I used to think “death on the battlefield” was just a phrase people in documentaries threw around to sound dramatic. Flags, trumpets, hero shots. You know the vibe.

The night I watched my best friend die in the mud, I realized death wasn’t a phrase. It had a face. Actually, it had wings.

We grew up on the same street, me and Theo. Same school, same cracked concrete court where we played ball until the streetlights blinked on. When the recruiter showed up at our high school, we sat in the back of the auditorium whispering jokes about “free college and cool uniforms.”

We promised each other we’d sign up together or not at all. Two idiots chasing some blurry idea of honor. His mom cried. Mine pretended not to. We both said the same dumb line: “Don’t worry, nothing will happen to us.”

Months later, we were standing in a trench that smelled like metal, mud and fear. No music, no slow-motion hero walk, just the kind of silence that feels like the whole world is holding its breath.

Then everything hit at once.

The sky tore open with artillery. The ground punched my legs. People shouted words that didn’t even sound like language anymore. I remember seeing sparks, hearing someone scream “Move, move, MOVE!” and my body just… ran. Training took over where courage should have been.

I turned to check on Theo. I was about to yell some stupid line like “Keep your head down, man!”

But he was already on the ground.

No dramatic fall. No slow collapse. One second he was there, the next he was a broken shape in the mud. I dropped beside him, hands shaking, trying to find where the blood was coming from without really wanting to know. His eyes were open, staring at something above us.

So I looked up too.

At first I thought it was just smoke twisting into weird shapes. Maybe a helicopter, a drone, anything that made sense. But the longer I stared, the more it didn’t look like anything human had built.

There were figures in the sky.

Tall, lean, with huge black wings like ravens soaked in oil. Faces sharp, almost beautiful in a cruel way. Their eyes glowed—no other word fits—like embers buried under ash. They weren’t flapping like birds. They were just there, hanging in the smoke, watching.

Not the battlefield. Not the tanks. Not the fire.

Us.

Watching the ones who had fallen… and the ones who were about to.

I remember thinking, Okay, I’ve finally lost it. This is what going crazy in war feels like. I blinked, wiped mud out of my eyes. They were still there. And the worst part? They looked… excited. Not screaming or laughing, just this twisted calm, like paramedics waiting patiently outside a burning house.

I shook Theo’s shoulders, screaming his name, begging him not to leave. He tried to say something but only air came out. His eyes never left the sky. It felt like he saw them too. Like they were calling his name in a language only dying people understand.

When his chest stopped moving, something inside me went silent. The explosions turned into background noise. I just knelt there, holding him, while those winged things hovered above us, as if they were ticking another mark on some invisible list.

War ended for me, officially, the day I came home. Papers signed, uniform folded, family hugs. But in my head, it never really stopped. I woke up at 3 a.m. to the sound of artillery that wasn’t there. I heard Theo laughing in the shower steam. I saw those wings whenever a shadow crossed my window.

One night, scrolling my phone because sleep refused to show up, I stumbled on a thread about Greek mythology. Someone mentioned the Keres—spirits of violent death who follow Ares, the god of war, drifting over battlefields, hungry for the souls of the fallen.

Black wings. Burning eyes. Feeding on war.

I dropped the phone. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking. It was like someone had reached into my head and given a name to the thing I’d been trying to bury.

Since then, I can’t stand it when people talk about war like it’s a video game, or a cool movie, or a good way to “prove you’re a man.” I’ve seen what waits above the smoke. Maybe it’s just trauma. Maybe it’s mythology. Maybe it’s my brain trying to give shape to something that makes no sense.

But here’s what I know for sure:

Death is not a clean, noble moment with swelling music. It’s cold mud, shaking hands, and something in the air that feels like it’s counting down. It doesn’t care if you’re brave or terrified, right or wrong, just or cruel. It just waits.

Sometimes, when I’m walking past the hospital at night, I catch myself looking up at the grey sky, half expecting to see those black wings again. Not just for soldiers this time—car crashes, overdoses, arguments that go too far. The battlefield just moved.

Maybe you think I imagined it. Maybe you’re right. But tell me this:

If you were kneeling in the mud with your best friend dying in your arms, and you looked up… what do you think you’d see?

And if you’ve ever lost someone suddenly—an accident, an illness that came out of nowhere—did you also feel, even for a second, like something was standing in the room, just waiting?

Be honest.