December 24, 1991: Greater Caucasus Mountains, former undisclosed Russian base in the Republic of Georgia: Atrium

Chapter 14: This Is the End

Flint stood silent. He felt alone for the first time since he had known Jaye. The old clichéd voices of poets past flooded his mind and he was certain this was what it felt like to have your world turned upside down and ripped to shreds. He berated himself for letting the situation spin out of control. Why didn't he say something? Why did his mouth refuse to move?

Because she was supposed to lecture him, tell him he was acting like a child, and he would agree. They would stare at each other. He'd smile, she'd shake her head and then allow him to take her up in a big bear hug. But now, this? He couldn't plan for this. How did one plan for your girl rejecting your proposal before you had a chance to make it? Any certainty he had in his life was gone. But that wasn't entirely true.

There were certain things of which he was sure. First and foremost, he was confident in his intelligence. Even putting his schooling aside, he knew that he stood sometimes heads above his peers. He knew that finding a mind of his caliber would always be a difficult task. Second, he was confident in his looks. Overall, he knew he was pleasing to the eye. Genetics blessed him with a taller than average physique, sharpened by summers working his father's farm. He had his mother's eyes, the death of many a man before his father. He also possessed his grandfather's chiseled jaw. Abnormally large in its protrusion at first, he had grown into it and it cut a stunning profile. Third, he prided himself on his command of a team and on his tactical skills. It was these attributes, and his apparent knowledge of them, that gave him his reputation with the team as an ego maniac. He never had problems brushing it off. He was who he was after all.

It all changed around her. Around her, he let down his guard for the first time in years, for the first time since Oxford. With the changing of the guard came all of his old insecurities and foibles. For a time, he managed to keep them at arm's length while he kept her at bay. As he let her in, other things slipped past his defenses until he stood before her a defenseless man. It was precisely that man he wanted to be. With each passing day he grew stronger in his resolve and there was only one inevitable conclusion.

In the blink of an eye, that inevitability shattered. She was walking away, out of his life. He was the cause. He alone drove the wedge. A flood of memories overwhelmed his senses—their first meeting, running blind into the storm of Cobra eels to save the team, to impress her really, walking around the edge of the first Pit, revealing his fears, the beer they shared, the next night when she hinted at family troubles, fixing work schedules so he could "bump" into her more, her increasing suspicions at their "bumping" into each other so much. He remembered their first date, real date, when he left the beret off and she wore a dress. That was the true departure from his ego self. He let her know that he was scared at night of the unknown and that he desperately missed home. He was afraid of dying, but he was more afraid he would be the cause of it for someone else. He was afraid of making the wrong move, of letting his guard down around the others. He let her know he was afraid and she still loved him. She loved him still. As long as there was that, he couldn't give up. He would fight.

"Flint?"

Flint turned to face Wild Bill. "I messed up."

"I'll say."

"I can always count on you for support."

Wild Bill chuckled, "Just calling a spade a spade." He paused, "You know nothing happened."

"Now I do. I couldn't back then."

Wild Bill waited. He sensed Flint had more to say.

"Do you know why I joined the Army?"

"I reckon it was because you're a hundred dollar saddle with a twenty dollar horse."

Flint shook his head and continued on, "I always said I was bored with the rigors of academia, looking for something more challenging. In a way, that was true. But being me, I also just had to get away." Flint exchanged a look with Wild Bill. He could sense that the pilot knew the old turn his story would take.

"Yes, it was a girl. I was infatuated with her. She knew it. She was clever, engaging, a quick study. I thought I had met my match, but I was out of my league. She was heads above me in the romance department. She rightly took what she needed and I let her. I was a doormat. One can only be attracted to a doormat for so long. It was the excitement; it was the exoticness of the situation. She was glamorous and opinioned in a way I'd never experienced. Up until that point it had been Kansas cheerleaders all the way." Flint winked at Wild Bill, "Not that there's anything wrong with a Kansas cheerleader."

"Well, I don't know about that. I heard that Texas ones are the best."

Flint shook his head, "A fight for another day." Flint resumed his tale, "Have you ever heard of Richardson's Poetry for Study?"

"I can't say that the name rings a bell."

"Ever take a poetry class?"

Wild Bill scratched the side of his head trying to remember if poetry and his life ever intersected. Wasn't there that one freshmen seminar? "You know, I reckon I did."

"Well, chances are you read Richardson's. There's an even greater chance you no doubt hated Richardson's. In the end everyone does. Richardson's Poetry for Study is an exalted and vile tome. Anything you loved about poetry, it will kill. But the killing will make sense and you will hate it all the more for being right. I, unfortunately, must love Richardson's as no man can. Richardson's was my legacy and life for a time."

Wild Bill fixed a puzzled stare on Flint. "I'm not getting where you're going."

Flint smiled, "I'm Dashiell R. Faireborne, the "R" standing for Richardson."

"Sheesh, you wrote that book?"

"Not me, I just help edit. My great-great grandfather was its soul. The rest of the family merely fills in the flesh from time to time. He created a necessity for classrooms all over America and the UK. We serve to keep that need alive. My mother is currently editor in chief. I was supposed to succeed her. After my stint at Oxford, it was expected that I would use my training, and more importantly, contacts, to continue on in her family's footsteps. Chloe changed my trajectory."

"Chloe? I think my sister has a cat named Chloe."

"Chloe was rather feline in her moves." Flint turned away for a moment, a random memory floated across his head. Move was the wrong word. Chloe seemed to float on air, her muscles deftly navigating her body as if she was always a part of where she wanted to be. Flint let the memory slip away. For so long he allowed it to torture his mind. Now he wished it to be gone forever. It no longer had any hold on him.

"Chloe was not a cat but a woman, a very beautiful, clever, devilish woman. She was another scholar from London. She was sophisticated in every way. At parties, she knew the right drink to request and the right outfit to wear. She knew what she wanted and what she had to do to get it. Naturally, she was attracted to me." Flint winked, "Me being the best looking man in the program of course."

Wild Bill shook his head. Some things were to be expected from Flint.

"I assumed that what we shared was mutual. How could she resist my charms, as rustic as they no doubt were to her? The joke was on me. Chloe had her own agenda. By sheer dumb luck I stumbled upon it when I arrived back at my residence unexpectedly when a lecture was cancelled. Chloe had free reign to my room. She decided to use that free reign to entertain my best mate. A less confident man would have recognized the situation as it developed. I had cast a blind eye. It was, in a word, humiliating. She only took up with me for a chance to work for Richardson's. My mate, Gerard, was who she should have been with. I don't know how long they had been going on behind my back. It was the usual story; they wanted to tell me but just didn't know how. It didn't matter.

"Academia was a rough and tumble world of everyone looking out for themselves. It was dirty and deceitful. The chase for elusive tenure, for the elusive book deal, made rogues out of them all. I couldn't live that life. I dropped out. My mom was disappointed. She had already lost Butler to the farm."

"Wait now a second. You had a butler?"

"No, my older brother Butler."

"That's some weird names your mom gave out."

"We were at the leisure of whatever my mom happened to be lecturing or studying. For me, she kept herself company late at night with mysteries and detective yarns. For Butler, she was teaching a seminar on Yeats. For Day . . ."

"Day?"

"Yeah, he was the most unfortunate of us all. She was writing a paper on Cecil Day Lewis. My father vetoed Cecil, so the little guy became Day.

"With the loss of Butler and myself, my mom gave up hope that Richardson's would continue under the family. Day was in no shape at the time to be the great hope. Things looked bleak. The publication was hemorrhaging money and I had run off and joined the Army. In hindsight, it was probably a coward move but it turned out for the best. I recommended Chloe for the board."

"Wait now a second, the cheater?"

"Yes. She was a cheater but damn if she couldn't navigate those academic circles and open closed doors. We needed someone like her. I guess it's the whole keep your enemies closer. She married Gerard. I didn't go. I see her rarely.

"Day turned out to be the other thing Richardson's needed. He has no ear whatsoever. But he knows numbers and business. He turned the old ship around and created an empire. He convinced the worthless members to restructure the board and give proxy to him. He launched new titles, and entered new markets. Turns out, Brazil is quite lucrative. He has his sights set on the Commies. The Soviet Union is crawling with potential readers for Richardson's Guide to Russian Poets and who knows what can happen with China if we partner with the right folks." Flint paused, "I know you're wondering why I wasted your time with this."

"I reckon you'll saddle up that horse. You're good for that."

"I thank you in advance for your kindness. This meandering tale has an end. What I am is the sum part of my experiences. Alison, I mean, Lady Jaye knows everything and doesn't care. She understands everything and still made the decision to stick by me. Jaye took it all. The boys like to rib me about her fortunes and call me a gigolo looking to strike it rich. It doesn't matter. I have my own. She and I, we're the same person divided long ago. Whatever I had to go through to find her, whatever path I had to take, it was worth it to become whole once more. She is worth everything and I let her down."

Wild Bill could only nod his head in agreement and stand beside his friend. Flint continued, "It wasn't anything like she imagined. It's just that . . ." Flint's words tapered off. He stood there, silently thinking, regrouping, and he began again, "Bill, there's no one else, no one I want but her. I was going to let her know too." Flint reached into his pocket and pulled out a small black velvet box. He held it up to Bill, who, puzzled, took it from his hands.

Bill opened the lid to reveal a delicate engagement ring, bright and shiny, waiting to be placed on someone's finger. Bill let out a low whistle, "Wow, I'll say there partner, were you ever going to tell her." Bill closed the lid and handed it back, glad to not be responsible for Flint's precious cargo for any moment of time longer than necessary.

Flint held the box tight before placing it back in his pocket. "It was my great grandmother's. We had everything set, my family that is, for this Christmas, Christmas Eve to be precise. She'd be a member of the Faireborne clan in time for Christmas. I know, it's a bit cheesy, but I thought she'd like it. Besides, if I did it without my parents around, well at least my mom, I'd never hear the end of it." Flint turned back to the window, looking out at the falling snow, "I was going to wait until our next leave, but my mom's itching to get things started. When she found out we would be stationed here, she sent my brother packing and he met me in Germany with the ring. That's why I disappeared for a few days. I couldn't tell anyone. Secrets don't stay quiet for long around here." He chuckled, "Poor Butler got off the plane and had to turn around and get right back on another," shaking his head, "once I got it, I've been itching to do it. It's been burning a hole in my pocket, but the timing's been all wrong. I couldn't get Hawk alone. I can never get her alone. The one time I got her alone, she was sleeping. I just wanted to do it right. Even this, I can't do right." Flint's shoulders slumped, resigned to his fate. "Maybe she was right in a way. Maybe I'm not good enough for her and—humruff—hey, what did you do that for?" Flint began to rub the spot on his forehead where Wild Bill had slapped him upside his head. "Not you too?"

"Listen here, I'll not be hearing those words. The two of you, who's good for who. Sheesh, the way you two prattle on, it's a miracle anyone's right for anyone else. I will tell you one thing. I've seen many a thing in my life and if you two aren't right for each other, I'll eat my hat. I reckon it don't taste too well so I don't say this lightly. If I tell you a hen dips snuff, you can look under her wing. Do what you have to and make it right. You round up that filly and grovel like you've never groveled in your life. The boys and I will back you up. We just need a plan . . ."

Wild Bill's musings on love and marriage ended abruptly when a thunderous boom was followed by the atrium windows imploding and sending a rain of silver shards down upon their heads. Flint, tempered by his training, threw himself at Wild Bill like a lineman sacking a quarterback, and the two skidded across the smooth tile, the steel frame of the skylight crashing down upon where they were just standing. The base shook again and more explosions filled their ears. A dark, dank smoke settled around them. Crouching down in the corner, they waited for the scene to clear. Exchanging glances, they knew Hawk's timeline was just shot to hell. Scampering up, they both bolted toward the vehicles. Cobra had brought the fight to them.