*All rights to the character Jasper belong to Stephanie Meyer and her association with Twilight; as well as the reference to Eowyn, belonging to LOTR but not the character herself

THE MAJOR

Jaspers POV

Passing through the grove, air thick with smoke and ash, we spotted another deserted field of battle foraged and the dead lay scattered about. No time to bury the dead, leaving many wounded where they fell to make haste towards another town. These fiends whom called themselves soldiers were hacking their way through the country side by orders of General Lee, burning homes, crops, even animals along the way. They had no reverence for human life, killing not only the men and boys but sparing no woman or child; no life unscathed. These were not the orders I was given and it burned at the very tethers of my soul to see such inhumanity.

A young woman, say no older than I, lay torn and bloody in this same field, her life had not been spared nor the babe that she cradled in her arms. Monstrosity I thought, grinding my teeth at the depravity. I bent down to her and closed her eyes, at least give her a fragment of dignity in a time where her last moment surely had none.

"Jesus …Whitlock, are you seeing this?"

Hmmm?… I murmured as I turned about facing my Captain. The repulsion in his eyes matched mine, he knew there was no accord where man should slay a woman, especially one with no proper way to defend neither herself nor her child.

"When the hell did we get orders like this? Jerad asked once more

" I was given no such order, nor would I obey as such if this is the intended outcome. This is blasphemy" I spat

There were hundreds of small towns between here and the end of our battles, would they truly slaughter everyone in their path? In the distance I continued to hear cries out from the trenches, men lay gasping at their last breaths begging for a reprieve that wouldn't come. As a final mercy, I sent my men to finish the brutal work Second Lieutenant James failed to complete. Men were still men, enemy or not.

"Jerad, may I have a word?" Motioning him over to my canopy

Cpt. Anderson, a loyal trusted ally, my closest confidant throughout our childhood into adulthood and an equal in the arts of war. I held him in the highest regard, with the utmost respect and in these trying days ahead I feared I would require his council more than ever.

"This is the last in a long line of bloody fields I will walk through, finishing off men for a creature I dare not even share a battlefield with. This is wrong. You know this, I know this. Any further inaction would be as cruel as indifference, I will not tolerate this any longer. Will you make my stand with me?"

He paced, as he often did when a decision needed to be made… We had made difficult choices in the past but this time we were speaking of treason. As an Officer, I would certainly be tried for sedition and hung. Anyone I asked to follow me would share the same fate, a fact Jerad was keenly aware of and weighed heavily through.

"Jasper, we are men of reason. You and I have seen numerous battles, planned many strategic downfalls that necessitated the loss of life. We have gained prosperous promotions because of our ability to defeat the enemy in ways I dare not reminisce. I have made peace of this, decisions that needed to be followed through. I am not questioning our methods, nor am I questioning your resolve. I know what you are asking of me now and why you do. We will need a plan to have any semblance of success, this you also know. They will march with numbers and weapons that far outnumber our own. So, my friend, let's plan the attack as we always have; calculated and precise for neither of us can afford to lose. This victory will belong to us"

Jerad reached for his staunch whiskey, raising it high in the air, "I am with you. To whatever end"

Meeting his toast "To whatever end!"

As my subordinates slept , Jerad and I, along with 6 of my trusted strategists worked through the night and into the weak hours of morning drawing up our final combat plans. We were no more than a day's ride behind the 2nd Lieutenants traitors from what we could ascertain, if this crusade were to come to pass, it would be bloody and brief; lives lost from both camps, the rest imprisoned if they were spared. No matter how we mapped it out, there left no tactic which didn't make corpses of us all. We could not be caught.

Looking at the final battle draft, we all sat in agreement. There was no turning back from this moment, as preparations needed to be made, and it fell to the handful standing before me. I upturned my eyes to the brave men that were seated around me and if there were ever a chance for success, it would be with them at my side. With my life I trusted this task and they of me. "Here sits the option we have, we have to strike swiftly or not at all. I stand here as your commander asking more than I should. We make for Albany if the battle goes ill, if you make your own way to there and not with me, I will honor your decision." Rounding the table, matching each man's eyes to my own, I took my dagger from the sheath forcefully spearing the map.

"We depart in one hour, gentleman… Dismissed"