It has been a year. An eternity in my eyes, but nevertheless a year. I have seen it all, done it all, experienced it all. The good, the bad, the beautiful, the horrible. I have trained vigorously and have been sent on missions of peace, missions of diplomacy, missions of hope. I have also been sent on missions of war, of rebellion, of ruthlessness. There was no time for mercy, no time for forgiveness, no time for thoughts. My name is Micheal Smith, and I’m a soldier in the Eastern War.

“Smith! Smith? You okay mate?” shouted John.

John was my squad leader, we had been together since day one, through thick and thin. He was probably the only guy within 50 km who cared if I was OK or not.

“Yeah sure, I’m fine, a bit distracted but I’m good.” I replied back.

“Great, because we’re 20 seconds away from the LZ and we’re coming in hot.”

“Alright, I know the drill. Jump out, Hit the deck, and scout out the immediate area.”

The rookie in front of me jumped out of the chopper 3 meters from the ground, and sprinted for 10 meters when a shot pierced the silence. The rookie crumpled, a small stream of blood coming clean out of his head.

An orchestra of machine guns followed up after the sniper shot. All around the chopper bullet holes appeared, and we jumped to the floor covering our heads. As 50 men dressed in Eastern garb jumped out from their hiding places, the twin rotary cannons on the side of the chopper fired up.

Me and John jumped out of the chopper and started firing at the Easterners. In front of me, a squad of machine gunners was mowed down. Amidst the bloody bodies of the machine gunners, a soldier climbed out, a bullet through his chest. He rolled over, crying out in pain behind the bodies.

We fought on for 2 more minutes and finally sensing a lull in the fighting i ran up and grabbed the soldier by the collar. As my feet sank into the yellow, fine sand, I backpedalled. In my mind I believed he would have done the same for me. I nearly had reached the medical evacuation chopper when the same sniper who took out the rookie shot me in the leg.

The pain was too much, I blacked out.

I woke up, my eyes crusted together with blood. The first thing I noticed was the smell. It was the smell of flesh and blood.

“We know you are awake, get up.” an unknown Easterner said.

I moaned at the prospect of getting up. The pain in my leg was barely tolerable. I forced my eyes to open.

“Fine then, we will interrogate you lying down.” he said.

“Why do you fight, you are losing this war?”

I responded “You Easteners are different from us. We fight for our friends, our families, brothers and sisters, we fight for freedom.”

With one final effort, i drew the pistol from my pocket, wasted one shot on him, and the last one on myself.