Several days passed and Blake didn’t show up at OC Front. Presumably giving me an opportunity to ascertain my new position. In the mean time most of the characters around me were jockeying around in an effort to check my ability to handle the assignment while at the same time prove themselves to be the right choice for the expected assistant spot. At first, I was considering one, or both previous deputies, having the experience and the clout with the troops.. but I dismissed this idea soon enough, as I realized, these two lizards will do everything they can to undermine any effort I make.. remembering Geetieh’s performance, I wouldn’t put it past them to be even worse. As time dragged by, I couldn’t make my mind and put the matter on hold.. until, one evening a certain soldier by the name of Metz arrived at HQ bunker,

               “My name is Metz sir, and I have just arrived back from my assignment.. I have a captive soldier and I tried to take him to the prison but the guards refused to open the gate. I was told you are the new deputy.”

               “OK Metz, where is the captive?”

               “He is outside bound atop his mount.. he is in bad shape sir.”

I Looked at the unassuming soldier for a few moments.. then I told him to follow me. We walked towards the prison with Metz pulling the horses behind us..

               “Where is the chief prison guard?” I yelled aloud.

One burly man emerged from the side door of the guards station,

               “I am the chief here.. and we have a serious___”

               “What is your name soldier?” I yelled again, as a few guards gathered around to watch.

               “My name is Curly.. and we have___”

               “Curly you are no longer the chief guard here.. meet, Metz, the new Warden of this prison.. Metz, now that you are the chief.. go ahead and give the orders you need .. “

Everyone was stunned at the sudden turn of events.. there was a loud murmur.. and Curly shouted,

               “There is a revolt inside the prison.. some prisoners escaped from their cells.. you open these doors and you may have a disaster on your hands.”

               “This is all the more reason for this decision.. you have been incompetent and insubordinate.. further punishment may come your way. Metz, go inside the guards room, find out what is going on and come report to me.”

Curly tried to speak but I shut him up.. then Metz walked gingerly to the room from which Curly came and after a few minutes, he came to explain,

               “It seems that someone forgot to lock the door of one of the cells assuming the prisoner was unconscious.. that prisoner got out and opened the rest of the cells to free the others.. they are taking control of the inside for now.”

               “Did they take any guards hostage? How many prisoners are inside?”

               “No sir, the guards managed to escape outside… there are nine prisoners free inside.”

               “Cowards..and incompetent..” I yelled at the gathered guards..

At this point, Asfar came by with a few other soldiers who stood at a distance watching to see how I shall deal with the situation.. I stopped to think for a few moments.. when we all began to hear the inside locking beam removed from its housing, and the banging of tools against the huge wooden doors of the prison.. Curly screamed, forgetting that he was no longer chief,

               “They are going to break down the doors__”

I slapped the foolish man on his fat face,

               “Pull yourself together idiot.”

I walked to the door to examine it, while the banging continued.. I found that it had two tiers of locks.. a huge log was tightly secured across both panels, with an additional  big metal lock with a key holding both panels together..

               “Metz, please run to the HQ bunker.. there is a large pile of ropes in the store room.. bring it back here fast.”

               “There is a very strong rope right here inside the guards station.” One of the guards ventured to speak.

As soon as they brought the ropes I took one end and wrapped it tightly around the nearest tree to the door.. then I took the other end and handed it over to Metz..

               “When I give you the signal, you pull the rope up..”

The banging on the door continued until, I put the large key in the keyhole, and turned it .. the banging stopped.. there was a loud murmur heard inside.. I turned the key again.. then the place turned dead silent.. and finally I turned it one last time.. the door became unlocked, and  everyone heard the outside locking beam being removed from its housing as well..

Each side waited silently for the next move.. I waved to the guards to slowly push the large panels inward.. and the gate became wide open.. still, the prisoners didn’t try to make a move.. clever ruffians perceived there might be a trick.. so, I had to play the last card.. I asked Metz to bring his captive and rolled him into the threshold of the gate.. the poor wretch groaned in pain, and it produced the required result.. as the prisoners rushed through the open gate screaming and shouting, The rope was pulled up and they fell in a heap over each other.. they were rounded up without a fight..

Some soldiers tried to beat the prisoners and whip them, but I sternly stopped it.. many of them were badly wounded already.. yet they all stood firmly in the lineup as I passed by them.. it was a scene of courage I had to admire.. I looked at their faces and wondered what were they thinking.. such a desperate and apparently futile attempt to flee.. it didn’t sound logical to me.. finally I couldn’t keep my thought to myself,

               “Why commit yourself to such insane effort, knowing fairly well it must be doomed? Do you want to die?” it was almost a whisper.. then a strange surprise jumped at me.. as one of the prisoners started sobbing and crying,

               “No.. No.. Oh no, Harts.. it’s you.. I cannot believe it.. this is impossible.” He continued to sniffle and whimper .. then he got out of the line and started hugging me and kissing me while everyone was standing is complete shock..

I gently pushed him away and asked him to get in line, though I was quite baffled at his behavior.. I ordered Metz to return all the prisoners to their cells and secure them, except for the crying man, whom I beckoned to follow me to the great hall..

I sat there and let him sit across from me, still weeping and mumbling some incoherent words..

               “Stop this nonsense man and talk straight.. what is the meaning of all this?

               “Harts.. you.. you cannot.. it’s impossible.. you forgot.. you completely forgot..” He stammered.

               “Please.. “ I yelled, “stop and control yourself.. how do you know me.. why do you call me this strange name?” I spoke sternly.

He stopped for a while.. wiped out his tears with the back of his hand and looked straight at me.. then he smiled sadly and spoke slowly,

               “Remember when I warned you about the strangers you met outside the city?”

               “what city? And what strangers? Are you crazy? I see you today for the first time.. and you come up with all these hysterics.. is this an act to try to get sympathy? Or to find some weakness in our system?” I spoke to him while my brain was spinning at a crazy speed trying to figure out what I am dealing with.. then he spoke again,

               “Harts, I am Warren .. your cousin.. try to remember.. please.”

I didn’t answer immediately, but I looked at the wounded man and couldn’t but feel some pity for him.. finally I spoke again,

               “OK, listen, Warden.. or whatever your name is.. look at yourself.. you and almost all your friends are seriously injured.. you all need some immediate professional attention, yet you go on this insane attempt to escape.” I paused for a moment watching his face relax slowly into a smile, “there is no way any human being can break out of this place.. the only way__”

               “No my dear cousin.” He interrupted, “none of us will remain here for long.. I assure you .. we shall either die here.. right here .. or we shall be set free.. we shall be saved either way.”

I had to laugh,

               “You seem to be disoriented.. if I didn’t use this trick to draw you all out, some of you would have been killed.. maybe even all of you___”

               “Of course we knew that.” He interrupted again, “ even if one of us succeeded to escape , it would be worth it..”

               “You must be crazy.. who will choose to die in order to let the others run away?”

               “Everyone of us would do that without hesitation.. but..” He started to cry again and hide his face into his palms, “It’s all my fault.. I am the idiot who failed everyone..”

I let him calm down on his own, then I asked quietly,

               “What do you mean? What did you do? How did you get out of the cells in the first place?”

               “Your guards left Tom near the well and kept pouring water over him, thinking he was unconscious, as soon as they left, Jon called on him to open the cells.. he did and we overpowered the guards and took their weapons.. they all ran like rats.. and you know.. the rest was .. I mean..” He started to snivel again.

               “Well that seems very brave.. but stupid.. there is no way to escape this place__”

               “We were about to succeed.. Yes we___” I waved my hand to stop him.

               “where would you go? You are in the middle of our camp?”

               “That is not important.. we would find our way and we would certainly get help.. a lot of help.. except for my stupid mistake..” He lamented.

               “What mistake? And where would you get that help?”

               “I got emotional when I saw our brother rolled on the ground through the gate groaning.. I lost my mind .. I just rushed and the others followed to help me.. we should have___”

               “Listen.. that was the plan.. you cannot blame yourself .. it was just a matter of time before you were all caught or killed..” I said with utmost confidence and vanity..

Then, as soon as I said that, the captive screamed some mysterious words about a King, very loud like a wailing bird.. and before I realize what happened, the doors of the hall were flung down and several horsemen rushed in.. one of them lifted the man on his own horse, and when I stood up in shock, foolishly trying to stop him, I felt the front hoofs of his horse hitting my chest and throwing me to the far end of the room.. then everything went dark.

I felt like swimming in a murky ocean.. I don’t know how long I had been out.. I couldn’t even moan or groan.. every part of my body was aching bad.. the voices I heard were muffled and seemed to be travelling under water,

               “….. lucky to be alive”

               “there is .. something strange.. about.. this whole.. incident..”

               “.. cannot.. im… he.. stupid.. to..”

The voices began to become clearer gradually.. now Blake’s voice came through,

               “It is typical of this man.. he has no fear..”

Then Deemeon answered,

               “Most probably he didn’t know what was happening.. I figure he doesn’t know anything about the Light Brigade.. these must have been very important soldiers.”

               “But we lost all ten captives, that is the bottom line.” Trapp said angrily.

               “That is your fault ,, not his.” Deemeon yelled.

               “Me.. How do you figure that?” Trapp objected

               “The security of the cells and the whole prison was set up by your team.. there will be a complete investigation of this catastrophe..”

               “He was in charge.. it was his responsibility___” Trapp tried again.

               “Shut up and look.. he is moving..” Blake warned.

I moaned and tried to move, and almost fell off the couch where they placed me.. I opened my eyes to see Deemeon close by,  smiling at me.. while Blake and Trapp watched at a distance..

               “Welcome back to the land of the living.” Deemeon jested

I tried to smile but when I tried to speak, I only could groan in pain.

               “I have never seen tenacity like this.. Don’t try to speak.. it is a wonder that you didn’t die.. I don’t know why they didn’t kill you… they killed four guards already.. it makes you all the more a valuable asset to me.” He stopped turned to look at the other two people in the room and then turned back to me, “You see.. I was right about you all the time..”

               “You mean.. all the captives are lost?” I stammered

               “Never mind that.. I now have a bigger catch.. you know Hort.. you can be the second man in all Vycee.. imagine that.. if you only learn how to submit yourself to your real master.”

               “My.. real.. master?” I smiled through my pain.

He roared up laughing..

               “Yes.. you sneaky bastard..”

               “Oh.. second.. you said.. second man?” I closed my eyes with the fake smile lingering on my bloody face..

He laughed again..  

               “Blake.. our patient is becoming delirious..  call the Doctor back here..” He yelled seemingly in a very good mood..

After the doctor gave me the pain killer.. I went back to my murky ocean pretty soon.

During my recovery period, they wanted to take me back to BKC but I decided to stay at the front to supervise the repairs even though I had to be in bed or a wheel chair. Blake stopped by almost daily.. and explained what happened.. However, for some unexplained reason, I couldn’t get myself to believe everything he said.. He sounded like a reluctant informer reciting the story as they wanted me to know it. He spoke of a fantastic group of warriors he called the light brigade.. and blamed them for the surprise attack.. but at the same time he tried hard to evade answering any of my specific questions, until I gave up and stopped asking..

Almost two weeks passed, before I was able to walk on my own, let alone ride again.. gingerly I must admit, nonetheless. I went to check the damage to the prison .. it was extensive.. and the process of repairs was already underway. Metz was doing a good job and I wondered if I should take him away to be my assistant and put someone else in charge of the prison.. finally I asked him, and he recommended Shana, from the north camp.. she was a vicious woman with a strong inclination for discipline .. so I agreed.