“I thought that we might make it, Peter…”

His voice was raspy and quiet- barely audible above the sound of drizzling rain on fallen leaves. Peter had to bend down close to hear anything above the moaning of the wind that buffeted their faces. He lay on the ground, his chest heaving, his clothes so covered in mud and dirt that he appeared to be a part of the very earth that supported him. Peter squinted away tears as they stung in his eyes.

“I really thought…”

The man’s shoulder glistened with thick moisture that soaked through the matted wool of his uniform, staining it red. His face was black, the product of time and warfare, with streaks of white branching from the corners of his eyes where tears had cleared a path through the dirt to reveal his pale skin. His smile was artificial and tainted with pain as he squirmed beneath his friend.

Peter knew that he was dead. The overcast sky painted a perfect atmosphere of dread matching the sickness in his heart. Death was among them. Death was real now. Death swept its bloody fingers through the distant fields then hid again, seeking them, hunting them. There was Jean, lying on the cold hard mud, dead.

The men were alone in the forest. It had been hours since they had lost their battalion. There was no chance of reuniting with them again now, now that the forest had become veiled with a thick fog that masked the men from all the world around them- both friend and foe.

Peter sat down hard against a thick tree trunk, too exhausted and afraid to think about the moisture that soaked through his pants. He was already soaked, anyway. He kept his musket close to him, checking it every thirty seconds, making sure it was still dry and ready. The weather was relentless- wet and cold. Peter stared up at the thick grey clouds that followed them every step of the way from Philadelphia, watching the sparse drops of rain form a tunnel of motion up to the sky.

“So…”

The voice startled him. He brought his head down and felt streamlets of water trickle down his cheeks and chin. It was Samuel, poor young Samuel, who had joined the militia and lied to the recruiter four months ago telling him that he was really 18, eager to take up arms with his friends and fight for the revolution. Samuel stood now in front of Peter, looking scared and alone.

"What will we do, Peter?"

Peter looked at him with a grimacing despair painted on his face.

"What can we do, Sam? There's a whole division of redcoats camped out in every direction around us." He looked away toward the three other men that crouched and sat in the near distance, looking out into the fog.

"So..."

"So we wait."

Samuel looked at Peter questioningly. "Wait? For what do we wait Peter? If the enemy surrounds us, won't they find us?"

Peter looked at Samuel, his eyes dark. He wanted so badly to tell him that everything would be all right. Poor, innocent Samuel- he'd never done anything wrong to deserve this. He wanted to tell him they would be met with reinforcements any minute, that the division would notice their absence and turn back toward the abandoned battlefield to rescue them. He wanted to tell him that there was hope. But hope had died with Jean. Hope had turned and fled the group in the wake of the approaching storm, it was lost in the chaos of the skirmish, and had flickered in their hearts for a mocking moment until Jean had snuffed out the last dying ember with his final breath. Hope had lost to despair. All they had now was despair.

"Pray, Samuel. Pray for yourself. Pray for it all to end quickly." Peter looked at the ground, feeling his words slice deeply into the boy’s optimistic heart. He heard Samuel sigh deeply.

"Face into the wind, Sam."

Peter looked up, "What did you say?"

Samuel's eyes glistened with tears, but they sparkled as he looked at Peter. "It's what my father said. The last thing he told me before I left for the war. I've heard it in my head every time we step up to the line, my father's words." The boy looked down at his feet, seeing them caked in mud, feeling the rain drip from his ears and nose. It was getting heavier now. Face into the wind, Sam.

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