The quiet Italian officer who had been speaking to the woman, Wojcik, suddenly jerked, making a coughing sound almost like one would make if discreetly covering a belch. With no warning, he crumpled to the ground and the cracking of gunfire was heard in the neat explosion of shattered glass. An abstract thought crossed her mind that he should not have allowed himself to be silhouetted in through the window’s shade before her nurse’s training kicked in.<br/>Isolde leaped forward to catch him and he coughed,<br/><br/>“I’m dying.”<br/><br/>He was conscious but his heart was pounding furiously, Isolde noticed as she caught him by the wrist. Her  hands were instantly covered in bright blood as she barked out,<br/><br/>“Get him to the table.”<br/><br/>Her orders were not meant to anyone specifically but to all universally. Hands obeyed her and the young man lay blinking straight ahead,into her face without really seeing her. Some one, she didn’t recognize the voice murmured,<br/><br/>“He’s been shot. Wounds like that are lethal.”<br/><br/>Isolde glared around at the men standing there and at Officer Wojcik who appeared to be in a state of shock. All talking ceased as she listened to his chest. With a frown, Isolde cleared his airways and then reassessed. She knew where the bullet had entered but damn her if she could see an exit wound.<br/><br/>“Damn bullet has torn up his chest cavity and is still inside.” She said to no one particular. The stricken look of agony on the Italian’s face was enough to make Isolde forget her anger or that this man was her enemy. She was above all else a healer and a woman driven by compassion.<br/><br/>“I need to try to let out some of the blood without injuring him further.”<br/><br/>“Mama, I want my mama. Did you see my brother?” the Italian began to whine in a little boy’s voice. Isolde frowned. He was losing blood and oxygen. The poor man was fading fast. He was sucking air as if he were gulping a vat of water and Isolde knew for sure that his lung must be in sheer tatters. Blood began to bubble up on his lips.<br/><br/>Isolde knew his chest cavity was filling with old air and fresh blood. She grabbed an awl type surgery tool and made a quick puncture in the chest wall. The Italian shrieked with a thin wail reserved for a child who is weary. Blood gushed out with a hissing sound of air under pressure escaping. Isolde was sprayed by the blood, and her arms were bloody up to the elbows. Ignoring this, she worked to control the bleeding and bring him some relief.<br/><br/>She was cursing the Nazis for taking their oxygen machine and their supplies of morphine.She could do nothing to stabilize his blood pressure or his pain. Even though Isolde knew she was fighting a losing battle, she continued to fight for his life<br/>.<br/>She placed a tube in the opening in the chest wall and instructed the soldiers to move the Italian to a semi sitting position while she piled bloody pillows behind him. The patient nearly fell off side ways.<br/><br/>“Hold on to him, Dummkopf.” Isolde snapped as she dropped bloody gaze bandages to the floor.<br/><br/>“No blood to give. No fluids to feed in his veins. Nazi vultures have taken it all. Curses to them all. May Hitler eat cyanide and blow his brains on the walls, alone and in hiding for the way he has reduced the entire world to hell. Goddess visit his iniquity on his three fold.” Isolde was frantically trying to save this man’s life.<br/><br/>“Come on , fight it, live, damn you,” she encouraged while applying pressure, wiping blood, snapping orders to all around her when finally, he arched his back, heels drumming the table and lay still, a gout of blood at his lips. She fought death for several minutes before she became aware of Erlind standing at her elbow<br/>.<br/>Turning, covered in his blood, her face painted with streaks of the crimson life force, Isolde squinted her eyes at Erlind.<br/>“And this is the help you were vowed to bring? His blood be on your hands!”<br/><br/>She turned and pummeling the demon on the chest, wanting nothing more than to be alone with him, like they had been at the hotel in the beginning. The beginning, Life had been full of hope and possibility then.