Warflower

The planet cooled and cycles of stone churned. In time, soil covered the surface and tiny single celled organisms moved tentatively about, feeding on its bones and on one another. Ages passed and cells combined into structures of increasing complexity – simple animal forms and plants once again joined in the dance of creation played out through an infinity of worlds. Its first buds opening to the light of a young sun, the warflower eventually spread its leaves in warmth and joy, then was crushed back into the earth by the thundering footfall of some massive beast, its seeds rejoining the loam from which it had emerged. Its memory joined with all its kind as it sustained the world and rose again and again through the years and the soil. Emerging in a deep forest, the warflower sensed a hunter’s breath and tension as the nearby creature waited for its prey.

Ears twitching in the breeze, Trebor listened for the telltale scratching that would betray his quarry’s furtive crawl to the mouth of its hole. Mimicking the big saber-toothed cats had proven easier than he had thought, once he had learned to crouch in a more comfortable position. Being naturally bipedal, it was, he determined, difficult to remain poised and patient while squatting tensely for an hour. Calling to the tiny rodent had also proven useless. So, he positioned himself at the leeward side of the hole, in soft dirt that wouldn’t rustle if he shifted, and set himself about the business of watching. He was particularly proud of his total silence when a bluefly buzzed in front of his face and lighted on his whiskers for a moment. An hour passed, then two, as Trebor waited for his chance to strike.

Nosing its way from the hole at last, the little mammal sniffed at the air, flinching at shadows as it sought assurance that its pursuer was nowhere nearby. Stepping gingerly around the warflower, it was barely out of the hole before a sudden movement caused it to spin about and jump for the safety of its burrow. Too late, as a furry hand swiftly slapped itself over the opening and another followed, swinging downward with a round rock to smash its life into the forest floor. Leaping upon the hand covering the hole, then over it and between the legs of its hunter, the mouse heard a sickening thud as its hunter brought the rock down violently on its own hand covering the hole. A yowl of pain was followed immediately by cursing and a grunt as the rock was hurled angrily toward the mouse as it ran for safety. Against all reason and odds, the stone flew to a point off the forest trail, directly to where the mouse leapt at the same moment to dive into the underbrush and escape. White light exploded in its head as it rolled, its body broken and its last sight the astonished face of its attacker, one bruised hand in its mouth.

Trebor’s foot scratched the warflower from its roost as he leapt after his dinner, sucking on his rapidly swelling fingers and running to where he had laid out the mouse with his throw. Typical of his luck, he had managed a successful hunt haphazardly and with a minor injury. Just once, he wished something would go according to plan. But then, the mouse’s end of the bargain had probably been worse, he mused as he dropped it into his mouth, sucking the tail up at last with a smack.

The roots of the warflower nestled deep in the soil, patiently waiting for water and warmth to rekindle its growth. Rising again, it spread its kind over hills that rolled and pitched in waves on the seas of time. Trees rose and fell as the stones continued their grinding evolution of forms. Sometime amidst the centuries, the land heaved just so, laying itself into a valley and hills inviting storms and farms and battles. The warflower bent beneath the weight of chariot wheels.

Drül smiled distantly as he pulled his long blade free of the man’s ribs. The sucking sound of steel made sliding from a lung always sounded so peculiar. It was one of the vagaries of battle that never ceased to darkly interest him. An arrow glancing off the back of his helm caused Drül to duck convulsively at the same moment an axe blade whistled over his head. Reflexively, he dropped to one knee, twisting and thrusting his short blade into the attacking infantryman’s groin. One day, he mused, an efficient method would be developed for common soldiers to armor the armpit, the back of the knee, the groin and such, but not in time for the emasculated wretch swiftly bleeding to death before him. The high pitch that a full-grown man could give voice as he died…remarkable. The wail joined the chorus of battle around Drül, a performance that he heard not as a dirge or march - no misery or glory there. After so many paid engagements, it sounded simply like security, so much gold in his purse.

With the tide of battle obviously turned in favor of his latest patron, Drül turned casually atop the crest of the hill, listening for the clashes or voices nearest to him. Finding himself in no immediate peril, he strode warily over the churned and trampled field, over the muddled debris of battle to where the opposing banner lay snapped over the body of its bearer. Slicing the banner from the splintered remains of its pole, he folded it haphazardly and stuffed the bloody thing behind his belt. Proofs and trophies of victory always earned a gratuity, and cloth was so much neater than heads or ring fingers. There was also less chance of taking one from the wrong side. Even a quality sword-for-hire could mistake a dead face on occasion, especially when it was covered with the mire of the field, but a successful mercenary like Drül seldom confused house sigils.

Trumpets sounded the retreat on the far side of the field’s high ground; the sound of cavalry passing and likely abandoning the opposing foot telling him that a rout was underway. There would be ample spoils for the opportunistic camp followers who inevitably came with the birds to scavenge the field as anything that might slow a headlong run would be cast off by the youngest foot. Meanwhile, the dead would lay conveniently with their meager treasures until relieved of them. Drül had seen many times how easily rank and file soldiers died once their cause was lost, their wills broken and their backs turned. As good a reason as most he could think of not to hold to any cause but one’s own gain.

With all attention on the retreat and spoils, he impulsively took a friendly bannerman in the back with his blade, simply out of spite at the man’s enthusiasm. Bloody banners! Oh, bloody spite! It had been a perfectly good weapon that snapped on the wretch’s spine, worth several silver. He did find such impetuousness in himself distasteful, not to mention unprofessional. But for a respectable time at least he could afford to forgive himself, once he visited his patron’s paymaster. Drül glanced impassively down as the man’s final breath rattled from his throat and his blood washed over a small flower of the kind that had once covered the field.

The moisture that nourished the warflower came with a salty warmth. It could sense the decimation all around, as most of its kind had been churned into the mud and gore where before a vast family field had lain. Years passed with many winter’s runoff as the iron and bones washed into the soil, renewing the field and bringing forth new life. Men came many more times, laying down roads and lives with equal measures of care and abandon. Still, the land heaved through the centuries and the warflower rode the crests of time. Then came the killing clouds.

Lieutenant Crowell blinked as he tried to clear the dirt from his eyes. The last round striking the top of the trench to which he currently trusted his life spat the soil at him, erupting only inches from his terrified face and stinging his eyes. As his vision cleared, he screamed without hope for the corpsman. Crowell had heard enough bullets hit enough bodies to know that whoever had been behind him hadn’t been lucky enough to get a face full of dirt, but a breakfast of blistering lead instead. Over his shoulder, he saw that the soldier, whoever he was, had been climbing over the back of the trench, finally driven mad by the constant pounding of shells, putrid shin-deep water, and haunting fear that filled each slitted wound in the earth sheltering them. Whether deserting or going “over the top” he was equally dead and therefore equally glorified in the rolls that would hold the names of Crowell’s doomed platoon. Both of his sergeants were dead and the enemy was coming, he was sure.

As the cold breath of despair wrapped itself around him, he felt a shiver. Cold was a part of him now as sure as flesh. He was ice and fear and desolation. But the shiver strangely seemed to spread from his sodden feet to the muddy walls of the ditch, rising in force as its vibrations rippled the stagnant water. Tanks. He’d seen such from a distance on another field. Their roar and diesel stench nearly stole what little breath he still could muster as first one and then another rose like riveted leviathans over the friendly side of the trench, their titanic weight climbing, rising, rising, them smashing down into the mud on the other side. They rolled into the no-man’s land, firing their guns blindly.

Crashing though the enemy barricades and barbed wire, their hard packed trails making an easier run for the infantry that leapt over the trenches in their wake, preparing to steal away the enemy’s opportunity to take the field and hills that so many had died for over the past months.
Shells struck the field. Not so many this time, Crowell thought with a glimmer of hope. Maybe the artillery is already overrun? They sound different, too, he thought as he considered taking this chance to run out of the trench and as far toward home as he could find the strength to go. Peering gingerly again over the trench lip, he saw clouds spreading across the field. Whitish yellow as they burst from the shells, they floated on a fickle breeze over the scene and across the attacking troops. As the mists touched them, men fell with cackling screams as their tongues swelled inside their throats. Spitting blood and curses, a few made it back to Crowell’s position, falling headfirst into the muddy stew and laying very still while the lieutenant stared wide-eyed from beyond horror. As the poisonous fog reached him, Crowell felt his eyes burn again, but rubbing them produced not grit this time, but blindness. His breath burned in his lungs as he tried to gasp out his last note of anger and frustration at the futility of his life. Reaching out to neither God nor glory his hand snatched instead the last green and living thing in the wasteland of battle – a tiny flower atop a fledgling spray of leaves, snatched from the mire atop the trench and clutched in his fist as he fell onto his comrades and laid very still along with them. As the tiny leaves withered, the wind shifted and washed the cloud back over the enemy’s position.

Roots touching other roots and memories, the warflower let the surface go and folded itself again into the embrace of the warm, grumbling earth. Seed, stem and flower followed an endless cycle of death and rebirth and it danced from ice to oasis. Stones crumbled as the warflower split them, allies of rain and wind grinding them in the pestle of time. As the sun rose on yet another first day of life, the warflower broke the surface to find a paved way upon which trod innumerable people.

The city had begun as a haven and marketplace for those visiting the ruins of an ancient war memorial. Lost in the comfortable haze of centuries passed, the shock and chaos of battle now rested, tamed, within a slowly crumbling statue, its plaque worn smooth and its language all but forgotten – a quaint relic of ancient times adding charm to the great city. Cracks in the pavement around the old fountain made way for tiny white flowers, untidy next to the carefully tended gardens and their exotic hybrids and blossoms.

Lon reached down with his stubby fingers and picked one of the small flowers as his mother stopped to take a quick image of the statue. The vacation was all a whirl to him, with the parks and rides and funny people. He missed his school and his friends and wished that he could have gone on the orbital field trip instead of this family visit to a city he’d never heard of. Still, the food was interesting and he was learning exotic names that he could call his classmates when he saw them again. The adults had spent a great deal of time trying to please him, which was nice. For the past two days, though, they had all been very tense as they read the video news and argued with one another. In the summer heat, Lon pulled his hand from the slippery bond of sweat in his mother’s palm and pressed the little bud to his nose, sniffing at the petals and trying to distinguish its scent from his mother’s flowery perfume. She wore several of the buds in her hair, playfully planted there by his father when they had sat together by a splashing fountain.

The afternoon quiet in the Ruins Garden became even more hushed as a rushing sound pressed down on the people. Lon thought his mother was shushing him at first, but then he hadn’t been making any noise. The sound grew rapidly, reaching pitch and volume like wind or sudden surf. Lon looked up in time to see a flaming streak pass over his head and strike at the heart of the nearby city. A flash, then a moment of shocked silence followed before the wave of heat and blasted debris wiped Lon, his mother, and all their days to come from existence. Dust that was the ancient statue joined with dust that was bones, stones, and tiny white flowers, blowing over the scorched, glassy ground and rising into the atmosphere, where it blocked the sun and choked off what was left of life on the surface.

Eons passed, as the sun burned its fuel into heavier elements, the increasing force gradually expanding it until it consumed its nearest planets. At last, the star fought to consume its own iron heart as it starved and drew its final breath. Collapsing in upon its superheated core, the light that had brought life finally exploded out into space. Metals and molecules and memories floated, swirling and gradually combining again; a protostar gathering mass and possibilities to itself until fusion ignited again at its core and a new stellar life began. Around the newborn, planets formed and cooled. On one just near enough to its sun, cycles of stone churned crust over infant ages. In time, soil covered the surface and tiny single celled organisms moved tentatively about, feeding on the minerals and on one another. Ages passed and the cells combined into structures of increasing complexity – simple animals and plants once again joined in the dance of creation played out through an infinity of worlds. As life renewed its potential and a new future opened, the first buds of a tiny white flower returned the favor and challenged the universe to another battle.