The Dead Must Die. Bull Run Battlefield, VA (April 22, 1990, © F. P. Dorchak)

I wrote this story based on a dream I had as a kid. What happened to me in the dream (and past life) is what happened in the opening scene to this story. I’d awoken from my dream in actual pain and had rolled off my bed onto the floor, clutching my side for several moments before “coming to.” Years later, in adulthood, I’d found out that one of my other brothers had had “the same dream.”

I’d also written this story based on some Twilight Zone-like weirdness that had happened to me upon visiting Bull Run (Manassas) battlefield, in Manassas, Virginia, in 1990. I feel that I was a Zouave in The Second Battle of Bull Run.

Both of the above are related on my other blog, Reality Check.

This story was originally…