WinterAnon here. It's been a long fucking while. Anyway, trying to get back into it with this. Forgive the inaccuracies as I have never actually been to war but I would love to incorporate any suggestions from military personal into this story. Feel free to point out what is wrong so that I can go over it in the final draft on PB.

Also, this features fairly dark themes such as child-soldiers, rape, murder, beheading, PTSD and racism. You have been warned.

Name: Fear.
Description: See the world though the eyes of a soldier during a tour in Afghanistan, circa 2014.



>Fear.
>It’s an interesting sensation.
>A cold chill down the spine.
>Hair standing on end.
>A rock in the pit of your stomach.
>You’ve felt this feeling more than you care to imagine.
>When you got into your first fight.
>When you crashed your car.
>When your girl broke it off.
>When you touched down in Afghanistan.
>The first time you got hit with an IED.
>It’s strange that there’s no fear now.
>Not anymore.
>You came here to do some good.
>You signed up in the Canadian Armed Forces, did quite well in basic and was shipped out to the sandbox as a replacement.
>Things were alright for a while.
>Lines shifted, politics was spoken and rounds were fired but none of it made much difference.
>The fighting seasons came and went.
>Friends and comrades came and went.
>You went out to win the “Hearts and Minds” of the locals.
>Like that was going to work.
>You’re lying on your back, looking up at the sky.
>There are a few clouds in the ritch blue sky, drifting lazily by.
>It’s rather nice, despite the incredibly bright sun.
>Sadly the scene is ruined by a few wisps of inky black smoke rising into the air from the corner of your vision.
>Confusion is your first emotion.
>Who the hell is ruining your beautiful day?
>You roll your head on the sandy ground and take a look.
>Ten feet away, there’s an HMMWV, windows pasted with blood, missing the entire engine compartment.
>It’s on fire.


>You start piecing things together.
>You start to remember.
>You were up-top on the Browning.
>You remember the dirt flying up in front of you.
>You remember the heat and the deafening sound of an explosion.
>You remember flying through the air.
>You don’t want to remember.
>The ringing in your ears, that you didn’t notice before, begins to subside.
>You ears are immediately assaulted by the radio, static squealing punctured by sporadic voices yelling back and forth.
>The roaring fire beside you adds a morbid backdrop, earrily close to hell, to the dusty landscape.
>Gunfire tears through the air all around you, the smaller rounds cracking quickly with the larger weapons shaking your chest with deep booms.
>The cracking of rounds coming in above and around where you’re laying.
>Sensation returns to you all at once.
>You reach down and grab the C7 on your sling, rolling over and aiming your rifle where everyone else was shooting.
>Then you feel it, like an icy hand clutching your heart.
>Fear…

>You’re lying on a road in the middle of nowhere, just having hit a fucking bomb. To your right is the wall of a compound of a village that you went into yesterday.
>Probably tipped the bombers off.
>Across from the wall is a field with a few low walls cutting up the poppy fields.
>A hundred, hundred and fifty, meters further was a treeline with bright flashes winking out of it.
>Just to the left of that is another compound with a broken door and shot up walls.
>Your training takes over.
>You flick the safety off and hunker lower on your dirt mound.
>You pop off a shot, barely feeling the kick of your weapon as you send a round at one of the winking lights, causing it to go silent.
>You fire off another three round at another as a rocket comes out of the treeline, just over you and impacts the compound wall behind you, shattering it to dust and spraying you with debris.
>You continue to fire, emptying your magazine.
>Changing the mag, you finally take a look around.
>You were the lead Vick in a convoy of three trucks and two gun-trucks with an LAV for support.
>It wasn’t even anything worth much.
>Three trucks of water.
>Soldiers died for water.
>How fucked is that?”
>You return the bolt to the forward position and continue to shoot, now suppressing more than anything.

>One more mag and the flashing has died completely, the enemy either running away or rotting in a gully.
>You see someone running from the enemy position toward you holding something solid and green.
>They look almost too small to be a soldier but they are a threat.
>You line up and put three rounds into their chest, dropping them like a stone.
>Your ears still ring.
>Your heart pounds in your chest.
>The thick reek of cordite and metal is dissipating quickly.
>You take some deep breaths and steady your hands.
>They won’t stop.
>You feel faint.
>There’s a pain in your side.
>You can barely breathe now.
>The cap is doing squad checks to see who’s still up.
>You hear your name being called.
>You roll onto your back, feeling the pain almost knock you out as it explodes down your spine.
>You pull your hand up to the transmit button but you can’t seem to get it to work.
>Your mouth is dry as the desert under you.
>You click it on and try and talk.
>All that comes out is a croak and a cough.
>”Vick one? Anyone from Vick one, respond.”
>Another voice joined. “The whole car’s burnt out. Both in the front seat are dead. Wait one.”
>You hear boots hitting the half-paved road toward you.
>The pain is getting worse as the adrenaline fades.
>You see a soldier, dressed in the same uniform as you drop to their knees next to you and hit the call button on their rig.
>It’s a girl.
>”I found the gunner. He’s alive but he needs a medic now.”
>It’s a girl.
>Then she looks at you.
>It’s not a human face.
>It’s a dog’s.

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