Every time I look at this photograph, I get a knot in my throat… Except for my own life and body it is the only physical thing I brought to and back from Rigel 4. Everything else was lost. Together with many, many lives… I still don't quite know why I took the 300+ year old mechanical Nikon that belonged to my ancestor, on the assignment to Rigel, maybe I was curious to see if it still worked, I kept it in pristine condition after all, and I even found a couple of film rolls sealed away in it's box. Anyway, when I boarded the ship headed to Rigel to cover the fighting against the Drakhians invaders for the Terran Press, the camera was in my travel pack. Rigel 4, what a nightmare! What a brutal, brutal nightmare! I was attached to B Company, 357th Battalion, 4th UC marine Division, who was trying to repulse the Drakhian forces on the outskirts of New Toronto, and they were really in the thick of it, but the enemy was slowly giving way. The boys were confident to clear the invasion force despite the heavy fighting. And I quietly got to know them, slowly, one by one, individuals in a big machine. Everybody seemed to look pretty positively on the early resolution of the war. Then one night, all hell broke loose… A fleet of the seemingly neutral n'Drub approached the orbital stations of our fleet and in an pure act of treachery started blowing our squadrons out of the sky! In a single battle our forces lost 2 battlecruisers, 5 destroyers, 3 frigates, at least ten transports, and I don't know how many other supply ships! The surviving ships had no choice but to retire as fast as they could. The ground forces, us, were stranded! And then, the n'Drubs landed… And things got scary! The n'Drubs are scary! More then 3m high, fierce and vicious fighters, and with the Drakhian forces they slowly surrounded us… We had 5 infantry/marine divisions, 3 support and one airforce division on the planet mostly around the biggest city in the colony, and slowly, we got cornered, and slowly, we were decimated. But we put up on hell of a fight, I say we because we all had to fight, we had to hold on until the relief force could pull us out. It was vicious house to house and hand to hand fighting sometimes. The casualties were atrocious on both sides. I lost everything, my Hyperspace recorder/communicator was blown away, as were all my electronic cameras and even my clothes were in taters. At one point all I had was my ancient Nikon and my last pair of pants. So I took some photos, not knowing if I could develop them or even if I would survive. Photos of the guys in B Company, some of the best guerrilla fighters ever to wear a Human uniform, photos of the fighting dead. I remember them all: captain Patel, sgt Li, lt Murphy, John, Hassan, Jamal, Luca, Pierre, Jorge, Curtis… Curtis, the point man at the right of the picture, he saved my life and others a dozen time at least, Curtis, one of the last to go, defending the bunker we had made under a collapsed building. It was there that I lost my Nikon, blown away by a n'Drub fragmentation bullet that took half of my arm off. I don't know how, but I managed to recover the film and put in my pocket before I passed out. When we were finally evacuated a few days later I found the film still in my pocket, dusty and bloodied, and I held it tight thinking of all those that were left behind… And all I could save is this one Photograph! Just having fun with the story! Poser Pro 2014, LuxRender via Reality 4, Photoshop. Thanks for looking, Dan