Steady On, Soldier

We Heroes fight this war for glory, for honour, as our countrymen will forever remember us...

Sometimes, I wonder about that phrase. I wonder if this war is worth fighting, I wonder if I'm really doing the right thing, I wonder if I will feel hot lead tomorrow, piercing through my brittle armour, and if I really will be remembered, the small, insignificant me. 

Yet, even with these thoughts in my heart, I think that we are doing this place good, by coming in, and bringing order to it.

Even now, as I run across dusty stone ground, through streets walled by concrete buildings falling apart as bullets and shells smash their bodies through the walls.

Even now, as my blood fills with adrenaline, as my heart beats furiously, like it knows that I might stop and fall at any time, and wants to make up for all the time that it would lose....Even now, I still think about my wife, my children, and whether I will see them again.

Then, something next to me erupts into fire, and I feel something ripple across my body, I feel myself slowly, slowly drifting away into peaceful darkness. It holds my exhausted frame, and caresses it, putting my overdriven mind into a welcome sleep of exhaustion.

Am I dead? No, no, I can't be....I wouldn't be thinking if I were, right?

I tried to open my eyelids, but oh, did they feel so heavy, I just wanted to let go again. But despite that, I force them to bend to my will, as something in me struggles to survive, some fire in me fights for every heave and breath that enters my lungs, and pumps blood through my body, driving me on till me last breath, seeking the things that are still precious to me.

As light pours in, I am met with a sight of blurry figures moving and distorting, approaching me, emotions dancing on their faces, a mix of curiosity, fear, and a most chilling one, something that should never be on the faces of children, the tearful rage of loss and death.

Yet I still struggle to my feet, giving a helpless look towards them, watching as they shrink away, eyes cast on me as if I were intruding on something dear. My arm hangs limply against my body as I start to take steps, watching each foot rise and fall, rise and fall, speeding up, and slowing down as my running is erratic.

My eyes swim across the landscape, splashed with splots of dark red, large, burning holes in the ruined earth, and bodies, bodies everywhere. I retch on the ground, but I refuse to stop and take my time, as I feel eyes staring at me from every corner, every crevice of a door, and every little child, sitting near a body, bawling their eyes out as they wonder why their parents won't wake up.

And I feel, as my feet stumble across the world, my mind, already, even amid this chaos, wondering what happened to the people I see on the ground denying the truth of what's been happening right in front of my naïve eyes, something I have been coerced into being a part of. This....this hell on Earth which I have helped to create.

But even with this realisation, I run, I sprint, I stumble, away from the guilt of my actions like a child, scared after breaking something. With all the evidence in front of my eyes, some part of me still can't believe that the good guys did this, that I did this. It isn't how it's supposed to be! The posters promised me glory, promised that I would be a hero! Not some monster whose hands are stained black from the blood of innocents!

I was told that I ran back to my base a gibbering mess of words, some sane, some insane. Now, as I lay on this hospital bed, I reflect on what's happened to me, what I've realised about this war, this slaughter, this crime against my own humanity, and all involved.

War. War never changes. It'll always be a product of two politicians squabbling, and will always result in people dead on the cold, hard ground, no matter civilian or soldier. It never ends in anything but blood, and too much loss for all, for the price of ending it, is always, too high.