Oct 14, 1918: Ypres, Blegium
German soldiers ran up and down the trenches in their muddied grey uniforms. Rifles slung over shoulders as the men hunched to keep their heads below the trenches ledge. To their west lay the ruins of the Belgian Village of Ypres. It had stood since the Roman Empire an ancient settlement that had passed from kingdom to kingdom as the ages passed. Now the largest of the cities in Flanders County was almost indistinguishable from the devastated lands that it lay upon. Only a few structures lay about to separate rubble of streets, tattered and bullet ridden walls, the spire of a church. But all brown and stained with blood, soil and years of war.
Further to the west, in some cases nearer than the city, lay the trenches of the Entente. The British and Belgian armies stood opposing the might of the German Empire. They had stood, fought, lived and died in their sunken muddy trenches across no-man's-land, just as the Germans had in their own. The armies had been facing one another, staring the other down, hammering them with artillery, bleeding them with bullets, choking them with gas since early in 1914.
It had taken the power of the British, French and Belgian Empires along with their American allies to hold back the armies of Germany. And only with the entry of the United States had they begun to turn the tides in some regions. Things had gone far better to the east where the Russian Empire had crumbled under the might of Germany, and had been consumed by their own ancient decadence and fallen into Civil War and Revolution. The Russians could never hope to best the might of the German people and German Empire.
And now, with the hardened German Armies from the Russian front moving along the rail tracks to the west, the tides will turn again, and the Corporal's beloved German nation would be victorious. It nearly drove him to madness that this small stretch of a small weak nation the likes of Belgium had not given way to a great and ancient people like the Germans. But they had.
The young German Corporal ran down a communications trench when it happened. Bombs, artillery rained down on the earth. He was no where near safety. Forgetting about his mission he darted around looking for a place to hide. He could be blown to a thousand pieces, buried alive or worse. There was also much worse. Running into the main German trench line the Corporal moved for a dug out but was thrown aside by a man in panic. As he stumbled back he tripped falling to his back.
The smell was the first warning. The gas smelled of mustard, as the Corporal opened his eyes he saw the yellow-brown cloud descend into the trench. He stumbled looking for his mask, no where on him. Already his lungs burned with the gas when finally he found it. It had fallen near the entry to the dugout. He scrambled for it, his vision blurring and the day going dark. He reached for the mask, but even with his dulled senses he saw it taken up and away from him.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." A voice said to him in German. Muffled as the man pulled on the mask. "Please forgive me. I have a family. And, you're already too far gone. I'm so sorry."
"Curse... you." Spat Corporal Hitler. "Curse.... you." He spat again as the man... did something. His vision was gone, and slowly his other senses left him. The last thing he heard was the sounds of croaking from his fellow Germans. He hopped maybe his mask had had a tear.