In the space of six months, they\u2019d gone from a green and pleasant land to the hell of the battle. Bullets flew before they even got a chance to disembark. It seemed like half the battalion was dead or dying. He would never forget the stink of putrefying flesh mixed with cordite as they made their way through leafy country and across plains.<\/p>\n
For most of the time he was protected by the rest of the guys who covered while he stayed well-hidden and picked off the enemy. If he\u2019d been a cowboy, his gun wouldn\u2019t have been long enough for all the notches. He was proud of, and horrified by, his work. They moved on: fighting, skirmishing, surviving.<\/p>\n
Until the day a new stink hit their nostrils; the stink of human waste and wasted human life. The tragic parade of living dead, literally lousy, made him throw up. Bernie muttered \u2018there but for the grace of God\u2019.<\/p>\n
Until that day, Mike Starsky had approached his job as sniper with mixed feelings; the men he picked off would have killed others, but dammit they were human beings and probably conscripted just like him.<\/p>\n
But that anyone could do to others what he saw that day changed his mind. As the battalion progressed across the ruins of Europe, he had no compunction in picking them off.<\/p>\n
He went home with medals and he let his little son play with them.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope you will never have to see what I did, Davey. Or do what I had to do either.\u201d<\/p>\n
Twenty years later, David Starsky found himself in the heart of the jungle, finding the right position to be able to pick off the enemy and pick them off before they saw him.<\/p>\n
Like his father, he had mixed feelings about shooting fellow human beings. Until the day, like his father, he came across a camp and saw the haggard ghosts of men in bamboo cages. The stench was unbearable; the human misery insupportable.<\/p>\n
He saw what his father hoped he would never see: man\u2019s inhumanity to man.<\/p>\n
Like his father, he went home with medals.<\/p>\n
Like his father, he used his skill with a gun in the name of law enforcement.<\/p>\n
Now he was lying against the wheel of his car, and as the world blurred around him, he remembered white-wall tires, stained with his father\u2019s blood. As he lost consciousness, he thought: \u201cLike father, like son.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In the space of six months, they\u2019d gone from a green and pleasant land to the hell of the battle. Bullets flew before they even got a chance to disembark. It seemed like half the battalion was dead or dying. … Continue reading