Advancing on own traces | BANDERA FELLA

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We’re supposed to be pulling back, retreating to our lines, but every step away from the enemy is a step through our past, over the debris of our own making. The commanders talk about strategy and future operations, but all I see are the trails of those we’ve left behind, screaming of battles past and those yet to come.

Here I stand, in the rubble of what used to be a bustling market town, the locals have started to return, their faces lined with a history of despair. They sift through the ruins, searching for anything unbroken. I watch a young boy, no older than ten, pull a battered toy from the wreckage—a superhero, one arm missing. He wipes the dust off with care, a small gesture of defiance against the chaos. This town, like his toy, is broken but still cherished.

Our orders are to fortify, to prepare for the possibility that this silence breaks, shattering into violence once more. So we dig, we build, and we wait. The waiting is the worst part. It’s in the waiting that the mind wanders, down the dark alleys of what if and what was.

Last night, I dreamt of home—of a place untouched by war, where laughter isn’t laced with sorrow. Waking up was a return to reality, the cold dawn reminding me that home is now a place as foreign as peace.

We hear rumors of talks, of diplomats bartering over lines on maps, trading our sacrifices for terms and treaties. But the ground here knows the truth—it doesn’t forget the blood spilled, the lives torn apart. These so-called peacemakers, can they stitch together what war has rent asunder?

I find solace in the routine, the daily checks, the cleaning of my rifle, the patrols. These actions tether me, keeping the creeping despair at bay. Yet, in the quiet moments, I catch myself staring at the horizon, wondering if somewhere out there, there’s an end to all this. Or if peace is just another word we soldiers say, never fully understanding its weight, its impossibility.

We're bleeding for every millimeter. No grand ceasefire, no pulling back to lines of comfort—instead, each foot of ground claimed is paid for in blood, and it feels like we're pouring out every last drop we've got. Here, in this hellscape, retreat paths are unfortified—they're a bloody afterthought. We’re thrust into defensive positions that might as well be graves for all the protection they offer.

The higher-ups may have prepared some spots, slapdash works barely holding dirt together. These positions, they're a joke, and the enemy is bound to have the last laugh. It's like preparing a banquet for slaughter—except we're both the guests and the feast.

Every man and woman at my side knows it—the grim acceptance in their eyes speaks volumes. We're like fighters with nothing left to lose, because what’s left behind is already in ruins.

What's ahead?

More of the same, just painted with fresh despair. We've become the kind of warriors who don’t flinch at nightmares because we’re already living in one.

We don't have the luxury of pondering outcomes or moralities. Our reality is the next bullet, the next bomb, the next desperate grasp at holding ground that nobody else would dare claim.

The irony isn't lost on us: we're digging in, not because it promises survival, but because there's nowhere else to go.

So, as we fortify what can hardly be called fortifications, as we bleed for each sacred slice of this cursed land, I brace for the storm. Enduring one more day, one more fight. Maybe, just maybe, this drive is what keeps the remnants of our spirit flickering in the darkness. Maybe this is what it means to be a warrior with nothing to lose: not the absence of fear, but the presence of an unyielding resolve to stand, bleed, and, if it comes to it, fall right here.