July 1915

Today was the day.

The empty bed in the dugout was about to be filled. Someone was going to come along and take Butters' place.

Kenny was sat on one of the crates, staring at the bed. Some private, fresh from boot camp, had been assigned to their platoon to fill the void left by Butters' death. He had to remind himself that this person - Phillip, his name was - wouldn't know. It wasn't his fault that he'd ended up here.

Still.

He couldn't help thinking that having someone coming to fill the bed sort of erased Butters out a bit. And Butters meaning what he did to Kenny, he wasn't exactly pleased to have a brand new friend to keep him company while defiling that memory.

"Kenny," Clyde said, stepping in between him and the bed, "listen. I know you're still hurting over Butters-"

"No shit, Sherlock," Kenny growled, not even bothering to look up.

Clyde sighed. "But. You're going to have to at least move on."

This time, Kenny looked up to meet Clyde's gaze. "You think I don't know that?"

"No." Clyde sat down opposite Kenny, on the bed. "God knows we all know you know that."

"Don't sit there."

"What the fuck did I just say?" Clyde asked, not standing up. He didn't make any point of sounding angry, something Kenny couldn't help but appreciate. He couldn't do with people being angry right now. "Someone's living in this bed, you're going to tell them to fuck off every time they want to get a bit of sleep?"

Kenny didn't have an answer to that. "For your own sake, Kenny, move on," Clyde pleaded. "Or-"

"Guys!"

With conversation quite thoroughly terminated by the appearance of Craig, both Clyde and Kenny turned towards the door. He was standing with a blonde man behind him, with neatly combed back hair and a very annoying smile. For a second Kenny even thought that it might have been Butters, but a closer look showed he clearly wasn't. The hair was similar, the eyes were almost identical, but the face was far more angular.

"I've got two things for you all. Here's our new squad mate, Phillip-"

"Pip," interrupted the man behind him cheerily.

"-Pirrup. Don't be afraid to tell him to shut up because believe me, he can be an annoying fuck and taking offence seems to be completely beyond him, but other than that I want you treating him like you'd have treated Butters." Kenny's eyes narrowed a little at that comment. Craig didn't make eye contact with him, and very pointedly so.

"Secondly, good news for you two." Craig glanced at Clyde and Kenny - still not making eye contact. "After what happened in Belgium, and also after the nine or so months of what I consider to be acceptably good conduct I ran a request by Yardale to have the lot of you bumped up the promotion list."

Kyle raised an eyebrow. "Everyone?"

"Yup. He took a bit of convincing, and I may have embellished facts a little, but-"

"Is this your way of making up for getting Butters killed?" demanded the sergeant. Craig levelled a glare at him. Kyle managed to maintain it for a few seconds, but as Kenny had learned in his time there, Craig was a king at maintaining death glares.

He did note, however, that Craig had not denied the accusation.

"Donovan, you've been promoted to the rank of full corporal." Clyde managed a brief smile, but no more than that. Craig fished in his jacket pocket for a few seconds before pulling out fresh chevrons for him. "Get that sewn onto your shoulder as soon as you can."

"Yes, sir."

Craig turned to Kenny. "McCormick, you've been promoted to the rank of lance corporal." Craig rummaged again and pulled out a single chevron. "Once again, sew that on as soon as you can." Kenny nodded, but said nothing. "Marsh, Broflovski, I couldn't convince Yardale to bump you guys up far enough for immediate promotion, but if he has any sense of honour, which being a soldier who spends his time fifty miles behind the front line where he fucking should be means he does not, he's said he'll keep an eye on you."

Stan raised a hand. "He has to keep an eye on tens of thousands of men."

Craig nodded. "Yes. He does. He's probably already forgotten. But I will be taking any excuse to remind him that he kind of promised. Hint hint."

Even Kyle's glare managed to soften a little. Phillip, or Pip or whatever, came in as soon as Craig was out of the doorway, and made his way to Butters' bed. Kenny consciously made the effort not to stare him down, instead opting to go back to his own bed and start writing a letter. Besides it having been a while since he last wrote, it was about time Karen knew.

Dear Karen

Sorry it's been a while. I've had to get over something horrible. You remember Butterfingers, my friend from the factory who I signed up with. Well, unfortunately he is… Kenny paused. He sighed, and listened to the chirpy young man who was sitting on his bed now, telling everyone about his story. A Staffordshire boy, from what he'd heard.

Move on he told himself. His brain told him that using Clyde's voice, much to his own annoyance.

dead he wrote. I wish I were able to say it was a heroic death, or that he died for something, but I can't. He ran into the path of a shell and that was it. His replacement has just arrived.

On a slightly lighter note I've been promoted to lance corporal. From what I can tell, it doesn't mean much. All it means really is I get to pull rank on this new guy occasionally and get a pay rise, but other than that it's largely symbolic. Aside from that, not a whole lot has happened that's worth talking about. Kyle continues to give Craig excuses to court martial him, et cetera.

Will write again soon.

Kenny

Kenny folded the paper up. "Stan!" Kenny shouted, before he got outside to go on duty.

"What?" he asked.

"While you're out, could you take this to whoever sorts mail?"

Stan picked the letter up. "No address, dude."

That had been Butters' job, too. "Shit." Kenny took the letter back and, on the back, in the neatest scrawl he could manage, wrote out the address. "Here."

Once again, Stan took the letter. "Alright. See you guys later." Stan left again, this time without interruption.

With little better to do, Kenny turned his attention to the story of the newcomer.

"…doing archery, so when it came to sharpshooting I wasn't entirely bad," Pip was saying with a level of brightness that was a nice enough thing as it was, damp as the mood had been for the last month or so, but Kenny anticipated it becoming a primary source of rage for him in the imminent future.

"Isn't a bow and arrow a bit different from a rifle?" Kenny asked. As he said it he realised that maybe it was coming off a little too acidic in tone to be considered civil, and both Craig and Kyle shot him warning glares. Pip, though, didn't actually seem to notice.

"Oh, yes," he agreed. "But the whole aiming thing is pretty much the same. Following the line of the arrow, following the line of the sights, it's kind of similar."

"No it's not," Kenny contested.

Pip looked down briefly. "I guess not. But the point was I turned out to be not too bad. Almost failed the physical test, mind you, I couldn't run a hundred yards if there was fifty quid glazed in chocolate sauce in it for me when I started training."

Kenny nodded. "So why did you do archery, exactly?"

"He went to a private school," Craig replied. "Posh place. Archery's on their curriculum up in Staffordshire, apparently."

Kenny cocked his head back towards Pip. "So why'd you sign up?"

"Oh, all the lads did as soon as they were old enough. School was pretty much barren. I'm pretty much the youngest, that's why it's been so long, but I've been getting letters from most of them since they joined up. They've been saying it's an awful lot of fun out here"

They lied Kenny thought, but he made a point of not vocalising the sentiment.

"Well, in any event," Craig said, "no matter why you signed up we're glad to have you here." Craig glanced towards Kenny. "Aren't we?"

Kenny nodded.

"Aren't we?"

"Yes, sir," Kenny replied blankly.

Craig stared for a minute, gauging his tone. "Good."

In the silence that followed, Kenny couldn't help noticing that Pip was glancing between the two of them. "Uhhh…" he monotoned. "Is everything okay between you chaps?"

"Fine," Kenny immediately replied. Craig, though, was a little less abrupt in his response.

"I'm afraid that the reason you were assigned to this squad was because of the death of another member of it. That member was the person who Kenny signed up with, and had been acquainted with for…" He looked towards Kenny for the figure.

"Eight months," Kenny informed him.

"Eight months before the outbreak of the war. As you can imagine, he is not entirely happy with this turn of events."

Pip nodded. "Well, I'm sorry for your loss, Kenny."

"I'm sure," he muttered.

Craig sighed. "Kenny, if you're not going to be civil to your new squad mate, please go and be somewhere else."

"Oh, come on," Pip interjected, "he's not being that bad. I mean, I can see why he'd be a bit peeved, being as his friend just died and all-"

"Excuse me," Kenny announced, running straight outside of the room. He needed a minute alone.

Immediately, he was followed by Pip. "Everything alright?" he asked. Kenny did not turn to acknowledge him.

"Fine, I'd like to be left alone please," Kenny said through grit teeth.

While Kenny couldn't see it, Pip had cocked his head. "Did I say something?"

Kenny sighed and span around, which on the wet wood almost made him lose his balance and fall into the trench. "Listen. Clyde hasn't been letting me hear the end of this, so I want to be absolutely clear with you on something, alright?"

"Uh…okay?" Pip replied uncertainly.

"You haven't done anything to piss me off. I'm sure you're a very pleasant person to be around, and I'm sure we could be good friends."

"Thank you!" Pip beamed.

"But," Kenny continued, "you're arriving to replace who I could very easily rank as the best friend I've ever had, who I watched die a very horrible death that he absolutely did not deserve. So… Just so you understand that if I'm a little short with you, it's nothing that you've done, okay?"

Pip nodded. "I understand, old bean." Then he paused. "Well, I don't understand, really, I've not had that happen to me, but I get why you're a bit off." Kenny nodded thankfully. Pip was really reasonable, at least. "If it helps," he continued, "I can tell Lieutenant Tucker not to be too hard on you if you get into one of your off moods?"

Kenny nodded. "That'd be great. Thank you." Pip turned to head back inside. "Oh, Pip?"

"Yes, Kenny?"

Kenny forced what was a very fake smile out. "Welcome to the squad."

"Thank you," Pip acknowledged.

Once he was inside, Kenny closed his eyes and exhaled. Reminding himself to behave himself and be nice, he followed him. He didn't catch Craig's glare as he headed to his bunk. Keeping the thought It's not Pip's fault firmly in his mind, he fell asleep to the sound of Pip entertaining the rest of the squad with his life story.