THE FRONT: PART 1
The trench was damp, and littered with shell casings, and empty ration tins, and as Scott splashed into the ankle deep mud, several men looked up at him from dugouts, small rooms carved into the sides of the trench.
"Replacement." One of them said hollowly to his fellows, and then lay back down. Scott was shocked, he had envisioned alert clean soldiers guarding each and every parapet and shooting down wave after wave of German attackers. But instead they were hopeless, filthy, and for the most part left the parapets alone. A crate of Mill's Bombs sat on the edge of a relatively dry patch of mud, and scott grabbed two, he hadn't received any with his supplies, and wanted to have them, just in case.
"Come on now, what if Fritz attacks?" He asked, a soldier laughed briefly at that, then another, a wolf, spoke.
"If Fritz hasn't paid us a visit already the rest of the day is likely clear, now come on, sit down." Scott hesitated for a moment, then realized that the wolf was most likely right, and joined him in the mud, shrugging off his pack and setting it next to the crate of Mill's Bombs.
"What's your name?" The wolf asked, his tail disturbing the mud as it swished back and forth.
"Corporal Scott Godfrey." He said, the wolf nodded.
"Sergeant John Wynter, welcome to Passchendaele." He said. Scott smiled, realizing that he had just found a friend. Wynter reached out a paw and Scott was about to shake it when the German shell landed just outside of the trench.
There was a tremendous roar and the ground bounced under Scott, throwing him face first into the mud. He saw Wynter jumping to the side in the corner of his vision, then the front wall of the trench collapsed and scott felt himself pinned to the far wall of the trench by a wave of mud.
Scott struggled wildly, mud flooding his mouth, then miraculously he was breathing. Scott tried to sit up, but his head sit something solid and he realized with a shock that he had been swept into one of the dugouts and now his head was stuck in an air bubble. Scott sighed in relief, but it was short lived. He couldn't move his arms.
"Shit." Scott swore quietly, trying not to panic, the mud was like cement, imprisoning his body from the neck down. If the other soldiers didn't find him soon then he would suffocate, the air bubble only had a certain amount of oxygen in it, and already it was becoming difficult to breathe.
"Wynter!" He yelled, hopefully he was close to the surface, then perhaps his voice would carry. Scott bent backwards and discovered that he could move his body slightly backwards in that direction. But his head hit the back of the air bubble before he had moved too far, and Scott felt death very close at that moment. The air had nearly been used all up and he could feel his heart accelerating as his lungs pulled in less and less oxygen with each breath.
"Wynter!" Scott yelled again, but the effort made him cough and he stared into the darkness and felt a tear run sideways down his face, tickling his ear. That made him pause, he was buried face up, like a corpse in a graveyard. In his steadily blurring thoughts Scott just had time to appreciate the irony before something sharp struck his leg.
"Ow..." Said Scott dully, his lungs were on fire and he knew that death was very near. Then something tugged on his legs and Scott felt himself being pulled. Mud was again covering his face, but Scott didn't mind, he just wanted to close his eyes and drift.
The daylight was blinding, and Scott just had time to see Wynter smiling triumphantly before he fell unconscious.
TO BE CONTINUED IN PART TWO...