With squinted eyes, I stared through the glare of the sun on the fresh fallen snow. The wind bit at my exposed cheeks, but I pushed forward, a trail of red drops following me to the crest of the hill. No tree for shelter, nothing at all really. Just wind, snow, sun, and the winter winds whistling through my ears. I glanced over the hill and down into the valley below, my breath frozen from the cold or with anticipation, my eyes leaping from one side to the other and back again.

Nothing.

Snow and hills for miles to the south, the same to the east and west. My eyes turned back to the north, to my own footsteps and the trail of blood from my arm. I had taken him down, but he was a kamikaze… trained in the art of self destruction. As my bullets ripped through the wings of his plane, he simply aimed up, which frankly I had never seen coming.

I could still picture the scraggly black stubble on his chin as we had come so close.

The Pillar of smoke from my plane rose high into the blue, cloudless abyss above me. Perhaps someone would see it. Perhaps they already had. Perhaps it was someone I didn’t want to see it. The world spun slightly and my feet moved quickly to balance myself. I took a deep breath and looked to my right arm, I felt it wasn’t pretty but the blood loss was starting to get to me.

Through my leather jacket, a bone nearly as white as snow poked out into the chilly air. I recognised it as the humerus, a long bone connecting my shoulder to my elbow. Too bad I didn’t find it humorous. With half a chuckle, I smirk at my own stupid joke. A broken humerus isn’t humorous. A pun so bad my Dad wouldn’t have even approved.

Glancing down the steep slope, the snow shows no prejudice and covers all. Its hard to even tell where ground is considering the depth of the snow. A sharp pain pierces my thoughts and sends my mind reeling in agony. The force of the blow sends me tumbling forward and spinning to face my assailant.

His scraggly black stubble was nearly white with frost, a large knife dripping blood at his hand. The pilot? Surely he’d died!? He grew blurry a moment as I regained my footing. I could see bandages around his left leg, and what looked like a lot of blood on the cloth. He came at me again and my left hand finally proved its usefulness in my life. I twisted his arm violently and thrust my heel at his leg.

Desperate times called for desperate measures and this wasn’t a brawl, this was life or death.

My heart raced as I prayed he didn’t notice a giant bone sticking out of my arm. He was still howling in agony and searching frantically in the snow for his knife when I realised that time was passing. In fact, my life was starting to flash before my eyes.

Dark haired twins, age three. Beautiful young girls. My wife, that perfect natural beauty, as the guys around base called her, the ‘Ultimate’ girl next door. I’d always had a thing for freckles, now I was surrounded by them. Well, not now-

A shimmer from the snow caught my eye and I kicked the snow with my boot. The boot and dagger connect, sending the latter truly up and over the hill. Maybe I should have tried football, Dad always wanted a quarterback in the family. From the snow, my enemy emerged in a rage. His shoulder landed against my right side and the pain blacked me out a moment.

I watched the blue sky as wind whistled through my ears, and I felt weightless. Snow surrounded me in many the many forms between a dusting and chunks as the other guy flailed his arms in circles. Not sure if he wanted to fly or was busy praying for a soft landing. Darkness took me quickly as the snow tumbled down upon me.

Cold.

Everywhere. No wind though. My eyes slid open and through the slits, I saw snow. Not like before. Panic began to set in. My left arm flailed wildly as I pushed heavily with my feet. My head broke through and my eyes caught a glimpse of the sky, darker than earlier, but not quite night. I clawed at the snow, begging my arm to get a grip on something, anything.

Except that.

I felt the cloth in the grip of my hand and looked up to see a single boot, sticking out of the snow. Upside down? That’ll be nearly impossible to get out of. I pulled myself from my own cold, white grave and stared at the boot. It was moving, especially since I grabbed it. My good hand began acting separate to the thoughts in my mind.

Dig, dig, dig.

Shouldn’t we leave him to die?

Dig, dig, dig.

He almost killed us!

Dig, dig, dig.

What’s to stop him from doing it again?

I grabbed a gloved hand and pulled him forth from the snow. I drop his hand and he tumbled away from me, nearly face first. He spun, his eyes narrow and his brow furrowed. We stared at each other, unsure of what was next. His eyes darted from me, to the hill and to the snow around us.

“Do you speak english?” My heart was drumming up a storm, but my mind kept pushing.

The man shrugged. “Japanese.” He shifted uneasily in the snow, but seemed as exhausted as I am. I watched him examine the surroundings and wipe the snow from his face. I followed suit and lay back in the snow for a moment. If it weren’t for those damn cute kids I have, I might have considered falling asleep and taking the chances of this guy killing me. My arm pulsed from the cold and the exposed bone. Movement caught my eye and I sat up to the sound of cloth ripping. The man across from me moved slowly in my direction, the cloth pulled tight in the gap between his hands.

Unease sets in, and our eyes locked. He stared into my baby blues with his near black voids, and nodded slowly toward my arm. He moved close and I recoiled, mostly in pain but also in fear. If he decided to go for the kill, I hoped he got it over with, nothing slow. As the cloth slid beneath my arm, he raised it tight against me. I partially blacked out as he tied it up and I felt my eyes rolling around in my head somewhere between dusk and darkness.

I snapped out of my daze and the man was sitting up against me, tapping on his compass. As strange as it was, his warmth was a welcome feeling and by warmth I meant simply being not as cold as the rest of the damn place. I tapped on his compass and shook my head. He looked down at it sadly as I tapped the N and then pointed to the north star. My hand cleaved the air from north to south and I nodded, hoping he understood. He taped south, and I smiled. “Yes south.” I said through laboured breath.

He shruged and taped his chest. “Takeo.” He said, his voice deep and commanding.

I tapped my own chest. “Leo.” My voice felt meek in comparison, as if I still had to hit puberty. I took a deep breath and felt the cold sting my lungs, forcing me to cough for it. What now? I’m sitting here with the enemy just waiting for the cold or the wild animals to kill me? Maybe he just plans on waiting me out to eat me… I’d heard stories of such savagery, but luckily never experienced it. I glanced at him sideways as he fiddled with his compass and glanced back up at the north star.

A sudden click snapped us both to attention and a man stood near by, his gun aimed at us. “No funny movements you two. What side do you fight for?”

I stared at him, my mouth wide open. English, he spoke english! “I fight for the allies, and you?”

He nods and pointed the gun towards Takeo. “What about that one?”

Takeo glanced from him to me, visibly trembling. “Uh… um…”

I see the man look down the iron sight of his gun and I pushed myself with all the might left in my good arm between him and his target. “He… he saved me.” I said aloud. I glanced down at my arm and nodded. “He’s… a friend.”

“Are you sure?” The man stared at me, his gun still raised.

I sighed heavily, my hot breath sending clouds into the chilled night air. “Yes. He did try and kill me three times, to my two attempts…” Takeo sat uncomfortably behind me, oblivious to my joke at his expense.

The man lowered his gun and waved a few men onward. “My name’s Ernest McGinnley, most people call me Mac.” As the men gathered us up, I grabbed Takeo’s arm tightly. He looked to me, concern written all over his face. I nodded and smiled, in an attempt to reassure him. As they carried us around the hill a small plane sat perfectly in a field of snow.

“We saw the smoke from the plane wreck, figured we should probably check it for survivors since we were in the area.” Mac smiled beneath his bright red moustache. “You not a very good pilot?”

As he helped me up into a seat on the plane and strapped me in I shrugged. “I’m still alive, so I suppose there’s worse.” Together we laughed at the dark humour, after all, war was a terrible thing. Might as well share a laugh to make it not so bad. They strapped Takeo in beside me and one of the men moved to bind his hands. I moved quickly and raised my hand above his. “He won’t need those, friend.”

The plane moved forward and into the air and already I felt at home. Surrounded by allies was far better than snow. My eyes drifted to Takeo who was sitting so still he could have been mistaken for a statue. I gently hit his arm and he looked to me, his eyes wide with fear. I pointed to a Canadian flag painted on one of the plane’s doors. “Canadians!” I smiled. I gave a quick thumbs up and watched Takeo process what I was trying to say.

“Leo, Canadians?” He asked innocently.

I grinned wide and nodded. “Yes. Canadians.”

After a long and luckily uneventful flight, I awoke to landing at an Allied base somewhere I’d never been before. Mac stared out at the runway as we came to a stop. “So what’s the plan?” He turned and looked to Takeo then me. “What do you want to do with him?”

I shrugged. “I’m sure he’d like to go home at some point.”

Some of the soldiers on the plane laughed at the thought. I couldn’t blame them. They unloaded us onto some nurses, one of which happened to speak both Japanese and English and befriended Takeo immediately. They spoke quickly and I watched as the other men in the group grew uncomfortable.

“Miss…” I whispered. “Miss, may I have a word?”

The nurse came over, her hair tied up beneath a small cap. “Yes?”

“Takeo, can you thank him for me?” I felt my cheeks flush as I scratched at the back of my neck. “I don’t know the language like you do.”

“He would not accept that at all.” She said sternly. “He told me he owes you his life.”

“Do you know what will happen to him?” I asked.

She smiled warmly. “Yes, he is actually going to be traded back to Japan for some of our own prisoners along with a few other men in the camp here.”

“Oh, really?” I smiled as I glanced over at him, sound asleep in his bed. “Well, that’s fantastic news, I hope it all goes well for him.”

“I’m sure it will.” She laid her hand upon my heart. “But I hope you never forget him, as he will never forget you.”

I stared at the man who was once my enemy, a man I tried to kill and a man who tried to kill me. We were both soldiers of countries with white and red flags, and despite our differences we both wanted to survive.

After all, we are all just human.