Post by FicWriter on Dec 29, 2008 18:35:55 GMT 10
Hidden
(A ficlet written for the community 100 Moods on Live Journal)
Warnings/Spoilers: Deals with material of a sensitive nature.
Summary: Luka flees the hospital in Vukovar only moments before Serbian soldiers arrive
by JD
We never believed that it would happen to us. That they would target patients in a hospital and those who would treat them, but that's exactly what happened that day, that November afternoon in Vukovar. I didn't want to go, to run away while others stayed behind, placing themselves in danger to save the lives of those too weak or too badly injured to leave. But, I'd made a promise, some of us had to live, if only so we could speak for those who would never be able to.
So I fled, down crowded hallways and stairwells. Even as I heard the gunshots and screams of those whose lives were being lost I wanted to believe that it wasn't happening, that no one could harbor that kind of hatred, or be that cruel. I knew the truth though even as I tried to deny it, I'd seen it for months on the faces of those I had treated in the very hospital that I was now running from.
Once I entered the street I realized that for as long as the soldiers remained the only safety would be in finding a place to hide from them. If I could stay hidden until dark I could then try and make my escape from the City. I had no idea where I would go once I was outside it's walls, but I knew it had to be better than this.
Then I heard them, the sounds of soldiers coming my way and all I could think of was finding somewhere to hide before I ended up like those in the hospital. In the end I found my safety in an abandoned building, hidden beneath broken wall-boards and fallen timbers in a shallow of dirt barely large enough for someone half my size. When one of their trucks stopped in the street outside the building I'd chosen to hide in I was terrified.
When several soldiers entered the building I was sure I'd been found, afraid to breathe for fear they would hear me. I lost track of how long they were there. As I was laying in the darkness, I listened to the the sound of glass broken under foot, felt the dirt rain down on me as someone walked over the very boards that sheltered me. I lost track of how long they were there, laughing over the misery of others, sharing jokes and cigarettes while those I knew as friends were losing their lives.
And then, after what seemed like hours, but might have been minutes, they were gone, but still I dared not move, and so I stayed hidden. Three, four, five hours more, until I was sure they were gone, until I was sure that dark had fully covered the City, only then did I dare reveal myself, only then could I chance my escape.
The End
(A ficlet written for the community 100 Moods on Live Journal)
Warnings/Spoilers: Deals with material of a sensitive nature.
Summary: Luka flees the hospital in Vukovar only moments before Serbian soldiers arrive
by JD
We never believed that it would happen to us. That they would target patients in a hospital and those who would treat them, but that's exactly what happened that day, that November afternoon in Vukovar. I didn't want to go, to run away while others stayed behind, placing themselves in danger to save the lives of those too weak or too badly injured to leave. But, I'd made a promise, some of us had to live, if only so we could speak for those who would never be able to.
So I fled, down crowded hallways and stairwells. Even as I heard the gunshots and screams of those whose lives were being lost I wanted to believe that it wasn't happening, that no one could harbor that kind of hatred, or be that cruel. I knew the truth though even as I tried to deny it, I'd seen it for months on the faces of those I had treated in the very hospital that I was now running from.
Once I entered the street I realized that for as long as the soldiers remained the only safety would be in finding a place to hide from them. If I could stay hidden until dark I could then try and make my escape from the City. I had no idea where I would go once I was outside it's walls, but I knew it had to be better than this.
Then I heard them, the sounds of soldiers coming my way and all I could think of was finding somewhere to hide before I ended up like those in the hospital. In the end I found my safety in an abandoned building, hidden beneath broken wall-boards and fallen timbers in a shallow of dirt barely large enough for someone half my size. When one of their trucks stopped in the street outside the building I'd chosen to hide in I was terrified.
When several soldiers entered the building I was sure I'd been found, afraid to breathe for fear they would hear me. I lost track of how long they were there. As I was laying in the darkness, I listened to the the sound of glass broken under foot, felt the dirt rain down on me as someone walked over the very boards that sheltered me. I lost track of how long they were there, laughing over the misery of others, sharing jokes and cigarettes while those I knew as friends were losing their lives.
And then, after what seemed like hours, but might have been minutes, they were gone, but still I dared not move, and so I stayed hidden. Three, four, five hours more, until I was sure they were gone, until I was sure that dark had fully covered the City, only then did I dare reveal myself, only then could I chance my escape.
The End
