Sorry about Anamaria's name in the last chapter being Analucia, don't know why I was doing that, but I fixed it.
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Chapter 14: Remembering the Alamo
Flashes of fire, sparks, the smell of cordite in the breeze. The Battle for the Alamo.
I dropped down to reload as a bullet whizzed over my head. Beside me on the wall another man sprung up and fired a wild shot into the innumerable Mexican troops beyond the wall.
"Like fish in a barrel!" he hollered through the barrage as he ducked down to join me in reloading.
"Yes, but we're the ones in the bloody barrel," I told him. "This is ludicrous. Who the hell came up with this 'plan' anyway?"
The man glared at me. "We'll be legends, battling impossible odds for our country."
I scoffed. What good is legendary if you aren't round to enjoy it? "Have fun with that," I said, then peeked back over the wall and took careful shot, hitting the legs of my targets. The legend beside me reeled backward, blood spray misting my arm. I ducked and turned.
Half his face was gone. I watched his eyes roll back, and then covered his head with his fallen hat.
I observed the chaos on the walls. Texans, a few hundred, shooting and reloading and firing again into the thousands of Mexicans. The explosions and yelling and the pounding heat of the sun. I was at the southeast corner of the nearly rectangular fort facing Morales men. The western wall opposite me was taking a beating by Cos, Castrillion, Romero, and Amat's forces. They would break through soon; 12-foot walls aren't much of a deterrent.
I had several options to escape this madness:
One- Flee over the northeastern corner, which, as far as I could tell, was seeing no action. The trouble with this was that though I wore clothes that resembled more the Texans, my skin was dark like most of the Mexicans, and so if either side saw me darting away from the action I'd probably be shot as a deserter.
Two- Fight it out and hope my luck in battle was still with me after my decade sabbatical in Indian Territory, where I had encountered fighting, but nothing on such a scale as this. My luck had already kept me alive for a century, but I hated relying solely on fortune alone. If they breeched the wall, which they would, every Texan would be killed. Effectively, I was a Texan.
Three- Switch sides. I was only in the mess by chance anyway, and didn't have any stakes in it. I didn't really care who won. I wasn't fighting for ideals, I was fighting to survive. I'd faced terrible odds before, but I was a pawn here so my idea of winning was living through it. I couldn't give a damn about territory. This seemed like the safest bet, but I had to think of a way to get there without being shot first, and I didn't have much time to plan.
But improvisation has always been one of my greatest gifts.