Winters creeps through the rows and sits directly behind Compton, who stares transfixed at the screen. He asks after Buck, and his four ass wounds, and whether he's seen the movie before; stony silence greets every inquiry. Dick slaps Buck's arm, and Compton revives himself long enough to call the movie "a real corker." I didn't quite understand this scene. Is Buck just shell-shocked from his injury, and facing his own mortality? Is he annoyed at Winters? Is he upset that Winters isn't commanding Easy? Is he upset because they ran out of supplies and plugged his four bullet holes with chocolate chips? Seriously, though, this just makes me even sadder for Winters. He needed a buddy, and Compton's all zoned out and useless.

Luz gets excited because the movie's female star is about to say her line. He imitates it really, really badly three times before she gets around to uttering it herself, and Donnie rightly spins around and shoots a major stink-eye at Luz. Suddenly, soldiers march through the tent, shut off the movie, and turn on the lights. Luz is under arrest for perpetrating an illegal assault of our senses, and will be flogged forty times in the town square with a copy of the regiment scrapbook. And once that's done, Easy will move out again. "Elements of the 1st and 6th Panzer divisions broke [into the] Ardennes Forest," a man barks. The Germans have overrun the U.S. 28th infantry and parts of its 4th, so the 101st is in line to reinforce the line. Dejected, Luz, Toye, Donnie, Malarkey, and Skip file out of the tent to collect their things. Compton sneaks one look at Winters, then stares straight ahead and doesn't move. Dick rises and briefly waits for Buck, then strolls toward the exit. Stopping, Winters makes a half-turn, which is enough to jack Compton's holy butt off its seat. Buck is not at his most strapping; I guess a bullet through the buttocks can do that to a person. But he can still swagger.

Near the vehicles, which are being loaded, Winters hails Lt. Peacock and asks him whether he's seen Col. Strayer yet. Peacock is too busy looking for the Easy CO, Lt. Dike, and complains that the 4th Army's problem is being unfairly dumped on the paratroopers. Suddenly, CO Dike appears and bitches that Strayer hasn't returned from London yet, of all the damn nerve. Winters is curt with him, pointing out that Dike's bigger problems are myriad: his men will return to action in the dead of winter without enough cold-weather clothes or ammunition. Dike doesn't get it. Winters doesn't order him to canvass the whole base and gather sufficient supplies like rations, clothes, and weapons; rather, he suggests it with an air of helpfulness and an undercurrent of menace, as if to imply Dike's ineptitude as Easy CO. Dike promptly turns forty-five degrees and delegates all those instructions to Peacock and Compton. It's barely perceptible, but I think Winters flinches.