WW1 Rat Story: Growing Disaster!!!

The First sound that Malcolm heard as he opened his eyes was a bomb going off in the distance and he somehow recognised that he should crawl for cover, he saw a pair of legs- human legs. Malcolm was new-born, a small rat and the solider towered over him and to Malcolm he was a giant. Further sounds, so loud it made Humans cover their ears but it was a wonder Malcolm still had eardrums. He crawled further sliding through the narrow zig zag gap, exploring his muddy new habitat and all the people who were holding pointy black sticks and poking their heads over the top of this trench that he had found himself . Then one of these new creatures he had found surrounding him clutched his chest and started to fall, by the time Malcolm noticed this he was almost on the ground, landing face down, then another object came rolling after him, Malcolm looked up and saw a sandbag heading straight for his head. Malcolm moved just in time to avoid getting crushed. Malcolm dived for cover under a rock to avoid any more objects crushing him. This array of destruction continued for a few more minutes before the sounds seemed to quieten. Then he decided to be daring and move forward, Malcolm was a Black rat and he could see a crowd of Brown Rats in a group but Black rats didn’t get on well with Brown Rats. 

As Malcolm continued to explore he found another human soldier sitting down. He trotted over and leaped onto his lap but the man was shocked to see a rat on him and tried to get Malcolm off his legs, Malcolm feeling himself fall tried to cling on and shouted at the man to stop but the man did not understand just like the man did not understand the rat, he thought he was just like the rest. Moments later the man heard his friend calling and telling him he was going over the top. Malcolm was left alone as the gunfire resumed.  Malcolm took this time to eat some leftover scraps on the floor, but the food was horrible and the bread was bland. The food was so disgusting he almost spit it out but he soon realised that food was scarce. Malcolm soon dozed off and when he woke up he was been shifted away by the same soldier from early who had returned from no man’s land after a fight with the Germans. Night was falling and the men were trying to sleep to the sound of gunfire and distant explosions, Malcolm was as well. The Soldier who he had bumped into before was sleeping next to him on the ground, he saw from the name on his ID tag that his name was John. But while he was observing John’s tag he saw hundreds of tiny lice crawling over his body, despite only been a Rat, Malcolm had been eating and was growing considerably he felt he should protect the human to gain his trust and saw he jumped up to frighten the lice away. The Lice began to scuttle, but John had woken up and seen Malcolm and yelped out.

Malcolm sighed, what could he do to gain this man’s trust. Whatever he did, John just pushed him away, he decided they could not be friends as they did not understand each other and could not communicate and he decided to move on, just then a sound ringed out, close to the trench, far too close thought Malcolm. Moments later an explosion went off down the other side of the trench and sent shrapnel and debris flying towards the Rat and the Man. John was quick to react, he shot up and looked around at the dead bodies, he got his rifle and clambered up where he was faced with German soldiers and a gush of bullets.

Malcolm clung to the sandbags with his claws and also made it up to the top and got his first look at no man’s land, John had been apprehended by a German soldier and was about to be shot, Malcolm knew he had to act and he jumped as high as he could and scratched the opposition’s face, the German was left in pain and stumbled back and Malcolm continued to scratch him, giving John time to escape and with backup coming from the trenches, open fire on the storm of German Soldiers heading for them. When they finally retreated back into the trench, John had finally realised that Malcolm had been trying to help him all this time, as he laid back down he talked to the rat in a language that Malcolm did not understand but he was grateful when John fed him some bread.

 

Five Days Later, while sleeping in the trench, the British soldiers were ravaged by a gas attack and suffered great losses, as this was almost certain death if they were not wearing gas masks, as John succumbed to the effects of the Gas, Malcolm sat with him and they were later found together, to the very end. The sad reality is that many soldiers were wiped out by the devastating effects of gas.