# 4 – Mine Field (Season 7 episode 23 In Country)
Bam.
Harm's eyes are open.
It is what burns itself into her memory: his eyes are open. Wide, steel-grey and empty against the sawdust sky. There is no trace of life in them. When the marines reach her Sarah MacKenzie is crouching next to her dead partner. Her arms wrapped around herself tightly, she is rocking back and forth without seeing anything. She doesn't cry when his coffin is loaded unto the plane and she doesn't cry when they unload it again. Her eyes are dry when the tomcats shoot past in missing man formation. She never cries again.
Inwardly, she screams.
Bam.
The Humvee explodes in a brilliant flare.
It burns out on the road side of a dust track in Afghanistan. When the marines from the nearby camp finally arrive it is nothing more than a smoking ruin of metal and circuitry. The two bodies they pull from it are barely recognizable: a female, protection vest and scraps of cloth fused to her bones, her face burned so badly her features have melted. Parts of her hands still cling to the steering wheel. A male, tall, dressed in the same fatigues: both with their dog-tags almost unreadable. Their identification, nevertheless, is unproblematic. The Humvee was assigned to Lieutenant Colonel Sarah MacKenzie and Lieutenant Commander Harmon Rabb Jr., both senior staff members of JAG corps.
The flowers on their graves always are fresh.
Bam. Bam.
"MAC!"
The ringing in his ears is overwhelming, dust and rubble settle everywhere and still Harm is on his feet as fast as possible. He's almost out of the Humvee when his training sets in: mine field. Don't leave the vehicle. "Mac!" He shouts again, panic constricting his voice. The dust around the Humvee settles slowly, too slowly, and only then he sees the small figure on the ground a few meters away from the car. A still figure. Too still. Her arms are spread-eagled at her sides, her one leg strangely bent under her body. And she isn't moving. From his heightened view-point he can see her face: still beautiful even with a bloody scrape across her right cheek. But her eyes are open and there is no life in them. "Mac. Mac, answer me! Mac!" He jumps out of the Humvee, crosses the grey sand desert between them with as few steps as possible, crouches down next to her. The pulse is barely there. "Hold on, Mac, it's gonna be alright." Gathering her up carefully and trying not to think about what damage he could be doing, he makes his way over back to the Humvee. Harm doesn't think he's ever driven so fast.
Sarah MacKenzie dies in the marine base camp four hours later.
Bam.
"Harm! Harm, are you okay?"
He wakes with a start, bolting up in his cot, and training kicks in: Afghanistan, marine base camp, the mine field. Mac. He can feel her fluttering pulse under his fingers, feels the feeble press of her hand – I'm not going anywhere – and terror grips him so hard he starts shaking. No. It can't be true. "Harm." Mac is right there, her eyes full of concern. In full combat uniform, including vest, but it is still Mac. Staring at her, taking her in, Harm is gripped by the desperate need to pull her close and check she really is still alive. He restrains himself. Why has their adventure two days before shaken him so much? It's hardly the first time one of them almost died. Maybe it was the bombing they watched that night. Or the thought that Mac could have died. Or maybe the nightmare. The nightmares, he corrects himself. "Are you alright?" Mac asks quietly.
"Yeah. Bad dream. Sorry for waking you."
She smiles slightly. "Couldn't sleep, anyway."
