Hi again brothers and sisters.

Even if the title changed, you might recognize me from my First Story, my Second Story, my Third Story, my Fourth Story, my Fifth Story, my Sixth Story (Pt.1), Sixth Story (Pt.2), Seventh Story and Eight Story. Once again, thank you for all your support. Writing is my therapy, you reading it is part of it. Thank you for your caring and loving comments.

Merci beaucoup.

I’m French. I’m in the Army. I’m in the infantry and fucking proud of it. I do love embracing the suck and I always took everything with that « fuck it » mindset.

27/07/2021.

This is the day I lost a brother.

He was not from my God-given family. He was the brother the Army gave me.

He was there from the start. Basic training and all the qualifications and trainings after. I wouldn't have survived SERE training without him. Always smiling, welcoming with a never ending optimism. Always first in line, always a volunteer.

We had great expectations concerning our experience in the Army and we wanted to see combat. It was a time where we needed to prove ourselves. A time where dying was not a problem. A selfish time.

I remember the times where we talked all night in our foxhole about how all this awful training will give us the opportunity to see war. Nights to talk about the perfect way to experience combat for the first time. Days after days being smoked by our drill instructors because they heard us say we wanted to go overseas and fight. I wouldn't have called us innocent but we were naive. Naive boys being trained to kill.

We were shipped for our fist mission together and we were so excited. Life gave us a tough lesson to learn. This is a story for another time.

Our first mission gave us the strength to go forward and seek similar experiences. We began to deploy separately depending on the skill set required.

Brothers seeing each other from time to time. Sometimes around a tea, sometimes just before one of us ships out. I still can hear him laugh in the never ending hallways of our barracks. I can hear the furniture being pushed around when he drank a bit too much with his roommate and started playing "who can submit who".

I was getting ready for a longer deployment. Training is getting more intense and I have less time to spare for him. I'm tired and I'd rather sleep because I have to wake up at night for some exhausting training. I have to plan my family time during the summer while dealing with the moving schedule of the Army.

We see each other on the deafening MG range where we send hate downrange, belt after belt. We don't talk, we appreciate the moment. The ground is a bit damp but firing my M240 warms me up. We eat some noodles and drink some tea. The sky is dark grey, there is no wind. It's hot and our MGs are heavy.

We talk a bit and I learn that he's being deployed to do a recon mission in the region I'm going to deploy too. His unit will approve the quality of our local intel. It's a short deployment. One or two patrols, one meet with locals and back for the week end.

We talk about specifics and mission related stuff. Once everything is settled we joke around and I tell him :

- "Remember to hide some whisky for me or you'll have to deal with the consequences !!"

This is the last thing I said to him while pushing his ass with my wet combat boot. He laughed and we gave each other the finger across the bus' window. This is the last time I saw him.

He died during a recon patrol. They got lit up. They fought, they bled, they screamed and he died. He died in the warm sand. He bled in a foreign country for something greater than him. He gave his life for it.

He had a warrior's death but I'm not sure his family understands that.

I carried his coffin with our brothers. I regret not feeling sad during the funerals. I regret feeling such hate. It was time to honor him and my mind was already overseas ready to fight.

There was a thing that upset me a lot. I was not here when he died. Nothing I could have done for him. A step further, a step back and that's about it. Nothing but bad luck.

I wasn't at peace with it for a while. I had to talk to the people who fought alongside him. I needed to know how he laid there, in the sand.

His face was looking at the sky. I am happy about this.

I made my peace with it. I miss you brother. If you could see the good we did too.

Adieu mon frère.