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“Camir has already gone this
way. I will lead.”
    “God-damn-it, I’m in charge here!” Monte shouts.
    Yusif smiles, “Well, of course you are, Sergeant,” and bows
his head, letting Monte lead them into the tunnel.
    Smith is under the grate, pushing hard to break it free his
face barely able to get out of the water for air, “Come on, you bastard.” He
works harder, struggling to get a good hold as blood runs from the headless
German corpse and onto his face, “Guys! Hey, guys!”

Chapter 7
    Monte leads them though an intricately carved tunnel. Strange
symbols adorn the walls, crude drawings of women warriors, hooded priests, and
human sacrifice. Camir waits in front of a headless German corpse, scimitar in
hand. Yusif looks at him; Camir shrugs with a smile.
    “Only one?” Monte asks.
    Pilch looks at the head, “What the fuck?”
    It’s the German with the scared face.
    Monte looks to him, “What?”
    “I shot that guy.”
    Monte looks to the head, “Seems you missed.”
    “No, before up top…”
    A screaming German soldier emerges from the darkness running
toward them at full speed. He slams into Pilch, and they both fall to the
ground. Pilch rolls on top of the struggling German and pins him down, “Crazy Kraut.”
    The German looks up at Pilch as he continues screaming his
feet kicking as he tries to run.
    “Jeez, shut ‘em up,’ Oddball says.
    Pilch punches him in the jaw and he stops screaming, looks
into Pilchs’ eyes and then stops moving. Pilch checks for a pulse, “He’s dead.”
    Monte kneels and looks him over.
    Oddball looks to Pilch, “You didn’t have to kill him?”
    “I only hit him.”
    Monte checks for wounds, “He ain’t shot.”
    “Then what?” Pilch asks.
    All eyes look down the tunnel.
    Matty gulps, “Scared to death.”
    Johnson shakes his head, “Bullshit.”
    “No, I heard about it from a guy in Baker Company at Kasserine,”
Matty claims.
    Monte stands, “Matty, shut up.”
    “It’s true; my pa saw it in the Great War,” Clint says.
    “We should go back,” Oddball turns to leave. Monte grabs him
and turns him around.
    “All of you, shut the hell up,” Monte barks, eyeing the men.
    A distant whump of a grenade shakes the tunnel.
    Monte, satisfied that the men are listening, looks down the
tunnel, “Let’s get moving.”
    Screams and gunshots come from ahead. A bullet whizzes past.
    “Johnson, get that other Thompson up here,” Monte orders.
    Johnson moves forward, and they both have the submachine-guns
pointed forward, “Let’s go, slowly,” Monte tells him.
    Johnson holds the Thompson tight, ready to shoot. Bullets breeze
past them. The screams get louder. Something moves from the shadows ahead.
Johnson stops.
    “Steady,” Monte says.
    A German soldier comes at them, walking backwards and firing
wildly. He turns to face them.
    One of the Americans steps on a discolored brick. There’s a
click from the floor. The American looks down.
    The German and Johnson lock eyes. The German brings his
weapon up, Johnson fires, blowing him down. There’s a loud crash, and Monte
spins to see one of the Americans pinned to the ground by a large lead spike
that has fallen from the ceiling and now sticks out of the man’s neck where his
head used to be. It holds the twitching corpse up right like a pin through a
doll.
    “Nobody move!” Monte screams.
    Camir looks at the brick; he points out another booby-trapped
brick nearby.
    Monte nods, “I got it.”
    A bullet whines in and hits an American in the head, and he
falls back dead. Some of the men drop to the ground for cover at seeing this.
Another American lands on a bobby-trapped brick. A metal spike plummets from
the ceiling, the tip of the spike impaling him through the skull and exiting
his mouth. He writhes and groans in agony, vainly trying to pull himself free.
    “God-damn-it. Nobody move!” Monte screams even as more
rounds fly in, “Yusif.”
    Yusif waves Camir forward, and he walks