The snow is falling thick now. He pulls his coat collar up to protect his face, but it makes little difference, and for once, he is glad of the cap keeping his head covered. Please let it not come, he thinks.

He throws a glance to the man standing next to him- breath pluming like his own in the cold air; a gust of wind flumes the snow this way and that around his feet.

Now light dazzles through the fog. Is it coming?

He takes a glove off, puts the bag on the ground and blows on his frozen fingers. The relief his hot breath provides is welcome but fleeting. The lights rush past. His lips curl up a little, and his furrowed brow relaxes once more. Not this time. He pleads to his own gods that it will not come. Surely, the snow is too thick!

He adjusts the strap on his backpack, his fingers throbbing with the cold as he does so. He slips the glove back on. More lights emerge slowly from the gloom. As they approach, a familiar shape looms through the fog and snow. There will be no escape from duty today. Something nags at the back of his mind. What is it? Whatever it is, it refuses to surface from his gloomy demeanour. He will realise later the catastrophe that will emerge from the thing that eludes him, and it will be too late by then. He moves forward, stamping his boots to shake off the slush. The battlefield reveals itself, as it always does. At the front, in their position of power, sit the generals. One day perhaps, he will join them, but not yet. That privilege will only come with time.

Next to them, the cadets bump and bounce like kittens in a sack. They have no standing, nor do they want any; theirs is the innocence of youth. When one of them strays, they are soon herded back to their place with a word, or a kick should that fail.

At the back, the Amazons rule. All face paint and nails and pouting, they will only accept their own amongst their ranks.

His place is in the middle, and he makes his way there before realising, to his horror, that there is no room for him. For a moment, he considers joining the boiling mess of the cadets, but one general, watching him with a baleful eye, wags a finger. The message is simple to him: he must brave the other place. There is a gap in the ranks at the back. He has seen others of his rank venture there; it is rumoured amongst his own that one time they did not return at all (although he suspects this is an exaggeration), and their desecrated body was found days later when the battlefield was being cleared.

The general orders him again, and this time he has no choice. He makes his way back; a quiet descends momentarily as his destination becomes clear to all; mocking sounds erupt around him. The cacophony of cat-calls that arise threatens to overwhelm him; he pulls his backpack off and clutches it to his chest like a shield. Something hits the back of his head, and he feels the cold kiss of ice running down his neck. More shouting. If he is to survive this, he must act, but he has little idea what to do! He curls up, trying his best to protect himself from the inevitable attack. Then–a miracle. A figure emerges in their midst, one whom all must pay obeisance to. A barked instruction. Even the generals cower down.

It is only later that morning that he realises he left his sports kit at the bus stop, and must now endure the utter humiliation of the school swimming pool lesson “sans culottes”. The next day school is cancelled because of the weather, but this respite is brief, as the snow soon melts; he finds himself again at the bus stop, praying that he can sit where he wants to this time around, and that the girls will stop mocking him.