The Taste of Dust

His world was spinning around him at a blinding speed. Memories; priceless, crumbling before his very eyes. Flashes of how things might have been. But he knew he had chosen this path at the crossroads in his life. It was the righteous path, the hardest path, teeming with impediments. He saw them ready to be vanquished by his one wepon that could not be destroyed. His own will. It was like a hallucination, though he knew that this reality was as real as the groud he was lying on; as real as his muscles as they throbbed with his hoarse breathing; as real as the taste of sweat on his lips, and the dust in his eyes.

He spat on the ground beside him. A momentary respite, as his insensible gaze strayed from the battlefield in front of him to his comrades who lay limbs splayed out beside him, with agony in their eyes and remorse in their hearts. He was different. He had no regrets. He savored the pain one last time before giving the final charge. This is what he had lived for.

Feeling the slow surge of adrenalin through his veins he gathered every last ounce of strength that his body could produce, drawing his breath one last time before he faced the inevitable. Countless thoughts whizzed through his mind as he staggered to his feet. Then, he looked his oppresor straight in the eye he lunged forward uttering his war cry -"Kabaddi kabaddi kabaddi kabaddi...."