Head On Home...

III. 1916, The Trenches, The French-German Front

7

I looked up at the rainy sky. The rain was coming down without mercy. The drops that hit my skin were freezing cold. The rain had been going for two days now. I was already tired of the darkened sky.

I imagined what Christmas would be like this year. If I could take Christmas off, I would eat turkey and drink fine wine. I'd sit on the couch listening to vinyl records. But my imagination was useless here on the battlefield. First, we'd need biscuits, which would be more satisfying to chew on than turkey, and water, which smelled less rancid than any wine. We had no records, but the constant background sound of exploding shells. We had no couches, but were cushioned by the dead bodies of our comrades.

As I watched the rain with my useless imagination, an explosion suddenly went off right next to me. I heard screaming. The falling rain drops were joined by flying flechettes. I grabbed my helmet as I ducked. Then, I heard the sound of shells landing in the distance. It sounded like German mortars.

I'd been assigned to the trench east of a fort in Verdun. Each trench was dug into the ground to serve as a passageway for soldiers to move without being directly exposed to enemy fire. Each was about two meters deep and a little over one meter wide. All soldiers, living, dead, or in the process of changing over, used the trenches. The battlefield at Verdun was lined with trenches hundreds of meters long. The whole war was one long session of trench warfare. Everyone fought and died in trenches. We kept on digging new holes to hide in, and so did the enemy. Sometimes we ran at each other with bayonets and did damage that way. It was as though we were squeezing in time to kill each other between rounds of digging. The artillerymen, seized by fits of boredom, would fire barrages of shells to try and destroy the trenches we'd built. In the end, though, all they accomplished was filling the land with huge holes from shells that landed off-target. (See figure)

I got up and ran through the winding trenches. It seemed like the first line of trenches had been damaged. I heard the voices of German soldiers mingle with the artillery fire. I threw a grenade in the direction of a voice. The grenade exploded, but I don't know if it did any damage to the enemy. The trenches were dug in a zigzag pattern in case of enemy attack, so even if there were an enemy right around the corner, I couldn't see them. Therefore, there was no way to confirm how effective my grenade was. In the trenches, explosives thrown by hand are highly effective because they fly in a parabola right over the enemy defenses. But at the same time, that also makes them difficult to handle. If you weren't careful, you could even hurt your own allies. For all I knew, I could have just wounded several of our own men.

A friendly soldier carrying a Berthier, a French-made rifle, came running from the front. He slipped past me and ran off somewhere, quick as the wind. As he passed me, he whispered that the Germans would be retreating soon. Apparently, he was planning to bury the remaining Germans.

I decided to go back the way I came. The path had been damaged by shells in several places. The soil making up the back wall had collapsed. The rain of explosives was still ongoing. I stopped and briefly poked my head out of the trench to look around. The shelling had shredded the entire landscape. It was like a scene from a science fiction novel I'd read as a child. In the scene, an adventurer from the future landed on the surface of the moon and said “What a sad and lonely world this is. It's completely desolate. There's nothing left.” My feet were soaked in rainwater. Trench warfare is also a battle against flooding. On particularly rainy days, we sometimes found ourselves up to our waists in water. We had to aim our rifles while wet and shivering. Only the most ruthless sniper could hit an enemy in such conditions, the type who could gun down a defenseless enemy without hesitation. I could never have accomplished something like that. I suppose I just have a weak spirit and lack patriotism.

When I arrived at the back of the trench, I saw that the allied infantry's movements had grown somewhat restrained. They were lined up with their guns on the edge of the trench. They were ready to fire if the German army ever showed themselves. Raindrops dripped off their helmets.

“You going for a walk, sub-lieutenant?” a soldier with a gun asked me, his eyes fixed on mine.

“Well,” I said with a wry smile, “the phone lines are down. I'm gonna go call the repairman.”

“Then bring a beautiful woman back with you. I don't even care if she's an Austrian or a German, as long as she's a babe.”

“How about a Russian?”

“That'd be great.”

He said something after that, but I couldn't hear it over the sound of the artillery. I waved goodbye and continued through the trenches.

No two trenches are alike. It depends on the physical properties of the land, but in most cases, the shape of a trench is determined by top secret battlefield strategies. If their structure was known to the enemy, it would definitely place us in an unfortunate position. Many trenches were camouflaged to throw off reconnaissance aircraft. The trenches formed a labyrinth. We were wandering a labyrinth, relying on a map that only existed in our memories.

When I looked into the underground bunker, I saw the soldiers preparing to go into battle were sitting in groups. They were all so young. Dust fell from the ceiling as they napped, played cards, talked about goings on back home, and looked afraid. Even if a fierce battle was raging right outside, the order to stand by was absolute. The floodwater didn't seem to bother them. The lanterns hanging from the ceiling were constantly shaking. I wondered what would happen if a shell fell right here. They'd all die. Or maybe three of them would survive. We'd be lucky if it were that many. Most of the trenches had experience losing many soldiers on standby. Some platoons had been entirely wiped out while on standby.

The communications room was located next to the auxiliary bunker. Inside were communications engineers and repairmen. I called one of the repairmen and told him about the phone lines. He merely replied “Okay,” and slung a rifle over his shoulder. When I asked him what the rifle was for, he replied “Self-defense.” His face was still youthful. Together, we went back the way I'd came.

“It seems the Austrian emperor is dead.”

The repairman said that while we walked. I nodded.

“Everyone dies in war.”

“Do you think this war is Austria's fault?”

“I never thought about it. We just pull our triggers and throw our grenades. The unlucky ones take bullets and die. Assigning blame is reserved for the ones left alive at the end.”

“That's true. Still, I'd at least like to know what it is we're even fighting for here.”

Even as we spoke, shells continued to fall somewhere and shots continued to ring out from somewhere. But it seemed the battle was dying down. The enemy was growing exhausted, and their attacks were thin. The French army's superior seventy-five millimeter field guns were driving them back at every turn. It was said it was only a matter of time before we took back the area around Verdun. Our trenches would soon be out of the combat zone.

By the time we returned to the front line, the fighting seemed to be over. The corpses of enemy and ally alike lay at our flooded feet. They were doubled over in the water like mud dolls. They smelled of gunpowder, blood, and death.

“This is why you don't go to war on a rainy day.” Hale was picking through the clothes of his dead comrades. “You can't even read the letters to their families anymore, they're soaking wet.”

“Where's the enemy?”

“Gone. Thank God, we can take our time repairing the lines. But it still looks like bullets are raining from the sky. Well, they're just worthless German artillery guns, anyway. They can't hit us.”

Hale laughed as he rounded the corner of the trench.

Hale was a survivor of my unit. For a man of his sturdy build, he did have a sensitive side.

The repairman and I went to work on the phone line installed on the wall. The repairman told me he could take care of the rest. I decided to return to the bunker. Looking back, I didn't know anything about telephone lines. There was nothing I could do to help.

The water level on the ground was rising. At this rate, even if the rain stopped, it would still be waist deep by night. We'd have to pump the water out or drain it somewhere else, or else we'd have to learn to fight like fish. The sun was setting. I joined Hale and the other survivors and we congratulated each other.

“What about Raymond?”

“He's dead.”

“Um, what about that guy? The one who had that collection of German poetry hidden away.”

“Leroux? He's dead, too.”

“Who's still alive?”

“We are,” Hale said shortly.

“This war is terrible,” said Jean, kicking some muddy water. “The Somme was bad, but it's even worse out here.”

“I hear that soon the fighting at the Somme will be over. It'll all be over here too, Jean, soon enough.”

“I wonder if we'll be home by Christmas. Sub-lieutenant?”

“Yeah.”

I answered quickly. I always nodded whenever someone asked if they could go home soon.

“I don't have any family back home anyway,” said Hale, looking bored. “The war's already taken away my place to return to. Everyone's gone. Soon I'll be gone, too. Just like the others.”

“I wonder if the dead are laughing at us somewhere. Are they still suffering?”

“You can't laugh when you're dead.”

“I wonder what will happen to me when I die...”

“I'm going to be reborn,” I said.

“Reborn?”

“When we die, we're reborn as a new person. Haven't you ever heard of it? Hinduism and Buddhism both have concepts of being reborn called reincarnation. The Bible also had a description of reincarnation once, but it was removed by a Roman emperor a long time ago. I think it sounds nicer than spending the rest of time with a bearded old man, doesn't it?”

“Oh, reincarnation, huh? Well then, I hope I reincarnate as Claudia Gasper.”

“The Mediterranean diva?”

Hale and I looked at each other, then burst out laughing. Jean clicked his tongue in embarrassment.

“Is that a problem?”

“No, it's not a problem. It just doesn't suit you, is all.”

“Hmph. So, Hale. What about you?”

“I'm gonna be a goat.”

“A... goat.”

“Better that than a human. I'll be a goat and live a quiet life in the mountains. I'll eat grass and drink the water from the stream. At night, I'll sleep on a soft bed of mulch and listen to the babbling brook. Sometimes, wolves will come by, but they'll be distracted chasing rabbits. I'll wake up to the sun filtering through the trees and the smell of morning mist. That's what I'll do every day. It'll be a quiet, peaceful life.”

“Ha. Then the hunter will shoot you dead, and BAM! Thus ends the life of the cheeky poet goat.”

“Beats being blown to pieces.”

“You know what your problem is, Hale? You only hate people, even though all living things are cruel enough to kill,” Jean said sarcastically. “Hey, sub-lieutenant? Someone once said that the most basic instinct of living things is violence. Even goats and rabbits go to war. All living things in this world go to war. It doesn't matter if they're big or small. As long as life exists, we'll all keep killing each other.”

“You're pretty smart, Jean,” I said, impressed. “Maybe the trenches made you into a philosopher.”

“Heh, thanks. So, what do you want to be in your next life?”

“No, I don't want to be reborn again. I'm done.”

“Eh?”

“I've had all I can take of reincarnating.”

8

After the sun set, we were transported by truck to a nearby dormitory. The dormitory was a beautiful whitewashed building. After our shifts were over, we were allowed to rest in the dormitory. While many soldiers were unable to find accommodations, we were fortunate enough to be provided with this fine private home. That was because the owner of this house just so happened to be a strong patriot. He had gone to Paris with his family and was planning to move further into the country's central region in the near future.

Inside the dormitory, a medic from the Red Cross and a pastor were kneeling together, discussing something. When they noticed us, they stopped talking to each other and welcomed us. They offered us their prayers and compliments with an extensive vocabulary. I didn't really listen to them, though. They weren't bad people by any means, but I'd much rather have been arguing with Hale and the others. These people had no sense of humor. I left early and went upstairs to my bedroom. I immediately fell into bed. Maybe I was tired. There was nothing I appreciated more than being able to rest in a bed.

As I looked up at the abstract art hanging on the wall, I thought about my fate to reincarnate. I knew the legend of the Six Headless Knights and the six cursed daggers. I also knew that the daggers may have been the origin of my curse. However, I had no idea why I had been saddled with this chain of reincarnation.

I keep getting reincarnated. There is someone I need to kill. Those are the only things that remained clear in my memory.

The sound of shelling had ceased, but the rain outside was still noisy. I lay on my back and turned my head towards the window.

Someone was looking at me.

I jumped up and grabbed the pistol off the table. I turned the safety off. I pointed it at the window. There was no one there. I slowly approached the window and was shocked. The room was on the second floor, and there were no footholds for a person to use to look in. I put my face right against the cold glass and looked outside. I thought I saw something white moving below me. But it soon disappeared.

I clutched the gun to my chest and went back to bed. I turned off the small light on the side table. I couldn't imagine a German soldier dressing in white, but better to be cautious.

Just as I was about to fall asleep, the door opened and Jean entered the room.

“Sorry to trouble you. We'll be sharing a room tonight.”

“Better you than Hale. He talks in his sleep constantly.”

“Oh, he's busy arguing with the pastor. When I left, the poor man was on the verge of crying. In 30 minutes he'll be ready to renounce God. But in 40 minutes, all will have been forgotten. Everyone down there will be singing and dancing and have forgotten all about God,” Jean said cynically, sitting down on the bed next to me. “By the way, a message arrived for us. We have to go back to the trenches tomorrow.”

“Why?”

“They're short on manpower. They want our help repairing the communication trench. It'll only take a day.”

“Alright. I'll tell the others.”

I felt disgusted. The repairs were just an excuse. We'd be holding guns, not shovels.

“I always wondered, why don't you ever complain when we talk to you like we're not your subordinates?”

“I wonder the same thing, but now you always talk like you're my equals.”

“Hmph,” Jean snorted, giving me a sly grin. “By the way, there was a woman downstairs who said she knew you.”

I sat up.

“I'm going downstairs.”

“'Kay.”

I put the gun in the holster at my hip. I always carry a gun when I'm on my feet.

“It's always a pleasure to see each other again.”

“Save the poetry for the lady. Now get out of here.”

I left the room and went downstairs. In the living room, a group of soldiers were acting rowdy, wine in hand. They were enjoying themselves to the fullest in what little time they had. I stepped out of the room and walked away from the noise.

In front of the kitchen, someone had set up two small easy chairs. The chairs had been placed quietly, as though they'd been left out of all the hustle and bustle.

She sat in one of the chairs. She looked up at me, wide-eyed.

“Raine!”

She jumped on me and threw her arms around my neck and shoulders. I hugged her back.

“I'm not Raine right now.”

“I know. I'm not Marie, either. But we're still Raine and Marie.”

I stroked Marie's long hair. She looked up at me with her clear chestnut eyes.

“The game has begun,” I whispered in Marie's ear. “Either the dagger wins, or we do.”

“Where is the dagger?”

“In the attic. It belonged to the owner of the house.”

“I'll be the one to die,” Marie said with a sad expression on her face. “I'll always be the one to die. Even if I die, it'll be fine, as long as I can see you again. I'll die over and over again.”

“Marie...” I shook my head. “For us, death itself is no longer the problem. The problem is that the moment of death is the most painful, most agonizing, and most tragic thing left in this world. If you're stabbed with the dagger, you'll start bleeding. You'll definitely cry. You're a crybaby. That's why there's no way I can kill you.”

“I'm not a crybaby.”

“Alright, then, a pushover,” I laughed. “In any case, I'm going to resist that dagger to the bitter end.”

“That's a pretty boring plan.”

Marie and I sat down in the chairs. The two lonely seats suited us.

“I'm surprised you made it here.”

“Yeah. It's a strange story. If I search for a dagger, I always find you.”

“It's ironic. The daggers are the indicator. Thanks to them, we can meet each other intentionally. We can discuss how to resist our fate. But the dagger will always be there at our side.”

“Can we destroy the dagger?”

“I don't know. I've done a lot of research on how to rid the world of the daggers. But most of them are just mystical rubbish. Ancient Celtic rituals, white magic from English mystics, dubious things like that. And there are six daggers around the world. It's hard to imagine we could destroy them all at once.”

“If only the Earth itself would disappear.”

“Good idea.”

“But then we wouldn't be able to see each other. I'd miss you.”

“We're always reborn. But what if someday, when we're reborn, we lose all our memories? Will we still reunite and kill each other with the daggers, without knowing why?”

“That would be okay. It would be a tragedy if only one of us were to lose our memories. Maybe you wouldn't believe me even if I explained it to you. Or maybe you'd find another woman. What could I do if that happened? I couldn't abandon you, but I couldn't approach you either. What could I do?”

“I don't know.”

“Are you tired, Raine?”

“It seems so.”

“You should get some rest.”

“Don't worry about me.”

“None of that, now. I'm a nurse. Tired soldiers listen to nurses.”

She stroked my head as though she were soothing a child.

“Marie, who am I right now?”

“You are an honorable French soldier.”

“Ah. Yes. That's right. I'm not a knight in shining armor. I carry a gun. My memory has been so hazy lately. Is it the dagger?”

“Sometimes I'm not sure who I am either.”

Marie slowly shook her head. I stood up and kissed the back of her hand. Marie smiled at me shyly.

“Yesterday was war. Today was war. Tomorrow will probably be war, too.”

“You won't die. Because I won't kill you.”

“Good night, Marie.”

“Good night.”

9

I was awakened by a tap from Jean. It was a dark and cloudy morning. I hurried out to put on my gear and found the rest of the platoon already there. They were looking up at the sky with somber expressions. A few snowflakes danced in the air above us. I took roll call and went over the day's itinerary with the other platoon sergeants and lieutenants.

“No wonder it's so cold.”

I looked out over the distant plains. The rubble of the town had turned into a faint world of white. The outlines of the collapsed buildings and fallen trees were outlined in white, clearly highlighting the devastation.

I heard the sound of a mortar. “Make as much noise as possible to alert the enemy forces before starting a full-on artillery barrage.” This was an unwritten rule of trench warfare to keep things from degrading into a war of attrition.

“It looks like the trucks aren't coming. We'll march on foot.”

“It'll be a good way to keep warm.”

We started marching down the dirt road. I thought about Marie as I marched. I regretted that I'd left without saying anything to her.

Every time we heard the sound of heavy shelling, we'd stop, our necks stiffening.

“I remember one guy who got sent to the hospital with shell shock. What ever happened to him?”

“He's in jail. No one just comes out and says they have shell shock. They suspected he was trying to get out of the service, so they threw him in jail.”

“So nobody believed him, even though they could see the look of terror on his face.”

“We're in the same situation he was in, and we haven't gone crazy.”

“Yes we have. We've all gone crazy.”

After about an hour of marching, the shells started landing nearby. We were getting closer and closer to the war zone. The snow had stopped.

Soon, we were down in the trenches.

As expected, they were filled with water. They looked like irrigation canals. We entered the water and were instantly up to our waists. The water was muddy. Moreover, it was cold. Instantly, my entire body was chilled, and my legs shook beneath me. I was frozen so stiff that I couldn't take the gun off my shoulder. I heard someone's teeth chattering. I could hear the screams of my allies on the front lines. But I was so busy shivering from the cold that the war seemed like total nonsense. In a situation like this, it was inevitable that I'd die sooner or later.

We joined up with another unit and received instructions from that company's commander, a lieutenant. All he said was “Attack.”

“What happened to repairing the trenches?”

“There's no need for that. The enemy is close at hand. Listen here, a foolish coward who can't even pull a trigger is no better than a pig. The French army won't honor the deaths of pigs. Go die a human death.”

The officer's voice sent us running. We knew we couldn't run because of the water, but we had to because we'd been ordered to. One of the soldiers, perhaps having gotten fed up with the muddy water, scrambled out of the trench on a ladder that had been set up on the ground. He took up his bayonet and started running. Instantly, he was hit by a machine gun firing at a rate of 500 rounds per minute. Blood sprayed out. His body was reduced to a red mass.

“We need to keep going,” someone said.

Those words may as well have been a curse.

Our group split up at a fork in the trench. Hale and Jean had already gone off somewhere hunting Germans. I made for the front line, picturing the terrain in my mind's eye. I pulled the bolt on my gun and loaded the bullets. I put my helmet on. I never knew when the Germans would attack from directly above. I held my gun slightly upwards. A reconnaissance aircraft was flying overhead. An allied machine gun was firing at it. The shots were in vain, and the aircraft disappeared into the eastern sky.

I stopped at a bend in the path. Looking closely, I noticed a slight disturbance in the movement of the water. Someone was on the other side of the bend, which turned left ahead of me. The water rose and fell in waves with the movement of the person walking ahead. I held the gun to my chest and took a deep breath. Then I exhaled, slowly, so that my breath wouldn't form a white mist. The distance between the waves on the surface was shrinking. The person was coming closer. I pointed the gun at the bend. A mortar exploded just behind me. A flash of light blinded me for a moment. My ears rang. The waves rolled. Finally, the enemy soldier appeared from around the corner. I was confident that I could fire my gun faster than the enemy. But I didn't pull the trigger.

The enemy soldier appeared from around the corner, staggering towards me, his chest stained with black blood. To my shock, his head from the shoulders up was gone. His missing head exposed a mess of flesh and blood. I suppressed a scream and reflexively backed away. The headless corpse collapsed into the dirty water. A red spray hit my cheek. The corpse floated in the water, hands hanging limp.

He must have been alive. He'd been alive until just before he'd appeared in front of me. Until that moment, he and I had been enemies, and we were in a position of kill-or-be-killed. He must have been walking towards me with bated breath. And yet, when he'd appeared, his head was missing. Had he been walking through the trenches with no head? I looked at where he'd come from. There was no one there. All I could see was the muddy water swaying with the vibrations of the bursting shells.

A machine gun roared overhead. Allied machine gunners seemed to be firing blindly at the enemy. I don't know how many German soldiers died. However, the sound of the machine gun brought me back to my senses.

I couldn't hear anything but the explosions of shells. I couldn't hear the shots of rifles or the screams of soldiers. The battlefield had been monopolized by a symphony of 75 mm field guns, 42 cm siege guns, and 25 cm mortars. There was no more room for infantry. It was impossible to distinguish between shots from allies and the enemy. Only within the trenches was there a silence that seemed a lie. Even the shells that landed near us seemed to be part of a war taking place in another world.

After a short walk, I ran into Jean. Floating beside him was a man in a French army uniform. It was obvious at a glance that he was dead.

“Who was it?”

“Christophe,” Jean said, angry. “The notebook, the I.D. tag, the watch, the boots, they're all Christophe's. We were going to go home together. We were both from Montpellier. But then this happened. Look! His head is gone! How can he go back home like this!? Who did this to him!?”

Jean was lost in his emotions. I had to calm him down somehow.

“He was hit by a German shell. Shouldn't we avenge our comrades before we mourn them?”

“So we're going to go kill a specific artillery gunner 500 meters away from here? And how can we do that without getting reduced to mulch by machine gun fire first? Moreover, can a person be hit by a shell and only have their head blown off?”

“It's not impossible.”

As I said it, I was taken aback by my own words. It wasn't impossible, that much was true. But it wasn't very likely. Looking at the body, the cut on the neck looked more like it had been inflicted by a sharp blade than ripped open by an explosion.

“It's more than that,” said Jean with a wince. “Christophe's head disappeared in an instant.”

“In an instant?”

I couldn't quite make out the end of Jean's words over the sound of a shell that landed nearby. Jean nodded.

“We were walking together. Christophe was a bit behind me. Around us, the sounds of machine gun fire and shelling were constant. Indeed, when it comes to being noisy, German science is the best in the world. We were making our way through the hail of shells and bullets. Then, I turned a corner. I thought I heard a voice calling for me mixed in with the sound of the shells. I turned around. Christophe was gone. I turned back around the corner. It's hard to believe, but there he was, still standing, but headless.”

As I listened to Jean's story, I thought back to the headless German soldier. Our stories were similar. At the same time, I also thought back to the legend of the Six Headless Knights.

“Let's go, Jean” I said, taking his arm. “There's no point in us staying here.”

We were about to start moving when a German soldier suddenly jumped in the trench, attacking us from above. He came straight at me, the bayonet attached to his Mauser outstretched. He shouted something in German. I raised my Berthier, but it was too late. I accepted the prospect of my death. Death comes for us all in the end. Whoever had originally said that hadn't been wrong. My chest ached violently. I thought I had already been stabbed in the heart. But when I opened my eyes, the German soldier was still in front of me, about to make the kill. The instant felt like hours.

Just as I was about to die, the side of the German's head popped like a balloon, sending blood flying. There was a small hole in his head. He fell dead in the trench, creating a splash of muddy water.

“It's a bit early to be reincarnating again, isn't it?”

It was Hale who'd fired the shot. He was standing at the bend in the trench, holding his rifle.

“Ah.”

“Here come some more.”

Two more German soldiers came running and screaming. We'd already calmed down. Hale shot one and Jean shot the other. My bullet went off somewhere far away.

“What are you idiots doing standing still in the middle of a war zone?” Hale asked as he came up to us. “What's this?”

“Christophe's body.”

“Headless again?”

“Again?” I couldn't help but ask. “You saw it, too?”

“Yeah. I saw four headless bodies in the bunker just now. There was a big gaping hole in the ceiling of the bunker, so I figure they got hit by artillery. I hear that German siege guns can even punch through solid steel. Apparently that happens sometimes. The heads had all been taken clean off.”

“Were they the bodies of our allies?”

“Of course, they were all wearing French uniforms. They were probably new recruits waiting on standby.”

“I see,” I nodded. “I'm sorry, but I have to go.”

“Where to?”

“The bunker you just mentioned.”

I started walking, leaving Hale and Jean behind. I tried to swim as I made my way towards the underground shelter. With this much water, the bunker had probably turned into a pool by now.

I arrived soon enough. I stood at the entrance. I couldn't actually go inside, as the water had almost reached the ceiling. There were four bodies floating around. Three of them were floating on their stomachs, so it looked as though they simply had their heads down in the water, but the fourth was on its back, and it was clearly missing its head. It was a bizarre situation. Every body I'd seen today was headless. I had seen many unbearably awful corpses on the battlefield in this war of attrition, but this was quite unusual.

As Hale had said, there were marks on the ceiling that looked as though they'd been left by a bomb. Looking at the bodies, it did look as though their heads had been blown off by an explosion.

A faint light came down from the large hole in the ceiling. Something flashed around the edge of the hole. It was a German rifle. I quickly raised my gun and aimed it at the enemy. A German soldier was peering down at me from above the hole. His gun was definitely trained on me. His face was shadowed against the sky, so I couldn't see his expression. We stared at each other for a while. The coldness of the water, up to my waist, chilled me to the bone. I was definitely at a disadvantage.

“How are you doing?” the German asked me in French.

“Who, me? I'm doing great, thanks for asking.”

“Do you want to die?”

“Not really. You?”

“I'm not as afraid of death as you are.”

“Put down your gun.”

I asked, but he didn't move at all.

“You're going to lose here.”

“Maybe.”

“In that case, you should put down your gun.”

“But I can't die here.”

“Even if you die, you'll just be born again. Isn't that right, Raine?”

I gasped. There was no doubt about it. He knew everything.

“Don't move!” I screamed. “It's all over. This ridiculous repetition ends here!”

I pulled the trigger. But he'd vanished faster than the bullet. The bullet hit the edge of the hole in the ceiling. I quickly pulled the bolt and loaded my next shot, keeping calm, but he didn't reappear.

I ran out of the bunker and peeked above ground. On the shell hole-riddled ground, I saw a few dead bodies and some barbed wire. I looked around and saw nobody. Smoke rose in the distance. I could see machine guns spewing lead. A huge shell landed nearby. The vibrations shook the area for a long while. I slowly crawled my way up the trench, gun in hand. Perhaps the enemy was preoccupied with other targets, as they didn't fire their machine guns. I kept one eye out for snipers as I ran to the base of the burnt out husk of a tree. I ducked under the tree and checked my surroundings. There were so few living humans to be seen that it made the human cost of the war seem like a lie.

I crawled back and went to the top of the bunker. There was a huge hole in the ground. This was where the German soldier had been standing moments ago. I stretched my neck to look in the hole left by the shell. There were no headless bodies in the bunker. I leaned over even further and lay down at the edge of the hole so that I could see all the way into the bunker. There were no bodies. Only mud brown water filling the bunker to the brim. All four corpses were gone.

I had been planning to pursue the German soldier, but I gave up on that and decided to search for the bodies. In the short time I had been looking away, four corpses had vanished. That was a job for eight medics. It had been done in an instant, with no one in sight to do it. I jumped back into the trench and returned to the entrance of the bunker. I looked inside, but the bodies were still gone.

As I stood at a loss for words, Rolo came walking up to me from the other side of the path. He was moving slowly along the surface of the water, searching for something.

“What is it?”

“Oh, sub-lieutenant. My glasses got swept away somewhere. I put them in my case.”

“How's it look on the front lines?”

“It's a stalemate. It's been like that for a long time now. I remember a few infantrymen came charging in, but that's it.”

“Did you see any bodies?”

“I've seen a lot of bodies, sir.”

“No. Headless bodies.”

“I didn't see anything like that. I came from the other side, but I didn't see any bodies there.”

I nodded and helped him search for his glasses. But they were nowhere to be found. Rolo quickly gave up on them and returned to the front line.

If someone had moved the bodies, it would have taken a long time. I continued on to the auxiliary trench. I ran into Jean and Hale again. They were taking turns sipping from a small bottle of whiskey. They'd mounted their guns on the edge of the trench and were watching for enemy soldiers.

“I'll confiscate that.”

“Don't be such a spoilsport.”

“What's going on all of a sudden?” asked Hale. “Did you go to the bunker?”

“Uh-huh. As you said, there were certainly bodies there, but they're gone now. All four of the bodies vanished.”

“Vanished?”

“Has anyone come by here carrying the corpses?”

“We'd have seen right away if that had happened. We've been here this whole time,” said Jean.

“Then where did the bodies disappear to?”

There was no evidence that the bodies had been moved, either in the trenches or up above. On the contrary, the combined testimonies of Jean, Hale, and Rolo made it impossible for the bodies to be anywhere.

The sound of shelling never stopped. Even though the bodies had disappeared, the war continued on.