. Then another. My fingers grew raw from scraping against rough stone. Claire worked beside me without complaint, though I noticed the fine trembling in her arms as fatigue set in.

“Rest,” I ordered, taking the shovel from her hands. “I can keep going.”

She shook her head stubbornly. “We don’t have time.”

I couldn’t argue with that logic. The train would cross the viaduct in less than twelve hours.

As I dug deeper into the collapse, my shovel struck something that wasn’t stone—something that clattered with a sound that raised the hair on my neck. I shone the lantern closer.

Bones. Human bones, yellowed with age, scattered among the rubble.

“Monks,” Luc explained, seeing my expression. “Buried during the plague centuries ago. The catacombs were part of their crypt before the railway was built.”

I nodded, forcing myself to continue. We were literally digging through graves for a last chance at resistance. The irony wasn’t lost on me—the dead helping us prevent more death.

Near dawn, a small breakthrough—my shovel punched through to open air. I widened the hole frantically, clearing enough space for a person to crawl through.

“I can see the underside of the tracks,” I called back to the others, my voice hoarse from dust and exhaustion.

But our victory was hollow. We had our access point, but nothing to place beneath those tracks. Marcel and the others had brought what explosives they could scrounge—shotgun shells, a few sticks of ancient dynamite with unstable nitroglycerin sweating through the paper, a canister of gasoline. Nothing that would derail an armored train.

Claire pulled me aside as Luc examined our meager collection. Her face was streaked with dirt, but her eyes were clear and piercing in the lantern light.

“After this… what happens to us?” she asked softly.

The question caught me off guard. I looked away, unable to meet those eyes that seemed to see straight through my defenses.

“If we don’t stop that train, there is no after,” I replied, my voice hoarse.

She reached for my hand—a small gesture, brief and tender. Her fingers were warm despite the chill of the catacombs, rough from work but still somehow gentle. For a moment, I allowed myself to imagine a different world, a different time, where such a touch might lead somewhere.

Then I pulled away, picked up the shovel again, and returned to the rubble. There was no time for maybes, for possibilities. There was only now, and the ticking clock, and the train that would deliver death unless we found a way to stop it.

Behind me, Claire stood silent in the shadows, her expression unreadable as the lantern light flickered across her face. The world above us began to wake as dawn crept across the horizon. Our time was running out.

 

I hit the ground hard as a German boot connected with my ribs. The world spun, dirt and blood mixing in my mouth as I struggled to catch my breath. Through swollen eyes, I watched Sergeant Kurt Weiss and his men tear apart Marceau’s Grain Mill, upending sacks of flour to reveal our hidden arsenal. Each weapon they discovered felt like another nail in our coffin.

“Look what we have here,” Weiss sneered, holding up a British-issue Sten gun. “Quite the collection for simple farmers, no?”

I said nothing, conserving what little strength I had left. My shoulder wound throbbed with each heartbeat, a constant reminder of how far I’d fallen—from flying bombing runs over enemy territory to lying face-down in the dirt of occupied France.

The Germans paraded their findings through Saint-Denis-sur-Vire like conquering heroes, rifles and ammunition boxes held high for all villagers to see. I watched from the shadows of an alley, my chest tight with rage and helplessness.

Captain Matthias Vogel’s voice crackled through a loudspeaker mounted on a requisitioned Citroën: “Citizens of Saint-Denis-sur-Vire, martial law is now in effect. Anyone harboring terrorists or the American pilot will face immediate execution. At dawn, traitors will hang.”

My fists clenched at my sides. This wasn’t just about me anymore.

The holding cells beneath Fort Étoile smelled of despair—mildew, urine, and fear mixed into a nauseating cocktail. I crouched behind a stack of empty ammunition crates, watching as guards shoved Claire Marchand into the first cell. Her chin was high despite the blood trickling from her split lip. Behind her came young Émile, no more than twelve, followed by Marcel DuBois and three others I recognized from village gatherings.

Their names were already scratched onto a slate board—a final accounting before their deaths.

Claire’s eyes swept the shadows where I hid, somehow sensing my presence without seeing me. I pressed a finger to my lips, though I doubted she could make me out in the darkness. My whole body screamed to rush forward, guns blazing, but that would only get us both killed.

Captain Vogel’s boots clicked against the stone floor as he approached Claire’s cell with deliberate slowness. “Mademoiselle Marchand,” he said, his voice almost gentle. “I take no pleasure in this, you understand.”

“Go to hell,” Claire spat, her French accent thickening with anger.

Vogel chuckled. “You’ll be first tomorrow. For your brother’s crimes. For the American’s blood.” He produced a black rose, twirling it between his fingers before placing it on her cell bars. “A tradition for the condemned.”

After he left, I waited fifteen excruciating minutes before slipping away. Every fiber of my being wanted to stay, but I had work to do if anyone was going to see another sunset.

“You look like shit,” Luc muttered when I rejoined him in the catacombs beneath Viaduct de Chêne. His face was gray with fever, the bullet wound in his leg seeping through makeshift bandages.

“You’re not winning any beauty contests yourself,” I replied, dropping a canvas bag of stolen German grenades onto the limestone floor.

Luc’s eyes widened. “How many?”

“Seven. Lost two getting away.” I unfolded the crumpled blueprints Henri had left us. “The problem isn’t the grenades. It’s the detonation mechanism. These don’t have timers.”

“Then we’re finished.” Luc’s head fell back against the damp wall.

I studied the tunnel ceiling, where ancient supports held back tons of limestone and earth. Years of engineering training at West Point resurfaced as I ran my fingers along the crumbling mortar.

“No,” I said, pulling out my pocketknife and scratching a diagram into the dirt floor. “We don’t need to blow the train. We blow the track. Or rather, what’s under it.”

Luc leaned forward, wincing. “You want to collapse the viaduct? That’s insane.”

“Insanity got me shot down over Nazi-occupied territory,” I said, completing my sketch—a crude trigger system using friction wire. “Might as well keep the streak going.”

Chapelle Saint-Martin stood silhouetted against the evening fog, its bell tower a finger pointing accusingly at the heavens. Inside, the familiar scent of candle wax and ancient wood wrapped around me like a shroud. Just days ago, Henri had hidden me here. Now his blood still stained the altar steps.

“For Henri,” I whispered, rigging a Molotov cocktail beneath the bell tower rafters. A trail of kerosene led from the bottle to a frayed piece of rope I could light from below.

I didn’t believe in God anymore—not after what I’d seen from 20,000 feet in the belly of a B-17, raining death on German cities. But I believed in Henri’s sacrifice, and in the hollow justice of fire.

The match flared between my fingers, bright as a star in the gloom of the chapel. I touched it to the rope and ran.

By the time I reached the cemetery wall, the bells began to toll—warning and defiance in one sonorous voice. Orange flames licked at the night sky, consuming the wooden rafters that had stood for three centuries. Strange, how something so ancient could burn so quickly.

From my position in the hillside brush, I watched German soldiers scramble like ants from their garrison posts toward the church blaze. Captain Vogel stood motionless in the square, his face orange in the firelight, expression cold as marble. He wasn’t fooled. Not entirely.

“Weiss!” he barked. “Take half the men. The rest stay with the prisoners. Prepare for transport immediately.”

In the chaos, two resistance fighters dressed as German soldiers extracted a pair of prisoners—not Claire, I noted with bitter disappointment. Vogel calmly reloaded his Luger and gestured toward the supply trucks.

I slipped away, my heart hammering against my ribs. The diversion bought us precious little time.

The tunnel beneath the viaduct was never meant for a man my size. Ancient bricks scraped my back as I inched forward on elbows and knees, dragging the satchel of grenades behind me. Water dripped onto my neck, each cold bead a reminder of how many tons of stone and earth hung over me.

Finally, the tunnel opened into a maintenance space beneath the viaduct’s central support. My hands, slick with sweat and grime, worked quickly to position the grenades against the crumbling mortar between the primary support beams. I braced the ceiling with scavenged timber—not to prevent collapse, but to direct it precisely where I needed it.

Above, the faint rumble of the approaching munitions train grew stronger. Steel wheels on steel rails—a sound that had once lulled me to sleep on quiet Midwest nights now signaled death or deliverance.

I fed the wire through my improvised trigger system—simple friction against primer caps, held in tension until a single pull would release everything. One chance, one moment, one breath.

The train’s weight made the entire structure shudder. Dust rained down on my shoulders as the first engine wheel rolled over the viaduct. I counted heartbeats: one, two—

My hand yanked the wire.

For one suspended moment, nothing happened. Then the world exploded.

The blast threw me against the tunnel wall with crushing force. My ears filled with the thunder of collapsing stone and the shriek of twisting metal. Through a gap in the falling debris, I glimpsed train cars tumbling into the gorge like children’s toys.

Ammunition cooked off in rapid succession—crack-crack-crack—each detonation lighting the chaos with brief, deadly flashes. I crawled backward through the tunnel as fast as my battered body allowed, choking on limestone dust and the acrid smell of gunpowder.

When I emerged on the hillside, the viaduct was gone. In its place, a jagged wound in the landscape, bleeding smoke and flame.

Fort Étoile erupted in gunfire as Luc’s Maquis fighters descended on the prison cells. Even with his leg wound, Luc led the charge, his face a mask of pain and determination as he smashed open Claire’s cell with the butt of his rifle.

“You’re late,” Claire said, her voice breaking as she embraced her brother. She pulled young Émile close and snatched a ring of keys from a fallen guard.

“American timing,” Luc grunted through clenched teeth, leaning heavily against the wall.

Cell by cell, Claire released the prisoners. An elderly woman wept silently as she stepped into fresh air for the first time in weeks. Marcel DuBois, who days before had eyed me with suspicion, now clasped my hand in thanks.

“They would have killed us all,” he said simply.

I nodded, words unnecessary between men who’d stared into the abyss.

The villagers of Saint-Denis-sur-Vire poured into the streets like a river breaking through a dam. With the train line severed and Vogel’s forces scattered, resistance cells emerged from hiding places throughout the village. Radios, hidden for months in root cellars and behind false walls, crackled to life with messages of hope.

Marcel DuBois, blood on his hands and fire in his eyes, lifted a stolen MP40 and joined a group of fighters clearing German stragglers from the eastern quarter.

“The tide turns in a single morning,” Luc observed, watching from a café doorway as the village reclaimed itself. “All it takes is one spark.”

“And a shitload of German grenades,” I added. He laughed—the first real laugh I’d heard from him.

Captain Vogel’s command office in Fort Étoile was a study in Teutonic precision. Every pencil aligned, every document squared with the edge of his desk. I rummaged through drawers until I found what I was looking for—a locked metal box tucked beneath false papers.

The lock yielded to my knife after some persuasion. Inside lay a dossier marked “Operation Crosswire” in both German and English. My hands stilled as I leafed through communiqués between Vogel and Allied intelligence, dated months before I’d been shot down.

“Son of a bitch,” I whispered.

Captain Matthias Vogel—the butcher of Saint-Denis-sur-Vire—had once been our informant. Something had made him switch sides. And the order to execute Claire? It bore the signature of a British intelligence operative in London—someone eliminating evidence of a failed operation.

I closed the file, suddenly cold despite the summer heat. Was anyone’s hands clean in this war?

Claire’s old schoolhouse had been transformed into a field hospital. The smell of antiseptic and blood replaced chalk dust and children’s laughter. I found Luc on a cot by the window, his leg heavily bandaged, face slack with morphine.

“The doctor says he’ll walk again,” Claire told me, holding her brother’s limp hand. “But he’ll never run.” Her voice was flat, drained of emotion after thirty-six hours without sleep.

“Walking’s enough,” I said, placing my hand on her shoulder. She leaned into the touch, just slightly.

Outside, a British liaison officer approached me with news: an extraction team had established a rendezvous point near Bayeux. I could be on my way to London within hours.

“Transport leaves at dusk,” he said, offering me a cigarette.

I took the smoke but shook my head. “I didn’t come this far just to leave.”

The officer shrugged. “Your funeral, Yank.”

Maybe it would be. But something told me my war wasn’t in the sky anymore—it was here, in this broken village with these broken people who somehow found the courage to stand up again.

Atop the shattered remnants of the viaduct, I watched smoke curl from the train wreckage below. The cigarette between my fingers trembled slightly—the adrenaline still working its way out of my system after two days of hell.

Claire’s footsteps crunched on pulverized concrete as she joined me. She didn’t speak. Didn’t need to. We stood in silence, watching black smoke twist into a perfect blue French sky.

I exhaled a plume of smoke, my lips curving into a half-smile despite everything. “Well, I came here to fly a plane… but I guess blowing up trains ain’t bad either.”

Claire’s hand found mine, warm and solid in a world gone mad. Together, we watched the horizon, where distant explosions meant other resistance cells had taken up the fight.

This wasn’t my war anymore. It was ours.