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followed me down the stairs as everyone else picked up their rifles and got in a good position to send down rounds. We got down to the last step when Gizmo’s light caught the shadow that I had seen. It was a very dirty woman that now had a broken neck. I knew she was just hungry since she was still clinging to an MRE. Gizmo crammed his knife into her temple and left me staring at the young woman as he pulled his blade free and walked away unnerved.
    It made me think back to the young Chinese woman we had to take down and her note. At least this woman didn’t have to die just to come back and die again. Gizmo definitely didn’t give her the time for all of that.
    I pulled the MRE from her dead gripped fingers and walked over to secure the front door, then slowly walked back up the steps. It was a shame, because I would have just given it to her if she would have just asked for it. I even would have led her to safety, but the deal with the devil was already made.
    When I got back up the stairs, everyone was already laid back down. I however, stayed sitting up. I couldn’t forget the look of her face and couldn’t help to think that if she was walking around so easily around the city, she either wasn’t alone or others could be doing the exact same. I pulled my knife from its case and used the tip to clean from under my nails.
    Steven shuffled around until he got up and joined me. “Can’t sleep?”
    I shook my head, no. “Do you remember the first time we went out off base and got ambushed?”
    “Yeah, it was a fucking disaster, but if it wasn’t for you, there’s no telling how it would have ended. You were the first person in our unit to pull the trigger.” He exclaimed.
    “You know, even though we were being shot at and I wanted nothing more than to blow those fuckers up. I paused. It was only for a second, but I thought about my kids and what it would do to them if I didn’t come back home, but then I thought about the Arabic’s and if they had kids.” I started to say.
    “But, you did shoot and here we are.” He interrupted.
    “Steven, I saw the guy with the RPG before he shot it. I watched him take aim on all of us. I could have shot him before he got that round off, but I paused. None of us got hurt, thank god and I don’t regret those that I injured or killed there, but that girl at the bottom of those steps, I just killed her over an MRE.” I explained what was on my mind.
    “Yeah, but you didn’t know. You couldn’t have known.” He answered.
    “I didn’t, but my point is…I’m not sure if it wouldn’t have gone the same if I would have.” I stated.
    “What do you mean?” He questioned.
    I reached over and pulled different things I’ve collected from my kills, to include the note and handed it to him. “Nothing has changed for me. It’s like a huge game of playing for blood.”
    “Well, after all of our training, it’s understandable, but why the keepsakes?” He added as he looked through the items.
    “It’s part of their legacy, it’s what they left behind. That’s one of the reasons I started writing books. It was the one thing I could leave behind. It was the one thing that everyone would always remember me by.” I answered.
    “Now that makes sense. Sounds to me like you may be the only one that has life still figured out.” He gave guidance.
    I laid my head back on the dusty book shelf and let his advice sink in. “Thanks brother. Are you still glad you came down to visit?”
    “We didn’t know this was going to happen and if I would have known, I would have stayed with my family, but not at home, I would have brought them to you. Believe it or not, but you’re the only person I know that I would trust with my life and my family’s life.” He answered.
    We sat back on that bookshelf and talked what seemed like an hour when I could start to see the sunlight breaking through the darkness from an overhead window.
    Howard lied still while listening to us talk and