Lancer

  'Hello? Anyone there?' Felix pulled off his gas mask and stuffed it back in its leather carrier. 'Hello?' he said again, enjoying the sensation of fresh air on his face.
  A pall of fog hugged the ground, drifting slowly across the landscape. It was so thick that Felix, who'd spent the last few hours wandering between the hedgerows with no one but Leni for company, hadn't caught sight of the town until he was almost alongside it. If he'd happened to lift his head just couple of moments later, he might have gone right past it without ever knowing it was there. But fortunately, he'd looked up at just the right time to see a jumbled assemblage of buildings, huddled in the middle of a clearing like a spider in the middle of its web. Surrounding the town, Alpine forest – tall, dark pines than smothered the Tyrolean Crownland with their serried mass – effectively blocked the rest of the countryside from view.

  Now, Felix rode through the deserted streets, on the lookout for any sign of the inhabitants.
  ’What do you think, Leni?' he asked his steed. 'Where is everyone?'
  Leni, who was used to questions such as these from her master, nickered softly and continued walking. Her hoofbeats echoed on the weathered cobblestones.
  'Yes, maybe it is my lance that's scaring them. I can see how it might give them quite the wrong impression.' Pointed at both ends, with a tempered steel head and ashwood shaft, Felix's lance was taller than he was. Despite its size, it was light enough for him to carry one-handed, and he'd spent most of the past four years doing exactly that, one hand wrapped tightly around the leather grip on its midsection. Sometimes his fellow cavalrymen would ask why he was so attached to it – most had discarded their lances soon after the war began, since they were so awkward and unwieldy. They'd inquire jokingly whether he was compensating for something. Felix would smile, and tell them he was carrying it for exercise, as a form of weightlifting. No one believed that explanation, but Felix didn't care. In truth, he just felt safer when the massive wood-and-steel spike was at his side. It sounded ridiculous, even to him, so he didn't dare explain it to his squadronmates. After all, everyone used guns as a matter of course: trotting into the town square astride Leni, he could feel the weight of his own rifle as it knocked against his back. In the 20th century, where both sides pelted each other with machine-guns and artillery, what good was a cavalry lance? Felix couldn't explain it to anyone, least of all himself.

  After so much time in Italy, the familiar architecture of the houses (a half-timbered Tudor style, with white plaster infill and red-tiled roofs) awoke a forgotten sense of nostalgia in Felix. It was almost as good as being back in Galicia. All that spoiled the illusion was the writing on signs and shop fronts – recognisable as German, yes, but some strange Bavarian dialect that he wasn't familiar with. He tugged on the reins, bringing Leni to a halt outside a restaurant window that advertised the quality of the establishment's Schmankerl, whatever that was.
  'I'm a friend – I'm from Austrian Poland,' he announced to the empty streets, suddenly aware that the townspeople might have mistaken him for an Italian. Still no response. Somewhere out of sight, an empty door banged open and shut in the wind. He licked his dry lips, closed his eyes, and let flow the words that had been hammered into him in preparation for this task. 'My name is Wachtmeister Felix Thiel, from the 2nd squadron of the 4th Galician Ulans, 5th Cavalry Brigade, 3rd Cavalry Division, 21st Corps, 10th Army, South Tyrolean Army Group. I've been dispatched here with an important message – a glorious message. It's for all of you to hear, but I'm meant to deliver it personally to your mayor. I will ask once more: is anyone here?' On opening his eyes, nothing had changed. If the citizens really were hiding from him en masse, they were unshakeably committed to the deception. More likely, the town had been abandoned. Perhaps the residents had fled north. Perhaps they'd gone to a neighbouring town. Whatever the reason, the message was destined to go unheard by its planned audience. Felix sighed.

  As the wind picked up, the unseen door slammed, opened, slammed and opened with increasing rapidity and volume. Though he was annoyed by it at first, gradually an idea crept into Felix's mind.
  'Stay here,' he instructed Leni, while he unstrapped a saddlebag from her flank. 'I don't have anything to tether you with, so just don't move, okay? I won't be long.' Ignoring him, Leni lowered her head to the pavement, and discovered to her disappointment that the cobblestones were inedible. 'Good girl.'
  Thanks to the wind, the fog had been dispelled a little. Following the sound, Felix turned left into a side street and soon came upon the door itself, which belonged to a house much like the rest. He stepped inside, closed the door and locked it, ending the repetitive pattern once and for all. In the front room, some framed family portraits hung above a blazing fireplace. Strange that they left the fire burning. Perhaps they left in a hurry? thought Felix as he pounded up the stairs. He barged into the first room he came across (a study, it turned out), strode over to the window and wrenched it open. At last, he knew why he'd kept ahold of his lance all throughout the campaign. It was for this very moment, when it would finally come in useful. He snatched a fountain pen at random from the selection than lay on the room's writing desk, clicked off the lid, and withdrew his top-half red, bottom-half white pennant from its bag.
  All the army's lances came with four eyelets at one end, so that a flag could be attached and the lance used as a makeshift flagpole. To Felix it had always seemed like a pointless idea, even for Austria-Hungary. But now, he saw how he could make use of it. He scribbled his message on the pennant, attached it to the lance, and stood said lance so that it leant out of the window. With the window closed as much as possible, wedging the lance in place, passers-by would be able to see the pennant as it fluttered in the breeze. When the townspeople came back, if they ever did, they'd find Felix's message waiting for them.
  ’WAR IS OVER. WE SIGNED ARMISTICE WITH ITALIANS YESTERDAY. DO NOT DESPAIR: INSTEAD CELEBRATE END OF DEATH AND DESTRUCTION. PEACE IS WORTH PRICE OF DEFEAT.’