No-Mans land

A brief overview of the battlefield and our very first battle.

It was a perfect sunny day, the sun was up, the sky was a pleasant light blue stretching from horizon to horizon, not a cloud in sight, a few flocks of birds dotted here and there, going freely about their daily business. Below this beautiful sight was a patchwork of different shades of green, yellow and brown, farms, roads, forests and a small village, a nice village full of old buildings and pretty places, but all is not well in the village. Every road in and out of the village, guarded by armed soldiers, houses barricaded, the only signs of life within, shown by an occasional rifle sticking out of a window or over a balcony fortified by sandbags. Other than the military, nothing in the village moved, shops and restaurants were closed, houses were abandoned, their owners moved off to greener pastures (or so they hoped). Further to the South of the village was the "Front Lines", the greatest fear of every soldier, here the ground is many different shades of black and muddy brown, stretching from ocean to ocean East to West. At the fringes of this physical border, etched three meters deep into the earth, is a network of front-line trenches, behind these at regular intervals tall observation towers protrude out from the chaos of supply trenches and the mazes of communications trenches. Behind all this chaos sit the command and reserve trenches and behind them the field hospitals. Further south still is no-mans land, the only place feared more than the front-line trenches. In no-mans land nothing lives, and anything that does wishes it was dead, the earth is scarred by countless craters, cut into the earth by stepped on mines, bombs artillery and desperate shovels. The whole place is littered by corpses and barbed wire, here and there a few fires burn sending up clouds of smoke, the fires the only color in the desolate landscape. Further South still lies a similar chaotic maze of trenches etched deep into the  ruined earth. 

North again back to no-mans land, in a shallow muddy improvised trench. This is where our first heroes struggle begins. 

There was silence, there always was after an artillery barrage, a deafening silence, followed by the yells of commanders and the screams of the injured the stomping of booted feet, then, the dreaded whistle, which meant we were moving from our hole in the ground, Through mud, water, blood, mines, barbed wire and bullets, to our enemies hole in the ground. That was if we didn't stand on a land-mine, get shot in the back by friends or shot in the front by enemies. 

If by some miracle we make it through that, we then have to deal with bayonets and the far more terrifying soldier holding them. Once we made it through that, we got to sit in our new cold wet muddy hole and wait for the enemy to bombard us. If we survived the bombardment, we could expect a counter-attack, where it was finally our  turn to watch as we mow them down, and they slip in mud, get tangled in barbed wire, stand on land-mines and get shot from both sides. 

If we survived all that we got to sit in our new hole and rot and die of everything, like starvation, sickness, gas, or just simple executions for not following orders correctly. That was if we even managed to make it to the enemies hole in the first place.

Now the whistle was blown, it was time to attack and let the enemy shoot me, or stay and make my friends shoot me. We all know which we prefer, so once the whistle was blown the thirteen of us chosen for the charge were up and out of our hole, war cries masking our fear and making us feel more brave. I was running as fast as I could, the air was thick with smoke and bullets, to my left our commanders pet, the flag-bearer running with a look of stupid pride on his face, I jump over some barbed wire, next thing I know two guys to my left and right drop dead. I know i'm next in line, the enemy probably already has their sights on me, I weave to the left, just in time, a bullet whistles past my head and into the some poor fool behind me. Out of the corner of my eye I see the stupid f**k with the flag fall into a crater, I keep running, i'm almost there, I can see the glint of my enemies bayonet in the sun. I hear a click. OH SHI... I feel warmth and a sharp tearing pain rushing up to meet me, I am flying, free as a bird, this is going to hurt....

I am flying, free as a bird, I see the battlefield bellow, what a view! One I hope I never see again, I start to fly away, but something is biting my thigh, Dragging me back down to Earth. It hurts, it hurts really bad. 

I am wide awake, I am being carried at an incredible pace on a stretcher through the supply trenches and something is wrong, The pain is unbearable, It feels like I have a thousand knives stuck in my back and legs, I lift my head to get a better look. My leg, its... WHERE THE F**K IS MY LEG!!! Every second of awareness seemed to see a continued increase in the deep throbbing excruciating pain of my leg, or lack of. All I can do is try and relieve some of the pain through my only pain escape valve. I scream, I yell, I sob, I beg and then I start all over again. All the way to the field hospital. Once inside the huge green tent I am roughly shoved, still screaming from my stretcher into a makeshift hospital bed. Not long after my arrival I feel hands turning me over onto my front. I open my eyes just in time to see one of the most beautiful nurses I have ever seen. I hear the doctor scream at her to go get morphine and realize I am still screaming. I calm myself down enough to be able to hear the screams of all the others in the tent, then I feel the soft hands on me again firmer this time. As if to hold me down. Then I realize i'm about to feel more pain, what more could the possibly do I wonder. Then I felt it. I screamed....

Author's Note

Maybe a bit rough around the edges, but I think it gets the point across.