I believe that if I should die,
and you were to walk near my grave,
from the very depths of the earth
I would hear your footsteps.
-Benito Perez Galdos-
It's hot. He can hear men screaming, crying. Things are burning all around him. People are bleeding to death. Including him.
He looks around for his supplies, but he can't find them anywhere. Nothing is recognizable anymore, especially the bodies. He staggers over to the closest man. The man's legs are blown off, and he's writhing around and screaming and looking where his legs used to be. Oh God, he's saying. Ohgodohgodohgodohgod...
He rips a piece of cloth to tie around the man's bloodied stumps, then gasps with the effort. Sharp pains shoot around inside his chest. He looks for a wound, but he's covered in blood, his and who knows who else's. No time for that now. He gathers his strength again and ties the cloth around the other man's leg tightly. The screaming has tapered off to quiet sobbing. He tells him he's going to be just fine, and as he crawls away he hopes he doesn't suffer too much before he dies.
He goes to the next man who is still in a recognizable shape, but he's already dead. His eyes are open, wide and brown. A foot long piece of metal is sticking out of his chest. He goes to the next man, but he's dead too. He wipes blood and tears out of his eyes and goes to the next man. He's still breathing. Barely.
Black spots dance across his eyes, and he shakes his head, trying to chase them away. Cristina whispers to him, tells him to hold on for her, for them. It's funny, because they haven't talked for months. As usual, he'd managed to ruin everything, and instead of waiting for things to cool off, he'd re-enlisted. They hadn't talked since.
He does what he can for the man, which isn't much, and then he realizes that there's no one left to save. He settles down heavily and unbuttons his uniform, biting his lip to keep from crying out when the shirt pulls away from his wounds. There is a large hole in his abdomen, edges pulsing black. Blood spills out of him. He knows the signs, and he's bleeding fast.
He pushes his shirt in the hole and tries to stay awake. He thinks of Cristina.
He feels around in his pocket carefully, inhaling sharply through his nose when he shifts into a bad position. In his pants pocket he finds a scrap of paper and the end of a pencil. He writes.
His face is wet with sweat and his hair is plastered to his head. He breathes in short, shallow pants. Cristina is there, brushing his hair back. Her hand is cool on his forehead. He smiles up at her, and she smiles back sadly. He wishes he could help her. He wishes she would hold him.
The faces crowd around them; the faces of the men he could not save. It's only fitting that now he should join them.
He thinks he can hear the chopper in the distance, coming for whoever might still be alive, but he's too tired to wait for them. He signs his name carefully, and then he's gone.
Sorry this is so depressing, I'm going to write something happier after I finish the next part, which will be Cristina's POV.