Tale of the Week 265: Mud and Blood- WINNER'S CIRCLE !

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Mud and Blood

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._-_wounded.jpg

The idea of an easy and fast victory shattered by a war of never changing front lines. Caligula's confronts the famous sentence "It'll be over by Christmas" with a short impression about the muddy battlefield, scarcity of food and the thought that the loss of leg seems more attractive than remaining on the battlefield. Landmines were especially often used during the battles of Ypres (epecially in 1915), so a nice detail to that. (Since one hardly ever reads about landmines in WW1) A well deserved first place!

Caligula's winning entry below:

TotW 265: Mud and Blood- WINNING SUBMISSION

The men drag themselves across the bomb shattered earth. With each step, the sucking mud threatening to suck their boots clean off their feet. A man amongst them looks at the sky, and wonders when was the last time he ever saw the sun. It seems as though the sky is perpetually darkened with smoke, and the rain is ceaseless as it pounds the men into submission worse than any artillery barrage. The men were drenched, and tired. They were tired of this cursed war that seemed without end. “It’ll be over by Christmas”, oh how naive they were back then. “We’ll give them a licking and they’ll scurry back to Berlin”. Instead the war had devolved into a constant back and forth, a stagnancy had set in that none had noticed. Even day to day concerns such as finding enough food to eat was seen as ambitious, instead you focused on the next step and the one after that. If that next step just so happened to be on a mine, then you thanked the heavens that you were out of this damned war with nary a thought for the loss of your leg and being fated to :wub: in a bag for the rest of your life.

TotW 265: Submission thread | Voting thread

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Good luck and keep writing.

Congratulations! :D

Congrats on the win. :)

Post here for some rep. :surprise:

Caligula, is that your first TotW win? Special congratulations for that! :clap:

Congratulations. You captured what I was thinking. I simply could not put the words down. I admire you skill at a short but good tale.