writing prompt "The heroes who saved us, 40 years later."

Gary never liked the monument. He had avoided it for many years, but now with his wife dead and there really nothing to do with his days he spent his time walking along the park and feeding the birds.

There the four of them were, captured in bronze. Will and him ducking over as they were scampering to the enemy line, Jim behind them kneeling with his gun ready to fire. Zeb the centerpiece of the monument, standing and pointing at the enemy. Rifle slung over his back and his other hand holding the flag of the republic.

Heroes and legends they were. The four brave men who led the great charge that broke the enemy line and won the battle that turned the war. He shook his head. If only people knew the truth of the men on in that monument.

Will was a sex addict, he couldn't help himself, consent wasn't really required when it came to women he came in contact with. If there was no women the animals would do. He jerked off constantly when he had nothing else to stick his dick in. Gary was just thankful he never tried to screw any men in the company or it could have ended badly. He was glad he never heard about any corpses being defiled.

Jim was the definition of a coward. The only reason he hadn't been hung before this battle was he found good places to hide while the fights happened, here he was fighting for the simple reason he had been shot in the foot early in the battle and he couldn't run away. Caught in the maelstrom if the battle he wasn't a half bad fighter, but with that injury he never would have fired a shot in anger the whole war.

Then there was himself, the fight raged on for seven hours and he had spent three of them incapacitated. He remembered fighting and battling and then nothing, just a lost chunk of time. When he came too it was dusk, an enemy fighter was kneeling over him. Gary thought for sure he would be killed. Instead the man offered him a drink from his canteen.

Gary took the drink and nodded to thank the man, and right then a bullet ripped through the man's chest. It was Zeb who shot him, Zeb the murderious lunatic. After the man fell Zeb rushed over and lifted his rifle high in the air and then brought the butt down with a sickening crunch. The man's head exploded and sent blood and gore spraying in all directions. Zeb had heard the enemy displayed their dead publicly as part of their religion. So Zeb wanted them to be as maimed and disfigured as possible. Lulls in combat were skull smashing time. Both the dead and the wounded were fair game for Zeb's rampages. Zeb's gun was always caked in blood and chunks of skull, brain and hair.
And there the four of them were immortalized in bronze for future generations to look up to. The great heroes of the republic, a rapist, pigfucking maniac who kept it in his pants only when his life was threatened. A coward we was forced into combat thanks to injury. Himself a man only alive due to the misguided mercy of the enemy. All of whom were led by a psychopathic monster who was happiest when he was covered in the blood of people he had killed.

The heroes of the republic read the inscription at the base of the monument. Gary wondered if the public had any idea who these men they called heroes really were. As he looked at a group of young people being led to the monument by a teacher. She began explaining the story of the great battle and the final change and all the nonsense that passes for history.

Gary walked away and got back to feeding the birds. People needed their legends. Their tales of great men doing great things. He knew that he wasn't a hero, nor were the others, but if looking at that monument made people feel better about themselves and their nation, then that would be good enough.