You stood with the rest of us on the top of a ridge that cold night, listening to the rumbles of thunder that were not thunder, and cringing at the flashes of lightning that were not lightning. I remember you looking up, entranced so by the streams of gold and flashes of deep silver tinged with deep red. I looked at your delighted face, and could not bear to say that each flash meant young men only a bit older than you were being torn apart and thrown into the cold vacuum of space. I could not bear to say that the ensuing meteor showers that so thrilled you were the escape pods that did not launch correctly, that they were now overqualified crematoriums.
There were celebrations afterwards as people rejoiced that the invaders had been driven off. I watched you revel, not knowing the reasons behind them, not knowing that victory had been bought at the cost of thousands of souls. All you were told was that the Empire had preserved yet again.
And I could not bear to tell you the truth.
I watched, waited, and hoped.
But the war dragged on, years after years.
I remember the day speakers came to the schools and called together the cream of our planet’s society. I listened to their speeches that expounded on the importance of striking a blow in the name of the mighty Ascanian Empire, I saw the cheering of the crowds, and I shuddered at the familiarity of it all.
I tried to tell you of the horrors of the War, of the bloodshed, of the cruelties. That you had not yet looked into the scared eyes of someone as old as yourself and then pulling the trigger because their survival would mean your death. That you had not yet shot a life-long friend to spare him a slow, painful death because no medics were available. That you had not yet watched a beloved captain slowly bleed to death, unable to help because you knew that one life did not balance out the lives of two hundred.
All you could see was adventure and glory.
I tried to tell you again. You listened but did not hear.
The war dragged on, years after years, and one day the recruiters came.
You were one of the first to sign up for preliminary training, the first among the one thousand students that formed the newly-created 200th Battalion. I watched behind the links of electrified fencing, listened to the barks of instructors, watched you students gradually turn from fresh-faced recruits who knew nothing of military decorum and war to fresh-faced soldiers who could properly salute officers and still not know of war.
I listened to the old men ruminate; how they would go to war if only they were young and fit again. I watched them observe the preliminary trainings with good-natured jealously, but I did not join them. Those that I had gone to war with had not returned; these men knew not of war.

Then the day arrived, and so did the transport shuttles. The ceremonies with pompous officials and the lines of recruits marching in strict formation with trained grimness made one think that the war was over and you were as victors, not departing as eager recruits to long years of strange, hostile worlds and lonesome bitterness.
We followed the fortunes of the battalion; we celebrated at its victories; wept at its defeats, and were filled with apprehension when communications ceased for long periods of time. We comforted those whose husbands, fathers, brothers, sisters, mothers, wives, sons, daughters would not be coming back. We heard of the massive casualties sustained on Temphi and feared for you youths of our home. We were filled with relief upon hearing of the battalion’s reappearance at Keljiro, evacuating tens of thousands of civilians from the terrible aftereffects of bioweaponary. We prayed that the war would never come home.
The war dragged on, years after years.
The recruiters came again and left with a few more recruits.
The war dragged on, years after years.
The recruiters came again and left empty-handed; no one was left that could be recruited.
But the war dragged on, years after years.
The calls for reinforcements were almost daily now.
I prayed for an end. I prayed for your return.
Then there was surrender of the enemy, his navies smoldering carcasses, his moons shattered, his armies annihilated, and his planets devastated.
The Ascanian Empire had emerged victorious once again.
I remember that cold night when the transport shuttles returned. I watched them open their doors and watched the sixteen stumble wearily out into the frigid air, you among them.
Where were the celebrations, the ceremonies, the pompous officials?
Where were the recruits that once trained here? Where was the innocence, the happiness?
Where was the promised adventure and glory?
I observed you; you had changed. Where was the carefree youth I remembered, the one who was an endless fountain of laughter?
Some nights, you would curl up in bed and scream and scream. You would insist that it was just nightmares and we would all sympathize, listening but not hearing, not understanding. What happened? we asked. What did you do? we asked, ready to listen to tales of dangerous but heroic exploits.
You did not answer.
I noticed how those shadows that once haunted me were now on your face. I noticed the emptiness in your eyes, recalling and seeing things no one could imagine nor would have wanted to know. We asked, listened, and did not understand.
I’m fine, you insisted.
I’m fine, one of the survivors of my time had insisted. Really, I am he had said. But I guess he was never really fine until the day he walked into the meadow and put a bullet through his head.
I removed the firing mechanisms from all the guns that you knew of.
Sixteen.
Sixteen remnants of close to one thousand that left so long ago, fighting and dying on worlds thousands of kilometers from home.
All for the intoxicating promises of adventure and glory
And for the Ascanian Empire of course. Obviously.
You left behind the bodies of your classmates as you withdrew in defeat, leaving the corpses to glow on dark nights in rocky hills and blasted fields.
You left behind the infected, the sobbing and screaming of parents separated from their children, of couples torn apart from each other echoing in your ears as you utter “Uninfected only.”
What else did you leave behind, in those ruined glades and sickened cities?
Was it worth it?
Everyone asks and eagerly await your responses, always listening but never comprehending.
There is no real answer, is there? you had replied.
Maybe there isn’t one.