of ash-tainted wings // a short story word count: 1379 cw - themes of war, death, and sickness ____ forum version can be found here: https://scratch.mit.edu/discuss/topic/744574/?page=1#post-7881681 Hello again <3 While I've written many a short story before - this is the first one I've decided to put in project form. Mainly because this session's extended deadline gave me some time to edit and polish this piece into something a little more publishable. Yet again I present to you a work of historical fiction (surprise, suprise :0 ), this time, centered around the impact of the Second World War on civilians in Japan. There were certainly many ups and downs while writing this piece - it was initially a rushed substitute for another piece I had planned to enter in the writing competition but ended up scrapping, and after quite a lot of work and a few minor crises, I think this is a least a semi-decent story and representation of events. This story was inspired by a range of works and literature surrounding the lives of Japanese civilians, but notably, the Ghibli film "Grave of the Fireflies", which I'd highly encourage watching if you haven't already. Although a fair forewarning, this film is absolutely devastating, and will require a toll of a few hours sleep to process. Anyway, thank you for taking the time to read through this story, and I hope you enjoyed this piece, or were able to learn something from this depiction of events <3 ____ Credits: music: "November" by Benjamin Tissot thumbnail: designed on Canva @Coco_animator for providing wonderful critique on this piece <3