Before You Start A War

Chapter Two

Apparently, Andy wasn't the only one to die during the night. Four other men that were wounded yesterday died at some point, and Harry can tell that there are three more on their way out.

Harry wasn't able to find out what the light and bang was from that woke him since the shock of waking up to a dead friend caused him to forget what even roused him in the first place. A couple of other men seemed to know, though, since soon after Harry woke up, three men darted to the door and began kicking, yelling and screaming. This continued for nearly twenty minutes, before the men realized that whatever happened wouldn't happen again, and that the door wasn't gonna budge.

Throughout the day, Harry spent the majority of his time counting. He counted the number of men still alive, he counted the hay bails, he counted the boards making up the walls, he counted the nails in the boards. He took notice of every colour of the wood and made tallies into the dirt floor. He even tried counting the straws of hay in each bail, but gave up after he reached 200.

By the time he finished his counting, the day was nearly over. He could see through tiny cracks under the barn as the sunlight grew bright and then faded. He could hear the ruckus of around the camp flare up and then die out as night drew closer. He heard laughter, voices, and even tried to tune into a few conversations of passing enemy soldiers just outside the walls, but everything was garbled and incoherent.

Finally, at the end of the day, after the sun completely went down, the door creaked and pulled open slightly, and in came six men. They all had guns on their backs and two even had theirs drawn, pointing them into the building.

Everyone jumped to their feet when they noticed the door starting to open. Quite a few of them planned to attack, but once they saw the drawn guns, they backed down. As the six men filtered in, Harry noticed one of them carrying a sack. He looked around at everyone, motioning with his head to the bodies lying around on the ground. The group dispersed, leaving the one with the sack to stand at the front of the building, in front of the door. He drops the sack and draws his gun.

Harry recognizes him as the man who volunteered yesterday. Niall Horan, he recalls. He then looks around at all the other men that accompanied him and sees them collecting the bodies. Two men have two bodies thrown over each shoulder, with another man accompanying them by keeping his gun drawn. One man picks up the last body, Andy, and since Andy died quite close to the door, carelessly drops him just outside, making Harry cringe. He then draws his gun and waits for the three other men to make their way back outside. After they've all left, the remaining men, all eighteen of them, eye the remaining man up and down. He glances outside, watching and waiting, before removing his gun from his body.

"I'm not here to hurt you," He calls out, and throws the gun outside. He closes the door behind him and stands in front of it, tying a rope around the handles on the inside to keep it shut. "I don't want to hurt you."

Niall's eyes glance around at the group of men. Many of them are sending him dangerous glares, a few are staring at the sack warily, and one is staring at him with a curious gaze. Niall sighs.

"I will not hurt you, unless I need to. I don't want to have to need to." Niall bends down, and pulls the sack closer to his body. He opens it up and pulls out two small loaves of cornbread. He looks up to see a few men's eyes lighting up. He smiles. He breaks off pieces from the loaves of bread, trying to make it as even as he can.

He manages to make eighteen rations of cornbread, pulling out a cloth to set the pieces onto. He then pulls out a large jug of water.

"If you would like a ration, here you go." Niall isn't exactly sure how he wants to do this. He doesn't want to leave the safety of the door, since there is no security on the outside as of right now, but he also doesn't trust letting the men too close. He pushes the cloth further out, and then motions for the men to come closer.

However, the men are strangely obedient as they make their way to the cloth. In no time, there are only four rations of cornbread left on the cloth, since most of the men have dispersed and only four have yet to come up. He looks around to see who doesn't have a ration yet, and notices a few men whom are leaning against the barn walls in pain. Another man, the one who was sending him a strange look when he first came in, comes up to the cloth and collects his single ration, bending down on his knees. He looks up at Niall, holding his cornbread between two fingers, before scurrying back to the wall where he originally was. Niall looks at the three remaining rations, and then at the three men leaning against the walls. He debates going over to each of them to give it to them, but instead he leaves the cloth alone. The remaining rations will be gone by the time he return tomorrow, he's sure.

"Now, if you would like a bit of water, open your canteens and come up." Niall opens his jug of water, ready for men to begin filtering toward him. "I wasn't given any cups so this will have to do."

One by one, the men come up to him. He fills each canteen only slightly, not nearly full for each of them. Each man sighs sullenly and returns to their previous positions after receiving water.

The same man as before comes up last, carrying four canteens. Niall sends him a strange look, raising his eyebrows.

"I brought theirs," He points to the men against the walls. Niall nods and fills each jug evenly. "Thank you. Uhm, can I take those last three pieces? For them, too."

Niall nods, and calls out loudly. "I will return tomorrow." He gathers up his sack, dropping the empty jug of water and cloth back into it, and unties the rope from around the door. He looks around once more to make sure no one is planning to attack him, before he squeezes outside, back into the cold air.

Harry watches him go, wondering why the man waited inside for each of them to eat. He guesses it's because he didn't want to leave the jug and cloth inside, just in case his allies could use them as weapons or something, but he could've just thrown all the food on the ground and not even offer them water.

He could just let them die.

But he actually cared. He actually made sure each person got a ration and some water.

He wanted them to trust him.

Harry shakes the feeling off, and brings the canteens and food over to his dying allies, hoping that it could buy them another day.

The next day, when Harry goes to check on them, each one of them are already gone.