Forever the Colours (12 page)

He needed to piss and badly. He couldn't remember the last time he had been, and looked over to the tent opening.
Bollocks
. He was going to have to go outside, and was tempted for a moment to wake Maurice to go with him.

‘What the hell am I thinking,' he said to himself. ‘Am I gonna get him to hold it as well?' He climbed out of bed and gave himself a once over; he was still wearing the dirty greyish trousers and vest-type garment he had woken up in yesterday – or the day before, he couldn't recall. Time had stood still for him.

He looked over at the two officers and still couldn't believe any of this was real, but how could a dream be so vivid and long-lasting? With tentative steps, he walked over to the tent opening and stood before it. He listened for a moment and found that yesterday's noise was substantially reduced. He surmised that it may be morning, as the light in the tent was quite dim.
Or
is
it
dusk
and
just
the
same
day
over
and
over?
He shivered as he remembered that movie
Groundhog
Day
,
where the guy keeps reliving the same day over and over again.
But
, he thought,
where
is
the
beautiful
woman
in
my
repeating
day,
because
if
whoever's
controlling
this
thing
thinks
I
will
end
up
trying
it
on
with
the
lovely
Arun,
well,
they've
got
another
thing
coming
. He chuckled at this and decided that he was going mad after all.

He reached for the flap of the opening and pulled it open just a little.
Wow!
What
a
scene!
he thought. The sun was just rising over a mountain range in the distance and was casting an orange red glow over the massive camp site. Mist hovered over the lines of tents, and he realised that his view was from a raised vantage point. The sight was breathtaking! And it was incredible to believe he was seeing a military camp from the 1880s.

His full bladder was forgotten for the moment, so he squatted down to survey the scene. There were a few bodies moving around in the mist – and smoke, he realised – for he saw a few men, Indians by the look of them, starting fires.
Cooking
fires
probably
, he thought.

More images were coming to him now: horses, quite a few of them, and the gun carriages he had seen yesterday, last night, whenever. His school days were coming back to him too, the history lessons from Mr Roberts, pouring over books in the library and reading about the wonderful tales of bravery of the British Army in Africa, fighting the Zulus,
or in the Anglo–Afghan wars. Everything was coming back to him, the endless images of the Red Coats
fighting off hoards of tribesmen or Cossacks or Boers
or French Garde Impériale.
Dad
would
love
this
, he thought, as he wiped at the tears forming in his eyes. Then he stood, took a deep breath and walked through the entrance.

The heat hit him.
Jeeeeze
, he thought,
that
mist
won't
last
long
. He started to look for a toilet, but couldn't see anything remotely like a loo.
Idiot!
he thought after a few moments.
What
do
you
expect,
soft
toilet
roll
as
well?
It
will
be
a
ditch,
won't
it,
with
maybe
a
cover
and
separate
stalls,
or
it
could
just
be
a
bucket.
Tommy was ready to burst. He looked around the back of the tent and found a small tree clinging to life.

‘Aha!'

He trotted over to it and spent one or two minutes struggling with his trousers. ‘Stupid sodding things,' he said as he got the last button undone. He then spent the next few moments looking up at the sunrise with half-lidded eyes and a stupid smile on his face. He frowned as a thought came to him:
What
if
I
need
to
shit?
He would have to dig a hole, and he didn't relish the thought of trying to wipe his arse with anything rougher than the cardboard they used here. Just as he was finishing emptying his bladder, the silence was ripped apart by a bugle.

‘Shit, shit,' he said, as he desperately tried to do up his trousers while trotting back to the opening of the tent. ‘That was the Reveille! Everyone will be awake in a minute.'

He managed to do up the last button as he he stepped into the entrance of the tent. At that moment, he glanced back at the camp and saw, at the nearest cooking fire, an old man leaning over a pot, stirring the contents. The old man stopped, looked up at Tommy and smiled. Tommy frowned. Had he seen this guy somewhere before? He was about to beckon him over when there was an almighty groan from inside the tent. He turned and found Major Preston sitting up at his desk and rubbing his temples with the palms of his hands. Tommy swung back to the old man but he was gone, replaced by a young Indian soldier. He poked his head out and looked around, but it was no use; there were thousands of men now vacating their tents, stretching and yawning in the early morning sun. Still confused by what he had just seen, he let the flap fall back and returned to his bed.

‘I despise that infernal racket,' moaned Maurice as he rolled onto his back. He pushed himself onto his elbows and looked over blearily at Tommy. ‘Well, I must say, you look decidedly sprightly this morning, Thomas. However, the perpetual look of confusion is starting to be a bore.'

‘Good morning to you too, ya miserable git,' replied Tommy. He chuckled to himself. ‘If you can't handle your drink, mate, then don't do it.'

Maurice flopped down onto his back and sighed. ‘Sorry, old chap, but I think the gentlemen with the hammers inside my skull are going to it with far too much delectation, what.'

‘Yeah, well, ok then, if you say so. I think we're all feeling a little worse for wear this morning.' He nodded in the direction of Preston. ‘Take a look at the Major over there.'

Maurice looked over at Preston and found him sitting at his desk with his head in his hands. ‘My dear Major, are you feeling unwell?'

‘Mr Rayner, your aphorism and sarcasm are not wanted at this time, so please tread particularly carefully before you continue,' Preston said in a gravelly voice.

‘Sir, I was only concerned as to your felicity, given the aberrant locus you have adopted.'

‘Yes, well, that will be quite enough of that, thank you, Lieutenant. Now if you will excuse me, I have matters to attend to.' Preston stood a little shakily and, looking rather green, made his way out of the tent entrance. A second or so later, the Tommy and Maurice could hear the sound of him retching.

‘Oh dear, the poor Major sounds rather poorly. I wonder if he needs a doctor?'

‘Don't take the piss, Maurice. Preston's all right as officers go.'

‘I was effecting a jape, Thomas. I know the Major is a thoroughly likeable chap. And is that what “take the piss means,” to make fun of?'

‘Yeah, something like that.'

‘You must teach me some of this strange language you use, Thomas. If we are to be compatriots, we must learn to converse a little better, what.'

‘OK.'

‘There you go again. What is “OK”?'

‘Err, it means all right and can be used for, I don't know, acceptable and other shit like that.' He stood. ‘Now do me a favour, Maurice, and tell me what my uniform looks like and where I can find it.'

‘Should be at the end of the bed in a rough wooden chest. But why do you want to know where it is, Thomas?'

‘Because, me old mate, I'm gonna have a little stroll round the camp. It's not every day you get a chance to walk around a genuine nineteenth-century army camp, and if I am asleep right now, I might wake up without doing it. And you know how hard it is to get back into a dream once you've woken up.' Tommy said this while unpacking the uniform he had found in the chest at the bottom of his bed, pith helmet included.

Maurice swung his legs out and moved to the end of his bed, unpacked his own uniform and started to remove his bed clothes.

‘What are you doing?'

‘You said, Thomas, that you are from the future. Yet you didn't tell me when in the future.'

Tommy stopped what he was doing, ‘OK, Maurice, I'm from the twenty-first, well, no, actually I'm from the twentieth-century. I was born in 1989, but it's the twenty-first right now.' He gave Maurice a resigned look. ‘Now you know, mate. I'm bonkers!'

‘Well, my twenty-first century friend, if you're going to go for a stroll out there, you will need a nineteenth-century chaperone. We don't want you getting into any unfortunate predicaments, do we? Besides, I am famished. What say we go and procure a bite to eat.'

‘Thanks, Maurice,' said Tommy with forced gratitude. Although he didn't say it, he wasn't looking forward to it really. He checked the uniform and found it was quite basic: matching trousers and tunic, with buttons up the front and a waistband that came up nearly to his armpits. The boots looked as if they were ready to fall apart, and the dirty grey, bandage-type gaiters were, well, they looked like gaiters.
My
God
, he thought. He was starting to sweat and he hadn't put half of it on yet. He looked over at Maurice, who was humming as he dressed himself.

‘Maurice, will you give me a hand with this, mate?'

‘Certainly, old chap.'

Twenty minutes later, they were dressed. Tommy was starting to feel the heat already.

‘How the hell can you march and fight in this get up? It's crap, there's no movement in it and it's itchy as hell.'

‘Thomas, my dear chap, how could you possibly go into battle not looking the part, eh? It's what separates the British Army from all those other savages out there in their delicate and cool cotton garb. We are the Red Coats –
well, khaki at the moment – scourge of all those with poor dress sense.'

Tommy tried on the helmet and found it was a perfect fit. He took it off again and checked the inside, and found a name scrawled in the lining
.
T
Evans
.

‘What the fuck!' he exclaimed and, dropping the helmet as though it had given him an electric shock, he stepped backwards a few paces.

‘Thomas, whatever is the matter?'

Tommy couldn't breathe.
How
can
that
be
my
name?
he thought. He was trembling from shock; he tried to speak but it came out in a squeak.

Maurice took two quick steps and took hold of Tommy by the shoulders, who had started to sway, and guided him to the stool by his bed. He sat with a thud.

‘Thomas,' he said. ‘Thomas.'

Tommy looked up at him, the shock evident in his eyes.

‘How can my name be in that helmet, Maurice?' He paused for a moment. Then he said, angrier, ‘How the fuck did my name get in that helmet? Did you put it in there? Preston? That twat, when I was on that cart? Come on, Maurice, you can tell me now. I had a terrific time but the game's over.'

‘Over!'

Maurice took an involuntary step back and looked aghast at Tommy.

‘Thomas, I can assure you, as a friend, no one put your name in the helmet. It was already there when you were brought in. I swear to you, no one has tampered with your belongings since you arrived.'

He was breathing heavy now, his eyes bulging with anger and fear.

‘Was it that arsehole Watson? It had to be.' Tommy was confused for a moment. ‘But I don't remember telling him my name or anything.'

Just then Arun entered carrying a jug of water.

‘Good mornings.'

He wandered over to the desk looking for the wooden cups, and frowned when he couldn't find them. He turned to the two men. ‘Pardons but have you seen wooden cups for drinking water, please?'