War

• Marshall Sing, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2012

I’m Private John Ryan; I was killed on the 30th of April 2010, during the raid of Bagdad, Iraq and this is my story on war.
29th of March 2010, our battalion rolls in to the city of Bagdad, Iraq, we are heavily armed, tanks, what look indestructible, aeroplanes flying at the speed of light, you roll into the centre of town, then you realise, your armour is useless, tanks in a huge ball of fire, aeroplanes crashing and burning to the ground, this was no city, this was a warzone. There was no sign of civilisation, buildings burnt to ash, roads disintegrated to dust and the skies filled with smoke. Our battalion slowly fights our way to an old abandon warehouse, there was peace for about a minute, then BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Into the side of the warehouse, next a shower of bullets hit, men are jumping down for their life and others falling.
This attack went on for another hour, men kneeling in the corners praying for it to stop, they were crying, they were scared, we weren’t men and then you look out to the empty souls of men lying on the ground staring into the a better place than us. It was 3:15pm we been under attack for hours until, BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! Everything went quiet, the battalion slowly got the confidence and pride back that we needed, I went to the entrance with slug and storm to breach the area. BOOM! The door hits the ground 100m/h, slug leads first followed by me; I raise my gun to eye level, thank god, the 3rd battalion standing right in front of us.
They were under the command of Captain Johnston; he believes we have to move into city, instead of moving downtown, Johnston decided him, me, slug and storm will go through the gully at the edge of town to provide sniper support for the troops. The terrain was rough, bushes sharp as needles, trees as tall as skyscrapers and the gully was filled with thick dark water. We got to the position an enormous ledge of a cliff for the sniper cover for the soldiers on the ground; where it clearly outlined the battle zone. The ground soldiers were opening there raid early tomorrow morning so we camped out on the ledge of the cliff.
30th of March 2010, the battle started, we all scope on the warzone, and our first target was any machine gunners, so our men could have the advantage. BANG! BANG! Two machine gunners dead, slug killed three and storm killed the other two, our men were getting closer and closer, our next target was the ground soldiers, I took around ten men, Slug fifteen, Storm eight and Johnston nine. We had the advantage, until, BANG! A gunshot close to us, I turn to Storm, blood pouring down his head, BANG!
Private John Ryan, was killed on the 30th of March 2010, 12:16, his cause of death was a bullet.