The little things in life make a big difference.
We’d just crossed into Germany and pulled into a town called Görlitz. It’s beautiful, even now with the smoke blackened towers and the burning fields. We were flagged down by a cheery Herr Emmerich, landlord of a Gastehaus that survived most of the fire. He babbled at us in German but luckily the Doc was able to get some sense out of him. Yes, she knows German too. He was offering us bed and breakfast and hot showers.
We all looked at each other in disbelief. The Colonel, Doc, Monk, the Czech boy.
Showering with hot water and soap was something I’d almost forgotten.
Waking in a proper bed with crisp white sheets was something I never imagined would happen again.
Eating a cooked breakfast with a white napkin on my knee was … well, it was ok.
After breakfast, Herr Emmerich, sat down with us, poured some wine and regaled us with tales of what happened in the town. And the problem he had. There was a gang of militia in the town that were causing problems for the civilians. And he was asking for our help.
The Colonel listened intently.
And then we packed up and left. Emmerich was very unhappy, turns out he knew a lot of English too. I understood. We just weren’t equipped for a fight. I don’t like to think of it as running away, but we weren’t the US Army rolling into Paris to liberate it from the Germans. We were just looking for a bed and a hot shower. So, we rolled out of there and we weren’t happy about it either. But it wasn’t worth getting killed over.
As for our Czech friend, turns out his name is Dalek. After I stopped laughing he was really funny with me for ages even after I tried to explain. I’ve told him that we will all call him Dal, to tell no-one his full name and that he’ll thank me for it. I’d love to show him what I mean but finding a tape and a VCR would be tricky in this place.
Asking us to get rid of some armed thugs wasn’t a small thing. It would have made a small difference. This world is broken. There would just be another bully picking up a gun. And we’d be dead.