Echoes of Dark and Light

by Chris Shanley-Dillman

  Back again on dry land, we marched two miles closer to the front lines and then set up camp for the evening. More waiting. No one even attempted to sleep with the sounds and smells of battle permeating every inch of space. Still, I think I managed to doze now and again, my head resting on my propped rifle. Fleeting nightmares haunted my mind, visions of the fellow I’d shot back at Fort Sanders, his young, blank eyes staring unseeingly into my own.

  Shortly after one a.m., we again moved out, making our way up Parker’s Store Road. The darkness surrounded us, concealed us, muffled our marching, but no amount of shadows can completely shield an army, and we advanced with rifles loaded and ready. My eyes peered into the thick trees on either side, ears siphoning the sounds for those of the enemy, nose burning from the gunpowder smells wafting on the light breeze, heart thumping loudly with unease and determination, legs itching to run but held back to a march.

  Just as the sun’s sleepy morning rays peered over the horizon, rifle fire exploded all around us. Captain Truckey commanded us to take cover to the left of the road, and we dove into the thick trees of Virginia’s wilderness. Immediately, we returned fire, and the deadening sounds of rifle explosions crammed my ears, bursting inside my head. I fought the confusion that settled like a morning mist. Enemy fire erupted from nowhere and everywhere, and I struggled to focus on the unseen. This time, I didn’t hesitate to return fire on this enemy whom I’d never met. Sometime over the last few months, I had fully accepted my role as soldier, including every consequence, every guilt and every death that went along with it.

  “Men!” Captain Truckey yelled above the explosions, “cover fire for General Potter!” He pointed to the division of troops charging across the open field just in front of our covered position.

  We fired shot after shot in a continuous volley at the enemy, allowing General Potter’s men to traverse the open field. Despite our efforts, I saw three soldiers catch bullets and stumble down into the green spring grass. I couldn’t imagine the courage required to cross that open field with cannons and musket balls whizzing through the air.

  All too soon, our turn arrived, but Captain Truckey led us around the field through the trees instead of across it. I appreciated the added cover, yet a few shots found targets and the wounded wails clawed at my ears. Part of me needed to help them, drag them to safety. But my job kept me at Captain Truckey’s heels; I knew the hospital staff would come in as soon as possible to rescue the men lying in the thick underbrush.

  We worked our way through the trees, briars catching our clothes and scratching our skin, tripping over General Potter’s men. Falling in on their right, we faced the Rebels who had established themselves just beyond a marshy gulch. By then, the afternoon sun dappled down through the shade-offering branches, yet sweat dripped down my back, soaking my shirt. My canteen banged against my hip, empty and dry, and I could smell the marsh’s moisture so close, yet so unreachable. I thought about asking Toby for some of his water, but didn’t have the heart to take any away from his parched lips. Just as I loaded my final musket ball and powder, a fellow nudged me from behind, dolling out more supplies.

  “Do you have any water?” I yelled.

  “What?”

  I shook my head and re-aimed my rifle. It took too much effort to communicate above the confusion. Besides, I didn’t have any spit left to work my tongue.

  “Here,” Toby yelled, thrusting his canteen into my face.

  I shook my head, pushing it away.

  “Just take a drink, you stubborn goat. It won’t do me any good to have you keel over from dehydration.”

  I cocked a grin at him in thanks and took a gulp. The warm water trickled down my parched throat, washing away the dirt and dust. I used every ounce of will power I had to keep from downing every delicious drop.

  We managed to charge once or twice, pushing the Rebels back, but each time they regained their ground. We held our position however, continuing to pound them with everything we had.

  Then came the orders for an organized attack, every division hitting at the same scheduled time, 5:30 p.m. Captain Truckey regrouped us for additional instructions, and I took a quick glance around to count the familiar faces. Toby, Woody, Preacher, Kenny and Kevin. Even Jimmy. Kenny had a bleeding gash on his arm, but nothing worse than that. No known losses then, only those whom I hadn’t yet learned their names.

  At 5:30 exactly, every one of us charged forward with deafening yells and gunfire. The mass confusion of noise and smoke disorientated me and somehow I became separated from Captain Truckey’s infantry. A cold knot of fear formed in my gut as a throng of unfamiliar faces pushed by me. I tried to focus, load my rifle, fire at the enemy, stay on my feet, keep from getting trampled, to breathe. But all too soon, the confusion started swirling around in my head. I felt alone and defenseless, despite being crowded and shoved by hundreds, and armed with two loaded weapons. I ducked behind a tree, scanning the smoky confusing crowd, searching for a familiar face. My training, deeply ingrained for months now, kept me firing across the swampy trench at the enemy. I mechanically sighted down the barrel, pulled the trigger, reloaded all the while holding my spot behind the tree and desperately searching for Toby. But I knew the 27th must have charged far ahead and I felt completely lost without them, as if the 27th had become my backbone and without them, I wilted as if completely spineless.

  A musket ball winged past my ear and thunked into a tree trunk behind me. Someone grabbed my elbow, yanking me to the ground.

  “What the heck happened?” Toby yelled through the noise. “I turned around and you’d disappeared!”

  I took in his brown eyes glaring at me from a powder-smudged face, and just barely stopped myself from throwing my arms around his neck.

  “I got separated,” I yelled back, repressing a smile of relief.

  “I’d say. And now we’re both separated from the captain.”

  “I appreciate your coming to find me, but we’ll be okay.” My courage trickled back to my bones at Toby’s arrival.

  “Well,” Toby said, ducking another musket ball, “I’m not so sure. The Rebels have more reinforcements coming in from over there. We just got completely cut off from our army!”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  He cocked an eyebrow at me. “Do you really think I’d joke about something like that during the middle of a battle?”

  “Sorry. So, what do we do?”

  “We get out of here and take cover until we can get back to the captain. It won’t do them or us any good getting taken prisoner or shot dead. Come on!”

  We crawled on our bellies through the leaf litter and trampled undergrowth. Rocks bruised my knees and scraped my palms, but I didn’t take much notice; I pinned my eyes on Toby’s boots a few inches in front of me, concentrating on keeping my head and bum as close to the ground as possible. As soon as we skirted the trampled paths and reached the shielding cover of the waist high undergrowth, we cautiously rose to our feet, senses alert to any sign of the Rebels. The screaming shells and exploding rifle fire had moved just far enough away to leave a ringing in my ears. Nothing moved through the jungle of trees surrounding us, not even a leaf ruffling in the breeze. Maybe we had found a safe zone…

  “Get down!”

  Toby plowed into me, knocking us both down a steep incline. Slipping and sliding, we tumbled down the slope. I came to an abrupt and painful halt, slamming into the trunk of a tree. A loud pop preceded a white-hot stab of pain in my shoulder. In the cloud of confusion, dizziness and fire burning in my arm, I knew I’d knocked the joint out of place, again. It’d happened twice before, and the pain burned all too familiar.

  I painfully pushed myself up to a sitting position, my injured arm hanging uselessly by my side. Scanning my surroundings through pain-blurred eyes, I found myself halfway down the steep, forested hillside, my plunge halted with my abrupt introduction to the sugar maple tree. Farther down, I spotted Toby at the foot of the hill. He climbed to his feet unsteadil
y, grabbing onto a nearby sapling for support. He seemed okay.

  A scuffle of falling dirt clods shifted my gaze uphill to discover the reason for our rather ungraceful departure. A Rebel officer stood at the top of the hill, his rifle aimed at my heart.

  I knew his chances of hitting me at that distance could only be slim to none. I didn’t wait around to increase his odds. I grabbed my rifle with my good hand and slid the rest of the way down the slope on my rear, my numbing arm held protectively in my lap. If we could find a bit of cover to aim our own rifles, we’d be okay.

  “Toby,” I warned as I narrowly missed knocking him over, “we’ve got company.”

  Toby, glancing up at the Rebel, reached down and grabbed my arm to haul me to my feet.

  The excruciating pain burned like lighting striking every nerve in my body. A scream escaped and I nearly passed out. Toby dropped down next to me, his hands hovering around as if afraid to touch me again.

  “What? What is it? Are you shot? Bobbi, talk to me!”

  “My shoulder,” I mumbled. “It’s dislocated.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nodded. “It’s happened twice before.”

  “Come on, let’s get you to a doctor.”

  “Hold it right there! You two Yanks aren’t returning to your company anytime soon.”

  Damn! I looked up to find a rifle aimed inches from our heads. I’d forgotten about the Rebel for one ill-fated moment and now our future loomed dim and dreary; either short and quick, ending with a bullet to the head, or long and torturous with a trip to a prison camp. I searched the Rebel sergeant’s eyes for a clue to our future. But something about his face caught my attention, something I couldn’t quite pinpoint. Something besides the fact that his eyes held a glassy, glazed look as if his mind wasn’t quite right.

  “Randy.” Toby’s hushed voice echoed volumes.

  I looked from Toby to the Rebel and back. The Rebel looked a little confused, yet Toby had never seemed more sure.

  “Randy, it’s me, Toby. Your brother.”

  The silence stretched into eternity as Randy’s eyes blinked several times. The rifle never wavered an inch.

  “Don’t you remember me, Randy? I used to tag along after you, annoying you in front of your friends. You taught me how to swim in the back pond, and spent an entire summer teaching me how to shoot straight.

  Recognition slowly filtered into his face, where I could now pick out some family resemblance. The brothers shared a strong jaw line, and their ears stuck out at just the same angle.

  Close on the heels of recognition, a deep hatred spread across Randy’s features, brows furrowed, jaw clenched and lips parted in an ugly sneer. “I have no brother named Toby!” Spittle flew and anger slurred his words, but left no doubt in their meaning.

  A quiet sigh left Toby, and I glanced at him to find the bit of light fading from his eyes.

  “I had hoped you would have changed your mind in the year since we’d last seen each other.” Toby’s dejected tone broke my heart.

  “Has anything happened to have changed my mind? I see you are still wearing your Yankee uniform and fighting on the side of the enemy. You are still firing your rifle at your own flesh and blood family!” His voice rose shrilly, echoing off the trees.

  The tiny speck of hope I’d found at encountering Toby’s brother shriveled up and died. Randy wouldn’t be setting us free with a brotherly embrace to see us on our way. Toby and I would be lucky to make it alive to a prison camp, and I had serious doubts about even that. Toby had stuck painfully true to his beliefs of right and wrong when deciding to join the northern army, but with the consequences of not only loosing his family, but becoming their sworn enemy as well. I shifted my gaze back and forth between the cold steel gleam in Randy’s eyes to the cold steel glint of the rifle pointed at Toby’s chest. And if Toby’s marksmanship had been taught from this man, there was no way, in all of this hell man had created, Randy would miss. Randy will kill Toby, of that I had no doubts, with me quickly following.

  What could I do? My rifle leaned uselessly beside me. I couldn’t pick it up and aim it with just one hand, especially without drawing Randy’s attentions.

  But I still had my Colt tucked inside my boot, mere inches away from my useable hand. Normally, I’d use two hands to aim my Colt, but that would now be impossible. One hand would have to do. I’d aim for a wounding shot, not a mortal one, because how could I kill Toby’s own brother, even in self-defense? Slowly, ever so slowly, I slid my hand down to my boot. I kept my eyes pinned on Randy, who seemed only able to see Toby in his hatred-filled eyes.

  “Randy, you know I would never raise a weapon against my family. I told you that when I left. I joined the northern army for principles, not to raise war against my own brothers.”

  “Yet that is what you’ve done. We’ve been trading gunfire for days now! You say your decisions don’t have direct consequences on the family, but how could they not? You are a disgrace to the southern way of life, and a painful shame to the Dove family name! Mother cried for months! You deserve to suffer your sins for all eternity!” He lowered his head to sight down his rifle.

  My fingertips grazed the handle of my Colt.

  “Randy, don’t do this!”

  “I don’t do any favors for enemy Yanks!” He pulled back the hammer.

  “Promise me you’ll let Bobbi go; he doesn’t have anything to do with you and me!”

  “I have no special hatred for that Yank. He’ll be shipped off to a prison camp to rot like he deserves. Just as you deserve to die and rot in the fires of betrayal and lies!” His finger clutched the trigger and began to squeeze.

  I ripped my Colt free and fired. Randy tumbled backward in an explosion of sound and gunpowder. I’d aimed for his shoulder, his upper arm, but I’m afraid my hand shook; the hours of stressful battle and the pain on my dislocation may have effected my aim. A wave of exhaustion and nausea swept over me and I slumped to the ground.

  Toby stared at me for one shocked second before dropping to his knees beside his fallen brother. “Randy! Can you hear me?”

  No matter how badly I wanted to just lie there until the war ended, I couldn’t ignore the potential danger. So I painfully crawled over and confiscated Randy’s rifle, just in case. But it probably didn’t matter, as I saw no movement from the Rebel; even his chest lay sunken and still. A cold, black chunk of ice took hold in my chest as I realized what I’d done. I killed Toby’s brother.

  Toby let loose a wail of pain as he fell over his brother’s body. I didn’t know what to do, and helplessness shook my innards. I placed my hand on Toby’s sobbing shoulder, but doubted he even noticed.

  I don’t know how long we sat like that, long enough for my entire arm to go from a throbbing flame of pain to numb, long enough for the sun to slide behind the horizon, for the sounds of battle to trickle off into the darkness, for Toby’s first wave of grief to fall silent.

  Toby sat up and took a deep breath. Then he stood, and I could see blood soaked through his blue uniform. My aim had wavered, piercing Randy’s heart. Toby bent down and hefted the body over his shoulder. He finally turned to me.

  “You killed my brother. Get out of my sight.”

  Toby plowed past me, the lifeless form of his brother slumped over his shoulder. Not knowing what else to do, I followed a dozen paces behind. I understood Toby’s anger, accepted it, even welcomed it in a strange way. But that didn’t stop the fist of pain crushing my heart or the tears running unchecked down my filthy cheeks.

  We slowly made our way back to camp, Toby’s shadowy form carefully picking out a path through the thick forest, me trying to follow silently and invisibly. I heard his breath, ragged and winded under the strain of carrying a burden equal to his own body weight plus some. But he never complained. In fact, he never said a word, as if he struggled through the deserted battleground alone. I didn’t know which hurt worse, my dislocated shoulder or his new hatred of me.

  Luckily we
avoided stumbling across any other stray Rebels. The bustle of camp and lights from glowing lanterns and beckoning campfires lured us the last quarter mile. Most of the troops had bedded down right in the battlegrounds, leaving the hospital tent as the main bustle of human activity. Orderlies hurried past bearing loaded stretchers of wounded and dying soldiers. Doctors shouted orders and hollered for more supplies over the moaning and screaming of their patients. A jumbled pile of severed limbs grew minute by minute outside one of the tent flaps. Toby stepped around it and ducked inside the tent. I hesitated, and then followed.

  Despite the open tent flaps, the air inside felt too stifling and polluted with the smell of unwashed bodies, blood, infection and death. I fought to keep my empty stomach from heaving, and focused instead on staying near Toby. He wove through the confusion and chaos until he found an empty bed, where he carefully, gently lay down Randy’s body.

  “Hey! What’s a Reb doing here? Get him out of the way!”

  Toby grabbed the orderly’s collar, dragging him in close to avoid any misunderstandings. “He’s my brother, and he stays. Understand?”

  The orderly’s eyes grew wide at Toby’s fierceness, paling a bit around his dropped mouth. But he managed to get out a shaky nod.

  “Good,” Toby said, releasing the collar. “I’m going to arrange transportation to ship his body home. You make sure no one touches him.”

  He turned and walked away without a word or even a glance in my direction. I followed him with my eyes, too dejected to trail after him farther. Why hadn’t he asked me to watch over Randy?

  “Hey, I’m talking to you!” The orderly rudely poked me in the ribs.

  “Huh?”

  “I said, do you need medical attention?”