Between the Crosses, Row on Row

Amiens, France

8th of August

1918

Heavy mist and fog blocked the moon that dawn. It was 4:15 AM, 5 minutes until the offensive began. Dew dripped from the burnt and twisted husks of trees. There was no moon in the sky, leaving the land dark and gloomy. The Canadian men of the 13th Battalion had secretly moved up to the frontline trenches the night before. Alongside them, were dozens of British Mk V heavy tanks, lumbering along like iron snails. Two treads on their sides propelled the machines forwards, with cannons and machine guns in the front and back.

Two Handley Page bombers flew the night before the attack, dangerously low to the ground. The men on the ground heard their droning propellers, Their presence put them in risk of anti air fire, but they had come out unscathed, and allowed the whole of the Allied forces' tanks to roll up secretly under the noise of their engines.

Near all the machinery, the infantry sat in their trenches. Their regimental kilts, which they had the special privilege of wearing in the trenches, were soaked and stained. The cloth puttees, wrapped around their legs, had tears and holes. Rust started to form on some of their Brodie helmets, chipping off when high boards and mud walls made contact.

The men were on high alert. Dark sacks oscillated around their eyes. They were tired beyond belief. But the tension kept them standing. They clenched their rifles tightly and muttered silent prayers as Zero Hour approached.

Everyone already knew what to expect. But it was the relative silence beforehand that kept them on edge. Only a few small harassing shells were hitting the enemy, covering the noise of the tanks who were now at the front line, ready to advance.

"Just start the slaughter already, Christ Almighty!" muttered Elliot Bates under his breath, anxious and restless. His hands were tight on his rifle, pointing upwards over the parapet. Cpl George Grant looked over at him slyly. "Stuffed your ears with cotton yet? I'm sure the Huns have after all these years!"

All of a sudden, they could hear it. Whooshing down from the heavens like a tsunami crashing onto the shore, a mass of shells hit the German lines. The earth shook all around them with a terrifying boom, rustling the boardwalk planks and sending loose objects flying as the bombardment intensified with the fury of a demon. Elliot braced himself and gritted his teeth as shock ran through his body like a wire. The world seemed to be tearing in two while divine punishment rained down from the clouds, killing and maiming all in its way.

The tanks revved their engines. The great metal machines of death advanced slowly, crossing right over the infantry trench. Their huge treads dropped stones and mud into the ditch as they skipped over the gap, like a boat riding over a shallow wave. A clump of grass bounced off of George's steel helmet with a thud.

The tanks drove straight into the fog, right into the path of the mortars. But as soon as the tanks neared the shells, they landed some 50 feet in front, as if by some sorcery. It was to shield the incoming forces with a barrier of steel and shrapnel, and so far it seemed to be working as the machines crawled along, unharmed.

The mortar shells arced gracefully, miles above the front, beyond the clouds, among the heavens, where birds dared to fly. A place of endless glittering stars above, and rivers of white below. And then this serene place, far above the Earth, where which no creature called home, was invaded abruptly by legions of artillery shells, piercing through the clouds in their path. Leaving the heavens as soon as they came, the shells tipped down towards the ground. And then, with might and fury, they whooshed into yet another war stricken field, in another war stricken land, of a war stricken Earth, killing the pure and damned alike.