Dead or Alive

I held Jay’s body in my arms and fear drowned my insides.

“We’ve got to move out!” I ordered. I was nineteen and one of the youngest British soldiers but with Jay dead I was next in command.

“What the hell!” Ray, turned to me his face held so many emotions it was impossible to tell what he would do next.

“It took three days to take over these trenches and you want to bail over one dead soldier?!” The anger in his eyes leaked through now and his wild hair made him look even more threatening as he stared at me.

“The waters up to our fucking waists and we are surrounded by the enemy! By midnight tonight these trenches will be theirs whether we stay or not! If you want to stay then be my guest, but I am ordering a retreat!”

I led the small group through the connection trenches, it wasn’t easy, and it was only six pm but the dim light that had not very long ago had dwindled and faded, shadows now lurked around every corner and the water was rising fast … too fast for my liking. After our last encounter our numbers now dwindled to ten men and I knew there wasn’t much hope of all of us coming out of this alive. A voice called out to me from behind.

“Gerard! Frank’s gone under!”

I turned and I could barely see in this light but I noticed the top of Frank’s hair sitting on the top of the surface, he was only seventeen and still a year shy of legally joining but like so many others the glory and violence had drawn him in and he had managed to lie his way in. He lived in New Jersey, quite near to Mikey and I and he had gone to the same high school, and although he was two years younger than me we had instantly gotten along. I waded over to him and yanked him out of the water. He immediately went into a coughing fit and when he looked up and saw me colour flooded his cheeks.

“That’s what you get for cutting gym man” I joked.

“Yeah, but I never thought swimming was something I would ever need to do.” He admitted.

“Well, if we ever get out of this place your learning I can’t come and pluck you out of the water every time!

“Sorry “was all he managed.

But we couldn’t linger so we kept on moving, it had been hours since we had stopped and the water was now only half way up my calf so I decided to stop and try to make some sense of the winding trenches after a short break. That’s when they came.



The sky was suddenly crimson and the air temperature dropped in a matter of seconds. They came out of nowhere, a man of about six feet stood 2 metres away from me. His skin was alabaster and ghost like; his eyes were deadly black and burned into my skull, his long black hair hung by the side of his face. He whispered something incomprehensible and suddenly three more people were standing behind him, two men and one woman. The stance they held suggested an attack was imminent and the idea sent a shiver down my spine.

“Gerard!” Mikey called to me, the fear plain in his hazel eyes.

I couldn’t speak, it felt like someone was gripping my throat and this site a was altogether the most terrifying moment of my life for months, and I had no idea what was going to happen.

The man turned to face me directly and whispered;

“Not all of you will live”.