Alchemisland

Flattened sideways, pressed hard to the gaunt trunks of skeletal trees flayed ivory we waited for our chance. Ducking and rising in step to the shells zipping overhead, as partaking in a perverse game of musical chairs, we waited. Huddled around the rim of an enormous shell crater, like vigil mourners about an open grave, we dart in twos across the open stretch of scorched earth. Enormous flashes from Bosch flairs dispel nights cover at regular intervals chiming temporary day. Bless any man caught beneath that summoned star, in the crossfire of the guns, ceaselessly growling and whirring. No wonder tales abound of evil hounds given human minds with all associated cunning and avarice, grown in German labs and bred to chomp wayward Tommies. Is it so far from gas?

The chattering machines reminded one of a clockwork dog gnashing, or a writhing swarm of angry bees just at the ridge of this rise or the next.

Hills we had no shortage of. Hills to climb, hills to cover, hills to collapse. Every shape and slope and shade of clay, chalk white and fantastic ochre, dusty grey bluffs and silver rocky crags. The land was all hills now, so it would be always, I suppose.