A glimpse of the life of a mountain soldier

Hi to all! I am Monica, an Aunt to the writer. I will share with you my experiences during my days within the movement outside our government. People tend to refer to us as No Permanent Address (npa). We are moving and doing our tasks around the province, especially in the mountainous part. We connect and interact with the villagers and introduce to them the true vision and ideology of the group as our leaders would say so. I am not part of the PR team but sometimes we regroup with them to give support just in case we encounter the government soldiers.

Meet first these beautiful souls

We moved during the night, we are like wind passing through the villages by villages by foot alone. No matter what the weather is. The dark is our most companion and the best shield that we can rely on during that journey.

One day our commander decided to go down to one of the villages nearest to our nest. We are seven in the command. Some of my comrades are hesitant to follow the order. The reason is, the government troops are around the area. Our leader told us to just stay on the rear side of the village to avoid our encounter with the soldiers. So that's the plan and we move out.

While on our way, nobody is talking. You just hear the boots sound in every step we make. The gushing wind was cold. We heard those tree branches and the tall grass swaying with the wind blows.

We trailed our way to the village rear on the mountainside. Down there was a creek in which we can build our temporary camp. It's almost morning when we almost reached our destination. My leg is cramping and I decided to sit down for a while, I told them to go ahead. But instead of going, they stop to have a quick break too. Everyone was tired and hungry so our leader told us to have a quick rest and continue our walk so that we can cook our food before the sunrise.

The people in that village were familiar with us already. We know the elders whom we always contacted to send our supplies. What we so-called supplies are those goods the villages collected from every household in the form of rice, spices, and vegetables. But in the meantime, we got some supplies with us which we collected from the other village we came from.

Finally, we reached the valley in which the creek was situated. Our leader told us to build our tent there. One of our comrades told us that the spot we chose was where our other troops were raided by our opponent. Our leader ignore the possibility of being spied again by the army. He told us that nobody will expect that we settle there again as it is a battleground in the past already. He added that the Army would think that we are afraid to stay there anymore, so it's the least place for them to patrol. To that point, no more argument from us, we thought he has a point too. So we settled and relax for a while. I and my buddy were the cooks for that day. After cooking our meal and eating it. We were designated to our place of duty to watch out for possible suspects of intruders.

Alternately, we do watch out for the very entrance of our camp. We communicate through signs to avoid chattings and sounds. You only heard the birds singing and chirping in the trees. And the sound of the water flowing down the creek. Suddenly a man appeared holding a bag and a bunch of taro vegetables in his other hand. He called out a name and we recognized him as one of those villagers who delivered our supplies before. We welcome him in our temporary camp but as a precaution two of our comrades left on the entrance to watch out.

Our leader asks the man for information regarding the government troops. And according to him, the convoy of the army visited the village the other day and was left the next day to downtown. We believed in him as if he is already known to us. We requested him to buy some sugar and coffee and we handed him the money to buy it. The conversation ended up and he went away. The next morning, another man appeared with the coffee and sugar, and other supplies. We are not used to it that this man happen to bring something to the camp before. Everyone gets alerted, our leader signals the man to come near. He moved forward and handed the things and said that his Uncle was not able to bring the items because he has other errands to attend to.

I got goosebumps into the unexpected entry of the man, the truth is from that time I feel uneasy already. I feel something is coming. I don't know but I told my buddy what I feel like, he just laughs at me telling me to get easy on it.

Baang! Tsug! Tsug!....braatatatat!....

I saw our commander drop down to the stoney ground bathing with his blood.

💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚

Hang on guys! The next chapter is coming later. I just need to attend to my house chores in the meantime. See you then and thank you for reading!

*All the images were from Unsplash

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Article #59
Published: January 05, 2022
Time: 12:21 PM PH 
All images used owned by me 
     unless otherwise stated 

Love,

Kendy42🧡