She stood there on the green lawn of the estate in fatigues and a black top with her trusty M4 on her shoulder and a black beret on her head. Despite the new head gear, Trevor recognized Nina’s telltale golden ponytail dangling to her shoulder blades. He also recognized the black and gray Norwegian elkhound at her side because that dog had belonged to Richard Stone in the old world.
He walked away from the reporters not sure if his gait appeared as wobbly as it felt. He heard the guards push the trio of questioners away, out of earshot.
“Captain Forest?”
“Hello, um, sir.”
Odin, her dog, trotted to Trevor with his head lowered obediently. The beast appeared old and shaggy and his white undercoat shed in bushels. He knelt and patted his old elkhound between the ears. Nina, for her part, took notice of the body language of familiarity between the two.
She said, “I wanted to, well, I wanted to see you before I left. Or, I guess, well, before you left, too.”
“Oh,” he gave Odin another good pat then stood. “Well I’m-I’m glad you did.”
The two walked side by side along the grounds leaving the front yard in favor of the quieter north side.
He stumbled, “I don’t know if I ever really thanked you, um, for last year. You came and found me. And all. I mean, thank you.”
Trevor knew his voice trembled with nerves. He did not know that Nina heard that tremble not as nerves, but as discomfort. She nearly ran away at the sound in fear that he did not want to talk to her; that whatever she had done to make him disavow their love a decade ago was so horrible that he could not bear her presence.
Nonetheless, she stayed. An act of courage on par with anything she dared on the battlefield.
“It was my duty,” she said with a stiff resolve meant to sound soldierly. But that resolve faded. “And I wanted to,” she admitted.
They entered the shade of maples and oaks along the northern side of the mansion. Ahead lay the barn where the original pack of Grenadiers had lived and bred.
Trevor listened to her words and wished he could believe that he heard a tone of affection. But that was impossible. She did not remember what she had meant to him. She could not. That life had been stolen from her by The Order’s Bishop.
So he stepped carefully with his response, the way a nerdy teenage boy may worry that his every word to the class beauty might reveal his secret crush and cause embarrassment of a high-school apocalyptic scale.
“Through all of this you have been an excellent-an excellent warrior, Nina.”
She felt him choose his words carefully, like a master tactician moving the right pieces in order to not expose others.
He continued, “I have a great deal of respect for you. I always have.”
A breeze sent a whirlwind of decaying leaves spinning in the damp shadows beneath the trees.
She removed her beret and replied, “Sir, I–I’ve always tried my best. I’m just saying, it’s because of you. You always-I always wanted to do right by you.”
She hoped he heard an apology for whatever she had done a decade before; whatever she had done to keep him from seeking her again after The Order had stolen her memories.
They stopped near the old shooting range. Frayed clothesline still ran on pulleys and held paper targets that fluttered in the breeze. A pair of Grenadiers marched out from the K9 barn and headed off on patrol.
He wished he could take her by the shoulders, look into those blue eyes, and confess. But what good would that do? The Nina he had known and loved no longer existed.
A small helicopter swooped overhead unseen above the budding branches.
Nina struggled to keep from bursting. She stood close to him now and she realized that for years all she really wanted was to be close to him. Why had it taken her this long to understand that she loved him? He was a man with a single purpose, just as she seemed to have only one purpose. It consumed him just as her instincts drove her to battle. Yet Nina felt certain she could find more with him. It pained her-a horrid, aching pain-that apparently she had once known that greater purpose and had done something to lose it.
Trevor said, “I’ve always been able to count on you, Nina. You’ve done some of the most difficult, and nastiest, jobs in this war. I often times think of you as my sword,” he paused and grimaced as the words sounded sour to him. “I don’t mean as a thing-an object-I mean, I mean as one of the few-one of the few people I could count on no matter what. You’ve always been sturdy and true.”
She heard praise for his best soldier. She also heard an undercurrent of emotion. She feared he might say something like why did you betray me? We had something together and you screwed it up! Why?
Regardless, she refused to walk away. She had to make him know that she regretted any past misdeed. She turned and faced him with the same bravery in which she faced the nearly indestructible Shadow in Wilmington or the flying spawn from a hideous Hostile 157. Indeed, to Nina Forest affairs of the heart proved more frightening than any beast conjured in that new world.
She found her eyes locked onto his; held captive by the intensity of his stare. In those eyes she saw something-a sadness of loss-a longing. Yes, there had once been something more with this man and the memories of it scarred him.
He spoke softly, “What you did for me last summer was more than a person should be asked to do. I don’t know how it has affected you, but you know there’s more to all this than meets the eye.”
Trevor could not help but be fixated by her gaze. He wondered if he had pursued her after the removal of that implant if he could have duplicated the events that led to their union. Doing so would have been against the will of the Old Man and his ilk, but as the armies of Voggoth marched across the Great Plains he wondered if that would have been preferable; if perhaps winning this war would eventually hinge on breaking those rules.
On disobeying Gods.
Trevor’s hand rose, with no conscious thought; he felt detached from it. Perhaps the ghost of a former self seized control. That hand reached to her cheek.
“You risked a lot,” he whispered.
Nina felt his touch. She sensed warmth there and it unlocked a sensation from years ago; another memory that might have been his or might have been hers but it felt real all the same: a comfortableness in another’s soul. A feeling of sameness, of trust, of devotion.
She saw that sadness in his eyes again and felt ashamed. He had loved her once; this came through with an unmistakable energy. But she had betrayed him or hurt him or both. Intentional or not, the removal of her memories had only made it easier on her. She wished she had never seen that tape. She wished she had no recollection of all she had lost.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered an apology for what she could not remember.
Trevor withdrew his hand, embarrassed he had done something unprofessional. He unfairly placed her in an awkward position. He had no business doing that. Whatever the past, this woman was not the Nina Forest he had loved.
Still loved.
He had no right to treat her as such. He could only imagine the confusion she felt. The Emperor-the man whom she followed without question-touching her like a husband to a wife; a man to his lover. He felt guilty again. It seemed no matter what he said or did it could only compound his agony and confuse her.
“No,” he volleyed, “I’m sorry. I should not have done that.”
“It’s okay,” she grabbed his retreating hand with both of hers. “It was-it was nice. This is strange for me to say. Look, I mean, I don’t know how to put this but I’ve always, well, felt close to you. I always did my job because I didn’t want to let you down.”
His fingers trembled in her grasp. For the first time since the early days he felt a surge of confidence; confidence in his humanity. A strength that could lift him above the doubt and guilt and regret. A strong shoulder to support the weight of the world.