There should be a light, or light above everything this early. Winter may be here to shorten the days, but never until now did the nights come so early.

Mud and snow mixed into a slush, he didn’t care much about wet shoes. When the bright reds turned into purples then blackness, he was more concerned about finding a place to hide this night.

Occasionally, the sounds of gun fire and the sounds of waterfalls drowning it out would give him the idea of distance. The only thing he cared for was distance.

He came to a clearing of trees where the forest and touching city below was seen. His body was caked up to the knees with hardening snow from the stumbling. No sensation of tactile.

The sheet lighting from the city and trees. Sound of the waterfalls, turning off and on intermittently. All the light and sound of war. Pretty when one didn’t understand what it was.

With no time to stare, he clambered up the hill as they could see in the darkness. Quickly despite thinking he wouldn’t make it.