"Fire, you idiot!" yelled Willi.
Albert just sat there, starring at the T-34 with its barrel aiming right at Willi's Panzer.
"You son of a bitch! Fire! You are going to get us all killed!"
Albert continued staring at the barrel until there was a giant flash and explosion. The shell hit Willi's tank but was lucky enough to bounce off. The whole tank shook and knocked Willi off his feet.
Willi walked over to Albert and smacked him on the face, repeatedly.
"What the hell is wrong with you! Oskar, get on the gun and blow that thing to dust."
Oskar, Willi's young tank machine gunner, crawled over to the tank's main gun and fired one shot after another. The slapping
knocked Albert out of his flashbacks, thinking of the girl in the forest, the deaths of Kurt and Ralph awhile ago, and being sent into a Russian P.O.W camp and meeting Ernst and escaping. All of those things randomly popped into his head as he saw the Russian T-34.
"Answer my question, sir! What the hell is wrong with you?"
Albert slowly moved his head up to look at Willi. His eyes stared blankly at Willi with no answer. He then quickly moved his head back down and looked at his hands, that we smeared up with gunpowder and dirt.
"I......I don't know, sir."
"I won't take 'I don't know' as an answer."
"Flashbacks." Albert said quietly.
"Flashbacks? How could flashbacks stop you from......"
"You don't get it, Willi. Have you been to a Russian P.O.W camp, seeing a dead young woman get killed by a German soldier of our kind, two of your friends die on the same night? Or what about watching a young soldier huddle a Russian grenade against his chest and watch him explode right next to you and trying to bury......?"
"That's enough, Albert. No, I've not seen any of those things you've seen. Russell stop firing and...."
"Sir, we've already lost two of our tanks already."
"Yes I was going to say surrender. Bring out the white flag."
"But sir we......?"
"Do it, Russell."