I love jam
After a couple weeks of working with Doc, Bren started to understand more about the Western Front. Two enormous armies, locked in a life and death struggle, faced off against each other along a narrow band of land called the Western Front. It was a kind of thin strip of no-man’s land that ran, quite literally, for hundreds of miles.
Everything seemed so new and different from what she imagined the future to be. Fantastic flying machines, terrible guns mounted on wagons that moved by themselves, and explosives that did more damage than anything that Bren had ever conceived of, filled this future world. How had humanity come to this?
Sitting in the mess tent, Bren ate something called “corned beef” with a type of hard bread and something she really liked named “jam”.
Today, it was quiet on the Western Front as Sundays tended to be. For most soldiers, it was just a day of rest while others attended makeshift churches and worshiped as best they could.
Hey lady!
“Hey Lady!”, sounded a cheerful greeting from behind her.
Brenzel wheeled around and, seeing a boyish grin, exclaimed “Sam!”
The young soldier, plopping down across from her said, “I see you’re settling in just fine”.
Bren, furrowing her brow, replied, “I’m making due, and as long as I don’t run out of this jam, I think I will be fine”.
Bren had only seen Sam a few times after he saved her life on the front line. Sam, it turned out, had a knack for stealth, and his commanding officer made use of his talents in capturing enemy soldiers, which they interrogated for vital information. It was risky business, but Sam seemed to enjoy it immensely. He said it got him out of less desirable types of duty and put him in good with his superiors.
“Thank you for saving me, Sam,” Bren said, thinking back to the day they met. “I don’t think I ever had a chance to say that to you.”
“Aw, don’t mention it ma’am. Odds are you’ll probably do the same for me some day! Besides, I couldn’t stand the thought of the Krauts taking a dish like you prisoner!”
“Dish?” Bren repeated, looking bewildered.
“Where did you grow up?” Sam asked, as he enjoyed a biscuit with some of Bren’s jam ration.
Bren, flustered for a moment, replied, “In England.”
“I figured,” said Sam, “your accent is awfully funny. I have trouble understanding you sometimes. Plus the words you use seem a might fancy. ” he added.
Dust bowl
Wanting to shift the focus, Bren asked, “Tell me about your home Sam, please”.
Sam shrugged and said, “There ain’t much to say about it, cause it’s mostly blown away. See, I grew up in the dust bowl.”
“Dust bowl?” Bren looked puzzled again, “What’s that?”
“Well, you see, where I grew up my parents were farmers. My dad, a tough old buzzard, tried to make a go of it, but it wasn’t in the cards. It wouldn’t rain and it got powerful dry for years. So dry, that when the winds blew all the ground would blow away with it. It blew away my family’s farm and we had to move out west to California.”
Bren, perplexed, tried hard to picture what Sam was saying, but it seemed too fantastical to imagine.
“So, when the war came, I enlisted. Seemed a way to get out and see the world. My parents are proud of me. They’re religious folk and said that God would watch over me. My mama sends me a letter every week saying that she’s praying that my guardian angel will keep me out of trouble. I’ve been in some tight spots, but so far her prayers seem to be workin! What about your parents, ma’am, are they doin ok?” Sam inquired.
Brenzel, feeling a twinge of sadness said quietly, as she looked down, “No, Sam, they passed away quite some time ago.”
“Oh, I am sorry to hear that. I know they’d be powerful proud of what your doin’ here though.”
“Thanks Sam, I think they would too”.
Questions and answers
Sam stood up, thanked Bren for the biscuit and jam, and said he had to report for duty. Brenzel, looking after him, felt that it was time for answers, and she knew just where to find them.
Late in the day, Doc sat in the corner of a makeshift bunker serving as a field hospital. Cramped and dimly lit, she reclined on a wooden chair, shipping sherry she’d found in a bombed out home. Short black hair, barely below her ears, framed her wide set eyes that burned with intelligence. Her mouth, set with a sort of permanent, all knowing half-smirk, sported red lipstick whenever she could find it. A slight woman, barely five foot four, she usually worked in perpetual motion as she raced to save the lives of as many wounded soldiers as she could.
That day that she had pressed Bren into service, her commanding presence caused everyone around her to hop to it, working as hard as she did to try to give first aid to as many as possible. Bren, at that time still reeling from being dropped in a war zone, didn’t think much about being called Seraph Hunter, yet, as soon as she got her bearings, Bren had asked, “How do you know what I am?” Doc replied, “Because I’m one, too”.
Gifted
Today, as Doc sipped her sherry from a tin cup, Bren abruptly entered the bunker. “Tell me why I was chosen to be a Seraph Hunter. Why me?”
Looking down at her liqueur, as if to ask it’s opinion, Doc said, “Because you have the gift.”
“What gift?” Bren demanded.
“The gift of grace.” Doc said slowly.
“What does that mean?” Bren demanded further.
The first connection
Doc half smiled, and leaning forward in her chair looked directly at Bren with those piercing eyes. “There was an original grace that God gave mankind when He created us. It is a direct connection to His essence. The first man and woman had unlimited grace and walked in perfection. ”
“Ok,” Bren said hesitently with a look of disbelief, “and what has that to do with me?”
“You’re a throwback Bren. You are very much like the first people who walked in God’s presence. You possess unlimited grace. Consequently, our enemy fears you, that is why people tried to have you hung.”
Bren chided, “I suppose you are going to tell me that the Devil did it”. Doc, sitting perfectly still, simply let that realization sink in.
Continuing on, Doc explained, “Traveler found you before they killed you and offered you the hat.”
“Do you have one, too?” Bren asked.
“Yes.” Doc replied. And as she touched her head, a hat, similar to Bren’s, appeared.
Bren, amazed, asked breathlessly, “How did you do that?! I can’t see mine, unless it is time to go!”
Tip your hat like this
“You just have to touch where the brim should be and tip it forward, then it will appear.” Doc instructed. “It takes a bit of practice though.” Doc added as she demonstrated a couple more times.
“You should never do it though, unless you need the glasses or it’s time to travel”. “Also,” with an unearthly gravity, Doc cautioned, “never take the hat off for any reason, else bad things tend to happen.”
“Like what?” Bren demanded.
“Let’s just say ,,, it’s dangerous to be uncovered.”
“It’s late Bren and I’m tired, we’ll talk another time”, Doc said as she stood, moving towards the door. Placing her hand on Bren’s shoulder, pausing as she passed, the experienced Hunter said, “I know it’s hard, kid, but this is your true calling and you’re a natural. You’re one of the best I’ve ever seen”.
Afterwards, Bren sat up half the night, reaching, concentrating, and ultimately failing to make her hat appear. Finally, giving up in frustration she decided to go to bed. Half jokingly, Brenzel smiled into a small mirror hung on her tent pole, curtsied, and pretended to tip her hat to Traveler, saying, “Good night sir!” when suddenly, to her delight, the hat appeared! “Wow!” she exclaimed, and then, tipping it again, made it vanished. Over and over Bren caused her hat appear and disappear until a rooster announced a new day had dawned.
