Sometimes, war isn’t about bold charges.
“Captain?!”
Sometimes, war isn’t about complex maneuvers or brilliant strategies.
“Captain Tome!”
Sometimes, war isn’t about breaking through the enemy lines or striking their flag to the ground.
“Can you hear me, sir? Please answer me!”
Sometimes war is about surviving.
“Captain!”
My eyes snap open as my hearing returns with a rush. First Lieutenant Akimbo is standing over me, shaking me from my unwanted slumber as shells shriek overhead and tracers crisscross the sky to the backdrop of screams from wounded and dying ponies. Akimbo practically sobs as I blink the dirt from my eyes. Actually, check that. She’s been sobbing; twin rivulets of water run through the mud and blood that cake her face, revealing the white fur beneath. I say the only thing that comes to mind.
“Ow.”
Truly, I am a poet.
“Oh, thank Celestia you’re alright!” she gushes, pulling me to my hooves. It takes some doing. Turns out I was half-buried under a layer of freshly pulverized dirt, courtesy of a 105mm shell that landed entirely too close for comfort. “For a moment there I didn’t think you were gonna wake up!”
I cast a sideways glance at her. Her voice is cracking, obvious even under the enemy barrage. There’s a jitter in her shoulders and her eyes dart back and forth. Her helmet is askew, letting her curly riot of a red mane tumble out more than usual. She’s close to cracking.
But then, so am I.
“Oh, don’t worry about me, Kim,” I say, feeling around in the dirt for … something. I don’t know what, exactly. I just feel like I’ve lost … something. Something important. “I’m too embittered to die just yet.” I glance over and note that her tunic has become undone beneath her olive drab combat armor. Well, olive drab if you ignore the layer of mud. “Your uniform is out of order, First Lieutenant.”
She flips her wings out and adjusts her helmet, re-buttoning her tunic at the same time. A civilian would probably laugh at my implied order to fix her attire. After all, we’re both so covered in grit and gore that having a buttoned tunic and a straight helmet probably seems a bit like throwing a cup of water on a bonfire to put it out.
But it’s not about appearances. It’s about maintaining the illusion of control; a little game we play to keep ourselves from snapping. We dress like professionals, so we are professionals. And professionals don’t snap.
Even if madness does seem tempting sometimes.
“We have to get up to the line,” I say, still feeling through the dirt for something. My hoof brushes past the bloodied face of a young, blue-coated stallion, lying in the muck with a piece of shrapnel protruding from his throat. He was one of the survivors of the 49th Fusiliers who stumbled back to our position two days ago. I didn’t get the chance to learn his name.
Guess I will when I come back for his dogtags tonight.
Akimbo hands me my carbine, answering the question of what I was looking for. Right. Rifle. Need that. I shake my head to clear it. Did my left ear always ring like that?
“Equalist troops are massing across from Bravo Company’s position,” she reports, “As soon as this barrage stops—"
As if on cue, the enemy earth-pounders go quiet, leaving us with the relative silence of rifle fire crackling along the line as snipers on both sides try to get lucky. But the lull is an illusion, and we both know it. “No rest for the wicked, then,” I say, slinging my carbine on my back. “Shift it, Lieutenant!”
We sprint on all fours through the ruins of Galloper’s Drift to reach Bravo Company’s position: a hastily constructed fortification along the edge of the town combining what’s left of the outer buildings with a line of trenches and barbed wire. We duck through a hole in the wall past a machine gun nest and the grimy veterans who man it.
We bolt for the trench, I hear the bark of an Equalist long gun, and a patch of dirt explodes next to me. Swearing, I swerve and dive into the pit, Akimbo hot on my heels. Landing in an undignified sprawl, I’m offered a hoof by a large red-brown earth pony with sergeant major’s tabs. “Nice o’ ya to drop in, Cap,” drawls Crabapple as he pulls me up with a wink. “Glad ya’ll could join us.”
I give the Appaloosa native a dry smile. “Well, I wouldn’t want to miss the party, Crabbie.” I risk a peak over the top of the sandbags and am rewarded by the bark of a second long gun and another near miss. Crabapple hauls me back none-too-gently.
“None o’ that, ya hear?” he rebukes. “We lost enough officers to stunts like that!”
“Yeah,” snickers Private Buck Hayworth, who’s leaned up against the trench cradling the bolt-action Springer rifle that most of the infantry carry. “Gettin’ our heads blown off is what greenjobs like us are for.”
I give a dry grin, but there’s little humor in it. Both enlisted ponies have a point. I’m the fourth officer to hold the honor of commanding the 179th Battalion of the 10th Infantry, EUP Guard, and, as of yesterday, I’m the longest to hold the command without dying.
I also happen to be one of the last two survivors of the original officers’ roster. The other is sitting in the trench next to me, trying to keep her hooves from shaking as she fixes a bayonet to the end of her carbine.
“Kim’s got the right idea,” I say, indicating Akimbo with a flick of my head. “Fix bayonets.”
“Fix bayonets!” comes Crabapple’s stentorian roar.
All down the line the ponies of Bravo Company draw their blades and attach them to their guns. Over the sliding and clicking of metal I give my final orders before the fight. I can’t project like my senior NCO, but I’m loud enough. “Ammunition is low, boys and girls, so we’re gonna let them close the gap a bit before opening up. Wait for my order to fire, and don’t shoot what you can’t hit!”
A chorus of ‘Yes sir!’ answers me.
Crabapple leans over and pitches his voice low so as not to be overheard. “How’s the ammo really look, sir?”
No point in lying to the stallion. “If we mass fired into every charge like the Book says we should, we’d be dry by nightfall.”
“Buck!” grunts the NCO, settling back.
Buck indeed. We’re running low on food, ammunition, medical supplies, and ambulatory combatants. A glance at the soldiers sharing this trench with me shows plenty of bandages and splints, reminding me that I had to loosen the definition for ‘ambulatory.’ It’s the sort of thing calculated to make a stallion go mad, thinking about how bleak the situation is. Akimbo is doing breathing exercises now, so I guess thinking about it is the sort of thing to make mares go insane too. Even Crabapple looks like he’s thinking about it, if the haunted look that slipped through a crack in his warrior’s mask is any indication. But we all must keep up appearances. For ourselves. For our troops.
Fortunately, the shrill sound of an enemy command whistle cuts through the relative silence and takes all our minds off of how bucked we are.
With a great, guttural cry the enemy rises from their trenches and charges into No-Ponies Land. Most have their rifles clutched single-hoofed liked the spearponies of old.
“Up!” I shout, and Bravo Company rises to their hind legs, sighting up on various targets. A few shots ring out from the enemy charge as individual Equalists stand bipedal to fire, but none hit anywhere close to us.
“Hold!” I shout.
The charge draws closer. A nearby machine-gunner attempts to chamber a round, only to realize he’s already done so.
“Hold!” I repeat.
The screaming line has almost reached the halfway mark. We can begin to make out the features of the enemy. It makes not seeing their faces during fitful bouts of sleep that much harder.
“Hold!”
They cross the halfway mark. I can hear their warcry rattling my bones. Soldiers shift in agitation all down the line. I should be panicking right now. I’m not a commander.
“Hold!”
Akimbo shoots me a nervous glance, but I ignore her. I’m not a tactical genius. I’m just operating on instinct.
“Hold!”
Two-thirds there now. I can make out the detail on their muddied brown uniforms.
“Fire!”
Ninety-four rifle shots crack over the thunder of hooves. My bullet punches through the horribly insufficient chest armor of an enemy soldier and sends him to the ground in a spray of blood. Three machineguns roar to life and send death through the enemy line, heavy .30 caliber rounds ripping through flesh and bone like tissue paper, twisting bodies into a macabre dance and sending dozens to meet their Maker in a matter of seconds. I chamber another round and fire again.
And again.
And again.
And again.
The lever-action Model 37 Wind-Chestnut Carbine has a rate of fire much higher than that of the standard issue bolt-action Mk1 Springer Rifle, allowing me to put twice as many rounds downrange in the same amount of time as the average infantrypony.
Every enemy pony is so close that I can see the hairs on their heads. Too close to miss.
Sometimes I wish I carried the slower Springer Rifle.
The first Equalists hit the wire and we pour fire on at point blank range. Half the ponies I shoot are already dead. Waste of ammo we can’t afford, but it’s hard to suppress the instinct to shoot when you’re scared witless.
Then they’re through the wire, rearing back on their hind legs as they raise bayonet-tipped rifles like spears. We respond in kind.
Sidestepping a strike from a shrieking stallion I bayonet him in the heart. As he crumples forward, another Equalist charges in, swinging a trenching shovel. His attempt to tackle me is thwarted by the body of his comrade and we all tumble into the muddy trench floor.
I drop my weapon and so does he. There’s so much mud on him that only the cut of his helmet marks him as the enemy. There’s fear in his blue eyes as he feels around for his rifle. For an instant our gazes meet, and I see a pony very much like me.
I draw my sidearm and put a .45 slug between his eyes. Rolling onto my back, I see three Equalists at the top of the trench. With precision that I never have when I stop to think, I put a round through all three. Or four. Not sure.
My rifle is in hoof again somehow and I’m shooting somepony. One moment all eternity stretches out in a single look. The next moment minutes have passed, and I don’t remember them passing. Adrenalin’s funny like that.
The officers and senior NCOs have drawn swords while the rest heft maces, shovels, and hatchets for trench fighting. I have my own sword out in one hoof and my pistol in the other. Not sure where my rifle went.
Akimbo fires a captured shotgun into a pony at point-blank range, screaming incoherently.
Crabapple hauls a unicorn into the pit and crushes his skull with a heavy stomp before the enemy stallion can cast a spell.
An Equalist fumbles a grenade and kills three of his comrades and himself in a spray of blood.
A young mare from Canterlot takes a bayonet to the throat.
I reload as her killer drops dead atop of her.
Then it’s over. Maybe hours. Maybe seconds. The enemy commander blows a retreat and what’s left of the charge falls back to their lines. A few shots ring out from our line, but an order from Crabapple puts a stop to that.
Just as well. We can’t waste the ammo.
I sink into the mud on my haunches.
There’s been enough killing today.
Crabapple ambles over. He’s practically coated in blood but, judging by how he’s moving, very little of it is his. “Reckon they’ll start shelling again?”
“No,” comes my hollow reply. “Even they don’t have ammo to spare.”
Akimbo sinks to the ground next to me, eyes staring ahead at something that isn’t there. All down the trench, stallions and mares alike sink into the muck. A weak joke is heard here and there. Mostly it’s cries of pain or just plain crying.
My gaze falls to the soldier I shot in the head. The first one, anyway. His eyes are still open, staring at me as though in accusation. He’s an earth pony like me. Younger, I think, though it’s hard to tell under the mud.
Did he have family, I wonder? Did he want to be here? Did he come out here thinking he was doing the right thing? Did he still think that when he died?
I know his side is wrong. Heavens above, I’ve seen what the Equalists have done. The atrocities, the massacres… I know I need to protect my home, but…
Doesn’t he probably feel the same way? They’re told we’re the savages! And most of the Equalists don’t slaughter civilians – that’s the Commissars and the Blackcoats. Tartarus! Those animals kill their own troops! Maybe this stallion was just scared, far from home, facing guns at the back and the front, and I killed him.
Me.
I did that.
I put that hole there.
I want to shout, to scream at the horror of it all. That I’ve almost been killed. That I’ve had to kill. That I’ve held dying ponies as they choked out their last, bloodied breaths.
I want to rail against the unfairness that I, of all ponies, am in command, responsible for the lives of every mare and stallion in the 179th, when before the war I was a librarian who’d never so much as touched an old musket, much less one of the rifles we have now.
I want to see Crabapple go back to his orchards, where he grows living things, not here harvesting death.
I want to hold the shaking Akimbo, a music instructor before this madness started, and tell her it’s gonna be okay. That we won’t fight again tomorrow. That she’ll never have to take another life.
I want to raise my voice to the heavens and scream. Scream for agony and loss.
I want to do it.
I want to lose it.
I open my mouth to do just that and—
“We need to collect the bullets from the dead,” I say calmly. “Theirs and ours. Equalist cartridges should fit most of our guns.”
“Yes sir,” responds Crabapple.
Or that. Yeah. I guess I could say that.
War isn’t always about being brilliant, or talented, or gifted. I’m an adequate officer at best. I know that. I was never cut out to lead a battalion.
My glance falls on Akimbo, who’s somehow still holding it together. I lied to you, Kim, when I said earlier that I was too embittered to die. Really, it’s that if I got killed, you’d have to do this job, and I’d never forgive myself for that.
I let my head hit the back of the trench wall.
No, war isn’t about being the right pony for the job. War is about doing what you can. Sometimes that means bold master strokes. Sometimes that means holding the line until somepony more qualified can come along and take that burden from you.
Sleep tugs at my eyelids and I obediently let them fall shut.
I’m not one for master strokes. I’m just holding the line until the master stroke falls.
To do our duty. That is asked of us all, and is all that can be asked. This is my burden, so I will bear it.
Somepony has to.
Author's Note
“So long as there are men, there will be wars.”
—Albert Einstein
War. That inevitable tragedy. Noble and right as it is to strive for peace, the grim fact is that the specter of war shall always haunt us. We are, after all, subject to the same vices and ambitions that have ever plagued humanity, and we always shall be.
Since war, then, is inevitable, it falls to us to strive to prevent it to the degree that we can. When preventing war is impossible, or when avoiding war would allow a great evil to go unchallenged, it falls to us to strive for honor and justice in the waging of it.
Perfection in this regard is impossible, of course. Even the noblest of causes shall see ignoble men fighting for it and injustices committed in its name. But though perfection is impossible, we should not abandon our efforts to achieve it. For, in the words of Vince Lombardi, “If we chase perfection, we can catch excellence.”
Every war will see heroes and villains on both sides. The United States was right to war against the Nazis in World War II, but that did not justify the Biscari Massacre. The Third Reich was an evil empire, yet in their ranks were German soldiers like Karl Plagge, who used his position in the military to protect Jews from Nazi atrocities in Lithuania. If we are to learn from our past, we must honor the heroes as loudly as we denounce the villains. In fact, I would argue that we should honor all heroes, regardless of their uniform, with even greater vigor than we remember the villains they strove against.
It is fitting, then, that we received Veterans Day (called Remembrance Day in many countries) from World War I, that seminal tragedy, where the war truthfully did not determine who was right, only who was left. Both sides saw their share of atrocities, but, in far greater numbers, both sides saw honorable and noble soldiers – ordinary people who displayed extraordinary courage for their countries, their causes, and for the brethren beside them. Often their honor was so great that it transcended the law of friend and foe and let enemies see each other as brothers.
Perhaps nowhere is this more poignantly seen than in the Christmas Truce, where men of opposite trenches put aside their orders and their guns and came into No Man’s Land to celebrate the One who became Man, not as enemies, but as kin in the great human family.
In a world where we are increasingly belabored with the lies of division and hate, we need more than ever the example of these men who, though enemies, called each other ‘brother.’ If men whose job it was to kill each other in a senseless and unnecessary war could manage that, then think how much hope there must be for us!
War shall always be with us. Tyrants will rise, and it will take brave men and women to throw them down. It will take men and women willing to make those great sacrifices – to die, and to kill. Let us honor those who have made those sacrifices with nobility and courage, and take their service as a challenge to build a better world, one wherein we achieve that excellence by chasing perfection.
Let the lessons of these generations of tragedies drive us towards a better tomorrow.
God’s peace to the fallen.
Veteran's Day, Remembrance Day 2019
This story is intended as a snapshot of the Great War spoken of in Memoirs of My War and Flowers of the Forest. The broader AU this takes part in, War's Generation, and links to those stories may be found here.
I am placing a link to the Veteran Crisis line here, as well as links to the national suicide prevention hotline and a list of international hotlines. There is no shame in needing help. In truth, it is courageous to ask for it. To those who served, you served us - let us help you.
