Hozier imagines - inspired by awesome fanfics I read in a ridiculous short time

AU / The Trench

[A/N]: Set during WWI, this AU imagine presents Hozier as a soldier during the First World War. Irish, he serves for the British armies and while on leave meets a woman that could possibly change his life for good.

Andrew Hozier-Byrne was a brave soldier, had been from the very first day he signed up a paper making official the decision he put his mind through: he was to serve for Britain. Not that he particularly appreciated the country that had repeatedly humiliated his native soil nor did he particularly like bellicose times but in Ireland, he was an idle young fella since no work was given to him. In fact, Ireland shared a common point with the United Kingdom it so harshly tried to take distances from: both countries were elitist, assigning the proper jobs to always the same people, the better born, the most likely to get a job. For other men, war felt like a relief, an opportunity for them to prove their value to the world, no matter what the cost of that sacrifice could be.

When he was given a number to which he must reply by now, Private Hozier-Byrne realized the whole process of making canon fodder out of the loud host on its way to fight because one archduke had not been lucky and got killed. The talion law had never been that cruel before. All those men willing to die to have their corpse being prayed upon by all those politicians who would never take one tenth of the risks taken just to keep on living. Naturally, almost organically, Andrew started scribbling words that soon became sentences, sentences becoming journal entries day after day. Those notes were supposed to give a face and a name to the men he would meet, those he would fear, those who would give him absurd orders and those he was supposed to hate.

In order not to drive insane with the unhealthy humidity that brought the days of November and the unidentifiable insects milling about in the trenches, Andrew wrote verses that were seemingly only written by his zeal for living, verses that could have easily made his superiors die of the sorrow caused. Ignoring that many other men, such as Private Wilfred Owen followed the same destiny, Andrew could not help but to write, sometimes wasting the rare sleep he was given the permission to get. That exhausting process was here to fill something he could possibly not have, something that scarce crumbs of stale bread cannot replace: the company of someone that was, like him on the lookout for the next assault against the Germans. He was craving for an ear he could talk about the tough hours of waiting for something, even a wee thing, to happen. About the tears he would shed when the twilight would eventually fall over the cliffs, leaving him thinking of the sweet coast of Ireland he had left behind. Simply about life and death being so close from one another and the harsh fight to keep away from the latter. The weight of his riffle against his thorax, he would dream of the armistice and of a brighter future for him in Ireland, if he was ever to return.

By chance, his name was to serve him once. His surname being Hozier, it soon captured his sergeant's attention. Indeed, not less than Clementine Hozier who by marrying Winston Churchill - a promising politician who, in despite of some men who saw in him an opportunist, had already showed to the world his temper a few years before - had become a socialite and thus, an important woman in the British society. Sergeant Mooney, a fierce Irishman proudly wearing medals he had gained by the past on a grim green outfit strongly believed that amongst his men was a relative to Clementine Churchill, a nephew perhaps. If it was not even remotely true, as far as Andrew was aware, if he kept mum, he could possibly leave for a while the dire fields of blood. Which he did on February of 1915 when some respite was offered to the soldiers who were for some fighting since September on end.

Through the cold streets from the North of France, Andrew ended the short period of his leave in a distillery in the region of Lille. Very early in the morning, he was to take a carriage that would inevitably put him back to the front. He had had three days that he spent getting drunk, trying to forget that he was a soldier now. He had had three days that he spent writing hollow letters that he could resolve to send to his parents and to his brother who had remained in Ireland. Although the French government tried hard to stop the spreading and the sale of the Green Fairy, many bars were still offering that poisonous comfort for broken men, prone to despair and nihilism. It is in that context that Private Hozir-Byrne had discovered the holy beverage. He was about to order another glass when all of a sudden, he heard, from behind him a sweet voice he thought to be belonging to his imagination:

"That thing's gonna kill you", a woman it was. She had such a tenderness in her features. Her age was difficult to guess, she could have been fifteen or forty. If Andrew could not tell what her age was, he could tell that a woman was a beautiful one. He put the glass back on the counter and introduced him, his hand reaching out for the woman's.

"I'm Andrew, dead man walking", those three last words had escaped as an Austrian psychanalyst had written ten years earlier as the expression of his repression. If Sigmund Freud had studied his case he would have drawn the conclusion that Andrew Hozier-Byrne, so zealous to live a few months ago was now wishing that he was dead. Now that he had someone to talk to, even for just a couple of hours, would he change his behaviour?

"I'm Y/N, sutler for the soldiers in Neuve Chapelle", the woman replied with a candid voice that made Andrew's face white.

"Nice to meet you!", Andrew replied to that sordid encounter. Y/N nodded as to say that she too was glad to have met the man at that time of her life. Volunteer like Andrew, Y/N had no skills enough to be a nurse but was to get involved in the Great War, one way or another. Her father had been a soldier too, she could understand more than anyone what it means to fight for one's country, but above all for freedom. She had become a sutler on September of 1914, giving a hand to more than one soldier in the villages of the Marne and now in the North of France, since the dreadful battle of Arras and then Ypres, in Belgium. She had seen bodies scattered, plundered from their weapons, making them appear to be gawkers when they had been brave, making them look sad when they died happy, happy to have been part of that humongous fight.

That meeting was doomed to no outcome, which made it even more intimate. Knowing that they would not see each other after that night, they could talk about everything with no fear. That is how they started talking about the war freely, the lost hopes, the victory that was so difficult to imagine once amid the stifling dust and the mice. If Y/N had been a spy or if any malevolent soul had listened to the conversation, Andrew would have easily been charged for treason against his country, or at least the country he served under the flag for. But even then, Andrew would not mind. If he was to be hung, at least he would have been honest doing so. His neck attached to a noose could not be as revolting as what he had been witnessing for months.

After a whole hour of a heated discussion about silly orders men were told to follow and about the beauty of the Irish coast, Y/N was called by the owner from the other side of the bar. "And now, may I introduce you to the gorgeous Y/N", he said in a strong French accent. Andrew looked at her as an improvised stage was now floodlit. Y/N advanced on the minuscule promontory and began a little speech that she concluded by: "To all the Irish soldiers, that song dedicated" and on that looked at the distraught man. With eyes closed and the voices dumb around her, Y/N sang heartily The Wind that Shakes the Barley, thus echoing to the morbid taste Andrew was given in as well as his melancholy towards his country.

Tears were forming on Andrew's canthus as the words were so precisely describing his feelings. Between the moment Y/N had started singing and the moment she sat back next to Andrew, the latter knew that singing was his own destiny. If he was to come back from the war, he would be a singer. He congratulated Y/N when she sat back. The two of them spent the night together, aware that the world was coming to an end, trying their best to delay the deadline.

By seven in the morning, Y/N woke up in an empty bed, hers that an angel had blessed during the night. During the rest of the fight that had torn apart Europe, Y/N did her best to get informed on Andrew's fate. Has he survived? She hated herself for she had not asked his surname, which would have helped far more than to look for every single Andrew fighting in the trenches.

She had no information when the armistice was signed and started losing hope as to see him again. She was still living in the North of France, thinking that if Andrew wanted to see her again, he would seek in the region, making things easier for their reunion. Which was a great option since that happy day happened.

By December of 1918, almost a month after the war had ended in Europe, Andrew wished to go back to Ireland. He still had some papers to sign to make official his departure from the army. In Ireland, a new fever impregnated; men who fought during the war now wanted their young wives and their future children to be called Irish, and not British anymore. Andrew wanted to take part in that fight too, with the same strength that he put into the Great War. From the fields to Ireland, Andrew had to cross the region in which he had met Y/N. He prayed that she was still there. When the two gathered, it felt just like they had never stopped seeing each other.

Three months later, the two moved in together in the venerate Ireland that only a year later became independant, far from the mud of the war.