Sacrifice
-
Amy Abdilla, Grade 8
-
Short Story
-
2012
The air was cold and the sky dark. I ran through the town dodging the pieces of flying shrapnel as the bombs fell down on our homes. Pausing to catch my breath I dared to glance up at the sky, what I saw terrified me. The planes were flying in low formations over the town, they glinted sliver in the firelight but were otherwise invisible. I stared at one house that had had its wall blown to pieces. Inside was the sad form of a young girl and her family lying motionless in the bedroom, ‘this was the price of war,’ I thought sadly, ‘the price of our greed’.
Screams filled my ears as a bomb dropped somewhere nearby. I started to run; I had to get to the truck before the town erupted into a wall of flames. Pain pierced my side but I couldn’t stop running I was only just ahead of the bombs. The world was entirely silent, but it was not still, bombs still rained down everywhere I looked. I tentatively raised a hand to my ear and clicked my fingers. My ear popped but otherwise there was no other sound. ‘Great’, I thought, ‘one of the explosions must have ruptured my ear drums’. Out of the corner of my eye I saw one of the houses near me burst into flames.
I started running again, my thoughts focused on only one thing. Run and don’t stop. My legs burned as I stormed through the town at top speed. I ran and not stopping for anything. I kept running when building blew up around me, I kept running when shrapnel cut my legs and I kept running when my body started to tire. A mixture of mud and blood splattered my legs causing them to sting like crazy. The world around me was still silent beside the occasional hiss of my damaged ears.
I was so close to the truck, that would carry me to safety that I could jump for joy, when something small and white caught my eye. ‘Ignore it’, said a quiet voice inside my head, ‘you’re almost there’. ‘Go and see what it is’, said another voice, ‘you know you want too’. I stopped running and listened to the war raging inside my head. In the end the curiosity won and I jogged over to where I saw the piece of white cloth come into veiw, and I’m surprised to see a baby lying a few feet away from a ruined home. I pick up the small bundle of life and head towards the edge of the town.
I feel the earth shake slightly as the bombs falling close by and soon they were right behind me. As I reached the getaway truck, the driver motioned that they only have room for one more. Feeling the heat of the fire on my face I know it is only a matter of minutes before this area is engulfed in flames. The driver franticly motions to hurry up, hjis mouth forming words i cannot hear.I looked at the baby’s scared inocent face and think. My family had given their life to get me out so that I could get to saftey, a thought that had occupied my thoughts all night. I look at the baby's face and stare hard, nothing else seemed more pure, my heart melted. It's my turn I decided. My turn to make the same sacrifice as my family. I hand the baby to the driver, and make my final and ultimate sacrifice.