Everything around him felt unbearable; more than once, Reinhard had wished to be among the fallen. A single lamp cast a dim glow, barely enough for him to see. Rows of wounded men lay motionless around him, and it was then he realized he had been placed in the trench's rear dressing station. The stench of mud, gunpowder, and decay filled the air.
With all the strength he could summon, Reinhard tried to sit up. The moment he rose, the world blurred.
A medic rushed over, steadying him. He looked younger than Reinhard, though Reinhard scarcely had the energy to notice.
"Whoa there, take it easy. You've been hit by a rock fragment," the medic said, easing him back onto the stretcher. "Lucky, if you ask me. Most don't survive like that. Just a bang to the head—you'll be all right. Regiment?"
Reinhard blinked at him blankly before realizing the question. "19th. The 19th Division."
The medic nodded. "Name's Karl. Bloody hell out there—bodies everywhere, trenches torn to pieces. The French hit us hard today. Anyway, you'll need to head back soon. Just follow the signs along the parapet; lanterns are hung by the entrances." He gave a weary smile before turning to the other wounded. "And if you ever get a stick or shrapnel lodged in you, come back and I'll 'fix' you up." He chuckled at his own joke.
With a sigh, Reinhard made for the exit. Rats scurried across the floor; he kicked at them in disgust, though the effort only unsettled him further. Outside, devastation stretched in every direction. Parapets and parados lay in ruins, duckboards shattered into splinters, barbed wire lay torn and twisted, and many bunkers had collapsed. Most haunting of all were the bodies littering the trench floors. Field medics moved among them, stripping the dead of their erkennungsmarken and stuffing the tags into sack bags. Overhead, the sky was dark and heavy. Artillery echoed in the distance. Every step risked tripping over a corpse.
"Hey, comrade—toss me that erken, will you?" a medic called.
Reinhard hesitated, then knelt by the body. He tore off the dead man's tag, whispered a quiet farewell, and handed it over.
"Thanks," the medic said, falling in step beside him. "Sure is bloody out here. Mind if I walk with you?"
Reinhard gave a silent nod. As they made their way through the maze of trenches, the young medic snatched tags from any fallen soldier he passed. There was something unusual about him—his accent, his manner—but in the dark and smoke, Reinhard couldn't be sure. After hours of missteps and dead ends, they reached the right flank of the front.
The sight was even worse. Fires still burned among the wreckage, bodies lay strewn across the mud, and the few survivors huddled broken against the trench walls. Then, through the gloom, Reinhard spotted Ernst.
Ernst was hammering something above the parapet—nails, perhaps—trying to patch the ruins. As Reinhard drew closer, he saw the bandage wrapped around Ernst's shoulder, the bruises and cuts across his face. When Ernst climbed down and noticed him, his expression lit up.
"You're back! What did the doc say? And who's that fellow behind you?"
Reinhard explained what had happened, how he'd been struck unconscious and stumbled across the strange field medic.
"I do have a name, you know," the man said. "It's Grucher. I'll just... take care of these unfortunate ones." He dragged a corpse away by its leg and disappeared into the rear trenches.
"That's odd," Ernst muttered. "Anyway, let's sit." He guided Reinhard to an empty spot, lowering himself with a grunt. "Tell me—what's it like in the field tent? I've never seen one."
"Well—"
Suddenly, a piercing whistle tore through the air, and the earth convulsed beneath them—each tremor stronger than the last.
"Down!" Ernst shouted, pulling Reinhard to the ground.
A deafening explosion split the trench wall behind them, hurling mud, splinters, and debris in every direction. Reinhard's ears rang as the trench filled with smoke. Screams rose from every side—men scrambling, clutching wounds, stumbling for cover.
Shell after shell rained down. Lanterns shattered, plunging sections into darkness. Over the thunder, Reinhard could just make out Ernst's voice:
"They're softening us up—get ready! They're coming!"
Through the haze, shadowy figures appeared, scaling the parapets—French soldiers advancing. Rifles cracked, bullets snapping overhead. Reinhard snatched a rifle from the mud, his head still pounding.
The French charged across no man's land as artillery still fell around them. Smoke blinded Reinhard, but he could hear officers barking orders, men screaming and shouting over the chaos. By the time the Germans scrambled into position, the French were pouring into the trenches.
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Reinhard jammed his bayonet onto the rifle; Ernst did the same.
"Behind you!" Ernst shouted. His rifle roared. Reinhard froze, fearing Ernst had shot him—but a French soldier crumpled at his feet.
"We've got to move!" Ernst cried.
Reinhard pressed in behind him. One misstep could mean death. Twice, French soldiers lunged from the shadows; Reinhard drove his bayonet into their guts, pushing them aside.
Then came the shrill of a whistle. Retreat.
For a moment Reinhard didn't understand. But the truth set in: the Germans were abandoning the first line. Artillery had stopped; the French had taken the trench.
Reinhard and Ernst joined the retreat, scrambling to the second line where soldiers braced for another assault. Guards manned the openings, while others mounted the firestep. The guns fell silent, and all that mattered now was survival.
The French came again, charging over the top. German rifles opened fire, grenades arced through the air, men on both sides falling one after another. The siege dragged on until, at last, the French faltered, retreating under heavy losses.
"Go after them! Drive them back!" an officer bellowed.
Reinhard surged forward with Ernst, shots cracking through the air, bullets whizzing past. As they reached the front again, Reinhard prayed only for survival.
Then the shells returned.
Artillery screamed down, blasting the men apart. Reinhard was thrown backward into the trench, cut off from Ernst. He staggered to his feet—the world empty around him.
From behind, arms seized him in a chokehold. Reinhard dropped his rifle, slamming his attacker into the wall until the grip loosened. He scrambled for his weapon.
The French soldier raised a hand, kneeling, begging in broken words Reinhard couldn't understand. He reached into his coat. Reflex took over. Reinhard pulled the trigger.
The man collapsed into the mud. Reinhard turned him over, rifling the coat. Inside was not a weapon, but a small, worn photograph—his family.
He carried the man aside, slipped the identity disc into his pocket, and lowered himself next to the body. With a whispered prayer, exhaustion overcame him, and Reinhard drifted into uneasy sleep to the sound of gunfire and screams.
He was too tired—and too sorrowful—to care.
Reinhard awoke to the acrid stench of smoke and blood. His head pounded, and for a moment he forgot where he was. Then the memory rushed back—the French soldier, the photograph, the shot that still echoed in his ears. He looked to his side. The man's body remained where he had left it, face half-buried in the mud, his hand still clutching at nothing. Reinhard's chest tightened, and he pressed the photograph back into the soldier's pocket before pulling the mud-soaked coat over his body.
"I'm sorry," Reinhard whispered.
The sky above the trench had turned a pale gray. Dawn was breaking, though there was no warmth in it. The battlefield was eerily quiet now, except for the distant moan of the wounded and the crackle of small fires still smoldering along the parapets. The silence unnerved him—it was not the peace of safety, but the emptiness after slaughter.
Reinhard dragged himself to his feet, his body stiff from exhaustion. The trenches were littered with corpses, some sprawled across the duckboards, others half-buried under collapsed earth. He recognized neither friend nor foe at first glance—death had made them all the same.
A movement caught his eye. Ernst.
His comrade stumbled into view, his uniform caked in mud and blood, his shoulder bandage seeping through. Reinhard rushed toward him, relief flooding his chest.
"You're alive," Reinhard said, though his voice cracked.
"Barely," Ernst muttered. He leaned against the trench wall, breathing heavily. "They held hard, but we were able to penetrate through them. The French fell back."
Reinhard nodded, though his mind lingered on the cost. "How many did we lose?"
Ernst gave a hollow laugh. "Too many. Half the line's gone. The rest are patching holes with whatever they can find. Command will call it a victory, of course."
They both fell silent. Reinhard could not meet Ernst's eyes. He still felt the weight of the Frenchman he had killed—the man who might have been surrendering, the man with a family waiting somewhere far away.
Before Reinhard could speak, a voice echoed from deeper in the trench. Orders. Officers barked for men to gather, to re-form companies, to prepare for a counterattack should the French return. Reinhard and Ernst exchanged a weary glance.
"Not even an hour to breathe," Ernst muttered bitterly.
As they moved toward the sound, Reinhard noticed a familiar figure emerging from the haze. Grucher. The field medic carried his sack heavy with tags, his boots and hands stained darker than before. There was something unsettling about how calm he seemed, strolling through the wreckage as though the dead were little more than a harvest to be gathered.
"You survived," Grucher said cheerfully, spotting Reinhard. His foreign accent made the words sound almost mocking. "Not everyone was so lucky."
Reinhard said nothing, but unease prickled at the back of his neck. He watched the medic disappear again into a collapsed section of trench, dragging another body behind him.
The soldiers were herded together near what remained of the command dugout. A lieutenant, his uniform torn and his face streaked with soot, stood on a wooden crate to address them.
"We've held the line," he announced, though his hoarse voice betrayed little pride. "Reinforcements are expected within the day. Until then, we hold this ground at all costs. Patrols will be sent to recover the wounded and clear the trenches."
Reinhard and Ernst were assigned to one such patrol. Neither spoke as they picked their way through the wreckage. Reinhard's rifle hung heavy at his side, though he doubted he had the strength to lift it again if needed.
The patrol was grim work. They pulled crying men from beneath collapsed beams, carried the mangled on stretchers, and marked the dead with chalk. More than once, Reinhard's hands slipped in the mud and touched cold flesh. Each time, he forced himself to continue, numbness spreading through him like frost.
At one point, they uncovered a boy no older than sixteen, his eyes wide open, staring into nothing. Ernst knelt beside him and gently closed them. His hand lingered on the boy's forehead.
"Children," Ernst muttered. "They send children now."
Reinhard wanted to speak, to comfort him, but no words came.
Hours passed in a haze of labor and silence. By the time the patrol returned to the dugout, Reinhard's body ached in every limb. He sank against the wall, too tired to move. Around him, soldiers slumped in the mud, some smoking, others staring blankly ahead.
The war had not ended with the night's battle. It never ended. It simply shifted, demanding more from them with each passing hour.
As Reinhard closed his eyes, the image of the Frenchman returned to him—the raised hand, the photograph, the look of desperation. It haunted him, as real as the mud beneath his boots.
He wondered if he would ever stop seeing it.