I was there. I saw it. I caused it.

And it was in those dwindling days of the empire that a new dance was born. Born of terror, in fleeing from hordes, barbarians, turn frock neighbors. It was born of thunder and lightening, as in those days great storms took root over the countryside weeks at a time. It was born of hunger, as the crops suffered pestilence and neglect, and their first fruits taken by mercenary soldiers with little to heed else their bellies.

I was one of those soldiers. The shear adrenaline, say of charging into a side street melee through a village crazed me for days. Coming down from the rush, I'd feel such damn hunger, I'd run through the unburnt fields to pick a' corn, sing a' song, pick a' corn all day long till my hunger satiate.

Mayhaps that's how it all began? There's no need to put myself in the center of things for any reason other than curiosity for cause and effect (its why I took up soldiering in the first place. The hitting of things then looking at how it was smashed up.

In the corn field, winding down from the rush of battle two days before, picking a' corn and singing a' song, I heard a' scuttering through the dense shucks. I dreweth my short sword and spat, hacking my way through with some seriousness, making my presence known with full gruff of creatures in greater portion than I would ever be especially in my unarmored state, nearly as naked as those knaves who go abouts getting plundered on our weekend retreats.

Slicing through and caught notice of damaged growth and there a few feet beyond spotted children, two and three hidden, huddled, shaking, mud smeared, tattered. I stared at them, my face with as much warmth as those idols in their town square after we knocked their heads off. Though somewhat absent from my present mind, I began to whistle a happy whistle. I tapped my sandal in the mud for a beat. I rolled my eyes and sheathed my sword. I unsheathed corn and played a mock flute for the children. They giggled hesitantly to each other and then at me. I took a piece of gold from my ear and tossed it to them. I said, "Boo!" quietly for the ghosts of their ancestors we'd unearthed in our sacrilegious zeal.

They looked at the gold, then back at me and one started to cry and shake her finger at me. She was angry. I said, "Then dance!" We circled each other, clearing a space in the corn, a circle. I took off my belt, dropped my short sword and various daggers and brushes. We continued circling, sizing each other up, a hawk to a pigeon, heads bobbing, a go-go beat beatboxed by the other children gathering, a dance unseen before crafted to meet the new aims of the neglected children. Neglected in home, hearth and now war, they would go on to be the greatest generation, regarding this particular dance.

That's how I think it all happened. I was there. I saw it. I caused it.