Alone Among Ashes

Ashes rained from the sky in a silence that saturated the air. The earth expelled noxious fumes and was marked with dark craters. Every once in a while the stones from crumbling edifices cracked, scattering fragments of concrete and brick across the ground. Smoke rose from the shambles of the city.

Underneath fallen walls and sprawled across the dry earth lay hundreds of contorted corpses, many riddled with bullets. Hands grey from the constant fall of ash were visible beneath the rubble. Children with their mouths agape stared at the white sky with their red eyes still open from the last moment of terror. Mothers remained clinging to their children in death.

Through the reverberating stillness a tiny figure emerged from within a collapsing structure. It silently limped and then stumbled and began to drag itself between the bodies. It coughed and gasped for air, sobbing and scratching the encrusted dirt beneath its desperate fingertips.

Its hair had been singed off, revealing a pink scalp. If you had been near enough, you would have noticed that the crippled form was a young child. The suffocating weeping became a great cry of agony as the child looked at the destruction. It crawled against the burnt ground and turned its eyes to gaze at the ashen sky.

Someone else perceived the sobs and attempted to yell from underneath a pile of rocks. Only gasps escaped their lips.

~

A woman leaning against a tumbling wall lifted her head from between her hands. She wore a grey handkerchief over her hair. Drying her tears, she thought she had heard a distant noise. Perhaps it was only more soldiers picking through the devastation. But she heard no gun shots, so the woman listened, hoping to once more hear the sound.

The child whimpered.

The woman stood up and slowly ambled into what had been a wide avenue. She paused until she heard the child again and then she started to weave through the mangled cadavers at a faster pace. Had someone else survived?

Turning the corner, she discerned a small shape sitting on its knees further away. Encouraged, the woman ran toward the child, and when she came closer, shouted, “Ich bin dein Freund! Haben Sie Keine Angst.” I am your friend! Don’t be afraid.

The child shivered and stared at her with dull eyes. It was near death and she did not know what to do to help it. The woman sat next to the child, who she discovered was a little girl of five or six. She proceeded to pick the girl up and put her on her lap, where the child curled up and continued to cry.

Her parents were dead. That was obvious enough. Hopefully they had died in the first bombing and had not been forced to suffer an excruciating death at the hands of the soldiers. As the girl wept, the woman stroked her bent form and whispered over and over that it was okay and everything would be alright. But how could she say this? The soldiers were most likely ravaging the closest city and she had no source of food or water. Betrachtung, the nearest town, had long been abandoned and raided by the Enemy.

We are going to die, the woman thought bitterly. She felt a painful jealousy fill her heart: she and the child would starve. It would have been better to die during the attack than suffer such a prolonged death.

The air chilled as night crept in. The little girl’s naked body trembled from the cold and the woman wrapped herself around the child in an attempt to warm her. They lay upon the hard ground. Ash still filled the sky and hid the comforting, starry sky from view.

The woman did not know how long she had lain on the ground before the girl’s soft breaths lulled her to sleep. She woke up the next morning to stone silence. To her relief, the child blinked and opened her eyes cautiously. Her stomach grumbled in protest.

Carrying the little girl in her arms, the woman stood up and hobbled down the street. Maybe soldiers had not taken all the food. She rummaged through the remains of homes that did not threaten to crush her in an avalanche of rubble. There was nothing.

After several hours of futile searching, she rested, reclining against a concrete slab. Her head throbbed and the girl whined. In the eerie quiet the woman sang a lullaby and watched the child fall asleep. There was little hope.

The woman awoke as the sun was setting. She had not even noticed her head had sunk in surrender and she had fallen asleep. Her lips were cracked and bleeding and she could barely stand. Worried, she shook the child and she gasped with some twisted kind of relief when the girl breathed slowly in response. At least she was not alone; at least they would die together.

A group of vultures circled overhead and began to descend. Is this what shall become of us too? the woman asked herself as she saw the ominous creatures gorge themselves on a corpse. She turned her eyes away in revulsion and held the tiny girl tighter.

The moon emitted a blue light. Even in her suffering she had to admit that it was beautiful. Allowing herself to be overcome by the arrival of nightfall, the woman closed her eyes and grasped the girl, keeping the small, frail body close to her chest. A wave of calmness enveloped her. She felt the girl wriggle nearer.

~

It was sunrise and a group of tired soldiers ascended a hill overlooking the ruined city. They had not destroyed it and the sight filled their mouths with bile.

“Too late,” lamented one. They started to walk down the hill toward the city, lugging heavy gun and ammunition. A half-filled water canteen beat against a soldier’s leg.

The soldiers entered the city solemnly, beholding the damage with grim expressions. They were used to sights such as this, but never to this extent.

“So much death…”another soldier mourned.

His eyes took in the rows of cadavers that lined the street. When his teared-up eyes rested upon the stiff corpses of a young woman holding a tiny, nude girl to her chest, he whispered, “So young…”

Then he continued his walk down the road.