All Alone

The rain poured down as I stepped off the transport. The ground shook as the transport took off and left me feeling alone. The feeling of being 27 parsecs away from any friendly system of planets could make anyone feel lonely. I had'nt seen my home for seven years, that alone made me want to go back. Through the cracking of thunder I could hear my sergent yelling to form lines. I can't tell you how many times I've imagined putting a bullet between his eyes. A smack in the head brought me back to the moment, my best friend was in line next to me. Though we were all wearing full face masks I could tell it was him from the Bld-423 label that we all had. A sharp squeal from are headset radios shuts us up. The sergent tells us the usual crap about how we are fighting to protect are families and that some of us will die but how proud he is of us. I'd heard that a hundred times before. He then goes on the tells us that our main objective is to protect the the heavy weapons convoy until they could set up the guns. The squeal comes back as we start moving. The flash of light followed by the rumbling from explosions far off gets more frequent and more violent until we come around the hill to see the full battle and destruction right in front of us. Before any of us could react the front line of troopers gets torn up by enemy weapons. We lay cover fire and sprint towards the trenches. One of the weapons carriers gets a direct hit and blows up sending me face first into the dirt. One of my squad mates helps me up and we both dive into the trenches. I put my gun up and line one of those ugly four armed slug drooling magots in my site and pull the trigger... nothing happens, I try again with the same result. I duck down to examine my gun and find out my core battery chips fried. Frantically searching for a replacement. My squad mate that I had fought with for so many years takes a bullet right to the face. Cursing the day I joined the army, I grab his gun and fire a hail of bullets into the sea of aliens rushing forth. Off in the distance I heard a someone yell grenade, frantically I look around and feel the explosion hit my back last thing I rememberd was screaming and fighting. When I woke up everything was dead quiet. My body burned all over, struggling, I eventually was able to get on my knees. Then I heard a faint moan. I looked over to see my best friend lying on the ground. Crawling over to him I saw his face mask had been blown off along with half of his face. I held him in my arms as the life slowly left him. I knew I could'nt stay here, I picked up his gun checked the battery and ammo and took about two steps before footsteps behind me made me stop and turn around. I found my self staring down the barrel of a gun. Before I could do anything I heard what sounded like laughter then BOOM.....

The rain poured down as I stepped off the transport.
"Dont think about that." I told myself the ground shook as the transport took off.

Capt. Jason Crowe