Lone Survivor

The most terrible of deaths is one that is long-drawn-out and inevitable. Every laboured breath that follows its raspy predecessor seems like a waste of time, a cruel and forceful stretching out of the wispy strands of life for the expense of a joke to amuse an ultimately indifferent god. This is why a soldier dying out in an extremely treacherous terrain, under hostile fire, and without any hope of rescue might behave with surprising valour - because these last few minutes of his life are when the soldier is at his bravest.

The unavoidably staunch knowledge of approaching deat....