Orders © Danny Rider
The rain never covers up the sound of death. Death: not a single sound, but a mixture of all the noises never meant to exist that somehow do. In some way these sounds were given the perverse ability to be the most memorable noises a person hears. Explosions shrieking, thumps of pounding feet, small droplets of liquid meeting a tile floor. Maybe death sounds like the roof of a barn collapsing, or the unnatural noise a fire makes as it swallows a house. Maybe death sounds like two men hitting each other over and over again until the sound of their punches and their energy fade to nothing. For me, death sounds like the screams that creep out from the grayness of no man's land. The sounds of gunfire and artillery, of boots splashing in mud and of steel meeting flesh sound like death to me. Perhaps I've seen more than I should of death and now I'm left with the notion that everything sounds like death. And the rain, the rain tries so hopelessly to cover up those sounds that it too joins the long list of noises; I now associate the drumming of a downpour with death.
It's raining now and I know that somewhere close by men are dying. I also know that very soon many more will be dead and others still will join in the damned chorus that makes up the screams of the dying. I try hard not to think about the screams and the finality of life they represent. “You're a soldier, you do what you're told,” I tell myself over and over again. And then I snap to attention and do my job like a good soldier: take orders, give orders, coordinate, try to forget the doubts that I share with any of the men. I'm a captain, a leader, a rock. But here and now: in the trench, soaked to the bone, ankle deep in mud, I remember those doubts and fears and thoughts I shouldn't think. I sit and tell myself to be a soldier and do what I'm told all over again and then I wait for everything to begin. For the dying to begin.
“Colonel.” “Captain.” “Orders?” “No retreat. No Surrender.” “What about the supplies?” “They're not coming. Just rely on morale and your wits and keep the men fighting.” “What's the General planning?” “You have your orders, best to stick to them.” “Yessir.” “Dismissed.”
You can always tell when the dying is about to start because everything gets really quiet. The silence starts back in the recesses of the grey; somehow the fog swallows up the last sounds of enemy activity and blankets the front with the sound of an undisturbed afternoon. The lack of noise reaches the forefront of the line, the silence begins to trickle through our trenches, filling the men with noiselessness, and then both sides are completely still. You can not hear the man breathing beside you even though it might be cold and his breath might mist, or it might be hot and his breathing wet with pneumonia. This is the silence that all men, all living things, should fear because it is so foreboding and so tragically short.
Tonight the silence starts and I am ready and whole. I am myself again; I can give orders, take orders, shoot, kill, lead, inspire. I can outlast the enemy and most of the men under my command because I know that if I don't, then I am dead and none of this will matter.
I turn to my left and see a dozen men braving the barrage in typical fashion. Eyes closed, ears covered with legs curled up tight, they sit and wait. Some pray, some mutter curses. One of them, Lieutenant Kosh nods at me.
“Captain Mayes.” “Captain Elias.” “Did you get the orders?” “I did. I have worries though.” “You think the General has lost it?” “I don't know what to think.” “I think home is a long way off.”
The artillery has paused and I wave my arm, sending Kosh and his men forward. They spread out into the grey fog and disappear. I look to my right and wave forward the next squad. The first rifle shots ring through the air, and I know the enemy is trying to work its way through our line. I turn to see the last of the men fade into the grey. Some will not be coming back. If they follow their orders though, if they do what they're told, some of them might be able to see the light of morning. They'll live to fight again. I wonder if that's really a blessing.
There is another explosion closer by, and I see something tumble through the air as another wave of artillery rips open the line to my right. The explosion is far enough away that my ears don't ring, but in the light I can see the sea of men encroaching upon the exposed position. I shout out more orders and watch as a heavy burst of fire rips into the approaching enemy. The light from the explosion fades out and leaves me with only the sounds of the fighting. The sounds I know all too well.
“Lieutenant.” “Captain.” “We're tight on supplies. Make sure every shot counts tonight.” “Yessir.” “After you're spent, use bayonets and rifles of the fallen.” “I understand sir. What about the reinforcements?” “You have your orders, best stick with them.” “Yessir.” “Dismissed.”
Down to two clips now, and there is no end in sight of the enemy relenting. They pour across the field now and into the trenches. The right line has fallen silent, and I know exactly what that silence means. A unit of soldiers, one of ours, pulls back into the trench, noticeably missing several members. Several of them carry extra rifles, and others have mounted bayonets already.
There is a splash to my right and I see a soldier stumble forward, his arm clenched to his side. He stutters something and slumps to the ground; his legs disappear into the mud and murk of the trench floor. He's from Mayes' company. Mayes was holding the right line. Maybe he made it home; maybe he's still fighting. I can't tell right now and I push that thought to the back of my mind. There's a group of soldiers, not ours, running up the trench on my right. The enemy doesn't have time to think about Captain Mayes.
I open fire and the first man drops. The men behind him raise their rifles slowly. They are bogged down by mud, by death, by fear. They crossed the grey to come face to face with death who lay beyond. I am their death. I do as I'm told and drop the next two soldiers before the fourth gets a shot off at me. He misses and I drop him too. There are more men coming after him, and I don't have enough shots to stop them all. I fall back to the left where Lieutenant Kosh should be.
Kosh and his surviving men are there all right. Some have mounted bayonets already. Damn. Kosh is good, but I wish we had bullets to rely on. I fill the men in on the advancing enemy and I hand out my last two clips. I order the men with bayonets to flank the enemy's position. We'll drop the first line and then counter attack the rest. The men do as they're told, they don't cry, whimper or disobey.
Kosh and I fall to opposite sides of the trench and wait for the enemy. We don't have long to wait, because within moments they emerge from the shadows of the trench. They plod along cautiously, and Kosh and I play the shadows and silence to our fullest advantage. The point man pauses as if he suspects something, but I don't give him time to voice his concern. I drop him and Kosh drops the rear man several feet back, wedging the remaining soldiers between the two dead bodies. Recklessly they run forward ,and I drop another before they are upon us.
Meeting your enemy face to face might appeal to someone with a notion of honor, glory and courage but not to a man such as myself. Someone might argue that eye to eye is the only honorable way to fight a man. These are the same individuals who do not have to look into the grey fog day after day, or to hear the silence that marks the death of yet another hundred men. I do. I prefer my enemy as far away as possible because when I meet them face to face, as I am doing now, pieces of me wonder if these same men feel and fear and think and debate the same as I do.
Kosh and I struggle with the front men for a moment before our bayonet support drops from above. Then there is hacking and punching and screaming. The enemy tries to fall back but they are trapped, and so instead they plunge even further into the fight with a desperation that rivals my own. Perhaps the same desperation that fills these men is what causes them to creep out into the gray, to come looking for death in his own house before death has the desire to seek them out.
There's a sting in my arm and I know I'm cut. I don't know how badly, I don't care. I turn to the man responsible and bring the butt of my rifle across his temple, and with a sloppy cracking sound he stumbles back into the trench wall. I follow up with my bayonet to his chest and for a moment he is pinned like some bug and his eyes look into mine and I look away, because once again I feel those pieces in me wonder about this man and I can't stand that. ‘He is my enemy. I live, he dies.'
The thought brings me back to the fight but when I turn to help Kosh, I see him pinned up against the trench wall, his opponent driving a bayonet deep into his gut. There is a sneer on the soldier's face that sickens me. I plunge my bayonet into his back and tell myself that I don't sneer that way when I kill a man. Kosh slumps from the wall and struggles for words but I stop him.
“Don't move. Take it easy. You did good. You'll be fine.”
I don't worry about the rest of the fight. The enemy is beaten and Kosh's men are dropping the rest as they flee. They're good soldiers; they follow orders. Kosh is a good soldier too. He does as he's told and dies quietly.
“Colonel.”
“Order the men to fight tonight until the last. No retreat, no surrender.” “But the men are under supplied, sir.” “No retreat, no surrender until the last!”
“Tell them to follow their orders! My name will not go down in the history books as the General who turned tail and ran! Our stand here will be the rally cry of every division! Books will be written of this moment and songs sung about the bravery of our soldiers! Tell them that as martyrs we shall become more powerful than any force of artillery! With our last stand here, the war will surely come to end!”
I turn to face the rear position. Mazes of trench and wire spread outward into another sea of grey. Between the two grays I sit and imagine the General applauding the success of his men, and of how well they followed orders. And I know he's sick. He's sick with ordering men to their death the way I'm sick with following orders and the way the enemy is sick with desperation. The way I'm sick with the silence that comes from the grey and the way I'm sick with the noises of death that begin to rise from the ruined right line. Moans, splashes, screams of anguish and of a few rifles being readied once more. I can hear the whole mess of these noises through the rain, and I try to tell myself to do what I'm told, to shoot, kill, lead, inspire, take orders, give orders, eat, sleep, fight, live and die but I can't bring myself to believe any of that this time.
I stop doing what I'm told. |