They Were Sleeping

Sleep is not easy when you are hungry, this she has come to be familiar with throughout her life, more so in the past week since her parents both died when the shelling began once again at that time.

Their deaths had been quick and she had been left with her younger sister and two younger brothers, one not even two years of age, to take care of. She was still a child herself of barely thirteen years from yesterday.
So hunger was always familiar to her.

The shelling has stopped in the past few days but she knows that the shelling will likely resume soon, it always did. The next round of shelling could very well kill her or her siblings or all of them, few ever survived once they were caught in the crossfire.
Her parents and grandparents hadn't. Other relatives had managed to flee the city but she wasn't sure if they were still alive.

They probably weren't.

But that is not her concern at this time, she needs to find food for her siblings and for herself. There had to be food nearby or someone who could help, someone who wasn't going to use her like they had earlier in the week.
It had been painful and degrading to be used in such away but it had ensured some food for herself and her siblings, she didn't want to do it again though. There had to be a better way than that.

If she could find a way out of the city with her siblings then she would, somewhere safe where they can be away from this destructive conflict. If there was such a place.
For all she knew this conflict was happening everywhere and there was nowhere safe.

Food now though, food. Safety after if she can find it, but food first.

Pushing herself up from where she has been sleeping with her siblings and holding them close protectively, she feels her stomach growl and tries to ignore the painful hunger. This was nothing new, she rarely ate and always made sure that what food there was mostly went to her siblings and she ate what little was left.
They came first after all.

She can hear faint gunfire in the distance and explosions even farther away, she can also hear the sound of men close by. Very likely soldiers, of which side she cared little about, but if they were willing to share food then that would be very welcome.

Being sure not to wake the sleeping children, she gets up slowly and moves slowly over to the ruined archway of a former building which had suffered severe damage during the previous shelling, it still had a reasonable roof over it so it provided some shelter.
Peeking out from the archway she looks down the street, first to her left then to her right before looking straight ahead. She can see a slight fire just down an ally way in front of her and she can make out shadows that are illuminated by the fire, she hopes they're friendly.

Looking back at her siblings to make sure none of them are waking, she heads out towards the men a minute later and steps slowly towards them, she can hear them laughing and talking about things that had little interest for her.
They don't know she's there until she speaks.

“Excuse me, but do you have any spare food? My siblings and I are very hungry and we have no one else to turn to” The men jump and grab their weapons, rifles by the look of them she thinks, and they aim at her before seeing that she isn't a threat.
They lower their weapons and one of the men gets up from where he is sitting and approaches her, he is like so many men she has seen, large with considerable facial hair. His eyes, however, are cold and cruel. There is no hint of compassion in them, he looks at her as if she is less than the dust that she and her siblings are covered in.

“Where are they?” He asks, his voice is rough and as cold as his eyes. She feels uneasy around him but her hunger overrules her caution.

“Just down this ally way, please, we are so hungry” Her stomach growls loudly as if on cue and the men laugh when they hear it.

“That you are, girl. My friends here will see what food we can spare, take me to where you and your siblings live” A voice in her mind tells her to flee, to not let him see them, but she pushes it away. She needed food.
So she nods and leads the man to the makeshift home in the ruins of the destroyed building, she doesn't question why he has his weapon with him slung on a shoulder, soldiers did that often from what she saw of other soldiers she has seen before.

“They are here, they are sleeping, I hope to have food for them to eat once they wake” The man pushes past her and looks at the sleeping children, a cold smile on his face.
He swings his rifle down and turns to her, bringing the butt of the rifle down on her face which causes her to fall to the ground, then he turns to her siblings and aims at them.

Her legs feel weak as her head pounds from the impact and she screams out in horror and shock as the man opens fire, killing her siblings with each shot before firing another shot into the head of each body. He spits on their bodies before turning back to her.

“They're not hungry now” He says in that cold, cruel tone. Swinging his rifle back onto his shoulder, he picks her up from the ground, ignoring the blood on her forehead where he had hit her with his rifle, and drags her back to his friends.
She tries to fight back but she is too weak from hunger.

“Deal with them?” His friends ask, with which he replies with a grunt before throwing her down in front of them.
“This one needs to learn her place” Another one of the men remarks.

She knew what that meant.

Feeling herself being picked up again, she is moved roughly into position and she feels her legs being pried open. It didn't matter to her though, if she died then she died, she had gotten her siblings killed and she saw no reason to even care about living.
Let them kill her, at least then she would be free and safe from this hell called life.

There was nothing left to live for.

~~

Touching the scar on her forehead where the rifle had hit her so many years ago, she wishes that this scar was her only one. She had so many scars and many of them were within.
Her adopted family who had saved her after she had been found in that dirty camp site, the men who had raped her dead around her after they had been shot by a passing patrol, were waiting for her to join them for dinner. They had adopted her after she had been taken to hospital and they had been there as part of an aid relief mission.

That life seemed so far away at times, like a different life entirely. On the TV she can hear the usual news reports about more conflicts in her former home, more death, more suffering, more children separated from families or likely killed. All for meaningless, destructive violence in the name of whatever ideals or motive that is driving it.

How many young women like she had been were facing what she had faced all those years ago right now? Did any of them have a hope for a future? Or were they waiting to die just as she had done?

Which part of her still did.

The TV is turned off and the room falls silent, she is not alone even though she is very much alone in the room. Her siblings are with her and she knows that they forgive her for what happened, all they want is for her to one day join them when it is her time.

“One day” She whispers. “One day”

She is hungry, so she leaves her bedroom and heads to where her adopted family are waiting for her.

And her siblings wait for her as always, no longer hungry, just waiting.