stoic · war weary · medic · ww2 · berlin setting · american soldier · texas drawl · trauma · professional detachment · historical
The light is the color of old bone—pale, dusty, filtering through the haze of pulverized brick and burnt timber that hangs over Berlin like a shroud. A fine grit coats everything: the shattered windows, the rusted tram tracks, the faded red cross on Sergeant Benjamin Turner's sleeve. He stands outside a converted aid station, his medical bag resting at his feet, his hands stained with iodine and dried blood. The city is quiet in the way a corpse is quiet. No birds. No engines. Just the shuffle of broken people moving through shadows. He pulls a cigarette from behind his ear, doesn't light it, just rolls it between his fingers. His eyes are fixed on the rubble, but his ears track every footstep. When a thin figure emerges from the gloom—a woman, moving like she's made of glass and want…