
Part 1
A lone gunner watches the sky ignite in a blinding flash as an atomic strike turns his city into a storm of fire and debris. In the cramped safety of an underground post, Private Jerry Conlon and his surviving comrades scramble to don radiation suits, fire the last remaining defenses, and cling to fleeting thoughts of a wife and child far beyond the chaos. The narrative plunges listeners into the visceral terror of an instant where every heartbeat is a question—will anyone make it out alive, and what will be left of the world they knew?
As the fallout settles, the surviving team members navigate a shattered landscape, hearing the ominous roar of incoming rocket planes and feeling the weight of a devastated nation. Through terse dialogue and stark observations, the story captures the raw fear, camaraderie, and lingering hope that flicker amid ruin. Listeners are drawn into a tense, gritty portrait of a soldier’s struggle to survive and to hold onto the fragile threads of home.
Language
en
Duration
~16 minutes (16K characters)
Publisher of text edition
Project Gutenberg
Credits
Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
Release date
Sep 12, 2021
Rights
Public domain in the USA.
A little-known mid-century science fiction writer, remembered today for the short story A Soldier's Home Is Battle. The tale first appeared in Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy in March 1954 and later found new readers through Project Gutenberg.
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