It was midnight. The clouds, silhouetted against the pale moon, looked like castle battlements. Trees stood side by side, huddling together. The world seemed shamed into a smothering silence: the river trickled slowly; the small noises from the animals in the undergrowth were muffled and soft.

The clearing was still. Warm breath fanned over cold flesh – skin that looked sallow in the moonlight. A cigarette was rolled between shivering fingers; smoke swirled in the fire's flickering light like a ghost, curling and dancing, before disappearing into the shadows. A cough broke the silence, the sufferer hawking loudly and spitting the phlegm into the dry leaves at his feet. Hugo Stiglitz drew again on his roll-up and exhaled through his nose. He sniffed, and rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand.

The cigarette flared as it reached the end; he sucked in a breath as the heat seared his fingertips. He flicked the butt into the fire and spat again.

Hugo felt angry and confrontational, uneasy and subdued; broken. He picked at a scab on his hand until he felt warm blood trickling over his knuckles; he licked it and revelled in the metallic taste that filled his mouth. Pulling at the collar of his shirt, he licked his top lip and ran trembling fingers through his hair. He couldn't concentrate. Emotions were running wild in his blood; Hugo stood up and shouted loudly, a wordless scream of frustration and fury. He realised he sounded like a wolf, and started laughing.

'God, what's wrong with me?' He spoke to the sky, his eyes on the moon. There was no reply; he didn't expect one. He tugged at his collar again, and accidentally caught his thumb in the chain that hung round his neck. Remembering its existence brought a flash of pain. Hugo pulled the chain from under his shirt, and flicked open the heavy locket, feasting his eyes on the small photograph trapped in its silver case. Magdalena looked beautiful and young, just like Hugo remembered her: long hair pinned at the back, shadowed eyes, slightly dark skin.

Looking at her photograph, his mind involuntarily flicked to Léa, the French girl who – as he believed – was a spy for Dieter Hellstrom. And, Hugo thought disdainfully, I won't change my mind until she proves her innocence. Although Hugo had imparted his fears to his American commander, Lieutenant Raine, he still felt unprotected and bare. He constantly found himself on his guard around the girl – and Wicki, the girl's 'translator' – and was almost afraid of her and what she could do to his life.

Hugo snapped the locket shut. He couldn't think about Magdalena. It had been three years, and yet he still felt physical pain whenever he remembered her. Why can't the dead just be dead? The thought flashed through his head before he had a chance to stop it. Immediately he regretted thinking it. 'Sorry,' he whispered, and kissed the locket. 'I love you.'

The crunch of leaves and whispered voices from above broke into Stiglitz's silence like a gunshot. Startled, he dropped the locket back down his shirt and hid the movement with the pretence of rubbing his face. As he looked up, Sergeant Donny Donowitz and Private Omar Ulmer slid down the bank and into the clearing, creating such noise as to make Stiglitz hiss, 'Shut up!' Donny put his hands up as a signal of submission to his complaint – the gesture slightly marred by the heavy gun in one hand – and then frowned.

'Where's the 'tenant?' Donny asked, his black hair falling forward into his dirty, mud-streaked face. Stiglitz ignored his American comrade, instead pulling out his tin cigarette box – full of ready-made roll-ups – and putting a match to one of them. Donny looked at Ulmer, who shrugged, and then back to the German. 'Asleep?' he continued. Stiglitz nodded curtly, and pushed himself off the ground, turning and stalking off, his shadow flickering in the fire's light. As he left, Stiglitz just heard Ulmer's muttered words;

'We need to wake him up. Raine needs to know what we saw.'

As Donny moved towards the tunnel, a noise inside halted him. Raine appeared at the tunnel entrance, his eyes dark from sleep.

'No need, boys. Now, what is it ya'll need to tell me?' he asked, buttoning up his overcoat and seating himself on a log by the withering fire; Donny and Ulmer sat opposite him

'We were doing our scoutin', and we saw –' Donny broke off in the middle of his sentence as Wicki stepped out of the tunnel too and crossed to the fire, his skin white against the midnight sky.

'What's happening?' Wicki asked, settling down beside Raine and pulling from his pocket a hipflask. He offered it round: Raine and Ulmer declined; Donny took a hearty swig and returned it to his Austrian brother-in-arms.

'Is the girl awake?' The Bear Jew asked apprehensively. Wicki shot him a questioning look, but shook his head. 'We was just telling' Raine here what we found on our scout-out. It's about half a mile out, to the north. There's a camp o' Nazis, about thirty of the fuckers.'

'The only reason we could think of for their being here,' Ulmer interjected, 'was that the French kid led 'em here.'

'That's impossible, you morons. How could she have led 'em here? Why are you so judgemental toward her? She's just a kid.'

'Incorrect, Sir,' Wicki said quickly. 'Léa's seventeen.' The three Basterds turned at stared at Wicki in disbelief. Léa was the smallest girl any of them had ever seen: stick-like arms, tiny abdomen, long fingers; a child's proportions. At a guess she could be twelve, or thirteen at the most.

'She's seventeen?' Donny exclaimed. Wicki nodded in assent.

'She told me yesterday,' he explained, his mouth curling into a smile. Raine warmed his hands over the fire.

'Lieutenant, now do you believe she led those Nazis here?' Ulmer asked.

'No. She hasn't had any time alone to leave a message, let alone physically get in contact with them.' Raine shook his head slowly as he talked, running his hands through his hair. Donny looked awkwardly over the fire at his commander. 'Spill it, Donny,' Raine said, his voice clipped.

'Well, that first day we found her – the day Stiglitz came into camp with her – she was at the river with him, 'member?'

'And, so what?'

'Well, Stiglitz came nearly runnin' to the camp, all angry, and so I went to get the girl. She was alone for about three minutes, sir.'

All four men sat back, contemplating this new piece of information. Wicki, the closest of all the Basterds to Léa, was in complete refusal to this idea: she was young, she was small, she hated the Nazis; what use would she be to them? He couldn't comprehend how the others were even contemplating this idea. As he opened his mouth to speak, another foreign voice joined their conversation.

'How can you dispute my reasoning now?' Stiglitz stepped into the fire's light, a cigarette between his fingers. He put it to his lips, drew, and spoke again; 'As you Americans say, 'the odds are against her.' The things I told you – and now this. You cannot deny it, Lieutenant.'

'What about coincidence?' Wicki asked angrily, his eyes burning as he defended the girl against the German.

'There ain't no such thing,' Ulmer said, quite oblivious to the furious stares passing between Wicki and Stiglitz. 'Two people die in the same circumstances and it ain't coincidence. This ain't no different.'

'I can't agree, Lieutenant.' Wicki took another swallow from his hipflask and continued; 'The Nazis have known our position since we let the first prisoner go. They just have attacked in single groups, and now they attack in a large band you think something is wrong. There is nothing wrong. We will kill them all and then things will go back to normal –'

'And we'll lose two more guys?' Donny cut in. 'Just like with Kagan and Sakowitz?' Wicki turned to him.

'We can be more careful this time. Trick them.' Raine looked at Wicki with a renewed interest: his eyes brightened, his eyebrows raised an inch and a small smile played around the corners of his mouth.

'How?' he asked.

'We leave. Tonight. They storm into our camp tomorrow morning and we're not here. Then we ambush them from the sides – they'll be cut off and surrounded.' Raine nodded in contemplation, before asking of his Sergeant:

'How many did you say there were, Donny?'

'We saw about twenty in the first group, six in the second and about twelve in the third. So that's about –' He did the maths on his fingers. 'Thirty-eight, sir.'

Stiglitz spat onto the ground and coughed, disgusted.

'You are so blind! All of you!' he shouted. 'She is a Nazi spy who will get us all killed! I am sick of this. We are supposed to be killing the filth, not protecting their traitorous asses!' Stiglitz swore loudly in German and pushed himself off the ground. 'I can't sit here and wait for her to betray us. I'm going to do something about this.' He turned his back on the gobsmacked group of Basterds and stormed away

'If you do something stupid and get yourself captured we ain't comin' after you, moron!' Donny called after him as their ex-Nazi brother disappeared into the shadows.

'I hope he doesn't do anything foolish,' Wicki commented quietly; he had calmed somewhat and now saw the reasoning behind Stiglitz's argument.

'I agree,' Raine said. 'I'll go have a word with him, calm him down a bit. He'll see sense.' Their commander stood up and reached into his pocket. 'Anyone got a smoke?' he asked. Everyone patted themselves down, but no one could find any cigarettes. Raine shrugged and left the clearing, following Stiglitz's path.

'Perhaps it's time to sleep,' Wicki suggested.

Donny muttered: 'I'm gonna stay up and find something to eat.'

'G'night,' Ulmer nodded to Wicki.

As the Austrian trudged back towards the tunnel, something white caught his eye. It was hovering just inside the entrance; as his eyes focussed on it, Wicki realised what 'it' was – a hand, with slender fingers and bruised nails. A female hand. Then it was gone in a blur of white.

Hurrying a little, Wicki crossed the threshold to the tunnel and looked towards Léa's bedroll. She was fast asleep, one arm flung over her face, the other tucked under the blanket. Her left foot – clad in a thick sock – was poking out from the end of the bedroll. Wicki bent down and pulled the blanket over it. As he gazed down at her, she mumbled in her sleep and her fingers twitched. Wondering if he had imagined the hand-like apparition, Wicki knelt down on his own bedroll, the one next to the girl's, and folded up his jacket for use as a pillow. He lay down, two questions floating in the back of his mind: Had the girl been there? And if so, how much had she heard?

Morning dawned bright and clear. Smoke rose from the ashes of a once-blazing fire; it had long since collapsed and now sat in a circle of scorched grass. A light frost covered the ground, crunching underfoot. Leaves, their colours ranging from dark brown to deep ochre, steadily flowed from the trees above.

The boy shivered under his grey uniform. He was barely eighteen, his face still smooth and soft, with no trace of stubble. Eyes like emeralds stared from under a heavy brow and shadowy lids. His lips were thin and pale in colour, and chapped from the cold. His name was Raoul. He was going to die in thirteen minutes.

As he crouched at the edge of the clearing, he thought about how he would die. The thought took him by surprise; but he realised he was not afraid. Calm and confident, Raoul straightened his back and took a deep breath. Holding it, he stepped forwards into the clearing. His foot came down on something that was not leaves. Lifting his boot, Raoul pushed aside the mud and felt his fingers close around something cold and sharp. He pulled it from the dirt and rubbed it with his thumbs. It was a silver six-pointed star, the Star of David; the star of the Jews. Staring at it, Raoul saw all the Jews he had killed: a thirty-year-old man named Ralph, and his wife Sarah; a teenaged boy named Bruno, who had black hair; Lisbeth, a nine-year-old girl who had cried for her brother as Raoul put the gun to her forehead. They had all died quickly; Raoul was not one to revel in causing pain. When he died, he hoped to die painfully, to repent for all the lives he had taken; he hoped to die in a Jew's quest for vengeance.

A sharp whistle alerted Raoul to the outside world. He dismissed the morbid thoughts from his head and concentrated on the task in hand. Pocketing the Star, he wiped his fingers on his grey jacket and raised his gun. Slowly, he edged into the clearing. His feet crunched on the grass and leaves, making more noise than was appropriate. There was nothing to be done, however, so he continued. Reaching the entrance to the old fort, he paused to look inside. As his eyes grew accustomed to the dark there, Raoul saw that the tunnel was empty. Well, emptier than he'd expected. General debris littered the floor: empty rounds, ripped cloth, a pair of boots, standing tall.
More than a little surprised, Raoul pulled his head from the tunnel and signalled to his fellow soldiers. He hit his left palm with his fisted right hand, put up two fingers and then sliced his right hand through the air. The signs for empty, look and return. It's empty, I can see. Returning.

Seven minutes had passed. He had five minutes left to live.

The bullet was released from a sniper rifle at 860 metres per second. It entered Raoul's body just underneath his sixth rib, from the back, putting a hole in his uniform. The bullet ripped through his lung and then exited his body.

The young soldier's eyes widened. His gun fell to the floor and his fingers straightened. Then he dropped to the floor. Blood pooled in Raoul's left lung. His tongue felt big, too large for his mouth, and tasted salty. He coughed. A metallic warm liquid collected in his throat, and choked him. He coughed and coughed, unable to move. Then the pain hit.