The Silent Battalion
- Pishaach
- Mar 3
- 4 min read
It started with a noise.
Low. Rhythmic. Like boots pressing into damp earth in perfect unison.
Professor Arthur Hale, a historian, had come to the French countryside to document forgotten battlefields from World War I.
The ruins of trenches stretched across the landscape, half-swallowed by time. The village of Beaumont, barely more than a scattering of homes, lay just beyond the rolling fields.
That night, as he sat by the fireplace in his rented cottage, he heard it again. A distant, measured sound.
Marching.
He stood and peered out of the window. A thick fog had rolled in, smothering the land in a pale veil. No one was outside. Nothing but the skeletal trees swaying in the wind.
Yet, the marching did not stop.
He pressed his ear to the glass. The boots struck the ground as if a phantom regiment moved across the fields. The thought sent an uneasy chill down his spine.
The villagers had mentioned stories, muttered warnings about soldiers who never left. He had laughed then.
He wasn’t laughing now.
Forgotten by History
Beaumont was a quiet place, its people wary of outsiders.
Arthur had arrived three days prior, eager to study the battlefield near the village, an unrecorded site where, according to whispers, an entire British battalion had vanished without a trace.
No graves. No reports. Just men who marched into the fog and never returned.
“Les soldats perdus,” an old woman at the inn had muttered when he asked. The lost soldiers.
Even Pierre, the innkeeper, seemed uneasy. “We do not go into the fields at night,” he said, eyes darting
toward the window. “The war took them. But something else made them stay.”
Arthur dismissed it as folklore. Villages like this clung to their legends. That was before the marching started.
That was before he saw them.
The Battalion That Shouldn’t Exist
The next night, Arthur ventured out.
The fog was heavier, curling through the trenches like ghostly fingers. He stepped carefully, his boots sinking into damp soil. The air smelled of rot, of something long buried and half-remembered.
Then, the sound returned.
Marching.
He turned sharply, holding up his lantern. Shadows stretched long in the mist. The rhythmic stomp of boots sent vibrations through the ground.
Arthur’s breath hitched in horror. Shapes emerged from the fog.
They were Soldiers.
Their uniforms were tattered but unmistakable. British infantry from the Great War. Their faces, pale and expressionless, stared straight ahead. Mud streaked their hollowed cheeks, and their rifles, rusted and useless, hung by their sides.
They did not speak. They only marched.
Arthur stepped back, the lantern flickering in his grip. His mind screamed at him to run, but his feet refused to move.
The soldiers passed by, their movements impossibly precise. Their eyes, sunken and empty, never wavered.
Then, one of them turned its head.
The dead man’s gaze met Arthur’s.
Their War Never Ended
Arthur fled.
His pulse thundered as he crashed through the trenches, mud splattering his clothes. Behind him, the marching continued, steady and relentless.
He stumbled into the village, breathless. Pierre met him at the door, his face grim.
“You saw them,” he said. It was not a question.
Arthur nodded, shaking.
Pierre sighed. “They do not know the war is over.”
“They saw me,” Arthur whispered. “One of them looked at me. He smiled.”
Pierre’s expression darkened. “Then you are marked.”
Arthur swallowed. “Marked?”
The innkeeper grabbed his arm, voice low. “They march every night. If they notice you, they will not stop. They will return until you march with them.”
A cold dread settled in Arthur’s stomach.
The battalion had seen him. And now they would come.
No Escape from the March
Arthur locked his door, and bolted the windows. He told himself it was superstition, that fear made men believe in ghosts.
But deep down, he knew the truth.
Midnight came. The air turned heavy. Then, the marching began.
Louder. Closer.
The sound was inside the village now, echoing through the empty streets.
He pressed himself against the door, heart pounding. Footsteps stopped outside.
Then there three knocks.
His fingers trembled as he reached for the lantern. His mind screamed don’t open it, but his body betrayed him.
The door creaked as he pulled it ajar.
They stood there.
The soldiers. Their lifeless eyes fixed on him.
And at the front, the one who had smiled.
The dead man extended a hand, his voice dry as dust.
“Join the march.”
The Last Footsteps
The villagers found the cottage empty the next morning.
The door was ajar, the lantern still flickering. Arthur’s belongings remained untouched.
But he was gone.
Pierre sighed, lowering his head. “He marched.”
No one searched for him. They knew what had happened. That night, as the fog rolled in, the marching returned.
The rhythm was the same. The footsteps steady.
But this time, there was one more.
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