After you're finally done with the war, the first step back on American soil is a rough one. The emotions overwhelm you, and while you were trained not to show your emotions, you're weak. You're broken. You've spent four years in captivity, four years of torture, and you're lucky to be out alive. Yet, here you are, home in the land of the free and the home of the brave, arm in a sling, practically skin and bones, and with slight limp. You're not the man you were when you left, and you're not the same man you know people remember.

Mostly, because you were told on the flight over from Afghanistan that you were listed as missing in action. Most of your family and friends, well they think you're dead.

Your parents passed away years ago, before you were captured, so at least you got to say your goodbye to them. At least you got to see their faces before the accident, and you were able to attend their funeral and see them off. But had they had to do that for you, you're not sure if they would have survived. After all, you barely survived their passing, wouldn't it be worse to lose a child?

The wind picks up in the cold night air, and while one of the Generals tries to usher you inside, you ask him for a few more minutes. Understanding, the man nods and you're soon alone in the middle of the tarmac of the military air strip, inhaling in the night air and exhaling out just as deep and trying to take everything in. You're broken, but you're alive. You're alive.

That one fact is one that you almost don't believe, and you wouldn't if it wasn't for the fact that you were home, and that you can feel your heart beating strongly against your chest. It beats strong, and you know what it beats for - you fought to come back alive, you fought to come back to a life worth living. You had plans. You had things you wanted to accomplish. You had hopes for marriage, a family, and now...

Just as you think you can handle all the emotions and thoughts that are suddenly all around you, everything all comes forward and crashes into you too hard, as if you were punched in the stomach. Suddenly, you lurch over and throw up, sick and overwhelmed, trauma of your body catching up to trauma in your mind. It overwhelms you. You cry out in anger.

What if you're never the same? What if when you close your eyes, you'll just see the torture for the rest of your damn life? What if this never goes away, this feeling of paranoia?

Your actions of throwing up and apparently screaming out -- which you didn't realize you were doing until you felt a hand pat you on the shoulder to calm you -- caused the Generals to come back out, and when you look to them, it's with tears in your eyes. But they get it. They understand.

The next part is done without words: the two of them put an arm around you to support you, and together, the three of you walk inside, to get you cleaned up, to get you a fresh bed, and to start your rehabilitation and therapy tomorrow. It's going to be a long road.

But at least there's a future for you now, something you almost didn't believe four years ago.

But you know you'd be a fool to assume anything will ever be the same.