The stench was insulting. A deep, saturated soot from gun powder and recently used explosives clogged the air. The sky blocked by a hazy screen. Buildings crumbled from the impact of German steel while wails from the dying echoed through the near barren streets. This was the fate of Poland’s capital, Warsaw. A ghost of a city once brimming with beauty and commerce had turned into a landscape of an ill nightmare.

Verena covered her nose with a handkerchief as she surveyed the area beyond the medical tent. With ample protesting from her family, she became a nurse within the German Red Cross. Only by name however. All the medical personnel knew that the Red Cross was controlled by the Wehrmacht. German soldiers were given priority, the poles, devastated by Hitler’s tactic, Blitzkrieg, were treated last. Any who did otherwise was removed from his or her station. Not that many cases occurred however. The superior people deserved life more so than the filthy.

“Fraulein!” A German soldier was walking straight towards her as she quickly smoothed her bloodied nurse uniform and turned to face the man. What was once a clean white was now grey and caked in dried blood. “Are there any empty beds in this tent? The others are all full.”

She moved to the tent motioning for the soldier to follow her. “We have … four openings. How many?”

“A whole squad. So, nine.”

It didn’t sit well with the nurse to turn away patients. Verena tried to accommodate however she could. The medical tent was meant to hold forty patients maximum, they currently attended to sixty. She felt like a gatekeeper more than anything, for she decided who could or couldn’t enter.

She felt her stomach flip. More badly wounded men to treat. When she signed on to do her part for the Fatherland she never thought the things she’d witnessed would be so grotesque. However, such was the fate she chose instead of baring children like her other woman in the Reich. Her father had tried to find her a suitable match, but the men she’d seen disinterested her so. There was no feeling with any of whom she met. Why bother with creating a family based on duty alone? It was ludicrous. She dare not share it though. Thoughts like this was what sent people straight to a Gestapo holding cell. Women included. She shuddered from the stories she remembered hearing.

“Only four,” she finally said. “Check the other tents; they may be open. Can you carry the wounded here?”

“Yes.”

With that, the soldier was off as he held his helmet down with his hand.

“More?” It was Margaret, another nurse Verena worked with. “For heaven’s sake Verena! We cannot hold anymore!”

“But we have four empty spaces.”

Margaret sighed, wiping a sheen of sweat from her forehead. She wasn’t an unattractive woman. Margaret came from Hamburg. Unlike Verena’s family, the brunette came from a farming background, an occupation looked down upon by the middle and upper class. While a tad on the obtuse side, she woman still looked rather well.

“We’ve already got more than enough to attend to! Seven cannot take care of sixty. Simply cannot!”

She couldn’t deal with this right now. Verena walked into the tent as she quickly washed her hands in a dirtied bowl. She moved to the first of the four soldiers brought in. The other nurses who were checking on the ‘stable’ patients came to help. “Get some bandages,” she said as she began to inspect the wound. She gagged. The man’s leg was dreadfully close to severed. “Wait…”

Margaret came over and inspected the leg. She frowned. “Amputation. I’ll go get the doctor.”

Verena’s hand began to tremble. Amputation! How awful she thought to herself. Images of more blood filled her mind as she stepped back. She couldn’t stand to see that. Small gun wounds were fine, but this was far too much.

“Verena?”

She didn’t hear the voice.

“Verena!”

“What?” she half screamed the word. The soldiers were looking at her, as well as the other nurses. “…Sorry.”

Margaret placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “You’ve yet to take a walk from this, no?”

She stared blankly back. Did she or did she not take her recommended break? She couldn’t tell. With the constant stream of patient after patient, she had lost track of time.

The next thing she knew, Margaret had guided her to the tents opening and pushed her out. “Don’t come back for another half hour. Go get something to eat, walk around the controlled zone. Take your mind off of this for a moment. When you’re ready, come back.”

The older woman spun on her heels and marched back in leaving Verena to herself. Perhaps Margaret was right. Maybe all she needed was a breather. Taking off her nurses hat, she walked slowly walked towards the checkpoint leading to the city. She nodded to a soldier as he let her pass into the city. While there wasn’t anything much, the desolated city somehow made her at ease. A peculiar feeling.

Though the invasion had only started months ago, the area where the Wehrmacht had assumed control was finding an uneasy normalcy. Small cafe — the ones that weren’t blown to bits — had patrons visiting, brothels were opened for German sons, and the citizens of the near defeated country hid from the invaders. Especially the Jews.

The Fuhrer’s loathing for the Jewish people was clear. On every propaganda poster, public humiliation in the streets of Berlin, and the destruction of shops, ghettos had been formed to imprison the enemies of the Reich. Verena’s friends who were Jewish had been sent there. She didn’t see the danger in them whatsoever; however, years of propaganda and education quickly changed that.

Walking into a relatively empty store front save for a few soldiers and Poles, Verena took a seat at an empty table. The atmosphere rivaled the gloominess of a rainy day. It sucked all the energy from her. She placed her face into her blood caked hands. She loved the Reich and the Fuhrer; but, she wanted all this violence to stop. She wanted a peaceful Germany. The invasion of Poland was slowly wrapping up. The Fuhrer had already promised a strong and secure empire with the capture of Poland. She took comfort in that promise. It’d all be over soon.

Sura let out a puff of air to move the bit of hair that had fallen in her eyes. Her hands were currently occupied by a tray full of used glasses and dirty dishes. The lunch rush had just ended and the task of cleaning up the mess was left to her. Her hands trembled slightly with the weight of the tray as she placed it atop the counter. She used the back of her dirty hands to move the rest of her hair out of the way. It had been months since the invasion had begun, and Sura was sick of it. She wanted these people out of her home. She wanted her house to be whole again, and most of all she wanted her sister back.

Rebecca unfortunately took after her father, with brown hair and brown eyes and the prominent Jewish nose. She was one of the first taken to the camps. Sura could still hear her screams in the middle of the night. It was a horrible thought, but she was grateful her mother had passed on before this had all happened. She wouldn't have survived it. The only reason Sura had escaped capture was because her father had claimed she was adopted. Her blue eyes and blonde hair had validated the lie, along with her perfect command of German.

"Come on, girl! Get your head out of the clouds and back on the tables where they belong!" A tall wiry man behind the counter bellowed. She quickly cleared the tray of the dirty dishes and went back to clean up the rest, weaving through the patrons that continued to mingle on the floor, talking about this or that involving the war. She scowled. She wanted it none of it, but in actuality, what could she possibly do to avoid it?

There were a few things she was grateful to the invasion for and the first among those was the prospect of marriage. She wasn't opposed to the idea of it, of course. But rather that she didn't want to marry someone she didn't love. Her father had introduced her to many fine young men, but all of them had the same insufferable trait. They treated her as chattel, a prize to be won. She wanted someone to marry her because of her mind, because of what she had to say on matters that women had no say in. Not simply because she had a pretty face. She sighed, catching a glimpse of a girl sitting at a table she had just cleaned.

She took her notepad out of her apron and made her way to her. "Is there anything I can get you?" she asked politely. It was the last thing she wanted to do. The uniform she was wearing was a dead giveaway as to who she was and she couldn't help but feel contempt for the Nazi nurse. It mattered little that her profession was actually a noble one and that Sura secretly wished there was something she could do for the cause. The fear of being discovered was too great for her to risk it however, so she waited tables to be kept in the loop. "We're out of today's special, but we have plenty on the menu."

Verena was just about to leave when a voice stopped her. Taking her out of her grim stupor, she blinked in surprise when a very blonde woman with piercing blue eyes stood before her. They had people like this Poland? Back home, the Fuhrer spoke of how the brothers and sisters in Poland were disgraceful creatures to the Aryan standard of beauty. Yet, here stood a woman whom completely shattered that preconception. Why, if she were in Germany, she'd be highly sought after! A shame the woman was born in this god forsaken country that spelt her people's blood. It made her think of the many other women that surpassed her in the Aryan beauty. What a sad thought it was.

It took all of Verena's control to not go slack-jaw in surprise. "You can speak German?" she asked. She brought her hands away from her face. She must've looked terrible. Her clothes were still stained with dried blood, her normally well-kept blonde hair ill-kept, and smudges of grime smeared across her face that only made her pale-green eyes stand out more. Truthfully, she wanted nothing. "If you have any black coffee, fraulein, that'll do. After today, I don't have the stomach to eat anything. Are you originally from the fatherland? You lack the distasteful polish accent. A horrid thing it is."

A commotion drew her attention outside as she saw three soldiers walk down the streets. She scoffed indignantly as the three caroled a cohort of people wearing the yellow star on their arms. Jews. Mixed feelings crawled through her skin. She welled with pride that the soldiers were helping ridding the blight on the world, yet she felt sorrow as well. They were people too.

"How you poles tolerate them confounds me," she said, oblivious to the waitress. The other soldiers in the cafe were making crude remarks to the passing caravan of prisoners. "Yet, how we treat them astounds me as well..."

It took only seconds for Verena to fully comprehend what she said out loud. Her eyes went directly to the soldiers. She sagged in some relief that they hadn't heard her. If they did, she'd be thrown into that sad looking herd and marched away. "Excuse me, I ramble. The coffee please."

Sura looked at the patron in mock appreciation. In all honesty with her first comment, she wanted to punch her right in the nose. She didn't of course, as that would give her position away. She would be of no help to the cause if she were thrown in some underground cell, or worse, a labor camp. "Yes, I speak German fluently. I lived in Germany for one year with friends," she said, trying to hide her disdain for the German woman in front of her. "Yes, it is quite distasteful," she agreed but not wholeheartedly. "I was adopted by Jews, but I am originally from Germany," she continued to explain. The reason why had long since been lost to her. Perhaps she was intrigued by a woman who both loved and hated what was going on around her. To be frank, Sura only felt pity for the woman.

"They are human beings. The fact that they are unpleasing to the eye to some gives nobody any right to treat them in such a repugnant manner," she said, the anger in her voice was rising. Instead of letting it seep out even more into this torrid conversation she turned to get the nurse her coffee. "A coffee please, Casmir." The wiry man from behind the counter sprang to life as he watched the soldiers outside berate the Jews that brought forth the same reaction in the blonde at the front.

Sura walked briskly towards her table and slammed the saucer and cup a bit harder than she intended. But she gave no indication of an apology. "Will there be anything else, Fraulein?" she said in a bitter tone. She wanted to get away from her as soon as possible. She felt as if the nurse could smell her religion on her, although she wore nothing that would give her away except a small tattoo of the Star of David on her inner thigh. She got it tattooed on her skin a few weeks after her sister was captured, from a Jewish Rabbi who wanted everyone to wear something for protection but something that no one could remove if they couldn't see it. It ached her heart that because of these… people, if she could call them that, everything she knew and loved had been ripped out from under her. "You’d do well with sticking to the feeling of astonishment. You would not feel the same if the shoe was on the other foot, Fraulein."

Verena watched as her order was being fulfilled. Was she angry at her? Of course she was. The whole country of Poland probably hated her guts, for it was her people that ravaged their once beautiful country. Verena was so tired of it all. While the home front was filled with the vigor of victory, they didn't see what happened on the actual front. Sons and fathers died. Wives too when the bombs fell upon the cities. Before the war, Verena had visited the countryside of Poland. It was beautiful; her family came as well. The way that it burned now. It made her wary of what propaganda and speeches the Reich's government gave.

What the waitress said to her wasn't wrong. The jews were also human. She had jewish friends. They went to university together and enjoyed each others company very well. Why was she so quick to get rid of them? Just because the Fuhrer called them the sole instigators for the fatherland's downfall? How daft. It was also because of the recession they came out of due to the first world war! Her family had come from poverty and built up during those early years as proud, pure Germans. They had hired jewish and non-jewish workers; her father respected each equally. However, when the great change came, he hated them.

The clash of the cup filled with her order again against the table made her jump. She looked down and then up. She frowned. "If I angered you somehow, that really wasn't my intention," she said taking the cup and sipping its contents. It was warm. She looked over as the soldiers finally left and joined their colleagues outside. She breathed easy as it was only polish customers left. "Not every German is so bad, Fraulein. Not that you'll believe that of course. The Fuhrer is such a magnificent speaker; he makes you believe everything he says without too much thought. He took away my friends when they spoke out. The Gestapo. Nasty people. Andria was one of them. She too was a jew. It's funny how fear changes you..."

Finishing half her cup, Verena realized how much she said. Her heart immediately went cold until she remembered that the people in here weren't German. Weren't the Gestapo. She cleared who throat and took out a few coins. "I spoke too much. Here's the payment for the coffee," she said. She slowly got to her feet. She was probably needed back at the medical compound. "Stay safe, Fraulein. I appreciated your company, even if you did not."

Sura released a dispirited sigh. She really did feel bad for the nurse. Her bloodstained uniform, the grime smeared across her face and neck, the distant look in her eye. All were telltale signs that she had been through a terrible ordeal. Signs that she had seen things that no one at their age should ever have to see. A feeling of regret welled up in her chest as the woman apologized. Sura's shoulders slumped with defeat.

"Please, do not apologize," she said. "Whatever is going on here is not your fault, and I should not have taken my anger out on you." The blonde was right, not all Germans could be as bad as the Fuhrer. Here this woman sat, her mind heavy with the deaths of countless soldiers who were doing what they thought was right, including herself. It wasn't her fault that she had been brainwashed.

Sura wondered what the nurse would say if she invited her to see the other side of the mess the Germans had caused. Would it change her mind? Would it shake all the years of misguided information? She didn't know, but in her heart she knew she had to at least try. "Please, don't leave," she said. "I'd like to show you something."

It was peculiar. Moments before, all Verena could sense from the woman was anger. Now, she felt the complete opposite. Pity? Sympathy? The woman must have been as frustrated as her, having her home being shelled to pieces. The Red Cross symbol on her nurses uniform probably didn't mean a thing at all. It wasn't news that their organization was forced to treat german soldiers first before any others. Many poles had died because of it.

"It's quite alright," she said, offering a smile that she rarely gave these days. There wren't too many things to smile about at all in the fell clutches of war. "I sometimes forget that I'm not at the immediate mercy of the Gestapo. Our words have to be spoken carefully. The right things earn favor while the wrong things got you thrown into a dark cell. I love the Fuhrer, the fatherland, and the sacred mission he so passionately speaks of. I came hear thinking all of this," she motioned to the things outside, "was well justified, to cleanse Europe. Now, I think it makes us barbarians more so than civilized people."

Verena stood there surprised when the waitress asked her not too leave. She had to go back to the tents. She was sure her thirty minutes were up. Well up in fact. Would they all be okay if she didn't head back? A part of her didn't want to go back after her treasonous words she shared with a complete stranger. What if the waitress was an informant? Her strikingly beautiful features that rivaled many german women in the Reich, and her perfect command of german couldn't be a coincidence. Fear clutched at her heart as her new found revelation saturated her thoughts like a parasite.

Her eyes refocused. It was getting harder to breathe. "Show me what?" she asked tentatively. "You're not ... you're not with the Gestapo are you...? Could you forget everything I said?"

There was a sense of confusion currently overwhelming Sura. The woman sitting at her table was German, she loved the Fatherland, she represented the chaos that was sweeping the young girl's home and here she was being very amiable, when all Sura wanted to do was hate her. The fact that she held a noble position didn't help matters much, on top of the way she sounded conflicted about the situation herself.

Sura sighed, it was useless trying to make sense of the entire situation. She would only get a headache, giving her reason to stop overanalyzing it. "That is the Germans' problem," she said with exasperation. "None of you have the power to cleanse anything. God is the only one with the power to decide who lives and who dies. I don't know why you Germans think you have that power."

She tried to be patient, but every word she heard from the Germans was a crock and it angered her. "If you believe any of this," she gestured around her, "is right, then you are misled. There is nothing cleansing about any of it. It's murder!" She couldn't help but get angry. She missed her father, she missed her sister. Every night she slept alone in a cot in the back of the café, wondering, hoping, that her family and friends were alright. She dreamt every night of fighting back and giving the Germans a taste of their own medicine.

She laughed when the woman assumed she was Gestapo. "Oh darling, you of all people know the Gestapo better than anyone," she said still laughing, "and after what you just told me, do you think you'd still be alive? I just want to show you how this inhuman war looks from my perspective, that and no more. You may leave if you wish, but perhaps seeing it from my eyes will help that feeling of doubt in your heart." She looked into her eyes, hoping that she could see the sadness in them.

Of course she knew the Gestapo much better than anyone here. She couldn't say she had very many run ins with the police of the Reich. Nor was she looking for any opportunity to be acquainted with them. The situation of mentioning them here was highly inappropriate; however, it must have been the waitress's overt German attributes that made Verena question it so. The state rarely called on women to act in such rules. It wasn't unheard of though. An informant had ratted out her neighbor back when she was in Berlin. It was a terrible sight to behold.

Verena's lips creased down as she listened to the last words parting from the waitress's mouth. It was the Red Cross's obligation to help any prisoner of war or civilian that was included within the Geneva convention. They were to give aid however they could. Being from the German branch, however, complicated things a great deal. Would it be so bad to follow the girl? What if she had more nefarious aims than what she let on? Leaving the German controlled zone frightened Verena so. But she signed on to give aid. Why cower from the duty now? Because I'm German she thought to herself. Regardless if she wore the red cross on her sleeve, it wouldn't matter to the angered man or woman looking for an outlet.

Clasping her hands and fidgeting, a terrible habit when she was nervous, her lips creased downward. "What you're going to show me..." she finally said. She couldn't help but notice the other patrons blatantly looking at her now. It was as if she were a cornered doe amongst a pack of wolves. She sighed. "How long will we be? Will we be leaving the German occupation zone?"

Sura couldn't help feeling pity. The girl was just as scared as she was. Everyone was staring at them, more so at Sura, who had temporarily forgotten her place. "My name is Sura," she proffered, hoping it might soothe the girl somewhat. She was very pretty in spite of the mess that was her uniform. Under other circumstances, they could have been friends, but now... Sura dismissed the thought. "It won't take long, it is only one block behind this building," the Jewess wasn't sure how far the perimeter for the Occupation went on. She hoped that the girl would know and could judge its distance with that information.

There was a small glimmer of hope welling inside Sura. If this girl was conflicted, then perhaps there were more people of the Reich that felt the same. With some work, there was a chance they could turn the war, possibly end it. She didn't believe all Germans could be that heartless. What angered her is that they know deep down that this entire conflict was wrong, but they still followed asinine orders. They killed people against their better judgment, without a thought as to how it felt to be persecuted.

There was not much else she could say. She stood there waiting, looking at her enemy in the eyes. Everything was a mess, all she wanted to do was fix it.