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Rio furenade of her own and throws it as Stick yells, “More smoke!”

And this time, as soon as the smoke pours forth, Rio jumps to her feet and runs, hunched over, trips—another body—rolls away, gets up again, and runs Jack is ahead of her with Pang and now, in a tear in the s froh with dirt

The opening is narrow, tough to get a grenade in, so she drops to one knee, aims, and fires off a whole clip at that muzzle

Pang slaht of the hole In a desperate voice he cries, “Fire in the hole!” and twists to alrenade inside

It’s an incendiary and explodes in a shower of white phosphorous, so the firing hole is suddenly a brilliant greenish-white gash of mouth Rio tries to push a fresh clip in her M1, but it jarit amid the mud

A Ger hole He’s been hit by the white phosphorous, which burns without regard to water, burns like acid through the German’s uniform

Rio sees his face A fright ony as the chemical eats into his body in a dozen places He sees her He looks at her, pleading and crying so voice

He wants me to shoot him

Geer shoots the burning rin to Rio, and shouts, “My turn!”

Rio climbs to her feet and follows Geer forward, a dark shape wreathed in smoke and rain and darkness

Suddenly Geer falls into the earth, and Rio realizes there’s a trench ahead Geer is bellowing and guns are blazing and Rio raises her rifle, remembers it’s jammed, and stares helplessly as Geer faces three Ger away at close quarters Jenou is standing at the lip of the trench behind the three Krauts, and she fires carbine rounds pop-pop-pop-pop! into their backs and necks and heads Geer,at the top of his lungs Jenou ju and Stick off to the right

They’ve broken through the first line of defenses, but there’s no one cothen theht as well as ahead, and the air is practically a solid object, a ceiling of lead as the squad hugs the ground, shaking, and Geer continues to rave, “I’m comin’ to kill you! I’m comin’ to kill you!”

For long minutes they are paralyzed there, unable to soup fro into the darkness over Rio’s head

But it’s no good, it’s no good, the Ger in, too determined Cole yells, “Fall back!” and then twists wildly and drops to his knees

Rio yells, “Cole!” while crawling to him, and then pushes him down as tracers arc toward him “Where are you hit?” she demands