The Way Back Home

Chapter Nine: Compass

CHAPTER SONG: "Compass" by Zella Day

"Let me through!" Schofield struggled to shout amidst the hellish chaos around him. "Let me through!"

Two orderlies standing guard at the Colonel's cut-and-cover were restraining him by the arms, preventing the Lance Corporal from entering.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" One of them demanded, holding him back against the wall of heavily weighted sandbags that constructed the makeshift shelter.

"I have to get through! I have to see Colonel Mackenzie!" Schofield clutched the crumpled letter in his fist, praying the penmanship of the General was still legible after being in the river. "I have to stop this attack!"

He could hear other voices inside the dugout ante-room, giving Schofield the drive to push back against the two guards, but to no further avail. He could feel whatever strength left inside of him fading...

Another captain swept past where Schofield was being held and inside the shelter. "Colonel, we've seen flares. The men on the left flank have made it to the German line."

"Colonel!" Schofield screamed at the top of his voice. His throat burned as a result of his efforts to be heard above the exploding noise.

The orderlies hauled him away from the dugout and up against the trench wall only a few feet away.

"Listen to me! I have a letter!" Schofield faced the two guards struggling to hold him down. "I need to see Colonel Mackenzie!"

He looked for any sign of understanding on either of the men's hard stares on him, but found nothing of the sort.

"There's no bloody way you're getting in there, mate!" Both of them continued to hold onto Schofield as the captain that had entered the dugout a couple moments before, his deep voice bellowing out the orders.

"Sergeant, send in the next wave!"

"NO!" The Lance Corporal managed to strike on the orderlies in the stomach with his elbow and free himself from their grasps. He stumbled forward and entered the dugout, panting with breath to find the energy to speak again.

A group of men were huddled together around a table, possibly looking at a battlefield map. One of their voices stood out from the others, imposing and undeniable to a near fault.

"Tell Ivins and Murphy to direct their men to the left flank. Concentrate everything there." Mackenzie continued to direct accordingly when the younger soldier alerted them to his presence.

"Colonel Mackenzie!" The men around Mackenzie turned in the lance corporal's direction, stunned into absorbing silence. "This attack is not to go ahead! You've been ordered to stop!"

"Who the hell are you?" Mackenzie stared Schofield straight in the eye, taking in the more youthful man's frenzied appearance and his frantic yet weathered facial expression.

"Lance Corporal Schofield, sir. 8th." He saluted as was the custom for one of his rank acknowledging a superior officer. "I have orders from General Erinmore to call off this attack!"

In his shaking hand, Schofield held out the wrinkled and dampened letter, hoping against all better judgment the Colonel would oblige and at least take it. None of the men stepped forward, standing in place.

"You're too late, Lance Corporal." Mackenzie began to turn away from Schofield and toward the table he had been leaning over.

"Sir, these orders are from Army Command! You have to read them." Schofield was out of breath, his lungs aflame with over-exertion of his body.