FALLEN
The world was a watercolor of blurred grays and an absolute silence, dense as concrete. Germán Jones couldn't feel his body; he inhabited a void where time had stopped, suspended on that liminal border between life and utter oblivion. Consciousness came to him in bursts, like the flickering of an oil lamp about to go out, bringing with it the perception of an icy pressure that gripped his chest and reminded him, with methodical cruelty, that he was still alive. It wasn't the common winter chill one greets with a coat on a doorstep; it was the embrace of white death, a temperature that seeped through the seams of his threadbare uniform and sought the warmth of his organs to claim them as its own.
When his eyes finally opened, the light wounded him with the ferocity of a fixed bayonet. The sky above the trench wasn't sky at all, but a leaden vault spewing snowflakes so heavy they resembled fragments of a shroud crumbling onto the wounded earth. It was surrounded by walls of frozen mud, their veins of ice glistening with a sickly glow in the dying light, forming a labyrinth of earth that twisted like an open wound in the landscape. The scene was an ode to desolation: the barbed wire, tangled along the edges of the parapet and covered in crystalline frost, resembled gigantic crowns of thorns waiting to ensnare the unwary, while the blackish mud mingled with the pure snow, creating a viscous substance that clung to boots and souls with equal persistence. It was an unnatural silence, broken only by the whistling of the wind that seeped through the cracks in the splintered wood of the shelters, sounding like the lament of a thousand ghosts refusing to abandon their guard posts.
At the epicenter of that disaster, Germán tasted the metallic, rancid flavor of blood in his mouth and felt the weight of his own defeat sinking him into the mud. The concussion kept him anchored to ground that seemed to vibrate beneath invisible artillery. His vision was a narrow tunnel, blurred by a haze he couldn't tell if it came from his lungs or the atmosphere itself, making everything more than a foot away an unreachable blur. Then, the silence was suddenly broken. It wasn't the roar of a shell or the dry crack of a rifle, but a vibration that pierced the fog of his mind with the force of lightning.
"Dad!" The word struck his chest with more force than any shrapnel, shaking the very foundations of his unconsciousness. He tried to turn his head, but his neck felt as heavy as if it were forged from old iron.
"Commander... wake up!" the voice insisted, now closer, filled with a desperate urgency that tore through the frozen air.
"Hold on! Come on!"
It was a woman's voice, young but tempered in the fire of a tragedy Germán still couldn't fully recall. Through the curtain of snow and the mist that clouded his vision, he thought he discerned a silhouette that defied the blinding whiteness of his surroundings; a figure leaning over him, its hands desperately searching for a pulse in his neck. He wished with every fiber of his being that his eyes would obey, that the smudge would become a face, and that the blur would finally transform into Daiana's features, but reality was elusive and cruel. The world tilted violently once more, and the young woman's cry became a distorted echo, as if she were calling to him from the other bank of a wide, rushing river. The last thing he registered before the total blackness engulfed him again was the touch of something warm against his frozen forehead and a subtle, almost imperceptible scent, not of gunpowder or mud, but of a home that felt an eternity away.
The emptiness receded once more, allowing Germán's consciousness to creep back through thorns of pain. The taste of copper and earth was now more intense, and the cold had ceased to be a sensation, becoming a paralysis that coursed down his spine. He moved his chapped lips, feeling his skin crack with the effort, and a broken whisper escaped his throat, a question more of a plea than a word.
"Daughter...?" he managed to articulate, though his own voice sounded like the crack of a dry branch about to snap.
There was no time for a reply. Suddenly, he felt firm, desperate arms encircle his torso, pulling him with a force born of pure panic. The world ceased to be static and became a whirlwind of violent jolts. As he was dragged along, the leaden sky seemed to tear itself apart: the sharp whistle of projectiles sliced through the air, followed by the deafening roar of bombs impacting just meters from the trench. The earth trembled, spewing clouds of debris and dirty snow that rained down on them like natural shrapnel. He felt a sharp blow as the young woman holding him threw herself to the ground, covering him with her own body as the chatter of machine guns swept overhead, slicing through the air exactly where his silhouette had been a second before. The smell of sulfur and burnt flesh flooded his nostrils, dispelling any trace of the homely scent he had dreamed of.
Around him, chaos found its voice. Through the incessant ringing that drilled into his ears, Germán began to distinguish the harrowing cries of his men, voices he knew, now high-pitched, stripped of all military discipline.
—Back! Fall back to the second line!—
Someone roared to his left, a shout that ended in a gasp of terror.
"It's a massacre! Get out of the sector!"
The echo of explosions swallowed the orders, but the message was clear: the position was lost.
A soldier ran past him, tripping over the remains of an ammunition crate, and his voice reached Germán like a death sentence.
"There are no reinforcements left! There aren't enough troops to hold the left flank! We're alone!"
Panic spread like wildfire through the snow. Germán felt the pull on his shoulders again; Daiana, or whoever that apparition calling him father was, was forcing him to move, to fight against gravity and death, while the roar of war turned the trench into an open grave from which they were desperately trying to escape.
The world faded away again, but this time it wasn't a slow transition, but a free fall into an abyss of black velvet. The effort of uttering that name exhausted the last reserve of energy he had left; the silent, constant bleeding was stealing his warmth and light. Germán felt his eyelids turn to lead and, with a final sigh lost in the roar of a nearby explosion, he surrendered completely to unconsciousness, leaving behind the chaos of the trenches and the young woman's desperate plea.
When the veil finally lifted, it did so not with the violence of war, but with the heaviness of a feverish sleep. Germán opened his eyes and the first thing he saw was not the leaden sky, but a white canvas roof, yellowed by dampness and the passage of time. There was no snow falling on his face, but the cold was still there, barely mitigated by a rough blanket that covered him up to his chest. As he tried to move, a jolt of pure pain shot through his side and arm, reminding him that his body was still a landscape of wounds.
Looking down, he saw her. Daiana sat there, in a wooden chair that creaked with each of her weary movements. Her head rested on the edge of the examination table, and her fingers, stained with a mixture of soot and dried blood, gripped Germán's hand with a strength that seemed to be the only thing keeping her awake. Feeling the slight twitch in her father's fingers, she looked up; her eyes, the beautiful yellow inherited from her beautiful mother, once bright, were now surrounded by deep shadows, reflecting a weariness that went beyond the physical.
"Don't move, please."
She whispered, her voice breaking with relief.
“You were shot in the shoulder, and the bullet in the abdomen passed very close to your spine, but you survived. The medics did what they could with what little supplies we have left. You were out of action for a long time, Dad.”
Germán tried to speak, but his throat was a desert of sand. She brought him some water before he could ask about his men, about the front lines, about the war that had devoured them. Daiana lowered her gaze, squeezing his hand tighter, and a single tear traced a clean path down her dirty cheek.
“It was a massacre,” she continued, her voice trembling as she recited the figures that bore witness to the disaster. “It’s over, Pa—I mean… Commander Jones. There’s no army anymore. We started this offensive with twenty-five troops, almost seven thousand men ready to give their lives for this land. And now… now there are only four battered troops left.” Of the 150 soldiers under your direct command in that sector, only four have returned alive. The rest were left behind in the snow. We lost too much, Dad... the war has left us with nothing... There are no more men left... It pains me to prepare more than 7,000 flags of our nation and then see the reaction of their families.— Germán felt his heart clench, not from the shrapnel still lodged in his body, but from the weight of the despair emanating from his daughter. Seeing her like this, her gaze lost in the statistics of a massacre she shouldn't have witnessed, hurt him more than any open wound. With a superhuman effort that made the stitches in his abdomen protest with a sharp, burning sensation, Germán turned his palm to intertwine his fingers with hers.
“Look at me, Daiana,” he said, his voice, though weak and raspy, still possessing the commanding tone he used to calm storms. “Look me in the eyes.” She looked up, and in that brief moment, Germán ceased to be Commander Jones and became simply a father. With the hand that still obeyed him, he clumsily stroked the back of his daughter’s hand, trying to convey a warmth his own bones barely remembered.
“Don’t dwell on the numbers, my daughter. Numbers are for history books and for generals who never set foot in the mud. You’re here. I’m here. Those four men who remained… they’re alive because they didn’t surrender, and because you didn’t surrender with me.” Germán paused, breathing heavily, feeling the cold air of the medical tent fill his lungs.
“War takes a lot, it’s true. It takes almost everything. But it can’t take away the fact that we’re still breathing.” As long as there's a heartbeat, there's a chance to start again. — He forced a small smile, a tender grimace amidst a face scarred by gunpowder and exhaustion...
“You've been braver than any entire battalion, Daiana. You pulled me out of that hell when the world was falling apart. Now I need that same bravery to help you forgive yourself for those we couldn't save. We aren't gods, we're just soldiers... and now, we're just survivors. Rest your head here with me for a moment. The front is far away now, and for this instant, there is only this silence.”
Daiana let out a stifled sob and finally rested her forehead on her father's arm, allowing herself to cry without the weight of responsibility on her shoulders, while Germán, despite his pain, kept his hand steady on hers, guarding her rest amidst the desolation.
Hours passed, Germán somewhat recovered from the unbearable pain that plagued his body. He got up and went to the meeting room, finding other commanders, sergeants, cadets, and even a few soldiers. He sat down in a chair and greeted everyone with a nod.
The air inside the command tent was thick with tobacco smoke and the acrid smell of rusting metal. A single kerosene lamp flickered above the map of the region, casting long, grotesque shadows on the faces of those who still stood. The silence was a physical presence, a pressure in the ears that no one dared break, until the creak of a wooden chair announced a man's collapse.
Sergeant Gabriel, his reddish uniform torn and a blood-soaked bandage where his right arm had been, slammed his one hand on the table. The sharp sound made Sergeant Chai and Major Lauren tense up, but Gabriel didn't stop. A hoarse sob, filled with a fury that burned hotter than the cold outside, escaped his throat.
"They're gone! All of them!" Gabriel cried, tears beginning to trace clean lines down his ashen face. "My boys, my men... my son! I saw him collapse in the snow and I couldn't... I couldn't get there in time because I was trying to drag Julian, whose insides were already spilling out. I lost my arm for a man who died before we even crossed the second trench!" "What for? So we're sitting here counting shadows?" Cadet Rachel lowered her gaze, unable to bear the intensity of Gabriel's pain, while Commander Pérez drummed his fingers on the table, his stony expression masking his own torment. Gabriel stood, swaying from the loss of his balance, pointing to the empty space where his arm should have been.
"They ripped my life away piece by piece out there! And you're asking me to calm down! My son isn't a statistic in a casualty report! He was my own flesh and blood!"
"Enough, Gabriel," Commander Lauren interjected, her icy voice cutting through the air like a whip.
“You’re not the only one who’s left shreds of his soul in that mud. We’ve all lost something we’ll never get back. But pain is a luxury we can’t afford while the front remains open.” Germán Jones, his shoulder bandaged and his face pale from a lingering fever, looked at the sergeant with a mixture of pity and utter weariness. He understood that inner fire, but he knew that war didn’t feed on lamentations, but on fresh meat. With a slow gesture, Pérez slid a document across the table, a piece of paper with the official government seal that seemed to glow with a sinister light under the lamp.
“Forget the past, Sergeant,” Pérez declared, with a chilling coldness. “Your son’s sacrifice has been paid for. Now we must look to tomorrow. The government has issued this decree: immediate forced conscription. Every man and woman capable of holding a rifle will be brought here, whether they like it or not.” “It’s a blood contract,” Cadet Rachel whispered, reading the mandatory clauses. “We’re going to force entire families to go through what we did.”
“Sign it, Germán,” Lauren ordered, ignoring Gabriel’s stifled sobs. He had sunk back into his chair, defeated.
“We need numbers. We need soldiers to fill the gaps left by those who are gone. If we don’t sign this contract to mobilize the civilian population, there will be no one to protect what’s left of this stupid, useless country. Sentiment is dead; only survival remains…” Germán took the pen, feeling it weigh more than his own rifle. He looked at Gabriel, who was still sobbing silently for a son who would never return, and then at the paper. He knew that by signing, he was condemning thousands to the same snow that had almost devoured him, but in that room of shadows and broken commanders, compassion was a language no one remembered how to speak anymore...
