IX

It had been two full hours since our battle. The silence of the beach and the rustling of the tall grasses soon became a howling reminder of what had transpired. And as wave after wave from the sea lapped loudly behind us, it was as though the sea beckoned us to turn around and witness what we had done. Taunting us. Judging us. The howling winds and the laughing waves cut deep into us, and the wound was worse than any injury or loss we have incurred.

Ah yes. Those were the memories of a life I lived in an age that no longer remembers me. I have become a man lost in the annals of time. Unremembered, and unloved. Those were the days when we fought over beach, jungle, and conscience. Purging the land of the enemy and their misguidedness. It was a time when the action of a man was never judged, only remembered. Saved, to be judged by the victor. It was a time when men fought, not for petty idealisms such as honor or valor, but for the baser instincts of life and death. It was a life I lived. Where I killed, and slaughtered; and they loved me for it.

But I am an old man now. What fool would possibly love me?