AN: I feel like I've been neglecting this, sorry! I've been stuck in a small writer's block for a little bit, and I'm struggling with the Capture the Flag sub-storyline. College has just been leaving me exhausted, so I haven't had much chance to write new content. So this is going to (hopefully) become a regular occurrence: passages young Bella Morgens (Belgium) has written about her experiences and thoughts. Depending on how far I get in this story, hopefully some of the things she mentions will make sense eventually.
Sometimes, I wonder if I made the right choice. Joining the army was never more than an unrealistic dream until the Wall fell. I'm still not sure I want to be a soldier. Do I really want to give my life to a land that belittled my existence, giving young girls such as myself no choice as to how to live their lives? I don't entirely blame the government for the decisions of a small village so far from their reach, but their lack of interest in settlements like my hometown has meant for years that women have been robbed of a good future. I might even live a longer life in the army, as funny as that might sound.
I hope what I am doing will make my brother proud. He's always sacrificed the nice things in his life so that I can be happier. He thinks I don't know that he puts me before himself. He thinks I don't know a lot about his life, but I do. His life and his secrets, one day I hope he can tell me everything so once again we can stand together as siblings. My brother tells me that one day I will be great, and I will bring honour to our family. I really hope this will become true.
I've spent a lot of my spare time reading so that I can catch up on the years of education I missed. It's alright for some, having parents educated enough to teach them how to read and write. I don't envy them, though. I learnt how to look after myself and those close to me, and I learnt how to run a home. Most of the people training with me to become soldiers are little more than children, even after the two years we've been here. They don't know what the real world is like. Their parents have made sure they don't know about how cruel this world is. They are treated like infants, causing panic and confusion when they are left to deal with a situation themselves.
Wall Maria's fall has been a great benefit to many of these children, who have been forced to mature and understand the responsibility needed to look after their friends and the remains of their family. Only those children should have had to lose family. Yet here I am, holding the memory of my parents and my younger brother while standing at my older brother's side.
I don't deserve that pain. Have I not been through enough?
Jan tells me that on the day glory will fall upon us, the pain will stop. I often worry that these vague claims of his will never happen...