The horse whinnied in pain. I saw it limping, half dead, along what passed for a road. It was no more than a knee deep muddy trail strewn with the refuse of a passing army. Cartridge shells and belts, pieces of uniform, bandages, helmets, and assorted pieces of shrapnel all in the same soft brown of mud, but with a slight glint of metal, or tell tale contour, that set it apart form the ground. I could see how a man could drown in the mud, or a horse become so trapped in it that it couldn’t be pulled free.
The sound of the artillery guns overhead were a disorienting whiz followed by a thunderous bang. Wagons and ambulance trucks splashed along the road. The muted voices of men rose from the waiting area outside of the aid station. They felt the rain pelting down on their faces as they lay on the narrow sodden wool stretchers that held them. Their feet hung freely over the edges. They had to wait for hours in the wintry cold and dripping wet for an exhausted doctor to tend to their wounds.
My muscles ached. My feet were blistered and swollen from weeks of lingering cold and wet. Water was everywhere. There was no escape. I could smell gangrene setting in on some patients limbs, the sickly, pungent odour that meant amputation, and often death. My hands were raw from exposure to the elements and were barely capable of feeling the surfaces they touched. I kept cutting and jamming my fingers.
I was past being scared. I had been scared for so long that now all I felt was a lingering numbness. I just wanted it to end. I didn’t really care how.
