Rile Backet was no ordinary young man. His mind was always full of dreams of places he'd like to visit, and things he'd like to do. While all that was normal for a boy his age, the reason he had these desires was beyond the realm of normalcy for a thirteen year old, or for any human being. Rile had the ability to channel spirits through his dreams and live as they had once lived-- in their time and place--for a single night. He had first discovered this unique ability whileflipping through an old Civil War journal his father was reading. Although he wasn't much of a historian, the accounts of many grusome battles seemed to spark an interest in his young mind. Unknowingly, he had already begun creating the mental connections he would later use to bring his curiosity to life. He had absolutely no idea of what was to follow- and shortly began drifting to sleep.

In what seemed like mere moments, he was surrounded by expressionless men, each nursing a musket. The air was calm, as a heavy fog rested over the land. "It won't be long now," muttered the man next to him as he laid a weary hand upon Rile's shoulder. "Won't be long for what?," Rile thought as he turned his head to peer over the ridge. What he saw shattered his confidence, as he had thought that he had known everything. Before him stood a true battleground with men dying just feet away from their companions who were powerless to help them least they be injured the same way. Shots rang out from both sides, the gunpowder and smoke so thick in the air it seemed as if a fog had rolled in. Rile was repelled from the sight at the same time as his eyes refused to let him turn away.

"What do you feel like joining them or something?" Rile heard the man mumble as he was jerked down just in time to avoid a flurry of bullets. As Rile turned to face his new companion, the man's familiarity startled him. He tried to focus the image through the heavy smoke, but just as a clear picture was coming in it began to fade away. He was wakened from his slumber by the sounds of his own family starting their day. "Time to get ready for school," called his mother from downstairs.

"What a dream," he thought as he dressed himself. He tucked the old journal into his backpack and ran down stairs just in time to grab breakfast to go. He could hear the school bus coming down the street. As he found his seat next to his best friend on the bus, his friend asked him, "What's that in your hair?"

"What?" Rile defended himself.

"All that junk in your hair, it looks like dirt or something."

Rile touched the back of his head and brought back a muddy hand. "It can't be . . . it's impossible," he thought. He began to gaze out the window and didn't hear a word his friend was rambling. " . . . man, what's wrong with you today? You sure are actin weird."

That day at school was different for Rile. He didn't care about his school work. Friends and teachers noticed something different too. He was preoccupied. He spent the day studying faces. "Who was the man in my dream? I know him."

By lunch, Rile was exhausted. It seemed that the previous night’s adventures had taken a great deal out of him. He collapsed onto a chair in the cafeteria, managing to mumble “Wake me in time for period six,” to his best bud Max, before passing out.

The gunfire had ceased, but The smoke was still thick, and Rile began to cough. “Quiet, dang it!” He looked to his left, trying to find the source of the gruff voice. It was the same fellow as before! This time, however, he was able to key in on the man’s features – dark, nappy hair; creamy brown complexion; and the most piercing black eyes Rile had ever been sized up by. “Boy, they’s just robbin’ the cradle now, ain’t they?” Rile had no idea what this tall black soldier was talking about, and looked around for the infant that had caught his new companion’s attention.

“Why would anyone want to bring a baby out here? They’d hafata’ be nuts!” The man erupted with laughter.

“Boy, you are an innocent! Imagine them putting you out here! Those plantation owners are dumber than ah thought!” Rile could only look confused at this point. “Sorry, son,” he said, suddenly somber and cautious. “M’name’s Washington."

Across the field from Rile, in the killing grounds between the two camps, a fellow traveler was still trying to figure out what was happening to him. His memory was fuzzy as to where and who he was. He was seeing black spots dancing in his eyes as he faded in and out of consciousness. The smell of cordite and blood were overwhelming and the underlying smell of urine and feces made him nauseous. "Who am I? Where am I?," he frantically thinks, as he lies staring at the darkening smoke filled sky. He feels something brush his ear and turns to see a pile of intestines next to his face, he jerks upright and suddenly gets violently ill. Long after the spasm passes, he looked around from his new vantage point. As far as he could see through the smoke and the dark, he was surrounded by dead men, some torn apart others oddly intact, but all very dead. His vision faded into a tunnel, the black spots twirled faster and faster, his heart hammered in his chest, he leaned forward and braced his hands on his outstretched legs. "I have got to get in control of myself," he thought as he took slow deep breaths. His mind was racing, he found that he had no past, he could not imagine the future, all he had was the grim reality around him. His body responded as his heart slowed and his vision returned from the tunnel and the spots were then just pulsating with the beat of his heart. He could hear sounds; he recognized them as words, as speech with a very familiar accent. "Quit yer fussin Jeb, if we weren't the best at creeping and sniping, we would be dead like these poor souls"

"Ah know that, but it ain't no life fer a hillbilly to be creepin around all nite, listenin to the same bluebellys we will be killin come mornin."

"Jes hush yer mouth boy, before they hear ya and open up on us."

"Ah still don't like hit Omar, thas all..."

"Help me" the traveler said in a hoarse whisper, "Help me."

"Tarnation!" Jeb says, "a live un!, he one of ourn? kin ya tell?"

He was straining to hear, he opened his mouth to speak again, but a wraith from the dark clamped to the right side of his neck. A low whisper in his ears told him, "You move, breath funny, blink wrong, I will kill you, even if you are in our uniform, do you understand me boy?" He noded slowly. "Good", the whisperer said, "Jeb, get over here and be quite about it."

Low whispers and hand signals between Omar and Jeb over his head, decided his fate. The blade on his neck disappeared.

"Kin ya crawl boy?," Jeb whispered.

He shook his head no,"I am having a hard time just sitting."

"Keep it down!" Jeb whispered harshly. "Ya wantin' fer us all to die! Jes shuddup till we tell ya to talk, or Omar will gut ya."

He was pushed back down on the ground and a hand on each of his shoulders gripped the fabric of his uniform as they start ed dragging him away. The first jolt of movement caused such an intense pain to his whole body, the lights went out...

In the darkness he felt something tug his eyelid open and he was blinded by a bright light, then the other one, a scratch to his foot, something squeezed his arm painfully, he felt air being forced in his lungs, there was a sharp pain to his left thumb, but he could not do anything in the darkness. He hears a voice, it calls him Paul, "I am Paul," he thought, it is all he understood, but the voice was comforting. He felt a coolness to his head, he opened his eyes, the rain was falling on his face, "Paul, I am Paul"

"Ya kin yammer all ya want now boy, we's home," Jeb says to him, and then in a dry tone murmurs "home sweet home."

In an ICU in Missouri, a nurse noticed a change in his patient, subtle, indefinable, but a change nonetheless. A quick neuro and vital signs check reveals nothing. He looked over the last few days; nothing here was different, nothing that he could document to back up the feeling that something had changed. He shook his head and talked to his patient, "Paul, my friend, you sure have messed yourself up. I know you are there, somewhere, you just win whatever battle is going on in that head of yours, and we will try to have a decent place for you to return to." He placed a cool washcloth over the forehead of the young man with the severe head injury. He looked at the data from the machines hooked to the young man quickly and at his patient, one more time carefully and walked away to his other patients.