Unjust Desserts

Gray’s muscles were sore, his feet ached and his boots were wet. He desperately wanted to sit down, to take a break and eat a little grub. His stomach had been a taut drum of hunger since that morning, when his breakfast of two stale biscuits had failed to make any dent in his longing. Every step through the thick, clinging mud that carpeted the trenches he slogged through sapped his strength even more.

Just a little farther, he told himself. He longed to take off his pack, remove the rifle slung over his shoulder and maybe even slip off his soaked boots. At a junction in the trench-line, Gray spotted another soldier from his squad. With him was their commanding Lieutenant, a gaunt man with a perfectly manicured mustache.

“Ah, perfect timing, Gray,” the Lieutenant said. In his hands was a cardboard box with twine knotted around its sides, like a stack of newspapers.

“Oh?” Gray replied. He sidled up to the officer and his squad-mate, White. He nodded politely at the sandy-haired man.

“Indeed. I have a special assignment for you two,” the Lieutenant said. He pulled a piece of paper from his rigid, mud-caked, uniform. “You lads are to deliver this package to General Trotter at the Menier Estate.”

“The Menier Estate?!” White chuffed, goggling at the Lieutenant, “That’s four kilometers to the east—the Jerries have been shelling that route all day!”

The Lieutenant sternly examined White, his mustache bristling. “Western connecting routes are closed until morning, Private. This package needs to be delivered ASAP.”

Subdued, White muttered, “Yes, Sir.”

Gray, sensing his cue, asked their superior officer, “What’s in the package?”

The Lieutenant’s stony gaze shifted to Gray. “Truth be told, Corporal, I don’t know. It arrived here by accident and was only located today after several of the General’s incessant telegrams. Now, you lads need to get it back to him.”

Despite his aching muscles, heavy pack and sodden, frigid feet, Gray accepted the proffered package and slip of paper the Lieutenant held. The box didn’t weigh much, but it was awkward to hold. He opted to swing it from the twine.

“Good luck and Godspeed,” the Lieutenant said with a crisp salute. His mustache twitched correspondingly.

“Well, this is a shit assignment,” moaned White as he and Gray trudged their way to the front-line’s Eastern flank.

Gray opened his mouth to reply, but he paused as his stomach growled. He was so hungry. “There’s worse,” he finally said, he didn’t elaborate.

White and Gray began ascending a hill, careful to keep their heads ducked low behind the wall of sandbags peppering the trench’s edge. As the geography changed, so did the air; malformed by distant, thunderous explosions and strangled, desperate screams, they entered the Eastern-line.

Mud-encrusted men hunkered against the sides of the trenches, hands wrapped around their saucer-shaped helmets, medics tended to the dead and dying and officers barked orders and reprimanded reticent soldiers. Explosion after explosion patterned the background. The earth shook with each blast.

White and Gray, crouching low, navigated through the chaos. “This way, right?”

“Yes! Move!”

They moved. They followed a side trench’s narrow confines for almost an entire kilometer, the reports of rifles gradually fading behind them. However, as they moved farther away, the blasts of artillery only grew closer. Dirt and stone and a thousand other things best left buried found their home in the air after each explosion. The fatal rain skittered into the narrow trench with alarming regularity.

Shortly, they found the end of the line, the path sloping gradually upwards towards ground-level. “Are you ready for the run?” White asked, adjusting his pack.

Gray shrugged. “Not much of a choice,” he said. There was about forty seconds between explosions, he had counted under his breath. In that time, they had to cross a hundred meters of exposed, crater-filled field. They had to try.

Gray made sure he had a firm grip on the cardboard package. Just a little farther, he told himself. The sky split with the whistle of another artillery shell and a millisecond later, it made landfall.

“Go!” shouted Gray as the explosion dissipated. White was already running, up the embankment and across the pitted field. Gray was on his heels, the box clasped to his chest. Ten, eleven, twelve, he counted mentally. They sprinted past splintered wagons and decomposing horses. Thirty, thirty-one...

Another screeching-whistle divided the air and an explosion went off right behind White and Gray. It shook Gray to his bones, the blast shunting him off his feet and sending him sprawling in the dirt. He was peppered with a shotgun-blast of debris, blessedly deflected by his pack. His ears rang. They felt warm and wet.

It seemed like forever before Gray had the wherewithal to get to his feet; but once he was up, he blearily scanned his surroundings, spotting White several meters away face down in the crater.

He staggered to his comrade and flipped him over by the shoulders. A dirty, ragged gash smirked from the side of White’s pallid neck. The sandy-haired man coughed blood.

“Shit, hold on, White. I got you.” Gray began to drag White backwards, his feet pedaling furiously in the soft earth. Behind him, through his ringing ears, Gray could hear someone yelling.

Gray had begun counting in his head again and it was around twenty-eight that he suddenly felt a set of hands lighten the weight of White’s body. A soldier from the resupply-line helped him drag his squad-mate the remaining distance. As they slipped behind the wicker-wrapped trench walls, another shell landed, its blast the threatening roar of a looming predator.

“What the bloody hell were you crazy fucks doing?” demanded the soldier. Gray didn’t answer, his mind was fixated upon a different question: Where’s the package?

Gray peered over the trench-line; the cardboard box had landed just outside the crater. Besides being a bit dirty, it looked undamaged.

“Where’s the medic?” Gray yelled at the soldier.

“He’s on his way, but—”

Gray didn’t let him finish. “We’re on a high-priority delivery for General Trotter. Help White!” With that, Gray went to climb over the edge, but he was stopped by White’s slack grip on his trousers. He bent down to better hear his comrade’s words.

“Ge-get it to the General...finish it for me.”

Gray clasped White on the shoulder and looked him in the eye. “I will. And after, I’ll find you in the medic’s tent, in your warm bed with the pretty nurse.”

White smiled ruefully then coughed. Blood spurted out the gash in his neck. Before Gray could clamber back over the top, the light in White’s eyes faded. His head lulled.

“I’ll get it to him,” Gray murmured and closed White’s eyelids. Then, moving faster than his leaden limbs had any right to, Gray climbed up and over and sprinted towards the package in the crater. He snagged its twine and began running eastward.

Gray continued in that direction for nearly two more kilometers, the nightmarish sounds of the front fading more and more with every step. His legs moved with all the urgency they could muster. Soon, he would deliver the package and its mysterious contents; Maybe maps? Or Crown secrets?

Gray occupied his mind by imagining what he could be transporting, considering why it was so important. It helped distract from the day’s—his life’s—morbidity. Then Gray navigated his way through the end of the Eastern-line, past a thicket of pine trees and onto the foot of the Menier Estate, where he was rendered numb.

It was a vast wasteland of manicured lawns and gardens, elegant water features and cropped hedges. A baroque mansion dominated the center of the land. Apart from some shattered gargoyles, it looked untouched by the great war that raged beyond it’s perfect borders. A gravel walkway led from the edge of the woods to the chateau's stoop.

Gray followed the path, quelled by the sudden opulent architecture; shell-shocked by the transition from his home of mud and blood. Two soldiers in clean uniforms guarded the mansion’s entrance. Gray wordlessly showed them the Lieutenant’s yellow slip of paper and they opened the gilded structure’s front door.

“General Trotter’s in the parlor,” said the taller soldier.

Gray followed his direction. In a daze, holding the mud sprinkled cardboard box with both hands, he stumbled through the gold encrusted foyer and past the marble staircase. Everything smelled of sunlight and rosewater. He saw a carved archway, adorned with infantile cherubs, and from within, he heard laughter. Dumbfounded, Gray walked through the archway.

“Ah-ha! Look girls, the cake is here!” Boomed a rotund man with slicked-back white hair and a thin beard; judging by his ornate uniform, General Trotter. He stood by a white couch, his meaty hands resting on the shoulders of a small girl, adorned in a frilly, white dress. A woman, her face layered with expensive makeup, lounged on the couch.

“Took you long enough, lad,” chided General Trotter, moving towards the disheveled Gray.

“Cake?” was all Gray could manage.

Taking the twine-knotted, cardboard box from Gray’s stiff hands, General Trotter placed it on an end table. “Yes, cake!” he said, “it's the most important part of any celebration!”

“Besides having something to celebrate, Dear,” said the woman on the white couch.

“Yes, of course you’re right my lady,” admitted General Trotter, untying the twine around the box. He unfolded the cardboard and revealed a misshapen but still perfectly intact, chocolate cake. Its frosting gleamed with the dull luster of rich cocoa.

“Cake…” muttered Gray, fixated on the dessert.

General Trotter cocked an eyebrow at him. “Yes, cake. What’s wrong with you, lad?”

Gray snapped from his reverie, suppressing the currents of raging hurt that threatened to consume him. “Nothing, Sir. Sorry, Sir,” he said.

General Trotter examined Gray for a second, taking in his mud-caked uniform, his sodden boots and unshaven, bony face. “Good. Thank you for your service, Corporal,” he said, “return to your post at your convenience.” As Gray remained unmoving, the General barked, “Dismissed!”

Gray snapped a salute and turned on his heel to go. While he retreated from the parlor, he could feel the little girl examining him curiously. Her eyes felt like another unneeded weight for him to carry.

The two soldier-guards weren’t outside when Gray left the mansion, so he sat down on the lavish front steps. He still felt dazed, as if the explosion that had damaged his ears had also cast a film across his mind. He started to cry. Salty tears trickled down his cheeks, dripping into his lap. He was so tired, so hungry.

Why cake? The thought pounded in his skull. He could’ve rested earlier, if there hadn’t been cake. White would still be alive, if there hadn’t been cake. The General’s chocolate cake had come at a high cost.

Then, Gray heard the doors groan and a set of gentle footsteps approached him from behind. A small hand entered his vision, holding a China plate with a slice of cake and a silver fork. Gray looked up to see the little girl’s wide-eyed face gazing back at him, her expression far too remorseful and anxious for her young age. Wordlessly, she pushed the cake into his filthy, empty hands. Then, with a twirl of her frilly dress, she walked back inside.

Gray looked at the velvety slice of chocolate cake. He considered flinging it away, smashing it against the stone steps. He stared at the cake for a long while, but eventually, he filled the fork with a bite and placed it on his tongue. He cried silent tears as the dessert melted in his mouth.