It All Came Falling Down

five

    The streets were eerie, although it was just past noon. This town was under curfew, so the old cobblestone roads were empty. During other times, this place would have been pleasing and absolutely beautiful. Haisley would have loved to be here, witnessing the peaceful town that was beneath the barbwires and roadblocks, entrenchments and sandbag emplacements, the evidence of bombardment, and smoke from destroyed homes in every street.
    "Hey, you got a smoke?" asked my new battle buddy, the young Corporal Dewa Valslian.
    "No. I don't smoke," I said.
"Who the hell could get by without a cigarette nowadays, comrade?" she laughed. "Just give it some time, Corporal Wyllis. You'd be huffing and puffing like the rest of us."
    I raised my hand as a signal for her to shut up. She understood, as she was looking forward and noticed a man who appeared to be in his twenties walking on the road with his bags.
    "Sir!" I yelled. "Hey! What the hell are you doing on the street? This town is under curfew! What do you have in your bags?!"
    "You people don't dictate what this town can or cannot do!" he protested angrily.
    "Sir-"
    BANG! I was interrupted by a startling gunshot to my side. A bullet went straight through the man's neck, sending him limp to the ground with a spray of red.
    "Why did you do that? He didn't even do anything yet." I turned my head
    "We're in war, Wyllis! Don't tell me you haven't learned a damn thing." Valslian rolled her eyes. "There's a curfew right now; you don't just go on the street with a bunch of bags, genius! That guy got what he deserved. We're on a kill mission here, and I saw him as a threat. He could've been Resistance. End of story."
    "Yeah, he 'could've been' Resistance," I said, shaking my head in disbelief.
    "Spare me the freaking ethics, comrade. And do not question orders! Now, let's go check his bags," my partner groaned and walked ahead. She was right, though, like Jorlan. I might not agree with the way they did certain things, but we were in war. And I have to remember that, even though I had seen more than my fair share already.
    "What do you have there?" I finally asked, catching up to Valslian.
    "Family letters, some photos, and- holy crap! We hit the jackpot! This guy's got some food and a couple bottles of whiskey! Now that's what I'm talking about!" She dug through the bags. "We'll take the food and drinks. Why don't you carry it, big boy?" Valslian closed the bag containing those things and shoved it into my arms.
    Sighing, I put the straps over my shoulders and carried the whole package on my back. I took the lead this time, as my partner slowed down a little to admire her kill. "Damn, that was a good shot," I heard her mutter.
    "This guy came out from this building, I think," I said, pointing to a house with two floors. I gestured for Dewa to stand beside the door, while I prepared to breach it. "One. Two. Three," I mouthed before sending my boot in contact with the door. Stepping aside, I let my comrade enter first. She immediately raised her rifle, ready to fire. I followed suit.
    "Clear!" I heard Corporal Valslian shout from the house's dining room. We had done a clean sweep of the first floor. She hurried to regroup with me. "If that guy outside was against us, we have to treat everyone in here as hostiles," she warned.
    I nodded as if I agreed, although within me, I felt hesitant. "Upstairs," I told her with my rifle aimed up a flight of stairs after I heard a floorboard creak. I took initiative, cautiously taking step by step. The hallway above was dimly lit, with only sunlight coming through a small square window. I had approached the first door.
    Dewa tried twisting the doorknob gently. She shook her head. One. Two. Three. I kicked the door open, shattering part of its frame into splinters and wooden shards. My rifle was aimed and ready to discharge, but my finger was unwilling. I saw a blonde woman holding a young girl in her arms. Next to them was a man, slightly older, and a teenage boy. It was evident that they had been weeping and trapped in a corner with nothing left to do. They could've been a beautiful, perfect family at some point prior to this war. They were still beautiful, and I could not take my eyes off their faces— each and every single one of them. My finger would not leave the trigger, although I did not want to pull the it.
    "What the hell, Wyllis?! Shoot them! Pull the damn trigger!" Corporal Valslian walked up beside me and discharged her firearm, sending a projectile through the heart of the older man. Amidst the loud shot and the screams and the crying, my eyes were held fixed on them. And then I did it. I finally pulled my trigger more than once. One bullet into the mother's head, two into her daughter's chest, and another through the teenager's abdomen.
    "There we go! Can't let me have all the fun, eh? You're turning me on now," Dewa winked. She raised her rifle and aimed again, this time at the teenage boy. BANG! She fired at his head, because he was not dead. "Some mercy for him," she chuckled before laying a kiss on my left cheek and leading the way out of the room through the entrance we had entered from. "You did good."

Two days later
    I sat in the covered back of a military truck, pressed tightly against my own comrades and their gear. Somehow, I managed to pull out paper and a pencil. I wrote the first line, same as any other letter I wrote to send back to my home: My dear Haisley, today was another interesting day...

    My new unit has been assigned a kill mission during the past two days. We were to search for Resistance insurgents, but I am beginning to doubt the Army's goal. I know I should not doubt our beloved and victorious leaders, but we went from killing armed hostiles to shooting civilians we were suspicious of...

A teardrop fell from my eye and formed a small, wet circle on the paper. It's best to just be blunt.

    I helped kill a family of four two days ago, in their home. There was a man who disobeyed our curfew. My partner shot him, and we cleared the house he had left. A little girl, teenage boy, and a beautiful couple. We're moving forward now, to another town nearby. Resistance forces there surrendered, and we're reinforcing our troops there in order to capture the town. I love you, baby...

    I finished up the rest of my letter and personalised it before signing it and folding it into a smaller form. Shoving it and the pencil back into my uniform pocket, I sat up straighter and fed on some military rations. Once again, we were advancing into another town, and like this one and the last ones before, death and destruction likely would follow. The engine roared from the outside, the truck pulled forward.