In Small Heath | Peaky Blinders

twelve; for king and country

For King and Country.

That was what Bash kept telling himself, every time he had to reload the gun he held. He told himself that every time he closed his eyes and saw the dying Major General from the Battle of Fromelles. He told himself that when he had to write a haphazard report on what went wrong at the battle too.

What went wrong was they were grossly outnumbered. Two Germans to everyone one Brit or Australian. Even with the addition of the Australian air forces, they were still outnumbered and the losses they suffered were...

Seven thousand total, and the Australians lost about five of those.

It was all guess work, though. They couldn't dare go too close incase a German sniper was still around, the bodies left to the elements, but even still. From the rough guesses to the final counts when they were all at quite the distance away - they were missing far too many.

Charlie paled more than he had done two weeks prior, seeing his first casualty on the road, but he didn't falter. He listened to orders, acted upon instincts and saved more asses than he probably even realised.

The walk away from the battlefield was the only respite any of those men would see and they lapped it up like cats drank water from bowls left outside to fill up with rain water.

Thomas Arthur, a newly discovered river finder, found a calmly running river with fresh water in that men soaked their superficial wounds in, but never their socks and shoes. There was no way of ensuring that they'd dry out by the next British base they'd stumble across.

Rumours of trench foot killing men had spread when Bash was at home and he couldn't risk it. It, according to said rumours, left men unable to move- toes falling off from gangrene, legs rotting further up and not to mention the infestation of lice in the hat ever crevice they can crawl into.

Luckily, that had yet to happen to Bash and he thanked his lucky stars daily.

"You know what I miss? A greasy fish supper from the chipper down the road from me." Jimmy Dawson broke the silence, the talk of food instantly making mouths salivate from the idea of sinking their teeth into such a delight.

"What's your regular order then?" Charlie asked, surprising most of the men there.

He hadn't talked much since Fromelles.

"Battered fish, chips, peas and gravy. Sometimes I'll get scraps if they've any going." Jimmy replied almost instantly, not having to think of what his regular order was.

Most people in Small Heath had a chippy every Friday they could afford it, and it showed.

"What about you lot? What's your go to?" Jimmy added on before anyone had chance to answer off the cuff.

Charlie opened his mouth to talk but quickly closed it again, until earning himself a gentle nudge from the Lieutenant-Colonel himself.

"Uh, depends. Sometimes I get just a sausage and sauce- if I ain't been working with my brother." Charlie started, revealing small pieces of himself as he went.

No one knew he had a brother, let alone one he worked with - Bash assumed during the summer months when school wasn't in session.

"Or if I have been, I get large chips - but it's split between three... and either a steak pudding or... lightly battered fish, 'cause I find the batter either too much-" Charlie paused, wiping his hands down the side of his jacket, taking a small sip of water before continuing. "and it drowns out the fish or it's got this weird texture and it puts me right off."

"Wait, so no sauce?"

Charlie shrugged his answer, but no one pushed him any further than that.

The silence didn't last for too long before another soldier was rhyming their order off, followed by another - and another. Most of them were similar, if not the same to Jimmy Dawson, it was to be expected however, it was the bog standard.

"And you, Bash?" Charlie finally asked what most of the lads had been thinking.

None of them had quite gotten used to calling the higher ranking officer by his nickname. Most of them felt rather strange about it, but not Charlie. He'd seemed to be the only one who was willing to call Bash anything other than Boss or Lieutenant.

"Probably the same as you, Charlie. 'Sept, Finn usually eats all the good bits before I've sat down... plus gravy, you uncultured swine."

Quiet laughs broke out amongst everyone, not expecting Bash to say something but they all knew they should've expected a little bit of sarcasm or a witty remark. After all, he did promise to shine a man's head - to his face - and said man was his superior.

The laughs died down, and the group remained sat by the water, eyes floating past through the trees just in case. The fear was still there, and no one agreed subconsciously that it never would go.

At least, not for a long time.

"Why are we really talking about the chippy shop? I mean, I like it, it's a bit of normalcy, a bit of something mindless- but... I don't get it. I shot a man in the face..." Twenty-seven year old Private Harvey Ross, asked all too plainly.

Every man there had to do the unthinkable but it was either do that or have their body's be left to rot through the weather and time. Unable to see people age, being unable to age themselves - it was... well, the cost of war, really. The painful reality they had been all too blind to actually see.

Charlie swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat before standing up from the tree stump he'd been quite comfortably perched upon.

"Gotta think of anything but that, Harv." Charlie started, his eyes darting from left to right- a telling sign that he was thinking of what to say next. "I don't want to close my eyes and see none of that again, but seeing a battered fish instead? More than happy."

Before anyone had time to reply to that, the all too familiar sound of gun fire sounded out. Men jumped to their feet, readying their guns for the incoming threat. Seconds passed, fingers hovered over triggers, palms becoming clammy from the anticipation, but as the time passed by they all noticed the lack of people. Some jumped around, wondering if they were going to come from the tree lines, but again... nothing happened.

"Noise travels, you ever heard of the Doppler effect?" Jimmy Dawson whispered, but no one listened.

Something was coming and it was heading straight towards them. Where they were was no vantage point, nor did it have any significance to either side. It was just a river. Nothing was ever just what it said on the can, but this river didn't even have any fresh or salt water fish in it.

"Head for cover, in pairs- one to the river one to the forest. Whatever this is, an attack or our lot in trouble, we'll be ready." Bash commanded, his voice in a hushed whisper but still held its autocratic tone he had spent a few days working on.

The likelihood of this being an ambush was high, and from what direction was unknown but Bash believed in the men around him and they believed in him, too.

They'll be ready, for whatever life throws at them. They will become victorious, for King and Country.