No Man’s Land
Ada Whitfield
My fallen friend lay lifeless at my feet, glassy eyes no longer seeing. No, he couldn’t be dead, he just couldn’t. We’d been through so much together, it wasn’t fair. Our master had retreated to his part of the trench, but I wouldn’t move. I nickered gently, as if to wake him, but it was clear he could never reply. There were men shouting, and a faint rumbling, but I did not understand. After what felt like hours, when it could only have been minutes, I turned away my gaze. The faint rumbling was now a deafening roar, and a massive, army-green something rushed towards me.
I ran.
Heart pounding, I thundered through the trenches, too frantic to consider what I was doing. I knocked over an oil lamp, and felt the searing heat only an open flame could bring behind me. Men gazed upon me, stunned and surprised to see me, a trained cavalry horse, acting as wild and skittish as a colt. I interrupted a game of cards as I dashed, confused and afraid, onto the barren expanse where no horse should ever go. The barren expanse of No Man’s Land.
Bombs raged mercilessly on the ground and their shrieking whistles of torment rang in my ears, but there was no stopping me now. I crashed through debris, twisting my ankle in a shell hole and not even caring. It was dark, so dark that I didn’t see the wire. A piece of barbed wire was strewn across the earth, no doubt from the enemy defences. I rushed into it but felt no pain as it dug into my flesh – my adrenaline was too great.
However, my pain would come. Moments later, a more intact wall of wire, such painful wire, blocked my path, and this time the wire would not stand down. I fell, slipping on mud that I hadn’t noticed before, feeling the full extent of my pain. Exhausted, I gave up hope and closed my eyes in despair.