Work Text:
“I am old and wrinkled, years past etched into my skin like the concentric circles of a tree. Pain and melancholy are the summations of my time living as a soldier. I used to bear arms against the authority, fight for what seemed to be right and hold myself to the morality of men far greater and far larger than anyone who stood before. I remember the blood on my hands and the faces that I’ve drained of living; and still, I see them still in my dreams, the passage of time missing its mark on those very same faces.
I regret the calculating ethics of my fight, the excuses and rationalizations of killing; the live or die when it was all just killing. I see those churning machines built of metal made by men to end it all quicker, who never had to see that they had only made it bloodier. I regret the footsteps in the mud I made, never knowing if the mud was drenched in blood or rain.
Most of all, I hated the unknowing ignorance of my depravity. The fact of orders being omniscient, and of commanders being completely in the correct. Men reduced to weapons and fighting toys for greater things that were never great at all. A moral imperative that was never really moral; the virtue of winning assuredly outweighs the tragedy of killing. It was hypocrisy yet the truth of it all seemed to be incorrect despite the facts weighing upon everyone’s mind for no one wanted to admit they were wrong.
I have fought in those times, years have long since passed since that horrific era yet it still feels like yesterday…”
The veteran spoke with a clear voice, a stagnant waver yet poignant demeanour resolute in his speech. He sat in his armchair, his skin ragged and tired. A look in his eyes staring into you; Concern and worry gleam from his exhausted eyes.
“Nowadays, people in the street salute me to thank me for a service that I never wanted to take part in almost as if they forgot they once demonized that very same service only decades ago. I remember when I came back home after the war, the looks of pity and hatred that each and every civilian harboured against us. The rage that mere men could be capable of committing some of the world’s worst crimes against humanity.
They would heckle at us for weeks, and run us off from our jobs and the basic errands. To be a soldier in the aftermath was a shame that one hid underneath tons of guilt and shame. We were hated and truly deserved to be so, you don’t come back from killing children and sending your very own children to fight without feeling like you’ve failed in every aspect as a soldier. We failed in our job to protect everything that we cared about.
We allowed the things that we should’ve protected to fight for us.”
He grasps a medical pill bottle from the coffee table, shaking its contents within. Lifting the lid and popping some pills down, the bottle was labelled with some name that seemed long and complicated. His throat swallows the pills before continuing.
“Sorry for that, I saw the clock behind you and noticed it was time for me to take my meds. “He chuckles, grinning ever so slightly.
“Turns out years of handling extreme G-Forces as a pilot takes a toll on your health. I’m just glad that I’m blessed enough to have to take these pills in the first place, many friends of mine never lived long enough to take some. Which could be said for even the supposed “hero” of the war.
A child shoved into a war machine far greater than anything made before. Gundam had taken its sacrificial lamb, and it would spill the blood of many before it would spill its own. The fact that a mere child became the “hero” of a meaningless war, shows how depraved we became in our bloodshed. We failed to protect our future when our future had to fight for us, to protect the present. I remember when the pilot was revealed to be a child, there was tremendous outrage everywhere you went. Justice had to be served, for how can a child be the hero that saved us all?
There was a sham court case to bring to light the incompetency of the military, it served nothing. The pilot would die in service to the people, doing what they did best which was being a hero. I am one of the lucky few to be old enough to know that they shouldn’t have died in the first place. They should’ve never entered the battlefield at all.”
He lowers his head, bringing his hands to his lap sighing ever so slightly. His posture relaxes as tension seems to release from his body. Eyes gleaming with memory, a swirling shine that lasts for the slightest moment.
“We all lost in that war, it took decades for me to realize that fact. The mere idea that I am old enough to have that realization haunts me for so many never got to. I hate that such a meaningless conflict took so much from all of us for nothing. I’ve survived long enough, to tell my story myself but I wish I didn’t have to.”
-An Interview of a One-Year War Veteran, UC 105
From Dani A. Gomez, Reporter for The Colonial Gazette