Atrocity

The war had gone on for six months; though it felt much longer.

Bodies, limbs,charrred and disinterred, lay carelessly on the ground like a construction site of thrown bricks, catastrophic with piles of broken cement and debris. Building,destroying; progress, war - they were settling inside her slowly - as slowly and comprehensively as the ice that melted in her stomach. It was the only thing she had eaten all day.

But despite this, she couldn't be paralysed by pessimism. The eyes, still riddled with shock and unacceptance, drew her hope in a period of sudden and unexpected calm. She would wait quietly in the crevices of a fallen building,torn like a hurricane had come to rip the life of the town. This time, however, she didn't know if this time the anger was to abate eventually. She knew too well; the moody barrage of bombs and gunfire could soon begin again.

She began thinking about how the landscape looked different before. How precious those few moments of peace were. How sane everything appeared, she wondered. The sky ramained grey, almost obscuring the sun as it rose.

She noticed that the clouds were corrupted with smoke.Her brother had been alive for five days now in her mind. Five days of separation - it had been the longest she'd gone nott seeing his face, counting the morning sun rising through each monstrous day. His innocence became her quiet resolution now that hers had been shattered. She wasn't sure what the fighting had been about, or why it had erupted. How guns in the hands men in uniforms can be so violently heartless stemmed her confusion. Sometimes, anger would seize her. Out of trying to make sense of the situation that has become her nightmare, she was mad, held hatred for the men who were doing this to her and her brother. At other times, she only wished someone would burst through the city to free her from the prison of anxiety and fear.

And kill the beast within.