James Shipman - Task Force Baum

He lay there on the cold ground for long minutes. He was afraid to rise, worried that Knorr might return and pounce as soon as he showed any sign of recovery. After what seemed an eternity, he finally rose cautiously to his knees and turned his head slowly all around him, making sure the sergeant was gone. He didn’t see the man anywhere. He breathed a sigh of relief that immediately sent sharp pains down his back and upper legs. He still felt the stabbing throb where the boot had kicked his back. He was worried he might have internal damage. No matter, he couldn’t go to the hospital. That was certain death. He lifted himself to a squatting position, one knee still down, but the other foot on the ground. With a gagging groan of anguish, he drew himself up to a hunched, semi-standing position and shambled toward the nearby entrance to Goode’s headquarters.

He reached the door and slowly pulled it open, leaning against the frame, trying to find an angle where the fire in his back didn’t burn so deeply. He fell into the doorway and hit the wood floor hard, the blow sending flashing lights through the darkness of his mind.

“Hell, Curtis!” He heard Waters shouting. “What on earth happened to you?”

“Knorr,” whispered Curtis, with clenched teeth. He felt close to passing out. There were hands on him in an instant.

“Where does it hurt?” asked Waters.

“My back. He kicked me over and over.”

The colonel ran his hand down the captain’s back, probing gently. He touched a spot, and Curtis screamed out in agony.

“Get a doctor,” said Waters to someone else in the room, “and be quiet about it.”

Curtis lay there for a while, Waters talking to him and holding his hand. The captain heard boots on the wooden floor and a new voice enter the room.

“What is it?”

“Curtis was badly beaten by Knorr. I need you to look at it.”

The captain felt prodding again. He squirmed and called out again when the fiery pain grew too intense.

“He’s got some bruised ribs,” said the doctor. “Perhaps some damage to his kidneys as well. No way to tell for sure right now.”

“What can we do about it?” asked Waters.

“He needs rest and watching. Let’s get him to a cot, and I’ll keep an eye on him. He will need to stay put for a few days.”

Curtis heard Waters giving the order and felt hands on his shoulders and legs.

“Careful now,” said the doctor. “We don’t want to hurt him any more than he has been.”

The captain was lifted as gently as possible. He screamed again as the slight twisting sent scorching fingers of pain up and down his back. He opened his eyes and saw Waters and the doctor above him, along with the lights and the bobbing of the ceiling. They moved him into a separate, smaller room. In a few moments, it was over, and he was lying down on a cot, a pillow under his head. Waters quickly brought him a blanket and tucked it around his feet and up to his chest. He smiled down at Curtis. “There you go, son. Now you just lie there and rest.”

“But what about the liberation, the evacuation? I’ve got to get back to my boys.”

“Don’t worry about that now. I’ll send someone else to deal with your barracks. If Patton gets here, we won’t have a thing to worry about. If they evacuate us, well—”

“Well what?”

“We’ll worry about that when we need to. Now get some rest.”

Waters departed, leaving Curtis alone. The colonel turned the light off and closed the door. The captain lay in the darkness, a flicker of light poking through cracks in the rafters far above. The pain in his back was almost unbearable. He lay that way for a long time, the sound of murmured conversations in the next room too low for him to understand. Finally, he fell into a fitful, tortured sleep.

He was jolted awake by the lights and a loud voice. He tried to sit up before he remembered his injury and wrenched his back anew. He was trying to recover from the shock when he heard Waters’s voice, thick with urgency.

“Curtis, wake up!”

“What is it?” he asked, the pain still throbbing through his back, his head groggy from his half sleep.

“They’re taking us away. We have to line up for roll call. Word just came down to Goode.”

Curtis shook his head. “I can’t move. There’s no way.”

Waters bent down on one knee, his hand reaching out to grasp the captain’s arm. “You have to. If you don’t, they’ll kill you where you lie.”

“Maybe it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Nonsense. Look at me, Captain!”

Curtis opened his eyes. Waters had leaned in now, and his face was close. “You’re going to get off of this cot, and you’re going to walk out that door. You’ll stand good and straight for that roll call. I don’t care how damned long it takes. And you’re going to walk out of this camp with the rest of us and survive. You got that?”

Curtis nodded. He steeled himself against the agony and reached his hand out for Waters. The colonel grasped his hand and slowly pulled him to a sitting position. Fire lanced his back. He shouted out again, but he ground his teeth and continued to pull himself up until he was standing. With Waters’s help, he limped slowly out of the room and into the front of the headquarters building. A few other men were there, including Goode. They watched Curtis limping out with sympathy and fear in their eyes.

This was a joke. There was no way he could stand on his own. He was going to tumble over the second Waters let him go. He might as well just stay in bed and wait for Knorr to track him down. Even as these thoughts ripped through his mind, another part of him steeled himself and demanded that he continue, that he try to survive. He stared grimly at the other men as he stumbled past them. Goode came to attention and saluted. The other men, as one, did the same. Buttressed by this show of solidarity, he stumbled on.

By some miracle, he made it out of the front door and into the POW yard. He could make out the large cluster of men as they milled about, slowly putting themselves in position according to their barracks for the roll call. Curtis scanned the nearby German guards, trying to find Knorr, but he couldn’t see the blond serpent anywhere. Perhaps he would be lucky, and the sergeant would be off duty or called away. If he was absent, Curtis knew he had a far better chance of surviving.

“You have to straighten up now,” whispered Waters.

“I can’t.”

“If you don’t, you’ll be dead. Suck it up, Captain.”

Curtis focused on his back. Slowly, with Waters’s help, he drew himself upward. He gasped at the hot pain, but he kept pushing until he was standing more or less erect.

“Now walk with me. Not too fast. I’ll help you.”

The captain took one step, then another. Each movement was burning agony, but he kept going, moving toward the mass of men. His barracks was several hundred yards away. They would never make it that far, so Waters was leading him to the nearest group, trusting to luck that the Germans would not notice he was out of place and order him to the proper group. The journey took long minutes, and Curtis was sure with each step that he could not make another. Somehow, he managed to reach the lines of POWs, and Waters pulled him into place, explaining to the nearby men what was going on. Several of the taller kriegies moved quickly to surround Curtis, in front, back, and on each side, attempting to shield him from the prying eyes of the guards.

“All right, Curtis. I have to leave you,” said Waters.

“Sir, I can’t stand here for long by myself.”

“You have to. Don’t think about the pain. Think about getting out of here. Whether it’s today or a few days from now, we are going to be free. You look at me, Curtis!” ordered Waters.