Bygone

Part 2: War

Bygone

Part 2 • The War

The sight is disheartening.

The ground only dirt, sticky and colored with blood and other liquids of the body. The sky dark from the ash clouds of the fires. The sun (their hope) is hardly even there anymore. Some could be convinced it never existed if it wasn't for their memories of basking in its warmth.

The peace of the world now thrown in disorder and chaos. Silence now regarded as suspicious. There is always something to be heard. Whether it be the screams and cries of their dying and injured, or the sounds of metal against metal against flesh. Or even the squelch that sounded beneath their shoes as they move forward.

War is never a pretty sight. No matter the side you fight on.

It was just something everyone knew, whether they've seen war firsthand before or not. But those who haven't, didn't truly have the grasp of how horrible it is. At least, Sakura didn't.

She's heard stories — war stories. The elderly in her childhood neighborhood always did like to talk. As did the veterans in the hospital. Her older comrades talked about it once or twice. Sakura never prompted, she knew those times were rough and asking could seem rude. So Sakura only sat back and listened. She tried to imagine what war was like. She never liked her imaginings.

Though, looking back on it, her imaginings were better than what war truly is.

The constant smell of blood, rot, vomit, urine, ash, and death was enough for Sakura. And it was only one of the five senses. There was still the feel of her hands ripping an enemy apart, of being elbow deep of a comrade trying to save them, of feeling her bones be broken and fixed and broken all over again. Then the taste of stale, rotting food and dirt and blood.

There is also the pit in her stomach she feels everytime she marks off another one dead. The pit grows as she drags the dead in piles. And it sinks further in her when watching the piles burn. Sakura never really liked fires anyways. They only grow and consume everything in its path. Leaving behind pain and destruction.

( "Yes deary, but they also leave behind a more nutritious soil. It leaves behind a start of new and better crop for us."

Only five years old. Her mother behind her, her fingers combing through her short hair. )

Sakura remembers her mother's words from when she was a child. At the time, a small forest fire started at a training grounds near they playground. As a child, Sakura liked to explore the forest. She was almost caught up in the blaze without even knowing. It was a training accident, some kids practicing justus.

Sighing, Sakura looks arounds her. She's stationed in one of the few medical tents closer to the front of the war. In her time there, she's already seen over thirty dead and twenty critically injured. It's only the start of her second day stationed there.

Sakura was stationed in the tents further from the fighting before she came here. And before that she was the one fighting until too many became injured. Sakura much rather be stationed as a field medic. Fighting and healing at the same time. It's better to simultaneously see and cause death instead of just seeing dead bodies, one after another on a makeshift cot in a tent.

She's also far away from making sure her precious ones are safe. Though, from how things have gone so far, it wouldn't matter. Whether Sakura is out there fighting or she's in here healing. She wouldn't be able to save her loved ones — she's failed more than once already. After all, it is the fifth year of war.

Sakura looks up from the man she was healing. The other medics move to carry him off with the other shinobi that are recovering. Looking out through the open flaps of the tent, Sakura calls out her break. When she didn't get any objections to her ten minute break she walked out of the tent.