WARNING: STRONG LANGUAGE, VIOLENCE, ADULT SITUATIONS. READER DISCRETION ADVISED. 

David couldn't move, or breathe. His arms and leg were heavy, cold, and panic grew as fear he would never move again gripped him.

"You killed him! You killed him! What did you do!?" Corporal Stevens's eyes appeared twice as big as they glowed in the dark with fear, but his face screamed in anger. Pops of gunfire thundered in the distance like a drumline for death that grew louder as the insurgents got closer. Their deadly melodies crashing on the weakening armor of the vehicle now a shelter; eating away at it like a storm crashing on a cardboard roof.

"You doomed us all!" Private Wheeler said emerging from behind Corporal Stevens. His long face drawn out even more by his fatigued, sunken eyes. The left side of his head bled so much so it looked as if it were melting right off. He stretched out his long, bony arms towards David either for support or to pull him into the inferno growing behind them.

Smoke started to engulf the inside in darkness, choking everyone as screams outside grew to high pitch shrieks that ended abruptly one by one with a grunt.

David tried to jerk his body, throw his arms, and kick his legs as hard as he could but nothing moved. The toxic smoke burned through his nose, and throat, all the way to his lungs until he felt the pressure crushing his chest. The heat of the fire boiling the sweat from his body. He couldn't move, he couldn't breathe, he couldn't scream, and in the darkness that covered him now, one image emerged as clear as 10 years before.

"David, why?" his mother asked again as she fell.

"Nnnnoo!"

David finally kicked hard enough to wake himself. His heart racing and his t-shirt sticking to his back. It wasn't drenched but it clung enough to him that he sat up, and tugged at it from the shoulders to peal it off like masking tape.

"It was a dream, just another dream." David sat for a second relieved he had escaped the ordeal.

"Why again?" His frustration grew as the images continued to play in his mind. He struggled to contain them deep within it, but they refused to remain quiet.

"Damm. It wasn't my fault!" He searched his memories in an effort to convince himself. Retracing every step, every sequence again and again. But every time he uncovered a new mistake, another flawed decision that told him "that's why."

"Stupid!" David punched the mattress, and crossed his arms over his face hoping they would be enough to erase him from existence. Taking every trace of his life along with him.

"Dumb motherfucker. How could you be so stupid?" The incident had only gotten bigger with time, but only in his mind. It never got any better, only worse. And it was entirely his fault, and he deserved to suffer, and pay for everything that happened. That was his conclusion though. It was a spiral he effortlessly walked into, but struggled greatly to get out off. His body tensed up with anger, and self-loathing to the point his stomach churned in disgust with himself.

"Arg! Fuck everything!" David suddenly sat up with purpose on his mind. Nobody was with him in his bunk since everyone in his unit was out on a mission, and he had requested to stay on regular patrol after his suspension was up.

David rushed to his trunk believing his answer laid within it, slamming his hands on it with such force that he could have ripped it open. And then just stopped. His heart beat louder than it did before. The trunk hummed at him, daring him for the hundredth time. Taunting him.

His body completely tense. His teeth grinding and his hands fused to the trunk with his fingers wanting to crush it beneath them. He licked his dry lips with a desperate thirst which water alone could not satisfy, but had to for more than a year now. His head now aching, from all the chaos going on inside of it, at three in the morning. But he could not open it

"Why can't I? What's stopping me?"

"I've failed everyone. Everyone except, her."

The girl in the market.

Parisa, the girl in the smallest stand, made of old wooden creates, with no shade covering her from the hot sun, and only a bucket to sit on. He pictured her smile, the lone smile that twinkled at him like a glimmer from an oasis in a desert of pain, and disdain. A smile that stretched from the valleys of the Central Highlands to the flats of the Norther Planes and reached the highest peak of the Hindu Kush. Her buck teeth, and slightly crooked lower incisors giving her a distinguished beauty, like a valley undisturbed since the formation of Pangea. Thinking about seeing her made his heart rush with such vigor that it lifted David from his chest, and walk on his toes. Thinking about her amber eyes, rich like the sands of a peaceful desert dusk. Thinking about their honest gaze basked him in a warmth that melted his troubles, and sins. Liberating his soul from his turmoil, if only for a moment. Thinking about how her wild, bold, butterscotch hair breaks free with energy, and life from underneath her ragged hajib. How she struggles to gently subdue it back in place as it tosses in her face. Not unlike her own hopes, and dreams.

He can see Parisa in her stand sneaking lessons from the English book he gave her while looking after her thirteen year old brother Hakim, the man of the house. Hakim who acts tough to represent his family well, and be the man he wants to grow into. David sees Parisa and her mother tirelessly tend to the stand all day, every day. Constantly overlooked by crowds who maneuver around them in search of items of greater importance. Still, she sets up her stand early, staying long after everyone else is gone. Hoping to get in that final sale. Then with quiet dignity, takes everything down to head home, and do it all over again - day after day. That is her persistence, her resolve. Nobody noticing the lone wooden stand that pops up and gets in the way. Except for David.

David begins to breathe easier as these thoughts play out like sweet melodies, and replace the horrid memories which haunt his sleep. His body relaxing, and recoiling from the strain it found itself in not long ago.

"Coward." David slowly pulled his shaking hands away from the trunk and lays in his bunk. Grimacing his face, and shutting his eyes as hard as he can in an effort to bury any feelings as far down as possible.

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Hello Dear Reader! Hope you enjoyed the chapter. So what do you think? Did you enjoy the flashback? What do you think is going to happen? Will they make it out? Well don't worry because if you click that button below you'll find out! :D

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Thank you!

Roge. 

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