RE: 10min Writing Challenge #6 - PRESENT-...
callmeishmael remarked on August 09, 2012

"Is everybody present and accounted for?" the General barked.
"Yes sir, General sir!" exclaimed the young Sergent.
"Excellent! Now, grab the gasoline and starting poring it over the bodies." commands the general as he looks out in the night to the sound of the screams.
Sergent Henderson stands up from near the pile of bodies, his face smeared with dirt, sweat, and blood. Timidly he steps away from the mound of the dead. "Sir?"
"You heard me son. Light those bodies and load up. We ain't got all night and the enemy is 20 clicks on our heels."
"But sir, these people have families, they need to be notified," stammers Sergent Henderson.
The General turns his head away from the orange burn on the horizon steadying his gaze on the little man defying him. "Son,are you disobeying an order?"
"No sir, its just that..." the young man, puts down the tank of gasoline and walks closer to the General, his brow furrowed with distress, "Well sir, I'm a religious man sir and what happened hear tonight and in the last few days challenges all that I believe in and know of my faith. I'm not proud of all the things that I've done but I can live with most of them, burning these bodies, whatever they are, or what is left of them, they still have souls sir, burning them without a proper burial, is something I just cant participate in."
The General looks down upon the young man with a stern but understanding glance. He places his paw of a hand on the kid's shoulder as if to comfort him by providing some human contact. "That took a lot of courage for you to say that son. You've got guts and conviction, I admire that." The general takes his sidearm out from its holster. "I admire it but I don't need it." The general pulls the trigger shooting the young man in the belly. Sergent Henderson collapses face down in the filth of battle.