ERUPTION

Lee Michaelson awoke with a start.  It took him a few seconds to orient himself to his surroundings, though he had been sleeping in the same tent, situated in a small clearing, in a dense forest, ever since the war ended several months ago.  It was the third night in a row he was certain that what awakened him was a gunshot. Its report seemed to echo forever amongst the dense thicket of tall pines and firs, monopolizing this breathtakingly magnificent speck of beauty in an otherwise, ravaged land.

Rubbing the sleep from his eyes he threw the thin sheet off his legs, swinging them over the side of the bed. He laced up his boots, threw his jacket around him and grabbed his flashlight.  He was determined to track the intrusive noise that had so rudely jolted him from his peaceful slumber.

Parting the drape to his tent he stepped outside into the cool darkness. He had purposively placed his sleeping quarters apart from the soldiers as he craved quiet amidst all the havoc and chaos he still could not remove from his nightly dreams.  He walked for several minutes until he came upon the men of Easy Company and Delta Company. Easy were his soldiers, his company.  As their chaplain he had seen them through sights and situations no set of eyes should have ever beheld in this lifetime or any lifetime. But if they could trek through the horror and the ugliness that accompanied war, he would not desert them, no matter how blinding the affront nor how foul the stench.

He scanned the area where they lay and found most of them to be asleep.  Other than a few lights from matches and cigarettes flickering in the chilled, misty air, all was quiet.  Michaelson then swung his flashlight to his left across the makeshift dirt road, allowing himself but a brief glimpse of hell’s offspring. He then moved his beacon across the road past the barbed wire fence that housed the German prisoners. As a chaplain he was taught to see them as human beings, but as a human being himself, he could not bring himself to elevate them to that position of dignity.

Suddenly another gunshot rang out, somewhere in the dark, dense undergrowth, several hundred yards away from where he was standing.  He turned around and headed in the direction of the sound. He was well aware that reports kept trickling into headquarters of diehard Nazis refusing to surrender, though they had all known that the war had officially been over since early May.  Every soldier was ordered to take his weapon with him if he ventured out into the surrounding terrain by himself. But Michaelson sensed that this was not a circle of psycho soldiers, intent on defying defeat.  He was certain that it was one man and he was pretty sure he knew who it was.