The Spirit of the Corps » Band of Brothers

106: A Little More Alive

Chuck's surgery was long and intense, and Charlie was the brain surgeon's only assistant. His usual team were all at home, sleeping, and they hadn't had the time to seek out and rouse all of them.

But, after a three and a half hour operation, the brain surgeon, Doctor Kneissl, finished stitching up the wound in Chuck's temple and stepped back from the operating table. "He will live," he informed Charlie with a nod.

Slowly, cautiously, a smile began to spread across Charlie's lips. "He's going to be okay?"

Kneissl nodded once more, and the tiniest hint of a smile ghosted over his lips as Charlie let her relief show on her face.

Charlie tended to Chuck in the aftermath of the surgery, making sure he was stable before assisting the resident nurses of the hospital in getting him settled in a bed in a private room. When she emerged, intending to seek out Speirs to update him, she found Kneissl still lingering outside.

Lit from above by the bright lights of the hallway, he was surrounded by an almost otherworldly glow. His hands were buried deep in the pockets of the coat he had put back on over his striped pyjamas at some point since the surgery, and he looked about as tired as she felt.

Charlie crossed the hallway to him, her boots making a muffled clicking sound on the tile below her feet with every step.

"Will he have any complications?" Charlie asked, inclining her head towards the room she'd left behind. "Paralysis, memory loss..?"

Kneissl considered this question for a moment before giving a quick shake of his head. "I cannot be sure," he informed her. "Perhaps some issues with speech. We cannot know for certain until he wakes up."

"When do you think that will be?"

"Maybe in two hours. Around that, I would think."

Charlie nodded. Her shoulders felt heavy as they slumped with relief. "Thank you," she told him with as much sincerity as she could muster with the last threads of her alertness; having to concentrate for so long had taken all of the energy out of her. "He's a good man," she said, gesturing back to Chuck's room. "Because of you, he'll get to go home and life a good long life."

Kneissl nodded, that ghost of a smile back on his face. "It is my job," he replied simply.

"It's your job to look after your own," she objected, as gently as she could. She needed him to understand the depth of her gratitude. "It's not your job to be pulled from your bed in the middle of the night and forced into an American military jeep to operate on an ex-enemy soldier, while held at gunpoint no less." She let out a heavy exhale. "So thank you. Truly." Her thanks didn't feel like anywhere near enough, but she wasn't quite sure what else there was that she could give him.

Speirs appeared at the end of the hallway then, his eyebrows furrowed low over his eyes as he glowered and stalked towards them. "How is he?" he asked.

Charlie thought she must have been asked that question a hundred times so far tonight.

"He will live," Kneissl informed Speirs the same way he'd informed her at the end of the surgery. "He will wake in two hours, perhaps more, perhaps less, but around two. We cannot know yet of any complications, but I am confident he will be okay. He will live," he said again, rounding out his explanation with the biggest, most important bit of news he had to deliver.

Speirs thanked Kneissl, albeit begrudgingly, and turned to Charlie. "I gotta head back, see if the men found the piece of shit responsible for all this. I'll send Mabel over when I find her."

Charlie nodded. "Take Doctor Kneissl home on your way," she said, not phrasing it as a request. "Chuck's stable. He's done everything we needed him to do."