Countryside Road to Sainte Mère Église – June 11, 1944
The rain stopped, leaving Normandy steaming like an open wound. Cratered fields spread under a bruised sky. Shattered tanks—American Shermans and German Panthers—lay scattered like dead metal beetles. Jenkins ran his fingers over bullet scars on a Panther's hull.
"It's like they're crying oil, Sarge."
"Tanks don't cry, kid," Sarge muttered, scanning the treeline. "They just wait for scrappers or kids with big ideas." He kicked a spent shell casing. "War's a factory. We're the spare parts."
The Scars of War
Abandoned farms: Burned out barns and churned mud graves. A lone cow lowed beside its dead calf.
Spoils of battle: Jenkins pocketed a tarnished Iron Cross. "For my kid brother!" Doc salvaged German field dressings. "Superior stitching," he remarked.
The people: Hollow eyed refugees shuffled past—old men pushing handcarts, women clutching silent children. One spat at Hank's uniform. "Américain? Late. Always late." Hank tipped his helmet, silent for once.
Juni's burned Chronitron hung heavy around her neck, echoing future Hank's desperate plea: FIND ME.
Doc Henderson's Burden
Doc stumbled, nearly blind without his spectacles. Hank steadied him.
"Easy, Sawbones. Wouldn't do to patch up the Kaiser by mistake."
"I was at Guadalcanal," Doc mumbled, gripping Hank's arm. "Jungle rot, sniper fevers… but this smell…"
He inhaled deeply—cordite, decay, wet earth. "Europe's dying. And I can't even see the patient."
Juni handed him her Chronitron's cracked lens. "Temporal grade quartz. Magnifies 20x. Might help."
Doc peered through it. "Flux… I see atoms*! That festering blister on Jenkins' neck? A universe of pus!"* His grin returned. "Best spectacles ever."
The Maquis Ambush
At dusk, a bullet SNAPPED past their heads.
"Take cover!" Sarge roared.
Figures rose from the hedgerows. French Maquis fighters. Leather jackets, Sten guns, eyes gaunt with hunger and rage. Their leader, Léa, glared.
"Drop weapons! Maintenant!"
"Allies, sister!" Sarge barked, raising his hands. "101st Airborne! Pathfinders!"
"Airborne?" Léa spat. "You fell on Sainte Mère Église like drunk angels. Lit up the town for German target practice. My brother died in that church square because your parachutes woke the SS."
Hank stepped forward, wincing as blood stained his bandage.
"Mademoiselle Léa, your brother died for La France. A hero's death. Far nobler than mine shall be—expiring of gangrene and bad poetry!"
He bowed, then let out an apologetic BRRMP.
"Pardonnez moi. The beans here lack… diplomacy."
Léa stared, then laughed. "You are mad, soldat." She lowered her Sten. "But madness is sane in this war. Come. We have a priest's hole to spare."
The Confessional Hideout
Beneath a ruined chapel lay the Maquis' cache. The air reeked of damp stone and desperation. Candles guttered on crates of British plastique, stolen Panzerfausts, and wheels of rancid cheese.
Jenkins gasped. "A secret base! Like Dick Tracy!"
"Quiet, enfant," Léa hissed. "Or the Boche will hear your stupidity."
While Sarge traded K rations for intel ("SS patrols doubled near Sainte Mère's bridge…"), Doc examined Hank's wound.
"Gangrene's flirting with you, Rigby," Doc said softly, prodding the infected flesh. "Smells like… spoiled hope."
"Ah, my signature scent!" Hank wheezed, forcing a grin. "Can you stitch it, Sawbones? Preferably with rhyme?"
Juni watched, fists clenched.
ANALYSIS: BACTERIAL INVASION. SURVIVAL PROBABILITY: 62%... IF HE REACHES A FIELD HOSPITAL.
But the Chronitron pulsed with its grim countdown: TOMORROW. SAINTE MÈRE ÉGLISE.
Sarge's Secret
Sarge pulled Juni aside.
"Rigby's dying, isn't he? Not just the arm."
She nodded.
He lit his last cigar stub, eyes shadowed.
"Knew a guy like him in '18. Talked like Shakespeare. Fought like the devil. Died laughing at a German joke none of us got."
He blew smoke toward a cracked Virgin Mary statue.
"Rigby's got that look. Like he knows the punchline."
Jenkins' Broadcast
Jenkins fiddled with a Maquis radio scavenged from a dead SS officer. Static screeched.
"…schwerpunkt at Carentan… Fallschirmjäger regrouping…" German transmissions crackled.
"…Utah Beach secure… Airborne losses catastrophic…" American voices sounded grim.
Then—a clear, bright broadcast:
"This is Liberty Belle! Broadcasting hope from somewhere in France! Here's Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree for our boys!"
Glenn Miller's swing music filled the crypt, sweet and haunting.
Jenkins wept. "It's home*, Doc!"*
Léa snatched the headset. "Idiot! You broadcast our location!"
The Germans Arrive
THUD THUD THUD.
Boots stomped overhead. German voices barked orders.
"Verdammt! Partisanen!"
Chaos exploded:
Maquis grabbed their guns.
Sarge tossed plastique to Léa. "Light the candles, sister!"
Doc shoved Hank toward a tunnel exit. "Go! Your date with destiny stinks worse than your gas!"
Jenkins clutched the radio. "But Liberty Belle—!"
PURGE MODE: TACTICAL
Juni grabbed a wheel of rancid cheese.
"CHEESE BASED PROJECTILE INCOMING!"
She hurled it up just as Germans ripped open the confessional grate.
SPLAT!
The cheese exploded in rotten glory, splattering Nazis.
"MEIN GOTT! WAS IST DAS?!"
As they gagged, Léa primed the plastique.
"Go!" she shouted. "To Sainte Mère! Tell them… Léa remembers her brother!"
The Road at Midnight
They fled into flooded ditches as the chapel exploded behind them—Léa's final stanza.
Hank leaned on Juni, trembling.
"Sainte Mère Église… lovely name. Sounds like a place a chap might… retire."
"Shut up, Rigby," Sarge snapped. "Save your breath for walking."
Jenkins sobbed quietly. "Liberty Belle stopped playing. Did the Nazis get her?"
Doc rested a hand on his shoulder.
"Hope's harder to kill than you think, kid. It just… changes stations."
Ahead, through skeletal trees, the clock tower of Sainte Mère Église rose against the moonlit sky.
Juni's Chronitron pulsed once—a dying gasp. Letters burned on its cracked screen:
WHITE ROOM: 12 HOURS
Hank saw it. His hand squeezed hers.
"Whatever waits there, M'lady… promise me you'll throw something at it."
End of Chapter 5
The town lay silent, the war's distant crump its only heartbeat.
Sarge checked his ammo. Doc adjusted his makeshift lens. Jenkins clutched his Iron Cross.
Juni looked at Hank—bloody, pale, impossibly alive.
Twelve hours.
Twelve hours to cheat fate or break time itself.
Hank managed a weak smile.
"Onward, Misfits. Let's go wake the dead."