Valley Forge, 1778
It was the second month of our stay at Valley Forge. Our little huts, while still standing, were beginning to mold, which was not good for the soldier's already dwindling health. It was January, and the new year brought with it new snow which fell on top of the already frozen ices of the past few months. The four of us, who didn't need to worry about death: Connor Macleod, Sunda Kastagir, Kentucky Sue, and myself, began giving up our rations to those who needed them. We took turns 'dying' of starvation in one of the huts.
"Look Stiles, it's ok."
"No it's NOT! Look at you, John, if you could just see how frail your Face looks..!"
"And you, you Bastard!" he said with a weak grin. "Yours looks just as pretty as ever!"
"Well thanks," I said with a smile, "but I'm not really like that." To which he rolled his blood-shot eyes. "Now here, just take this." I carefully fed him the crumbly cracker-like ration, since his hands seemed to be too weak to even hold onto it.
He looked at me appreciatively as I got up to leave.
"Thanks, Jack. You know, you don't HAVE to keep doing this."
I almost smiled at him as I said:
"Yes… I do." I turned to go back to my hut, wondering, hoping that this one too would make it through these times.
Winter of 1813
It had been somewhere in mid November (I think), when I left that little town, once again heading back into the snow, headed south again. I didn't know what I was walking towards, or where I thought I would end up. Maybe part of me had wanted to get back to Washington for some reason, who knows. Or maybe I just wanted to get away from this damned snow. Well, anyway, a few weeks later, I was walking through the snow one night in December, when I saw, up ahead of me, I light shining through the trees. I thought maybe it was a campfire from, hopefully I thought, a group of Americans. Well, as I got closer the next couple of hours, I realized that this was no campfire. Finally, after three hours, I reached the source of the flames. Some fool had set the entire town ablaze. As I got closer, I broke into a full out run (though I really don't know how, as I was already almost dead.) When I arrived, half the town was already burned to the ground. Residents stood around in the snow, bewildered. Small children stood shivering in the cold night air, clutching parents' arms and weeping. Staring in disbelief as all they owned in the world burned to the ground.
"Who are you?" someone still in their right mind asked me.
"Anthony Stiles, I'm an American loyalist. Who the hell did this?.!"
"That madman Willcocks! Joseph Willcocks! Said he had to do it to prevent the advancing British from having lodgings."
With the help of this man, who I soon found out was named George Stronggood, I started urging the surviving refugees on. We had to find shelter soon, or these people would die.
"How far's the nearest town?" I had desperately asked him.
"Carlington… over 10 miles South."
"CURSES!!"
I was trying to help a young girl of about 10 years old, who seemed to shaken up to move from where she stood.
"There there, sweetheart, come on. It's too cold to stay our here, tonight. Where's your folks?"
I shouldn't have asked, for as soon as I did, she cried out, and then, after a long time of screaming, broke into much deeper weeping and sobbing than she had before. Then finally, clutching onto my pants leg, she pointed to the house she had been staring at, which was now burned to the ground.
"They, they got Trapped WAAHAHAHAAAAA!!" And she broke into harder weeping, hardly able to breathe.
I took the girl, whose name was Katy, and gave her to a middle-aged woman whose eyes were also filled with tears.
"I don't who you are… but thank you, sir. God, I don't know Why-oh Why!? In God's name WHY!?"
I took off my fur cloak and wrapped it around her and the child, then patted her on the shoulder.
"Hang in there, Mam, just gotta hold on till morning."
1779
I sat in the hut shivering, my cold getting worse as I felt myself begin to die. Connor MacLeod sat beside me, sharpening his sword.
"S, still carrying that same, nifty little sword, I see…M, mclou…HIGHLANDER!!" SNEEZE
"Heheheh. you really don't handle the cold too well, do you?"
"W, well, Highlander…un, unlike you and S, Sue, being from Greece, I wasn't exactly Raised on this k, kind of weather."
"Ya know… you surprise me, Autolycus…"
I gave him a look.
"After what I saw of you in the Carribian, I wouldn't have expected you to even be the type to fight in a war like this one. Much less, as you are now, sacrificing your life, over and over for the sake of these soldiers."
I gave him what was almost a smile.
"I am much older than you M,MacLeod. There are many aspects of me, y, you p, probably wouldn't understand. I was b, born a thief, yes, and I s,spent the first several centuries as one. B, but the past several centuries-the la, last two millennia, really, I have t, tried to make s, something of myself. And yeah, so I slip back from time to time, like when I met you, but that doesn't m, mean I don't like to help the w,world around me, t, too. We have to, don't we?"
"Then I guess I'm sorry, Greecian. But you're still a nuisance, heheh."
I looked up at him, and then said.
"Yeah, I don't necessarily like you either, Highlander, but I am glad we're fighting on the same side. Now, make yourself useful, and use that sword to hurry this up, will ya!"
"heheh, gladly!" he said before gutting me with his katana.
1813
We started on through the cold, December night. George and a few of the other men I had helped were in the front, while I brought up the rear. After a while, I could hardly feel my body, but I knew I had to press on. I noticed one of the men, a man probably in his early 40s, sit down to rest.
"No, no, no, no. Come on, you can't sit down, now. Got to keep going, just a few more hours."
"Doesn't matter," he said weakly, I could hear traces of madness in his voice, "I'm not even cold any more."
"Yeah, that's why you really gotta keep on going."
"But, but, my feet… so tired..."
"Here, I'll carry you awhile. Here, take this." I took off the overshirt I was wearing, wrapping it around him. A stupid move, probably-I could do no one any good once I 'died'. I then picked him up, and carried him on my shoulders until I could hardly stand. I then had to let him down. He said he could walk now and would be ok, but I wasn't sure.
I wondered just how much further we had to go. Every part of my body was completely numb, and my mind was beginning to fade under. This had become a very familiar experience over the last couple of months, but what worried me this time, was what would become of these poor people? I was walking along, and felt myself slipping out. The next thing I remember, is looking up at one of the younger men there. He was about in his twenties. He was standing there above me, trying to get me to wake up.
"Mr Stiles? Mr. Stiles! Come on, please, you gotta pull through! You gotta get up!"
I really felt like just letting myself go, but I knew I had to get through to this kid, so I pulled together all the strength I could muster.
"Now you listen here kid, and you listen Good!" Leave, Me, Be!"
"But, but,"
"No! If you don't, I'm gonna take this knife here and speed up the process! Now you just make sure to get yourself, and as many of these people as you can to that town!" Then, I looked him straight in the eye, and said to him as sternly as my remaining energy would allow, "And don't you Dare tell anyone I died, 'cause you never saw it! Did you!?"
I didn't even get to see him turn away from me before I died.
1778January
Dozens of my close friends had already died, as well as hundreds of others. Now, here lied another one: Paul Miller. He had contracted a horrible disease, just days after we had come to Valley Forge. Sue and Kastagir had worked together, doing all they could over the past several weeks, but they had only prolonged the inevitable. In fact, it was a miracle he had survived this long. I walked in to find Kastagir sitting there in a chair at his bedside, watching him.
"Kastagir?" he merely looked up at me and subtly shook his head, sadly. He then got up to walk out, patting me on the shoulder as he left.
"Hey, buddy…"
"Stiles…? 'zat you?"
"Yeah Paul, I'm here."
"Come here Stiles." I went and sat at the edge of his bed. He looked right deep into my eyes.
"I know you, Jack Stiles. You, you have some sort of secret, doncha? You're not like us… you're something different. That's why you don't have to eat as much." I started to speak-how cruel of me, trying to interrupt a dying man's last words. But he stopped me. "No, no. you do, Jack, no other way you could be giving up so much of your food. Listen though, Jack. Listen closely…I don't know what you are, an angel, a ghost, a witch, and at this point I really don't have time to care-heheh, maybe be one of the first things I ask Jesus when I get up there, heheh what is the secret behind Jack Stiles, heheh, he and I will probably have quite a laugh over that!...No, point is Jack, it doesn't matter. Don't you Dare think for a moment that that makes it any less special what you're doin't here, that I, or God thinks any less of it that you're helping me… and the other men here. You just go on doin' what you're doin' ok? And give those Brits a real run for their money! And Jack…?" I leaned in real close. "Now Listen, Jack Stiles-I better see you up there sometime, if you ever DO die, that is, ya here?"
I smiled, and gave him a small nod. With that, he drifted off. I put my hat back on and walked back outside, the tears already flowing. Kastagir was already there along with Sue. Connor was off doing drills with some of the men. Kastagir rested a hand on my shoulder.
"I'm sorry, Jack… That's 56, just this week." He said, shaking his head.
"It never gets any easier, does it?"
"Not in 2000 years…" I shook my head, as Sue held me, burying her head in my chest.
After awhile, she took my hand, leading me back to our hut. As we walked in, she started undoing my shirt. She lay down with me on bed.
1813
I awoke the next day to a cold, sunny morning. By the light, I would say it was mid morning. When I turned back towards what had been Newark, I could now in the daylight, see the big gapping area in the woods where it had been. I got up and quickly hurried towards Carlington, ignoring the frigid air, biting through the little clothing I still wore. I had given away everything but my pants, boots, and undershirt. My toes were soggy in my still-wet boots; still I ran on. It wasn't long before I started to run into those who didn't make it. The first was an old man. He was clutching a tree with both arms, as if holding on for dear life, looking up towards the sky. The next was far worse. There was a woman and her child far from the rest of the dead. It looked as if, accepting her fate, she had carried her little baby over away from everyone to feed and hold her child one last time. The woman was lying against a tree, holding the child in her arms with tears frozen on her cheeks, while the baby lay frozen like a statue, her lips stuck on her mothers' tit where she had been nursing. RRRG, how I HATED This WAR!!! Still, I continued on, passing by families, frozen in heeps, children passed out with their faces frozen to the ground, now buried beneath the new fallen snow. I even saw the dead body of the man I had carried on my back the night before. So, he didn't make it, after all.
I finally reached Carlington, about three hours later. Looking around, I rejoiced when I found many of the people I recognized from the night before, the first of which was George. Later on, in a small house I found Katie along with Sharon, the woman who I had given my cloak to. I went up and hugged her.
"Oh, it's so good to see you two alive!"
"Well, I had to survive so I could give you this!" She said, smiling and handing me my cloak.
"Look at you, running around in almost nothing! You'll catch your death like that!" It was half a joke, and half serious. Then she got really serious before saying, "Thank you, sir. What was your name?"
"Anthony," I said, taking her hand, "Anthony Stiles."
"I am Sharon," she said with a smile.
"And how is Katie, there?" She was holding the sleeping child in her arms.
"Oh, she Is coming down with a small cold, and I am sure it may take many months, even years for her to get over the emotional trauma, but I think she is going to be alright, thanks to you, Mr. Stiles. She's sleeping right now, but I'm sure when she wakes up, she'd love to thank you herself. Won't you stay?"
"Well," I started, "there are several more people I need to check on, but if I can, I will return later."
I eventually found the young man who had seen me last before I died the night before. I found out his name was Clark Johnson, and was he relieved to see me. Later that afternoon, I went back to see Katie and Sharon. I could still see the sorrow in Katie's face, but she was very glad to see me, and came up and gave me a kiss on the cheek when she saw me.
"Oh, thank you, Mr. Stiles! Thank you!"
"Hey, you hang in there, kiddo, Miss Sharon here is a really good lady, she'll take care of you. You just be good for her, ok?"
She nodded her head, a single tear running down her cheek.
I spent the night there, and in the morning, we took a few dozen of the men from town and started the painful task of burying the dead along the trail.
1778
The morning after, I saw Connor. With a very serious look on his face, he said, "So, while all the rest of us men suffer, you get to sleep with the only woman around!?" I started to protest, but then, lightening up, he said, "I'm sorry, Jack, just kidding…." There was a long pause. "I am sorry about your friend."
"Well," I said with a sigh, "it's like your friend Kastagir reminded me: "it never does get easier…. Even after thousands of years."
"No, it doesn't… but I guess we can't dwell on the past, can we?"
"No, we can't"
He started to walk away, then turned back to me with almost a smile.
"By the way, congratulations, old man. Good job."
At the end of the next month, the French arrived to help us, and with them, came new hope. Several weeks later, the snow started to clear up, and many of the men finally pulled through, after months of toil and suffering.
