[ WP ] If you kill a person with your bare hands , you gain their strength and will be twice as strong . Killing more , you can be ten times or a thousand , whatever you can get away with .

The methodical cadence of five thousand boots hitting the ground at the same time, one after another filled my ears til I was sure I'd go insane. The air was humid and warm. Sand battered my bare skin lightly as a breeze threatened to almost comfort my erratic thinking. Will I die here? How did it come to this? Where did my descent into madness begin? The last question, at least, I could answer. 
 
 At the time, I thought I had the world figured out. My parents were so proud, their only son, independent and successful. Brave, people called me. I was thanked nearly daily for my `` service.'' Day after day I grew in a community I called home. The US Marines. Life made sense. After 19 years on this Earth I was sure I had mastered my own destiny. I did well in all aspects of the Marines. Psychically and mentally. Daily I took on challenges to learn and grow. 
 
 One day, unlike any other day, I was approached by Staff Sargent Sheldon. As a junior enlisted Private First Class, I put my arms behind my back to signal respect for the higher ranking man in front of me. He scanned my bearing, down and up again. Without saying a word he handed me a sealed envelope and turned from me. 
 
 3 Days later I was stepping off a C-130 Hercules Airplane that had just landed in Afghanistan. I no longer had control of my destiny. I always knew deployment was a possibility but it did n't seem real until I was putting my boots in the sand for the first time. Eventually I became accustomed to life in the desert. My unit conducted daily convoy missions. My leaders preached this `` hearts and minds'' mentality, where we would go bring aid and assistance to local villages in eliminating and deterring the Taliban terrorist threat. Again, I felt in control of my destiny. 
 
 4 months after I placed my boot imprint on the desert for the first time my life changed forever. I set forth on a path that I'd never return from. Our convoy commander, Captain Granger was speaking to a local village elder. This was usual for our counter insurgency missions. The first bullet had buried itself into Corporal Johnson's throat before we ever heard the crack of a rifle. Everything after I watched Johnson's lifeless body hit the blood soaked sand is a blur. At some point I ran out of ammo. That tends to happen when you shoot wildly and in panic, a lesson I learned far too late. 
 
 The next clear thing I remember is him on top of me. I had n't supplied my lungs with air for what seemed like an eternity. Fear gripped me as it never had before. I'll never forget what he looked like. A dark skinned man with nearly black eyes, his face hidden behind a tan colored balaclava. 
 
 His eyes. 
 
 Those are what I'll never forget. Not as they pierced my soul as he took my last breathes away, and not as I managed to bury my knife in his gut. Even then I felt my life waning. He fell backwards off of me just as the black edges of my vision were closing in. With a surge of pure adrenaline I seized my moment and wrapped my hands around his neck, with my thumbs pressed against his wind pipe. I pressed with all my might for a lifetime. 
 
 Suddenly as he went limp, I felt a rush of energy and elation. I continued to squeeze and with newfound strength and I broke his skin with brute force. I could still here the sounds of war and hell around me. I took up my knife and passed carefully through an alley created by two mud huts. Before I could think, my instinct guided my blade into an unaware insurgent, who was shooting away from me. He yelped as I buried my already bloody knife into his lower back. Soon he was lifeless and again, I felt another surge of energy. 
 
 My muscles swelled and pure joy wracked my body. I sprinted off, faster than I had ever ran before in pursuit of my next target. At the end of the battle I had taken three bullet wounds to my body. 2 in the gut and 1 in my upper left leg. When I awake the next morning they were healed. 
 
 After 6 more months and dozens of skirmishes I had discovered something peculiar about myself. When I killed by hand I got stronger in every way. I was faster, more powerful, more capable, harder to kill. I took from my victims every single time they died by my hand. That was n't all I took from them. I took more and more joy each time. It was like a drug to me. I killed indiscriminately, ditching my rifle nearly instantly every time we took fire. Eventually I craved battle with the enemy. It kept me awake at night. I needed to kill more and more. 
 
 The first time I took one of my brothers lives I puked. I looked over my comrades lifeless body in his tent. But still that joy grew stronger. 
 
 I do n't know how long it's been now. I do n't know how many I've killed. Once my comrades discovered my fratricides they came after me. I killed many that day. I've never left the desert. Years or decades may have passed since then. I really do n't know. All I know is getting my fix of killing, and getting stronger. 
 
 But this... 
 
 Ten thousand men surrounded me. All nationalities in the region had united to destroy the `` Demon Devil Dog'' as they'd labeled me. It appeared that even the people we considered the enemy had temporarily cooperated with my comrades to kill me. 
 
 So there I stood. Listening to the beat of my impending doom approach closer and closer. Incredulously I was elated. So many to kill, all coming to me. This day I would either die a legend or become immortal. I looked to my knife, that dried blood had rusted long ago. 
 
 And sprinted towards the cadence.
