Tower and Town, November 2016 (view the full edition)RobotsMy grandfather loved to tell stories. He would sit there, next to me, on my old creaky bed, telling me stories of bravery, stories of tragedy. And stories of war. My dear granddad. Oh how he would go on, deep into the night, as if unaware of my presence, engrossed in his vivid memories. Yet what I did not realise at that time - being only a child - was that these stories possessing him were not stories at all. They were not made up; they were not fiction. They were true. True down to the tiniest detail, and I now know this because no one, not even someone with the wildest of imaginations, could have even merely hoped to produce such stories of horror, pain and cruelty. Some tales stood out among the rest to me as a young girl, but one in particular will never leave my mind. It went like this: I was not born a killer. Instead it was forced upon me with such brutal strength that I had no choice but to obey. Going against all my moral beliefs I stepped out onto the battlefield with only one thought in my head - if I was going to die, it would be for good reason. We don't all have to be robots. Lily Jackson |