My last sight of Morrow had been no different from how I had ended up. Except it had been his arm and part of his chest that were gone, but he was still firing. Any other circumstance, and he would have been horrified at all that blood. If he hadn’t noticed, he was never given the chance before another blast had gone up where he had been woozily holding out. From what I heard, he was the only one that they never had enough of to identify, but we’d all known he was there.
Walker’s eyes flicked to me, and he smiled. “And then there was you. Good old Cade, still haven’t got used to calling you that.Always there to hold us together, keep us in line, and be the one we knew we could turn to when things got bad. I still remember when Bassey took that nasty knock to the head, and I had to monitor him…and keep chasing you out of the room because you refused to sleep.”
“You made me,” I said with a snort.
“I never understood why you listened; it’s not like I had rank to pull.”
“Ya don’t argue with the combat medic that’s keepin’ an eye on everyone,” I said with a grin. “Everyone knows that. And I knew ya weren’t gonna let anythin’ happen to ’em, but…ya know, I had to be in there a few times at least. To let ’em know I was still hangin’ in there.”
“He knew,” Walker said, and then his voice softened. “We all did. I know that didn’t change after I had to be taken out, and I know it didn’t change until the end.”
The end…right.
It was supposed to be our last deployment, the hellhole that it had become for us, for everyone. There wasn’t much we could do there anymore, and it was honestly best if we didn’t linger; at least that was the rumor I’d heard. I had been told it was going to be our last mission, and after that? Well, there was more than just talk about putting us in a nice, quiet position. The team would have to be separated, of course, which had broken our hearts, but if it meant spending the last couple of years of our contract in relative peace, then…it was worth it.
“We were so close,” I said quietly, practically whispering. “So close.”
So goddamnclose.
“I-I wish I could say I was sorry and take it all away,” he said softly. “I wish it would work. Just like I wish that while we were talking about them in good times, you didn’t have that look in your eye like you were remembering the worst time.”
Startled, I glanced at him. “What?”
He shrugged. “Like I said, you haven’t changed. You might be good at hiding things behind that sunny disposition and bright smile, but if anyone is around you enough, they pick up on things. I could see it; you’d drift out of the conversation before snapping back and keep talking. You saw it, didn’t you? All of it.”
“The parts that counted,” I said, and then stared at him, eyes going wide.
Walker snorted softly. “What’s that look of surprise for?”
“I just… Only time I ever said that was when they debriefed me. When I was doped up so hard, I could barely remember what it felt like to feel. I…can tell people it happened but?—”
“That it happened, the overview,” he supplied, and I gave him a weak smile in gratitude.
“Yeah,” I said with a nod. “Not the… Not what I saw.”
“I’m not going to ask the details,” he said softly, his hand twitching, then curling around his cup. “I don’t know, maybe it’s because I know now that you’ve seen more than you should have, but maybe…maybe I’m selfish and I don’t want to know. I don’t want to hear about how they died. I wasn’t with you guys for long, not compared to how long you were working together, but it was long enough. I don’t want to think too hard about that.”
I snorted. “I don’t blame ya at all. Who wants to think about that sorta thing?”
“And then there’s you, who has no choice,” he said with a sigh. “Were there others?”
“Others?”
“Survivors? From what I heard, you guys were running an extraction.”
“There were others,” I said with a nod. “Other guys, and some civilians. But…no one who knew our guys, no one who loved them like we did. Their families…they asked.”
He winced. “Boy, I betthatwas fun.”
I didn’t know if it was the horror or the sarcasm in his voice, but I couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, it was a regular laugh. I had a great time staring them in the face and telling them I couldn’t remember much. That it was all jumbled up in my head after takin’ a hit myself and then all the drugs they gave me. Most of ’em believed me, but a couple…I don’t think they did. I think they let me lie,” I said softly.
Morrow’s mother was the one I knew never believed me. Her husband had barely spoken to me, and I hadn’t known if it was out of grief for the only child God had seen fit to give them, or because he blamed me as the squad leader and the only one to make it out. Her though, she hugged me and told me to take care of my own parents while I had time. And when I told her what I could remember about how they had died, she gave me this sad, knowing smile. Like she knew their deaths, or at least the moments leading up to them, were burned into my brain and haunted me awake and asleep. Maybe she understood there were just some things that shouldn’t be shared, that I would never tell any of their families the truth no matter what because those horrors didn’t deserve to be shared with them…or maybe she was just grateful that her impulsive question hadn’t been met with the truth.
Walker let out a soft snort, but his expression was hard and uncompromising as he turned back toward the window. “Isn’t that just about right?”
I frowned. “What, ya think I should’ve told them the truth?”
His eyes widened with a shock I trusted immediately. “What? No! God, no, absolutely not! Those are the kinds of fucked up things no one should know about their loved ones.”
