PLEASE READ: Sorry for the late update! But here it is anyway! I'm not entirely sure when I will next have the chance to update so I do hope this one is worth it for you all. Thing is, in ten days time I will be in Detroit, and no longer here in Australia and I'm not entirely sure how much access I will have to a computer then. I'm gonna be there for a month and I get home on January 5th, so just because I haven't updated, don't worry, I haven't died, I'm just not in the country. I love you all! I will see you when I get back! (I'll try to get in another update before I leave but I think we all know that's not likely to happen).

From Boys to Men

Chapter Nine

There's so many wars we fought
There's so many things we're not
But with what we have
I promise you that
We're marchin on
We're marchin on

xxxXxxx

It seemed unnervingly normal now, by the end of the second week, simply routine. They got up, ate a sparing amount of their daily rations, perhaps a sip of rum to get them through the morning, filled their flasks…with water mind you, loaded their rifles and then they were fighting again. In the evening, they returned to a trench after a particularly poor attempt to gain more ground, shifted a few corpses, ate the rest of their daily rations, including both tea and rum, and tried, usually unsuccessfully, to sleep. If their mother knew the twins were drinking rum…

Food was slowly becoming a luxury at times, it was nigh impossible to get decent food whilst a battle was in full flow. It wasn't until stand downs that the majority of the rations were issued to the trenches.

It was rather alarming to Fred, how easy it had become to use the gun. It was almost as though it had become a kind of extension of his arm, he'd learnt to reload it quickly now. Two weeks and both he and George had avoided being shot or injured enough to leave more than cuts and bruises, mercifully. He'd gotten past the point of feeling nauseous every time he saw death, it happened far, far too frequently for that. Not a few minutes ago he'd watched a member of Platoon Snake die, it was horrid…he'd vaguely known him, Crabbe or something. As much of a troll as that kid had been…he was still only fifteen…and clearly had snuck into enlistment.

Last they'd seen of either Bill or Charlie had been days ago, but the both of them had looked relatively in one piece. It was rather remarkable when one stopped to think about it, with people being injured or killed left, right and centre, it was remarkably lucky that neither of the twins had been hit yet.

xxxXxxx
For all of the plans we've made,
There isn't a flag I'd wave,
xxxXxxx

It wasn't fair for them to feel that they were the only one's leaving anything behind. That attitude was complete bollocks. In time spent with limited company it wasn't rare to know the backgrounds of people, or those who bothered to share. Surprisingly there was an alarmingly high number of people who were more than willing to come up, perch themselves next to someone they'd never met and proceed to tell them about their family back home.

Both the twins knew that Mooney had been having a difficult time leaving, he'd left a very pregnant wife behind, knowing full well he may never get to see the child. She'd had a very unusual name…a memorable one for sure. Nymphadora. What on earth had been going through her parents' minds when they'd named their daughter that, George would never know.

Prongs too had left a family. George had done a double take when he'd heard someone call him Potter. He'd shown the twins a photograph too, of his wife and son who they both recognised as Ron's good friend, Harry. In fact now that they knew, Harry bore a remarkable resemblance to his father, it was quite a wonder they hadn't recognised Prongs to be James Potter.

xxxXxxx
Don't care if we bend,
I'd sink us to swim,
We're marching on,
(We're marching on)
(We're marching on)
xxxXxxx

Another week in had seen the platoons essentially dissolve, the already pathetic tea grow even weaker, the ammo kept in ready demand and increasingly worse injuries continue to spring up. One of the field hospitals had been lost a few days prior, gone up in smoke after a grenade had been flung. It was terrible. Increasingly less progress was being made and George felt for sure the British and French hadn't even gained half a mile.

"Doing alright then?"

George looked up from his knees, having been trying desperately to quell the splintering headache, and grunted a greeting to Cedric.
"Yeah you know, aside from the explosions-"

"The headaches-" Fred interjected.

"The lack of sleep-"

"The horrible tea-"

"The filthy clothes-"

"The body odour-"

"We're just peachy." They finished together.

A mine went off somewhere to their distant right and Diggory slid down the wall of the trench opposite the brothers. "That's about right isn't it? Not been shot then?"

Fred arched an eyebrow and replied sarcastically "No actually you're wrong. I'm bleeding to death right now-ow! What was that for?" He looked indignantly at George, rubbing his shoulder.

George just glared at him and resumed his attempts to dull the throbbing in his head. "How're you coping?" He asked, somewhat muffled.

Cedric half smiled "Well I'm not hurt if that's what you mean. Wouldn't mind being back in England though."

"I thought you were excited to come?"

"No…just excited to see my father really…never know what day's gonna be your last out here."

Fred chuckled "Cheery thought, mate."

Diggory was good bloke, nice enough though not the brightest match in the box, good at cricket, particularly friendly, a little pompous sometimes but that was hard to avoid.

He was probably the closest the twins had to a good friend here, with the exception of Oliver whose leg had healed just enough to enable him to move around again.

"How long do you suppose this will last?" He asked half absentmindedly.

Fred looked at him for a moment "Ced…you know we're here until either the war's over, or we're shipped out or dead, right? Would you stop that?"

George glared at him again, he would not listen to Fred talk about dying. No sir.

Diggory chuckled emptily "I know, I just miss home…I miss Mum, and Cho…" He crinkled up his nose "And I think I mostly miss being clean."

"Oh come on, we know what you really are, Ced…" George grinned.

"You're always positive…"

"Insanely friendly…"

"Your hair's not messed up…"

Diggory arched an eyebrow and smirked, it wasn't uncommon for the Weasley twins to be taking the mickey out of someone.
"Go on then, say it. What am I then?"

"Nancy boy." They replied in unison, grinning.

"Just joshing, mate!" Fred stuck his tongue out, glad for an excuse to laugh again.

"Hear, hear!" George grinned, leaning his head back against the trench, feeling it shake as another mine, marginally closer than the other, went off.

"Anyway, what about you? Have you got someone waiting for you back home?"

"Besides the family, no." Fred shrugged.

"Really? I thought you and-"

"No one." Fred repeated stubbornly, ending the topic. Angelina was the very last person he wanted to talk about.

xxxXxxx
Right, right, right, right left right,
Right, right, right, right left right,
Right, right,
We're marching on.
xxxXxxx

Cedric seemed to have made it a point from then on to speak with the twins more. In Fred's mind he was rather akin to an oversized wart, though…much less troublesome than a wart and he would definitely prefer Diggory over one.

Perhaps it was this then that enhanced the impact they felt that day. Not yet a month into the battle and Cedric was only a few months away from eighteen years of age, only a little older than the twins. It was still odd really, the more Fred thought on it, how surreal it still felt to him, and how it had then too, despite well and truly having acknowledged the cost of war. Fred had come to terms with it early on, in the very first day after watching Miles Baker die in front of him. Though the expression on George's face, no doubt identical to his own, and the extent to which his skin whitened quickly, proved that this had been the moment for his brother. The moment of acknowledgement that anyone could die, at any moment. That they could be next…

The terrible cry had been heart wrenching, there really was no other word accurate enough. The sight of Amos Diggory determinedly pushing his way through a mass of soldiers was one that would stay with the twins for a long time to come.

"No! That's my son! That's my boy! Let me through!"

He had thrown himself down immediately onto the fallen figure, ignoring any kind of sympathetic looks he was offered or shouts to look alive…that there would be time to grieve later.

The insensitivity of the comment was not the thing that disgusted Fred. It was the truth of it. They were still fighting, barricade or no barricade there were still bullets flying. Taking the chance to stop and grieve for a fallen soldier could easily cost one their own life. But even despite that…the man had just lost his son…Cedric Diggory was dead. He may not be a parent but the seventeen year old knew enough to support the claim that no parent should have to bury their child.
The Captain's wails did not subside…understandably they only grew, he refused to be pulled from the terribly pale body of his son, viciously pulling himself away from any offered solace.

"My boy!"

Fred remembered why it had felt so surreal to him. Cedric had been invincible, even back in England he'd never so much as been struck by a stray cricket ball. To see him completely still and pale as anything was horrible really and he felt, in that moment like he had lost a good friend. Which was true to a certain extent, and in his own way he knew he too would grieve that loss. It wasn't hard to imagine being in Amos' position…

It made sense then to Fred why George hit him every time he even so much as joked about dying. George could see it happening and his brother, from that moment on, would know better than to put him through imagining that again.

xxxXxxx

"I'm not!"

"Oh come on, I can see you, it's blooming obvious...it's alright."

"I'm not crying, Fred! I don't cry! Now would you get off my back about it?" George, trying desperately hard not to do the very thing he way denying, snapped, turning away. "Get lost…"

"Hey! I'm trying to be nice here…it's alright, George." Fred shrugged off the heavy pack and sat down beside and a little ways behind his twin "No one's judging ya…half the men here have cried their share."

George didn't reply for several moments "You haven't…I thought I'd gotten used to this…I mean it's not like he's the first bloke who got shot…"

The older twin shrugged and stared down at the helmet he was twirling absentmindedly in his hands. "So? First one you really knew wasn't he? And why should you care if I cry or not?"

"Because, Fred…" George rounded on him "You're my twin. That's why, and because I feel real pathetic when I'm the crying one."

They lapsed into silence again, George taking to staring at the sky, trying to force unshed tears back, only succeeding in making his eyes water further with the unsettled dust.

Fred watched his brother's shoulder and nudged him "Oi...I don't think you're pathetic. If you're pathetic, than by default I am too. You're allowed to cry, mate. Ced was a good bloke."

George grunted and, barely realising it, opened his pack perched securely between his knees. He pulled the crimson garment from it and crucially examined the golden G before stowing it back into the depths of the bag.
"We shouldn't be here, Fred." He muttered.

"I know…here…" Fred held out the last of his rationed rum "You need it more than I do."

There was no complaint and George took the drink almost mechanically.
"We're gonna lose all our troops before we make any progress at all aren't we? Not much chance of being home for Christmas I suppose…"

Fred snorted "Probably not…unless we get wounded enough to be sent home but I don't fancy losing my legs, do you?" He laughed dryly and looked over at George who still refused to look at him. "God I'm scared."

The twins fell silent again, interrupted by a burst of random gunfire somewhere to their distant right.
George actually looked at his brother then, and in that moment felt three years old again, caught up in a horrifying nightmare.
"I don't wanna die, Fred…and I don't want you to die even more."

xxxXxxx

We'll have the days we break,
And we'll have the scars to prove it,
We'll have the bonds that we save,
But we'll have the heart not to lose it.

Marchin' On- One Republic