Jaycee Woods

Chapter 1 of Boudica and The Butcher by Jaycee Woods

STATUS: Second pass edit completed.

AUTHOR’S NOTE: As a draft this version is not perfected. Metaphorically speaking, the draft remains an unclothed body, not fit to be seen in public. Yet I am putting it out for preview and comment anyway as aversion therapy for future publishing fright. Comments welcome. Thanks, Jaycee.

This story has not happened yet; however, today, too many advocate ideas and actions plunging us towards our second civil war.

How will the war begin? Most think the death of innocents. Yet, ideas ignited the conflict long before; symptoms manifested soon after.

Perhaps the desecration and destruction of old statues memorializing the first American Civil War weakened the inhibitions caging the dogs of war. Activists for political rebirth painted those weathered testaments as shameful monuments to human depravity. While claiming stolen valor for defeating a slavery long dormant, those activists undermined the actual symbolization endowed by the statues’ creators, a promise to never have brother kill brother again.

Following the historic war, those grieving lost sons, brothers, husbands, and fathers joined together to raise memorials to the human cost of a war which killed more Americans than any other. Obedient to forms of the past, statutes of horsed generals Grant, Lee, McPherson, and others stood as sentinels against repeating the bloodletting again. Unlike the past, such monuments incorporated the men who served and died under the horsed leader, the lost men for whom their surviving families grieved. Some factories, wasted previously producing the armaments of war, repurposed to manufacture solitary soldier statutes suitable for memorializing the dead American soldiers, whether they had fought for the Union or the Confederacy.

Absent such reminders of the price of political violence, a decadent and increasingly ignorant populace enflamed politics as bloodsport again. Harsh words between partisans grew into blows, leading to shots, before causing death. Like a weak Buchanan, the progressive and conservative political leaders both fanned the flames while ignoring the approaching tempest. A flywheel of injustice and grievance turned faster and faster with growing momentum as a political circus had replaced a sober reflection upon substantive political problems.

The activists who sought to create a new reality by toppling the establishment instead released the horrors of the past, previously only held back by fragile retaining walls. Far from their live-action-roleplay defeating slavery’s legacy, these activists unleashed enslaving the vanquished to the victors and the victors to the memories of their own necessary but abhorrent deeds. Ares strode the land again with a sickle to harvest the corpses of the nation’s youth one stroke at a time.

The events in this tale occur in a future Second American Civil War. A confederation of city states, the Rebels, fights Unionists of the federal government. This premonition begins after years of bloody war, in an obscure rebel-controlled sector of the Ohio military theater where a Union commander known to the rebels as The Butcher had recently achieved unexpected Union victories.

On the abandoned battlefield of a recent rebel defeat, a young female rebel medic searched. This habit had become her lonely quest ever since the day her little brother had failed to return from a skirmish, which took his life. Her oversized uniform, bulky utility belt, and large med bag exaggerated her diminutive stature.  

In her left hand, she held a small bag of rocks for defense against nature. She no longer feared so much the crows, turkey vultures, and black vultures who feasted around her on the corpses of her fallen comrades. So much larger than the pigeons of her childhood in the city, these scavenging birds lacked the danger to her of a swarm of rats or a pack of feral dogs appearing to consume the dead. Before the war, human hubris assumed itself the top of the food chain; in battle death, men rejoined the food chain as the prey of not only birds, rats, and dogs, but also the occasional coyote, fox, racoon, or opossum before consumption by bugs and bacteria.

When looking for injured survivors on a battlefield in the past, she covered her nose and mouth with a bandana in a failed effort to ward off the smell and taste of death. She learned to accept her need to use all her senses while searching despite her disgust. Eventually she evolved to perform her rescue tasks without taking a break to dry heave from her empty stomach.

The sounds of the birds ripping flesh from the corpses still sent a shiver through her spine, but she learned to accept them as her allies. The scavengers consumed the dead so their absence from a fallen body offered the medic hope of a living patient. She observed the pattern of the birds and the human bodies.

She had found several bodies who had yet to feed the birds, however those soldiers were recently dead. As she examined the wounds, she observed those corpses had had their throats slit in the same manner as if done meticulously and long after the frenzy of the battle. As she pressed on, to her relief, the medic found an unconscious teen girl wearing the uniform of a rebel soldier; the young woman lived but suffered from a bleeding head injury. The lack of exposed brain matter gave her a little hope. The medic sighed in exasperation as she recognized the young woman’s slim chance of recovery under present deprived conditions.

Despite the critical condition of the rebel soldier’s head wound, the medic delayed action by examining the teen for other wounds. She found the usual scrapes and bruises on the girl’s emaciated body, but nothing to distract her from the injury she feared facing.

The medic assessed her patient’s rasping breathing while checking for any obstructions in the girl’s mouth; she cursed realizing she should have evaluated respiration first. Counting the girl’s breathing rate, the medic decided her patient should be getting enough oxygen plus her skin color did not display oxygen deprivation. Checking the coloring beneath her patient’s finger nails on both dirty hands, the medic decided she had good circulation. Taking her patient’s regular breathing, good circulation, and lack of clammy skin into account, the medic eliminated shock as an immediate and acute condition. She recalled that she could confirm her judgement by checking the pulse. Her frustration rose as she failed to follow an orderly checklist before making conclusions; despite knowing everything to be done by her, she lacked the discipline to do each in the correct sequence.

Taking a deep breath to calm herself, the medic counted the girl’s slow pulse. She noted the heat of the feverish girl’s brow. As she checked the head injury, she lightly probed the bleeding scalp laceration and swelling contusion. Gently she assessed the skull to find no evidence of a fracture. She noted the laceration required stitches, but first she needed to stop the bleeding or at least slow it. She opened her pack knowing her medical supplies would be inadequate as she did not even have a suture kit any longer.

In her mind, she reviewed everything, truly little actually, she knew about treating such a wound. She repressed her panic by reminding herself that stabilizing the patient should be her focus as her duty. She recognized the difficulty of dealing with such a head wound in the field without proper medical supplies. She sighed as she pulled a combat dressing from her med pack, which she used to apply pressure to the bleeding wound.

The medic cursed again remembering she had forgotten to check pupil response, so she might have wasted needed bandaging on a brain-dead vegetable. She raised the young woman’s pupils, first one than the other. Both pupils responded equally well to the sunlight. The medic’s confidence rose as this indicated no damage to the brainstem, no concerning increase in intercranial pressure, nor differential damage to the hemispheres of her brain. While there might be actual damage, her patient lacked symptoms to arrive at such a conclusion. Further, the pupil response signified the young woman had not yet gone into shock.

Her hand returned to apply pressure to the bleeding wound. Distracting herself for a moment from all the blood, the medic called out, “Anyone else here?”

To her horror and surprise, she heard a stern male voice behind her. “It is only us.” Turning her head, she saw a Union soldier covered in blood looming over her, looking at her, a machete covered with gore hanging at his hip.

She exhaled trying to calm herself as she looked at her enemy, a soldier. She checked his clothes, looking for a rank insignia but could not distinguish one under all the blood he wore, “Who are you?”

“The one responsible for this,” he answered as he pointed his blood-stained hand at the field of rebel corpses.

She frowned at him before attempting to refocus on working to stabilize the unconscious girl, “Are you going to kill me too?”

“I wasn’t planning to. Would you prefer that I did?” he replied sternly.

She did not answer, but instead continued working. Using her bare hands to apply pressure to the girl’s head wounds.

“You have skills. What is your training? If you have adequate bandages and medicines, are you any good?” he asked.

“Our army trained me to be a combat medic. My skills are more geared to first aid than surgery.” She continued working. Hesitantly, she looked over at the enemy soldier, who she decided was not a threat as he had not killed her yet. “Do you have any medical training?”

He rubbed the several days growth on his chin as he answered, “I am an amateur. I dabble. My skill gets more practice than I expected.”

She grimaced as she looked back at the field of bodies. “Do you kill all the wounded?”

“Only the men. If a woman is injured in battle, she is only killed if it seems like a mercy,” he replied

The medic asked, “Why only the men? Why are women spared?” She continued bandaging the unconscious girl.

He informed, “It is the law. There are only two punishments for rebels. Do you understand what those are?”

She shuddered for a moment at what he suggested. “You execute men in the field if captured. Women?”

“This war has devastated the population. Women are given an opportunity to offer restitution for their crimes. Do you understand what I am implying?” he replied as he looked down on her.

She stopped treating the girl for a moment, before nodding. Her hard dark brown eyes stared into his cold gray ones. She averted her gaze. Her hands shook. She felt sick but tried to remain professional as she silently treated the girl’s injury. She asked, “What about children?”

“We send children for reeducation and adoption by solid Union parents. Too many parents have lost their children to this war. Rebel children are innocent, so we don’t punish them,” he answered.

She paused thinking about his words for a moment before asking, “Have you…adopted any?”

Looking away into the distance, he replied, “No. My wife died at the beginning of the war; I have been a soldier since.”

She nodded in sympathy as her expression softened. She finished bandaging the girl. She checked the girl’s pulse. As she counted, lifting the bandage, the medic observed good clotting on the girl’s wound. She exhaled in relief the girl had not died yet. The medic reapplied the bandage and wrapped it in place. She turned her attention to the Union soldier. “I’m going to be honest, I probably don’t want to know, but I have to…,” she took a deep breath before asking, “What is it you do with the adult women?”

“The women are given a choice,” he answered. Looking at her work, he corrected her in disgust. “That will never do. Here take this antiseptic and plasma bag. Do it again with proper supplies.” He also threw his canteen to her. “Fresh clean water for your patient and yourself.”

The medic wanted to object but accepted that her patient should not die while she wasted time defending her own bruised ego. Afterall, she recognized his point as her lack of resources did limit her ability to provide quality care. She lamented that soon the only tool available to a rebel doctor would be a bone saw, or maybe a carpenter’s saw, for amputations.

Opening the canteen, she washed blood from her hands, before taking a drink to slake her own thirst. She carelessly tucked a strand of dirty brown hair behind her ear. Using the canteen’s water, she cleaned the patient’s left elbow pit before applying the antiseptic. She cut a strip of cloth from the hem of her patient’s uniform using the scissors from her med bag. Tying that cloth strip tightly around the patient’s left bicep, the medic hoped for a good vein. Meekly she apologized as her voice choked up, “I don’t have any gloves; we ran out of gloves. I know that I should use them, but I can’t.”

Silently he retrieved a pair of latex gloves from his bag to offer the medic.

Gratefully she accepted them without words. After putting on the gloves, she tapped the patient’s bulging vein with approval. The medic inserted the IV as the Union soldier pushed a forked stick into the bloody ground. Without a word, she hung the IV on the forked stick. The plasma steadily dripped into the patient’s arm.

“What do you need to do next but could not?” he asked.

“She has a fever. She needs antibiotics. I have none,” she lamented. She looked impotently at her patient’s sweaty brow.

Retrieving a vial and syringe from his bag, he offered these to the medic. She read the label, measured the dosage, and inserted the syringe into the IV line to administer the antibiotic. Knowing her patient received better care, the medic accepted her growing dependence upon the Union soldier.

“That bandage soaked through. Replace it and do better,” he observed.

A tear fell from the medic’s right eye as she admitted, “I don’t have a suture kit. That was my last combat patch.”

The Union soldier retrieved his suture kit and a combat patch from his pack. Offering them to her, he added, “Be careful with her neck. Consider that she might suffer a spinal injury. Limit twisting her about. Later, you will need to take steps to immobilize her to avoid aggravating any potential injuries,” he instructed.

The medic blushed with shame, realizing she overlooked how the blow to the young woman’s head might have caused unseen injuries to her neck and back. After she returned her attention to the Union soldier, she asked, “You said there is a choice for the adult women. What choice is that?” She accepted his supplies to redo the bandaging on the girl’s head wound.

Looking firmly into her dark brown eyes, he answered, “Death or slavery.”

The medic remained silent for a time. She focused on gently removing her patient’s bloody bandage. This Union soldier’s willingness to subject a fellow human being to either of those fates disgusted her. Preparing to speak again, she hoped her voice would not sound too judgmental. However, she failed as she asked him, “How can you justify that? Those options are…cruel.”

A slight smile escaped upon his lips in response to her accusation. He instructed her, “Consider your patient. How many good Union men did she kill? She is young. Her womb may pay the Union 10 children in restitution for her crimes.”

She frowned at him as she used water from the canteen to clean her patient’s bloody scalp wound. She noted good clotting on the wound persisted. She felt her indignation rising as she struggled to not betray emotion in her voice as she answered, “You speak of her as if she is nothing but a breeding animal…as if she, in essence, is an object.”

Like his former students, she asked questions and made statements he had heard repeatedly. By long established practice, he maintained his patience so she would learn and understand the lesson. He could not remember how long it had been since he had been a professor. He replied, “As a slave, producing children will be one of her primary purposes. However, as her children are innocent, they will be free. We only punish the rebel with slavery for her crime.”

Using his suture kit, the medic began the needlework to close the gashing laceration on her patient’s scalp. The medic attempted to swallow her discomfort and continue with an air of professionalism when she asked, “Are you married?”

Her question did not surprise him as women often asked it as if part of a standard profile to create within her mind. However, he noted that he had already given her that information. He considered why that question now. Perhaps her disordered mind did not realize she already had the answer, or her thoughts circled upon the same point unable to reconcile them, or she tried to use his dead wife to manipulate him emotionally in hopes of making him merciful. He said, “Not since rebel terrorists killed my wife and son.”

She looked down at the ground considering his loss. After a pause, she asked him something more personal, “Do you still love her? Your wife?”

He hesitated for a moment in thought before answering, “What does it mean to love? To not be able to live without someone? Since my wife died, I have become death.” As he said the last word, his blood-stained hand swept over the field of rebel corpses as evidence.

Taken aback by him referring to himself as ‘death,’ his phrasing stunned the medic. She stared at the corpses as she considered his words. She returned her focus to completing her needlework. After taking a deep breath, she asked, “Do you feel nothing? When you look at these bodies? Is there nothing left of the man you used to be?”

He thought to himself ‘those questions again’ as if these rebels did not understand they were in the middle of a war. He replied, “I see it as a beginning. Before I die, I will bring this war crashing down on the heads of those in the rebel cities.”

Shocked by his response, the medic almost lost hope for him. She could not help but pity him for the way he clearly lost his humanity. She tied the knot on her final stitch before cutting the thread. After she reassembled the suture kit, the medic looked at the girl on the ground. The medic resolved to ask the Union soldier the question she feared most, so she could determine whether her worst suspicions had any merit. “Do you…take advantage of the women who ‘provide restitution’?”

He noticed she attempted avoiding saying the words for the present facts. He asked, “Are you asking if I have taken slaves for myself?”

She blushed at his bluntness, “Yes, I am.”

Without evading the facts, he answered, “Yes. They all now live on my family farm raising our children. I would not endanger my children by keeping them near the battle front.”

The medic swallowed back her next question. In a failed effort to distract herself, she applied the combat patch to her patient’s wound as she rebandaged her patient’s head. She agonized over her thoughts about his actions. Her mind demanded she ask as she must know. She attributed her concern as for the welfare of the women and children. Her voice trembled as she asked, “Do you treat the women humanely?”

“I treat them as slaves,” he bluntly replied.

The medic gasped as her heart sank. She took a deep breath, attempting to hold her tongue, but unable to stay silent. She could not believe what she heard. She could not reconcile how the man saying these obscenities also offered her medical supplies to treat the poor woman’s injuries. Overwhelmed by rage, horror, and disgust, the medic glared at the Union soldier, as if she could burn a hole through his helmet with her eyes. She spat out a condemning charge at him, “So, what you mean to say is…you treat them like animals, without an ounce of respect or dignity.”

He smiled at her futile shaming attempt, before calmly asking, “Look at me. Am I not an animal? I stalk and kill my rebel prey with the ferocity of a lion. Did the rebel terrorists who murdered my wife and son worry about turning me into a beast?”

The medic choked as she attempted to swallow back her words. Everything within her told her that she should continue calling him an animal, or a monster, or a devil. However, considering the death of his loved ones, she faltered for a moment as she remembered the deaths of her parents and little brother in this war. Confronting the magnitude of his personal loss, her heart grew heavy with sympathy for his suffering. Yet she resolved that his pain could not justify his words. She gritted her teeth as she said, “It is your actions, not your loss, which makes you an animal.”

He acknowledged, then parried, “Perhaps. Yet, each of my slaves had a choice. She could have accepted the government’s amnesty by ending her participation in this criminal rebellion. Each one did not, so I punished her according to the law.”

She bit her tongue in a vain effort to silence herself instead of arguing about what she thought would be just. Dizzied by her effort to restrain herself as she remained shocked and speechless. Unable to stand the silence, she forced herself to speak again, “So how many slaves do you have right now?”

He answered simply, “Four.”

This fact horrified her with disgust as she imagined four women suffering, stifled, and enduring at his hands as he dominated them with his will and desires. She choked back an urge to vomit. Swallowing her revulsion, she forced herself to ask, “What do you force those women to do?”

With simplicity, he responded, “Obey.”

Her eyes narrowed as her vision darkened. Shaking her head in a fight to maintain consciousness, her expression grew colder in face of such a blunt and brutal reality. She could hardly believe his candor. Trying to recenter herself, she busied with cleaning up and stowing the medical supplies. Finding her composure, after removing her bloody gloves, she confronted her fears by asking a question she did not want an answer to, “And what if they choose…death over slavery?”

“Then I would have killed them,” he answered. Changing the subject to refocus her on life, he added, “I have morphine if she wakes up. Do you understand why I have withheld it for now?” he asked.

The medic paused, thinking about his question instead of his answer. Going so long without a supply of the pain killer caused her to stop thinking about it as an option with benefits and drawbacks. “She is unconscious, so I don’t understand whether or how she is in pain. Plus, she has a head injury; morphine would mask symptoms of brain damage if I could communicate with her.”

“And?” he prompted.

“Breathing…it could depress her respiration. Since I am to stabilize her, I shouldn’t introduce a new potential problem without specific urgent benefit as a trade-off for the risk,” she reasoned.

He nodded, satisfied with her demonstration of competence as she thought about the relevant facts instead of reciting from memory unthinkingly.

Her confidence grew under his supervision as he would correct her if she made a mistake such as performing steps out of order. She worried less as she could focus on her tasks, but retreating her patient’s wound had completed. She tried to busy herself rechecking her patient’s vital signs.

A shudder ran through her body as she recalled his earlier answer about killing the female rebels who chose death over slavery, but she pressed on, “Are they at least well fed? And clothed?”

Understanding the medic attempted to rationalize this new reality to herself, he explained, “They are well fed. Much better fed than rebels. Now, they are well provisioned on my parents’ farm. While I kept each naked in camp, my parents preferred to clothe them on the farm. I currently do not have a slave for myself in my camp.”

The medic frowned at the news, before asking, “How could you possibly think it normal to keep them unclothed?” Her voice laced with disapproval, she quietly added, “You kept them…naked?”

Understanding she visualized this new reality, he explained, “A naked woman doesn’t conceal weapons, which would put her in danger within a military camp. Plus, I can better monitor the improvement in her health from regular diet, exercise, and sleep.”

Her mouth fell open at his justification as she tried unsuccessfully to make sense of it. She imagined the humiliation of being nude without her choice and consent. In a stern voice, she shared her inner thoughts with him, “Surely you understand it is disgraceful for a person, a woman, to be kept in such a state? To be so degraded?”

Recognizing she had not yet grasped the choice involved, he replied, “Death is the alternative.”

Her eyes widened in shock, momentarily speechless. Recovering she asked with disbelief, “Is this really the mentality you abide by? You believe there’s no middle ground? You believe that the only options are to be made a slave, or to be killed?”

Her effort to face the brutal reality so bravely pleased him. His respect for her grew beyond her evident medical talent. He clarified, “By law, those are the only two punishments available to rebels. Now if a female slave is disobedient or displeasing then her master will sell her out of the country to the cobalt mines in Congo.”

Before the war during the decadence of luxury, women had been indifferent to how slave labor in the Congo and China contributed to her materialistic indulgences. He found it ironic that the most obdurate rebel women might replace the child slaves in Congo’s mines.

Her face reddened with outrage at this possibility. She could not understand how anyone could have thought of such a system of punishment. She shuddered at the thought of women forced to work in such a harsh environment, where most probably die from exhaustion. In a shaky whisper, she asked, “And would you take the profit from the sale of a ‘displeasing’ slave?”

As if it were obvious, he answered, “Yes, they are property.”

Her frown deepened as she made no attempt to hide her disapproval. The medic attempted to speak calmly, but she could not help that her expression and tone betrayed her feelings as she accused, “You speak of them as property…as nothing but tools. You don’t care about them at all. Your own greed comes before them.”

The soldier smiled at her predictable response before correcting her, “They are to be punished for their crime. It was not my preferred policy to grant the lenient punishment of slavery, but it is the law and the enslavement of rebel women for breeding is the government’s policy to restore the post-war population.”

Despite her disgust, she forced herself to push past her emotional reaction to probe with different questioning, “Have you taken a woman in this way as your wife since your wife died? Or to bear children?”

He chuckled as if her questions were absurd. In noted her repeating a question related to marriage that she already knew the answer to, he searched her expression for confessions of deception or manipulation. He accepted by her unfocused gaze that she only attempted to understand what to her had been unthinkable. He replied, “Wife? No, they are only slave girls. As my slaves, they have each given me a child.”

The medic swallowed back a sick feeling. She struggled to accept that he had children, innocent children, with women who he enslaved. Trying to push past the thought, she asked hopefully, “If the rebellion were to end tomorrow, and a peace established between the Union and the Confederation of City States, would these women be freed?”

Recognizing the progression of her understanding, he explained, “No. Their punishment is for life according to the law.”

Her face darkened with grief and horror. Staring at him with a somber expression, both more serious and sadder. Her disgust with his answers left her unable to find the words to express how she felt knowing he enslaved women. Before this civil war, women were enslaved around the world in Muslim countries, in China, and by the Mexican cartels engaged in human trafficking in the United States, but such facts had been evaded by her then.

To relieve the pressure of reality upon her mind, the Union soldier told her, “I will not take you as my slave.”

She felt a spark of hope from his answer as she wanted to believe it, but his history indicated she should know better. Trying to reassure herself, she asked him, “Is that a promise?”

He nodded as he explained, “I only take women who have been injured or disfigured by the war to be my slaves as other men would not have them. As any good commander should, I give the best slaves to my men.”

The medic gasped at his revelation, which struck her speechless. She looked at the young, injured rebel soldier lying on the ground, her condition a testament to his barbarism. As much as the medic feared his earlier words, the word ‘commander’ struck her like a hard slap. She had not seen any insignia of rank on his blood covered uniform, but now she began to understand he was no simple soldier. She tried to refocus her mind on the injured girl as this new thought was too horrible.

“Who are…you?” she stammered.

A faint smile intruded upon his stern face. “My mother called me…well that isn’t relevant. My men call me General, or Sir. You have probably called me…”

Her shriek of despair interrupted him. She collapsed as if her spine had been snapped. Fear blackened her vision. The dark shadow of her worst nightmare’s stood over her with her life in his hands.

As a last desperate hope of maintaining her sanity, she negotiated, “I would ask your release of this injured woman. Can we at least agree on that? She’s innocent. She just wants to live.”

Understanding the medic could more easily beg for her patient, instead of herself, he allowed her the diversion, to allow her time to process. He answered, “You know the lack of medical supplies in your camp as well as I do. With her head wound, sending her back there will be a death sentence for her.” He paused before asking, “Would you be the one who decides that she dies?”

His truthful blunt words hit close to her heart. She knew full well the lack of proper facilities in her camp. Not only would the injured young woman not receive proper treatment there but given scarcity of supplies and her condition a rebel doctor might deny her not only medicine but also food. The medic swallowed back her emotions as she reluctantly answered, “That’s true…she can’t go back to my camp. Can you not simply help her, and let her go? Please, I beg you.”

“I will take her with me. I will treat her myself so she might live,” he replied as if as a solemn promise.

The medic looked at him with surprise, but also relief. She did not expect him to show any form of mercy. The potential for her patient to live relieved her. The medic swallowed back her disbelief and doubts. With her renewed hope, she dared to ask, “You promise to treat her well? To feed her properly and take care of her condition?”

“If she lives, then she will become my slave. I will care for her and protect her. The war will be over for her,” he reassured the medic.

Unsure whether she should be glad or horrified, the medic held on to the hope her patient might at least survive, but the thought this young woman would become his slave disgusted the medic. She thought it better to not verbalize her thoughts as she swallowed back her response. She accepted his attitude could not be altered by her continued argument as he refused to deviate from the law. Gratefully, she accepted he would care for the young woman as that would have to be enough for her.

He recognized the medic needed time to marinate in her thoughts as she had stopped asking questions. “I can’t call in a chopper to med evac her and bring us something so simple as a backboard and collar,” he confessed. “My politicians sent heavy-duty equipment overseas leaving me to conduct a war as if it were the 19^th century, well almost.”

The medic thought silently with an added fear of how she might unintentionally hurt her patient without the modern conveniences ubiquitous before the war.

“You will need to fashion a litter using only what’s at hand. Find two long branches, at least six feet long each. Also, find at least a half dozen branches about three feet long for crossties to better immobilize her back and neck,” he ordered, handing her a tomahawk from his belt.

She obediently accepted the ax before venturing to find the necessary wood. As she searched, he used his knife to cut strips of cloth from the uniforms of rebel corpses. He wove strips of cloth together into makeshift rope for stronger bindings.

She returned with eight branches, each at least three feet long but none of the longer ones. Ashamed she confessed, “I was too weak to cut the longer branches.”

Taking back the tomahawk, he said, “I forgot for a moment that you are only a woman. I will get the longer branches. While I do so, strip clothing from the corpses to fashion the bed of a stretcher.” He left her to follow his commands.

Her heart sank at the thought of stripping the dead, but she did not have an alternative. She thought of all the lives lost in the rebel camp plus all of those who had been injured, but not one of them appeared as young as this injured teenaged girl. The rebels had reduced the age of conscription to sixteen, so she knew such would become more common.

The general returned later easily carrying two six-foot branches balanced on his shoulder. Placing them down near the medic, he instructed, “Use the makeshift rope to attach the crossties. Position them to support her body. One above the head, another below the neck, and the third under where her shoulders will be. That’s three, so place one at waist level and another below on the lower side of her ass to support her hips. Put one at knee level and one at her ankles. That leaves two crossties to support her back. If you understand, do it.”

Quickly the medic assembled the stretcher’s frame. She roughly measured, ensuring the crossties would be placed according to her patient’s bodily dimensions. “Done.”

“Good. Now take the clothing and weave it between the main branches and the crossties to create a bed of support for your patient,” he instructed.

Efficiently she obeyed. As she progressed, the medic evaluated the strength of her construction with special emphasis made on the load-bearing portions. “Done,” she reported, smiling up at him in satisfaction with her work.

He moved the improvised stretcher beside the injured young rebel soldier. “I will lift her onto the litter, so if she gets injured further it is my fault, not yours. I’ll need your help lifting her head and neck to keep them steady, immobilized. Can you do that?”

The medic bit her lip with concern but nodded. She moved to position herself near the patient’s head. Carefully she placed her hands, prepared to steadily lift the girl’s head while supporting her shoulders. She took a deep breath to steady her nerves.

He knelt beside the patient. Carefully he put one hand under her back and the other under her butt. “Keep her spine straight,” he reminded as he gently lifted the young woman. Smoothly, steadily he positioned her over the litter, lowered her. “Now, tie her to the litter so she neither moves nor falls off. Secure her at the forehead, across her shoulders, torso, hips, thighs, and calves.”

The medic breathed heavily with relief. Taking the remaining improvised rope, she secured the patient as instructed. When she finished, she looked up at him, seeking his approval.

“Good. Now use the remaining clothing to pack her tight with shock absorbers around her. Most importantly, her neck; we don’t have a collar, so balled-up clothing will have to do. Pack additional balled-up clothing around her head and sides. The goal is to fill space around her, so her neck and spine don’t move much. If you understand the principle, then do it,” he coached.

Carefully, the medic followed his instruction. She had not considered these precautions. She looked up at him gratefully.

Having given her time to process her reality, he asked, “Do you have any further questions?”

Her dry mouth wordlessly tried to swallow back the lump in her throat. She thought this young woman may die anyway, despite her efforts. Consideration of her patient’s mortality reminded her of everyone’s vulnerability in this war, including herself. Regaining her voice, she spoke calmly to hide the conflicting emotions she felt as she answered, “I have no more questions. Let us make our way to your camp.”

Sternly he reminded the medic, “First you must tell me the punishment you have chosen for yourself, death or slavery.”

Unsure what to do, the medic had not anticipated the Union commander making this offer, of making her explicitly choose. The reality of her situation washed over her as her suppressed fear, anger, and outrage bubbled back up. Warm tears fell from her eyes. She attempted to blink away her tears to hide them. After a moment, she looked into his cold gray eyes as she answered him in resignation, “I will accept slavery.”

He gently petted her hair to calm her before saying, “I will give you to my chief doctor, a good man. The comfort of a beautiful slave will help him bear the burden of this war.”

The medic blushed as she felt her heart beating rapidly in recognition of her vulnerability as a woman. She found it difficult to believe he would give her to a stranger. Her thoughts became muddled with anxiety as she found herself struggling to cope.

The Union commander explained, “My doctor is terribly busy with his duties. You will likely become responsible to assist in caring for my injured soldiers. Your master, my doctor, is likely to expect you to quickly expand your medical knowledge and skills. Will you endeavor to please him by being a devoted pupil and compassionate healer?”

The former rebel medic nodded to him earnestly, determined to do the best she could to please him. She swallowed back her fear as she forced herself to answer truthfully, “I promise. I will care for your soldiers…and your doctor. I will do my absolute best to please him.”

He continued, “At night, when he is exhausted from his daily trials, will you care for him and give him comfort?”

Her cheeks became hot. The fact he expected her to provide comfort to this doctor, even at night, made her nervous. However, she understood as a slave she could no longer refuse. Without looking at him, she nodded to him, “Yes. I promise.”

Accepting the new slave had begun to understand her new condition, the general returned his attention to the injured young rebel soldier. He placed the IV bag upon her chest before securing it under the makeshift cloth rope. After, he gently kissed the injured young woman’s forehead in an expression of tenderness.

The new slave girl froze in place as her eyes widened. She had almost jumped away from him in surprise but suppressed the urge as she chose not to startle him with a sudden movement. His display of such tenderness to this injured girl had shocked the slave. She had wanted to speak, but she became unsure if it was permitted to her, only a slave.

Clearly this injured girl’s life held importance for the general, but the slave girl was unsure what to make of it. His gentle treatment of the injured girl comforted the new slave as she had not expected him to show such kindness to a woman.

He picked up his canteen from the ground. “Kneel at my feet, slave.” Timidly she obeyed looking up uncertainly into his eyes.

Opening his canteen, he held it in front of her mouth. “Drink, slave.” She gratefully took a long drink. After she had been watered, he closed his canteen as he returned it to his belt.

From his pocket, he removed an apple. He took a large bite for himself. Holding the apple in front of her mouth, he commanded, “Eat, slave.” Starved she greedily obeyed as she ate the apple from his hand. She had not eaten since the previous day, even that had been half rations. She had forgotten the joy of eating a crisp juicy apple. When she had finished, he tossed the core into the field scattering crows feasting on a corpse as he added, “That should be enough fuel for now. More food waits for an obedient slave back at camp.”

The general directed, “I will take the head of the litter while you take the other end. Be sure to give her a gentle ride back to my camp so your new master, my doctor, can begin to trust in your skill.”

The slave girl silently obeyed his order by moving to take the opposite end of the stretcher. With deliberate care, the slave gently carried the injured young woman in the stretcher as they began to walk towards his camp. Although above average height, the medic stood at least half a foot shorter than the general. This allowed the patient’s head to be elevated while the makeshift ropes held the injured rebel soldier in place on the litter. The former rebel medic recognized that the general had silently planned to elevate the patient’s head to alleviate her condition.

As she obediently followed his lead, the slave girl remained silent as her mind pondered her new duties. She felt scared at the thought of meeting his doctor, her master. She began to wonder what the doctor would be like. She felt nervous about the thought of becoming responsible for his comfort at night. She had doubts as to whether the doctor would be so kind as the Union commander had briefly revealed himself to be.

The general confessed, “In the battle, I am the one who injured her. In the frenzy, I must have hit her harder than I intended.” His voice began to betray anger, “Those rebels are savages for drafting women into combat. She is so young, barely a woman. She should not have been on my battlefield. She was too fragile for that bloody business.”

The slave shook her head as her expression turned sad. The young woman’s wounds were awful while he was now showing such empathy for her. She wanted to say something, to show her appreciation for his compassion as his words made her feel sympathy for both the injured young woman and him. However, she remained processing the reality of her new life. She remained quiet as they continued to his camp.

BONUS: A draft of chapter 2, Antigone’s Interrogation is available for preview.