Please only post feedback on the thread for it - ************************************************************************************************************************** Sent to War- ************************************************************************************************************************** Chapter 1 ************************************************************************************************************************** War is all I know, war is all I have ever known and I am sure war is all I will ever know. Maybe if I am lucky life will give me a break and kill me painlessly and soon but more likely I will die a long and painful death. I am unlucky, cursed. I was born on the day war was declared and now 14 years later there is no sign of an end. In a few weeks time my cruel childhood will be over and I will be forced to join the army; my life will be handed to the enemy. I hope I will die making the world a better place, I hope my death will help the enemy win this horrific war. Jamli must fall, for the sake of the world. Jamli was once a happy place, centuries ago, but is now a place were 14 year old children are sent to war. In school I learnt that the enemy (Kinlgo) was once made up of badly run dictatorships so Jamli decided to take control, lead the word. At first this was a purely political battle, but then France left Jamli and was followed by others. They disagreed with what was happening they abandoned the cause but this lead to anger and eventually, 14 ago, war was declared. Jamli against Kinlgo a war that Jamli had been prepared for, a war that they wanted to have, that’s what I think... On 31st of November 3002 I was born and I was abandoned. My mother hated me because I was born the day war was declared. She abandoned me to live my life alone in a training centre. I wonder if she knew how famous we war babies would one day be, would she have left me in my hospital cot? I somehow doubt she would. After war was declared all babies that were abandoned from then on would be bought up in a training centre, only babies though. I guess they wanted to grow up as robot like people, slaves to Europe, I often wonder why I slipped through. Why am I not like the rest? I have noticed war babies are different to the others in the training centres, we are famous everyone knows us that’s probably why. I am child number 1, the first to arrive at a training centre, taken over to here almost as soon as I was born. There are 15 gigantic training centres huddled together on a well defended mountain. They needn’t have bothered defending it Kinlgo don’t kill innocent children, that’s one of the reasons I want them to win. The other is that Kinlgo wouldn’t send me to fight and kill, to risk my life. Now I’m here, away from my torturous life in the training centre and I will never return to the place I despise living in. I have just undergone an interview, to decide what my job will be. Most likely I will go to become a solider as this is where we need people but you never know. I am sat in a room with the first people to graduate from the training centre; I preferred it when I was alone, before the interview.... The woman in charge of interviewing me was fat; I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone that was fat before. She was fat and had a strange smell coming of her, she smelt of flowers but that’s just silly, it’s the middle of winter. Her seat looked soft and cushioned like the chairs I have sat on once before in a TV interview. I had no chair; I was just stood up, shaking. They are calling me up now. To tell me my fate, the way I will spend the rest of my life. I’m so scared, what will she say to me? I decide, there and then, no matter what happens I will never kill a soul. I step forwards, shocked my legs will hold my weight, and look up at the woman. “We have decided, that as the oldest of the war babies, you will play a slightly... different role,” she says “You shall be there as a sort of mascot, to encourage the troops” I bowed and walked to my chair, and with my back to her I let out a little sob. I am to support and encourage the very thing I hate most in the world; Jamli. I spent three more days in the interview building going to daily lessons on how best to motivate troops and the ways I should behave. I also discovered what they did with those children that “disappeared” from the training centre because of breaking the rules. They told me if I disobeyed any instructions one would be killed. Then they killed a child in front of my very eyes t prove they wouldn’t lie to such an important part of Jamli’s future. Then they packed me off with some new recruits to the war front. I could tell the other war babies envied me, they didn’t want to fight. Well I would swap with them given the chance. I wish I had the chance; I don’t want to be the face of the war campaign; I want to have a gun that I can shoot myself with.
*************************************************************************************************************************** Chapter 2 *************************************************************************************************************************** I am lying on the floor, pretending to be asleep but I was thinking, thinking about my childhood and the way I was bought up. I remembered the phrase “Home Sweet Home” That is a funny little phrase; I’ve never had a home, least of all sweet one. Well maybe that’s not so true. Once, for a few weeks there was someone that made me feel safe, someone how cared. She looked after me, and the rest of the war babies, when we were five. She was there to train us on how to behave on the TV but she didn’t do much of that. She played with us and taught us how to have fun. One time it snowed and she was told to have us run a mile in shorts and T-shirts. Instead she wrapped us up in coats and helped us build a giant snowman. But then she vanished and I cried for days. They punished me for crying but that made it worse. Eventually they told me that if I didn’t stop they would hunt her down and kill her, so I stopped. I know now that she was probably already dead already. I’m not sad for that, maybe she’s happy now, were ever she is. She might be free now, better than were I am. I have always wondered what it is like to be free, to not have to worry about your own side killing you, to be able to choose what you wanted to do with your life. Everything I have ever done has been dictated by Jamli, the only decisions I have ever made are ones of how I think. I can never do anything to change things if I do I’ll be punished. All I can do is wait. I remember some f the punishment handed out at the centre, cruel, cruel punishments. One little girl, she couldn’t have been any older that four, tripped up whist we were running so they starved her for four days. She still had to do all the drills so we could all see how she was suffering, so we didn’t do the same. One time I fainted whilst doing drills so they locked me in a room so small I had no choice but to stand. These punishments were not the slightest bit scary compared to vanishing. You could be “vanished” for pretty much anything, refusal to carry out punishments on other people, even just for being too weak to lift a weight. I have just realized I have my fists clenched¬; I am so angry. Why do they do that to people? Why are they determined to hurt people? But I realize with fear comes the ability to control people and ultimately, it gives them power. They make promises of a democracy, when the war is over, but even if the war ever ends I doubt they will ever hand back control.