Chapter 5: The Leg Ripper, John
John wasn’t one of us. Not really. He’d only been with the unit for a few weeks, a transfer from another squad after his own had suffered heavy losses. People respected him, sure—anyone who could come back to the front lines after losing a leg deserved respect. But respect didn’t mean connection. He wasn’t Danny. He wasn’t Larkson. And in a war like this, it was hard to let new people in, knowing how easily they could be gone the next day.
He didn’t talk much about his past, only dropping hints here and there. The nickname "The Leg Ripper" came up once, during a patrol. Someone asked him about it, and he just shrugged, “IED blew my leg off. Almost took the other one, too. Thought it’d finish the job, but guess I was too stubborn to die.” That was it. No dramatic story, no emotion. Just the facts.
The mission was brutal from the start—an uphill climb in unforgiving terrain, tasked with rooting out insurgents who had made the cliffs their fortress. The ridges were narrow, the paths barely wide enough to walk, and every step felt like it could be your last. John was ahead of me, climbing with an efficiency that seemed almost inhuman, even with his prosthetic.
Then the gunfire started. A sniper, perched somewhere above, let loose, the crack of the rifle echoing through the valley. “Move! Move!” the squad leader shouted, and we all scrambled for what little cover the cliffside offered.
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John was exposed, climbing ahead of the rest of us. A round zipped by, sparking off the rocks near him. He paused for half a second—half a second too long. Another shot rang out, and I saw his prosthetic falter on the loose rock. He slipped, arms flailing as he lost his balance.
I reached out, instinct kicking in, but he was too far. I watched as he tumbled down the ridge, his body hitting the rocks again and again before disappearing into the depths below. The sound of the impact echoed through the valley, but no one said a word.
We didn’t stop—not because we didn’t care, but because we couldn’t. The mission came first. It always did. When the firefight was over, we went back, dragging ourselves down the ridge to where John’s body had come to rest. He was gone, his prosthetic shattered beside him.
No one cried. There weren’t any speeches or heartfelt goodbyes. He hadn’t been with us long enough for that. Someone muttered, “Poor guy,” and another nodded. Then we carried him back, as we always did, and moved on.
I didn’t think much about John after that, at least not right away. He was just another name, another face in a war full of them. But later, when I was alone, I found myself replaying the moment he fell. His determination, his drive to prove himself—even when no one really knew him. It stuck with me in a way I didn’t expect.
He may not have been one of us in life, but in death, he was another weight we carried. And whether we cared or not, he became a part of our story, whether we wanted him to or not.