In Which We Stand Side By Side and Watch It All Burn (Part Four)
by Holly Rose Scott
[this is a four part series–
read In Which We Stand Side By Side and Watch It All Burn from the beginning]
Part Four
The sniper knelt beside the sergeant, his fingers pressing down on the wound that wouldn’t stop bleeding. They were alone, tucked into a ridge that hid them from the rest of the world—a grave built of dirt and rock.
“I got him, Sarge,” the sniper whispered. His voice shook, barely steady under the weight of relief and the cold knife of failure. “The one who hit you. I got him.”
The sergeant’s breathing rattled in his chest, each breath catching like a barbed wire snare. He blinked, looking at the sniper with an empty calm in his eyes, the spark already beginning to dim.
“Too late, kid,” he said, his voice a rasp like sandpaper against the bones of his throat. “But don’t worry… It’s all right.”
The sniper felt his stomach twist. He wanted to argue, to do something, anything, to hold on to the man who’d been a force of steel and strength, who’d marched beside him, taught him how to live, and how to kill.
“Don’t say that, Sarge. I can—I can carry you back.” He sounded desperate, even to his own ears.
The sergeant gave him a slow, sad smile, blood slipping from the corner of his mouth, dark and thick. “Can’t carry what’s already gone, kid. Everything burns. Everything rots.”
The sniper’s mouth tightened. “But… you didn’t deserve this.”
“Deserve?” The sergeant’s chuckle was a hollow, painful sound. “What anyone deserves is what they’ll get in the end. Don’t be sad for me, kid. Don’t be sad for any of it.”
A faint glimmer of bitterness crossed the sniper’s face. “That’s… that’s messed up.”
“It’s just how it is.” The sergeant’s eyes were unfocused now, his gaze fixed somewhere past the sniper’s shoulder, at something only he could see. “Everyone gets what’s coming to them. Someday… you’ll understand.”
The sniper looked away, unable to bear the sight of his sergeant—of his friend—slipping further. The dirt around them felt like it was swallowing them whole, dragging them into a pit they’d never climb out of.
The sergeant’s hand, surprisingly steady, reached up and grabbed the sniper’s collar. His grip was weak, but there was a fierce insistence in it.
“Remember this,” he muttered. “Nothing… stays untouched. Not by fire, not by time. The best thing you can do is… make peace with that.”
The sniper swallowed hard. “I’ll remember, Sarge.”
The grip on his collar loosened, the sergeant’s hand falling limp against the dirt. His eyes, still open, looked out into the distance, seeing something far beyond the sniper could imagine.
And just like that, the sergeant was gone, leaving only silence and a faint scent of smoke on the air, as if the world itself mourned.
The sniper stayed crouched there, feeling the weight of those words sink into his bones like a curse. Everything burns. Everything rots.
And in the end, everything catches up with you.
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