The ruins crumbled around him as he sat within the bombed out craer that had once been a down town hospital. Glancing from side to side the man rested his rifle in his lap and rearanged his armor. Hudled in his hell hole, the sounds of machinegun fire periodically punctured his thoughts accompanied by the boom of mortars. The rain poured down around the city, and still he sat. His mind wandered in and out of the present as he thought of his family and of his old house. He smelled the pure air for a brief moment before the putrid stench of cordite and smoke mixed in his nostrils. He saw his home, a small two story building with a pleasant exterior and a quant porch, but this was soon replaced with the harsh and grating exterior of the building across the way, gray, concreate and burnt.

The radio chirped in his ear as someone talked to him, they told him of an advancing column of enemies, they told him of escape routes and coordinates, but he only heard the whine and bits of its' meaning. "Son...Humming... enemies...humming.. on your position...Machine gun chatter... Get out and lay some... OOH a bug... you have three minutes," the voice urged him. His legs felt heavy, but he moved them anyway, his arms felt sluggish with fatigue, but they carried his gun anyway, his head was foggy, but he thought anyway. He thought of survival and nothing else, and his instict told him to run... told him to escape from that hell hole. He had already established booby traps upon arriving at his destination, the hospital, so he ignred them as he left. Wishing he had heard the commands, now he wondered were the enemy was and how they would move.

Street after street, alley after alley, building after buiding he ran in the oly direction he could, forward. His legs carried him and he flew still wrapped in tattered wrags, with his head held high in anticipation of freedom from the urban sprawl. Movement. His eyes caught sight of the tow of a boot as it pulled back behind a corner off too his right, he came to instant mental clarity and pulled back too. Shouldering his rifle, he unsheathed a knife, long wicked and sinester frm his boot. Grasping it firmly he left the alley he had ducked into and rounded the corner only to be confronted by the gray barrel of a shotgun. Freezing immediatly he began to look past the barrel, only to be confronted with a pair of gleaming eyes that radiated a thirst for blood. the individual looked back, then blinked in disbelief for they had both recognized the insignias upon the other. A friend. Without a word he stretched his hand out toward the individual expecting a firm handshake, instead he recieved a bold hug. His friend was of the opposite gender, both a blessing and a curse. She might be a distraction to him, but he would take an help he could get.

They talked a bit, standing in the street together and as he started to learn more about the situation of the city the more he became worried. They were being over run as they spoke. He began to run but a rifle craked and the wall beside him exploded into shards... he had been found. Whipping around he saw four men standing across the street from him with rifles leveled. He had no choice, he froze where he was and looked at them cooley as they slowly approached. A scream cut the air. The girl lunged at the patrol and fired a shell from her shotgun. A man on the end of the formation crumpled in his own blood as the others opened fire upon her. The single crack of a rifle and the chater of a machinegun filld the air as the girl was enshrouded in a torent of dust and debris. She was dead, there was no doubt about it.

In his mind images of the girl rapidly flashed through his mind. He didnt realize it until the images faded, but he had been screaming the entire time and was clutching his knife with both hands. His scream continued with unabated fervor as he ran toward the enemy...