nightmare to end, and the occasional tent of good humor. The occasional tent with soldiers sharing their company, whatever crappy drink they could nd rationed out among the group, cards being passed around, laughter coming from the cockeyed table. I didn’t know what they were talking about, but I did know what they weren’t talking about: war. The only people that could even fake happiness were so detached from the current situation they were of no use to me, they couldn’t ght, and those that were caught up in it were so depressed that they too could not function. Not that this was news, that's what happened. There are winners, and there are losers, yet somehow, everyone loses. The victor makes their terms and imposes them upon the vanquished with no one to stop them, and not until it's too late feels remorse. The vanquished had to live with these harsh terms and pay the consequences. Lose-lose. I was looking at men who had lost parts of themselves; they died with the enemies they killed. Every soul falling down to the depths of hell made its way into each soldier’s pack, adding weight and pulling them down too. They lost connections, the only proof they had that they were loved was in the memories, but what does that prove? Feelings change. Would they still love a man who murdered tens of other men also wrestling with loss, with families and friends of their own? Even the winner loses, even the enemy feels. No matter how much it hurts to think about, every man killed was being pulled away from their people. I knew that every single soldier in my camp was thinking about it. Dwelling on the grimaces of pain on the enemies' faces just before they went white and still. Remembering the cries of terror, the cries for mercy before putting a carefully aimed bullet right through their skull. The thought, what if it was me? I could watch them all dive down the rabbit hole as they lled their lungs with sweet, sweet smoke trying to burn these dark thoughts. They couldn’t. They pictured their girlfriends, wives, and children all on their knees, looking up at the sky and yelling, “why god, how could you do this to me?!” Their shirts wet from real tears, not the rain. What a world. Truly tragic, the nature of battle. My shoes sunk into the wet dirt deep enough that they tugged every time I took a step. It was as if the earth was begging me to turn around; it was grabbing me by the ankles and saying, “please don’t go.” But I wasn’t going anywhere; I was just walking. I walked past crates of weapons, now wet from rain dripping through the large cracks running down the wood. Soon the weapons would be covered in mud mixed with dark crimson - what a terrible thought. Why did I do it, this whole ghting thing? I needed to. It was my purpose. My family. Unlike the men who I looked at when walking down the rows of sagging tents, I didn’t have a family to mourn for me. I didn’t have the nagging in the back of my mind giving me endless playthroughs of death. Not anymore, at least. I had the demons, but by this point, we were friends. I couldn’t leave them now. My life had gone so far down the gutter that it was now at that point where the water is in free fall before hitting the ground, and all it feels is fresh air and gravity. That was me, stuck in a state of fake pride and meaning,
fi
fi
fi
fi
plummeting back to reality.
