Before the Battle

Scars 3/4

"You won," my voice trembled with emotion and surprise.

I hadn't expected that. Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that when I descended into the underground tunnels and noticed that the gunfire had died down, it was because Shira had stood triumphant against such overwhelming odds.

"How could you possibly do that?" I gasped in astonishment. After all, he was wounded and alone.

"Is that really something to brag about?" He asked quietly, something in his voice making me uneasy.

"Shira?"

"I've killed a lot of people over the years," he spoke. "Sometimes because I had to. Sometimes because I was ordered to. But I've never taken pleasure in the death of my victims. That night I did."

He studied my face as if looking for revulsion, for condemnation. He expected me to blame him.

Is that why he didn't want to talk to me about it?

"I remember that intoxicating feeling of power. It was so liberating. I killed without question, without remorse. I loved it. Their fate was in my hands, I could do anything. It seemed so easy, exciting, addictive."

He said it with contempt, with disgust at himself.

I suspected the fight had left its mark on him. But all the time I thought it was the pain and suffering he'd endured, as evidenced by the scars on Shira's chest. It didn't occur to me that the worst trauma came from the moment of his victory.

A triumph for which he had to shed everything that held him back. His conscience, his compassion, part of his humanity. He had to do it to win. To survive.

"What does that make me, Taira?"

He asked, as if he expected me to pass judgement on him.

"What do you want me to say? That you're a heartless monster? I know you're not. You just did what you had to do. If you hadn't killed them, they would have killed you. That's the way of war, and you know it. And if those feelings helped you survive in that hopeless situation, so be it. I know you and I love you. And nothing you say, nothing you do will make me stop loving you."

He shook his head in disbelief and smiled. Those blue-grey eyes lit up.

"You're incredible. What have I done to deserve you?" He squeezed my hand on his chest tighter. 

I hoped my words had made him feel better. But I suspected the worst part of his story was yet to come.

The worst part for me.

He seemed to find it harder to talk about his victory than the injuries, the pain and the fight for his life.

"What happened next?" I ask, my eyes wandering back to his scars. "You didn't escape that easily."

"No, it really wasn't easy," he agrees, his face darkening. "I made a lot of mistakes."

His hand, intertwined with mine, moved again, slowly running my palm across the middle of his chest, a little lower down his right side, to a spot just below his ribs.

My fingers traced two straight scars. I didn't need to see them to know what they looked like. I knew every scar on Shira's body by heart.

"That was the other one."

//

"Report  the situation! Repeat...report...tuation" echoed between the static crackling of the radio, which the commander clutched convulsively in his hand, trying in vain to move. "How's the hostage? Is he safe?"