I held the black shiny gun in front of me and pointed it at the man. I slowly set it, and then looked down at the man. He looked back up at me, with sorrow and loss of hope. He got up and kneeled on his knees, pulled his hairless head back, and started to pray.

My index finger slowly started to move and then released its powerful horrors. After the shot was heard I couldn’t stop my self and turned my head back to avoid seeing the body. But I was too late. The once living wise man was now dead laying in the street. There was no movement, and no sound. He was gone... A small stream of blood ran down from his neck and flowed into the street forming a puddle. A warm red fresh puddle. I had just taken a life. An innocent helpless life.

When I was in my tent that night, I cried for the man. I cried for his unknown family and for myself. That day changed my life forever, and it still hurts to think about it.

_______________


I stuffed my hands in my pockets to keep the unwanted cold air from biting my hands. My gun hung loosely at my side and bounced around in its case. My white foggy breath could easily be seen, as well as the other four hundred and fifty soldiers around me. Following me...

We split up into small groups. There were six soldiers that joined me and one of them was Gordon. He tramped around happily as if he were in a marching band, rather than searching for prisoners. I never knew a guy who could keep his spirits up no matter what the situation was.

We were making our way through the once busy, but now empty streets of London, looking for anybody that we could capture. So far, we had only seen one person. A woman with a baby frantically trying to escape and hush her wailing child. She was lost and confused so we had surrounded her, going unnoticed, and captured her. The two soldiers that had captured her returned to the camp as directed.

We silently continued along, searching every little hole and crack in the buildings. Behind trees, in garbage cans. Looking any place that someone could be hiding. The bomber planes were dropping their fireballs of death along the streets and on the war field on the far side of town.