I’ve always hated the rain. It is a beautiful sight – of that, I’ve no doubt. Rain is beautiful. The tiny water droplets cascade from the heavens, lit up like a chandelier by the occasional burst of lightning and soaking everything that they touch. The temperature drops and the air is cool and crisp, cloaked in a layer of fog as the water continues its downward journey from heaven – angel’s tears. But for all of its beauty, to most people the rain is nothing but sorrow. It is a lonely thing, to be caught in the rain alone.

But rain only wishes to bring life to the parched earth - and yet it is still so hated.

I suppose I should not hate the rain as I do. Indeed, today I did hot hate it – I was grateful for it. A soldier should never show any sign of weakness. But as I watched the line of bodies being paraded through the streets – there were so many bodies – I felt nothing but shame. I saw their faces as they passed. Some I did not know. Some could not be identified – their faces were covered in blood or otherwise grotesquely misshapen from the battle. But others I knew.

And there were so many others.

Suddenly I became sick. I broke from my steady position at attention and turned, retching with such force that I had fallen almost to my knees. My throat burned and my mouth tasted strongly of bile. Nobody said anything, so when I had finished, I simply stood up and wiped my face with the back of my hand. I became aware that I was shaking.

The line of bodies continued to pass in front of us. Most of them were very young. They were my age – younger, even. There were boys of perhaps no more than fifteen. They had not been given the chance to live, and I felt such an overwhelming sense of loss. Not for them, though. I thought of their parents. In my mind, I pictured a woman sitting by the fire with a letter from her son who was battling the enemy at the front. I pictured her face, her worried expression, as her husband came in from working outside and pictured them as they held one another, reassuring one another that they would see their son soon. I could not bring myself to imagine the soldier marching up their doorstep to tell them the news.

On this day, I was grateful for the rain because it hid my tears. They were hot when they first came. They almost burned; the salt seeping into the wounds that had only begun to scab over. The rain hid the fact that I cried for my fallen comrades. It hid the fact that I was weak. It hid the fact that I was afraid.

We burned the bodies. We did not have the time to bury them properly, as one would want. Instead, after the march, those of us who were able were ordered to find as much tinder as we could. Everything outside was wet, and so we returned to the neighboring village. Most of the residents were dead. We tried to ignore those who were left behind. It could not have been clearer that they didn’t want us there.

The unoccupied buildings had been marked, so we knew which ones we were to target. Brazenly and perhaps half mad, we smashed down the doors of the former homes and ransacked anything that could be set ablaze. Furniture, pictures, clothing, and every sort of item you can imagine – we stole it all, without once thinking of the people they once belonged to. If an item was too bulky or odd, we simply destroyed it, splintering it into a hundred tiny pieces, all of which were gathered up and set atop an ever-growing pile of broken homes.

Once the pile was lit, a small group was selected to place the bodies one-by-one on top of the quickly growing inferno. Without being dismissed, the remainders of us – of my company and I – were forced to stay and watch as our fallen brethren were swallowed up by the black smoke. I will never forget the smell. It was a horrid, rotten sort of smell, yet faintly sweet. I can remember nothing else like it, nor do I ever want to experience it again.

As I watched the fire grow higher, I knew then that it should have been me.

x-X-x

We slept on the floors of the now empty houses, but most of us were simply lying awake watching that sickly orange glow. Occasionally, we would hear a gunshot pierce the silence and we all knew that it meant that, even though the battle had ended, another of our comrades was off to face his judgment. But mostly, it meant that there was more fuel for the fire.

I’d had enough. I got up from my place on the floor and stepped over a few of the others as I made my way to the door. I kicked it open, not caring if I woke anyone up, and stormed outside towards the line of trees in the distance. They weren’t that far away – only about a mile, by my count – not that it mattered, anyway. I just wanted to be away from the village. I almost ran, and I would have if I thought I could. But exhaustion had begun to take quite a toll on my body, and by the time I reached my destination I was so out of breath, so tired and so utterly defeated I collapsed by the nearest trunk and lie sobbing dryly in the cradle of a nest of roots.

I didn’t want to die. Raw fear struck my heart, and I placed my hands over my face to shield my view from the monstrous fire that I could see even from here. I didn’t want to end up like one of them – the husk of a man, a useless soldier tossed aside like a rag doll to be burned in a hellfire so bright that even when I close my eyes I can still see it. I remembered the sounds of battle – bombs, machine gun fire and the everlasting presence of death: that still, quiet, hollow sound that echoes after each shell is spent, each bomb released, and then broken by the horrific screams and cries that rang in our ears long after the battle had ended and, oh God, I was so, so terrified.

I felt so hollow. I felt as though I had already died. Perhaps, I thought, this was my punishment. Perhaps I had failed my country when I fell, perhaps it had been cowardly to die, and so this was my punishment – to watch a steady line of corpses, each of whom I knew and loved, vanish beneath an orange glow because they, too, had died. To toil forever with sweat and tears and blood in the service of a country that should have crumbled long ago for its cruelties.

I thought of my wife, Natalia, and how I would never see her again if I died. I thought of her always, but in that moment I thought of her living life so alone, the ring on her finger shining with unreal brilliance in my mind. I thought of my parents, losing their son for a cause they never believed in – sacrificing all they had for the nation that had betrayed them by losing. I was racked with guilt.

I cursed Death. I cursed Him for taking my friends away from me. I cursed him for all the sorrow he brought into people’s lives – people who had never deserved such immense pain and loss – and letting those who would sacrifice thousands live a hundred years. I cursed Death with all I had, but I knew it would not be enough to save anyone.

I lifted my hands from my face and saw that they were wet with tears. I pushed myself into a sitting position and wiped my eyes with my sleeves. And then something happened that I did not expect.

“You do cry a lot.”

I shot up, grabbing my pistol from its holster on my belt. I pointed it in front of me, shouting, “Who’s there? Show yourself!”

But there was no reply. I looked around in all directions, but I didn’t see anyone. A little unnerved, I decided to head back to the others. I lowered my pistol and turned back toward the village.

Suddenly, a man was standing in front of me. He was no older than I, tall, and broad shouldered, with thick, messy black hair. He was thin, too, for someone of his height. His head was seemingly haloed with the orange glow from the fire, making his dark eyes twinkle and his wide smile very ominous.

“Here I am,” he said. He stared at me, unblinking, almost predatory-like. “Just like you wanted.” He spread his arms wide and grinned a little wider.

“Who are you?” I asked, surprised at how strong my voice was for the terror I was beginning to feel. Where had this man come from? There was nobody around – nobody.

“You know who I am,” he said simply.

I stared at him, confused.

“Surely you know by now,” he said. He dropped his hands at his side, as though irritated. “I’ve been here for three days.”

I thought back. Three days – three days ago, we were heading into battle. Three days ago, we first started to lose soldiers. Three days ago, people started dying. My innards suddenly went cold and I shuddered. He smiled, seeing that I had finally figured it out.

“So,” he said, looking back at the village, “I hear that you are afraid of Death. I hear you hate me. You hate me for… what was it, taking your friends? Bringing sorrow to the innocent? And my favorite, ‘letting those who would sacrifice thousands live a hundred years?’”

He stepped closer to me, and out of instinct I placed the barrel of the gun between his eyes. But he only laughed.

“Do it,” he said. He stared at me again, and I felt incredibly small. “Do it. Avenge your friends. Do it, because you’ll never get this chance again. Isn’t that right?”

I stared back at him. My mind was blank. The fingers of my free hand twitched from their position at my side. My gun was never as heavy as it was in that moment and I thought about dropping it. But I didn’t. My arm was steady.

Perhaps it was a mix of terror and hate and anger that fueled it, but it happened so fast – I don’t remember pulling the trigger, but I did. The man’s – Death’s – body went limp. His head, or what was left, flew back from the force of the bullet and his form collapsed on itself. Blood drained like a fountain from his head and ran over his face, even entering his mouth which was still spread wide with that cocky grin.

Once again, I lowered the gun. I looked away from the body at my feet, wondering about what had just happened.

“Did that feel good?” said a voice from behind me.

I stood where I was, frozen. I only moved my head to get a better look, but somehow I knew what I would see. Standing there, beside me, was Death, smiling like nothing had happened. I looked back down by my feet where his body should have been, but it had disappeared. It was an illusion.

“Yes,” I said. And, although I did not feel anything at all, at the time it felt like the right thing to say. I turned to face him. There was no point in running. “What do you want from me?”

“Oh, don’t act like you’re so important that I came specifically to bother you.” he said.

“Then why are you here?”

“Because it’s my job.” he said. “Every time there’s a battle, every time there’s a war, I follow the soldiers and lead them on their final march.” He spoke in a dreamy tone, looking at nothing in particular, a satisfied expression dancing across his face. “And,” he continued, “because I want to make a deal with you.”

“A deal?”

“You are listening,” he smiled. “I know how hard a soldier’s life is. I know what it’s like, having been among them for so long. And I know that you are afraid of dying.” He looked at me again with those predatory eyes. “What if you never had to?”

He began to walk around me, circling me like an animal. “What if,” he continued, “I let you live? Live through all these battles that you will fight – and trust me, there will be plenty more battles – would you like that?”

I watched him. I could feel my heart beating inside my chest, pounding against my ribcage as though it wanted to escape.

“In fact,” he said, putting a hand to his chin as though he were thinking, “what if I let not only you, but your buddies survive as well? Nobody you know will die and you can all enjoy your lives after the war. How does that sound?”

He looked at me, waiting for a reply, but my voice had left me. I simply nodded.

“I thought so,” he said. “Now here comes your part. If I was to let you and your friends live, you would have to do something for me. That is part of a deal. Correct?”

Again, I nodded. A feeling of urgency had begun to manifest in my gut, a feeling of danger. I had to ignore it. I didn’t care if he killed me, I didn’t care. But my buddies, my comrades – they deserved to live. I listened.

“If I were to let all of you live through this war,” Death went on, “all you would have to do for me is something very simple: I want you to help me. Do we have a deal?”

He held out his hand, but I didn’t take it. What did he mean, by “help him?” It could have meant anything. I thought about what he had said, looking for anything that would give away any hint of malice, anything that would support the idea that he was lying. I had read stories in my youth that told of how Death was a trickster. But from those tales I also learned that Death could be outsmarted if the worst should happen. There was uncertainty in the agreement he wanted to make – that was certain. I had no idea what I was getting into. But he hadn’t said I couldn’t back out, if I ever wanted to. In fact, he probably would have been more than happy to kill me. I decided.

I reached out for his hand, and, if possible, Death’s smile widened even more.

“Very good,” he said, “very good.” He brushed the front of his coat. “Well, then, I shall be seeing you.” He turned to go, but then paused suddenly. He turned back to me. “Here,” he said. “This is something you should think about.” He handed me a piece of paper.

I looked at it questioningly. “What is it?” But he was gone.

Silently, I unfolded the tiny piece of paper he had given me. Written in tiny, elegant letters was a single sentence:

The opposite of life is not death, it is indifference.