Applause.

The whole building, filled with more than four hundred attendants, rose after they announced my name. The giant blue banner with the UN emblem in the center welcomed me up stage. Reporters with nauseating flashes and journalists with their blaring eyes and important people from various countries watched me with curiosity.

I took the piece of folded paper from my suit pocket and the typed words glared before my eyes.

Thank you so much for inviting me here, I started to speak. I am standing in this podium to address the overwhelming and outrageous system still reigning in the very corner of the earth. I hope my speech doesnt suck and that I wont step down from here feeling embarrassed.

The crowds of people laughed shortly after my hasty and dry humor.

The American flag fluttered on my right and the newborn red and white flag stood firm on my left.

On December 15, 1940, I joined the American Army. I was a boy seven years ago, still innocent. I didnt know what it feels like to take someones life with my own hands, to see someone so close died right beside me, to see so many injustice and inhuman acts this world has to offer. But now that I understand horror fully, the questions started rumbling in my head. How many lives does it take until the ridiculous war ended? How many children and women have to die because of the complicated politics and ideologies of nations? How much loss and pain we have to lose until it all ended? How long do people need to suffer, to starve, to burn, before their nations flag is finally allowed to flutter in their own backyard?

Two years ago, August 17, 1945.

I stood profoundly at the edge of the courtyard in the city called Djakarta with my friend John. The Japanese had been beaten. Their two major cities were somehow bombed by the American and now, the hope for Indonesia to be its own country emerged.

That day was the official Independence Day for the country, and everyone celebrated.

One year ago, February 19, 1946.

The thick leaves of the pine woods blocked our faces from the place we wanted to be. The sun rose in the east, its warmth reached my skin and heated my body from the coldness of the air. My nine fingers clutched my dearest rifle as we proceeded.

Patrols! Ten oclock, John whispered.

We crouched behind the wet bushes, ignoring the splintering thorns that cut our skins. I saw three men, maybe more. They ate their breakfasts noiselessly, enjoying their meals in the middle of the rainforest beside their parked truck. The Dutch red and white and blue flag painted on the side of the truck shone to us.

I lowered my backpack and pulled a dark green, tubular object with a pin on top of it. A Japanese hand grenade. I pulled the pin and counted to three. The grenade leaped toward the center of the group of soldiers.

Granaat!

The blast jumped on them. Flesh and blood fountained with black dirt, flying over the ground and bounced back to the earth.

One of them screamed in pain. His left side was all but intact. The crying sound made the situation even eerier. John shot the mans head, ending it all.

How many innocent boys can one nation send to a garrison and be killed by a grenade? How many must die for pointless wars? Yes, Im talking on behalf everyone in the world. I experienced those sufferings and destructions. I witnessed horror with my own eyes.

Everyone below this roof sat straighter and opened their ears larger.

Also, I was given the advantage to talk about the reign of overseas power in the now independent nation of Indonesia. I was baffled by the fact that more and more countries tried to invade this country although its name is already official. Indonesia is independent since August 17, 1945, from the hands of the empire of Japan, yet more countries plunged in to take control of it again. NICA or the Netherland Indies Civil Administration is the official organization who deliberately tries to take back and retrieve the territory of Indonesia back to the hands of the Dutch. I am now speaking with the words of every Indonesian. Were tired! Weve been colonized for more than three hundred years! We want freedom! We want justice! We want to speak for ourselves and to live as ourselves and to work for ourselves and to go to school for ourselves without the political intervention of other nations! Were done being colonized and we have the right to stand as ourselves. These intruders are killing us! Theyre burning our villages, rampage our crops, raiding and raping our children!

Make sure all of them are down! I commanded to John.

We circled the area and checked the truck. Five large trunks full of explosives seated inside it, waiting to be snatched.

Suddenly, the body of the soldier below my feet moved. His face covered with blood and his legs werent in the right position anymore, but his hands tried to grab my leg. I hopped and pulled my rifles trigger to the guys head.

Bang.

John, I thought I told you to make sure all of them are down!

"He was dead when I checked. I'm not lying.

I ducked and wiped the blood off the guys face. His soft skin reflected the dim light of the sun.

Damn. This guy must not be older than nineteen.

But I also wanted to talk about the victims of the war itself. The soldiers are also the victims.

The building grew very quiet. The inevitable rounds of camera flashes blinded me for one second.

One day, to defend the eastern village in the island of Java, we encountered a Dutch outer patrol with four Dutch soldiers defending a supply truck. We killed them. We killed the four men with a grenade and they drowned in their own blood. These soldiers were practically boys, kids! Theyre teenagers who maybe had bright futures. Meanwhile, nations used them to kill and suppress other people. Political agendas are apparently more important than the lives of these brave boys. They died. They died for nothing. They died and buried in the wet soil of an unknown nation. For what? So their countries can achieve political goal? So their countries can have more lands and stronger economy? This is wrong, I tell you! You might confuse me with national laws and patriotic rules, but this is inhuman. You might say their sacrifices will be remembered if they die for their countries. It doesnt matter. It doesnt matter if they already die!

I could see in the faces of nation leaders that some of them were fond of my words, but some others were reddened by it.

I feel really guilty when I realized I just took the life of four young men. But I dont regret it. They were threats. I have to see them as malice, because they were threats. Why would we consider them as threats? It wasnt because they wanted to harm, but because their nations, their commanders, their political leaders in fancy suits wanted them to harm. It is as if they were used by their leaders to do bad things. Bad things they consider right, but in other perspective, it said a different thing. Soldiers are victims. Citizens are victims. Everyone is a victim in this chain of endless war.

Twenty local men helped us with the trunks and we decided to return to our settlements in Grogol Village. The walk there wasnt hard, but my mind was occupied by the thoughts of murders. I imagined the dead soldiers mother cried and fainted when she received the paper stating that her only son had been killed in Java by the resistance.

It seemed at this point that I killed a lot of foreign soldiers, but every time I did it, it felt really different. Its hard. Its hard the first time, and its hard the hundredth time.

At the villages outpost, we ran over Kristin Palemasari, the Javanese woman who decided to fight for the freedom of her people and the only woman in the resistance. She was also the only woman, probably in the entire island, who could speak English.

Kristin was with five or maybe six crying children and two sobbing women.

Kristins face stuffed with anxiety and worry. She swallowed her own sweat and her clothes stained with someone elses blood. She ran toward us with her limping feet. It felt awkward seeing her like that. She was always so tough and never showed any sign of trouble or difficulties on her face.

The village the village was attacked! Her voice was horrible. She was like she just saw a ghost.

What? When?

Just now. I tried to save as many as I can, but theyre everywhere. Trucks and men flooded in from the west. Theyre still fighting! We need to go back! Some people are still trapped between the houses, but we need reinforcement.

I checked my ammo and nodded toward Yudhistira, one of the local resistances. He tapped my shoulder and ran toward the group of kids. He hugged his girl and kissed her right on the cheek.

Bunda dimana?

The girl shook her head. The mother was still in the village.

Now back to the talk of peoples suffering. How many wars have this earth seen? Fifty? Sixty? How many people must die because of it? Try to imagine your only kid who just laughed at a silly joke one day ago, got killed by a British tank just after midnight. Try to imagine your grandmother, who just woke up from her long illness, died after a bomber bombed the town she was on. Try to imagine your wife, just cooked you salad for breakfast, got shot in the head after an American sniper accidently mistaken them for being a Japanese. Try to imagine yourself, enslaved and raped for doing exactly nothing by bored Russian soldiers and officers. But can you blame those soldiers? No. They face death every day. Is it good to enslave and torture and rape people? No, its not good. But the thing is they need something to get their minds off from stress, right? And who to blame? Nations, of course.

The raging fire filled the air with dust and smoke, making us harder and harder to breathe. Flames ate the wooden houses. I saw a girl running with flames on her back toward us. Yudhistira quickly brushed the fire out by tapping it with cloth.

I paced between the burning houses with wary eyes. The bodies layered the streets. Their bloods dried on the ditches, drank by mice and rats.

Yudhistira and the locals eyes turned red. Their heart crumpled inside their chests. Their heads raged, demanding for revenge.

A British Coventry Armored Car emerged after the flushing smokes, appearing dramatically in the distance, backed up by the marches of the enemy infantries. They paraded the streets of the city with menacing eyes, scanning the areas for more survivors of resistances.

Here they come! I shouted.

We hid ourselves behind the walls and fences and wells. They patrolled over the area.

I counted ten on-foot soldiers and one armored truck in the middle of them all. The headlights of the vehicle cut the misty-smokey air and aimed for their front environment.

Their uniforms blinked in my eyes. They stepped right in our range. Our rifles trained above our chests. We got them.

Fire!

What does every soldier saw before their doom picks them up? Bullets. Hundreds of iron bullets, rushing in the air and tumbling over them. Piercing metals cut their chests and spill their bloods and flesh everywhere. Stop killing each other! Stop all this sophisticated wars! Stop sending your countrys children to the front line! Stop invading other territories if they dont want to be invaded! Be logical! Do not be selfish! Dont just think about yourselves and the liberty of your country! Think about other people too. Were all living beings. We dont like being suppressed. It doesnt matter what country they are from. It doesnt matter what ideology they hold, what race they are, what religion they chose. It doesnt matter. Were all humans and humans ought to not kill and torment each other.

I could see in some of the attendants eyes that my speech sliced their hearts, but I could also see some others were infuriated by it.

I see with my eyes, Germans killing Jews. Japanese killing Americans. British killing Italians. Americans killing Japanese. Russian killing Germans. Dutch killing resistances. British killing innocent villagers. Villagers killing eighteen years old Australians. Its all pointless. But if it is, why do I join the side of the resistance and not my own country? Why do I support them killing the NICA soldiers? Because they have to! They need to defend themselves!

My speech impressed some, but some others yawned.

This people this people wont surrender. They wont give up their own lands to foreigners. They wont let themselves be enslaved anymore. They are tired seeing their children got shot and die. They are tired and they demand freedom! They do not ask for pity, but consider their feelings and their hearts, as so many innocent victims fell each minute because of these relentless battles. Stop this madness!

Clink clanks of our rifles chimed in the smoky air and the bullets started their jobs of slicing the enemies hearts and brains. The untouched soldiers scrambled and almost immediately hid behind the armored car or collapsed houses. They started shooting back.

The British armored car announced us with its turret. The giant explosions and machine gun rattles snaked the entire place like a hurricane. Soldiers and resistances flung and die left and right.

My hands kept shaking when I clutched my rifle. I covered myself behind a broken wall. The local fighter beside me caught a bullet and it sliced his arm from his body. He jerked back, fell to the ground, and started screaming audibly. The bleeding arm kept producing fresh blood, but another bullet got him again and his death was then confirmed.

Push in! I yelled.

Maju! Yudhistira translated.

Our forces moved constantly and I found a new place to hide. The armored car blasted another man.

The clipping sound from my rifle kept on going. Heads after heads, hearts after hearts. The enemys numbers were thinning and thinning. They ran back, rushing off from the area as we outnumbered them by four people.

Cover me! I screamed toward Yudhistira and John. They nodded at the same time.

The two reliable men covered me with extended rounds of shots as I drunkenly navigated through the fountains of bloods toward the front part of the armored car. I saw a small opening, a small window on the side of the car and I disposed a live grenade inside.

I heard the drivers screamed in panic. I vaulted to the left before the car exploded. Flame danced mockingly on its thick skin. Yellow and red monster leaped and ate the two drivers inside the killer machine.

Push them harder!

I took another shot and the back of one soldiers shoulder earned it. He bounced forward as Yudhistira shot him right in the stomach.

Another shot, another man falling down. Another one and the body crumpled below our feet as we kept pushing the enemy.

Yudhistiras man threw the hand-made Molotov and burned the poor soldier in active flame. He wiggled to find freedom from the fire, but his skin failed and he fell down after the humongous monstrosity.

The battle raged on. Our position was good. We covered ourselves beside some lining houses.

John. We need to circle round this building and surprise them from the other side!

Got it!

Yudhistira. Keep shooting them! Distract them from us!

Okay.

John and I kicked the houses wooden door open and burst inside before someone from the other side noticed. The shootings outside was intense, but we need to focus.

We exited the house with the other door and quickly entered the next house, and then the other, and then the other.

Finally, we stood right before the door in which would lead us to the back of these bastards bodies.

You ready?

Born ready. Lets do this.

I kicked the door and dodged the man nearest to me with both my hands. I grabbed his rifle and banged.

The men around me realized and started puzzling here and there as to be confused to make further moves. I commanded John to get behind a wall and we did. Now they were confused. They were cornered on two sides. We pinned them down.

Yudhistiras man started pushing in. John and I immediately covered fire for them.

The enemies were panicking. They got nowhere to run. Nowhere, but to die. So all of us finished all of them one by one. They pleaded for mercy.

Please. I got children, said a man with a Dutch accent.

Well, these men had children too. Now where are they? Oh yeah, they died. You burned them all.

Please.

A bang loudened my ears. Kristin shot the guy's eye.

Ladies and gentlemen, I want you to close your eyes.

They looked at each other and laughed all around. Maybe they thought that I was nuts and all. But I tried again and commanded them to close your eyes!

They finally closed them. Some of them looked hesitant. Some of them excused themselves by pointing their mechanical cameras they were operating.

Now The building was very quiet. Now, I want you to imagine yourselves, sipping coffee and listening to your childrens complains about the impossibility of their homeworks. Its a nice afternoon, the sky is golden and the birds are singing. The weather is perfect. You and your child are sitting on the terrace of your very house on your very country.

I closed my eyes.

Now imagine your cup of coffee on your table starts shaking. The ground starts moving and the streets in front of your houses start rambling. The alarms on your neighborhood rattle. You hear the menacing sound of a tanks motor. You hear feet stomping, men marching, women screaming in the distance from the area which they come from. Then, the turret of the tank blasts a huge cannonball of fire into the house right across the street. You see old Madame Pofirch burns with her daily tabloid curving in her hands. Then, the tanks turret starts moving bit by bit toward the place you and your son or daughter currently have a nice chit chat. You see death is coming, so you hug him or her as tight and comforting as possible. But you already see that it is useless. You will die. Your child will die. Your wife will die. Your husband will die. And then boom.

I made a loud impression of a huge explosion with the microphone. Everyone in the room seemed startled by it.

You see, right beside you, your son or daughter is bleeding. His or her belly is opened and the red liquid oozed from it. He or she crumples beside you, screaming in pain and holding the wound with all his or her might. The sound of fire glares upon you. Your house is raging with flames. Your son or daughter is dying, and theres a large group of infantry and a large tank blocking your way to the nearest hospital.

I opened my eyes and studied the crowds expressions.

A man. No an officer. A military officer walks to you. He swings his rifle to the left and then to the right. He says something in a language you dont fully get. More men flood the area and ransack your burning house. They come out with jewelries, electronics, moneys, savings. They spit on your bleeding son or daughter and the man forces you up. Soldiers jerk you up and you cant reach the body of your dying child anymore. He or she pants on the floor. Then the officer says in English, Work for us! Bleed for us! and the man pulls the trigger of his pistol to your son or daughters skull.

Bisma! Yudhistira shoveled the ground with his knees and crouched beside the bleeding boy with a rifle in front of him. Bisma was Yudhistiras oldest son. He joined his father in the resistance just one week before this happened and was still in the youth age of sixteen.

John appeared beside me and we watched the poor man cried before his dead son. He snuggled his arms, he kissed and hugged the boys limp body. My heart melted seeing the tragedy, but soon after, the rage rose like a barking dog ready to be released.

Open your eyes. The crowds possessed different eyes now. They were redder and far wetter. One woman, probably the ambassador from Yugoslavia, reached for her napkin and just glued out her misery. She cried without caring the spectating people all around her, but they didnt laugh. None of us laughed seeing the womans funny reaction. Every single person in the building was struggling to not cry, or to hide their cries as best as they could.

That was merely your imagination. But try to imagine that all of that was real and it happened to you every day. That was imagination without sound, without the essence of realness. These people really felt that, and these people are willing to die to make it stop. But theyre only farmers and villagers and fishermen and schoolboys with supposedly bright futures. All of you here just sit with your teas or your coffees eating your pastas and laugh about the funny joke your boss made. You hear from the radio about the sorrowful news, but you pity them for five minutes only, and then you move on.

I caught my breath.

So yes, ladies and gentlemen, they are alive. They are the same. We all are humans. We all deserve freedom and justice. We want to live beyond fear. We want our children to walk to school and to go back home with stories. We all want peace. We all want to live without despair and hunger. And that all can happen if nations dont invade and occupy other nations. That can happen if countries and monarchies dont kill each other.

I saw the Britishs ambassador and the Dutchs high minister and the Americans vice president and the Japaneses ex-military general who all wept a bit after I told them to imagine. The Canadian ambassador had his face red. The Belgian minister didnt even bother to conceal his sadness.

Go away from Indonesia. Go away from places youre not supposed to be. Go away and let us live our lives. Let us breathe. Let us prosper. And to every other powerful people in this room, Im not just telling the invaders of Indonesia, but to everyone who have power. Start to see things with different perspectives and dont make other peoples lives harder for them. Dont invade other lands and start helping each other. Peace and order is better than madness and selfishness. You all told your children to not lie, to not be selfish, to not hurt other people, to be honest and not be spoiled, yet all of you as adults do the exact things you told your children not to do when they were little.

Last minute, we heard the world burning. Then, we heard the running motor of the cargo plane right on top of our heads. Birds started flocking out of the way of the giant airplane, and even from down below, I could see the paratroopers leaped out of the flying thing

Parachutes started descending from the clouds, cutting those soft cottons into some and readied their weapons to rain fire on us. Men around me panicked. We all took cover, and counter fired when they were in close range.

They threw grenades and other form of explosives right onto our eyes. They killed us from the back and cornered us into the curve building. They confirmed their kills by shooting the dead bodies two or three times more before continuing. They didnt care who they killed. They killed teenagers and desperate men with bamboo sticks. They killed all of us with cold blood, and neither pity nor sorrow went to their hearts.

The sky was darkened after more and more men landed down. Their far more superior weaponries lessened our numbers one by one, until nothing was more but me and John.

Yudhistira, a hole in his chest, fired one more time and killed one soldier. Then he died before us. Kristin too, was shot. She died with honor and the resistance was lucky to have her. They knocked our weapons off us and escorted us toward one of the buildings.

Then, after waiting for about an hour, their trucks started filling the streets. More and more soldiers rushed out to deal with the bodies. They herded us to the most armored truck as we struggled to keep the cuffs not painful.

I hope you listen to me. I really hope you dont just get out of this building feeling the same way as before. I hope you dont neglect my speech right on this stage. I hope you dont consider everything I said as another man speaking for justice and truth for formalities and political consideration. I really do wish you all take this seriously.

John smiled at me at the back of the building with one man beside him. The man was holding a gun.

That would be all. Thank you very much.

I stepped down from the stage with loud clasps and cheers like I was winning the Olympic Games. I should describe my feeling after saying all of those strong and controversial words. Some of them might blatantly accuse me of terrorists and stuff. But the real sensation that I felt after stepping down was was relieve. Relieve that those hundreds of people from dozens of countries from all over the continents heard what I said. More people would also hear them after reading me in the newspapers when they ate their breakfasts and sipped their fresh black coffee and when they tuned in to listen to their expensive radios in their living rooms.

The man with the green uniform cuffed me and he led me to a room with only one table in the middle and two chairs. It was the interrogation room.

He cuffed me to the leg of the table and stepped outside.

A bang could be heard ten seconds after. The door reopened, and the familiar face appeared by it. He was holding a bunch of keys.

Nice speech. Strong words. You made that British ambassador cried.

Yamako

Yes, its me. Now lets move. He rushed to me and unlocked the cuff. We got to go to Yugoslavia now.

Yugoslavia?

Yes, to attend more speeches.

Wait, what? Is this legal?

No. But we can work it out.

Well be terrorists. People wont listen to us.

They will if we tell them the truth. They will if they heard what you got to say.

John entered the room with his happy face. Yamako freed me from the cuff, and there we go. Off to another adventure. For justice. For freedom.

The End.