Sveta had no luck in life. Or, her luck had run out sometime around the defense of Island. In fact, since Winters' transfer to Battalion XO, she'd had nothing but bad luck. First, she'd been shot in the abdomen. As if having her insides ripped by a bullet hadn't been bad enough, she'd been stuck in the corner of a hospital room that included Sergeant Guarnere. Moe Alley's presence made it a little better; at least she got along with him these days. But she wondered where Ron had been placed. Maybe with Compton?

She'd seen Heyliger's arrival two days before. He'd looked like a mess. The rumors claimed friendly fire. Bullets didn't discriminate between friend or foe, they had one purpose and that was to take life.

Like her mother's.

At just after dinner, the large room that contained about a dozen soldiers still buzzed with activity. Nurses, rushing here and there with dressings and bedpans and clipboards, reminded her of the workers in the estate she'd grown up in. Their gentle smiles at the patients seemed genuine, even when many of the men returned the kindness with vulgarity and flirts.

The medication kept her pain down. She'd woken up a few days after arriving in France, taken off the morphine and sleeping pills that had kept her quiet and still. The surgeon said she'd recover, but it would take time.

Sveta didn't have time to sit in a hospital surrounded by men she didn't know, or didn't like.

Alley had the bed next to her. He sat up, the wounds on his chest healing well, and dealt a hand of cards to Guarnere on the cot to his other side. Guarnere could barely walk; the broken leg and wound to his ass made him all sorts of grumbly. Not that she expected anything different.

"You fucking kidding me, Alley? These?" Guarnere scoffed at the cards in his hand. "I mean Jesus Christ, I know you like to win, but be more subtle 'bout your cheating."

Alley just laughed. "Keep thinking that, Gonorrhea. It'll make you feel better when you lose."

About half of the usual dozen full beds were empty. The pleasant weather meant those capable of and allowed to walk had left the confines of the recovery ward. She'd been cleared for walking the day before as long as she took it slow and stopped at any sign of increased damage to the wound. But she didn't want to go alone.

Then again, as Guarnere and Alley droned on in their card game, she didn't want to listen to them either. The spinning ceiling fans could only keep her occupied for so long. She yawned.

"Hey, Captain, you want in on a game?"

The question came from Alley. Still on her back, she rolled onto her healthy side and looked at them. Guarnere frowned from beyond Alley. She felt much the same. But the prospect of laying there, trying to follow a single blade of a ceiling fan as it went round and round in circles, seemed somehow even less appealing.

"What game?" she asked.

Alley shrugged. "What do you know?"

Sveta pushed herself up. A bit of pain shot through her left side, but she stifled it with a bite to her cheek. Stuff down the pain. "Five-card draw and Blackjack."

"You wanna play poker?" Guarnere asked.

Sveta grabbed the white metal of the bed frame and stood. The action felt foreign. But she didn't fall. "Is that a surprise to you, Sergeant?"

Guarnere's jaw set tighter. But only after he looked across and saw Alley snickering into his cards did he protest. "Hey, I ain't met many broads who play Poker. Guess in Russia they teach you different."

"I didn't learn Poker in Russia, Sergeant," she told him. "Luz and Muck showed me how to play. The only thing I learned in Russia," she added, moving closer to use Alley's bedframe for a bit of support, "was how to bluff."

Alley grinned. "Great. This'll be a good game then." He scooted over on his cot to give her a spot to sit.

The open spot made her pause. She had to sit there to play, there was no other option. The tingling of her anxiety filled Sveta's body with chills. But she stuffed it down. She had to sit.

So she sat next to him. Alley had gathered up the cards, not even bothering to continue the game that Guarnere had ranted about. As he shuffled, Sveta watched the space around them.

"Alright, Captain, I've got a question," Alley asked.

The suddenness of his voice made her startle. But she looked at him and nodded. "What?"

"Why are you so jumpy all the time when out of the field?"

Sveta didn't know how to respond. She could see him watching her, even as his hands moved to shuffle the cards without thinking. Guarnere looked as surprised as she did, maybe that he'd spoken up at all. What was she supposed to say?

"How so?" she asked. Guarnere snorted. But when Sveta turned on him, he just looked away. She turned back to Alley. "I'm careful, Alley, because I've been in the business for a while."

"Yeah, what business?" Guarnere interrupted before Alley could respond. "You were only in combat like a month more than us."

Sveta turned on him. His dark eyes glared back into hers. It made her skin crawl. Guarnere was the right mix of brash and ignorant to be potentially dangerous, and that opinion of him had yet to change. He was good to his men, but he didn't understand.

"You're not wrong," she admitted. "But I was taught survival many years before setting foot on a battlefield." Sveta looked down at the cards Alley had passed her. Pair of twos, a queen, a nine, and a six. She looked up at them. "What's the opening bet?"

"Two dollars," Alley said.

She nodded. Sveta assured them she could cover it. As they both agreed, she felt her chest tighten. She stared down at the queen in her hand. Queen of Spades. Unbidden memory of her mother's blank eyes filled her mind. She lowered the cards for a moment. "The enemy you can't see is more dangerous than any enemy you can," Sveta added. She didn't know why she told them this. But she did. "Not just snipers. The one to stab a knife into your back has to step behind you first. That's usually a friend."

Like her father. Like Beria. Like Stalin. They all smiled like friends. They all greeted her like friends. Her father even thought he was one. But they were not friends.

They were enemies.

"You got experience in that, Captain?" Alley prodded.

Sveta looked at him. It took a moment for him to glance up from his cards, but he met her gaze. She bit her lip and then looked back to the discard pile. "I think I've said enough to satisfy your American curiosity."

"Captain Samsonova?"

Sveta looked up at the call of her name from the doorway. The card game disrupted, they all turned. She found Ron standing next to a nurse, frowning. Sveta smiled.

"Captain, you need to start walking," the nurse told her. "Lieutenant Speirs is in the same boat. Neither of you seems to want to do what you're told," the fiery brunette added. "So. You're going to do it together or I'll have to find a surgeon to order you."

"Fine." She handed her cards back to Alley and stood. The bed creaked as she did so, but her balance didn't waver. She released a breath. Instead, she rounded Alley's cot to grab her coat. The nursing staff had allowed her to put back on pants instead of a gown, citing the right to privacy, but her loose tee-shirt would be too cool for outside.

"Hey, nurse," Guarnere called.

"What is it, Sergeant?"

"How's Lieutenant Heyliger?"

The room quieted, even the men who hadn't been involved in the poker match. They all turned towards the woman even as Sveta finished her careful movements to pull on her jacket.

"Touch and go, but the surgeons think he'll be fine," she said. "Once he's stable enough he'll be sent to England."

Guarnere nodded. "Good."

After a last look at her cot, wishing for a moment she had the sidearm Sveta loved so much, she moved somewhat slowly towards the door. Ron watched her. Once they'd gone out into the hall, the nurse turned to both of them.

"Right. You both need to walk for ten minutes. Lieutenant Speirs, you should try for more." She looked at her watch. "That means you should be back to the room no earlier than 1850 hours."

She nodded. The small infection post-surgery had derailed her recovery time. But the nurse was right. She needed to walk. She needed to get moving. And at least it was with Ron, not some random soldier or nurse. As the nurse started down a hall to another large room, they turned left to take a different one.

"How's your recovery coming?" Sveta asked him. "Was it worth the intel you gathered?"

Ron scoffed. "Well, walking is better than sitting."

"Ah yes, I see you followed in Easy's footsteps," Sveta teased. "Shot in the ass, right?"

He nodded. Sveta saw him trying to suppress the pain that each step likely caused. His nose scrunched up a bit, his eyes narrowed. But she figured she looked much the same. It wasn't even that the wound hadn't healed. It had been almost three weeks. The skin had mostly closed. But the pain remained.

She supposed pain was just like that: always below the surface, hidden away to be carried alone. A set of small, round tables sat outside in a small courtyard. A couple of men sat playing checkers by the massive spotlights. A nurse checked a clipboard under another one. In the cool air, she took a deep breath. The sharp pang up her side made her falter, but she forced it away.

"You're quiet," Ron said.

His eyes were on her. Sveta shrugged, not able to conjure a smile at him. She didn't like hospitals. Too many shadowy corners she couldn't watch, too many opportunities for someone to track her moves. And being wounded brought Sveta a whole new level of vulnerability she hated.

"My company would tell you that's normal," she argued.

But Ron just started snickering as they continued around the courtyard. After making brief eye contact with the nurse who kept an eye on them, he shook his head. "This the same Company who thought you were going to assassinate them one by one after you almost killed Guarnere?"

"Same one," she agreed. After a deep breath, she turned to him. "Did you shoot him?"

"Who?"

"The sergeant in your platoon."

Ron paused. His mouth became a thin line, and he looked away for a moment. Then he nodded, and turned to her. "I did."

"Why?"

"He was drunk," Ron told her, crossing his arms over his chest. "Pulled out a gun. He was going to shoot me, or worse, alert the enemy to our position."

She nodded. That made sense. Hard choices had to be made in war.

"Would you have shot him?" Ron asked.

She looked at him. Guarnere? or the D Company Sergeant. "Your sergeant?"

"Yes."

She nodded. "Yes. There are worse ways to die than someone else's bullet."

Weeks ago, she'd told him about missing Russia. About the way, she wished she could see the Volga again. He'd commented only once on the way she avoided mentioning the people. She told him very little. But she'd taken a bullet at his side. And as she looked at him, saw his eyes following her while they shuffled around under the spotlights, Sveta found herself wondering if this was someone she could talk to. She'd never had that.

"Do you miss your family?" she asked him.

Ron shrugged ever so slightly. "I try not to think about them. I'm here to fight, and to win, to die if necessary." Then he turned her way again. "You?"

She stopped breathing for a moment. The shadows didn't hide anyone, or so she hoped. Beria wasn't here, and she had to stop thinking he was. The only Russians anywhere near the hospital were herself and a few diplomats with the Brass.

"I miss my mother," she admitted. Sveta paused in their walk. She folded her arms across her chest and could feel herself rocking a bit on her feet. Admitting it out loud felt equal parts terrifying and relieving. "She died in 1940," Sveta tried to explain. "August."

"And your father?"

He nearly backed up when she looked him in the eyes. Sveta narrowed her eyes, quickly turning away. She was losing the mask here. She had lost it, then gained it, but Ron made it crumble. He shattered it, just by his presence.

"He killed her," Sveta said. At his widening eyes, she continued on. "He didn't pull the trigger, but he killed her."

"What do you mean?"

Her body trembled. It felt like flames fought to escape her chest, her face. Her fists tightened. "She killed herself, with my father's pistol. She got tired of hiding. Tired of the fear." Sveta tried to breathe, tried to think. Pain shot through her abdomen as each memory rushed through her mind. "I hate him. If I could put a bullet between his eyes, I would. Him and Stalin." And Beria. But that she could never say. She could never say his name out loud in an open space. "They killed my mom. They killed Nadezhda Stalina."

Would they kill her too? She couldn't stop shaking. From fear, from anger, from pain, Sveta didn't know. She couldn't tell them apart anymore. They all felt like burning sparks under her skin.

The Korovin pistol that killed her had been Alexander Samsonov's.

The regime that killed her had been Joseph Stalin's.

Her mother had pulled the trigger. But when a puppet had her strings pulled, what else could she do but die? Veronika had left Sveta. Alone, to watch out for Zhanna, to watch out for herself. The bloodstains had never left that mattress. They'd had to throw it away. But she couldn't get the bloodstains out of her memory, and memory could not be thrown away.

She wanted a drink. She needed a drink.

"Nadezhda Stalina?" he asked, a moment later.

"Stalin's second wife."

Ron raised an eyebrow. "How many women close to Stalin killed themselves?"

"I don't know," she admitted. Sveta ran a hand through her hair. She tried to calm down, tried to think, to breathe. "I don't know, those two at least."

"And you want to go back to that?"

The incredulity of his tone made Sveta step back. It cut through the air like the crack of a bullet. He didn't understand.

"I have to go back, Ron. It's my duty," she argued. But as he just shook his head, she could see the anger building in him.

"You're going to go back to a place that killed your mother?" he seethed. "Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

Sveta gritted her teeth. He didn't understand. That scared her more than almost anything. The idea of being the third, the final victim perhaps of Samsonov and Stalin and Beria. The third to point a Korovin pistol at her own temple. But she had no choice. "I love my country as much as you love yours!"

He scoffed. "You could defect. Stay in England, or the States."

It was her turn to laugh. "You don't think I've thought about it? I don't want to work for Stalin any more than you do. But Russia is my home. I don't know America, and what I saw of it and how I was treated made me certain America doesn't want me."

"Then leave the Stalin administration," Ron argued. "Russia's a big place."

Sveta could hear the anger leave his voice even as his shoulders fell. He did care. So she tried to let go of her own anger. "It's not that simple," she admitted. "I'm probably safer closer to Stalin than further away. My father thinks he loves me, and he'll be sure no one touches me so long as he and Stalin are allies. My hands are tied, Ron. It's the way it is. I fight for what I can take within the confines they set out for me."

He didn't respond. He couldn't understand, not really. Especially not without knowing of Beria's piece in the puzzle. But she couldn't tell him that. Not now. Maybe not ever. But then, maybe someday.

They kept walking. Sveta's side began to burn, and each breath became more of a hiss as they finished another lap around the courtyard. But before she could suggest going back, Ron interrupted her thoughts.

"I heard you almost drank yourself to death in Aldbourne."

Sveta raised her eyes to him. She hadn't expected that. Her breakdown on the day of her mother's death seemed to stay quiet. Zhanna and Compton had found her, not the enlisted. That at least had been good luck. But apparently, Compton didn't know how to keep his mouth shut.

"That wasn't my intention," she argued. "I overestimated how much alcohol I could handle."

"You nearly blacked out, Svetlana."

Sveta looked at him. "Yes. I did."

"Why?"

Silence fell between them. The two men who had been playing checkers had left. Only the pretty brunette nurse on duty remained, watching them between writing on her clipboard. Sveta figured she was writing something personal, based on the sheer number of times Sveta had caught her smiling down at the paper.

"21 August 1940," she stated. "That was the day she died."

"Your mother?"

"Yes. Everything changed when she pulled that trigger," Sveta tried to explain. Her voice wavered a bit. Taking a moment to force down the flood of emotions, she paused before continuing. "She left me alone. Alone to watch out for Zhanna, for myself. Politics is a game, but a dangerous one," she said. "She lost. And she left me alone. Sorry if it makes me drink!"

He just nodded.

"I'm tired. I want to sleep." Sveta wasted no time in starting towards the door where the nurse stood. Her side burned. She took a breath. Tears stung her eyes as a jolt like freezing electricity shot through her. Sveta hissed and stumbled towards the wall. "Fuck."

The nurse and Ron reached her at the same moment. "It hurts," she choked out. With every attempt at stuffing back the tears, her side and her face hurt more.

"Come on, hun," the nurse said. "Let's get you back inside."

Sveta forced out a nod. With her help, Sveta pushed off the wall and tried to straighten. Ron's hand on her arm never moved. The firm grip helped, grounded her. She breathed through the pain. She let herself focus on the warmth of the grip on her arm holding her up.

"Steady now," the nurse said. "Lieutenant, are you able to get back to your room?"

Ron turned from Sveta, who he'd been watching, and nodded once. "I'm fine. Standing is easier than sitting. Do you need help?"

Sveta realized he was talking to her. She shook her head. "I'll be fine," she assured him. For years, she'd handled herself. She hadn't cried in front of anyone, not since she could remember. The emotion that being near Ron Speirs brought out scared her. Her chest tightened. "Thank you."

He still didn't remove his hand.

"Lieutenant, you need rest too," the nurse insisted.

He let go. Sveta released a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding as the nurse, whose name she didn't know, spoke to her in a calm, quiet tone. As she steadied herself and they moved off towards the door, she offered Ron a small smile. It was the best she could do. The last thing she saw was his small frown and sharp eyes watching as they turned a corner.

"You need to be more careful, Captain," the nurse said. "Watch yourself. Don't push too hard. You got lucky, there was only a little damage to critical organs. But you were still shot."

Sveta nodded. "I'll try."

"Good. Come, then."

It didn't take long to reach her room. Guarnere and Alley were laying back on their beds, going through letters. Most of the beds, even the ones that had been empty earlier, had refilled. Some men slept, some chatted quietly. Sveta shook off the nurse at the door. She would enter without assistance, no matter the pain.

She'd been in worse pain.

The agony she'd felt in her chest the day she'd seen her mother die hurt more than any bullet ever could.

"You're due for more morphine," the woman told her. "Get to your bed, I'll fetch some."

Sveta nodded. As she moved over to her cot, past Guarnere and Alley, she didn't spare them another glance. Even a halfwit would've been able to read the pain in her face. She hated it.

But at least she'd get morphine. That would take the pain away, and help her sleep. Almost as good as alcohol. She eased herself down till she sat up against the pillows.

"Have fun?" Alley asked her.

Sveta scoffed. "Nothing related to getting shot in the stomach is fun, Alley."

"Ain't that the truth," he joked. "How long are you stuck here, Captain?"

She frowned. The doctor had spoken to her about that yesterday. She had awhile to go. He'd guessed middle to late December at the earliest. That gave at least a month in these cell walls. She told him as much.

"Well, shit. That's Guarnere's recovery time, too," Alley said. He laughed a bit. "Won't that be fun for you two? I'm out in just a couple of weeks!"

Sveta glanced at the Sergeant on the other side of Alley. Over a month with Guarnere for company. His dark eyes met hers. A month with Guarnere. Sveta huffed and looked away. At that moment she made a decision. She'd leave, as soon as she could, even if that meant going AWOL. She would not do two months in a hospital with Sergeant Guarnere as the only company.