I Was Once a Child Soldier

This is not the blog entry to read if you are looking for a quick, light diversion. What follows is a long and tragic work of historical fiction written by Eldest.

Eldest has been working for several days on a story for his seventh-grade English and social studies classes. Studying the civil war in Uganda, he read personal accounts of children who were forced into military action. He used the context and details of those stories to create this fictional account.

As a proud father, with Eldest's permission, I share it here, unedited:


I Was Once a Child Soldier


“Mother, wake up,” I whispered as I shook my mother’s shoulders. My mother stirred, yawned, and opened her eyes.

“Anaji,” she whispered, “Let’s go.”

We tiptoed through our home and woke up my six younger siblings sleeping on the mat on the floor my mother, father, and I slept on a breaking bed that was actually less comfortable than the mat. Once we had woken all of my brothers and sisters, we all slipped on our car-tire sandals. My mother placed my youngest sibling, Iniko, a brother born just a few months before into his pouch and slung him onto her back. We had heard that the Lord’s Resistance Army took even extremely young people, and we didn’t want to take a chance, no matter how odd it seemed. I thought of Iniko’s name, which means “born in dark times”, and how right his name seemed at the moment. I also thought of how lucky he was to be so young. Being thirteen, I now value youth and the happy ignorance younger people still have. I also grieved for the childhood that I never had, I had heard stories of America, and the long, happy childhood that most children have there. Mine was over before it had begun.

We ducked out of our tin-roofed hut and started our long trek to the bigger city. As we reached some more of the main roads, we were joined by more “night commuters”, which eased the pain of the nightly walking. I met a girl named Adamma, which has a special meaning of it’s own, “beautiful girl”. We talked about our lives, and I made the mistake of asking about her parents. She whispered as though I had struck a deep chord inside her heart, “They died of the monstrosity of AIDS.”

I instantly regretted asking that question, but my embarrassed feeling wasn’t able to last for long, as three armored vehicles started to surround us. Children and their mothers fled in all directions. Those who were nearing escape were shot in the back as they attempted to run. I tried to protect my siblings alongside my mother, and we gathered them in a huddle behind us. A man charged towards, his intention clear, to bull over my mother and I and reach my siblings. He pulled out a knife and slit my mother’s throat as she was pounding his head with her fists. Tears stung my eyes, and in a fit of rage, I sunk my teeth into his arm. His blood mixed with my tears, and as he screamed, he whirled around and with his free hand, bashed me in the face.

* * *

I woke up to a scene of carnage; bloody bodies lay everywhere, and children cried for their mothers. I held my throbbing head in both of my hands as I looked around. Nausea overcame me and I turned my head and threw up on the ground. I lifted myself off the dusty road with my hands, and felt a sudden sense of terror. My siblings! I started running around in a frenzied panic, checking every body for a sign of my family. Then I came across my mother. Her body had clearly been dragged across the road for a few yards, and tears swelled in my eyes as I remembered what had happened. The gash across her neck didn’t help my nausea, and I spilled whatever food I had left in my stomach on the ground. I couldn’t find the rest of my family, and starting sprinting across the road, checking bodies. I didn’t notice a tall, broad-shouldered man in front of me in my fear, and slammed into his powerful abs. He wore the uniform of an LRA soldier. My stomach dropped through my feet. He grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and dragged me over a hill, his gun over his other shoulder. He threw me over the last part of the hill, and when I lifted my face and spat dirt out of my mouth, I gasped. There, on the other side of the hill were a hundred or more children being counted by ten or so grown men. The man who had dragged me over the hill yelled to one of his comrades, “Hey, I found another one running through the bodies.”

He kicked me down the rest of the hill, and in a crumpled heap, I landed at its base. My sister Ayanna (“beautiful flower”) ran over to me and helped me to my feet, Iniko in her arms. The man who had forced me here and another one pushed us into the group of children. I hugged all my siblings and greeted them warmly. The man I had become to hate cuffed me on the back of my head to shut me up. A man wearing a different type of hat than the others started giving us a speech, but I only understood two words, “child soldiers”.

A girl, hearing this term, ran out of the pack, and started to run into the open. She was quickly chased down, and was beaten with a stick. The man who had caught her shoved a handful of red peppers into her mouth, and kicked her in the side, his hand still on her mouth. She gagged, and he let go. As she spluttered, he dragged her over to the leader, and they whispered for a few minutes. The leader turned to us and shouted, “As an example of what happens to ‘runners’, you will kill this girl with sticks, and drink her blood.” Gasps echoed through the children. I didn’t gasp, I was trying to figure out why this girl seemed so familiar. That’s when it hit me; it was my friend from the night before, Adamma. I couldn’t kill her, or anybody else! Men started shoving sticks into our hands, and trained their weapons on us as a threat. One man shot a child, and the rest of us starting running towards Adamma in fear. I let myself fall to the back of the group; I couldn’t bring myself to kill her.

I cried after she had been murdered, and I glanced at her broken body, this time, my body didn’t have anything to lose, so I coughed and spluttered where I was. Unfortunately, I couldn’t refrain from having to drink her blood. A man brought a tin cup filled with it and sneered, “I noticed you didn’t beat the girl, you have a cup of blood.” He grabbed the back of my neck and bashed me in the face. As I cried out in pain, he shoved the liquid down my throat and I gagged. He chuckled and walked away. I spat the blood onto the ground when he was out of sight, and started gagging again, unable to lose anything else from my stomach.

Next, the men ordered us to march, and march we did. We walked until smaller children collapsed. I told my siblings to remain close, and held Iniko on my back in his pouch. I was incredibly relieved at the fact that none of my siblings had died or been slaughtered. It seemed that everything else had been taken away from us, and we weren’t about to let us drift apart from each other. After marching for days, and sometimes carrying three of four of my youngest siblings in my arms or on my back, we finally reached a large encampment. I collapsed on the ground, and my siblings spilled out of my arms. Only Iniko remained on my back. Instead of crying out in complaint, my brothers and sisters who had fallen lifted my head in an attempt to lift me up. I propped myself up with my arms, and pushed myself the rest of the way up with my weak legs. I teetered back and forth, but Ayanna steadied me with her tiny arm. I thanked her with a warm look, and she smiled back at me. A man with a gun came up behind us, and ordered us to walk over to where the other children had gathered. He jolted me roughly in the back with the front of his weapon and we marched. When we reached the huddle, more men started pushing us into crude lines, and I was curious as to what the lines were for. I was at the back of the long line, so my curiosity would have to wait. When I neared the front, I noticed a large, wooden crate filled with weapons. Ayanna, who was in front of me, reached the front of the line. I gasped when the man standing by the crate pulled out a gun and handed it to her. She stared down at the killing machine in her hand, and then gazed at him. He pushed her away and into the mob of children who had received their weapons already. When I got my gun, the man looked at Iniko, who was peering over my shoulder at the man. He asked me, “How old is that child?”

I didn’t answer the man, so he grabbed Ayanna, and held a knife to her throat. I cried out in desperation, “Not more than fourth months old!” The man nodded, and threw Ayanna face first back into the swarm. He grabbed Iniko off my back, and I attempted to shoot him in the face. The man chuckled, and punched me in the face. I toppled over, and was dragged into the crowd of other captives. I stood up and looked at the man, he had placed Iniko in a plastic bag, and was suffocating him to death. I berated myself for not realizing that he was too young to serve. I screamed and charged him in a teary frenzy. I smashed at his legs with my gun until two more men grabbed me by my arms. They threw me back with my siblings, and held me until Iniko had died. The man threw the baby’s body to the side, and I broke out of the men’s hold to clutch it in my hands. The men didn’t care so long as the baby was dead, and allowed me to take it.

* * *

That night, we were assigned to a tent to sleep in, and I snuck out to bury Iniko. I prayed to God for his soul to be taken to heaven, and cried by his grave. I stayed up all night by the makeshift grave, and had to sneak back into the tent when a patrolman came back to check the camp.

The next morning was the first time we had had food in two days. The first act of kindness from the LRA soldier’s came with breakfast. Apparently, they either decided to be nice, or they had all gotten drunk the night before. But I didn’t say anything, I was happy with food, but I still felt white-hot hatred when I came to the man who killed Iniko. He chuckled when I walked by him, and made a choking gesture at his neck. Later that day, the men drove us to a new location, and my siblings and I were again forced into a line. This time, the camp was a city. I saw tents set up already, and figured they were for us. But when I got to the line, the unloaded killing machine still in my hand, the man pushed me off to the left, and Ayanna to the right. I screamed, realizing that we were being separated, and the man butted me away with his rifle. I fell on the ground, and Ayanna’s screams were drowned out as she was pushed onto a bus. I was thrown onto another bus, and was relieved when two of my siblings wound up with me.

When we got to our new destination, a bullet ripped through the bus and pierced a child I didn’t recognize in the head. Blood flew all over the walls of the bus, and the children all screamed and ducked to the floor. I shivered at the feel of warm, human blood on my clothes and face. I then realized that we were about to fight, without being warned or briefed. One of the men ripped open the door of the bus and started dragging us off. More men came and were hurling us to the ground and telling us to jump into the bushes and trenches. I chose a trench and ducked low to the ground. All my siblings, besides Iniko jumped into the same trench as me and ducked as well. None of us wanted to fire our guns and spill more blood. They were enough rivers on this battleground. And we didn’t fire, until children around were shot through faces, stomachs, arms, and legs, and we were sitting in puddles of blood. That was my first shot. I poked my head above the trench and pulled the trigger. Nothing. I still didn’t have ammo! The men had forgotten to give it to us. I spied a crate over to my left, and crawled over to it on my stomach. I lifted the top and pulled out plenty of cases of ammo for my siblings and I, and snagged a couple of grenades. When I reached my siblings again, they all loaded their guns as the men had taught in an earlier class at the camp where Iniko was buried.

After the gun was loaded, I fired into the midst of trenches of the enemy. I felt a cold shiver run down each vertebrae in my spine as a man’s head exploded from the shots. I fired again and again, killing many men and adding to the mass of blood and organs on the ground. Eventually, the enemies saw our trench as a threat, and grenades were lobbed towards us. We ducked further into our trench and saw the grenades fly over our heads, exploded harmlessly yards away. But our luck didn’t hold out. One man had a nice shot and we gasped as the grenade rolled down the side of our protection. We froze. The grenade exploded. We all cried out and our blood flew into the air. I felt an immensely sharp pain in my left leg, and passed out with that.

* * *

I woke up in the same trench, caked in blood. I struggled to lift myself up with my arms, and gasped in horror. The tears and nausea came before I saw the whole gruesome picture, my siblings body parts were flung around the inside of the trench, blood covered the dirt and made it red rather than brown. I threw up all over the ground, mixing my food with blood. That’s when I looked down at my own mangled figure. The bottom half of my left leg was gone, not even anywhere in sight. It had been obliterated. I cried for my own loss this time, and crawled out of the trench. I was careful not to rub the stump I had left, for pain seared it every time it was so much as scraped. I threw dirt into the trench to bury my siblings, and once again prayed for hours.

When I had prayed all that I had left in me out, I crawled along the dirt further, looking for something to help me walk. I finally found a piece of wood that had been used to build a defense, and propped it under my arm. I lifted myself up with it, and began to hobble my way to only God knew where. Many times I fell, and I cried out in pain as my leg was battered against the ground, causing more blood to flow from it. To halt the bleeding, I ripped off my sleeve, and wrapped it around the stump, and over my shoulder. This stung insanely, but it was either that or die of blood loss.

After three days of ambling and falling, I finally reached a large city. My first initiative was to find a church, and water. When I reached the church, I pushed open the door and fell onto the ground, thinking that I would give up right there and die. I closed my eyes and went to sleep, not wishing to wake up.

When I did wake up though, I berated God, asking why he couldn’t just kill me. I opened my eyes and looked into the face of an elderly nun. She muttered something that my disorientation didn’t allow me to comprehend, and rushed off. When she returned she was carrying a gigantic bottle of water. I grabbed it greedily from her hand and downed all the water in about two seconds. She then helped me up and took me back out of the church. All of this was very confusing, and my exhaustion only made matters worse. We crossed the street and went into a building. After three flights of stairs she walked me into a room with hundreds of children. I realized what was going on, and finally accepted something for the first time in months, my whole family had been killed, and my father had been nothing but abusive, so this was the best place for me.

She dragged me past all the children and into a small office. She said to the man behind the desk, “This poor child has lost his leg and wound up in the church.” The man nodded and motioned to a chair. He thanked her for bringing me here, and she left the room briskly. He told me that as soon as he heard my story, I would receive help from a doctor.

“And that’s where I am today,” I told the man.

“Thank you Anaji, the doctor will meet you in here in five minutes or so.” He left almost as quickly as the nun had, and gave a reassuring smile before he closed the door. When he had gone, I pondered everything that had happened in the previous weeks. I thought of how true Iniko’s name had been, and how ironic mine was. Anaji: he who triumphs.