It was the usual warm day up in Montana that early morning of June 25th. The sun was out, bringing a sky so blue it hurt to look at it. A few big, bulging clouds made their towering way across the sky, like huge slow moving dreadnoughts under all the sail they had, billowing and straining, moving majestically from West to East.

The scuttlebut was that today was the day. Something big was going to happen and the tension was so thick it made the hair stand up on your arms. The enemy was close and everything felt like it was going to bust loose any second.

Like happens every day in Montana the weather changed. The slow moving clouds so white and pure the moment before began to turn into that dark ominous grayish black underbelly that foretold a storm was coming. A big one from the looks of it. Thunder and the occasional lightning strike was seen and heard across the low rolling hills to the West. That and the electricity of the moment had the horses on the picket lines spooked as the wind picked up.

Suddenly all hell broke loose as the advance group of troopers already mounted and riding along the picket lines, the bugler sounding “To Horse, to horse” on his bugle, let everyone know this is it, mount up. They were about to ride into the storm.