By: Eric Guo

The man limped more and more as the blood slowly lurked down his leg. The pain was immeasurable from the gunshot wound. He needed a place to hide while the Arctic Empire rained down its bombs and bullets. His companions of war did not matter anymore — only survival mattered. The bombs impact and shook the ground near him, and the soldiers shouted their battle cries. The sound of boots hitting the ground, the smoky air around him, the unlivable conditions, all made Julian lose hope.

The Statue of Liberty, once holding a beacon of that hope, was now crumbled. Sunken into the unforgiving ocean and a broken memory of what once was a great country. The America that he used to live in was not the America he was in now. They never imagined that the Arctic Empire’s technology would advance so far. Developing high range missiles that could airstrike anyone from 200 miles away. The bombs were a surprise. American soldiers could not find the owners of the bombs. More land was lost until they finally realized the supreme range the missiles had.

The bombs landed hard, and the noise shook Julian out of his flashback. He needed to find shelter, a crater beneath a fallen building or even a sewer pipe would give him enough time to live through the battle. The smoke further went further into his lungs, weakening his body. The heat from the fires and shards of broken glass around him were only more and more obstacles in his way. It was then he saw a glimmer of hope, a small hole beneath the Empire State Building. The drip of blood ran faster as he limped faster and faster towards safety. The yells of soldiers became louder with the stomp of boots, forcing the adrenaline to rush faster and faster through his veins. Twenty feet, ten feet, five feet, each step felt like minutes passed by. The gray camouflage of soldiers’ jackets and the white furry leggings were designed to scare him. The look of a ferocious beast was in mind when they designed these outfits. Everything made them intimidating.

How funny it was to him that war never seemed like a big issue until he was in the middle of one. He never took the work put into peace treaties seriously, even ridiculing the government for the unfair negotiations in favor of the Arctic Empire. The Arctic Empire used to be laughed at. How could a country survive in the unforgiving cold with no plants? They had to give away so much for so little resources. They were the laughing stock of the entire world. He knew now how the flourishing economic state of America fell down so fast.

They arrived faster than he expected, no sooner than five seconds after he hid under the building. His shame consumed him more and more as his comrades fell from the heavy fire. The tears of guilt washed down his face as more and more of the American Army surrendered and faced torturous conditions. The loud lash of whips scarring his allies’ backs and the crude cuts of glass were presented in front of his eyes until there was only him alive. All sound stopped until the general’s a sharp voice cut through the air.

“There is still one alive. A coward watching from safety.”

Julian’s heart rate accelerated to rates he never knew were possible. How did they know, did they know his location, and were they searching for him? More and more questions rushed through his head. Panic and fear rushed into his heart, and he couldn’t take it anymore. Julian knew he could die in torture or die without pain. He couldn’t control his hand and brought it more and more into his holster.

He pulled the gun out and said his final words, “I lived a fearless man for all my life. Only now do I know fear is needed to control ourselves.”

Only when the bang shot through the air that Arctic General knew the battle had been won with strength and mind.