General Wellesley's Command VII

I will admit that as we filed out of the general’s tent that my respect for the man had increased. It was odd; it was because the man had admitted to us that he didn’t know everything that I liked him more. Possibly it was just that it was an odd trait in an officer. The officers that I had encountered before had always acted like they knew everything, even when it was obvious that they had no more clue then the rest of us. Even my own captain, a man who I would follow to the gates of hell, would never admit to any of us if he didn’t know what he was doing.

“Nice to meet you Jon,” said the sergeant, sticking out his hand to introduce himself to our newest member, speaking of another officer acting out of character of officers. Officers did not shake hands with men put under their control. Jon was obviously shocked as well but he still shook the outstretched hand. “I’ve been thinking I’m kind of deadweight on this missions, it’s kind of silly all of you calling me sir, demanding respect from you seems like a salve to my ego and I won’t have it anymore. Except around other people of course because they expect it, the officers will have my head if they find out I have done away with discipline.”

“If that’s what you want, sir,” said Alice and then realized what she had said. “Sorry, it’s habit.”

“I don’t care if it makes you more comfortable, I just don’t want you thinking that I am insisting on it,” the sergeant said, shrugging. I promised myself that I was going to take advantage of this as much as possible; it was such a rare chance that it would be a crime to use it.

“So what do we do next?” I asked, as we walked towards the tents that had been given to us by a very surly supply officer.

“We’re going to continue to bother the enemy of course,” the sergeant said. “They will be on the lookout for anyone sneaking into the camp for a couple of nights after our raid last night so instead we are going to go after their patrols. It will hinder the enemy greatly if their scouts don’t come back and it will make the scouts wearier and less likely to take chances to sniff us out if their patrols start winding up dead. It would be even more interesting if we can start leaving the bodies around the edges of their camp where they can find them. That’s of course if you can manage it,” the sergeant added sheepishly. He seemed to think that he had asked too much of us, which of course the three of us took as a challenge.

“We can do it,” Alice declared smugly and Jon and I nodded in firm agreement. There was nothing in world that the 99^th regiment couldn’t do.

Our days took on a pattern the next week. We didn’t bother going back to our camp every night; it was too much of a bother to then return to enemy territory the next morning without getting caught. Instead we slept under the stars and ate what we could steal from the enemy. We would take turns deciding who would go out and look for enemy patrols while the rest of us lounged around camp for our scout to report back, it was an easy life. Once we had a target we would all spring into action, kill the patrol, loot their bodies, and return to our camp. Most patrols were on horseback but that wasn’t a problem since some of the horses I had released from the enemy camp the first night had found their way into our hands. Once it was night we would drag the patrol’s bodies as close to the enemy’s pickets as we dared and consider it a job well done.

To be continued...