We’ve leveled off at 5 thousand feet… the leather jumpsuit it warm.. yet I still feel the chill to the bone.. I think it’s more nerves.. since this is my third flight, being a ball gunner…

My first mission, I had to do the tail gunner.. we lost both side gunners and the front gunner to shrapnel.. so I know how has you can lose it all.. I even packed my own chute..

I daze off into the clouds.. seeing the billowing black smoke mixing with the white clouds…

I see specks all over.. planes flying at low altitude.. just waiting for them to get the order to attack..
We don’t hear any contact.. but I see the glint off the glass of a canopy in the clouds…

Before I can even tell the boys. gunfire rips the metal in front of me… I yell out contact!! Contact, on aft tail.. coming in high…
The roar of cannons fills the space.. I can feel the shockwave of each shell as it leaves the chamber… the flash is huge.. I can feel the shock though my body.. my feet go numb… the fighter rips past me in a smoking nose dive… he clubs the tip of the wing, tipping panels off as he roars to his grounding…
He’ll probably bail.. but I’m not worried about him.. its that wing…

I watch as the wind catches the panels and rips them off.. but the wing stays intact for the most part… I hold my breath for a second.. as I hear the roar of gunfire..

Contact!! Contact!! 6’ocolk..

The call is seconds before the explosion hits.. a huge hole rips in the floor about 10 feet towards the ftont.. smoke quickly runs through the cabin.. and I know the truth.. everyone in the nose.. is dead.. I only get a recall from the tail gunner.. and he says we’ve got 2 behind us.. gaining fast…

One plane rips past and I try to fire… the gun clicks.. and then the barrel explodes.. gunfire rips through the wing in front of me… and it completely gives way in an explosion that separates the wing and engines from the body… the explosion knocks me back against the tail wall and folds me up. Into the crawlspace for the tail gunner..

My chute and flack jacket save me from a brunt of the shock… and I have a smoking piece of metal stuck in my arm.. but that doesn’t hurt as bad as my head…

I can feel the plan starting it’s spin.. I see Timmy, the other side gunner slumped against the wall… I know this plan is now just a flying tomb…

I grab the rails and start trying to haul out…I can hear the whine of the engines as they start to speed up…
I make it to the door window.. and pull myself up to my chest… I look foreword but the wind blinds me… I see a brown shape.. but it gets bigger.. quickly.. by the time I get to flop out, I can make out the bomber…

Both planes intersect as a viscosity that I couldn’t even describe.. my chute never had a chance to open… I collided with the bomber.. and the explosion… I died so fast that it all seemed like a dream.. like I was just looking in on this from the outside the whole time… least I got to enjoy the firework and at least all my boys are here with me.

03/14/2004

Author's Note: yet another descructive war dream...

Posted on 03/14/2004
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