Chereads / Plato - Part 2 / Chapter 10 - Old man Romanov

Chapter 10 - Old man Romanov

Much is not known about his affairs now, as he often kept to himself. He had no family and not many friends. And the only people he really knew now was the working members of the nuclear plant. He once had a family, long before the great war happened. A soldier he was, Romanov fighting in the great war. A high ranking soldier, not the ones that are in the first line of the trenches. A man behind giving the orders to them. 
He was a successful army man, a family man. A man with a reputation. And there were parties that occurred toasting to his name later on in life.And once they gave him a medal for his great accomplishment, not for his heroics in war, but for rising up the ranks in the army hailing from a small village. The tough battle he faced climbing the ranks and inspiring a lot of people from his village and the neighboring villages to join the army. And now he lives a obscure life, the same tough days he faced as a child. And many did wonder what had become of a war hero for a while . And the truth was only known to his wife. And she did not agree to his decision then to quit the army. She took it so badly that she left him, taking the kids along with her. The rest of the people, they forget about him as time went on. As people usually do. And Romanov did not care all that much , that people forgot about him. The only real regret that he had was that he never saw his kids ever again. That hurt him even to this day but the old man Romanov kept telling himself that they would be living such a wonderful life that the mere presence of him would deter their happiness. What people never did realize was that the old man was and still is a very spiritual person. And war would one day or the other get to a spiritual man, there was no escape in that. Romanov never knew about that, or he was too young to think about it. In fact he was too young and naïve to even figure out what war really was. Then he did not know about the complexities of it. The unnecessary terror in the minds of people and the invaluable loss of a human life to an ultimately inconsequential war. But Romanov ultimately came to know of it all, and when he came to know of it . It hit him so hard he vowed to never put on the uniform ever again. And there was exactly this one moment that could be pinpointed to where he had this epiphany. 
During the darkest and the most gruesome part of the war. The enemy came in droves with a false bravado that the territory was theirs and they attacked the trenches in numbers, thousands. Romanov watched the foolishness unfold form afar, and he saw the bullets pierce the soldiers. One after the other, they fell . And to Romanov it was just another day an unnecessary one. But ultimately just another day. Such was the length of the great war , that war became their reality. As Romanov watched the attack unfold and he was planning to devise another strategy he began to look closer at the trenches. The first line of defence, it was the very people from his village who became soldiers after getting inspired by him. And he began to turn somber as one by one they fell. The same soldiers who joined the army because of him. Romanov withdrew into himself, the whole battlefield tuned blurry. He could not see anything clearly now , just sounds from the battlefield. Suddenly, something turned his gut inside out. Romanov took his gun and charged into the trenches and jumped into the field. Charging and shooting at the enemy, missing a great many and injuring only a few. And that was all he remembered, but when people asked him, he would say that that last thing he remembered was him devising a new strategy to counter the enemy. And the soldiers who survive would attest otherwise.
Romanov woke him in the hospital a few days later, there was no severe damage that occurred to him, luckily. As he twitched and rolled his eyes he saw his wife sitting next to his bed. "And the first thing he asked was did we win?.What do you mean? asked Romanov? You mean our country? We were in the brink of a win. She said, "But as a family we lost. I do not understand?" said Romanov. "I doubt they will take you in now, that was an act of lunacy," she said. "I doubt that they will take you in now. What did I do," asked Romanov. "You don't remember?" Asked his wife. "No," replied Romanov. "Did I do anything wrong," asked Romanov reaching out to his wives hand. His wife held his hands and withdrew into a silence. "I just hope they believe you," his wife said. Romanov fell back tohis bed, still holding her hands