Why…

It was the only word he could think of the whole time when he was running to hide from the enemy soldiers. So many corpses and mutilated soldiers lay everywhere. He was horrified at what he was seeing.

This wasn't the life he wanted. He wanted to be a painter, or a chef, or anything related to art and not someone ready to die. But no, he couldn't have that life because of this war. He wanted to escape the battlefield he's into, but he couldn't. He is a soldier of Italy after all; he needed to fight for the sake of his country.

But he couldn't take it anymore; he had to surrender. So he raised the white flag he made, ready to wave it in case enemies were nearby. But he stopped when he saw the determined look on his comrades' faces.

He remembered the stories his comrades told before heading to battle, of dreams and promises they made to their families and friends, that they would make it out alive somehow and come back to them, and they would hug them and tell them how much they loved them so much. It was the only thing that they have which kept them fighting for so long.

He remembered his grandfather - his nonno - who took care of him and his fratello when their parents died in the war. He remembered his loving embrace, his smile that took away every bad thing that happened to his life, and the way he protect he and his brother. And his brother… He remembered his grumpy fratello, who always say he hated him but in fact told him that he cared for him so much when he decided to fight for Italy.

He started to have doubts with what he was doing. He was stronger than that. He had to fight. He would be strong to protect his country, to protect his countrymen, and for his nonno and fratello.

So he dropped the white flag he made and held a gun in his hands, readying himself for the enemies he was about to face.

But still, he can't help thinking there's no hope surviving the bloodbath in front of him.

Author's Note:

Forgive me if this story has so many grammatical errors. I tried proofreading it but my brain decided to give up on editing. This story was based on what have I written on my tumblr account. It was originally a 100-word story but I was not satisfied with it so I had to edit some things so that the story will flow nicely.

I don't know if I succeeded, so you'll be the judge to my story, ok?

Oh, and if you wanted to see the original version of this story, I'm going to post the link on my profile page.