Edge: Killer's Breed

"They cut us. to ribbons," came the shouted reply. "Came at us like hungry wolves. I hadn't been here, I wouldn't have believed such slaughter was possible."

From out of the darkness, cutting across the gunfire and pitiful calls of the wounded, a bugle sounded. Every man pinned down under the rebel bombardment turned to look across the river, straining his eyes through the gloom to see what was backing up the brave sound.

"It's Buell!" somebody shouted, the delight brittle in his voice. "It's goddamn beautiful Buell."

"Now we'll show the reb bastards," the lieutenant hissed.

The Union artillery battery waited for the head of Buell's column to splash into the river and then opened up with a murderous covering barrage. Runners spread out from Grant's command post, screaming to be heard above the din. Hedges could see the Union line advancing on both sides of the command post and did not wait to hear what the runners had to say.

"You're gonna get the chance to show them, lieutenant," he said and drew his saber, swinging it around his head and pointing ahead. "Forward!" he yelled and as his horse thundered ahead, infantrymen scrambled from his path, cursing and then bolting after him, finding an outlet for their anger in pumping a hail of bullets towards the rebel line.

All along the Union advance other cavalry units broke from cover in a series of headlong charges, safe from the enemy barrage which was still directed at the thousands of men pouring across the river. But for several minutes the rebel line held firm and the advance ran into an almost solid wall of flying bullets and ballshot as the opposing infantry found their range.

Hedges found himself gripped by the same feeling of exhilaration he had experienced at the Bull Run, heightened perhaps by the darkness of night. Horses and men tumbled about him, the sounds of their deaths swamped by the rattle of rifle fire and the deeper, more sporadic crash of artillery. Then the opposing armies clashed in close combat. Hedges saw a rebel soldier loom up out of the ground before him, raising a rifle towards him. A foreleg of the cavalry mount struck the man in the chest; spinning him to the ground. His rifle went off and sent a bullet crashing into the brain of a comrade as a hind leg thudded into the skull of the fallen man.

The rebel artillery abruptly ceased the barrage as an order to retreat was communicated down the line and moments later the Union battery was silent, its officers fearful of shelling their own cavalry and infantry.

Hedges' troop and the other cavalry units had broken through the rebel front line in many places but did not halt their charge as the enemy turned on their heels to flee. A rebel soldier fired his rifle at Forrest and succeeded only in putting a hole through the Union man's hat. Forrest was close enough and riding fast enough to slip a foot from his stirrup and lashed out with a boot at the man's throat. His neck snapped with a dry sound.

Douglas spotted an injured rebel sitting down and crying his pain. He rode in close, reached down and caught hold of the man's hair to drag him screaming across the ground. Bell swung in towards the speeding Douglas and fired his Colt twice, once into each of the rebel's wide eyes.

Seward, his giggling somehow more obscene than the crack of gunfire, had great sport zigzagging among the fleeing soldiers and swinging his rifle down, in skull splitting blows to the backs of their heads.

"Like eggs!" he shrieked in delight. "Just like rotten' eggs."

Scott, riding slower than the rest, confined his killing to those rebels already wounded, using his horse to trample unmercifully on the already broken bodies of sprawled soldiers. Hedges at first shot at anything that moved in front of his galloping horse, and then when he had emptied his rifle and revolver, slashed about him with the saber, feeling an electric thrill course his entire body with each spurt of blood that erupted from around the curved blade.

Sweat was pouring from every part of his body and his mind felt so filled with pleasure he thought it would burst. The sounds of the battle raging about him were diminished by his own personal war and he heard only the swish of metal through the air, the thud of its edge sinking through flesh to find bone, the screams of his victims. He saw only their bulging muscles as they strove to flee from him, the looks of terror as they glanced up at him, the gaping wounds and spurts of blood.

It was Forrest, galloping alongside him and then swerving in to grasp the reins and slow the horse, that wrenched him out of his private world of gore so that he heard a score of bugles sounding their strident notes.

"Recall, Captain!" Forrest roared at him. "They're sounding recall."

The two horses stopped and Hedges looked hard into the face of Forrest, his expression still set in an expression of narrow-eyed, lip-curled hatred. Forrest backed off, licking his dry lips and swallowing hard.

"You were right, Captain," he muttered.