Fragment by Damson (PG)

[likethesun2.livejournal.com]

Fandom: BAND OF BROTHERS
Pairing: Lipton/Luz
Author on LJ: damson
Author Website: Damson's Motherboard
Why this must be read: This is one of the Band of Brothers fandom's perennial favorite stories, and also perhaps its most unique. It comprises a series of short vignettes that form one sequence as set out in the LJ post, but on Damson's web site you can see it in its original format, in which you choose the sequence for yourself. Hence, the resulting piece isn't so much a narrative as a cluster of moments at once interconnected and fragmented--which is a particularly apt way of writing the experience of combat, where normal rules of continuity and causality don't apply. And all my high-falutin' jargon aside, it's a satisfying portrait of two very different men--Luz the rowdy company clown and Lipton the hyper-conscientious NCO--and how they come together in the face of a war for which nothing could have prepared them. Lovely, quirky prose, too, with flashes of startling insight.

you ached for it, a little part of you thought of your sweetheart back home, the feel of another live person, Muck and Penkala's foxhole was the deepest in the company, now also the deepest crater, you move closer because there are things you need, and there are things that still feel okay, in the last barrage their screams were recorded in tree rings, his lip is soft against your tongue, friends dead, ticked off on fingers at quiet moments, the image of your sweetheart fades, the pressure of a hand, against your crotch, pressing down, lingers.

Fragment