BdL Hildegard von Mises
Except for a couple of men who sat a bench near the superstructure of the ship, the small party accompanying Carrera stood in a group by its port side. In the distance, they could see Qamra approaching. A ladder had already been let over the side to allow them to climb down.
Soult and Mitchell watched Carrera as stood on the deck, while waiting for the Qamra to come alongside to pick them up. Carrera looked, to say the least, unwell. Soult worried about the "old man's" trembling hands. To Mitchell, the major concern was the glassy, mindless stare.
If the boss said it was right to nuke a major city and kill upwards of half a million people, that was enough for them. Still, though they, themselves, had no particular problem with the nuking of Hajar, perhaps it was bothering him.
Whatever he was feeling inside, though, could not be good. And then . . .
Ah, Jesus," Mitch thought, he's crying.
It was true, not some fluke of the light nor even some bits of detritus in his eyes. Trembling, staring down at the sea; tears also coursed down Carrera's face. He didn't seem to notice.
"Other side of the ship," Soult said to the other guards and seamen standing around. "Now! We'll take care of him." He looked at the boy, Hamilcar, and appended, "Stay here, son. Maybe it will help your father."
Hamilcar nodded but thought, I don't think anything much that I can do will help.
"He's just relieved that it's finally over," Mitchell insisted to the soldiers and sailors scurrying away. He called to their backs, "And if you mention a word of this to anyone, your grandchildren will have nightmares."
Both men moved in to stand close to either side. It was as well that they did; Carrera's knees buckled and he began to fall to the deck. They caught him and half carried him backwards to the bench.
"Boss? Sir? Pat?" There was no reaction, except that the tears were joined by sobs.
"What do we do, Jamey," Mitchell asked, desperately.
"Get him to a doctor? Get him home? Hell, I don't know. We've seen him in bad shape before, but this?"
"I think we'd better call the Sergeant Major."
"And my mother," Hamilcar added.
2/10/469 AC, Herrera International Airport, Ciudad Balboa
Carrera, Hamilcar, Mitchell, and Soult came in by chartered jet. The plane landed on the military side of the airport and was immediately surrounded by troops of the 1st Tercio, Principe Eugenio. Lourdes, Parilla and McNamara boarded, along with a dozen others. Inside they found Carrera stretched out on a medical litter, either asleep or comatose. Lourdes knelt before her son and hugged him tight, then turned and placed one hand against Carrera's face before bending to kiss his forehead.
"Home now, my love," she said. "Home now . . . forever."
If Carrera heard he gave no sign, but continued to stare straight up as if he were someplace else entirely.
"Doctor, what's wrong with him?" Parilla asked of the medico in attendance.
"Bare minimum, complete exhaustion," the doctor answered. "What other problems he may have will take a while to figure out and treat. A nervous breakdown is possible."
At McNamara's order, four of the men escorting picked up the litter and carried it first to the exit way, then down the long flight of debarkation steps to the tarmac below. There the litter was placed in an ambulance which drove slowly and carefully to a Legion NA-23, parked nearby.
Punta Cocoli, Isla Real
Marqueli and Jorge, and about seventy thousand others, watched the plane come in on the old military strip at the curved, northern point of the island.
The NA-23 cargo plane, in the colors of the Legion and with a picture of Jan Sobieski's Winged Hussars painted on the side, landed on the airstrip on the Isla Real, then turned and taxied to the terminal. There it stopped and lowered its ramp.
Virtually the entire population of the island—over thirty-five thousand soldiers, plus their wives and children—lined the fence at the edge of the airfield or found a spot along the road that led from there to the rest of the island.
Four of the people waiting were Jorge Mendoza, his lovely wife, Marqueli, and their two children. Another child was on the way; Marqueli's belly being impressively swollen.
Jorge's thesis was now the text for a course he taught at Signifer and Centurion Candidate Schools. The basis of the thesis and of the course was an Old Earth bit of science fiction written by a man known to Terra Novans only as RAH, a translation of which Carrera had had printed. Both thesis and course were entitled, "History and Moral Philosophy."
"This doesn't look good, Jorge," Marqueli said after the plane had lowered its rear ramp. "He can't walk . . . or isn't, anyway. They're carrying him on a litter, with my cousin walking beside. It looks like a funeral procession." The woman began to sniffle.
"It'll be okay," Mendoza said. "Old bastard is too tough to die on us . . . especially when we need him so badly now."
Carrera was carried down the ramp and placed on the back of a flatbed truck. Lourdes and Parilla had wanted another closed ambulance but the Sergeant Major had insisted, "No . . . rumors are flying everywhere. Let t'em see he's . . . basically . . . . all right . . . t'at he just needs a long rest. He would want t'at."
Marqueli wasn't the only one beginning to tear up. Jorge whispered, "He was my commander. I can't say I liked him, or that many of us did. But we did love him."
Women began to weep as the flatbed moved away. What would happen to them and their husbands and families now? Carrera had given employment and care, had given meaning to lives. What did the future hold for them? What about the coming war? Children cried as their mothers did.
With their women and children, the men, too, began to shed tears. This was their commander, the man who had led them to victory upon victory. Would he return to them, return to continue the great war on which they had all embarked? If not, would his like ever be found again? A hard man and a harsh one they knew him to be. Did not the times themselves demand hardness and harshness?
The flatbed moved to the guarded gate to the airfield. Now they could truly see him and the weeping redoubled. Guards lining both sides of the road kept the surging crowd back. The cries grew:
"Give us our commander! Give us our duque!"
Something touched Carrera. Where wife and family had not moved him, or not enough, the tears of his men and their women did. From under a draping sheet a single arm emerged and was held straight up.
At the end of the arm was a clenched fist.
Epilogue
The minstrel boy will return one day,
When we hear the news, we will cheer it.
The minstrel boy will return we pray,
Torn in body, perhaps, but not in spirit.
Then may he play his harp in peace,
In a world such as Heaven intended,
For every quarrel of Man must cease,
And every battle shall be ended.
--Anonymous, The Minstrel Boy, Third Verse