text: Shredded, Blackened with dirt and blood, their insides were naked to the flies. Those left alive were in a panic shooting themselves and each other in final acts of mercy. They've failed. They won't be taken alive. I wasn't even sure how this blasted thing worked. Still I struggled with the lenses and the shutter pointing at every anguished face and every focused weapon set alight. Now behind a small church in a small village with shells being exchanged amongst bushes and coconut trees that went on forever and familiar faces running in the line of fire, realizing at some point that I was home, I kept struggling to capture every single moment. A man head gets blown off trying to un-jam his weapon another without legs being dragged into the church. I kept hovering back and forth trying to get as much as I can even the little man pointing artillery right at me. I dragged myself to my feet feeling dazed and numb. I was convinced that I was dead but continued documenting dismembered men and crying women until the fighting stopped. I sat behind the church silently still taking the occasional snap and sip of water. She was there almost bare bottomed and smiling. She came over, said hello, asked for a pic posed playfully while we had a little banter. I knew things didn't end well but that didn't matter. We walked and talked, stood by the church while fresh faced smiling green men passed by in twos. Some of them were childhood friends I haven't seen in years. I acknowledged them with a pic then exchanged tight lipped nods. A few aunts and family friends were all sharing a laugh behind me as the platoons grew thinner and the sun disappeared between the trees. The voices eventually grew more concerned. There was now urgent chattering amongst the women about truck loads of enemy troops heading our way. This Chattering turned then to scrambling and I was now part of the struggle to get everyone evacuated. The main roads were full of buses and trucks heading to town most couldn't be bothered to stop. I eventually got this boy who was about 14 to stop, reluctantly. I squeezed as much people in the back as possible then shut the door allowing him to drive off before anyone could stop me from going back. I could've heard the rattling of rifles and the screaming of women as I ran though the church doors. The floors were bloody and peppered with corpses. I picked a handgun from a soldier's body and made my way through the back. There were women and children being picked off a few at a time while they ran. I fired back for a while, hitting a couple but they thickened in numbers. I abandoned my fight and ran back to the bushes where there were a few soldiers holding the line but they too began to fall one by one. There was a sudden sharp pain in my chest. I laid on my back unable to move and unable to breathe as I struggled to wake up.