Donold J. Grump #34

VS

Storming the Beaches Pt. 2

They were in a landing craft, packed shoulder to shoulder with twenty other men, barely more than boys, dressed in olive-drab uniforms soaked with sweat, seawater, and fear. Steel helmets rocked gently with each wave.

The sky above was slate-gray. The beach ahead was hidden behind walls of smoke.

One boy near the ramp was clutching a crucifix in both hands, murmuring prayers. Another vomited into a canvas bag without lifting his head.

Donnie’s jaw quivered. “No, no, no. I’m not doing this. This isn’t safe. We’re civilians. We’re… VIPs.”

Pete tried to scramble toward the back of the boat, only to be grabbed by a sergeant’s hand and shoved back into place.

JR Biden stood tall in the middle of the craft, unflinching as the boat rose and fell with the ocean.

“You wanted power,” he said quietly. “You wanted command. You put your names on weapons, sent men to die in your name. This is the price.”

Donnie’s hands were trembling. “You… you said we’d learn! I didn’t sign up for—”

“You signed up the minute you lied about what it meant to serve,” President Biden said.

The ramp began to lower.

Gunfire cracked in the distance. Mortar shells landed with hollow, thunderous booms, sending geysers of salt and blood into the air.

As the boat surged forward and the metal lip crashed into the surf, the soldiers charged into hell.

And Grump and Pete were among them.

President JR Biden walked calmly beside them.

“Time to lead,” he said, stepping off into the cold water.

And then the bullets came.

A roar of machine-gun fire ripped through the fog. Bullets cracked overhead like snapping twigs, pinging off helmets, tearing through flesh. The water turned red before anyone even took a step.

The sergeant’s voice cut through the chaos like a whip.

“Corporal Hoggs-Breath! Corporal Grump! Take your squads! That machine nest is chewing us up—FLANK IT!”

Pete Hoggs-Breath looked like a deer in a burning field, wide-eyed and frozen.

Grump tried to speak, but his mouth was dry. His boots slipped in blood as he stumbled onto the ramp. Another man screamed beside him, his face gone.

“MOVE!” the sergeant bellowed again. “You wanted to lead, now GET YOUR MEN OFF THIS BOAT!”

The two corporals each took ten soldiers and plunged into the surf, the water waist-deep and pulling like a hand from hell.

The machine guns on the bluff barked like angry gods, cutting men down mid-stride. Mortars rained down in arcs, thudding in bursts of sand and limbs.

Pete didn’t make it ten yards before the world exploded at his shoulder.

A bullet—or maybe shrapnel—ripped his arm clean off. He collapsed into the surf, screaming, face contorted in agony.

“MEDIC!” he shrieked. “MEDIC! OH GOD—MY ARM! MY ARM!”

His men were being mowed down all around him, bodies folding like paper dolls.

Corporal Grump didn’t look back. He charged forward, head down, his men crying out as they followed, some shouting prayers, others too stunned to speak.

Then—thunk. Thud. A low clink.

Grump looked down.

Grenades.

Three of them.

There was no time to run.

The beach disappeared in a blast of heat and fire.

His body lifted from the ground, then slammed into it like a ragdoll. The world went black.

Hours Later Field Hospital – Normandy, June 6, 1944 Dusk

The light was gray and flickering. Canvas flaps flapped weakly against the wind. The moans of the wounded blended with the low hum of voices and metal trays clinking.

Grump opened his eyes to pain. Blinding, searing pain. He couldn’t feel his legs. His vision blurred. His skin felt like it was hanging from his bones.

To his right, a man groaned.

Grump turned.

It was Pete.

He lay motionless in a cot, stripped to his bandages and tubing. His right arm was gone, torn from the shoulder. His right eye was sealed shut with dried blood. His chest rose and fell in shallow, rattling gasps. Machines clicked around him.

Grump tried to sit up.

He couldn’t.

He looked down.

There were no legs.

Just gauze-wrapped stumps.

The scream that erupted from his throat wasn’t human—it was a feral cry, somewhere between horror and madness.

“NO! NO! OH GOD—MY LEGS—WHERE ARE MY LEGS?!”

A nurse appeared and tried to calm him, but he thrashed until she backed away, her eyes wet with something between pity and disgust.

“I’M THE PRESIDENT!” he screamed. “YOU CAN’T—YOU CAN’T DO THIS TO ME! I’M IMPORTANT!”

And then he saw him.

President JR Biden.

He moved slowly between the rows of wounded—kneeling, holding hands, speaking softly to men whose lungs were failing, whose bones jutted from torn skin, whose eyes would never open again.

He didn’t glow.

He didn’t float.

He walked.

Solid.

Real.

Grump screamed again. “YOU! YOU DID THIS TO ME! LOOK AT ME!”

President JR Biden turned.

His face was calm.

He walked slowly to Grump’s cot and stood over him.

Grump’s tears fell freely now, streaking the grime on his face. “HOW COULD YOU LET THIS HAPPEN?! I CAN’T—YOU CAN’T DO THIS TO ME! I HAD A LIFE —I HAD A FUTURE—I HAD A GOLF COURSE!”

President JR Biden knelt beside him, leaned in close, and whispered the words like a tombstone carving:

“Welcome to the world of suckers and losers, Donnie.”

Then he stood and turned to Pete, placing a hand gently on his chest.

Pete blinked once, then slowly closed his one remaining eye.

President JR Biden moved on, his coat rippling in the wind.

Outside, the beach still thundered.

Inside, the moans never stopped.

to be continued...

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Just remember if you have someone in your life that loves you, holds you at night, makes you laugh, cry...

Then you are richer than

"He Who is PU!"