[i]It's too late ... there's nothing to be done about it...[/I]

As he'd watched the Massachusetts Second Regiment -- not just the first rank but nearly every single member of it -- surge through the South Wall, of which they were now in full control, William contemplated any number of ways to correct history, only to again repeat some version of his defeatist statement to himself.  He'd considered attacking the gun crews and somehow sabotaging the Howitzers, something that surely would have gotten him killed.  He considered finding Colonel Harding and assassinating him, knowing from history that the man had ultimately gone on to be a vital part of the Rebel victory, even if he'd been forgotten by or ignored in most future history books and classes.  Eliminating Harding might cause the attack underway to falter, but -- again -- William didn't see him surviving such an attack.  And correcting the future didn't seem to be all that important if it simply meant dying here in the present ... or the past, which ever it was.

He ultimately abandoned any hope of changing this [i]new[/i] history and joined in helping the injured.  For what seemed an eternity, he and others carried litter after litter of casualties from near the South Wall to a staging area nearer to town.  Those men who were critical and needed immediate assistance were [i]triaged[/i] and send further into the village, where William presumed Keziah was once again hard at work performing her nursing skills.  Those men who weren't in danger of bleeding to death remained where they were until they could get patched up, some for a return to and through the gate to the battle that was consistently raging further and further northeast through the Bottleneck into Boston proper.  

And, of course, there were those men who had no hope.  William found himself occasionally standing over of kneeling by a man in his last moments of life, talking to him, reassuring him, praying with him.  It was heart wrenching to see a man's life just fade away, but -- although he didn't want to acknowledge it -- William found it easier to accept as the day went forward.  When it was all over and he had a chance to reflect back, he would realize that he'd watched eight men die right before his eyes.  Eight men who may have died someday during this war but had died today because the guns he'd allowed to fall into Patriot hands had led to a fight that otherwise wouldn't have occurred for more than a year.

..........

When he stepped into the house that was his and his [i]wife's[/i], William was exhausted.  Darkness had fallen, yet the sound of the battle continued.  The two Howitzers from the Tyler farm now had company: six additional British guns that had been captured near the north end of the Bottleneck.  The Patriots were now pounding British positions far north inside Boston; and the Redcoats were, in turn, pounding the Second Regiment's positions to the south ... near where William feared Samuel and Elizabeth were still hiding, presumably they weren't dead.

"I'm sure they're fine," were his first words to Keziah when she turned and saw him closing the door behind him.  "He's a doctor, and she'd pregnant.  The British surely would have moved them deeper into the city ... away from the fight."

They chatted a bit about what was happening outside, then -- suddenly, and without any warning at all -- William began sobbing.  He didn't know why.  Was it the dead Militiamen?  Was it the destroyed history?  Was it the unlikelihood that he would now ever get home to his own time? Was it Samuel and Elizabeth?  Or, was it his fear that Keziah would blame him if anything every happened to what remained of the rest of her family?  He didn't know, and he couldn't stop it: he dropped into a rickety dining table chair and hung his head before him, embarrassed and devastated.