Blue, White, Red

Chapter 3 - Red

RED

The last time, Alfred stands in line, rows of white and blue facing rows of red and black. Throbbing drums pound a hot, dull ache into his head; bitter winds slice lines of ice into his skin. This battlefield is burning cold today, loud and silent like a place removed, its forested edges bordered by the last of the winter snowdrifts. Alfred feels lost in these rows of blue-clad strangers who are supposed to be his allies. After two long years, Alfred does not know these men. Too many come, and too many go, and too many fall and lose and die. But Alfred is bound by chains of red, white, and blue, and his rifle is an anchor on his shoulder. The ground is trampled green beneath his feet; the sky is blazing crimson behind oppressive clouds above. Alfred knows this country, he loves this country, but he has never felt its ground so trampled or seen its sky so red.

The years are long, and Alfred is tired of this. They say this will be over soon, but they say so many things, and Alfred has long learnt that not all words are told in truth. The world is nothing now but lies on lies when all he ever wanted was the simple and the real. But life is not simple, and it never will be, for now Alfred has bled and fought and his once white hands are stained with blood. These age-old lines of blue and red advance; these eternal drums thread their hate through his veins. But Alfred does not want to kill, and he does not want to die. He does not want these coloured chains or this metal anchor; he does not want this trampled ground and this red sky. Alfred wants that blue afternoon by a river, he wants that white night in a forgotten barn. But now his days are red and his nights are black, and his Redcoat Lion is not here to find him. Yet still Alfred believes in fate, and he believes in destiny, because when nothing makes sense you have to believe in something.

This is familiar now: the pounding drums, the shouted orders, this thick storm of descending chaos. This is too familiar, and Alfred's blood aches with it, with too many months facing muskets and cannons and men who follow different orders than his. This is familiar, yet it is always a shock when the lines meet and the colours clash, when the screaming haze of battle descends and his row of white and blue turns red with heat and blood. These shouted orders never make sense; Alfred does not want these orders. He is still a nameless front-row soldier, because he still does not know what he is doing, and he will never understand these rows of red and black.

A man falls to his side; a man falls before him. Alfred fires and a Redcoat falls. The white snowdrifts turn quickly red. Alfred pushes forward through this senseless haze, but he does not know where he is going; he presses through a mass of red, white and blue without knowing who these colours belong to. A moment passes, a lifetime passes, then a stunning rifle butt sends Alfred sprawling to the trampled ground. His weapon is torn from his grasp. He tries to push himself to his knees. Mud-stained boots pass before his eyes; the dead already litter the green-turned-red ground around him. Alfred is lost. His heart pounds in his ears, louder than those hateful drums and those blasting cannons. Alfred is too confused to feel afraid. He can not move; he can not get up.

"Alfred."

Alfred gasps at the unreal sound of his own name. He turns his head. The roar of battle fades; the blazing screams die away. Everything slows and stops until there is nothing, nothing but brilliant green eyes, looking up at him and staring through him and turning the world back into something simple and real and understandable. Arthur laughs faintly, nothing more than a breathless gasp on the icy wind. "Alfred. Fancy meeting a chap like you... in a place like this."

Alfred forces himself to move, drags his heavy body through the green-red mud. "Arthur," he breathes, desperate and believing. He reaches out and grasps Arthur's hand, clutches it like a drowning man clinging to land. "Arthur," he says again, laughing, heedless of the clashing battle that rages around them. Seeing his Redcoat Lion, Alfred forgets the last two years, and again he is young and foolish; again he is lost and found. "Didn't I tell you, Arthur? It's destiny. I told you I'd see you again."